Uncouth Reflections

Christmas Ducks

Posted on December 25, 2013 by Fenster

Fenster writes:

DUCK 1:

Over at Salon, Matthew Bruenig takes on “free speech hypocrites” of all stripes. He argues, with some truth, that the Duck Dynasty dust-up is more or less the Dixie Chicks dust-up in reverse, with the same offenses and complaints. Concerning Robertson’s “offenses”:

. . . we have here a perfect analogue to the Dixie Chicks spectacle: a popular entertainer said something offensive and outrageous to many, and an economic actor punished him for doing so.

Concerning the complaints, a kind of symmetry as well. Liberals cried foul when the Dixie Chicks got whacked, and now it is fowl the other way round. His conclusion: no one really cares about content neutral rules and each side is only out to win.

Everyone else has a substantive agenda and merely stakes out the short-term positions on content-neutral procedural justice that further that agenda. Filibusters are good when they block what I dislike, but bad when they block what I like. States rights are good when states do what I like, but bad when they do what I dislike. Private economic coercion of expression is good when it shuts down comments I dislike, but bad when it shuts down comments I like. And so on.

Given this reality, why do we even play the game where we pretend to believe in some sort of content-neutral procedural justice rules? Who are we trying to fool? What’s the use of having shell arguments about process that everyone knows are driven by core disagreements on substantive agendas? I don’t get it.

Maybe this is tongue in cheek and he doesn’t really get it. But I don’t think it is hard to get. Of course people are hypocrites. They are not required to be other than that, to play fair or to support the other side when it scores a point. What is required is free speech. That’s all.

It is OK to make hypocritical and incorrect statements that one’s free speech rights have been abridged. That’s free speech too. What is not OK is the abridgment of free speech. And that hasn’t happened in either of the above cases. I hardly feel as though all as well in the Republic. It would be nice to have less toxicity and hypocrisy. But as to free speech, both the Dixie Chicks and Phil Robertson can say what they want. They are not entitled to a megaphone, or a platform or a column in the New York Times.

Free speech is hard enough. It shouldn’t have to carry the burden of things it is not.

DUCK 2:

And as long as we are talking about ducks at Christmas, a quick shout-out to Kalle Anke is in order. God Jul!

Posted in Politics and Economics, Uncategorized | Tagged Christmas, Dixie Chicks, Duck Dynasty, Kalle Anke, Matthew Breunig, Phil Robertson, Salon | 10 Comments

Fagen o’ th’ Day

Posted on December 25, 2013 by Fenster

Fenster writes:

From Donald Fagen’s Eminent Hipsters, his crankypants but still quite witty semi-memoir.

On film nowadays:

The movies are so bad now that I usually pass out just after catching the first glimpse of the flesh-eating death-mist (or whatever), even before the archetypal hero has accepted the Campbellian Call to Adventure.

In which regard.

Posted in Movies, Music, Performers | Tagged Donald Fagen, Eminent Hipsters | 2 Comments

Merry Christmas!

Posted on December 24, 2013 by Epaminondas

epiminondas wrties:

The epiminondas household would like to wish you all a very merry Christmas.

Posted in Personal reflections | Leave a comment

Memo to Gittes

Posted on December 24, 2013 by Fenster

Fenster (as Duffy) writes:

To: Gittes

From: Duffy

Re: Claus

Date: December 24

Target Claus was spotted at workshop but gave me the slip. Picked up trail and located him again in Brooklyn at apartment of Mrs. Ida Sessions. Have photographs of Claus going down Mrs. Sessions back chimney, which is illegal in New York State. Photographs under sealed separate cover.

Tailed target to subway, which was taken to High Street stop in Brooklyn Heights. Was able to photograph target without being noticed as he climbed the stairs. See below.

Target lost after this encounter. At this point target put his finger to his nose and up the stairs he rose. Gone when I got to the street. Pursuing.

Posted in Humor, Movies | Leave a comment

Inequality Snippet du Jour

Posted on December 23, 2013 by Fenster

Fenster writes:

Actually, it is Peggy Noonan who writes:

The most arresting words heard this year? A billionaire of New York, in conversation: “I hate it when the market goes up. Every time I hear the stock market went up I know the guillotines are coming closer.” This was interesting in part because the speaker has a lot of money in the market. But he meant it. He is self-made, broadly accomplished, a thinker on politics, and for a moment he was sharing the innards of his mind. His biggest concern is the great and growing distance between the economically successful and those who have not or cannot begin to climb. The division has become too extreme, too dramatic, and static. He fears it will eventually tear the country apart and give rise to policies that are bitter and punishing, not helpful and broadening.

This year I came to understand, at meetings and symposia, that this has become an ongoing preoccupation of the wealthy. They are not oblivious, they are concerned. And though they give away hundreds of millions of dollars to charities, schools and scholarships, they don’t know what can be done to turn the overall economic picture around. Globalization isn’t leaving, industrial manufacturing isn’t coming back as it was, technology will continue to give jobs to the educated, and the ever-evolving mischief of men and markets won’t change.

They are worried. They are right to be. They are trying to think it through, trying to find any realistic solutions, and words.

Posted in Politics and Economics | Tagged inequality, Peggy Noonan | Leave a comment

Robertson Reducks

Posted on December 23, 2013 by Fenster

Fenster writes:

I favor reasoned discussion about the actually important issues brought out in the Robertson kerfuffle. But I recognize it is just so damn tempting, and so much fun, to just judge.

That’s on display in my area. In my part of the swamp–eastern Massachusetts–the conventional wisdom is that there are no serious issues to discuss, and that our side wins. Here, for instance, is how today’s Boston Globe discusses Duck Dynasty. Note that this is not a news article, an arts column, an editorial, or a critical review. It is a TV listing!

Ouch! Call Dr. Paglia!

Thankfully, not all of Boston is so hidebound. Here is a very nice essay in the most recent Bostonia magazine (put out by Boston University, so it’s got a nice Eastern pedigree). In it, a nice Boston liberal talks about how she has learned to respect conservative ideals. And she doesn’t even condescend. More of this would be welcome.

Meanwhile, Andrew Sullivan struggles with the angel on one shoulder and the devil on the other in his handling of Robertson.

His conclusion is a generous one, and he does not favor the firing.

What Phil Robertson has given A&E is a dose of redneck reality. Why on earth would they fire him for giving some more?

But he is being exceedingly generous, since before coming to this conclusion he felt compelled to note that

to posit gay people as the true source of all moral corruption is to use eliminationist rhetoric and demonizing logic to soften up a small minority of people for exclusion, marginalization and, at some point, violence.

In other words, let him stay on the air, but watch him closely since he has a gun.

IMHO, the issue has been handled best in two recent pieces, one by Cathy Young, a kind-of libertarian, and the other by the Christian writer Larry Taunton, in The Atlantic. In both cases, the writers try to identify the issues at stake, and engage in reasoned discussion. More of that would be welcome.

Posted in Philosophy and Religion, Sex | Tagged Andrew Sullivan, Boston Globe, Bostonia, Catherine Caldwell-Harris, Cathy Young, Duck Dynasty, Larry Taunton, Phil Robertson | 16 Comments

Girl Guitar Songs

Posted on December 23, 2013 by Fabrizio del Wrongo

Fabrizio del Wrongo writes:

Posted in Music | Tagged All Girl Summer Fun Band, Nikki and the Corvettes, Shonen Knife, The Donnas | Leave a comment

Quote Du Jour

Posted on December 23, 2013 by Eddie Pensier

Eddie Pensier writes:

When Theodora was still too immature to sleep with a man or to have intercourse like a woman, she acted as might a male prostitute to satisfy those dregs of humanity who remained some considerable time in a brothel, given to such unnatural traffic of the body…But as soon as she reached maturity she became a harlot. Never was any woman so completely abandoned to pleasure.Many a time she would attend a banquet with ten young men or more, all with a passion for fornication and at the peak of their powers, and would lie with her companions the whole night long, and when she had reduced them all to exhaustion she would go to their attendants–sometimes as many as thirty of them–and copulate with each in turn; and even then she could not satisfy her lust. And although she made use of three apertures in her body, she was wont to complain that Nature had not provided her with larger openings in her nipples, so that she might have contrived another form of intercourse there.

—Procopius of Caesarea, who was apparently not fond of Empress Theodora, as quoted in John Julius Norwich’s A Short History of Byzantium.

(Irrelevant but funny note: While writing this post, the WordPress dashboard suggested tags to apply. Among them were “Iphone” and “Fred Rogers”. The reasons for these suggestions I will leave to our readers’ imaginations.)

Posted in Books Publishing and Writing, Sex | Tagged ancient history, books, byzantium, exotic dancer, john julius norwich, prostitute, theodora | 3 Comments

Rossini Aria Five Ways

Posted on December 23, 2013 by Eddie Pensier

Eddie Pensier writes:

Gioachino Rossini was not only one of the opera genre’s most notable composers, wits, bon vivants, and gourmands (steak grilled in butter, topped with foie gras, and finished with truffles and Madeira? Yes, please); he was a thief.

Gioachino Rossini.

A tune-thief, to be precise. And to be fair, he mostly stole from himself. He was infamous for recycling overtures: at least three of his most famous (all featuring his signature crescendo) were previously used in lesser-known works.

One particular tune that repeats itself at least five times is “Non piu mesta”, Angelina’s cavatina from La Cenerentola. It’s also known as “Cessa di più resistere”, Count Almaviva’s Act 2 aria from Il barbiere di Siviglia, and “O Numi clementi” from Torvaldo e Dorliska, and “Ah, non potrian resistere” from Le nozze di Teti e Peleo, and “Cinga la benda candida” from Adelaide di Borgogna. (The last three are super-obscure.)

A heroically patient opera lover with the pseudonym LindoroRossini has uploaded the following audio to YouTube. It’s a pastiche of all five arias, with time-notes so you can follow who is singing when. I recommend opening up a separate window to read along. Clever and educational. Five arias in one!

If you want to hear the full tenor version of the Barbiere aria, here it is sung by the fantastic American tenor, Frank Lopardo. It’s often cut from live performances because it’s freakishly difficult and high even by Rossini-tenor standards.

Tournedos Rossini. (Because we love gratuitous pictures of steak here at Uncouth Reflections.)

Related

More about Rossini and food (he was buds with Carême, Brillat-Savarin, and Escoffier, who named several recipes after him including Poached Eggs alla Rossini and Fillet of Sole alla Rossini) from CultureKiosque.

Posted in Food and health, Music | Tagged Barber of Seville, five ways, foie gras, Frank Lopardo, Gioachino Rossini, La Cenerentola, Opera, steak, tournedos rossini, truffles | 2 Comments

A Walk Down Moody Street OR Fenster Does Dickens

Posted on December 23, 2013 by Fenster

Fenster writes:

Head west from Boston five to ten miles and you’ll find yourself in one or another affluent suburb: Newton, Needham, Belmont, Lincoln, Weston, Wellesley, Lexington, Concord or Wayland.

Then there’s Waltham. It’s actually a small city sitting more or less in the center of the ring of upper-middle class Boston suburban towns. It’s tired in a characteristically New England factory town kind of way and as such it is a kind of reverse crown jewel in the midst of relative affluence.

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