Letters to the Editor
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Why is Camille leaning towards Edwards?
As I recall from the last election, John Edwards was the only candidate in either party who claimed federal drug laws need to be even more draconian than they already are, which put him to the far right of Bush, even.
Camille Paglia has to stop calling herself a "libertarian Democrat" if she backs that kind of nonsense.
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You meant "sliver of stupidity"
You people just don't ever get it.
Conservative opinions are ok. Stupidity is not ok. Random opinions with no basis in fact and no supporting arguments are not ok. A 4th grader can do that.
The problem with Cammy isn't that she is a conservative, it's that she's a know-nothing. Actual research? Perish the thought! Cogent arguments? Never!
What kind of people enjoy reading mindless drivel?
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Oh I think she's so wrong on this
I was full of admiration at this demonstration of the beauty and efficiency of the modern distribution system, which I extolled in the first chapter of "Sexual Personae" as a male-created artifact of civilization.
I have one word for you Camille: textiles.
They were the first things manufactured by ancient people, the first things traded by ancient people. The loom was the first programmable technology, and clothing provided the first symbolic language and the earliest expressions of geometry.
And this was all done by women, not men. That is, until new metallurgical discoveries enabled ancient people to take large numbers of slaves and transfer textile production to slave labor.
Which is the part where the men can take most of the credit.
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Salon Fair and Balanced
I encourage anyone to take a look at the Editor's Picks of the postings for this article. Like any good global warming critic, the Editor reveals that there is no consensus that Ms. Paglia is a waste of cyberspace. Salon is slouching toward irrelevance. Its former potential is withering into the mediocre mean. I have to go read People magazine now.
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What?
"John Edwards got publicity for the wrong reason two weeks ago when Ann Coulter bizarrely called him a 'faggot' at the Conservative Political Action Conference. What could have been a good joke at the expense of p.c. Hollywood misfired badly first because that old chestnut of a schoolyard insult makes no sense whatever when applied to Edwards .. ."
So suddenly the word "faggot" is acceptable speech (even on Salon) and those who suggest it might be associated with homophobia and gay-bashing are merely being "politically correct?"
What is going on here? How much have we allowed ourselves to be manipulated by elements of vulgar self-interest?
Have Coulter, Limbaugh and their ilk corroded our language to such a degree that prejudicial taunts are a marker of wit?
I love Salon; I'll go on to read Blumenthol's piece. I just feel sad.
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I am tried of the vaporings of this
extremely shallow woman. She skims everything allowing only the loudest of the media voices to penetrate and then she spits out her "insights." The result is being able to characterize the Plame outing as "overblown." That above anything else tells me that she doesn't delve deeper than a minute or two into anything she spouts off about.
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Thanks!
It's been a slow couple of days at work, so I've been able to do a bit of surfing. What with the lack of pubic hair, breast, and "what you should eat" stories, there has been a serious lack of food fights on Salon of late.
And after Greenwald, Blumenthal, the comics and Heather Havrilesky, I'm here for the food fights.
Paglia once a month does the trick, guaranteed.
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Completely expected, still interesting.
Paglia is seminal(I enjoyed that) to Coulter, so what's the big surprise? Paglia is also a self-serving writer and always has been. She has also had her time of greatness, though it is gone. However, anyone who thinks Coulter and her ilk are unique to the "right" and only appeal to overtly racist, bigoted, or closed-minded people is out of touch or in denial. This is the country in which we live.
Lots of Americans cheer when they hear we are killing foreigners, torturing and generally behaving badly in the word and at home. Baseless arguments formed from preconceived dogma and/or agenda are far more common than well-researched and well-founded arguments. Incompetent literary criticism and critics vastly outnumber the competent. There are people on every side of every issue who call each other names and take statements out of context, almost immediately after chastising their "enemies" for doing the same. All politicians in our political system act out of self-interest eventually, no matter the orignal motivation that led them to...errr...serve the public. And, ALL so called news outlets are of the same mind...their goal and editorial agenda is to make the people buy things through sensationalism, fear and imbuing the unconscious with the sinking feeling that they are not as good as they should be.
Fox may be completely naked about their political bias, but Murdoch is just like every other media mogul...He wants money and power and he wants to be the only public voice expressed through as many channels as possible. He knows that in a country, nay world, in which most of the population don't bother to practice self-reflection, he can have his way every day of the week.
What? You think you and I didn't have anything to do with the world becoming what it is?
Paglia makes outlandish statements that cause a reaction, and that is her aim. Anyone who gives it to her, is completely "owned" by her, spinning in her orbit, they allow her to define them, ironically, not the other way around. The more a person reacts, the more Paglia achieves.
Keep living in reaction to your world, and you are never in action, get it? Keep reacting and someone else defines you, sets your moral center and takes all of your power.
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it's not her conservatism
I am so over Paglia's annoying, preciously baby boomer game of iconoclasm for the sake of iconoclasm. Never mind the inherent merits of this or that argument or position ... it's cool because it's against the conventional wisdom, period.
Also, as "reader" said, for someone so full of self-congratulation over her outspoken moral courage against the Establishment, Paglia was pretty darned quiet in the five years when we needed the real thing. I can't help compare her to Molly Ivins, who was far less intellectually pretentious and far more brave.