(Consider this a continuation of the post here.)
5. Incel
Ever since Elliot Rodger, SJW's have been using this slur to insult every man who dares to disagree with their opinions on pop culture. But like "alt-right," "incel" describes a fringe group of radicals with a clear ideology. Actual incels believe they are failing in the dating rat race because women are shallow bitches who just want attractive "chads" with money and fast cars. People who hate The Last Jedi or Captain Marvel, on the other hand, are often happily attached men with kids -- or, shocker of shockers, they're women.
Sorry to be crude, but last time I checked, I had tits and a vag. And yet - and yet! - when I went to see Captain Marvel, I found it to be, at best, an aggressively average hodgepodge of ideas that could've been good if their treatment had been more than cursory. Carol's discovering that she's been fighting on the wrong side of an intergalactic war all this time, for example, could've led to some intense guilt and soul searching that would've made her interesting as a character; instead, the twist in question is just thrown in there without any exploration of its implications. Similarly, the movie never really gives you a chance to appreciate the past relationship between Carol and Mar-Vell; thus, when Mar-Vell dies, there's no emotional impact.
When it comes to recent female-led superhero movies, I believe Wonder Woman is far superior to Captain Marvel. Not that Wonder Woman is perfect, mind you; I do think the development of the romance between Diana and Trevor is oddly abrupt. But on the whole, Wonder Woman is a more unified, more epic story. Hell, even Wonder Woman's score leaves Captain Marvel's 90's nostalgia in the dust.
So, SJW's: Given that I fiercely disagree with you and yet cannot, by definition, be an incel, isn't it possible that those hated men on YouTube also don't like the things that you like for perfectly valid reasons that have nothing to do with sexual frustration and misogyny?
6. Educate Yourself
Whenever an SJW makes an over-the-top claim that, say, they "struggle to survive" every day in a country that's irredeemably -ist and filled with -ism, their favorite way to worm out of explaining what they mean is to spit that their doubters are not entitled to their "emotional labor" and that, instead, said skeptics should "educate themselves." What a diabolically clever way to render their worldview impervious to critique!
Of course, we should never feel guilty for asking for evidence whenever one of these ideologues alleges something extraordinary. We should never feel guilty because most of their assertions are patently ridiculous. It's reasonable to say, for instance, that police officers are more suspicious of black men for reasons that are complex and generally not conscious and that perhaps this should be mitigated by better training or more community involvement. It is not reasonable, however, to say that, in 2019, racist police are routinely gunning innocent black men down in the streets and that therefore all black men should be in constant fear for their lives. It's horrific whenever a genuinely innocent black man is killed by the cops, but it turns out such cases are pretty rare -- so rare, in fact, that the Washington Post has to add clearly justified killings to its database to maintain the left's preferred narrative.
We lead remarkably comfortable, safe lives here in the United States; vanishingly few of us are actually "struggling to survive" in any real sense. Does that mean there aren't still ways we can improve? Of course not. But if you're a well-dressed, well-groomed college student with an iPhone, I consider it my right to question you when you scream that you feel endangered -- and if all you can do is condescendingly tell me to "educate myself," I'm going to dismiss you as delusional. I'm not obligated to believe you're oppressed simply because you say so.
7. White Privilege/Systemic White Supremacy
Since #MyWhitePrivilege is trending on Twitter this weekend, let's talk about why the left's obsession with this concept is both aggravating and unhelpful.
First of all, many supposed "white privileges" don't even exist. Nude bras and Band-Aids don't match my almost translucent Northern European skin tone. And I hate to break it to you, but unless you're named "Mike Smith" or something, whiteness won't necessarily protect you from the horror of having your name mispronounced. Trust me: When I was growing up, my last name (whose first syllable rhymes with "cow") became "Saunders", "Sounders", or "Sooders" during many a roll-call. I shudder to think what might've happened if I were Polish or Czech!
Secondly, "white privilege" is often better described as majority privilege. If you are one of the few people of color in a majority white society, then yes: often times, you will be the only non-white individual in the room and you will feel like the odd man out. But most of the time, this imbalance is not malicious, and your feeling of "otherness" is not being purposefully imposed upon you; it's just the result of a combination of raw chance and your own insecurity. How do I know this? Because, thanks to the unique demographics of my neighborhood, I've been the only white person in the room many times and have also experienced that sense of being on display as some sort of exotic specimen. Don't worry: the feeling eventually goes away if you don't dwell on it.
Then, of course, there are the "white privileges" that are really just indicators that you're rich. Yes, some white people have gotten off lightly for criminal behavior that would guarantee prison time for others. But as Jussie Smollett has taught us, you don't have to be white to escape sixteen felony charges despite the overwhelming evidence arrayed against you; you just have to have connections. By the same token, the fact that a white kid can slip into an Ivy League school despite less-than-stellar credentials as long as his parents pull out their checkbook and make a phone call is also not evidence of his "white privilege"; an equally white coal-miner's son in West Virginia certainly can't pull off the same cheat.
And lastly, there are the "privileges" that are the consequences of people's good choices. I had no control over the fact that my parents were happily married and invested in the education of their two children, so yes, in that sense, I suppose I am privileged. But that doesn't have anything to do with my being white. As it turns out, Asians have even lower unmarried birthrates than whites, and they're kicking our asses when it comes to median income and educational attainment. Are Asians the beneficiaries of "white privilege" and "white supremacy"? That's a bizarre proposition in light of the Chinese Exclusion Act, "yellow peril," and the Japanese internment.
I'm not suggesting here that there aren't some lingering racial issues that require thoughtful response (see my comment above regarding police bias). What I am suggesting is that SJW's radically oversimplify what's happening instead of examining the complex truth and crafting reality-based solutions.
Of course, clinging to a simple, univariate explanation for apparent racial disparities makes it a hell of a lot easier to gin up conflict and seize power for yourself.
Sunday, March 31, 2019
Wednesday, March 27, 2019
Geeky Recommendations, 3/27/19
Books
Ella Minnow Pea: A Novel in Letters, Mark Dunn
The main characters in this epistolary novel live in a fictional island nation that has organized its religion around the composer of the sentence "The quick, brown fox jumps over the lazy dog", which - as you know, I'm sure - contains all 26 letters of the alphabet. When letters start dropping off the nation's monument to this sentence, the governing council, in its infinite lack of wisdom, decides that the island's revered icon is commanding everyone from beyond the grave to stop using the missing letters. As time goes on and more essential letters are lost, life on the island becomes increasingly repressive -- and communication becomes virtually impossible.
Dunn handles the conceit of his premise in an able and engaging way. Eventually, he does have to cheat and use homophones once too many letters have been lost for him to proceed with his plot, but no matter: the theme here is remarkably timely.
Today I Am Carey, Martin L. Shoemaker
This novel is an expansion of Shoemaker's award-winning short story "Today I Am Paul", in which an android is tasked with caring for a patient with dementia. Here, Shoemaker follows the android over several decades as he/she integrates into a family and becomes progressively self-aware.
To quote my review on Amazon: "This is a quiet, beautiful SF novel that gets the essence of love exactly right. While it may frustrate the reader who is more action-oriented, I was hooked from the start by the title character and the well-drawn family who welcome him/her into their home and their lives. If you're looking for slice-of-life sci fi written with competence and, even more importantly, humanity, this is the book for you!"
(By the way, I see now that another reviewer has compared this novel to "Flowers for Algernon." I believe this comparison is apt.)
Comics
Saga (Vol. 1), Brian K. Vaughan & Fiona Staples
From the blurb: "SAGA is the sweeping tale of one young family fighting to find their place in the worlds. When two soldiers from opposite sides of a never-ending galactic war fall in love, they risk everything to bring a fragile new life into a dangerous old universe."
My impression: I doubt the creators of this series share my views on art or politics, but it doesn't - and shouldn't - matter. The story, at least so far, is very well told. I particularly like the balance between Marko's pacifism and Alana's more belligerent, defensive stance -- but even the other characters (including the narrator, their child) have voices that are distinct and interesting to read.
One caveat, though: Don't give this trade to your kids. The language, violence, and sexual content is quite explicit.
Fighting American & Fighting American: The Ties That Bind,
Gorden Rennie, Duke Mighten, & Andie Tong
These two trades take an old Jack Kirby hero from the 1950's and transport him to the modern day -- quite literally, through time travel. They are also a veritable workshop on how to do humor correctly. The story takes the piss out of Fighting American's earnestness (and the superhero genre in general), but it also makes fun of conspiracy theories, the news media, the alt-right, and - delightfully - communists. In every way, the satire is balanced, fun, and written with love rather than mean-spiritedness.
Weeb Stuff
My Love Story!! (Vol. 1), Kazune Kawahara & Aruko
I didn't think I'd like this shōjo romance (the two exclamation points in the title were a huge red flag), but gosh darn it, it charmed me anyway. First, I love that the big, awkward main character gets the girl by being heroic and properly masculine. Second, their budding love is so damned pure. At one point, the girl is ashamed because she wants to hold hands, for goodness' sake! Such a thing would never fly in our own over-sexualized, cynical culture -- which is why it's so refreshing.
From Far Away (Vol. 1), Kyoko Hikawa
This older portal fantasy is also deeply counter-cultural -- and therefore fresh. When Noriko is transported suddenly into a bizarre parallel world, she isn't instantly competent. Instead, she's fearful and struggles to make sense of her new surroundings. But we can see even in this early stage that she has the intelligence to be a heroine when she eventually calms down and starts learning the locals' language. I can't wait to see where the story goes from here!
Ella Minnow Pea: A Novel in Letters, Mark Dunn
The main characters in this epistolary novel live in a fictional island nation that has organized its religion around the composer of the sentence "The quick, brown fox jumps over the lazy dog", which - as you know, I'm sure - contains all 26 letters of the alphabet. When letters start dropping off the nation's monument to this sentence, the governing council, in its infinite lack of wisdom, decides that the island's revered icon is commanding everyone from beyond the grave to stop using the missing letters. As time goes on and more essential letters are lost, life on the island becomes increasingly repressive -- and communication becomes virtually impossible.
Dunn handles the conceit of his premise in an able and engaging way. Eventually, he does have to cheat and use homophones once too many letters have been lost for him to proceed with his plot, but no matter: the theme here is remarkably timely.
Today I Am Carey, Martin L. Shoemaker
This novel is an expansion of Shoemaker's award-winning short story "Today I Am Paul", in which an android is tasked with caring for a patient with dementia. Here, Shoemaker follows the android over several decades as he/she integrates into a family and becomes progressively self-aware.
To quote my review on Amazon: "This is a quiet, beautiful SF novel that gets the essence of love exactly right. While it may frustrate the reader who is more action-oriented, I was hooked from the start by the title character and the well-drawn family who welcome him/her into their home and their lives. If you're looking for slice-of-life sci fi written with competence and, even more importantly, humanity, this is the book for you!"
(By the way, I see now that another reviewer has compared this novel to "Flowers for Algernon." I believe this comparison is apt.)
Comics
Saga (Vol. 1), Brian K. Vaughan & Fiona Staples
From the blurb: "SAGA is the sweeping tale of one young family fighting to find their place in the worlds. When two soldiers from opposite sides of a never-ending galactic war fall in love, they risk everything to bring a fragile new life into a dangerous old universe."
My impression: I doubt the creators of this series share my views on art or politics, but it doesn't - and shouldn't - matter. The story, at least so far, is very well told. I particularly like the balance between Marko's pacifism and Alana's more belligerent, defensive stance -- but even the other characters (including the narrator, their child) have voices that are distinct and interesting to read.
One caveat, though: Don't give this trade to your kids. The language, violence, and sexual content is quite explicit.
Fighting American & Fighting American: The Ties That Bind,
Gorden Rennie, Duke Mighten, & Andie Tong
These two trades take an old Jack Kirby hero from the 1950's and transport him to the modern day -- quite literally, through time travel. They are also a veritable workshop on how to do humor correctly. The story takes the piss out of Fighting American's earnestness (and the superhero genre in general), but it also makes fun of conspiracy theories, the news media, the alt-right, and - delightfully - communists. In every way, the satire is balanced, fun, and written with love rather than mean-spiritedness.
Weeb Stuff
My Love Story!! (Vol. 1), Kazune Kawahara & Aruko
I didn't think I'd like this shōjo romance (the two exclamation points in the title were a huge red flag), but gosh darn it, it charmed me anyway. First, I love that the big, awkward main character gets the girl by being heroic and properly masculine. Second, their budding love is so damned pure. At one point, the girl is ashamed because she wants to hold hands, for goodness' sake! Such a thing would never fly in our own over-sexualized, cynical culture -- which is why it's so refreshing.
From Far Away (Vol. 1), Kyoko Hikawa
This older portal fantasy is also deeply counter-cultural -- and therefore fresh. When Noriko is transported suddenly into a bizarre parallel world, she isn't instantly competent. Instead, she's fearful and struggles to make sense of her new surroundings. But we can see even in this early stage that she has the intelligence to be a heroine when she eventually calms down and starts learning the locals' language. I can't wait to see where the story goes from here!
Sunday, March 24, 2019
Another Week That Was
A Civics Lesson
Quick question: In the late 1780's, when the US Constitution was written and ratified after lengthy argument, which state was the most populous? Children?
Yes, that's right, Sarah: my home state of Virginia. Virginia was enormously influential during this period; except for my boy John Adams, all of the first five presidents were Virginian. But for certain strictures (ahem), Virginia could've used its bigness and reputation to curb stomp little states like Rhode Island and Delaware and drive the entire country according to its interests. Given that Virginia was a slave state, how do you think that would've turned out?
Thank the holy God that the Framers had the wisdom to realize that a nation ruled by Virginia and its allies was less than ideal. Thank the holy God that they therefore created institutions like the Senate and the Electoral College to kneecap the tyrannical majority and force politicians to appeal to national - rather than regional - concerns.
Right now, roughly a fifth of the US population is rural. If we switch to a national popular vote - or dispense with the Senate - this minority will be effectively silenced. If you are among those agitating for the complete destruction of our republic, I beg you to reconsider. You would never treat any other minority of comparable (or even smaller) size in this manner.
Our federal system, with all of its weird complications and roadblocks, was born of careful deliberation and years of assiduous examination of human history. Forgive me, then, if I trust it more than the fanciful ideas of ill-educated Current Year politicians and activists who are pissed they lost an election.
Regarding the Importance of Careful Deliberation...
The message of this video needs to be tattooed on certain people's eyeballs.
No, it's not admirable that New Zealand is rushing to confiscate guns, ban books, and squelch speech after Christchurch. It is, in fact, yet another terrifying demonstration of the importance of our Constitution and its Bill of Rights.
In Other News: Dissatisfied Fans Are Not "Entitled Manbabies"
Last night, I saw another manifestation of this attitude in a Facebook group I follow, and to be quite blunt, I'm fucking sick of it. If you're a game developer, a comic book writer or artist, a genre film maker, or any other creator in pop geekdom, you are not some grand ah-teest who can spit on his audience and do whatever the hell he wants. Dial the arrogance way, way back, bucko. You are, effectively, a guy in a rubber mask screaming at a green screen like it's chasing him. And if you're working with an established IP - as many of you are - you're playing with something that, ultimately, is not yours to "fundamentally transform".
Do the fans want you to do the same thing over and over again? No: just to take one example, the principal critique I've seen of Star Wars Episode VII: The Force Awakens is that it's a weaker copy of A New Hope that strips out all the struggle of the original story. In other words, what we hate about the film in question is that it lacked creativity and heart -- not that it failed to perfectly replicate something we've already seen. So go ahead: as long as you respect the history of the IP you're borrowing, you can - and should - tell an entirely new story. We love evolution; what we don't like is rupture. 1990's Star Trek? Good. Rian Johnson's Star Wars? Bad.
Do the fans want you to completely avoid political themes? No, this is another strawman. What we hate is inorganic, in-your-face politics that stacks the deck in favor of one worldview. What we hate is boring, predictable politics; we hate the thousands of "Orange Man Bad"/"America is -ist and -phobic" stories that all unfold in identical fashion and therefore are never insightful and never surprise. What we love are things like DS9's "In the Hands of the Prophets," which tackles the theme of science versus religion in a manner that respects (and reveals the flaws of) both sides.
Do the fans hate diversity? No: we hate toxic diversity.
I don't think fans have the right to completely control what creators do. I respect artistic freedom. But the vast majority of fans aren't asking for that power. What we're asking for is craft and professionalism. Within those boundaries, multitudes can exist.
Quick question: In the late 1780's, when the US Constitution was written and ratified after lengthy argument, which state was the most populous? Children?
Yes, that's right, Sarah: my home state of Virginia. Virginia was enormously influential during this period; except for my boy John Adams, all of the first five presidents were Virginian. But for certain strictures (ahem), Virginia could've used its bigness and reputation to curb stomp little states like Rhode Island and Delaware and drive the entire country according to its interests. Given that Virginia was a slave state, how do you think that would've turned out?
Thank the holy God that the Framers had the wisdom to realize that a nation ruled by Virginia and its allies was less than ideal. Thank the holy God that they therefore created institutions like the Senate and the Electoral College to kneecap the tyrannical majority and force politicians to appeal to national - rather than regional - concerns.
Right now, roughly a fifth of the US population is rural. If we switch to a national popular vote - or dispense with the Senate - this minority will be effectively silenced. If you are among those agitating for the complete destruction of our republic, I beg you to reconsider. You would never treat any other minority of comparable (or even smaller) size in this manner.
Our federal system, with all of its weird complications and roadblocks, was born of careful deliberation and years of assiduous examination of human history. Forgive me, then, if I trust it more than the fanciful ideas of ill-educated Current Year politicians and activists who are pissed they lost an election.
Regarding the Importance of Careful Deliberation...
No, it's not admirable that New Zealand is rushing to confiscate guns, ban books, and squelch speech after Christchurch. It is, in fact, yet another terrifying demonstration of the importance of our Constitution and its Bill of Rights.
In Other News: Dissatisfied Fans Are Not "Entitled Manbabies"
Last night, I saw another manifestation of this attitude in a Facebook group I follow, and to be quite blunt, I'm fucking sick of it. If you're a game developer, a comic book writer or artist, a genre film maker, or any other creator in pop geekdom, you are not some grand ah-teest who can spit on his audience and do whatever the hell he wants. Dial the arrogance way, way back, bucko. You are, effectively, a guy in a rubber mask screaming at a green screen like it's chasing him. And if you're working with an established IP - as many of you are - you're playing with something that, ultimately, is not yours to "fundamentally transform".
Do the fans want you to do the same thing over and over again? No: just to take one example, the principal critique I've seen of Star Wars Episode VII: The Force Awakens is that it's a weaker copy of A New Hope that strips out all the struggle of the original story. In other words, what we hate about the film in question is that it lacked creativity and heart -- not that it failed to perfectly replicate something we've already seen. So go ahead: as long as you respect the history of the IP you're borrowing, you can - and should - tell an entirely new story. We love evolution; what we don't like is rupture. 1990's Star Trek? Good. Rian Johnson's Star Wars? Bad.
Do the fans want you to completely avoid political themes? No, this is another strawman. What we hate is inorganic, in-your-face politics that stacks the deck in favor of one worldview. What we hate is boring, predictable politics; we hate the thousands of "Orange Man Bad"/"America is -ist and -phobic" stories that all unfold in identical fashion and therefore are never insightful and never surprise. What we love are things like DS9's "In the Hands of the Prophets," which tackles the theme of science versus religion in a manner that respects (and reveals the flaws of) both sides.
Do the fans hate diversity? No: we hate toxic diversity.
I don't think fans have the right to completely control what creators do. I respect artistic freedom. But the vast majority of fans aren't asking for that power. What we're asking for is craft and professionalism. Within those boundaries, multitudes can exist.
Sunday, March 17, 2019
The Week That Was
Because so many things have happened this week - and because I can't decide which topic I should address - this post is going to be composed of many parts. Use the links below to navigate to the section that interests you. (Note: If you're on the main page for the blog, click the title of this post first.)
A Brief Statement on Christchurch
Don't Listen to SJW's: There's No Excuse for Poor Writing
What to Do About the Dysfunctional College Admissions Process
Historical Cross-Dressers Are Not Necessarily Trans
A Brief Statement on Christchurch
I condemn, without equivocation, violence against innocent Muslims. If you have reservations about Islam or unchecked immigration, the proper manner to address those concerns is through discourse, not mass murder.
I also condemn, without equivocation, all attempts to make political hay over this massacre before the bodies are cold. The correct time to discuss how the psychopathic shooter was radicalized - and what we should do about it - is after the time of mourning has passed. And the correct time to blame our political opponents? Well, that would be never. The shooter was trying to foment civil war; don't give him what he wanted.
The end.
Don't Listen to SJW's: There's No Excuse for Poor Writing
This week, a certain maleducated writer dreamed up a most remarkable rationalization for her complete lack of subtlety on racial issues. According to said author, the fact that, in her view, our society - and geekdom in particular - is still shot through with -ist and -ism proves that tackling racism through analogy "doesn't work" and that she's therefore justified in calling out bigotry directly in her books.
I feel a little sorry for this author, truth be told. A while back, I read an early novel of hers and found her to be an okay talent. If she had been guided by mentors who actually cared for her professional development, she might have overcome the damage of her post-secondary education (remind me to explain one day why I'd rather cover myself in paper cuts and jump in a vat of lemon juice than get my M.Ed.) and become a fantastic storyteller. Unfortunately, she was discovered by our Red Guards instead -- those toxic "diversifiers" I covered last week who encourage creatives from "marginalized" groups to sell their victimhood in lieu of developing their skill. Now, having been feted endlessly by these white flagellants, she's essentially stuck.
My sympathy for this individual, however, doesn't change the fact that she is wrong in almost every way.
There are racists in the US. There are also disparities that cut across racial lines. It does not follow from either of these realities that our society is therefore irredeemably racist and must be dismantled root and branch. Indeed, the US ranks among the world's LEAST racist countries. Since the 1960's, the white majority's support for integration and interracial marriage has climbed to commanding, near-universal majorities, and the share of African American families that live below the poverty line has declined from more than half at the start of the civil rights era to less than a quarter today. Once again, I'm not claiming that we have completely overcome the legacy of slavery and Jim Crow, but tremendous progress towards that goal HAS been made and will likely continue to be made so long as we cleave to our fundamental liberal values.
And whatever can be said about the US as a whole can also be said about geekdom. We have our bigoted cranks, sure, but they certainly can't be found "everywhere." On the contrary, geeks are probably among the most accepting of difference. If this were not the case, the author under discussion - and other SJW's of her stripe - would not have become so powerful and so celebrated. (It's quite despicable, actually, to leverage the geek's natural politeness, desperation to be liked, and sympathy for the downtrodden to berate a community that has showered you with accolades for its supposed depravity on matters of race. But this is generally how SJW's fight; they attack and then colonize soft targets.)
So the baseline premise of this writer's argument is pure delusion: we are not living in a racial hellscape, and we don't need a revolution. What this means, then, is that the sub rosa anti-racist storytelling of the past several decades likely did work -- that it did change minds over time. It wasn't the only factor driving the shift in white America's racial attitudes, to be sure, but it wasn't utterly inefficacious.
What this ideologically-possessed author is proposing we do instead of analogical storytelling, however, will categorically fail. Apparently, she was sleeping the day her psychology professors discussed the boomerang effect. To put it simply, people can't be insulted into agreement; upon encountering a hostile opponent, people in fact become more wedded to their original worldview. So if we scrap subtlety and subterfuge and start openly scolding readers for their prejudices, we will close minds, not open them.
How do we fight racism successfully? Non-threatening exposure helps -- which is why I'm not against healthy, non-toxic representation. Relationships of trust are also key; musician Daryl Davis, for example, has successfully persuaded people to renounce the KKK by befriending them and gently challenging their beliefs. And lastly, we must understand and grapple with racism's evolutionary roots in disgust and fears of contamination; indeed, ensuring bodily security and economic prosperity through liberal democratic capitalism may be our most powerful weapon of all.
Abandoning craft in favor of didacticism, on the other hand, is a profoundly unsound strategy that will lead to resentment and further division. Americans are some of the most tolerant people in the world; they don't need to be lectured by authors seeking short cuts to critical prestige.
What to Do About the Dysfunctional College Admissions Process
As regular readers no doubt know already, a big part of my day job involves shepherding students through the college admissions process. So when the Varsity Blues cheating scandal hit the news, it also hit me where I live. Here I am trying to get my predominantly minority and/or foreign-born clientele into college through the honest method of developing their academic chops -- and at the same time, some richie-riches are bribing coaches to get their mediocre kids in through the back door? I was spitting nails!
Of course, as other writers have correctly noted, criminal fraud isn't the only way to cheat the system. If you're an athlete, a legacy, an approved political activist, a child of a major donor, or a member of a sought-after minority group, you often get admitted under lower standards than the rest of the student population. This isn't fair to the students who were denied admission despite excellent credentials -- but it also isn't fair to those admitted under those preferences, who will likely find themselves at the bottom of their classes and struggling to keep up.
The focus needs to return to academic accomplishment alone. Each school needs to determine what sort of educational preparation is required for real success in their various programs and then mandate that preparation for all prospective students regardless of their extra-curricular resume, family connections, "personal qualities," or demographic identity. If a university is concerned about recruiting "whole men," then fair enough: that university should make its prerequisite curriculum wide-ranging. But we need to get out of the subjective business of assessing each student's ability to "contribute to the campus community" and get back to the objective business of assessing a student's ability to handle college-level coursework.
Obviously, this is the sort of change that would have to be phased in gradually. I doubt anyone would agree to the evisceration of certain popular college athletics programs -- and we'd have to establish an infrastructure to help needier students develop their intellectual bona fides so they can compete with their more affluent peers. But I think, in the long run, making college admissions standards purely academic will have positive knock-on effects. Imagine how much better off our young athletes would be if they were told they had to buckle down in school to play for their top-choice college. And I bet we'd finally kill off - or at least critically wound - the damaging anti-intellectualism I sometimes encounter when dealing with students who know they're being held to lower standards and therefore don't feel the need to do their very best.
What's eminently clear is that our current college admissions system is not a meritocracy -- nor is it sustainable.
Historical Cross-Dressers Are Not Necessarily Trans
Last on the docket this week is another bit of news from the literary world:
Yep: The author referred to her title character as a "she" and attracted the ire of the crazy trans-activist set.
A simple headdesk won't suffice for this nonsense. Do these people not realize that in the 19th century, women were pretty limited in their career choices? That in order to circumvent these strictures, ambitious women had to either fight or use subterfuge? How do we know that Barry was indeed transgender and not just a woman who put on men's clothing so she could pursue an occupation that would otherwise have been closed to her? Are we going to argue now that Disney's Mulan is a transgender princess because she impersonated a man to save her ailing father?
Please stop transgendering every historical figure who ever bucked gender norms. What those of us who don't quite fit the feminine mold really need is reassurance that our Oddness can still fit under the umbrella of "female." By booting people like us out of the "female" category, you're only reinforcing regressive stereotypes.
There are many ways to be a woman. There are many ways to be a man. Maybe, in certain edge cases, someone's internal sense of self really doesn't fit the outer equipment. But not everyone who's ever chafed at a social expectation for his or her sex is trans. Insisting otherwise is confusing our kids.
A Brief Statement on Christchurch
Don't Listen to SJW's: There's No Excuse for Poor Writing
What to Do About the Dysfunctional College Admissions Process
Historical Cross-Dressers Are Not Necessarily Trans
A Brief Statement on Christchurch
I condemn, without equivocation, violence against innocent Muslims. If you have reservations about Islam or unchecked immigration, the proper manner to address those concerns is through discourse, not mass murder.
I also condemn, without equivocation, all attempts to make political hay over this massacre before the bodies are cold. The correct time to discuss how the psychopathic shooter was radicalized - and what we should do about it - is after the time of mourning has passed. And the correct time to blame our political opponents? Well, that would be never. The shooter was trying to foment civil war; don't give him what he wanted.
The end.
Don't Listen to SJW's: There's No Excuse for Poor Writing
This week, a certain maleducated writer dreamed up a most remarkable rationalization for her complete lack of subtlety on racial issues. According to said author, the fact that, in her view, our society - and geekdom in particular - is still shot through with -ist and -ism proves that tackling racism through analogy "doesn't work" and that she's therefore justified in calling out bigotry directly in her books.
I feel a little sorry for this author, truth be told. A while back, I read an early novel of hers and found her to be an okay talent. If she had been guided by mentors who actually cared for her professional development, she might have overcome the damage of her post-secondary education (remind me to explain one day why I'd rather cover myself in paper cuts and jump in a vat of lemon juice than get my M.Ed.) and become a fantastic storyteller. Unfortunately, she was discovered by our Red Guards instead -- those toxic "diversifiers" I covered last week who encourage creatives from "marginalized" groups to sell their victimhood in lieu of developing their skill. Now, having been feted endlessly by these white flagellants, she's essentially stuck.
My sympathy for this individual, however, doesn't change the fact that she is wrong in almost every way.
There are racists in the US. There are also disparities that cut across racial lines. It does not follow from either of these realities that our society is therefore irredeemably racist and must be dismantled root and branch. Indeed, the US ranks among the world's LEAST racist countries. Since the 1960's, the white majority's support for integration and interracial marriage has climbed to commanding, near-universal majorities, and the share of African American families that live below the poverty line has declined from more than half at the start of the civil rights era to less than a quarter today. Once again, I'm not claiming that we have completely overcome the legacy of slavery and Jim Crow, but tremendous progress towards that goal HAS been made and will likely continue to be made so long as we cleave to our fundamental liberal values.
And whatever can be said about the US as a whole can also be said about geekdom. We have our bigoted cranks, sure, but they certainly can't be found "everywhere." On the contrary, geeks are probably among the most accepting of difference. If this were not the case, the author under discussion - and other SJW's of her stripe - would not have become so powerful and so celebrated. (It's quite despicable, actually, to leverage the geek's natural politeness, desperation to be liked, and sympathy for the downtrodden to berate a community that has showered you with accolades for its supposed depravity on matters of race. But this is generally how SJW's fight; they attack and then colonize soft targets.)
So the baseline premise of this writer's argument is pure delusion: we are not living in a racial hellscape, and we don't need a revolution. What this means, then, is that the sub rosa anti-racist storytelling of the past several decades likely did work -- that it did change minds over time. It wasn't the only factor driving the shift in white America's racial attitudes, to be sure, but it wasn't utterly inefficacious.
What this ideologically-possessed author is proposing we do instead of analogical storytelling, however, will categorically fail. Apparently, she was sleeping the day her psychology professors discussed the boomerang effect. To put it simply, people can't be insulted into agreement; upon encountering a hostile opponent, people in fact become more wedded to their original worldview. So if we scrap subtlety and subterfuge and start openly scolding readers for their prejudices, we will close minds, not open them.
How do we fight racism successfully? Non-threatening exposure helps -- which is why I'm not against healthy, non-toxic representation. Relationships of trust are also key; musician Daryl Davis, for example, has successfully persuaded people to renounce the KKK by befriending them and gently challenging their beliefs. And lastly, we must understand and grapple with racism's evolutionary roots in disgust and fears of contamination; indeed, ensuring bodily security and economic prosperity through liberal democratic capitalism may be our most powerful weapon of all.
Abandoning craft in favor of didacticism, on the other hand, is a profoundly unsound strategy that will lead to resentment and further division. Americans are some of the most tolerant people in the world; they don't need to be lectured by authors seeking short cuts to critical prestige.
What to Do About the Dysfunctional College Admissions Process
As regular readers no doubt know already, a big part of my day job involves shepherding students through the college admissions process. So when the Varsity Blues cheating scandal hit the news, it also hit me where I live. Here I am trying to get my predominantly minority and/or foreign-born clientele into college through the honest method of developing their academic chops -- and at the same time, some richie-riches are bribing coaches to get their mediocre kids in through the back door? I was spitting nails!
Of course, as other writers have correctly noted, criminal fraud isn't the only way to cheat the system. If you're an athlete, a legacy, an approved political activist, a child of a major donor, or a member of a sought-after minority group, you often get admitted under lower standards than the rest of the student population. This isn't fair to the students who were denied admission despite excellent credentials -- but it also isn't fair to those admitted under those preferences, who will likely find themselves at the bottom of their classes and struggling to keep up.
The focus needs to return to academic accomplishment alone. Each school needs to determine what sort of educational preparation is required for real success in their various programs and then mandate that preparation for all prospective students regardless of their extra-curricular resume, family connections, "personal qualities," or demographic identity. If a university is concerned about recruiting "whole men," then fair enough: that university should make its prerequisite curriculum wide-ranging. But we need to get out of the subjective business of assessing each student's ability to "contribute to the campus community" and get back to the objective business of assessing a student's ability to handle college-level coursework.
Obviously, this is the sort of change that would have to be phased in gradually. I doubt anyone would agree to the evisceration of certain popular college athletics programs -- and we'd have to establish an infrastructure to help needier students develop their intellectual bona fides so they can compete with their more affluent peers. But I think, in the long run, making college admissions standards purely academic will have positive knock-on effects. Imagine how much better off our young athletes would be if they were told they had to buckle down in school to play for their top-choice college. And I bet we'd finally kill off - or at least critically wound - the damaging anti-intellectualism I sometimes encounter when dealing with students who know they're being held to lower standards and therefore don't feel the need to do their very best.
What's eminently clear is that our current college admissions system is not a meritocracy -- nor is it sustainable.
Historical Cross-Dressers Are Not Necessarily Trans
Last on the docket this week is another bit of news from the literary world:
Shakespeare was never a 16th-century Moorish general in Vienna, but he had the temerity to write about one in “Othello.” George Eliot was never a crabbed and megalomaniacal mythologist, but she dared to create the gloriously appalling Mr. Casaubon in “Middlemarch.” And Leo Tolstoy wasn’t an adulterous woman — indeed, he was a man — yet he gave the world one of the most compelling and memorable portraits of female adultery in “Anna Karenina.”
Are such feats of imaginative creation and habitation now to be scrutinized by the gender police and social justice warriors?
The case of the American novelist E.J. Levy, celebrated author of “Love, In Theory” and “Tasting Life Twice,” an anthology of lesbian fiction, makes me wonder.
Levy has also written a forthcoming historical novel titled “The Cape Doctor.” At least, I hope it’s forthcoming. The book is about a real-life character, James Barry, née Margaret Ann Bulkley, a 19th-century, Irish-born army surgeon who practiced in Cape Town and lived as a man.
It’s that last fact, of course, that gives Barry’s story its dash of hot sauce.What do you suppose the problem is here? I'll give you one guess.
Yep: The author referred to her title character as a "she" and attracted the ire of the crazy trans-activist set.
A simple headdesk won't suffice for this nonsense. Do these people not realize that in the 19th century, women were pretty limited in their career choices? That in order to circumvent these strictures, ambitious women had to either fight or use subterfuge? How do we know that Barry was indeed transgender and not just a woman who put on men's clothing so she could pursue an occupation that would otherwise have been closed to her? Are we going to argue now that Disney's Mulan is a transgender princess because she impersonated a man to save her ailing father?
Please stop transgendering every historical figure who ever bucked gender norms. What those of us who don't quite fit the feminine mold really need is reassurance that our Oddness can still fit under the umbrella of "female." By booting people like us out of the "female" category, you're only reinforcing regressive stereotypes.
There are many ways to be a woman. There are many ways to be a man. Maybe, in certain edge cases, someone's internal sense of self really doesn't fit the outer equipment. But not everyone who's ever chafed at a social expectation for his or her sex is trans. Insisting otherwise is confusing our kids.
Sunday, March 10, 2019
Toxic "Diversity" vs. Genuine Diversity: A Handy Chart
Toxic "Diversity"...
- Scolds.
- Rejects evidence.
- Segregates.
- "Cancels."
- Encourages identity grifting.
- Rejects criticism.
Genuine Diversity...
- Invites.
- Is evidence-based.
- Integrates.
- Rejects censorship.
- Encourages skill development.
- Accepts criticism.
Toxic "diversity" scolds; genuine diversity invites. Toxic "diversity" is Brie Larson contemptuously dismissing the opinions of "40-year-old white dudes" because a certain movie supposedly "wasn't made for them." Genuine diversity says, "We wanted to try something a little different, but we hope everyone will like it."
Toxic "diversity" rejects evidence; genuine diversity is evidence-based. Toxic "diversity" asserts that all disparities are the result of "the cis-hetero patriarchy" or "white supremacy." Genuine diversity understands that the causes of such disparities are most likely multivariate; further, it acknowledges indisputable progress. It is a documented fact, for example, that while women are the minority in certain hard STEM fields, they now dominate higher education at both the undergraduate and graduate level pretty much everywhere else. It is also a fact that while significant wealth gaps remain, most African Americans do not live in poverty. Genuine diversity doesn't deny that racism and sexism exist - or that certain policies need to be tweaked to allow for greater equality of opportunity - but its approach to apparent injustice is fundamentally grounded in reality.
Toxic "diversity" segregates; genuine diversity integrates. Toxic "diversity" insists, for example, that black people should write about black people, brown people should write about brown people, and white people should write about white people -- that cultural streams should never be crossed. Toxic "diversity" denies that there is a universal human nature that allows any writer, with proper research and exposure, to feel empathy for people from other times and places. Genuine diversity, on the other hand, allows anyone to write about anything at all.
Toxic "diversity" "cancels"; genuine diversity rejects censorship. If an author fails to adhere to certain strict rules, toxic "diversity" bullies him or her into silence. If genuine diversity views something to be problematic, meanwhile, it discusses the issue politely without presuming that its viewpoint is the only right viewpoint -- and it never insists that certain books be pulped for failing to be sufficiently "woke". Additionally, genuine diversity does not erase history; it engages with it, taking the good and leaving the bad.
Toxic "diversity" encourages identity grifting; genuine diversity encourages skill development. Toxic "diversity" tells the "marginalized" that they are entitled to success and teaches them to sell their gender, race, or sexuality instead of their work. Genuine diversity, in contrast, values merit and hard work. It counsels up-and-coming new writers and artists of all backgrounds to focus first and foremost on improving their craft. It seeks new voices, but it never promotes those voices before they are truly ready for prime time. It holds everyone up to the same standards and doesn't set people up for failure.
Toxic "diversity" rejects criticism; genuine diversity accepts it. If a writer or artist hails from the upper levels of the progressive stack, toxic "diversity" equates all criticism of that writer/artist to racist/sexist/homophobic/transphobic/whatever-phobic harassment. But genuine diversity never makes excuses for shoddy work or contemptible behavior. If someone is clearly phoning it in - or is being an absolute wanker - genuine diversity calls them out on it no matter who they are.
Promote genuine diversity. Consign toxic "diversity" to the trash bin.
Saturday, March 2, 2019
Some Tweets on CPAC
CPAC complaint thread (sincere and w/o mockery):
— Stephanie Souders (@TheRightGeek) March 3, 2019
Back in the day, @CPAC used to have break-out sessions run by Heritage, ISI, etc. in which we talked philosophy and policy. Lately, though, the offerings in this regard have been very, very thin.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)