The truth is that [journalists] loathe ordinary unenlightened people more than they fear jihadists. There is always this great unwashed mob of right-wing lunatics just looking for an excuse to carry out pogroms against Muslims in the wake of Islamic terrorism. The fact that these Muslim-bashing episodes are always just that — episodic, I mean — never seems to change their minds.Come on, Muhammad, it doesn't happen that often! Jeez, you guys are as bad as the blacks.
Remember the fear in the media prior to the release of Mel Gibson’s Passion of the Christ movie — that the film would set off anti-Jewish pogroms around the country? Didn’t happen, did they? The concern within media circles was real; I remember it well. And yet, it was absurd. I knew that at the time, as did just about every Christian.See, anti-Semitism is bullshit, too. Except in France, and whenever it's convenient to say so.
But this one's the jewel. Dreher starts out about how France suffers religious maniacs like the Hebdo assassins because it doesn't respect the authority of organized religion of the right kind anymore. Then:
I thought about that this weekend when I saw a photo of a blasphemously anti-Christian cover that Charlie Hebdo once published (it depicts the Holy Trinity having three-way anal sex). It would not occur to me that anyone should lay a hand on the Charlie Hebdo artists or editors who produced that filth...
But...Yeah, you knew there'd be a but (and its homophone! Keep reading!):
...But the decadence represented by Charlie Hebdo is probably a greater threat to Western civilization than anything the Islamists can dream up, and it’s important to keep that straight even as we defend the right to free expression and a free press.Why a greater threat? Because it belittles religions other than the One True? Ha ha, kidding! On and on about the horrible atheists and various Dissolutions of the Monasteries -- "This is what the party of Charlie Hebdo has done to France since 1789: murdered its Christian soul, and called it progress" -- until Dreher's agon reaches, or rather suddenly collides with, its logical conclusion:
Scrolling my Facebook feed last night, I found this New York magazine feature about the season premiere of HBO’s Girls, which featured a scene in which a man performs oral sex on his girlfriend’s anus. It turns out that this is a thing in pop culture now."In pop culture"? Please, nobody tell him. Also, Dreher has "an Orthodox Christian friend" who feels the exact same way about things: "He talks about how his parish is pretty faithful," says Dreher, "but so many of the kids raised in it still get sucked in and away from their faith by the culture of Lena Dunham, of Charlie Hebdo, and the rest." Sucked away! Christianity is licked! These two should do a podcast while Wachet Auf plays in the background, or vice-versa.
In the end, all the stupid atheists join ISIS and Rod is ascended into heaven in divine recognition of his faithful mopes. Four stars! (h/t Will Menaker)
HBO’s Girls, which featured a scene in which a man performs oral sex on his girlfriend’s anus. It turns out that this is a thing in pop culture now.
ReplyDeleteWell, you knew this was going to go mainstream once people got to see the White House Press Corps tickling W's prostate gland with their tongues for eight years.
Sucked away! Christianity is licked!
ReplyDeleteThat's not what was being sucked and licked, dammit!
I get Dreher's dismay that HIS religion is not being respected the way he thinks it should be. The problem, Rod, is that YOU don't get why adherents to other religions might feel the same way. However, I understand that people like you look at those who follow any other religion and think, "Well, they don't really believe that mumbo-jumbo! So that means their religion isn't real--not like mine!"
ReplyDelete...But the decadence represented by Charlie Hebdo is probably a greater threat to Western civilization than anything the Islamists can dream up, and it’s important to keep that straight even as we defend the right to free expression and a free press.
ReplyDeleteDinesh D'Souza was peddling a similar line of bullshit a few years back.
Seems some people criticized the movie, and the likes of the Catholic League reacted in their usual subdued fashion.
ReplyDeletehttp://www.catholicleague.org/the-passion-of-the-christ/
~
All I remember about it was that the critics rightly called it torture porn. It was an unhealthy film. I don't recall anybody linking it with the Oberammergau pageants, or the tendencies of that community, but the same people who were bussed in by their fundie congregations to watch that movie and buy the T-shirts were a big part of the cross-section of the supporters of torture under the Bush regime, if not the whole sickass crew.
ReplyDeleteAnother news flash for Rod, the religious right did more to bring ass-eating to the notice of the general public than Lena Dunham could ever hope to do:
ReplyDeletehttp://knowyourmeme.com/memes/eat-da-poo-poo
And ten years ago Andrew Sullivan was foaming at the mouth about how the traitorous coastal lefties were going to sell the USA out, too. Maybe if fewer of these neoconfederates held ideas that made people want to stab them they'd worry less about being stabbed in the back. But then they wouldn't have a good excuse to buy another handgun...
ReplyDeleteanti-Jewish pogroms around the country? Didn’t happen, did they? The concern within media circles was real; I remember it well.
ReplyDeleteReally? There was REAL CONCERN that movie-goers might organize a goddamn massacre of Jews? Sure. Seymour Hersh, Paul Krugman, Joel Siegel -- they all felt REAL CONCERN that blue-eyed good ol' boys would rush out of the AMC, grab brickbats, and riot down the Jewish streets. Smash up Canter's Deli! Burn copies of the New York Times, and, uh, hundreds of pairs of Levis!
Sure, Dreher,. Build a scarecrow, stuff it with all the straw you can find, and then carry it around while you yell that it proves you're right about everything, you village idiot. No one remembers 2004. Say whatever you want about how it went down.
Somebody check Amazon to see if Rod's "dubious consent" erotic Girls fanfic, A Chunky Trust-Fund Auteuse Forced Me Gay, has been released.
ReplyDeleteAh, dang. Darko -- I just made the same comment before seeing yours.
ReplyDeleteNo one thought the movie would bring on actual attacks on actual Jews because the fucking Christians in this country are too lazy to get out of their barcaloungers. But people certainly pointed to the history of the particular anti semitic tropes the movie was peddling and the fact that the Catholic Church as an institution had more or less officially abandoned that reading of the Martyrdom of Christ. Of course Mel Gibson turned out to come from the far right/latin mass/totally nuts strain of Catholicism which rejects every attempt to accommodate with the non believers, the jews, or anyone else. Plus: daddy issues. Those are the things that were discussed at the time.
ReplyDeleteThat's not Rod, that's Ross "Chunky Reese Witherspoon" Douthat.
ReplyDeleteAlthough maybe they are publishing it together as "Two NeckBeards/No Waiting."
ReplyDeleteI was going out with a young woman from Krakow at the time, and she saw the movie with a friend of hers. I saw her a few hours later, and she asked me if her eyes were red from crying. I immediately thought, "Not only is it a three hour movie about a guy being tortured and executed, but it's about a guy whose picture is on your wall getting tortured and executed... you kinda know the guy."
ReplyDeleteMan was I pissed at Mel Gibson!
ROFLMAO! Thanks for my daily guffaw!
ReplyDeleteIs the Pope catholic?
ReplyDeleteNot according to Mel!
Yes, exactly. But if Dreher wrote "people were annoyed that the movie resurrected awful tropes," how would it prove he was right? So he has to say "people said there'd be a Kristallnacht" so he can say, "but there wasn't!" Then he gets to be clearly right about everything and his opponents get to be demonstrably wrong about everything.
ReplyDeleteWhy's he got to believe and promote such an off-kilter view of the world? What's at stake in his tiny, sputtering little brain? I just don't get these guys.
and so dreher's point is clear--we must kill lena dunham.
ReplyDeleteThe truth is that [journalists] loathe ordinary unenlightened people more than they fear jihadists.Since the former are a genuine threat to the survival of our republic, and the latter aren't? These journalists are much more discerning than they usually appear.There is always this great unwashed mob of right-wing lunatics just looking for an excuse to carry out pogroms against Muslims in the wake of Islamic terrorism.I see Rob has read the comments at NRO and The American Conservative.
ReplyDeleteThe fact that these Muslim-bashing episodes are always just that — episodic, I mean — never seems to change their minds.Yeah, come on, it was only a couple of nights of window-smashing, tops.I found this New York magazine feature about the season premiere of HBO’s Girls.Oh, for ... You know, if I could be billionaire tech genius Tony Stark for a little while, I would do my damndest to create a legion of Dunhambots to fly around and hatefuck these right-wing asspimples, just to get it over with. [PLACE FILTHY-YET-BRILLIANT AGE OF ULTRON PUN HERE]
What's at stake? Everything! If the faintest bit of wrongthink penetrates his skull, his entire constructed reality may come crashing down.
ReplyDeleteThere is always this great unwashed mob of right-wing lunatics just looking for an excuse to carry out pogroms against Muslims in the wake of Islamic terrorism. The fact that these Muslim-bashing episodes are always just that — episodic, I mean — never seems to change their minds.
ReplyDeleteDreher's right -- we've only gone to two or three wars and killed a few hundred thousand of them, it's not like we stamped them out entirely. It's cyclical. Like the seasons.
Nothing is stopping Mr. Dreher from joining one of the monastic orders. Then he will no longer "need" to subject himself to the decadence of secular culture and can truly dedicate himself to the contemplation of Christ and prayer, instead of dedicating himself to complaining about shows on T.V. that he hates (but watches anyway). And no one will ever be subjected to that complaining either. It's win-win all around.
ReplyDelete[Stabs mind's eye repeatedly with metaphorical pencil]
ReplyDeleteDunham/Dreher/Douthat, the three-way that shocked America!
ReplyDelete...But the decadence represented by Charlie Hebdo is probably a greater
ReplyDeletethreat to Western civilization than anything the Islamists can dream up
Should have known that Dreher would take the side of the murderers.
Lena's gonna need a fluffer.
ReplyDeleteI dunno , man - you'd be making Ol' Prof. Reynolds's's's' wildest, mechano-sexual dreams come true.
ReplyDeleteRod doesn't want to follow the Rule of Benedict, he just wants to follow the Rule of Bein' a Dick.
ReplyDeleteI dunno, she looks kinda fluffy as it is.
ReplyDeleteNothing is stopping Mr. Dreher from joining one of the monastic orders.
ReplyDeleteThe orders do have standards, remember.
Sadly, the spirit is willing but the flesh is weak. Or something.
ReplyDeleteRod: When I’m going through [mono], I wake up feeling exhausted, routinely, which is a very weird feeling, and a depressing one if it lingers. I wish I could go off to a monastery somewhere, and live quietly in a cell for a couple of months, just to chill out and regain my health. But life.
http://www.theamericanconservative.com/dreher/to-sleep-finally/
In fairness, though, the movie was bearshit.
ReplyDeleteSadly, the spirit is willing but the flesh is weak.That's what she said.
ReplyDeleteI wish I could go off to a monastery somewhere, and live quietly in a
ReplyDeletecell for a couple of months, just to chill out and regain my health.
Rod has this impression that monasteries are catered luxury retreats, like hotel suites but without the temptation of the porn channel, rather than feckin' hard work.
I wish I could go off to a monastery somewhere, and live quietly in a cell for a couple of months, just to chill out and regain my health. but the monks told me not to come back after that month long crying jag and the feces sculptures.
ReplyDeleteThomas Merton said people get on your nerves even in monasteries. Dreher would be the monk who whined endlessly about Brother Andrew getting the better carrot patch and Brother John's snoring.
ReplyDeleteMouldy old joke from the early days of translation software: "The vodka's all right but the meat's gone off"
ReplyDeleteLena Dunham again!
ReplyDeleteWho knew she was so influential?
Evidently she's the center of the universe.
ReplyDeleteAt least he seems to understands what the Left/Right divide is between Charlie Hebdo and the fundamentalists who attacked it.
ReplyDeleteMuch of the Rightwing media seems confused on that point.
"Time for you to take a vow of silence, Brother. We'll, uh, let you know when it's up."
ReplyDeleteRod: But life.
ReplyDeleteDunham: Butt life!
Take a lesson from Girls, Dreher, and put your money where your mouth is.
it's about a guy whose picture is on your wall getting tortured and executed...Whoa, there, BBBB! Some of us haven't caught up on the latest season of Person of Interest.
ReplyDeletecan someone please eat his a... uh, show him the way?
ReplyDeleteI'm mildly disappointed that Roy didn't provide audio accompaniment.
ReplyDeletehttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YrEE1CoAcaY
You gotta tell me where to get those metaphorical pencils. I find myself reaching for real ones...
ReplyDeleteThese two should do a podcast while Wachet Auf plays in the background
ReplyDeleteOkay. NOW you've pissed me off... I'm generally a mild-mannered and polite old broad but when you start fcking with Wachet Auf all bets are off. It ain't often that we altos EVER get to sing a decent harmony line. LEAVE WACHET AUF ALOOOONE!!!111!!!11!
You can always go back to the past and insert one.
ReplyDelete"I thought about that this weekend when I saw a photo of a blasphemously
ReplyDeleteanti-Christian cover that Charlie Hebdo once published (it depicts the
Holy Trinity having three-way anal sex)."
I wish I could think of anything that happened in the Catholic Church that would inspire such a theme in a political cartoon. Color me stumped!
You know, I had a professor who lived in a monastery for a while, just because he wanted to know what it was like. It was some island in the Greek Dodecanese where monasteries are about all you're going to find - there is plenty of space and they do take in outsiders provided they're willing to follow the rules. I bring this up because Rod seems to be talking about this as though it were hypothetical and he couldn't really do it. Of course he could, he just doesn't want to enough.
ReplyDeleteI'll see that and raise by one Rammstein fat-suit video:
ReplyDeletehttp://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Y1st6O1tqII
"How do you solve a problem like Maria Lena?"
ReplyDeleteIn the same way that I'd never heard of Saul Alinsky until Glenn Beck started using him as a universal boogeyman, so too I'd never heard of Charlie Hebdo until a bunch if fundamentalist nutcases decided some cartoonists needed to die. I'm thinking of having a T-shirt with "Je Suis Saul Hebdo" on it as a One Statement Covers Everything sorta thing.
ReplyDeleteWell, there's the Trinity and the whole priests on altar boys thing, doncha know...
ReplyDeleteobligatory.
ReplyDeleteShorter Rod:
ReplyDelete"There's nothing but vulgar trash on TeeVee, and there are WAY too many commercial interruptions!"
Reading it laid out like that, it's amazing how much modern conservative scolds read like old-school Marxists. Two disparate schools of though, unified in their belief that the West is on the verge of collapsing beneath its own decadence.
ReplyDelete"This is what the party of Charlie Hebdo has done to France since 1789: murdered its Christian soul, and called it progress"
ReplyDeleteThis is what France--hell, Europe--looked like for a thousand years or so before 1789. And you want to go back to that. This is why I refer to them as reactionary.
It's all about the ass with these guys, always. I think ol' Siggie Freud would have had a hell of a time in the 21st.
ReplyDeleteCulture cons really love using that term "enlightened" as a pejorative, to the point where it's now beyond me what it's even supposed to mean. I guess those are the people who spend their weekends sipping $10 cocktails and going to shows, as opposed to sitting in the dark and thinking about analingus as good God-fearing folk do.
ReplyDeleteI may have to watch the show she appears in, just out of curiosity.
ReplyDeleteI mean, if she's that important and all...
Rod's right. The great unwashed mass of right wingers doesn't just sit around planning anti-Muslim pogroms. They've got their hands full keeping black people from voting or walking down the street. So far Islamophobia's been more of a hobby than anything.
ReplyDeleteThe violence of the French Revolution was bad...
ReplyDeleteThe violence of the crusade against the Cathars was fine...
Discuss
He meant to write "Whack it Off".
ReplyDeleteEat Rod's ass? Is that a euphemism for reading Rod's column?
ReplyDeleteSure: they are like cicadas and we are like cicada-killer. Its episodic means that we match their episodes with ours.
ReplyDeleteExactly this. He wants to consume inner peace like other people want to buy shit off Amazon.
ReplyDeleteKill them all, let god sort them out.
ReplyDeletethe Rule of Benedict
ReplyDeleteThe eggs go over the muffin.
I'm sure there are many weekend spirituality seekers who want the same thing, but most of them don't have their hands as full of stones when the sinners are brought out.
ReplyDeleteAnd don't forget that they're also VERY busy keeping their eyes (and hands) on our ladyparts just in case we might want to do something that we might enjoy.
ReplyDeleteput your money where your mouth is.
ReplyDeleteRolled up tightly, please.
Intelligent Design 101: If God wanted people to eat ass, He would have packed the anus with sensitive nerve endings.
ReplyDeletemost of them don't have their hands as full of stones
ReplyDeleteRod would like to throw smaller pebbles but they keep falling through the holes in his palms.
Like Douthat wants transcendence.
ReplyDeleteThat ain't stigmata.
ReplyDeleteAss Eaters Anonymous?
ReplyDeleteI assume the first step is admitting your powerlessness over rusty trombones.
"Remember the fear in the media prior to the release of Mel Gibson’s Passion of the Christ movie — that the film would set off anti-Jewish pogroms around the country?"
ReplyDeleteWhy no, I don't remember that at all. I need at least several citations, not some schmuck weigh a blog.
Perhaps there will be a market for my "Voulez-vouz Saul Hebdo avec moi?" T-shirts.
ReplyDeleteSimilarly, I'm guessing that Lena Dunham knew that the Rod Drehers of the world would have their tongues dripping wagging if she copied Sex and the City again and did a buttlicking episode. Some people are born marks.
ReplyDeleteI really just don't get this obsession about which body parts are being bumped together. I sorta get the leave it to beaver family structure as necessary to maintain modern civilization stuff. I don't agree, but I get that there's an argument in there somewhere that can sorta make a tiny bit of sense. But who cares where Ward wants to put his tongue, or where June might want him to?
ReplyDeleteWow. Standing athwart the French Revolution yelling "Stop!" In other words. None of this would have occurred if Louis XXXV were running things.
ReplyDeleteRod Drehers of the world would have their tongues wagging
ReplyDeleteIndeed they would.
that's moops not mopes pal!
ReplyDeleteI had a feeling you were going to start jonesin for the basement.
ReplyDelete... and such small portions!
ReplyDeleteSeriously.
ReplyDeleteI was never even the slightest bit curious what Ward and June did behind closed doors. What difference does it make?
It takes a prodigious amount of fapping to wear holes through your palms. But for a man of Rod's faith, what is life without suffering?
ReplyDeleteWhat's at stake?
ReplyDeleteHERETICS.
Hence the reference to Lena. I get it now...
ReplyDeleteThat person on the cover, could it be...?
ReplyDeletehttp://rue89.nouvelobs.com/sites/news/files/assets/image/2012/11/unecharliehebdoeglisecatholique.jpg
ReplyDeleteI think “Bück Dich" would be keeping more with the theme.
ReplyDeleteI have gone and would have continued to go my whole life without hearing about Lena Dunham getting her salad tossed if it weren't for Rod. So what the hell is wrong with Rod Dreher's facebook friends that I have to hear about it now?
ReplyDeletewhat the hell is wrong with Rod Dreher's facebook friends that I have to hear about it now?
ReplyDeleteThere. Fixed that for you.
After looking it up on YouTube, I realized that I know this tune. It's "Sleepers Awake."
ReplyDeletehttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=F4OrJW18ZyQ
Absolutely lovely.
Reviews:
ReplyDeleteI gave this "contradiction IS the resolution " gift pack two stars, because I couldn't see any difference in the way people treated me afterwards. In fact, they kept calling me a smug asshole.
R Dreher, LA.
You're just saying that because you weren't the one who was raped by a roving band Cossacks.
ReplyDeleteHow soon we forget.
Only the universe Rod lives in. It's a very scary place.
ReplyDeleteStoryboard for Lena Dunham's spinoff "Dudes".
ReplyDeleteI'm a sucker for choral music, and particularly when it's done well by students:
ReplyDeleteLovely!
The Republicans are down to scoring these by the number of dead. I've actually had the discussion about "The enlightenment has produced more casualties". They are completely, remorselessly stupid.
ReplyDeleteWow, that IS nice.
ReplyDeleteThanks for the link.
Maybe some day somebody will 'splain me how to actually post a video! (Glad you enjoyed it. I thought it was lovely.)
ReplyDeleteYeah, what's the over/under on the number of times Rod read that description of the scene from "Girls"? 8?
ReplyDeleteJust put the URL in, and the video will embed itself. There's no need to use the embed code.
ReplyDeleteInfluenced much by R. Crumb? Keep on truckin'...
ReplyDeleteNot until you take that tie off, Ward. It's a nightmare getting shit out of silk.
ReplyDeleteDon't you know that The Pasty LIttle Putz's name is a trigger for some of us?
ReplyDeleteSee also Genovese, Eugene D.
ReplyDeleteWard's little fellers managed to swim up June's birth-a-majig at least twice. That's all we need to know, really.
ReplyDeleteThere was talk that Beav was Whitey's child. Hush money was exchanged.
ReplyDeleteWard raised him as his own, but everyone in the neighborhood noticed he was a little stricter with the bastard. He thought about going to a monastery, but life.
Opus Dei is arming up as we speak...
ReplyDeleteSmegmata
ReplyDeleteIn the end, all the stupid atheists join ISIS...just like on Michel Houllebecq's latest novel.
ReplyDeleteThere is no cup big enough.
ReplyDeleteRoy: In the end, all the stupid atheists join ISIS and Rod is ascended into heaven in divine recognition of his faithful mopes.
ReplyDelete"...in divine recognition of his faithful mopes...." [slowly stands and claps in sincere admiration for this brilliant transliteration of Dreher's inner melodrama]
But to this day, Moulitsa's fiends still roam the Internet assaulting women with random pies.
ReplyDelete... what with those vulgar cartoonists killing people right left and center with their nasty pichers!
ReplyDeleteI bet "The Far Side" really spooked him.
After looking at a couple of Hedbo's cartoons I had no interest in looking at any more. Nor did I wish to kill him, or ban his stuff. So I guess I'm one of them there hypocrite-lieberals, huh?
ReplyDeleteWhy on earth would anyone sit in the dark thinking about Ireland's national airline?
ReplyDeleteIYKWIMAITYD.
ReplyDeleteCheck out these satirical cartoons of Madame de Pompadour:
ReplyDeletehttp://www.historytoday.com/blog/2011/11/slideshow-obscene-portrayals-madame-de-pompadour
Vulgar & obscene wasn't invented in the 21st century!
I get 'em confused too.
ReplyDelete"Ross Doubthat!"
ReplyDeleteSlowly I turned... step by step....
Dunham is the Gruber of cable sitcoms.
ReplyDeleteThe Dunham/Gruber effect.
go back to the past and insert one
ReplyDeleteOffer only valid for R. A. Heinlein characters.
IYKWIMAITYD.
ReplyDeleteIf God wanted people to eat ass,He would have made his most fanatical followers more delicious.
ReplyDeleteOne of the more controversial aspects was representing the Holy Spirit with one of those doodads you use to rack up billiard balls.
ReplyDeleteI think it was actually Allison Williams who got her salad tossed, but your point stands.
ReplyDeleteAlso too, despite what Dutchmen may tell you, Hollandais sauce does not require their contributions.
ReplyDeleteAnnuit cœptis
ReplyDeletehttp://www.topix.com/forum/city/st-francisville-la/T3LKNF4VRFS01LE
ReplyDeleteLate, no time to read, so I'm probably gonna do what I usually do, but, WTF...
ReplyDeleteBut the decadence represented by Charlie Hebdo is probably a greater
threat to Western civilization than anything the Islamists can dream up
Um, what? These "Islamists" of yours--terrorist murderers to the rest of us--you know what they "dream up"? They dream up fucking dead bodies. They dream up shredded 10 year-old girls who probably had no fucking idea why their coats were so damn heavy. (I could get behind a Global War on *those* assholes, for sure).
But you know why he's so pissed at the French? Other than that they're French, I mean. He, and the rest of the nutbag Right, hate that France showed us how to deal with terrorists. You call the fucking cops. Oh, and that Muslim dude that saved the store full of Jewish shoppers? The Rightbloggers are probably trying to dox his ass as we speak.
Hollandaise, Hollandaise, Hollandaise
ReplyDeleteNow, I feel the pain of growin' old, I hear voices in the rain
ReplyDeleteI see a vision of doubt that keeps rollin' through my God's eyes
When he calls out my name each time that I complain
Seems like I rolled bigger stones than them
Seems like I roll bigger stones
"...while Wachet Auf plays in the background..."
ReplyDeleteWouldn't it be more appropriate to have Mozart's "Leck Mich Im Arsch" (Canon in B flat for 6 Voices, K. 231 / K. 382c)?
That's how the missionaries do it.
ReplyDeletethe far right/latin mass/totally nuts strain of Catholicism which rejects every attempt to accommodate with the non believers
ReplyDeleteWhat a coincidence! That just happens to be the very same strain that Rod Dreher belongs to!
And now for your listening pleasure, here's Rod Dreher and the Opus Dei Band performing their signature number, Ressentimental Journey.
ReplyDeleteOne of his homies is claiming his ass interest got started in high school:
ReplyDeletehttp://www.topix.com/forum/city/st-francisville-la/T3LKNF4VRFS01LETV#c8
I would rather be rimmed by my cat than consider a world with two of him.
ReplyDeleteI'll admit that I, too, have hate-watched Girls. Though I'm reasonably sure the things I hate about it don't overlap with Dreher's list.
ReplyDeleteI would do so, but only with reservations.
ReplyDelete"Enlightened" signifies everything that loath about the present condition. Enlightened people do not use racial epithets, nor tell jokes about retards, nor think women should be disenfranchised and kept pregnant. Enlightened people do not think the Bible is the literal word of God, nor do they think the Constitution cast in stone as though the world has not changed since its adoption.
ReplyDeleteSo, yeah--"enlightened" is a bad thing in their view. Though I suspect that many people like Dreher watch reruns of Hee-Haw and think it's a documentary.
To such great minds, it is obvious that someone making fun of their ideas is far more of an existential threat than someone actually killing people.
ReplyDeletePerspective: How does that work>
They only WISH they could get their hands on ladyparts. I think half the problem is that they can't find any women who are actually willing and eager to sleep with them, hence the obsession with sex and slut shaming.
ReplyDeleteFor a lot--perhaps most--of these moral scolds, there are probably Maytags filled with crusty gym socks and afternoons of crushing guilt.
The truth is that [journalists] loathe ordinary unenlightened people more than they fear jihadists.
ReplyDeleteSpeaking as an actual journalist for whom this is 100% true, it is true because we are SURROUNDED by ordinary unenlightened people, some of whom are our own peers (see: any mouthbreathing "voice of the suburbs" boomer columnist).
I am afraid of jihadists, if that makes the Divining Rod feel better, though if we're ranking our fears they're somewhere in between "being struck by lightning" and "supercollider accident" for me.
Annuit cœptisIYKWIMAITYD.
ReplyDeleteSomething to do with going around the world.
ReplyDeleteRemember the fear in the media prior to the release of Mel Gibson’s Passion of the Christ movie
ReplyDeleteNo.
If memory serves a few very sensitive Christians flopped around like landed fish because they were worried the movie wouldn't be respeeeeeeectful. Perhaps he's getting it confused with public reaction to Mel Gibson's anti-Semitic tirade when he was pulled over for a DUI.
Yes, I've been thinking right wing support for CH would dry up once they took a look at the its body of work.
ReplyDelete"Har har! They made fun of Moohamed!"
"Har har, another one!"
"Har har - Hey! Is that Jesus??"
And if no-one has called the rightbloggers a bunch of fucking doxies yet, well...they have now!
ReplyDeleteThe long-term violence that led to the French Revolution is a state to be regained
ReplyDeleteThere was talk that Eddie Haskell was John Holmes, too, which would have made the Beav Johnnie's Wad.
ReplyDeleteAnd I won't even bring up June's pearl necklaces...
Of course they love aristocracies. They cannot imagine that they would be anything other than aristocrats. The thought that they would be serfs and peasants in grinding poverty like the rest of us has never crossed their mind.
ReplyDeleteTo all those hypocritical fucks who have been saying "We Are Charlie Hebdo", imagine if an American publication dared to print the above cartoon. The collective freakout from Bill O'Reilly, Bill Donohue and the rest of the Christian Victimization Industrial Complex would be palpable. No one outside of Larry Flynt would touch this, so what the hell is everyone in the "Land of the Free" talking about. A couple of weeks ago, ND Tyson was taken to task for a mild joke. We are not Charlie Hebdo.
ReplyDeleteGives a whole new meaning to the boom - bust cycle.
ReplyDeleteEver watch HBO's Rome? Between that and Saylor's Roma Sub Rosa books, it's pretty clear that, even if ancient Rome didn't invent XXX graffiti, they surely enjoyed it...
ReplyDeleteAsking someone to "take one for the team" is asking a hell of a lot, and that's just asking some poor schmuck to lean into a pitch. The stakes would have to be considerably higher to make asking for someone to perform that particular service remotely acceptable.
ReplyDeleteSrsly. Maybe it's a French thing, but I don't get caricaturing every religious figure in history with teh buttsex (also too the gratuitous sexism and homophobia). I predict their circulation will rise briefly, then settle back to whatever is normal for them with their core constituency.
ReplyDeleteBroad City is miles better than Girls, though the wingnut closet-cases haven't discovered it yet.
ReplyDeleteAt the risk of repeating myself, the Xians are damn lucky it was Pontius Pilate, and not Vlad...
ReplyDeleteThe fact that these gay-bashing episodes are always just that — episodic, I mean — never seems to change their minds.
ReplyDeleteIf he hasn't typed it that way yet, he probably will.
And since Ted Bundy didn't kill all those women at once, the death sentence was probably a bit harsh...
going out with a young woman from Krakow
ReplyDeletewas this on the road between Milan and Minsk?
Believe it or not, I've known conservatives who were surprised to discover Betty Boop cartoons. They were stunned that something sexy in the media was made so long ago.
ReplyDeleteIt's taken as common knowledge among many on the Right that decadence in our society is kind of a new thing, and that the "Good Ol' Days" looked like a Thomas Kinkade painting. Everybody went to church and you didn't even have to lock your door at night.
There's that, and then there's its usefulness as a club to wield against all things Obama:
ReplyDeleteHe didn't go to Paris.*
He's thinking of letting Gitmo detainees go**.
The fact that CH makes fun of Christians proves Obama is a Muslim***.
*If he had gone to Paris, he would be grandstanding and probably taking yet another vacation on the taxpayers' dime.
**President John McCain, President Lindsey Graham, and Secretary of State Kelly Ayotte all went after Obama for thinking about letting the Gitmo guys go when the Paris attack means the Gitmo guys are somehow involved in masterminding the attack. Or something.
***Already bounding around the Rightwing Wurlitzer--because Obama didn't leap into stage in his underwear screaming "ISLAMIC TERRORISTS!!!!!!!!!!!!!!" upon first hearing that something happened in France.
...But the decadence represented by Charlie Hebdo is probably a greater threat to Western civilization than anything the Islamists can dream up
ReplyDeleteUm ---- no, it's probably not.
Seriously, I hate Weaselspeak.
Yeah, that's what I think, too.
ReplyDeleteI could be wrong but if memory serves that the period when the Roman Empire was at it's utter height of decadence (orgies, fired hummingbirds and Peacock tongues for dinner and all that) was also known to history as the "Pax Romana" and that the western empire fell after adopting Christianity as the state religion. Not really sure if either two events are related (Gibbon did think the fall of Rome was Christianity's fault by the by) but it's instructive to remember that when these folks start flinging about the word decadence and suggesting the collapse of western civilization is just around the corner .
ReplyDeleteOur culture is truly in a race to the bottom.
ReplyDeleteThe fact that lynchings were always episodic demonstrates the non-existence of racism.
ReplyDeleteI think it's because they weren't getting any action in the 1930s. They can't imagine that anyone else was either. It's the same consistent failure of empathy that they display in every other aspect of their lives.
ReplyDeleteAs a billiards player, I am offended.
ReplyDeleteAnd every light bulb was 500 watts.
ReplyDeleteI suspect Rod would more likely be some grubbing obsequious courtier, always kissing up and kicking down, always hyper alert to his status on the social ladder, always aware of his precarious position on it, always afraid of falling off it and having to do real work for his living. So, no difference.
ReplyDelete"[Dreher's Orthodox Christian friend] talks about how his parish is pretty faithful," says Dreher, "but so many of the kids raised in it still get sucked in and away from their faith by the culture of Lena Dunham, of Charlie Hebdo, and the rest."
ReplyDeleteMaybe MY values and lifestyle choices are, in the eyes of today's youth, less kewl than being a literal butt-munch -- I don't know. I guess not having kids means I don't have to worry. Well, I'll worry, but about whether these butt-munchin' youngsters will fix our messes. If they get sucked away from Me in that process, fine.
I'm confused: are you referring to Genevese when he was an avowed Marxist, or his later flirtation with being a rightwingist; of course both isms share a contempt for liberals.
ReplyDeleteOffensensitivy...
ReplyDeleteThere are some Neolithic cave drawings/paintings that would probably make Rod fall over dead.
ReplyDeleteFace it: Sex feels waaaay too good for people to not want to ogle the sexy bits.
Kids have been rebelling against their parents' views on pretty much everything since they invented parents. The Faithful Right needs someone to blame it on, and guess who they picked. I know you're as shocked as I was when i figured it out...
ReplyDeleteBoth--his going from old-school Marxism to paleoconservatism without missing a beat.
ReplyDeleteSeasonal pogroms. Sounds so farm to table, somehow.
ReplyDeleteimprobable premises
ReplyDeleteI hope you are not referring to the Riddled office building.
Rod's just jealous 'cause he's a giant asshole and nobody has ever stuck their tongue in him.
ReplyDeleteScrolling my Facebook feed last night
ReplyDeleteNEW EUPHEMISM
I want to take this comment and uhm, hmm. There's nothing in particular I want with do to, or with, this comment but I did give it an upvote.
ReplyDeleteAnalingus is Rod Dreher's mother tongue. Every asshole is born speaking it.
ReplyDeleteI was exposed to just enough Fox News today to make the connection. It's kinda stupid (natch) but it goes like this: Al Qaeda in Yemen took credit for the attack in Paris; many of the remaining prisoners in Gitmo are Yemeni*; there is a 30% recidivism rate among prisoners released from Gitmo,* ergo, talking about the release of prisoners from Guantanamo Bay is just like getting gay married to Islamic** Terrorism. That was the gist of it, anyway.
ReplyDelete*According to Fox.
**The only kind, really.
Good catch. I didn't even notice the milquetoast 'probably' in there. Why can't Rod fully commit to his bold notion that 'degenerate' cartoonists are a greater existential threat to Western Civilization™ than religious fundamentalists? I would almost say it's because he's self-aware enough to realize he's part of the problem, but it's more likely that he threw it in there to fend off the angry emails about how the Muslins are out to convert us to Shania Law.
ReplyDeleteHow in hell do you become an adult without hearing about--or seeing--Betty? Did the Cons secretly discover star travel, and start raising their get on on Planet Derp in the Horseass nebula?
ReplyDeleteAnd nobody cared because electricity was Too Cheap to Meter...
ReplyDeleteEspecially in 3D...
ReplyDeleteThey have wet dreams about taking a gun to a knife fight...
ReplyDeleteI know when I'm licked. All over...
ReplyDeleteRod and most of the modern American rightwingers would be scrambling to be named tax collectors if France still the Le Ancien Regime. They'd drop their anti-tax stance in a heartbeat once they learned that they could personally profit from being tax collectors.
ReplyDeleteBut such is the life of principle for a dedicated conservative!
Where all the best seats are in the tail.
ReplyDeleteThis is the South.
ReplyDeleteMany of the people in the rural areas home-school their children, and many refuse cable television in an effort to keep out the decadence. Such people culturally isolate themselves and their families voluntarily. That doesn't make them unintelligent necessarily... I've known men who could take a truck apart and put it back together but stare blankly at you if you mention a common reference from pop culture.