Idiots, Disingenuous, or Both?

Posted on Thursday 23 May 2024 by Mark R. Kelly
  • Republicans misinterpret, either naively or maliciously, boilerplate language about use of force by the FBI as a plot by Biden to assassinate Trump;
  • Thoughts about accountability;
  • Testimony from Stew Peters and Steve Bannon, both presumably self-proclaimed Christians, about their plans to take over America.

This week’s faux outrage on the Right.

The outrage:

And

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For Certain Values of Natural

Posted on Wednesday 22 May 2024 by Mark R. Kelly

Conservatives are obsessed over things that are allegedly “unnatural” (especially homosexuality), when what they are really concerned about is any behavior unsuitable to tribal morality, in particular the expansion and growth of the human tribe, for which any sexual behavior that cannot lead to reproduction must be banished. (As is the traditional position of the Catholic Church.) And yet, in the real, natural world, there are behaviors that defy those human notions of “natural.”

Joe.My.God, 21 May 2024: Cultists Melt Down Over “Queer Planet” Animal Series

And

LGBTQNation, 20 May 2024: Conservatives are freaking out because they learned that some animals are gay, subtitled “The animal kingdom isn’t exactly like Noah’s Ark, after all.”

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Living By Stories, Not Reality, Part 2

Posted on Tuesday 21 May 2024 by Mark R. Kelly
  • A New Yorker review of a new book about human origins;
  • Robert Reich on how Americans don’t understand the reality of Trump and Biden;
  • Short items about the Pope, and fundamentalists beliefs in the evil nature of human beings; how conservatives praise foreign autocrats; and how Trump floats bans on birth control, then walks them back.

Continuing yesterday’s theme, with a couple substantial items. First, that New Yorker piece I wasn’t able to access yesterday.

The New Yorker, Maya Jasanoff, 6 May 2024: What the Origins of Humanity Can and Can’t Tell Us, subtitled “There’s still much to be learned about our prehistory. But we can’t help using it to explain the societies we have or to justify the ones we want.”

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Most Humans Live by Stories, Not Reality

Posted on Monday 20 May 2024 by Mark R. Kelly
  • Books by Gottschall and Rosenberg, and how history is just a bunch of stories;
  • A couple notes from the fringe;
  • Beck’s “We Live Again”.

I’ve mentioned more than once the truism that “history is written by the winners.” I just finished reading Jonathan Gottschall’s The Story Paradox: How Our Love of Storytelling Builds Societies and Tears them Down from 2021 (which got a killer review by Timothy Snyder in the NYTBR, that I discussed here). One thing that occurred to me as I read the book is: the losers also tell history, from their own perspective. Both the winners’ narrative and the losers’ narrative are stories, told to justify and flatter themselves. (I’ve occasionally wondered what the history books in England say about the American Revolution, for example, but I don’t know any easy way of finding that out. Order a history textbook from Amazon UK? What do Russian history books say about the United States? Is there a book somewhere that has compiled these issues?) Yet again, I suspect this is something obvious to everyone that I have only just realized for myself… or realized it in the sense that I’m trying to integrate it into my theory of science fiction.

Again, Gottschall reminded me of the 2018 book by Alex Rosenberg, How History Gets Things Wrong: The Neuroscience of Our Addiction to Stories, which I’ve put off reading (though it’s right up my alley) since I had some issues with Rosenberg’s earlier book, yet whose point apparently is that all historical narratives are just stories, and therefore wrong, in a fundamental sense.

I’ll write up my reactions to the Gottschall book later this week. Meanwhile, here’s a new item that fit this into narrative about narratives.

The Atlantic, Annie Lawrey, 20 May 2024: The Worst Best Economy Ever, subtitled “Why Biden is getting no credit for the boom”

Note this first paragraph: “the strongest economy the United States has ever experienced.” And yet many people don’t believe it. Is this a prime example of the power of stories over reality?

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Climate Change and Conservative Denial

Posted on Sunday 19 May 2024 by Mark R. Kelly

Like any journalist or storyteller or blogger, I am alert for items with thematic connections. Here are two, or three. About climate change and conservative denial.

NY Times, today’s front page, 19 May 2024: Mexico City Has Long Thirsted for Water. The Crisis Is Worsening., subtitled “A system of dams and canals may soon be unable to provide water to one of the world’s largest cities, a confluence of unchecked growth, crumbling infrastructure and a changing climate.”

This is not news; it’s been happening. It’s happening elsewhere, and will keep happening.

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Rules for Storytelling

Posted on Saturday 18 May 2024 by Mark R. Kelly
  • Vatican updates rules for identifying miracles;
  • Some conservative Christians, dealing with gender wars and their own kids identifying as gay, are bowing to reality.

If storytelling, more than we realize, drives the human experience — if people understand only through ‘narratives,’ or perceived causes and effects — then it’s significant when rules for storytelling explicitly change. Two items today.

NY Times, 17 May 2024: As Supernatural Claims Spread Online, Vatican Updates Its Rules on Them, subtitled “People have long claimed sightings of the Virgin Mary or bleeding crucifixes, and some endorsed by the Roman Catholic Church have become hugely popular pilgrimage destinations.”

To those of us outside “the” faith, Continue reading →

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Liberalism and Its Discontents

Posted on Friday 17 May 2024 by Mark R. Kelly
  • David Brooks on how authoritarians have momentum, because liberalism doesn’t appeal to people’s needs for a higher metaphysical meaning;
  • Biden and Trump: appearance and reality;
  • Double standards at Fox News about Butker and James;
  • Republicans about Trump: loyalty vs. principles;
  • Yet another Ten Commandments mandate; what is the point?

NY Times, David Brooks, 16 May 2024: The Authoritarians Have the Momentum [gift link]

David Books consistently includes himself among “we liberals” even while espousing a lot of traditionalist notions, especially the need for shared values in a large society. Here he tries to explain that, even though liberalism should be “winning,” it isn’t, for reasons. He opens:

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Expressions of Tribal Morality

Posted on Thursday 16 May 2024 by Mark R. Kelly
  • NFL player Harrison Butker’s expression of tribal morality, and responses;
  • Mike Johnson wants to boycott Target because of his fear being caught there when the Rapture comes;
  • Moron Jesse Watters; a GOP Rep’s claim of proof, but lack of proof, about Biden at SOTU; No fact checks at the debates; Conservatives claim that every natural disaster supports their positions.

The news today that most relates to the themes of this blog is the commencement speech made by an NFL player named Harrison Butker. It was covered by the Today Show this morning!

CNN, 16 May 2024: Backlash over NFL player Harrison Butker’s commencement speech has reached a new level

His speech was an expression of pure retrograde tribal mentality — women’s ideal roles are house maker and mother; being gay is a “deadly sin”; and so on. His audience apparently cheered, except for a minority, precisely the minority Butker and his ilk would demonize.

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Keeping Things In Perspective

Posted on Wednesday 15 May 2024 by Mark R. Kelly
  • How Biden is less unpopular than leaders of other major nations;
  • How 17% of voters blame Biden for the end of Roe (that is, many voters are not paying attention); and how I think many voters select a presidential candidate based on the effects of the previous president;
  • Review of a book that attacks the left with “mockery and sneers,” not argument or ideas;
  • Vice signalling on the right; Fox News on Michael Cohen; childish arguments from a MN creationist; more false Christian Nationalist history;
  • Beck’s “Wave”

NY Times, Paul Krugman, 13 May 2024: Biden’s Approval Is Low, Except Compared With Everyone Else’s [gift link]

Biden is less unpopular than all the other leaders in the Group of 7.

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Robert Reich on Red vs. Blue

Posted on Tuesday 14 May 2024 by Mark R. Kelly
  • Robert Reich on red vs. blue states;
  • Shorter items about the eagerness of Republicans to kill people (not just dogs); MAGA blaming Biden for Red Lobster; Red states anxious to discriminate against LGBTQ students; a pastor who apparently truly thought he could raise his wife from the dead; and how Christians blame Madonna for a flood in Brazil.
  • And a final thought about the potential for humanity to survive.

Here’s Robert Reich, yesterday.

Robert Reich, 13 May 2024: America’s second civil war? It’s already begun, subtitled “If Trump is elected, he’ll make it worse”

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