thoughts in and out of season
James Kalb Why Nazism? Many of the theories proposed to explain something so horrible and bizarre have had an ulterior purpose—it was all about big business, Christian antisemitism, authoritarian child-raising practices, or whatever. Pick the thing you like least about European society, and that’s what caused the Nazis. A contemporary eyewitness account by a young German, “Defying … More ...
Quote for the day: “Every group has its code words. These words serve an important social function—they enable the members of the group to deliver a harsh judgment on others without accountability.” (Deal Hudson)
The old ball and chain really does work: University of Florida study: Marriage can reduce life of crime. The effect is said to be “strong” among hardened offenders in their late teens and early 20s, although the article unfortunately doesn’t give figures. And it has to be marriage; shacking up doesn’t do the job. … More ...
Two stories from Britain illustrate the discipline now imposed on words or actions at odds with the emerging order of things: Top Tory backs blast at gays and lesbians and Farce as heroes nick thug.
The first involves a senior Tory baroness, Caroline Cox, who lent her support to a book written by an … More ...
This seems to add a piece to the puzzles regarding the comparative weakness of the ties between black men and women worldwide: Public policies promoting marriage may not benefit all children, Cornell social policy expert finds in study. What the study suggests is that white children are affected more by broken homes, black children … More ...
Some tricks worth thinking about: Seeing through the lies. Long pauses, short sentences, and frequent errors in diction or grammar can be a tip-off that someone’s lying. Here’s a more complicated system: Become a Human Lie Detector. Act truthful in one way and something else you do will betray you.
No system works … More ...
Here in New York we didn’t know what to say about the September 11 atrocities, so we repeated old patriotic speeches and spent a couple hours reading the names of those who died in a sort of spoken equivalent of the Viet Nam Memorial. In England they apparently had the same problem, and Spiked provides … More ...
The forces of built tradition are rallying in Britain and making headway against modernist tyranny: All the King’s Architects: The surprising success of Prince Charles’s anti-modernist crusade. Unfortunately, there are no pictures in the online version of the article, so unless you’re unusually good at visualizing buildings from lists of details you’ll want to … More ...
This woman sounds like a parody, but not by much: Smith presidency offers a bully pulpit . Carol Christ, the college’s new president, thinks that “equity and access are some of the key issues facing American higher education.” She’ll therefore be pushing for colleges to bring more gender balance to their faculties, especially in the … More ...
What happens when journalism gets too real? ‘Philly Daily News’ Ponders Photo Controversy. The paper ran a spread on the city’s at-large murder suspects and two of them got caught. Unfortunately, the suspects were all the wrong color. The paper had to apologize in response to a flood of angry phone calls and emails, … More ...