Illiteracy and Indecency at CNN

This article featured on CNN is, in so many ways, a perfect example of our decline.

It hardly deserves mention that although it is a news site and not a Playboy magazine, it discusses in shameless detail the most intimate details of female sexual pleasure. Any mask of decency dissolved long ago in the acid bath of modern culture.

The article is adorned with a gallery-style listicle "10 Reasons to Have Sex Tonight" that features 3 gay couples (out of 10), a tenfold overrepresentation of the 3% of the population they comprise. And, the gallery has only one image with a baby, reminding us that "sex can also make a baby. And that can be good for you," a perfunctory if not grudging mention of the essential element of sex, i.e. procreation. The other 10 reasons are predictably selfish: better memory, lower stress, burning calories, et cetera. As if modern man is so encumbered by practicality and self restraint that he must be convinced by medical science to have sex. The propagandizing surrounding sex continues apace.

It is not just the moral decline on full display here, but also the linguistic decline. The author contrasts "intercourse", penetrative sex, with "outercourse", non penetrative sex. He appears to think that he is being cleaver by contrasting "inter-" and "outer-" as if they opposites. But of course, they are not. "Inter-" does not mean "inner" it means "between". It only accidentally resembles "inner" and is no more related to "inner" than the verb "inter", i.e. to bury, is to "intercourse". The opposite of "intercourse" would be "intracourse" which would have to be a neologism for masturbation, though obviously not for the mutual masturbation the author is so earnestly and graphically advocating. 

This man is older than I am by a decade or two, and he has a Ph.D. to my M.S., but did no one teach him basic Latin and Greek roots? Or basic decency? Apparently not.

Civilizational Retirement

The problem with democratic socialists like Bernie Sanders, and indeed everyone who believes that a large welfare state is a moral imperative of western countries, is that they take for granted the wealth that makes socialist programs possible. That staggering wealth was produced by industrial and post-industrial capitalist economies. Once socialism is adopted, it will be a few short generations before that wealth is spent.

This pattern is natural. Humans work all their adult lives, scrimping and saving and sweating and bleeding, and if they are successful they can have a nice comfortable retirement. Socialism springs from the same impulse: just as the old seek comfort in their twilight years, so old, successful civilizations seek retirement, and encourage in their population lifestyles suited to a slow, cushy decline. Witness the advocacy for small families, career women, and all around the disinterest in producing enough children to forestall population decline. 

Socialism is civilizational retirement. And western societies are ready for it. They have allowed the vitality to seep from Christendom; it's bones have grown frail, it's eyes dull, it's womb barren.

The socialist fantasy is that this scenario is sustainable. But it isn't. Retirement is only ever a prelude. Those who advocate socialism are advocating for the death of civilization.

The Self-Dhimmitization of the West

Under Muslim rule through the ages, non Muslims were afforded the status of dhimmi, a euphemism that literally means "protected people" but in actuality has meant second class citizen. Native populations were dhimmitized forcefully by the violent subjugation at the hands of their Muslim conquerors.

Now, the people of the west are self-dhimmitizing, as they actively will the transformation of their countries into Muslim lands, not by the sword, but by immigration. Look at Piers Morgan, attacking Tommy Robinson, while demanding that Robinson put down the Koran and show it respect:

Robinson attempts to make the point that while not all Muslims are bad people, Islam itself is a bad ideology, and he has the quotes, from the Koran, to back up that claim. Piers Morgan, already a dhimmi by willing submission, is clearly as ignorant as a stump, but considers it his sacred duty, nevertheless, to defend Islam and it's prophet and holy book, not by facts and argument, but by shouting down one of the few people willing to tell the truth.

Tommy Robinson is seeking a peaceful solution to the escalating violence in the west, and Piers Morgan, and those like him, are already so inured to their new masters, that they insist on defending the indefensible until Britain is ruled by a Caliphate.

Review: "Alien: Covenant"

"Alien: Covenant" sets aside the uneven world-building and vague, sophomoric philosophizing of it's predecessor, "Prometheus", to deliver a horrifying tale that had me groaning in discomfort in the first 10 minutes, and slumped in despair by the end. Though borrowing heavily from it's predecessors, it was not as successful at building a slow crescendo of horror suspense as in "Alien", nor in establishing emotional bonds with those under threat, like Newt in "Aliens". Yet, knowing what's coming and watching monsters rip through body after frail body is enough to create a compounding sense of inevitability and dread.

Michael Fassbender returns to play the android David, as well as a newer model called Walter. As in many sci-fi tales with androids, he is easily the most interesting character on screen, especially in his interactions with his "brother" Walter. The erudite David sprinkles poetical quotes and literary allusions into the dialogue, adding some thematic depth to the proceedings.

However, in serving up, as if in answer to the questions raised by its predecessor about the meaning of human life, another merciless meat grinder of action horror, "Covenant" ultimately becomes an exercise in demonstrating the meaninglessness of suffering in a brutal and Godless universe. But isn't that why we go to see horror stories these days? Not for thrills and catharsis, not to test our mettle, but to have our souls crushed? In that sense, it succeeded terrifically.

★★☆ (2/3 stars)