Category Archives: Culture Wars

We Seem to Disagree on Everything

Extremism, Gender Warfare, Moral Humility, Pluralism, Social Issues, Woke

 

The divisions in America keep growing in number and in the depth of those divides. As usual, Canada is the same just a little more gently. Polls have shown that many Americans think those divisions are so deep that the country will not be able to survive its problems.  In other words, because of polarization we are doomed.  But are things that bad?

 

Mark Edmundson writing for the New York Times pointed out that evolutionary biologists have determined that,

 

“binary behavior is an evolutionary adaptation. It inheres in the reptile brain. There was a time when it was incumbent on us to decide and decide quickly who was friend and who was foe. Will it eat me? Am I safe around it? Err, if you must, on the side of enmity. You don’t want to equivocate about a sabre-toothed tiger.”

 

But, he also said, he did not agree things were that bad. Edmundson suggested the famous philosopher Jacques Derrida had some important things to say on the topic.  Derrida hated the compulsion so many of us have to divide the world into binaries or polarities.  Life just was not that simple he said.  That is why according to Edmundson, Derrida was an “an enemy of simple, dualistic thinking.” That is not a bad thing. Such thinking deserves critics. Added to that, he said “Derrida worried that compulsive binary thinking, in which one seeks opposition everywhere, could readily lead to violence…”  Edmundson agreed with Derrida. So do I.

 

Edmundson preferred the position of that modern philosopher Ted Lasso, who said instead, we should “Be curious, not judgmental.” That is often good advice. As a result Derrida called for thinking that did not require polar opposites but instead “resembled a form of thinking that was not based on the tension of opposites but resembled an ever-expanding web of rich associations.” Derrida’s curiosity led him to affirm the free play of the interpreting mind.

 

I agree with both of them but put it just a little differently.  My take is that we should not think and see in black and white, nor even gray. We should think and see in colour. Glorious colour. But that is not what we do.

 

Instead of that we think in black and white. We think the world is either A or B. 2 choices no more.  Pick a side and stick with it. As Edmundson said,

 

“Our culture is amok with binaries. We have two major parties, just two, and they are forever opposed. When a group tries to start a third party, it can be summarily disabled by the existing powers. We love sports, generally the most binary of activities. One side wins; one side loses. Root hard for your squad and the devil take the opposition. We savor debates where one side wins and one side loses.”

 

In the larger world, we find allies and we find enemies. We are, as I say, Democrats or Republicans, realists or idealists, people of much faith or people of none. We wear our team jerseys with pride and scoff at the opposition’s colors.

 

 Such binary thinking is just plain impoverished and so are we if confine ourselves to black and white.  Yet it is everywhere.

 

There is one clear modern example of this deficiency which is pretty plain if you look. That is thinking about  sex and gender.  More and more people are saying there are only 2 sexes and 2 genders.  A person is a male or female. Oner or the other. The pendulum is swinging. There are no other choices. In fact this is an issue in the municipal elections in Steinbach this year, as odd as that seems.

 

But life is not that simple, even if we would like it to be.  It is an uncomfortable fact that some people are born with ambiguous sexual organs. It is just not clear whether the person is male or female. Such a person could be one or the other or some combination of both. Such people are called intersex.

 

The differences between the genders is even less clear. There seem to be a lot of choices when you look. As Edmundson said, “Insisting on purity — you must be one thing or another — will inevitably create confusion and resentment.” That really is the point.  Insisting on simple answers will just bring about a lot of unnecessary unhappiness and pain.  There is no need to insist upon a clear distinction. There is nothing to be gained by such simplified thinking. Its none of our business. Let others live and let live.

 

Edmundson had a better approach, which he found in eastern religions. This is what he said,

 

“A person influenced by the great Eastern texts, the Upanishads and the Bhagavad Gita, would be likely to see it differently. The best state of mind is one in which you can look out on all creation, other people in particular, and say to yourself: That, too, I am.

 

We are all part of one being; we all possess the same soul. This way of seeing does not cultivate opposition or conflict. It accepts what comes its way without picking sides and initiating strife.”

 

This does not just apply to issues of sex or gender. We should look at the other and keep our opinions to ourself.  If the other person is suffering from confusion let him or her or they choose. Be happy.

 

I am not sure the Bible actually says, as some suggest, “we are all God’s children,” but it could still be true. If you believe in God surely you would say we are all God’s creation. Is that not enough to give us all dignity? Sometimes, we should give up judging in favour of accepting. As the Beatles said, “Whispser words of wisdom. Let it be.”

 

Is that not enough?

Improper Ideology and Treasuring Ignorance

Death of Truth, Social Justice, The War on Smart, Woke, Woke

 

Donald Trump is indeed a master turning accusations against his accusers.

 

One of the best recent examples of this technique, was when Trump issued an executive order called “RESTORING TRUTH AND SANITY TO AMERICAN HISTORY.” Trump stated that “over the past decade, Americans have witnessed a concerted and widespread effort to rewrite our Nation’s history, replacing objective facts with a distorted narrative driven by ideology rather than truth.”

 

As we all know this is precisely what Trump has done over and over again. As John Biewen said in his podcast, “Orwell could not have said it better himself. Because of course Trump is doing precisely what he accuses his opponents of doing: replacing facts with ideology.”

 

 

As a result of this order, the internationally respected Smithsonian Museum must in the future ensure that they do not employ “improper ideology.”   Any exhibits that “divide Americans based on race” by creating the wildly improbably claim that white Americans treated African-Americans shamefully would run afoul of this rule. This rule was particularly offended by a prior exhibit while Biden was in power called “The Shape of Power: Stories of Race and American Sculpture,” because it pointed out that “[s]ocieties including the United States have used race to establish and maintain systems of power, privilege, and disenfranchisement.”

 

Such an exhibit, no matter how much history supports the conclusion cannot be true because American conservatives are uncomfortable at the thought that it might be true.

 

At the same time any suggestions that American men have used their power to dominate women is again out of bounds. American men would never do that. The museum should only celebrate the achievements of women.

 

As Orwell said, slavery is freedom. War is peace.

 

John Biewen said,

 

“The author of Trump’s executive order doesn’t explain what’s wrong with these historically and scientifically uncontroversial statements. The administration apparently assumes that everyone – in the intended audience, anyway, the MAGA base – will nod in agreement that this is typical woke nonsense.”

 

Trump and his cohorts were also saddened that in some places statues of Christopher Columbus on pedestals had been taken down. As Shannon Speed, a Chickasaw Nation member and director of UCLA’s American Indian Studies Center, explained to Public Radio, “the explorer’s legacy, besides “discovering” the “New World,” also includes “pillaging, raping and generally setting in motion a genocide of the people who were already here.” These really are not controversial statements at all, but Trump and his happy Trumpsters don’t like to be reminded of these uncomfortable facts.

 

 

As always, Trump made no attempt to disprove any claims by museums or scholars. He just says all the criticism is “nothing but woke.” As John Biewen said,

 

“Trump and his henchpersons want to return men like Columbus to their pedestals for obvious reasons. If they can re-establish Columbus as an untarnished hero – along with America’s slaveholding founders – maybe that will stop all this bothersome talk about injustices done to oppressed groups, both past and present, and discredit any efforts at redress and repair. Only a “Radical Left Lunatic” would want to dwell on the racist, sexist, homophobic or economic abuses carried out by historical figures – or by the current regime. Enough with all that.”

 

 

David Joy is a novelist who weighed in on this issue before the North Carolina commission investigating the issue as a result of a Confederate memorial. Joy is a descendant of enslavers and pointed out to the commission  that he had grown up with such memorials and how his people in the south  revered the slave state. These were his people. He had grown up with them and loved them. “And then,” he said, “I grew up. And I read books.” That’s it. He learned the truth and that was not quite as rosy as the previous generation had made it out to be. He did not let his discomfort over that truth impair him. As he said to the commission, “Yes, millions of Americans still treasure their ignorance and will do their best to defend it. But a whole lot of us feel differently.”

 

I hope he’s right.

 

Nixon and the Politics of Division

Culture Wars, Right-wing Extremism

 

Donald Trump did not invent the cultural wars, nor was he the first right-wing politician to take advantage of them.

 

The author Rick Perlstein  was interviewed in the film The Brain Washing of my Dad in which he said “the  brilliance of Nixon was to bend a politics of deference to money and autocracy and frame it to a kind ofcultural populism.” Nixon’s idea, according to Perlstein, was “the real snobs are not the people who hire and fire, but the people who decide cultural trends.” Nixon early on, realized the importance of culture wars, though that expression was not to my knowledge used by him.

George Lakoff is the author of the book, Don’t Think of an Elephant! The Essential Guide for Progressives.  He was also interviewed in the film about Richard Nixon. In 1964 the Republican Party candidate for president, Barry Goldwater got smoked.  Lakoff said, “conservative” was a dirty word. Nixon started running for the presidency in 1967 and he knew he had a problem. How to get around the apparent despising of conservatives? How could he change the Americans who wanted to be liberals?

Specifically, he wanted to get working people to vote for him, rather than a Democrat. Many veterans saw the anti-war movement in the US as a betrayal of their service and unpatriotic to the country. Nixon was hostile to protesters. He also opposed women who were railing against societal norms that forced them to stay at home and raise children. Their movement was called. “Women’s Liberation,” and Nixon hated that too.  So did many others.

Nixon argued for traditional family values to attract working men who felt threatened by what they saw as radical feminism.  Women would try to upend their privileges and take their jobs. Which was, of course, was completely true.

Nixon capitalized on fears of whites that they would lose their hegemony to uppity blacks. He elicited fear and loathing among whites. He ran in favor of law and order, which was often a dog whistle for whites who felt most criminals were black. He latched onto white bias, often of a silent implicit kind of bias. Again, he concentrated on white fears. There is nothing quite like fear to bring out the vote.

Donald Trump used similar tactics in order to twice get elected president of the United States.  Many think those tactics were crucial to getting Trump elected both times. Winning the cultural wars can be a winning statetgy.

 

Picking on the Vulnerable

2024 Trip to Eastern Canada, Gender Warfare

 

 

During this trip to eastern Canada we experienced the Republican Party spending millions on LGBTQ issues, even though their polls had shown that not many Republicans cared very much about the issue.

 

Donald Trump warned Americans that under the leadership of the Democratic party they could send their sons to school and they would come back as girls without their knowledge or consent. This is the simplified nonsense that Trump preached. And it was effective. He also told the American people that Kamila Harris looked out for “they/them” and he would look after you!

 

The Republican Party in the US spent millions of dollars on ads attacking the LGBTQ community in the last couple of weeks in the campaign, demonstrating once again that their dominant ideology on this subject, is the ideology of the bully. They want to pick on the most vulnerable people in America. That’s what bullies do.

 

The Republican claim trans people are the demons destroying America.  According to USAfacts, “Approximately 1.14% of the nation’s adult population, or 3 million Americans, identify as transgender.”  How is it possible that less than 2% of the population consisting mainly of the most vulnerable people in the country could possibly be a threat to the country?  This tiny group is a big problem for America? This seems absurd.

 

We should be protecting the most vulnerable not demonizing them. According to the Bible in Matthew 25:40 Jesus said “… inasmuch as you did it to one of the least of these My brethren, you did it to Me.” That seems like the Christian attitude to me.  The Republican attitude seems more like the Anti-Christ.  We should be protecting the vulnerable not scapegoating them.  But bullies don’t protect the vulnerable; they attack them. Yet Christians are the most consistent supporters of Donald Trump. How is that possible?

Does God Make Mistakes?

2024 Trip to Eastern Canada, Culture Wars, Gender Warfare, Pluralism

 

 

One day in Prince Edward Island rain was forecast for the entire day. So we took a break and did nothing. As well, we felt we needed a break from driving and seeing things. So we stayed put. We do that from time to time on trips. We don’t have the energy to keep going every day.

 

We did hear about people in New Brunswick talking about their new laws targeting trans people. That really seems despicable to me. I think in a few years people will realize how nasty that really was. Some of the evangelicals justify their position on the basis that “God does not make mistakes?”

 

What would they say about our granddaughter who was born with her intestines outside her body.  Thanks to modern science, not God, the doctors knew in advance because of an ultra sound test and were prepared to deal with it. In the good old days, such a “mistake” would have resulted in her death.  We called it a miracle birth. Which it was. But it was a miracle of modern science and God should not get the credit. The scientists who invented the techniques to make for such tests saved her life. Did God not allow her to be born like that?

 

As a result of the surgery on the first day of her life, her intestines were immediately put back where they “belonged” and she lived. Fantastic. But I think God, if there is a God, made a mistake. And doctors “corrected” that mistake.

 

What about children who are born with cleft palate or a cleft lip?  It results in a horrible disfiguration that in many parts of the world permits humans to inflict untold misery on the children with the defect. I recognize that humans are the real problem here, but God, again if there is a God, gets the credit for the condition of that child?  Or can we blame the parent for that?

 

How about intersex children? These are children who are born with reproductive or sexual anatomy that doesn’t fit into an exclusively male or female (binary) sex classification. In some cases no one can tell if the child is a boy or a girl. It could be either.  Is that not a mistake? Why does God allow that? How can you impose a gender on such a child. Intersex traits might be apparent when a person’s born, but they might not appear until later (during puberty or even adulthood). In the US now, according to their new president, the country will only recognize 2 genders. What will they do with intersex children? Guess? Flip a coin?

Unfortunately, for Republicans and Canadian conservatives, not everyone’s sexual characteristics fit neatly into 1 of the 2 traditional categories. An estimated 1.7 of children born each year have variations of sexual characteristics. These variations are diverse. Some children have genitalia outside the norms for boys or girls. Some have feminized bodies but also have XY (male) chromosomes. Some have masculine bodies and XX (female) chromosomes.

Many of these children undergo surgery to “normalize” them because that is what their parents want. They want “normal” children, but that is not what God gave them. I actually don’t think this is a mistake at all. These children are just different. But in much of modern society, different is bad. Different means a mistake was made. And different means some children suffer needlessly.

I say, let it be. Whisper words of wisdoms, let it be. Some people are different. Thank God.

Picking on the Vulnerable

Evangelical Christianity, Exploitation, Gender Warfare, Trump

 

The Republican Party in the US is spending millions of dollars on ads attacking the LGBTQ community in the last couple of weeks in the campaign, demonstrating once again that their dominant ideology on this subject, is the ideology of the bully. They want to pick on the most vulnerable people in America. That’s what bullies do.

The Republican claim trans people are the demons destroying America.  According to USAFacts, “Approximately 1.14% of the nation’s adult population, or 3 million Americans, identify as transgender.”  How is it possible that less than 2% of the population consisting mainly of the most vulnerable people in the country could possibly be a threat to the country?  This tiny group is a big problem for America? This seems absurd.

 

According to the Bible in Matthew 25:40 Jesus said this in Matthew 25:40 “… inasmuch as you did it to one of the least of these My brethren, you did it to Me.” That seems like the Christian attitude to me.  The Republican attitude seems more like the Anti-Christ.  We should be protecting the vulnerable not scapegoating them.  But bullies don’t protect the vulnerable; they attack them.

Yet Christians are the most consistent supporters of Donald Trump.  In fact many of them believe Donald Trump was chosen by God to lead their country! How is that possible?

 

American Fiction

2024 Trip to South West United States, Movies, Woke

 

American Fiction  is , as its title suggests, yet another film about Fantasyland.  In some respects it is not real. In other respects it is all too real.  This is a very appropriate title for a film that explores one of America’s many Fantasy Lands. Walt Disney’s Fantasyland is an American creation that has stood the test of time. Just like America as Fantasyland itself.

The protagonist in this film is Thelonious “Monk” Ellison a black writer and professor in Los Angeles. His novels have received academic praise, but sell poorly, and publishers have rejected his most recent manuscript for not being “black enough.”

Monk’s literary agent tries to urge Monk to be realistic and take another approach. Give the public what it wants, even if it is crap. The agent says to Monk, “Your books are good but they’re not popular.” His publisher has rejected his latest book. The agent tells him  “They want a black book.” What is a black book? Monk has an answer: “They got a black book. I’m black and they’ve got the book.” But this incident causes Monk to embark on a flight of apoplexy.

Meanwhile his the University where he teaches has put him on suspension over intemperate politically incorrect remarks he made to his students about racial issues. Teh university bosses  suggest he attend a literary seminar  and spend time with his family in Boston. Of course, he doesn’t really want to be with his family. As he says, “All successful writers are tormented by their families.” His family is certainly no exception.

Monk’s mother is in the early stages of dementia. HIs sister Lisa is a physician who  tries to cheer Monk up. Lisa tells him, “Your books change peoples’ lives!” But Monk asks her, “Has anything I’ve ever written changed your life?” She responds, “Absolutely, my dining room table was wobbly as hell before your last book came out. It was like perfect!”

Monk attends a literary event in Boston in which black novelist Sintara Golden is reading from her new novel We’s Lives in Da Ghetto which seems to pander to black stereotypes. It is immensely popular, unlike his work.  It is filled with black stereotypes that Monk cannot stand. How could she be a successful “black” writer while he is suffering in the wings of the boondocks?

Monk’ literary agent encourages him to do the same thing that worked so well for Sintara. Monk listens to her reading from her novel which he despises. In disgust, Monk decides to write his own black novel as a joke. As Monk said, “If they want stereotypes, I’m going to give them stereotypes. “Dead beat dads. Rappers. Crack.”   He calls the book My Pafology and it contains every trope white readers expect from black novels. It has a melodramatic plot involving bad dialogue, deadbeat dads, gang violence, and drugs. As Monk says, “I just want to rub their noses in it.” And much to his surprise the book publisher loves it and pays him a $750,000 advance which is money he really can use. They won’t even take back their offer when he insists the book be called “Fuck.”

And it turns out to be a book the whites in the Hamptons will love. His black book is a spectacular success. Even though he wrote it as a joke, as his agent says, “its the most lucrative joke you ever told.”

Yet I kept wondering if his book was  really as bad as he claimed. Maybe the readers knew that his “serious” books were crap and his “junk novel” was actually a gem. In the world of fantasies who knows where the truth lies? Not I.

Monk’s family adds elements of great comedy. The film is filled with surprises.  Monk’s brother Cliff is a cantankerous gay man who does everything he can to rock the boat.  When a white neighbour, married to “the rules,” tells them they can’t spread the ashes of their mother in the ocean as she had requested,  Cliff tells him if you try to stop me, “I’ll eat your sweater vest for dinner.”

This film is a black comedy in more than one sense of that word. It really mocks the woke world of liberal white society. And there is no easier target in modern American society than that. The move is an intellectual romp through the racist memes of the publishing world and beyond.  It will make for a fine cinema experience.

A Safe Place to Hate.

Conservative, Evangelical Christianity, Fear, Hate, Moral Humility, Politics & Religion, Right-wing Extremism, Trumpism, Woke

 

There had been a lot of social change just before Rush Limbaugh arrived on the scene. There was gay liberation, women’s rights, and liberalism. Many felt they could no longer say what they wanted to say. Political correctness was seen as a stifling chain. They also thought no one was speaking like them or to them. They were ignored and invisible. As Justin Ling said in his CBC. Radio series , “In the universe of right-wing media compared to the Wall Street Journal and like the later Fox News Limbaugh’s listeners were older, whiter, more conservative, and more religious. For this slice of America Limbaugh created a safe space.” He created a safe place to hate.

Surprisingly, because there was a Republican in the White House, as Ling said, “he convinced these old, white, conservative, and religious Americans that they were disenfranchised!” Even though they were in the majority! It was pure alchemy. He told them they were looked down on. He milked them for their resentment—the elixir of devils. As Ling said, “He formed a kind of counterculture; a resistance against the liberals, and the progressives, and the feminists.”

In the mid-80s he syndicated to about 50 stations across the country but by 1990 he got 450 affiliates. He was the rock star of talk radio and the conservative movement. He led a Rush to Excellence Tour to various stadiums around the country with as many as 10,000 people.  As Justin Ling said, “Limbaugh declared a culture war”. Limbaugh put it this way:

“We are in the midst of a culture war. What are rights? This culture war illustrates precisely what is going on. We in America are in the midst—it’s an exciting time to be alive—we are in the midst of a redefinition of who is going to define right and wrong, what the punishment is going to be for those who violate the limits that we place on our behavior. We are arguing about who has the right to tell us what is right and what is wrong. We’re arguing over what censorship is And to me its pretty scary.”

 

And there it is again—fear—the secret sauce of paranoia and right-wing hysteria.

Like Trump later, Limbaugh went from being a spoiled rich kid to a champion of the working class. People all over America were starting to take notice of Limbaugh. I remember at the time hearing about him from a friend of mine, a trucker. Truckers loved Limbaugh, just like they later loved Trump and basically for the same reasons. They liked to have a wrecking ball in their corner as did my friend the trucker, and much later the truckers convoy in Ottawa in 2022. They got a rush from Rush Limbaugh.

As Justin Ling said, “On his radio show he was the voice of God on a one way street. And he loved nothing better than to run over liberal women. On his radio show he said, “this is a show devoted to what I think.” On the Dave Lettermen show he said people were bugged by him because “I have almost a monopoly on the truth.” No one could ever accuse Limbaugh of humility. Humility was a liberal vice. And his fans loved it.  He also said “This is a benevolent dictatorship. I am the dictator. There is no first amendment here except for me.”

Now he was entitled to be the dictator of his own show. If we don’t like it, we don’t have to listen to it.