Tag: society

God hates strength and beauty?

This post by Bruce Charlton on the evils of weightlifting strikes me as not only perverse, but downright irrelevant in the way that only the True Churchian can manage:

One of the evil signs of the times is the increased prevalence of intensive weight-training. This is part of a narcissistic, self-regarding, self-advertizing and physiologically- and psychologically-deranging package of extreme exercise regimes, extreme diets, and extreme chemical intake (especially androgen and growth hormones, but other drugs as well – continually expanding).

While Charlton points to the drugs as a useful red herring, it is clear that his argument is actually directed against all weightlifting and intentional body improvement.  If he lifted regularly himself, he’d know that the difference between a smoothly sculpted quasi-swimmer’s physique and a bulked-up bull’s physique is mostly in the amount of weight one lifts, not the time spent in the weight room and/or pool.  It would be interesting to know if he similarly objects to swimming and jogging, which can take up even more time than lifting does.  And while it cannot be denied that vanity plays a part in the pastime, he’s missing the personal challenge aspect that is much more important.  It’s not vanity that causes the lifter to go for that one more rep when his muscles are burning as if they’re on fire and his energy is rapidly dropping to zero, it is the desire to master the weakness of the body.

More importantly, he is spurning the manifold benefits of the discipline involved, discipline that is so obviously lacking in modern society.  It is simply ludicrous that in a post-Christian West, where a ludicrous percentage of the population has lapsed completely into gluttony and sloth, waddling from one sugar distribution point to another like addicts seeking their next fix, Charlton’s criticism is focused on one of the only elements of the population successfully resisting this decline into mindless obesity.

Who is giving into the flesh, the man who is ruled by his desires or the man who mercilessly tames them?  Indeed, the routine Charlton describes is more akin to those regarded as the holiest of men throughout most of the Christian era, the ascetics who mortified their flesh.  I am not saying weightlifting is akin to holiness; its purpose is not the glorification of God, after all, but neither is it the “rooted, habitual sin” he claims it to be.

Possibly influenced by the Greek ideal, Paul writes the following in 1 Thessalonians 5:23: “Now may the God of peace Himself sanctify you entirely; and may your spirit and soul and body be preserved complete, without blame at the coming of our Lord Jesus Chris.”   Because weightlifting strengthens and preserves the body, because it strengthens one’s ability to tame one’s bodily desires and temptations,  it is not only compatible with a Christian life, it is advisable.


Moreover, weightlifting provides more than strength and self-discipline.  I always appreciated the sign over the mirror in the free weight room at the Northwest Fitness Center in Fridley, which said something to this effect:

This place is for the weak, that they may become strong.  This place is for the strong, that they may become humble.

The iron knows no mercy.  The iron strips away pretensions.  The iron reveals character.  This is not the hallmark of evil. 

All that being said, I think Charlton’s position is born more from ignorance than fundamental wrongheadedness.  No man who is so sound on the weaseling and treacherous  mendacity of Rowan Williams can be totally misguided.

The need for “sexism” in literature

In which I address a common complaint concerning female roles in fantasy literature at Alpha Game:

The problem with what Wohl advocates is that by putting modern views
on sexual roles and intersexual relations into the minds, mouths, and
worse, structures of an imaginary historical society, it destroys the
very structural foundations that make the society historical and the dramatic storylines credible – in some cases, even possible.  It’s problem similar to the one faced by secular writers,
who wish to simultaneously eliminate religion from their fictional medieval societies,
and yet retain the dramatic conflict created by the divine right of
kings.  However, it is more severe because the sexual aspect touches upon the
most concrete basis of every society: its ability to sustain itself
through the propagation of its members.

The “sexism” of
which Wohl and many of his commenters complain isn’t cultural, it is
simply the logical consequences of biological and martial imperatives.

WND column

The Liberty Curve

Most people instinctively understand the truth underlying the concept of the Laffer Curve. It articulates the elasticity of taxable income, which is to say, it shows how the amount of taxable income tends to change in response to changes in the income tax rate.  This is because most people understand that they modify their behavior in response to positive and negative stimuli.

Seeds of societal destruction

Desiderius, a commenter at HUS, draws an interesting connection between Rome’s destructive foreign policy and the U.S. university system:

The empire/Unis identify the best and brightest of the
tribes/flyover communities. They wow the parents with the grandeur of
Rome/Uni-degree caché. Parents send promising youth off to Rome/Unis.
They are indoctrinated with values hostile to the communities that
raised them.* In the Roman case, the now-mature youth were then returned
back to the tribes to sow discord, which they did in spades due to the
contempt they’d been trained to feel for the communities that raised
them and the values those communities held dear.

In the present case, when the economy is good, they just stay in the
big cities and live the life of Roissy. Bad economy -> the Roman case
becomes a more real possibility. I’ve seen some teachers like this,
although to be fair, also some teachers pushing back. We’ll see if the
result is just impotent discord. The alternatives range from Alaric to
Washington.

The irony is that the values of the tribes more closely approximated
the republican values that allowed Rome to rise in the first place than
the decadent ones that precipitated it’s fall. Likewise today. It is the
liberal values that have been corrupted.

* I’d argue in both cases violently less egalitarian, but I’m a little
original that way – suffice it to say in the present case that Yale Sex
Week wasn’t what the parents signed up for, or if that feels too
judgie/SoCon for you, one can peruse the syllabi for rampant
illiberalism, anti-semitism, radfem, anti-western, you name it. It’s
bad. I call it anti-humanism.

This is a cogent summary of one of the various downsides of the so-called meritocracy.  Another one is the way in which the destruction of the old WASP network on Wall Street and its strong sense of noblesse oblige led to the rapacious, mercenary culture that has devastated the American economy, created vast quantities of debt, and led to major malinvestment throughout the nation.

Suzhi and the sheng nu

It’s strange, isn’t it, that so many organizations formed for the advancement of women’s rights were established by left-wing parties like the Fascist Party in Italy and the Communist Party in China.

They are articles about single, professional women published on the Web
site of China’s state feminist agency, the All-China Women’s Federation.
The Communist Party founded the Women’s Federation in 1949 to “protect
women’s rights and interests.” 

It must be a coincidence.  But these days, it isn’t hard to imagine either Mitt Romney or Barack Obama agreeing to establish a state feminist agency, assuming of course that Housing and Urban Development doesn’t already qualify.

I do rather like the idea of referring to unmarried women over the age of 27 as sheng nu, however.  Especially since comes with the imprimatur of an official international State Feminist Agency.  It would really be sexist to refer to them any other way.  However, looking at it from the long-term perspective, it is ominous that China has been actively seeking to encourage its best and brightest women to breed instead of pursue an education since 2007.

Iran is doing this.  China is doing this.  The USA and the nations of the West, on the other hand, are encouraging their best and brightest women to sterilize themselves.  Which societies would you bet on in the long run?

WND column

Debased Money, Debased Marriages


“When a government compulsorily overvalues one type of money and
undervalues another, the undervalued money will leave the country or
disappear from circulation into hoards, while the overvalued money will
flood into circulation.” 
– Gresham’s law, Sir Thomas Gresham

When gasoline prices are rapidly approaching $5 per gallon, it is no
secret that U.S. money does not buy what it used to. Even if we use the
CPI-U, which significantly underestimates historical inflation, the
value of a dollar in 2012 is approximately one-twenty fifth of a dollar
in 1913, when the Federal Reserve was first given the responsibility of
ensuring stable prices. How a relentless increase in prices is somehow
equated with price stability remains a mystery to everyone not working
for the Federal Reserve or seated in Congress; if this performance is
considered successful, one can only wonder what would constitute
failure.

The decline of human capability

Bruce Charlton posits a dark possibility:

I suspect that human capability reached its peak or plateau around
1965-75 – at the time of the Apollo moon landings – and has been
declining ever since.  This may sound bizarre or just plain false, but the argument is simple.
That landing of men on the moon and bringing them back alive was the
supreme achievement of human capability, the most difficult problem ever
solved by humans. 40 years ago we could do it – repeatedly – but since
then we have *not* been to the moon, and I suggest the real reason we
have not been to the moon since 1972 is that we cannot any longer do it.
Humans have lost the capability.

Of course, the standard line is that humans stopped going to the moon
only because we no longer *wanted* to go to the moon, or could not
afford to, or something…– but I am suggesting that all this is BS,
merely excuses for not doing something which we *cannot* do.

It is as if an eighty year old ex-professional-cyclist was to claim that
the reason he had stopped competing in the Tour de France was that he
had now had found better ways to spend his time and money. It may be
true; but does not disguise the fact that an 80 year old could not
compete in international cycling races even if he wanted to.

As true as this rings, I think Charlton is mistaking the decline of the West for the decline of humanity in general.  While our generation is the first in many generations to be less wealthy than its predecessors, while I am without question less generally capable than my father, and while it is easy to imagine most of the idiocracy starving or descending into savagery about one month after the system breaks down, all of these things only apply to the West.

Unlike the West, the East has not lost its values.  Even the Middle East may hope to see an imperialist renaissance of sorts once the New Caliphate is constructed and it continues the expansionary phase that began back in the 1950s.  But as for the USA, it is important to keep in mind that Ancient Egypt, Greece, Rome, and the medieval caliphates all saw a significant decline from their technological heights.  It would not be surprising, therefore, if 1972 was one day seen as the peak of America. 

Especially given that 1973 marked the point at which real wages began declining as the increase of women and immigrants into the workplace finally outpaced the exit of older white men from it.  There is no singular cause of societal decline, but it increasingly appears obvious that the secular equalitarian ethic that replaced the traditional Protestant one over the course of the 20th century was one of the more important factors.  Certainly, we have not seen the unleashing of human potential and capability that was repeatedly promised by its progressive advocates.

Gay marriage eliminates motherhood

Time exposes yet another lie from the pro-homogamy crowd:

France is set to ban the words “mother” and “father” from all official documents under controversial plans to legalise gay marriage.  The move, which has outraged Catholics, means only the word “parents”
would be used in identical marriage ceremonies for all heterosexual and
same-sex couples. The draft law states that “marriage is a union of two people, of
different or the same gender”. It says all references to “mothers and fathers” in the civil code –
which enshrines French law – will be swapped for simply “parents”. 

The homogamy advocates often like to ask how government-approved “gay marriage” could possibly affect normal heterosexual marriages.  Here is the answer: by eliminating both maternal and paternal status in law.  Nor is France the only place this legal assault on the traditional concepts of motherhood and fatherhood are taking place; the California Senate has sent up a trial balloon in its bill 777 which appears to be an attempt to remove the traditional concepts from the state educational system.

The interesting thing will be how this end to the legal statuses of “mother” and “father” will affect divorce law.  After all, it won’t be possible to assume that child custody will be given to the mother, once that position is legally abolished.  One wonders if the pro-homogamy members of the more progressive sex will rethink their support for the fake institution if they realize it may eventually result in their losing a substantial portion of their family court advantage.

Another mass killing

Teenager kills 8, wounds 5!

Sigh…. Another senseless, unnecessary tragedy caused by America’s primitive lack of gun control…. wait a minute:

A teenager killed eight people with a knife and wounded five more in northeast China after falling out with his girlfriend, state media said Thursday.

In other words, a guy with a SCARY ASSAULT RIFLE managed to kill all of four more people than a guy with a knife. So much for the gun control argument.

Backfire

We may have to rethink who was behind the possible false flag in Denver given the local response:

Colorado gun stores are seeing a big jump in demand for firearms since last Friday’s massacre at a midnight movie showing in Aurora.

Background checks for people wanting to buy guns in Colorado reportedly increased more than 41 percent after last week’s Aurora movie massacre. The Denver Post reports that firearm instructors have also seen increased interest in training needed for a concealed-carry permit.

“It’s been insane,” Jake Meyers, an employee at Rocky Mountain Guns and Ammo in Parker told the newspaper Monday.

Between Friday and Sunday, the Colorado Bureau of Investigation approved background checks for 2,887 people who wanted to purchase a firearm — a 43 percent increase over the previous Friday through Sunday and a 39 percent jump over those same days on the first weekend of July.

So, it wasn’t the Tea Party after all… it was the NRA! The rabbit hole, it runs deep indeed. But here is a serious point. Since Holmes isn’t talking and appears to be in a massively drug-addled state, how can anyone be certain that he was the shooter? No one saw him in the mask except perhaps the policeman who captured him, and it seems to me that drugging up a patsy dressed in SWAT gear, then sticking a smoking gun in his hands as soon as your colleague comes out the door and hops in the squad car would be trivially easy in all the darkness and confusion.

I’m not saying this scenario is likely, merely pointing out that it would be plausible in the absence of a coherent confession or blood matching the DNA of the victims all over Holmes’s clothing. After seeing that video of Holmes at the arraignment, hearing of his unintelligible rambling on his voice message makes me wonder how functional this highly intelligent individual was last weekend. And speaking as one who read the Unabomber’s manifesto because no one at the Pioneer Press could make heads or tales of it as well as a volume of Stalin’s works, I can attest that most intelligent individuals who turn murderous are not only willing to talk, they won’t shut up about their endless justifications for their actions.