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June 25, 2007
My earlier post on sentimentality -- as destructive of genuine feeling -- in the liturgy has caused me to think again about the embattled status of both reason and what Plato called thymos, "spirit" or "drive" or "noble ambition." Many of you will recall his famous metaphor in the Phaedrus, where he compares the human being to a charioteer whose rig is driven by a pair of horses, one of them noble and high spirited, the other tending to be fiery and wayward. The charioteer represents the reason or intellect; the noble horse, thymos; the wayward horse, appetite. It's a brilliant metaphor, capturing the truth that without the passions we literally get nowhere. It also distinguishes passion from passion, inasmuch as there is something about the noble horse that is friendly to reason -- in a sense it aspires to reason. It is wrong to call it simply irrational.
But here is what modern man has done, in brief. The thoughts are by no means original to me -- you can find them in Alasdair MacIntyre, or in John Paul II, or in Benedict XVI, or in Dostoyevsky:
1. "Reason" is shouldered off the chariot. A small subset of reason -- an amputated charioteer -- is put in reason's place. What is now called "reason" can no longer discuss, rationally, the nature of the good or the beautiful. It can do two things: it can spin out sentences of symbolic logic or mathematics, which, despite their complexity, it asserts are only tautological, without any real connection to the world of stars and mangrove trees and bicycles. Or it can manipulate matter according to the physical laws it imputes to the world, inferring them (as things that happen to "work," rather than as things that really do exist in themselves) from empirical observations and mathematical analysis. This "reason" can thus tell you how to build a Gothic cathedral, but cannot even begin to tell you why you would want to.
2. All other discussion of the good, the beautiful, and the true (except for the sorts of truths mentioned above) is relegated to the status of "feeling". This is the position of the emotivists; it is the position Lewis inveighed against in The Abolition of Man and That Hideous Strength. It is also the default position in every school and university in our country -- it is what the professor and student must consciously resist. So, to say "X is good," amounts to no more than "Hurrah for X."
3. All feelings are regarded as irrational. So then, not only is most of the function of Plato's charioteer assigned to the horses, but the good horse, the horse representing the rationality-aspiring passion for beauty, is eliminated entirely, leaving us with nothing but appetite.
And there it is, appetite in the service of an amputated reason -- the second-rate faculty of the intellect that may soon discover how to cobble together monsters of animal and human genetics, without questioning why it should be done, or rather insisting that any moral discussion of it is simply a matter of feeling. And all feelings are irrational.
My sense is that sentimentality is a very poor horse, a false substitute for thymos, in that it dampens the desire for the truly great and beautiful. It turns instead to the easy, to pretty trifles, to the frills and lace of an emotional etiquette, rather than to the deep feelings themselves. And that would leave appetite and the quasi-rational usurper with all the freer rein. Maybe there have been times when we could indulge a lot of sentimentality in liturgical art. Maybe -- but now?
Posted by Anthony Esolen at 01:36 PM | Permalink
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» Sentimentality dampens the desire for the truly great andbeautiful. from With Tears Oppressed
Dont bother with my blog if you havent yet read Anthony Esolens follow-up on his earlier post on sentimentality.
By the way, I hope this whets your appetite to read not on... [Read More]
Tracked on Jun 27, 2007 6:15:18 PM
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Sentimentality, however, is safe. It safeguards us from the need to confront great feelings, great thoughts, great decisions. It reduces life to the cute and the pretty, the charming and the innocuous. It keeps us from discovering that we have no depths to probe. It allows us to think of our lives as situation comedy, or—if you really want to get serious—a Lifetime drama. It’s very distressing, don’t you think, that the Bible seems to have no sentiment whatsoever? Thank God that Hallmark has come to the rescue! And St. Thomas Kincade: Let there be a Painter of Light ™!
Posted by: Bill R | Jun 25, 2007 2:05:46 PM
A repeat from a post I left under the "What About U-2?" thread some months back:
C. S. Lewis, "Notes on the Way" (1946) --
"The patrons of sentimental poetry, bad novels, bad pictures, and merely catchy tunes are usually enjoying precisely what is there. And their enjoyment . . . is not in any way comparable to the enjoyment that other people derive from good art. It is tepid, trivial, marginal, habitual. It does not *trouble* them, nor haunt them. To call it, and a man's rapture in great tragedy or exquisite music, by the same name, enjoyment, is little more than a pun. I still maintain that what enraptures and transports is always good. . . .The experiences offered by bad art are not of the same sort."
Posted by: James A. Altena | Jun 25, 2007 4:29:05 PM
And CS Lewis could be a hundred and eighty degrees wrong. For example, I find the first book in the Space Trilogy tepid at best and have never recommended it. It is so much bubble gum rock that depends on a lot of supposition and false awe. The second two were wonderful pieces.
He also says nothing about any form of art in particular. Nor does he create an "anti-art" heading. Just "bad" art. As such I can agree with him. He doesn't make the same mistake I believe you have fallen into with the U2 thread. There is definitively bad art. What that is, we, in our imperfect condition will probably disagree on. The difference of course being that I'm right and you're wrong :)
Things can also be misapplied. I'm not looking for deep meaning in a waltz any more than I'm looking for deep meaning in a Europop piece. I'm looking for something with a danceable beat. In church music I'm looking for reverence; not aging hippies with a guitar and flowers in their hair (I saw that for the first time a few months ago and am still dealing with the shock). I can also paint broad strokes by saying a majority of rap pieces are evil because they glamorize mindless revolt against society and at the vary least should be categorized separately from music since they purposefully avoid melodies.
In short, not all rock is anti-music if such a category even exists. Vast segments of Rock are probably sinful. The classical catalog isn't free from guilt either and I've often harbored serious reservations about Holst's "The Planets". Rock is not, ever, church music due, at the very least, to the societal connotations.
Posted by: Nick | Jun 25, 2007 5:22:59 PM
I think there has always been a tension within Christianity, stemming from its roots in Greco-Roman thought and culture, between religion made manifest in the more 'noble,' 'rational' sectors of the Church, as primarily dominated by monastics. However, this tension only occasionally snapped and went off-kilter, as even in strict ascetic monastic thought, the rational life included what we foolishly think to be merely feelings: love, compassion, faith, etc. Granted, monasticism sometimes treated these virtues as rather abstract, disembodied things- witness the frequent admonitions by many saints to not neglect embodied, expressed love of the other- but even then it recognized them. And the finest monastic writers, such as St. Maximus, describe the passions- even the 'lowly' ones, such as anger- being transfigured in the person of Christ Incarnate.
Christianity also managed, early on, to channel emotion in its liturgical and devotional life, for lay person, clergy, and monastic alike. The veneration of icons is a perfect example: Christians employ their senses, their emotions (think about all that kissing!), and their rational facilities at once in the veneration of icons. Likewise, the veneration of saints became, from late antiquity on, a means of expressing emotion wedded to devotion. Certainly, some such practices veered off into sentimentality and even superstition, but overall they provided a means, again for lay person, clergy, and monastic, to bring very human emotions and needs into a specific channel. This could take place because Christianity did not only inherit the legacy of Platonic body-soul division, but more importantly was grounded in an Incarnational view of the world, which meant the sanctification of the whole person, mind and passions.
The modern world retains, as a legacy of Greece, the division of mind and body- but it has jettisoned, by and large, the Incarnational world-view that sustained ancient and medieval Christianity, East and West.
Posted by: Jonathan Allen | Jun 25, 2007 6:47:13 PM
As I have said in another discussion, I am a great admirer of Professor Esolen. When Touchstone arrives, his contributions are among the first I read. His writing succeeds because it reveals the balance between reason and thymos he advocates in “As Listening to Music.”
I don’t know how anyone could disagree with the theory Plato and Mr. Esolen articulate. But as with all theory, the trouble arises in the specific application of that theory.
In the theory a human being is seen as a charioteer. Perhaps I have seen too many Greco-Roman epic movies, but most charioteers who spring to mind seem almost flawless. In fact, the metaphor suggests the charioteer’s problem lies not in himself (reason and intellect) but in his horses (emotion and appetite). As I read the Bible, I do not see human beings portrayed in this manner. The people Jesus gravitated toward were on the margins, not on a chariot. Most could not even be allowed to watch a chariot race, let alone participate in one.
The Bible seems to me to show humans as broken, wounded, and damaged, troubled not primarily by our external situation (horses) but by our very nature itself, sinful. The Biblical charioteer’s reason and intellect themselves have been corrupted, making his ability to control his horses himelf even more problematic, if not impossible.
I do not believe Jesus would agree that the trouble lies in our horses alone. To do so would place unmerited faith in our human reason and intellect. To paraphrase a famous line, “The fault, dear Professor Esolen, is not in our horses, But in ourselves.” It is with flawed human reason and intellect that Plato’s charioteer must diagnose and correct the problems with his horses. How does that work?
But we can save neither our horses not ourselves through human reason and intellect. These, like emotion and appetite, are false gods. ( I, like many music lovers, am apt to follow the example of the Israelites who began to burn incense to Moses’ bronze serpent and worship the art and not the one to whom the art is offered. My corrupted intellect will convince me that God is beauty, and this is beautiful, so this is God.)
How then are we to help others, whom we believe have their horses out of whack? It is a daunting task for broken humans to do. Jesus suggests that we bring them to Him, and let Him do it. He and He alone, can detect genuine sincerity or correct excessive emotionality. I am not God. I’m not even a charioteer, though I’d like to be, and I believe I could be if I place my faith in Him and posture my heart like His. In the meantime, I seek to align (tune?) myself, my songs, my intellect, my appetite, and my emotions, to Him, and not to brothers in Christ, no matter how well-meaning and loving they are. (Even C.S. Lewis’ writing against sentimentality has been labeled sentimental).
I choose to believe that my fellow worshippers, whether singing Bach or Crabb Family tunes, are on a similar quest, even when they annoy me to no end, even when I just know their caterwauling could not ever please the God of All Beauty. But I know my pay grade requires me to love them, and leave the correction to Him. And as Miroslav Volf writes, repentance is possible only after an embrace. I believe that, as a follower of Jesus, I am to embrace the singing hip-hopper, showing as best I can that God’s love is unconditional, so that the Master can take it from there, and lead my bro into the path of righteousness, as He sees it, not as I’d prefer it to be. In God’s Kingdom one size doesn’t fit all; He customizes our redemption, even musically I believe, and that annoys me as much as it annoyed the worker who worked all day and only got paid the same as the guy who worker only an hour.
If I am to sin, I want to sin by opening my arms too wide rather than not wide enough, even if it causes trouble with the horses I am trying to navigate.
Posted by: PAUL KURITZ | Jun 26, 2007 6:31:57 AM
[Averting my eyes from the tempting post from Horratniu...]
Mr. Kuritz, at risk of continuing to strain the charioteer analogy well beyond its usefulness, it seems a wheel has fallen off the chariot here. The charioteer is not the man, but reason herself. The whole man is the charioteer AND the two horses (appetite and thymos, which is not "emotion" per se') AND the reins AND the axlegrease.
Posted by: Steve Nicoloso | Jun 26, 2007 9:28:40 AM
"he compares the human being to a charioteer"
or not?
Posted by: PAUL KURITZ | Jun 26, 2007 9:43:40 AM
Well yes, but then there's this:
The charioteer represents the reason or intellect; the noble horse, thymos; the wayward horse, appetite. It's a brilliant metaphor, capturing the truth that without the passions we literally get nowhere.
Perhaps Esolen mistyped, but the gist seemed to be to view the whole man as the whole thing. Surely no one is making a case that a man is merely his reason or intellect. Gahh!! The **real** question is: Can man's reason, as you appear to suggest, be totally depraved? If so, then of course the metaphor doesn't make sense.
Posted by: Steve Nicoloso | Jun 26, 2007 10:00:11 AM
As I read Phaedo, the charioteer metaphor comes after a thorough division of a human being into a body and a soul, something the Hebrew world does not do. The three parts of the charioteer metaphor -reason the driver, noble emotion the good horse, and appetite the bad horse - comprise the parts of the soul, the part of a man Plato wishes were free from the corrupting influences of the human body.
N.T. Wright, rightly I think, points out that the Hebrew non-division of the human into body and soul is more helpful in understanding Christ than the Greek duality.
Posted by: PAUL KURITZ | Jun 26, 2007 10:13:09 AM
"Can man's reason, as you appear to suggest, be totally depraved?"
History and the nightly news make a strong case.
Why else do we need a Savior?
Posted by: PAUL KURITZ | Jun 26, 2007 10:16:08 AM
I make a horrible intellectual because I simply can't make it more than five sentences into Plato. In fact, I can't even read Gregory of Nyssa.
Posted by: Mairnéalach | Jun 26, 2007 10:55:03 AM
Nick --
"And CS Lewis could be a hundred and eighty degrees wrong."
Possible, but you offer nothing to prove it here. And between you and Lewis on any point of disagreement, my money goes on Lewis.
"For example, I find the first book in the Space Trilogy tepid at best and have never recommended it."
A judgment that explains why you also defend rock music. :-)
"He also says nothing about any form of art in particular."
Lewis' essay is titled, afte all, "Notes on the Way", not "Treatise on Aesthetics." You also have not offered here any general theory of aesthetics for music or any other art, either, so you haven't any grounds here on which to criticize Lewis. At least I did that much on the U2 thread, and no respondent has yet addressed the central principles of that arguemnt, as opposed to making peripheral objections or unsupported denials.
"Things can also be misapplied."
True, but again you've haven't proven that to be the case here.
"I'm not looking for deep meaning in a waltz any more than I'm looking for deep meaning in a Europop piece. I'm looking for something with a danceable beat."
I take it that by this analogy you here concede the essential superficiality of rock music -- that it has no "deep meaning."
"In church music I'm looking for reverence...."
But then you can't have "Christian" rock music, for this effectively contradicts your immediately preceding statement. Christianity is, by essence and definition, profound, for it is truth in the deepest possible levels of meaning. That which is inherently superficial cannot convey that which is profound. Thus, it follows that rock music cannot convey anything truly Christian. Like the sentimental, it can only offer a superficial imitation. We should not be looking for a "danceable beat" in music that identifies itself as Christian, for that is merely an appeal to the senses and passions. We should be seeking that which will further our salvation by ennobling our souls, purifying and disciplining our passions rather than gratifying them.
"Rock is not, ever, church music due, at the very least, to the societal connotations."
Due credit to you for recognizing this much. Others here have not. As I have argued, however, it goes beyond "societal connotations" to the very constitution of rock music pe se. And there is a problem with dichotomizing what we seek out for pleasure from what we seek out for spiriutal formation, since our pleasures surely inform us spiritually as well.
"I can also paint broad strokes by saying a majority of rap pieces are evil because they glamorize mindless revolt against society and at the vary least should be categorized separately from music since they purposefully avoid melodies."
I have no reservations here. All rap "music" is not music, and virtually all of it is overtly evil, with the rest being pernicious for the same reasons as rock music.
"The classical catalog isn't free from guilt either and I've often harbored serious reservations about Holst's 'The Planets'."
Right idea, wrong target. No-one would or should say that the "classical catalog" is pure, though objections should rather be lodged against works such as e.g. Berg's "Lulu" or virtually anything by John Cage. I do think one can argue that, apart from the libretto, the music of e.g. "Lulu" itself is inherently decadent.
By contrast, "The Planets" is not problematic here because, despite the composer's extra-musical astrological "program" for it, it can (and ought to be) appreciated as "pure" or "absolute" music (sonata form, rondo, etc.). Listening to "The Planets" does not entail acceptance of astrology any more than listening to Parsifal entails acceptance of anti-Semitism or Gnosticism, or listening to Bloch's "Saced Service" makes me into an observant Jew. In other words, the music is itself not inherently astrological, anti-Semitic or Judaic. But music itself and and does powerfully affect the soul by shaping, affecting, and arousing the passions adnd intellect in ways for good or ill.
Once again, the problem here is a confusion of extra-musical elements with the music itself. I keep pointing this out, and respondents keep failing to address the point.
As a side point, Christian writers such as Lewis and Tolkien have utilized astrological symbolism in their works, and we do not reject them on that account.
Posted by: James A. Altena | Jun 26, 2007 11:38:39 AM
Mr. Kuritz,
I think we are agreed that Plato separates man too much. That, of course, doesn't mean Plato is not useful, nor that he failed to make profound contributions to authentic Christian thought, which is usually seen as a synthesis between Athens and Jerusalem. We are decidedly not agreed on the nature of human reason. Notwithstanding the 6 o'clock news, I find little evidence that human reason is totally depraved. It can certainly become so, given original sin and a lifetime of willful exertion in the wrong direction.
Posted by: Steve Nicoloso | Jun 26, 2007 12:35:09 PM
Mr. Nicoloso:
I would like to believe your analysis of our human nature. But Jesus did not come merely to tweak a basically good thing.
He asked that we be totally reborn with the Holy Spirit inside and in charge, rather than under the rule of our old corrupt reason and intellect.
St Paul is eloquent on our deranged state.
Posted by: PAUL KURITZ | Jun 26, 2007 1:15:27 PM
Paul,
I did mistype -- I had to rush that post in. Sorry about that. I meant that he compares the human being to a "charioteer-whose-rig-et cetera," in other words, to the whole setup.
The old medieval motto was, "Gratia supponit naturam," or "Grace perfects nature." That includes reason, "ratio," which in us is the ability -- among other things -- to gaze in wonder at the "ratio" of the universe, its harmony and beauty, created by God. Plato's metaphor there was part of Socrates' discussion of the relationship of love and beauty, and why we long for beauty, and what the intellect has to do with that longing. I agree with you wholeheartedly that Greek thought tended to divorce the soul from the body, and that that was why Saint Paul received a rather cool reception in Athens. I've written about this, too; but in that metaphor we have, if anything, the saner side of Greek thought, the side that does not abandon the passions (though it does recognize that there is something not always reliable about them, and that the reason does not always see the truth, much less follow it).
So I'm not complaining about bad singing. I can forgive a lot of bad singing. I'm not complaining about the kinds of music that would not be fitting in a church, so long as they are not in a church -- there is a lot of religious art and music that is splendid for what it is, and yet that still does not belong in a church. A blow-up of Jim Caviezel under the cross, for instance. I'm complaining about an irresponsible and sometimes concerted effort to turn away from the beautiful -- sometimes this turn is cloaked by a desire to appear more "democratic", as if common people did not appreciate beauty, too. I guess I am pleading for some responsible training of the emotions -- these too need good Christian discipline.
It's possible that you are not aware how awful the music and art are in contemporary Catholic churches -- how often the pronoun "we" is used, in celebratory fashion.... How I long for the boisterous jubilance of "There is Power in the Blood" -- because I am not just talking about Mozart and Bach here!
By the way, thank you again for your kind comments!
Posted by: Tony Esolen | Jun 26, 2007 1:31:43 PM
>>>The old medieval motto was, "Gratia supponit naturam," or "Grace perfects nature." <<<
Older than that. The ancient Byzantine rite of Cheirotonei contains the key formula, "The divine grace, which heals that which is broken and supplies all that is missing. . ." Similarly, both the Mystery of Chrismation and the Mystery of Annointing affect the healing of soul and body by the descent, grace and action of the Holy Spirit, which is of course another name for the divine grace.
Posted by: Stuart Koehl | Jun 26, 2007 2:00:10 PM
"It's possible that you are not aware how awful the music and art are in contemporary Catholic churches --"
I have seen too much bad art everywhere. In fact our culture is characterized by a surplus of art. I once suggested that the NEA adopt the policies of the agriculture department - pay artists not to produce any art! In my academic world art is whatever you say it is and the Emperor's New Clothes is the handbook for art appreciation.
I think more people should criticize the art of today. But I also find that there is very little new art that anyone genuinely loves. So when I find a tune that some people really love, I tend to let it pass, and focus my indignation on "art" no one seems to care about, including custodians who accidentally mistake it for trash.
My youngest son attended parochial school and served as an altar boy. He also attended the local Vineyard Church. He was assigned to teach a religion class dealing with what the Catholic Church could do to connect with the people. He planned on taking the class on a field trip to the Vineyard until the idea was tabled.
Christ said whenever He is lifted up people will be drawn to Him; maybe contemporary worship is lifting Him up in ways more traditional worship isn't. Jesus drew thousands, not with great homilies or great ditties, but with signs and wonders. When whatever music causes the power of God to descend on a congregation, signs and wonders are possible, among with multitudes seeking His power to redeem their brokeness.
Posted by: PAUL KURITZ | Jun 26, 2007 2:22:15 PM
"When whatever music causes the power of God to descend on a congregation, signs and wonders are possible, among with multitudes seeking His power to redeem their brokeness."
I don't think any type of music causes the power of God to descend; that sounds shamanistic to me. On the other hand, I have no doubt that some types of music will chase the Holy Spirit away, and will instead draw other less benevolent unseen powers.
Posted by: Rob Grano | Jun 26, 2007 2:44:43 PM
I would like to believe your analysis of our human nature. But Jesus did not come merely to tweak a basically good thing.
Well, I haven't given an analysis of human nature, save to say that natural human reason is not totally depraved. Please note that I am not saying that human reason is untouched by the fall, nor am I saying that man can acheive perfection by any means other than the grace of God. The six o'clock news is certainly full of depravity, but such stories rarely name young children as the perpetrators of great evil. To acheive great evil requires great skill and practice, i.e., conscious and on-going willful choice. On the other hand, cooperation with the grace of God rarely seems pleasant at the time of reception, but I have little doubt that in beatific bliss it will all then appear to have been rather like a "tweak". I think there is a vast gulf between mere concupiscence and total depravity. That human societies, even pagan ones, manage to exist at all, let alone peacefully upon occasion, seems proof enough of that.
At risk of prolonging this rabbit trail, I wonder: Is anything God made basically a bad thing?
Posted by: Steve Nicoloso | Jun 26, 2007 3:15:26 PM
>>>At risk of prolonging this rabbit trail, I wonder: Is anything God made basically a bad thing?<<<
To say that He did would be rank heresy. At the end of each day of creation, Scripture tells us, God reviewed the work of his hands and pronounced it "good". To say that God can ever make anything inherently bad is both to deny a revealed truth about the nature of God himself.
Posted by: Stuart Koehl | Jun 27, 2007 5:43:10 AM
Tony Esolen writes: >>Maybe there have been times when we could indulge a lot of sentimentality in liturgical art. Maybe -- but now?<<
Two things that sell are sentimentality and hatred and both can be harnessed for political and economic gain. In this media-driven age, they are both manipulated, often unscrupulously and in very sophisticated ways, to package and sell religion, ideas, products, soap operas, and politicians. Schmaltzy movies, tele-evangelists with their palms out and their s***-eating grins, and shock jocks spouting hatespeak are all huge attention getters and money spinners. Hatemongering and shameless displays of sentimentality are business as usual in political campaigns. Superficiality of information and analysis are what make this manipulation so effective. One hopes that as people become better educated and more media savvy they will be less easily swayed by such base appeals.
Posted by: Francesca | Jun 27, 2007 2:37:29 PM
Yes, I agree Francesca. It is amazing how sentimental some politicians and media people can get about things like the prisoners in Guantanamo, who engaged in war against the United States and vow to continue if they get out, isn't it? This sentimentality has swayed numerous people to believe that those who have less than prisoner-of-war status should be treated legally like domestic criminals although nowhere in international law is this required. I hope people will become more educated so they will not be swayed by these base appeals.
Posted by: Judy Warner | Jun 27, 2007 3:28:45 PM
Touché, Judy!
Posted by: Bill R | Jun 27, 2007 3:49:19 PM
I second Bill's motion
Posted by: James A. Altena | Jun 27, 2007 7:12:06 PM
>> It is amazing how sentimental some politicians and media people can get about things like the prisoners in Guantanamo, who engaged in war against the United States and vow to continue if they get out, isn't it? <<
Clearly, not only sentimentality and hatred but fear are effective tools of manipulation -- fear of dark-skinned people and, at present, fear of Islam. Perhaps this is why some people are still in favor of Guantanamo, even though the International Committee of the Red Cross has broken with tradition and blasted the treatment of the hundreds of prisoners held there, allegations of torture and abuse have not been adequately investigated, and only a few of the detainees have actually been charged with a crime! Several have been released after years in detention after having been poorly treated and falsely accused. This is hardly a liberal perspective -- even Bush has said he would like to see GITMO closed and many detainees sent back to their home countries. History will look back on GITMO in the way it looks back on Japanese internment camps in WW2 -- as racist overreaction. I hope all the falsely accused and maltreated detainees will one day be compensated.
Posted by: Francesca | Jun 27, 2007 9:21:36 PM
>>>Clearly, not only sentimentality and hatred but fear are effective tools of manipulation -- fear of dark-skinned people and, at present, fear of Islam. <<<
Some day, Francesca, you will be an adult, and look back on your present words and think, "I was such a jerk".
Posted by: Stuart Koehl | Jun 27, 2007 9:29:36 PM
>>Some day, Francesca, you will be an adult, and look back on your present words and think, "I was such a jerk".<<
If you're still around in 30 years time, I feel sure history will have proven me correct and it'll be you who will be saying that. That assumes of course that you will have gained enough wisdom and maturity by then to admit that you were wrong.
Posted by: Francesca | Jun 28, 2007 9:58:20 AM
>>>If you're still around in 30 years time, I feel sure history will have proven me correct and it'll be you who will be saying that. <<<
I really doubt that, Francesca. There are many things I have said and done that I regret, and regret deeply. And in various ways, I am sure I can get my wife and kids to tell you just how big a jerk I can be.
But when it comes to my chosen profession, and my professional judgment, I have seldom been wrong, and more often than not, been correct when going against the conventional wisdom. The reason is simple, Francesca: human nature doesn't change, and history gives us guideposts by which we can plot our course into the future. It is a tendency of the young to be solipsistic, to believe that the world rotates around their own navels, and that they are the first to do anything and everything. One would like to think that as they age, people grow out of this. The Baby Boomers, I hope, are the exception that proves the rule. And in your case, I sincerely hope that you outgrow the facile, bumper-sticker philosophy by which you have lived your life so far.
Posted by: Stuart Koehl | Jun 28, 2007 10:32:39 AM
The International Red Cross is no paragon of virtue but has its own agenda. Many people who have visited Guantanamo portray an entirely different idea of it than the media have portrayed, such as the author of this New York Times article.
Posted by: Judy Warner | Jun 28, 2007 11:32:30 AM
"Sentimentality" in the case of partisan fighters (that is, guerillas captured participating in combat with no uniform...) in the past MIGHT mean occasionally sparing their lives, if perhaps they are particularly young or otherwise sympathetic, though by all traditional rules of war, their lives were forfeit. Spies understand this, expecting to be shot if captured. Guantanamo Bay thus represents incredible benevolence, so far as I can tell. (Perhaps I am biased - all of my ancestors who fell into the hands of the Federal Army as prisoners in the 1860's perished in their prison camps, though they were uniformed, recognized combatants.)
No, from our dealings with the Gitmo detainees, history will learn the shocking new lesson that a mixture of confinement, appeasement, indulgence and condescension can eventually smother a hostile ideology with sheer saccharine shock and "awwwwww" - or else, just possibly, we'll learn something else completely different.
Let us hope that for the commander in the field, the lesson taught by all of the Gitmo protestors and lawyerly-types is not simply, "Prisoners are a lot more trouble in the long run than dead enemies."
Posted by: Joe Long | Jun 28, 2007 11:59:25 AM
Francesca I have to seriously wonder where you read this stuff. Fear of dark skinned people? This is a blog. Do you even know what we look at? I have "dark-skinned" people in my own household. My children are part Asian. Judy and Stuart both belong to minority groups. Try real hard to believe that there might be actual logical reasons for some conservative positions. Just maybe. We even have a copt on here, who I would hazard to guess, is married to someone rather dark-skinned.
And when is fear not a good motivating factor? I am rightly motivated by fear all the time. I have yet to stick my hand in a tigers cage. You have to explain why the fear is irrational, not mock it in general. Unless of course you are taking Senator Kennedy's latest talking points verbatim (which I have to believe is exactly what happened).
Posted by: Nick | Jun 28, 2007 7:01:09 PM
*at*<->*like*
Posted by: Nick | Jun 28, 2007 7:04:55 PM
I am so fearful of dark-skinned people that I have lived in terror for the last two weeks while my brown-skinned niece was visiting. It's even worse when I am also in the presence of her sister and brother. It makes me want to send them all to Gitmo.
Posted by: Judy Warner | Jun 28, 2007 7:21:29 PM
It is interesting how often liberals accuse conservatives of "dehmanizing" their opponents while constantly resorting to cliched one-dimensional stereotypes and cheap pseudo-psychologizing to make ad hominen slurs against conservatives. Obviously conservatives, like pre-born children or the comatose ill, don't qualify for liberals as being human. I wonder how long it will be before liberals extend legalized euthanasia to, and make it mandatory for, conservatives.
Posted by: James A. Altena | Jun 29, 2007 8:13:12 AM
'It is interesting how often liberals accuse conservatives of "dehmanizing" their opponents while constantly resorting to cliched one-dimensional stereotypes and cheap pseudo-psychologizing to make ad hominen slurs against conservatives.'
I read a piece by Donald Davidson last evening in which he said something to the effect that modernists/progressives, when they realize that they can't get into the heads of conservatives, will just hit them there instead.
Posted by: Rob Grano | Jun 29, 2007 8:22:42 AM
James and Rob, they may hate us very much - may even wish deep in their little hearts to do away with us - but I just can't muster any alarm in a physical sense. The modernist/progressive Left is going to have to hire out its thugs from some other, probably completely incompatible movement (like Islam, for instance).
"They came for the smokers, and I said nothing, because I don't smoke.
They came for the meat-eaters, and I said nothing, because I'm a vegetarian.
They came for the drivers, and I said nothing, because I prefer public transportation and it's better for the environment.
They never did come for me.
No one was left in the Secret Police but sissies with rickets."
Posted by: Joe Long | Jun 29, 2007 8:33:16 AM
Somewhat germaine, CWN's Diogenes remarked:
If a man tells you he's a Unitarian (where anything goes doctrinally), you can accurately guess his race, income, social class, and how he voted for the past fifteen years. If you know nothing more about a man than that he's Catholic, you have no confidence about any of the above. The greater the insistence on doctrinal unity, the greater possibility for authentic diversity.
Posted by: Steve Nicoloso | Jun 29, 2007 8:45:32 AM
I agree with you for the most part, Joe. I think the Davidson quote is partly facetious, but he has a point: when the lefties can't debate with us, they prefer to bully or name-call rather than engage.
Posted by: Rob Grano | Jun 29, 2007 8:46:10 AM
Francesca,
The "dark-skinned" people remark is beneath you. I and my children look as Northern European as you can get, but I in fact have Native American ancestry in addition to my European ancestry and some of my first cousin have features that are common among Native Americans. I also have cousins who have Mexican ancestry and others who have East Asian ancestry. My wife has a cousin who has African ancestry. And, it is possible that my Native American ancestors had some African ancestry as there are indications (which are unprovable) that run away slaves may have been welcomed by their group and intermarried with them. Just about anyone whose ancestors have lived in the South for the past couple of hundred years has some Native ancestry and many have some African ancestry.
You really need to educate yourself and get rid of your prejudices against those with whom you disagree. Perhaps if you did, you could then open your mind to judge ideas on their merits and not on your preconceived and uninformed opinions of those who hold those ideas. Conservative does not equal racists. Liberal does not equal non-racists.
Posted by: GL | Jun 29, 2007 9:51:32 AM
>>The "dark-skinned" people remark is beneath you. <<
There is no need to be so defensive, GL (and others.) You, not I, introduced the liberal/conservative dichotomy (I don't consider myself to be either.) With regard to Guantanamo and the invasion of Iraq, there is no doubt that 9/11 resulted in a backlash against Muslims, just as Pearl Harbor did against Japanese Americans, even those who had no involvement in the attacks. There is also no doubt that many people, and whether they are liberal or conservative is irrelevant, feel that Arabs are somehow subhuman. Witness the charges of "Islamofascism" to cover all expressions of Islam and the hysteria about the growth of the European Muslim population. After 9/11, a Muslim coworker gave my mom some literature about "jihad," which within her cicles means the struggle between good and evil within oneself. However, there are still people who view her with fear and paranoia as a potential terrorist. If white, Christians were being detained indefinitely in Guantanamo without being charged, amidst a growing realization that many of them were low-level recruits or innocent men swept up in the chaos of war, I feel sure there would be far more of a public outcry than there is now. I feel sure that mutilating and orphaning white, Christian children in war, instead of those "other" Iraqi children, would be met with more concern and less callousness. Justifying human suffering in Iraq is much easier for those who consider Iraqis to be just "not quite like us."
Posted by: Francesca | Jun 29, 2007 12:56:36 PM
If you say so, Francesca.
Posted by: GL | Jun 29, 2007 1:10:42 PM
>>Witness the charges of "Islamofascism" to cover all expressions of Islam and the hysteria about the growth of the European Muslim population.<<
Odd, then, the the term "Islamofascism" is usually used to distinguish between radical politicized Islam and other forms. Or would President Bush, who takes pains to describe Islam as a "religion of peace," but who used "Islamofascism" in his State of the Union, be some sort of aberration?
Much less odd is the fear of European Islamification. You'll never guess what they found in downtown London today!
Posted by: Ethan Cordray | Jun 29, 2007 1:14:37 PM
>>>With regard to Guantanamo and the invasion of Iraq, there is no doubt that 9/11 resulted in a backlash against Muslims<<<
Bulls**t, Francesca. Post some numbers. Not from CAIR. Oh, wait--if you don't use CAIR's numbers, there's nothing to report.
But while we're on the subject, the number of anti-Jewish incidents has risen several-fold over the last five years, mostly in bastions of civilization (from your perspective) like the UK, France, and Italy. And guess what "religion of peace" is behind most of them?
First two guesses don't count.
Who do the European elites blame for this rash of anti-semitism?
Again first two guesses don't count.
Posted by: Stuart Koehl | Jun 29, 2007 5:06:35 PM
>>>Much less odd is the fear of European Islamification. You'll never guess what they found in downtown London today!<<<
Twice, even. But if it's al Qaeda, it means there's a third bomb still out there somewhere. On the other hand, given the ineptitude of the bombers, it's pretty certain that attrition among the terrorists must be pretty awful.
Posted by: Stuart Koehl | Jun 29, 2007 5:12:24 PM
>>Not from CAIR. Oh, wait--if you don't use CAIR's numbers, there's nothing to report. <<
And why, pray, should I not quote from CAIR?
Posted by: Francesca | Jun 30, 2007 9:20:00 AM
Sigh...I'll note you skipped straight to that and past Stuarts argument. Of course, Western elitism only allows for caring for those that you can keep in your pocket electorally. I'll let Stuart flatten you on that question though.
Posted by: Nick | Jun 30, 2007 12:39:33 PM
In case Stuart is away, I'll step in. CAIR is a fraudulent organization, pretending to represent Muslims' civil rights and other interests in America in much the same way the NAACP represents blacks or the Anti-Defamation League represents Jews. In reality it has a minuscule membership, though it lies about it, and most American Muslims do not want to be represented by CAIR.
CAIR has ties to terrorist organizations. To quote expert Daniel Pipes,
The Department of Homeland Security refuses to deal with it. Senator Charles Schumer (Democrat, New York) describes it as an organization “which we know has ties to terrorism.” Senator Dick Durbin (Democrat, Illinois) observes that CAIR is “unusual in its extreme rhetoric and its associations with groups that are suspect.” Steven Pomerantz, the FBI’s former chief of counterterrorism, notes that “CAIR, its leaders, and its activities effectively give aid to international terrorist groups.” The family of John P. O’Neill, Sr., the former FBI counterterrorism chief who perished at the World Trade Center, named CAIR in a lawsuit as having “been part of the criminal conspiracy of radical Islamic terrorism” responsible for the September 11 atrocities. Counterterrorism expert Steven Emerson calls it “a radical fundamentalist front group for Hamas.”
And here's what some moderate American Muslims say about CAIR:
The late Seifeldin Ashmawy, publisher of the New Jersey-based Voice of Peace, called CAIR the champion of “extremists whose views do not represent Islam.”[4] Jamal Hasan of the Council for Democracy and Tolerance explains that CAIR’s goal is to spread “Islamic hegemony the world over by hook or by crook.”[5] Kamal Nawash, head of Free Muslims Against Terrorism, finds that CAIR and similar groups condemn terrorism on the surface while endorsing an ideology that helps foster extremism, adding that “almost all of their members are theocratic Muslims who reject secularism and want to establish Islamic states.” Tashbih Sayyed of the Council for Democracy and Tolerance calls CAIR “the most accomplished fifth column” in the United States. And Stephen Schwartz of the Center on Islamic Pluralism writes that “CAIR should be considered a foreign-based subversive organization, comparable in the Islamist field to the Soviet-controlled Communist Party, USA.”[Stephen Schwartz is a Muslim convert.]
At least five of its employees and board members have been arrested, convicted, deported, or otherwise linked to terrorism-related charges and activities.
It has a number of links to Hamas.
It has consistently defended both accused and convicted radical Islamic terrorists.
It is a fact that radical Muslims consider it their duty to lie to non-Muslims in order to promote Islam. Thus not one word CAIR says should be accepted without proof. They have made a big deal out of supposed anti-Muslim acts by Americans but have not shown actual incidents, which have always been very low compared to acts against Jews. Instead, they pretend that Muslims who are arrested or even noticed because of acts that could be connected with terrorism are actually being targeted because of their religion. They did this most recently with the case of the six Imams whose behavior got them kicked off a flight in Minneapolis.
CAIR engages in intimidation to shut up its critics. The six Imams threatened to sue not only the airline but also the passengers who reported them -- a clear attempt at shutting up citizens who report possible terrorist activity. The lawyer who represented them is Omar Mohammedi, the President of CAIR-New York. They have also sued a website which published articles criticizing them.
In short, CAIR has no redeeming qualities whatsoever and anyone who uses them as an authority on anything is either terminally naive or a sympathizer with radical Islam.
Posted by: Judy Warner | Jun 30, 2007 1:30:21 PM
>>>But if it's al Qaeda, it means there's a third bomb still out there somewhere.<<<
In Scotland, it would seem.
Posted by: Stuart Koehl | Jul 1, 2007 4:44:55 AM
Wow. From the metaphysics of sentimentalism to racist accusations and a general condemnation of CAIR in 50 comments or less.
Would someone like to return to the point of the original post? As a tie-in, I suggest an explanation of CAIR in terms of Platonic anthropology, with a Thomistic refutation, leading to a liturgical/poetic climax that so stuns its readers with sheer beauty, and ennobles their souls, that future insults from all parties remain on-topic.
In much brotherly love... :-)
Posted by: Firinnteine | Jul 2, 2007 2:32:00 PM
As much as I agree with Firinnteine that we should return to topic, I do first wish to note that there have been at least a few instances of anti-Muslim action after September 11th.
I express no opinion about the statistical significance of such things, much less about their ratio to anti-Semitic acts. I expect the overall facts generally bear out Stuart's position. I speak only from personal experience: a very few months after September 11th, a coffee shop in Columbia, Missouri, an hour north of my home, was destroyed by arson. It had the unfortunate name of "Osama's."
And yet this is still the exception, even in "Red State" mid-Missouri. The other two coffee shops owned by the same Jordanian family (with the less magnetic name of "Coffee Zone") continue to prosper. Their owners appear to be thoroughly secularized; one is married to a Christian who attends my church, and I have personally seen him eat hot dogs and barbecue pork ribs without asking questions. He also makes the best hummus and only Turkish coffee in town.
In the same way, a world foods store owned by another Muslim family continues to thrive, even after the owner's home computers were seized in an investigation of an Islamic charity. He is, folks around here seem to agree, innocent until proven guilty.'
So "backlash?" Are a few isolated incidents over a very brief period a "backlash," or would it have to be a larger pattern? I think Americans are not quite so intolerant as Francesca seems to think, be that for good or ill.
Posted by: Ethan Cordray | Jul 2, 2007 9:41:26 PM
