Not Just Another Liberal Handwringer

Neal Pollack’s ATTACK! is a must-read:

The second night of the Republican National Convention, I turned on Fox News. I enjoy watching Fox about as much as I enjoy eating my own turds for brunch. But if you want to understand why this country is rotting from within, you need to stare into the oozing mouth of the monster.

Ich bin ein Klingon*

The BBC headline “German radio starts Klingon service” caught my eye this morning:

The German international broadcaster Deutsche Welle (DW) is celebrating 10 years of its online service by adding a new language to the 30 it already publishes – Klingon.

I have to admit that my first reaction was: Uh-oh. How long before we start hearing about the Romulan Corridor, and the mistreated Klingon minority on Beta Eridani? How do you say Ein Folk, Ein Reich, Ein Fuhrer! in Klingon? (Check with the Klingon Language Institute if it really matters to you.)
But as it so rarely happens, the better angles of my nature asserted themselves. The more I thought about it, the more I believe this is A Good Thing ( feel free to jump in here). A society that can “waste” technical resources and time on an intellectual conceit like the Klingon language service is a prosperous society. It speaks to a certain delight in intellectual matters for their own sake, rather than for the sake of the bottom line. Deutsche Welle’s Klingon language service is an indication of a healthy intellectual ecology in Germany and Europe, in naked contrast to the United States, where the word “intellectual” is often a slur.
To extend the ecological metaphor, intellectually speaking, our country is an environmental disaster area. The keystone species, physicists and engineers, are on the decline. PBS, a bellwether for the nation’s intellectual health, has dumbed down its lineup with the execrable History Detectives and various historical reality shows, such as Frontier House. The current president of the United States is the poster child for anti-intellectualism: his administration has suppressed or distorted the scientific analyses of federal agencies to bring these results in line with administration policy.
There will be the predictable blats of derision from media pundits over the Klingon Language Service. News anchors, some of whom should know better, will make the same tired, arch comments about Star Trek fans. Meanwhile, most Americans know more about Paris the parasitic socialite than Paris the City of Light, and care more about NASCAR than NASA. It’s enough to make me wish I, too, was a Berliner.

Welsh Rarebit

BBC Online has a fine feature called The Day in Pictures, which today yielded A competitor in the World Bog Snorkelling Championships in Llanwrtyd Wells, Wales emerges from the water.
The nervous, fidgety part of my brain that’s still a hyperactive ten-year-old amped on heavily sweetened breakfast cereal and Tom and Jerry cartoons seized on this picture and caption like a GOP delegate who’s gotten his first taste of hotel cable porn:
• People go bog snorkeling?
• That is so cool!
• There’s a World Championship?
• Who wins, the person who sees the least?
• Are there bumper stickers: Snorkel Wales?
• Is this a mental condition caused by vowel deficiency?
• That is so cool!

A Theory of Flame Wars

Crossposted from ‘s thread: Dropping My Standards.
Every once in a great while I’ve given into the temptation and let fly with insults online. I’m a writer, and I was a sailor, so I have some fluency in the black arts, but it’s never really been satisfying. Why not?
I think may have hit the nail a glancing blow: there is no shame on the internet. When you call someone out in real life (assuming you’re more in the right than they), you silence them through embarrassment. Other people stare at the object of your ire and think to themselves, Whatever that person did, it must have been a real pisser for to call him a degraded, pus-sucking asswipe. All things being equal, if you have the moral authority on your side, the degraded pus-sucker slinks away. In the entire history of the internet, no one has ever slunk away in shame. Hence the existence of flame wars.
That brings me to the other reason why trading barbs online is unsatisfying. In real life moral outrage sometimes trumps other considerations, but more often the insulted and the insulting are engaged in subtle calculations of size, strength, and willingness to take the argument literally to the mat. Violence, or the credible threat of it, usually settles arguments definitively. I’m not saying that’s a good thing, merely that the world works that way. But people say things online so crude and insulting that they intuitively know they could never utter the remarks in real life, because it would invite immediate physical retribution. Online, of course, everyone is the same size (or at least their mouths are), and there’s no violent punctuation to stop pissing contests from evolving into flame wars.
Boy, I really went on a bit there. Well, the world is full of long-winded, self-important, hyphenated-insult douchebags.

The Rapa Nui Reading List

Reading lists are making the rounds in my little corner of the blogosphere: there’s one just downstream in this journal, and has an interesting genre reading list with a lot of fine titles. usually posts an interesting and eclectic monthly reading list, along with thumbnail reviews.
At a recent writer’s workshop, we were talking about books on war—which ones were worthwhile and which ones weren’t—and I made my own short list of the good ones (hence that topic’s preeminent position below). While I was at it, I added a few more books that have moved me, educated me or entertained me over the years. I make no claim that these are indispensable books, or great books, merely that they left a lasting impression on me, and that I was amply repaid for the time I’d invested in them. Maybe you’ll find them worth a read, too.