Should the Supreme Court revive obscenity as a viable legal concept? I was recently trying to search for a Nintendo Switch game, and I typed in Thornkin, the name of the game. Google autocorrected it to something else and gave me something entirely different, and I didn’t even search for that.
When I say obscenity, I mean public obscenity. Google shouldn’t give you search results unless you actively look for something. There shouldn’t be an accident that leads to something you weren’t even close to searching for based on some kind of weird autocorrect. Adult films could be banned, but films that aren’t “adult” per se could just not get theatrical releases or insist no one under 18 can see it in a theater, regardless of being accompanied by a parent or guardian.
I’m also thinking of the Houston Rodeo.
However, even if someone disagrees with all of this, at least broadcast television should adhere to a stricter code and people should dress modestly in public places. Anything public where children will consistently be should follow much stricter decency codes.
Sorry for the double-post, I meant this to be a direct reply to Josh:
I just copy-pasted “Thornkin” into Google, and it gave me the game right away, no autocorrect.
I don’t think it’s worth having obscenity and modesty laws beyond what we already have. Anything beyond “No shirt no shoes no service” and media ratings gets into subjective territory, and I don’t trust the public to agree on where to draw the line.
I typed it in without Nintendo Switch in the search to show someone I know. It’s possible I misspelled the game or used Bing or Firefox search instead of Google. Whatever I ended up with shouldn’t have been so easy to find.
I do agree that there is an issue with what counts, but the law has to deal with what counts all the time. Many things are a matter of degree. For example, playboy would be something that’s a bit more obvious vs. the movie 50 shades of gray is borderline according to contemporary standards.
You can also look at standards. Compare “Cheek to Cheek” with modern rap music. The quality is a clear deterioration. We aren’t just talking about movies; music also fits.
The argument is that entertainment can corrupt the morals of a nation by glorifying awful or anti-social behavior. There’s also a basic dignity argument that some things humans shouldn’t do.
For example, here’s a weird hypothetical. Imagine some kind of necrophiliac finds an old cemetery where he can dig up the bodies and never be caught. He is even great at reburying them. He records himself and only shows people he somehow knows have no connection to the cemetery. That really strikes me as something so debauched it shouldn’t be acceptable in a functional society.
I could be wrong though. I’m still thinking all this stuff through, but I am really leaning towards changing some of my positions on the first amendment. I’ve been a pretty big first amendment person for a long time.
No you should not ban adult films. Adult films are banned in most Muslim countries, and what you see there is that banning does not necessarily increase the level of sexual morality of the men. In most Muslim countries a women is not advised to travel alone, due to incidents of sexual assault. We may remember the sexual assault on journalists (Lara Logan) by mobs and security forces in 2013 during the revolution against the Mubarak regime in Egypt. Part of the problem is misogynist attitudes fostered by Islam, but another part is lack of a sexual outlet for many men.
Porn sedates men. It reduces a man’s libido, because of it’s effect on a man’s dopamine receptors. In our society where some estimate that about fifty percent of men is still virgin at age 30, you should be glad that the rape figures are as low as they are. In a society without porn, young men with low economic and romantic prospects tend to engage in various bad behaviors such as violence including sexual violence, gang and mob activity, and crime. This “young man problem” is visible in many European countries today that are overrun by hordes of young men from Third World countries with zero economic prospects; this causes rape figures to go up significantly.
The Houston Rodeo issue is something different as this relates to behavior in public; porn tends to be consumed in private. This type of behavior directly affects other people, e.g. families with children. The solution is twofold a) enforced dress codes by private organizations b) enforced decency standards by law. The root cause of what happened at the Houston Rodeo are low standards of behavior in certain “communities” and subcultures; other aspects of that culture are rap music, street takeovers, and the type of behavior that generated many YouTube videos about Carnival Cruises and Spirit Airlines.
I do not see the Robert Bork approach (“The First Amendment only applies to explicitly political speech”) as a good solution; this would require SCOTUS action to greatly extend the exceptions to what constitutes free speech. As somebody who leans conservative and who sees that the dangers for censorship are mostly coming from the left I see more dangers that merits from that approach.
I’m not sure about the sedating men part. I’ve heard that argument before. The 1950’s was pretty rigid, and I don’t think rape was an epidemic then, but there could be something to your argument. I really don’t know.
Public spaces could be a middle ground, but I would also be in favor of extending more modest standards to every public place, even beaches. Perhaps we could do a “wall of separation” between public and private, so publicly, everyone acts decent, but privately, who knows? Maybe that could maintain freedom while also enforcing public standards of decency.
Interesting enough, arguments for censorship from the right and left (Bork vs. Europe hate speech laws) are basically motivated by the same thing, which is that public speech and certain forms of entertainment are believed to influence the attitudes and perceptions of citizens and governments should take an active role in forming the hearts and minds of the citizenry. Entertainment is a socializing force and thus requires regulation.
I don’t think anyone can deny entertainment does socialize. Everyone criticizes. I recently watched Legally Blonde with a progressive co-worker, and he didn’t like how the lesbian was portrayed in the movie, so everyone can look at portrayals and influence. We are just differing on exactly what concerns us.
All of this is just throwing ideas out. I’m not really constraining myself to any kind of sharp legal analysis, just more speculating.
The old Legion of Decency did want to censor immoral behavior in movies if it was glorified because of the fear of the corruption of public morals. I think part of them may have been right.
The old Legion of Decency did want to censor immoral behavior in movies if it was glorified because of the fear of the corruption of public morals.
The Legion of Decency was a Catholic organization who tried to impose Christian norms on motion pictures on behalf of Catholic audiences. The Legion worked in tandem with the Motion Picture Production Code (Hays Code) to ensure the silver screen remained sanitized. They also rated movies; Catholics were not allowed to watch movies with a C rating as this would be classified as sinful and had to be confessed. Famous movie classic that got a C rating by the Legion of Decency included The French Line (1953), Baby Doll (1956), Alfred Hitchcock’s Psycho (1960), and Antonioni’s Blowup (1966).
Due to the change in mores since the 1960s plus declining church attendance, the Legion of Decency has stopped operations.
Nowadays the Western world has censorship based on a different type of morality, more and government supported in Europe, and via “cancel culture” in the USA. We are not talking about traditional sexual mores from a Christian perspective here; we are thing about hate speech, criticism of immigration, climate change and other things the left and the woke care about.
My perspective on censorship is more libertarian. I want to be able to say what I want to say, write what I want to write, read what I want to read and watch what I want to watch, without any authority forbidding me to do so based on a set of morals that I do not support. If you do not like a particular TV channel, then please switch the channel. If you disagree with a speaker, do not visit his lectures, and definitely do not go to shout down the speaker!
Works of entertainment, but also books, magazines, blogs, YouTube channels have an impact on society as they change how people think and act. That is to be expected in an open society. The solution to bad expression is still better speech and expression.
The difference between Robert Bork and the woke left is in which speech they want to censor; there is no principal difference as both Bork and the left are OK with censoring speech that fall short of their standards.
The distinction between “public” and “private” applies to activities that do not fall under the category “speech” but “behavior”. E.g. it is OK to be naked in your own house when nobody else can see you, but in the public space you have to comply with legal standards regarding proper attire, or with dress codes set by the proprietors and other parties that can set the rules. When you are in public you have to behave like a decent and considerate human being, following standards of accepted behavior.
“Nowadays the Western world has censorship based on a different type of morality, more and government supported in Europe, and via “cancel culture” in the USA. We are not talking about traditional sexual mores from a Christian perspective here; we are thing about hate speech, criticism of immigration, climate change and other things the left and the woke care about.”
This is where i feel the most pause and caution in my thinking. The Legion of Decency believed its morals were tried and true for all time, so they wanted to get rid of any kind of glorification of behavior they thought improper.
The left does the same thing. They believe open borders, full acceptance of all things trans, and the like are matters of objective truth (even though they talk out of both sides of their mouth and say morality is relative). Many of them probably feel just as strongly as The Legion of Decency did.
Do I want the government to have that kind of power? No because I don’t trust it. But in some world where the government was run by better people, would I be in favor of a Hays code type of arrangement? Absolutely.
I think part of my fear is the left is abandoning the play nice arrangement our society has had where neither side really tries to censor the other. Conservatives and libertarians cannot just sit back and not also point out many things the left advocates for COULD be censored in a different world, and many forms of their entertainment have encouraged debauchery.
“But in some world where the government was run by better people, would I be in favor of a Hays code type of arrangement? Absolutely.“
You may need to consider the following phrase from Federalist 51 by James Madison: “If men were angels, no government would be necessary”.
Because men are re inherently flawed, selfish, and ambitious including those in power, a system of government with strict checks and balances is essential to maintain order and protect individual liberty, plus a Bill of Rights to protect the citizens from abuses of government power.
Looking at how Congress functions today, and the Courts, I can only conclude that we have too many bad people in power.
The Hays Code was puritanical and stifled creativity (while, admittedly, also stimulating it as film-makers figured out ways to imply sexual activity without really showing it. The Hays Code also mandated that good must triumph over evil in movies to send a positive moral message. Certain words couldn’t be used, like “abortion” and married couples had to be shown in twin beds.
My perspective on censorship is more libertarian. I want to be able to say what I want to say, write what I want to write, read what I want to read and watch what I want to watch, without any authority forbidding me to do so based on a set of morals that I do not support.
The bottom line is that if one does not accept an authority (Authority really) that defines rules of conduct about sexuality, there is no defensible or definable reason why there should be any regulation. At the base, the Catholic ethic is that of the Sacraments. Matrimony is a sacrament, and sexual immorality is a sin. The reasoning is sound, of course, but if one does not subscribe to the belief in the Sacrament, or that there is an Authority (i.e. a metaphysical imperative) then again you will do what you want. And no one can say anything about it.
The Hays Codes went further: for example it was not acceptable to portray clergy in a negative light. Or that in a film that a criminal not be caught and punished. So the ending of the movie Chinatown would not have been allowed (the criminal went free). There was much more to it. And the “breaking free” of all controls over speech and narrative became, of course, another sort of imperative for a rebelling generation.
Once the grounding is lost in metaphysics, then in Bork’s sense the rebels have all the right to attack all authority and all hierarchy.
In the larger scheme, the Codes oversaw how narratives functioned. Bad behavior = must be punished. Bad attitude toward religious authority = must not be allowed. The codes were far-reaching in that sense. I guess the idea is that if certain things were allowed to be portrayed that they would become normalized.
Practically speaking, the questions are different. I actually think our society currently could still slide back into some kind of Hays Code and reinforce standards of public decency. I am all in favor of that.
Specifics obviously matter though. Artistic expression needs to be protected. You don’t want the church lady from SNL on the board censoring everything, but wouldn’t more subtext, suggestion, and creativity really make cinema better? Some of the classics were made during the Hays code.
I look at music too, something like NIcki Minaj’s WAP song. There’s no artistic value to it for me.
I just copy-pasted “Thornkin” into Google, and it gave me the game right away, no autocorrect.
I don’t think it’s worth having obscenity and modesty laws beyond what we already have. Anything beyond “No shirt no shoes no service” and media ratings gets into subjective territory, and I don’t trust the public to agree on where to draw the line.
A couple of years or so ago, LA City Councilwoman Nithya Raman in a Q&A was asked about an ordinance requring homeless encampments to stay at least 500 feet away from schools and daycares. She said she voted against it, and rolled her eyes in response to the boos from the crowd: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sG8REWU1soE Now that she’s running for mayor, a recent protest has gone viral, in which the protesters pitched their tents and set up “camp” around Nithya Raman’s own house, and her attitude towards this ecampment being close to HER home was a little different: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AD8e-G42V5E
While at first I was delighted at seeing a progressive politician have to live with what she puts others through, should the protesters have considered the neighbors, on whose property they were camping?
They are trespassing, which has very little teeth. There has been a steady erosion of property rights and respect for them. You can see it where I live in particular during hunting season where hunters seem to think as long as it’s not fenced property, they can go where they please and leave their trash. (I blame their mammas for such behavior). I’m just glad we don’t have a little fishing pond for people to enjoy without permission. Without property rights, what rights do we have, really?
I noticed that there was some ruckus about Jaxson Dart announcing President Trump at a Giants game, I was not aware that there was a racial component to this. I thought it was a honor to announce POTUS regardless of party affiliation.
Here's what they've normalized and are trying to reinforce with the Jaxson Dart situation:
Black people can be offended by what white people believe. But white people can't be offended by what black people believe.
It's legal to love and worship Barack Obama. It's illegal to…
Just a few years ago, being excited to meet the president was bipartisan. It didn’t matter who you were because it meant a trip to the White House and getting a deeper taste of our history. People also could be friends, even with different political views. Although, in the 90’s, the parties were not as far apart as they are now.
Interesting commentary about decency, censorship and public standards. One thing I’ve noticed is that an awful lot was implied in the songs and movies we enjoyed as youngsters and teens. “I found my thrill on blueberry hill” and “will you still love me tomorrow” were sexual references, but we were so innocent in the 50s and early 60s, we did not understand. There is so much exposure at all levels and ages these days, innocence fades fairly quickly.
It is also interesting to note the rise of communism and Muslim power plays throughout the country. So many on the left have no idea what sort of censorship is in store for everyone, even them, if we lose our freedoms to either of these ideologies.
Subtext and suggestion do seem more dignified though. Just as a matter of taste, implying and hinting with a twinkle in your eye seems more elevated to me. That’s not a direct question of censorship though, just my personal taste.
It is hard to argue that entertainment today hasn’t done some damage though, even if you aren’t in favor of censorship.
My personal taste, too. It is such a difficult issue, because I am not a fan of censorship, but you are correct about the damage. More dignified and elevated, twinkle in your eye back then? Very well said.
We need to look about what is going on with Graham Plattner in Maine. There are so many rumors coming out about him, that some expect that the Democrat Party is going to pull a Biden-Kamala bait-and-switch, with Janet Mills being the Kamala.
This is getting very curious. These influential voices are coming out on this point VERY LATE. The primary is June 9.
I do not think anything will happen in advance of the primary, and Platner is going to win with no real opponent still in the race.
This is getting very curious. These influential voices are coming out on this point VERY LATE. The primary is June 9.
I do not think anything will happen in advance of the primary, and Platner is going to win with no real opponent still in the race.
BUT, under Maine law, if Platner were to drop out after winning the primary, he could be replaced by the Dems on the General Election ballot ONLY IF:
1. He drops out prior to the 2nd Monday in July, and 2. His replacement is named by the 4th Monday in July.
I think we are seeing the unfolding of a plan by the Dem. establishment OUTSIDE of Maine to begin a drumbeat for Platner to exit the race after the primary, and let the Party hand-pick a replacement for the General.
Pro-Tip — always read state law to figure out that plan that might be in the process of being hatched behind closed doors.
The Hays Code issue interest me because I am interested in the issue of causation (cause and effect) as it pertain to the breaking down of the integrity of the US and in the process of transformation of a Republic (which the whole world admired and emulated) into the sick, mentally ill, drug addicted, war-mongering, ultra-perverted, ignorant and incapable of reasoning, and indeed quite super-materialistic, atheistic and deranged nation that it has become. A diseased nation selling disease to the world.
Whew! I am on a roll here. 🤩 My operative theory is that this blog is habited by pseudo-conservative complainers. That is a unique species (saying this, I do not mean offense, just accuracy. It is much better to tell the truth then to lie, especially to oneself). Endless complaining (always in self-righteous tones) but no understanding of how things got to be this way! No ability to explain. And therefore just flowing with the current if American Radicalism down the river with no capability of changing course.
It is quite interesting: here in the first section are the Don’ts and in the second section the Better be carefuls:
Pointed profanity – by either title or lip – this includes the words “God”, “Lord”, “Jesus”, “Christ” (unless they be used reverently in connection with proper religious ceremonies), “hell”, “damn”, “Gawd”, and every other profane and vulgar expression however it may be spelled;
Any licentious or suggestive nudity – in fact or in silhouette; and any lecherous or licentious notice thereof by other characters in the picture;
The illegal traffic in drugs;
Any inference of sex perversion;
White slavery;
Miscegenation (sex relationships between the white and black races);
Sex hygiene and venereal diseases;
Scenes of actual childbirth – in fact or in silhouette;
Children’s sex organs;
Ridicule of the clergy;
Willful offense to any nation, race or creed;
The use of the flag;
International relations (avoiding picturizing in an unfavorable light another country’s religion, history, institutions, prominent people, and citizenry);
Arson;
The use of firearms;
Theft, robbery, safe-cracking, and dynamiting of trains, mines, buildings, etc. (having in mind the effect which a too-detailed description of these may have upon the moron);
Brutality and possible gruesomeness;
Technique of committing murder by whatever method;
Methods of smuggling;
Third-degree methods;
Actual hangings or electrocutions as legal punishment for crime;
Sympathy for criminals;
Attitude toward public characters and institutions;
Sedition;
Apparent cruelty to children and animals;
Branding of people or animals;
The sale of women, or of a woman selling her virtue;
Rape or attempted rape;
First-night scenes;
Man and woman in bed together;
Deliberate seduction of girls;
The institution of marriage;
Surgical operations;
The use of drugs;
Titles or scenes having to do with law enforcement or law-enforcing officers;
Excessive or lustful kissing, particularly when one character or the other is a “heavy”.
Obnoxious and offensive comment. Tell you what: why don’t you peruse all of the comments from 2009-2011, when critics who found the whole concept of an ethics blog annoying because a “so-called ethicist” had the audacity to use basic ethical systems and analysis to point out unethical conduct in multiple disciplines, institutions, and cultural terrains. My position then as now is that theirs was the classic and traditional rationalization of the arrogant unethical, “Who are you to judge me?” I have written extensively about why maintaining and building an ethical society and culture mandates continuous “judging.”
This site (unlike your comments, for the most part), supports its opinions, points to established ethics tools and systems in the process, and encourages good faith participants to employ the same tools to rebut or offer alternatives to the analysis. Denigrating the entire project as the whines of “pseudo-conservative complainers” is a mass insult to not just me, but everyone here, and, again as usual, there are no facts in put in evidence, only your typically eccentric world view. The blog is not about “how we got here,” “here” being defined as how your yellow-tinted glasses perceive reality. If that’s what you want to write about, fine: start your own blog. I may even read it. This isn’t your billboard. If you review the Comment Policies above, you will see this statement, dating from the very beginning of the blog:
5. Political rants are not welcome. In addition, efforts to muddle genuine objective ethical analysis by pressing ideological talking points and bombarding me with links are not appreciated, and won’t be tolerated for long, if at all.
I admit to have been too tolerant of your weird and bloated commentary for far too long, as you accumulated privileges by contributing content in good faith. However, you haven’t just crossed the line, but charged over it. Questioning the integrity of EA and the seriousness of its analysis is not legitimate commentary, it is just unjustified abuse. Try again, and harder, to deal with the topic: ethics. If you repeat this tactic displayed on this comment, I will pull your plug. If you try to defend this comment, I won’t even finish reading it: I will pull the plug. I will not be insulted on my own website.
And, for the record, thinking that the Hays Code has any greater significance historically or culturally on the US today than Pilgrim’s Progress is bonkers.
I admit to have been too tolerant of your weird and bloated commentary for far too long, as you accumulated privileges by contributing content in good faith. However, you haven’t just crossed the line, but charged over it.
Actually, in what I wrote there was only a small part that was critical or offensive. But since that is, in fact, what I do think, isn’t it best that we agree that my (weird) ideas are not appropriate here? This is what I wrote and what I in fact think and believe:
My operative theory is that this blog is habited by pseudo-conservative complainers. That is a unique species (saying this, I do not mean offense, just accuracy. It is much better to tell the truth then to lie, especially to oneself). Endless complaining (always in self-righteous tones) but no understanding of how things got to be this way! No ability to explain. And therefore just flowing with the current if American Radicalism down the river with no capability of changing course.
My view? You and you-plural should not take offense, as I do not mean to offend! I mean only to become clear, and to state things clearly.
You have been tolerant, and I do understand why you see my ideas and writing style as bloated and eccentric. Certainty eccentric! 😎 I appreciate your toleration and I will now leave of my own accord.
The last posts written by me — here, but also in other threads, and about America’s general direction and the over-influence of Israel — express ideas and views that are incompatible with your project and understanding, and I would only repeat similar things going forward. And that would be not very productive. So, at the very least I was able to write about what I think the Chaos of the present is really about. That is really what I think.
I will (as I have in the past) always check in to read here. Finally, I do not intend offense. It is all part of the fun activity of polemics!
I thought over this for a few days now and though I cannot control ir influence how you react to my writing or thoughts, here your own assessment is quite off the mark.
Your recommendation that I read previous posts, or deal with an issue of other people disagreeing with you starting an ethics-focused blog, has no relevance to the comment that I just made and which you took offense to. Again, I do not intend offense. If i did intend it, I suppose that would be wrong.
This site (unlike your comments, for the most part), supports its opinions, points to established ethics tools and systems in the process, and encourages good faith participants to employ the same tools to rebut or offer alternatives to the analysis. Denigrating the entire project as the whines of “pseudo-conservative complainers” is a mass insult to not just me, but everyone here, and, again as usual, there are no facts in put in evidence, only your typically eccentric world view.
I believe that the “line” I crossed with you personally and politically has to do with my views about Israel’s destructive influence on the US; and my views that Donald Trump has betrayed a segment of the base that voted him in to office. I view your views on this topic as morally wrong and strategically negative. And I noted as well that you describe my views as “antisemitic” which means that you regard me as an antisemite. This is wrong, and it is also “offensive” yet I do not get offended. I respond by saying that your too simplistic views, which label critics of recent Israeli policy , and the American Jews who make the criticism as antisemitic, is itself part of a problem. It is absolutely necessary for Jews to cone out strongly against Israeli policies. And because you discourage this, you are encouraging anti-Jewish animosity.
There are two other issues I have wrote about that (I think) irritate you somehow personally. One being my views on the Northern War of Aggression against the South as the starting-point of general American aggression in the world (the Spanish-American War being an example of this). I can only imagine that this view, given your patriotic view if the North’s war as a “good”, is offensive at a personal-political level.
The other (again, I suppose) is my view that race-integration as a “good” and necessary national policy for the Nation, this being one of the trends and outcomes of the Civil War, can perhaps be examined critically (this is my position in fact). Again, I am less interested in specific ethical situations and I am looking for reasons (the causal chain) as to why things have gotten to such negative points (in this Republic). I do not see anything morally wrong with my area of concern. But I think that you do.
Political rants are not welcome.
I did not ever make any political rants. Not once, not now, and not ever. What I did write about was very different. I used a Christian-Catholic base in metaphysics to make a statement, dealing in cause and effect, to further bring out my view about why things have got so bad in the country. Media, movies, sexual liberation, and a great deal else that can and should be talked about, are in my view a large part. There is nothing wrong or immoral in having this view.
I personally have determined that you have strongly anti-Catholic views. You are fully and absolutely entitled to have such view and all views! And I am fully and absolutely entitled to explain why it is that the essence of Catholic morals, ethics and metaphysics is very worth defending and explaining — because that is what I think.
Thanks for the good laugh!
“I am not a crook”—Richard Nixon
“I did not have sex with that woman…” William Jefferson Clinton
“I am the Lizard Queen!”—Lisa Simpson
Again, I have not posted any “political rant” and what I have posted have been — are — socio-cultural commentary with an interest in religious ethics and morality.
I admit to have been too tolerant of your weird and bloated commentary for far too long, as you accumulated privileges by contributing content in good faith. However, you haven’t just crossed the line, but charged over it. Questioning the integrity of EA and the seriousness of its analysis is not legitimate commentary, it is just unjustified abuse.
You can describe me and what I write and think in any way that feels true. This goes nearly without saying because this is your blog. But you cannot say something or bring an insult and expect no response, can you? That certainly would not be fair. So, my views may be to you, to anyone, and maybe to the world “weird”, and that is fine with me, but this I say in response: You do not understand much of what I write about because in certain categories you are 1) limited and 2) ignorant. (I use that word in the Spanish sense: unknowing, uninformed, uninterested in.
You long abiding sycophant (well-meaning Steve Witherspoon) has quoted something you wrote once about what you (at that time and in fact likely now!) think of me and my ideas. I would myself be embarrassed is someone quoted continuously a thing I had wrote about some other person. But I do not react! I am not offended!
I know that you regard the very essence of Christian metaphysics (I have reasons why I use this term) as irrelevant to intellectual and rational ethical philosophy. I do not. But if you desire to dismiss me ir my thought I also have no problem! But don’t expect me not to defend myself or my views. That is my entire purpose.
The greater influence on my thinking and the reason I came to Ethics Alarms a decade ago (gasp!) is Richard Weaver and his book Ideas Have Consequences. It was natural to google ethics and to have found this Blog and, at that time, to encounter “Conservatives” of a centrist sort.
That is to say mostly men who really are Classical Liberals who have been shove over to the Right just a wee little bit but in truth accept and embody the radicalizing trends in our present and which are inherent in American philosophy. This sounds like a senseless criticism or perhaps mean-spirited? It is NOT intended that way. To get somewhere you got to tell the truth. To establish a proper beginning-point.
Because you-plural are incapable of the Rx (the diagnosis and the remedy) and only COMPLAIN that things are bad (like Howard Beale in Network!), and because you are not really conservatives because you will not define what must be conserved! and therefore, in fact, are part of the problem — that is why I must act like an asshole in order to make my points.
And then? Silence! You won’t even fight back. “No Aliza, I assure you, we are warriors of restoration! And you better shut your (former) Venezuelan mouth!”
So here is the interesting detail: It is true that it was clerical Catholicism that tried to establish a moral code, and that is because only Catholicism has sufficient grounding in an articulated metaphysics to be able to detail the reasons why a metaphysical grounding is not only necessary but essential and crucial. But even Catholicism’s strict metaphysics not only was attacked by internal agents of rebellion (Vatican ll) but Catholic influence was relatively minor within a sea of Protestantism that was far easier to pervert because, sad to say, Protestantism is itself a species of rebellion in itself, and easily allows metaphysical principles to be put to the side and forgotten.
Traditional Catholicism (the Catechism) is in essence an attempt to train the child, the young adult, in metaphysical principles. But a child cannot actually reason at that level, so it turns into a thousand rules that must be followed. And once the surrounding culture not only cannot understand the principles, but actually wills to become rebellion to them, then the child (young adult, adult) no longer feels the reason to remain committed, and falls away. Then, ‘the rules’ become like a garment of lead: an oppression on the “freedom” of that child.
The Chaos in our present, which has been increasing and getting more intense, must have a cause, must it not? Well then: describe to me this causation. You have to be able to define an immobile point, don’t you? from which the chaotic movement can be assessed. But what is that point? I assure you it is defined by way of metaphysics and that it cannot be located merely physically and materially. Metaphysics is not part of material substance. It is only known in the mind and in the soul.
Intellectus:
(Latin intelligere — inter and legere — to choose between, to discern; Greek nous; German Vernunft, Verstand; French intellect; Italianintelletto).
The faculty of thought. As understood in Catholicphilosophical literature it signifies the higher, spiritual, cognitive power of the soul. It is in this view awakened to action by sense, but transcends the latter in range. Amongst its functions are attention, conception, judgment, reasoning, reflection, and self-consciousness. All these modes of activity exhibit a distinctly suprasensuous element, and reveal a cognitive faculty of a higher order than is required for mere sense-cognitions. In harmony, therefore, with Catholic usage, we reserve the terms intellect, intelligence, and intellectual to this higher power and its operations, although many modern psychologists are wont, with much resulting confusion, to extend the application of these terms so as to include sensuous forms of the cognitive process. By thus restricting the use of these terms, the inaccuracy of such phrases as “animal intelligence” is avoided. Before such language may be legitimately employed, it should be shown that the lower animals are endowed with genuinely rational faculties, fundamentally one in kind with those of man. Catholicphilosophers, however they differ on minor points, as a general body have held that intellect is a spiritual faculty depending extrinsically, but not intrinsically, on the bodily organism. The importance of a right theory of intellect is twofold: on account of its bearing on epistemology, or the doctrine of knowledge; and because of its connexion with the question of the spirituality of the soul.
Ethics Alarms 
MLB’s reaction Milwaukee Brewer closer Abner Oribe’s one (1) time…um…suggestive CELEBRATION
A fine and one (1) game suspension.
MLB’s reaction the SF Giant’s repeated OUTFIELD HUMP by Jung Hoo Lee, Drew Gilbert, & Harrison Bader?
You naughty naughty boys….you mustn’t do that again!
Perhaps that kind of…er…thing plays better in the Bay Area…?
PWS
Should the Supreme Court revive obscenity as a viable legal concept? I was recently trying to search for a Nintendo Switch game, and I typed in Thornkin, the name of the game. Google autocorrected it to something else and gave me something entirely different, and I didn’t even search for that.
When I say obscenity, I mean public obscenity. Google shouldn’t give you search results unless you actively look for something. There shouldn’t be an accident that leads to something you weren’t even close to searching for based on some kind of weird autocorrect. Adult films could be banned, but films that aren’t “adult” per se could just not get theatrical releases or insist no one under 18 can see it in a theater, regardless of being accompanied by a parent or guardian.
I’m also thinking of the Houston Rodeo.
However, even if someone disagrees with all of this, at least broadcast television should adhere to a stricter code and people should dress modestly in public places. Anything public where children will consistently be should follow much stricter decency codes.
Is that controversial enough?
Sorry for the double-post, I meant this to be a direct reply to Josh:
I just copy-pasted “Thornkin” into Google, and it gave me the game right away, no autocorrect.
I don’t think it’s worth having obscenity and modesty laws beyond what we already have. Anything beyond “No shirt no shoes no service” and media ratings gets into subjective territory, and I don’t trust the public to agree on where to draw the line.
I typed it in without Nintendo Switch in the search to show someone I know. It’s possible I misspelled the game or used Bing or Firefox search instead of Google. Whatever I ended up with shouldn’t have been so easy to find.
I do agree that there is an issue with what counts, but the law has to deal with what counts all the time. Many things are a matter of degree. For example, playboy would be something that’s a bit more obvious vs. the movie 50 shades of gray is borderline according to contemporary standards.
You can also look at standards. Compare “Cheek to Cheek” with modern rap music. The quality is a clear deterioration. We aren’t just talking about movies; music also fits.
The argument is that entertainment can corrupt the morals of a nation by glorifying awful or anti-social behavior. There’s also a basic dignity argument that some things humans shouldn’t do.
For example, here’s a weird hypothetical. Imagine some kind of necrophiliac finds an old cemetery where he can dig up the bodies and never be caught. He is even great at reburying them. He records himself and only shows people he somehow knows have no connection to the cemetery. That really strikes me as something so debauched it shouldn’t be acceptable in a functional society.
I could be wrong though. I’m still thinking all this stuff through, but I am really leaning towards changing some of my positions on the first amendment. I’ve been a pretty big first amendment person for a long time.
No you should not ban adult films. Adult films are banned in most Muslim countries, and what you see there is that banning does not necessarily increase the level of sexual morality of the men. In most Muslim countries a women is not advised to travel alone, due to incidents of sexual assault. We may remember the sexual assault on journalists (Lara Logan) by mobs and security forces in 2013 during the revolution against the Mubarak regime in Egypt. Part of the problem is misogynist attitudes fostered by Islam, but another part is lack of a sexual outlet for many men.
Porn sedates men. It reduces a man’s libido, because of it’s effect on a man’s dopamine receptors. In our society where some estimate that about fifty percent of men is still virgin at age 30, you should be glad that the rape figures are as low as they are. In a society without porn, young men with low economic and romantic prospects tend to engage in various bad behaviors such as violence including sexual violence, gang and mob activity, and crime. This “young man problem” is visible in many European countries today that are overrun by hordes of young men from Third World countries with zero economic prospects; this causes rape figures to go up significantly.
The Houston Rodeo issue is something different as this relates to behavior in public; porn tends to be consumed in private. This type of behavior directly affects other people, e.g. families with children. The solution is twofold a) enforced dress codes by private organizations b) enforced decency standards by law. The root cause of what happened at the Houston Rodeo are low standards of behavior in certain “communities” and subcultures; other aspects of that culture are rap music, street takeovers, and the type of behavior that generated many YouTube videos about Carnival Cruises and Spirit Airlines.
I do not see the Robert Bork approach (“The First Amendment only applies to explicitly political speech”) as a good solution; this would require SCOTUS action to greatly extend the exceptions to what constitutes free speech. As somebody who leans conservative and who sees that the dangers for censorship are mostly coming from the left I see more dangers that merits from that approach.
I’m not sure about the sedating men part. I’ve heard that argument before. The 1950’s was pretty rigid, and I don’t think rape was an epidemic then, but there could be something to your argument. I really don’t know.
Public spaces could be a middle ground, but I would also be in favor of extending more modest standards to every public place, even beaches. Perhaps we could do a “wall of separation” between public and private, so publicly, everyone acts decent, but privately, who knows? Maybe that could maintain freedom while also enforcing public standards of decency.
Interesting enough, arguments for censorship from the right and left (Bork vs. Europe hate speech laws) are basically motivated by the same thing, which is that public speech and certain forms of entertainment are believed to influence the attitudes and perceptions of citizens and governments should take an active role in forming the hearts and minds of the citizenry. Entertainment is a socializing force and thus requires regulation.
I don’t think anyone can deny entertainment does socialize. Everyone criticizes. I recently watched Legally Blonde with a progressive co-worker, and he didn’t like how the lesbian was portrayed in the movie, so everyone can look at portrayals and influence. We are just differing on exactly what concerns us.
All of this is just throwing ideas out. I’m not really constraining myself to any kind of sharp legal analysis, just more speculating.
The old Legion of Decency did want to censor immoral behavior in movies if it was glorified because of the fear of the corruption of public morals. I think part of them may have been right.
The old Legion of Decency did want to censor immoral behavior in movies if it was glorified because of the fear of the corruption of public morals.
The Legion of Decency was a Catholic organization who tried to impose Christian norms on motion pictures on behalf of Catholic audiences. The Legion worked in tandem with the Motion Picture Production Code (Hays Code) to ensure the silver screen remained sanitized. They also rated movies; Catholics were not allowed to watch movies with a C rating as this would be classified as sinful and had to be confessed. Famous movie classic that got a C rating by the Legion of Decency included The French Line (1953), Baby Doll (1956), Alfred Hitchcock’s Psycho (1960), and Antonioni’s Blowup (1966).
Due to the change in mores since the 1960s plus declining church attendance, the Legion of Decency has stopped operations.
Nowadays the Western world has censorship based on a different type of morality, more and government supported in Europe, and via “cancel culture” in the USA. We are not talking about traditional sexual mores from a Christian perspective here; we are thing about hate speech, criticism of immigration, climate change and other things the left and the woke care about.
My perspective on censorship is more libertarian. I want to be able to say what I want to say, write what I want to write, read what I want to read and watch what I want to watch, without any authority forbidding me to do so based on a set of morals that I do not support. If you do not like a particular TV channel, then please switch the channel. If you disagree with a speaker, do not visit his lectures, and definitely do not go to shout down the speaker!
Works of entertainment, but also books, magazines, blogs, YouTube channels have an impact on society as they change how people think and act. That is to be expected in an open society. The solution to bad expression is still better speech and expression.
The difference between Robert Bork and the woke left is in which speech they want to censor; there is no principal difference as both Bork and the left are OK with censoring speech that fall short of their standards.
The distinction between “public” and “private” applies to activities that do not fall under the category “speech” but “behavior”. E.g. it is OK to be naked in your own house when nobody else can see you, but in the public space you have to comply with legal standards regarding proper attire, or with dress codes set by the proprietors and other parties that can set the rules. When you are in public you have to behave like a decent and considerate human being, following standards of accepted behavior.
“Nowadays the Western world has censorship based on a different type of morality, more and government supported in Europe, and via “cancel culture” in the USA. We are not talking about traditional sexual mores from a Christian perspective here; we are thing about hate speech, criticism of immigration, climate change and other things the left and the woke care about.”
This is where i feel the most pause and caution in my thinking. The Legion of Decency believed its morals were tried and true for all time, so they wanted to get rid of any kind of glorification of behavior they thought improper.
The left does the same thing. They believe open borders, full acceptance of all things trans, and the like are matters of objective truth (even though they talk out of both sides of their mouth and say morality is relative). Many of them probably feel just as strongly as The Legion of Decency did.
Do I want the government to have that kind of power? No because I don’t trust it. But in some world where the government was run by better people, would I be in favor of a Hays code type of arrangement? Absolutely.
I think part of my fear is the left is abandoning the play nice arrangement our society has had where neither side really tries to censor the other. Conservatives and libertarians cannot just sit back and not also point out many things the left advocates for COULD be censored in a different world, and many forms of their entertainment have encouraged debauchery.
“But in some world where the government was run by better people, would I be in favor of a Hays code type of arrangement? Absolutely.“
You may need to consider the following phrase from Federalist 51 by James Madison: “If men were angels, no government would be necessary”.
Because men are re inherently flawed, selfish, and ambitious including those in power, a system of government with strict checks and balances is essential to maintain order and protect individual liberty, plus a Bill of Rights to protect the citizens from abuses of government power.
Looking at how Congress functions today, and the Courts, I can only conclude that we have too many bad people in power.
The Hays Code was puritanical and stifled creativity (while, admittedly, also stimulating it as film-makers figured out ways to imply sexual activity without really showing it. The Hays Code also mandated that good must triumph over evil in movies to send a positive moral message. Certain words couldn’t be used, like “abortion” and married couples had to be shown in twin beds.
My perspective on censorship is more libertarian. I want to be able to say what I want to say, write what I want to write, read what I want to read and watch what I want to watch, without any authority forbidding me to do so based on a set of morals that I do not support.
The bottom line is that if one does not accept an authority (Authority really) that defines rules of conduct about sexuality, there is no defensible or definable reason why there should be any regulation. At the base, the Catholic ethic is that of the Sacraments. Matrimony is a sacrament, and sexual immorality is a sin. The reasoning is sound, of course, but if one does not subscribe to the belief in the Sacrament, or that there is an Authority (i.e. a metaphysical imperative) then again you will do what you want. And no one can say anything about it.
The Hays Codes went further: for example it was not acceptable to portray clergy in a negative light. Or that in a film that a criminal not be caught and punished. So the ending of the movie Chinatown would not have been allowed (the criminal went free). There was much more to it. And the “breaking free” of all controls over speech and narrative became, of course, another sort of imperative for a rebelling generation.
Once the grounding is lost in metaphysics, then in Bork’s sense the rebels have all the right to attack all authority and all hierarchy.
In the larger scheme, the Codes oversaw how narratives functioned. Bad behavior = must be punished. Bad attitude toward religious authority = must not be allowed. The codes were far-reaching in that sense. I guess the idea is that if certain things were allowed to be portrayed that they would become normalized.
Sort of related (?) Are you aware of the Hays Code?
The view I have now is that even if a significant majority wanted controls over explicit content, that it would never be possible to enforce it.
Practically speaking, the questions are different. I actually think our society currently could still slide back into some kind of Hays Code and reinforce standards of public decency. I am all in favor of that.
Specifics obviously matter though. Artistic expression needs to be protected. You don’t want the church lady from SNL on the board censoring everything, but wouldn’t more subtext, suggestion, and creativity really make cinema better? Some of the classics were made during the Hays code.
I look at music too, something like NIcki Minaj’s WAP song. There’s no artistic value to it for me.
I just copy-pasted “Thornkin” into Google, and it gave me the game right away, no autocorrect.
I don’t think it’s worth having obscenity and modesty laws beyond what we already have. Anything beyond “No shirt no shoes no service” and media ratings gets into subjective territory, and I don’t trust the public to agree on where to draw the line.
A couple of years or so ago, LA City Councilwoman Nithya Raman in a Q&A was asked about an ordinance requring homeless encampments to stay at least 500 feet away from schools and daycares. She said she voted against it, and rolled her eyes in response to the boos from the crowd:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sG8REWU1soE
Now that she’s running for mayor, a recent protest has gone viral, in which the protesters pitched their tents and set up “camp” around Nithya Raman’s own house, and her attitude towards this ecampment being close to HER home was a little different:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AD8e-G42V5E
While at first I was delighted at seeing a progressive politician have to live with what she puts others through, should the protesters have considered the neighbors, on whose property they were camping?
They are trespassing, which has very little teeth. There has been a steady erosion of property rights and respect for them. You can see it where I live in particular during hunting season where hunters seem to think as long as it’s not fenced property, they can go where they please and leave their trash. (I blame their mammas for such behavior). I’m just glad we don’t have a little fishing pond for people to enjoy without permission. Without property rights, what rights do we have, really?
I noticed that there was some ruckus about Jaxson Dart announcing President Trump at a Giants game, I was not aware that there was a racial component to this. I thought it was a honor to announce POTUS regardless of party affiliation.
Just a few years ago, being excited to meet the president was bipartisan. It didn’t matter who you were because it meant a trip to the White House and getting a deeper taste of our history. People also could be friends, even with different political views. Although, in the 90’s, the parties were not as far apart as they are now.
Interesting commentary about decency, censorship and public standards. One thing I’ve noticed is that an awful lot was implied in the songs and movies we enjoyed as youngsters and teens. “I found my thrill on blueberry hill” and “will you still love me tomorrow” were sexual references, but we were so innocent in the 50s and early 60s, we did not understand. There is so much exposure at all levels and ages these days, innocence fades fairly quickly.
It is also interesting to note the rise of communism and Muslim power plays throughout the country. So many on the left have no idea what sort of censorship is in store for everyone, even them, if we lose our freedoms to either of these ideologies.
Subtext and suggestion do seem more dignified though. Just as a matter of taste, implying and hinting with a twinkle in your eye seems more elevated to me. That’s not a direct question of censorship though, just my personal taste.
It is hard to argue that entertainment today hasn’t done some damage though, even if you aren’t in favor of censorship.
My personal taste, too. It is such a difficult issue, because I am not a fan of censorship, but you are correct about the damage. More dignified and elevated, twinkle in your eye back then? Very well said.
We need to look about what is going on with Graham Plattner in Maine. There are so many rumors coming out about him, that some expect that the Democrat Party is going to pull a Biden-Kamala bait-and-switch, with Janet Mills being the Kamala.
Here is the full text:
This is getting very curious. These influential voices are coming out on this point VERY LATE. The primary is June 9.
I do not think anything will happen in advance of the primary, and Platner is going to win with no real opponent still in the race.
BUT, under Maine law, if Platner were to drop out after winning the primary, he could be replaced by the Dems on the General Election ballot ONLY IF:
1. He drops out prior to the 2nd Monday in July, and 2. His replacement is named by the 4th Monday in July.
I think we are seeing the unfolding of a plan by the Dem. establishment OUTSIDE of Maine to begin a drumbeat for Platner to exit the race after the primary, and let the Party hand-pick a replacement for the General.
Pro-Tip — always read state law to figure out that plan that might be in the process of being hatched behind closed doors.
The Hays Code issue interest me because I am interested in the issue of causation (cause and effect) as it pertain to the breaking down of the integrity of the US and in the process of transformation of a Republic (which the whole world admired and emulated) into the sick, mentally ill, drug addicted, war-mongering, ultra-perverted, ignorant and incapable of reasoning, and indeed quite super-materialistic, atheistic and deranged nation that it has become. A diseased nation selling disease to the world.
Whew! I am on a roll here. 🤩 My operative theory is that this blog is habited by pseudo-conservative complainers. That is a unique species (saying this, I do not mean offense, just accuracy. It is much better to tell the truth then to lie, especially to oneself). Endless complaining (always in self-righteous tones) but no understanding of how things got to be this way! No ability to explain. And therefore just flowing with the current if American Radicalism down the river with no capability of changing course.
It is quite interesting: here in the first section are the Don’ts and in the second section the Better be carefuls:
Obnoxious and offensive comment. Tell you what: why don’t you peruse all of the comments from 2009-2011, when critics who found the whole concept of an ethics blog annoying because a “so-called ethicist” had the audacity to use basic ethical systems and analysis to point out unethical conduct in multiple disciplines, institutions, and cultural terrains. My position then as now is that theirs was the classic and traditional rationalization of the arrogant unethical, “Who are you to judge me?” I have written extensively about why maintaining and building an ethical society and culture mandates continuous “judging.”
This site (unlike your comments, for the most part), supports its opinions, points to established ethics tools and systems in the process, and encourages good faith participants to employ the same tools to rebut or offer alternatives to the analysis. Denigrating the entire project as the whines of “pseudo-conservative complainers” is a mass insult to not just me, but everyone here, and, again as usual, there are no facts in put in evidence, only your typically eccentric world view. The blog is not about “how we got here,” “here” being defined as how your yellow-tinted glasses perceive reality. If that’s what you want to write about, fine: start your own blog. I may even read it. This isn’t your billboard. If you review the Comment Policies above, you will see this statement, dating from the very beginning of the blog:
5. Political rants are not welcome. In addition, efforts to muddle genuine objective ethical analysis by pressing ideological talking points and bombarding me with links are not appreciated, and won’t be tolerated for long, if at all.
I admit to have been too tolerant of your weird and bloated commentary for far too long, as you accumulated privileges by contributing content in good faith. However, you haven’t just crossed the line, but charged over it. Questioning the integrity of EA and the seriousness of its analysis is not legitimate commentary, it is just unjustified abuse. Try again, and harder, to deal with the topic: ethics. If you repeat this tactic displayed on this comment, I will pull your plug. If you try to defend this comment, I won’t even finish reading it: I will pull the plug. I will not be insulted on my own website.
And, for the record, thinking that the Hays Code has any greater significance historically or culturally on the US today than Pilgrim’s Progress is bonkers.
I admit to have been too tolerant of your weird and bloated commentary for far too long, as you accumulated privileges by contributing content in good faith. However, you haven’t just crossed the line, but charged over it.
Actually, in what I wrote there was only a small part that was critical or offensive. But since that is, in fact, what I do think, isn’t it best that we agree that my (weird) ideas are not appropriate here? This is what I wrote and what I in fact think and believe:
My operative theory is that this blog is habited by pseudo-conservative complainers. That is a unique species (saying this, I do not mean offense, just accuracy. It is much better to tell the truth then to lie, especially to oneself). Endless complaining (always in self-righteous tones) but no understanding of how things got to be this way! No ability to explain. And therefore just flowing with the current if American Radicalism down the river with no capability of changing course.
My view? You and you-plural should not take offense, as I do not mean to offend! I mean only to become clear, and to state things clearly.
As a woman long ago said “Your blog, your rules”.
You have been tolerant, and I do understand why you see my ideas and writing style as bloated and eccentric. Certainty eccentric! 😎 I appreciate your toleration and I will now leave of my own accord.
The last posts written by me — here, but also in other threads, and about America’s general direction and the over-influence of Israel — express ideas and views that are incompatible with your project and understanding, and I would only repeat similar things going forward. And that would be not very productive. So, at the very least I was able to write about what I think the Chaos of the present is really about. That is really what I think.
I will (as I have in the past) always check in to read here. Finally, I do not intend offense. It is all part of the fun activity of polemics!
What is it with you; are you a narcissist that likes to see your words in print?
You should have either gone silent after Jacks rebuke or written something very close to…
But nooooooooo, you have to post more of your figurative nails in the coffin generalities, tangents, cosmic puzzles, dancing angels and navel-gazing.
Do you know what they say about people that continue to do the same thing expecting different results?
For the sake of everyone participating at Ethics Alarms…
LEARN FROM YOUR MISTAKES!
Jack wrote: Obnoxious and offensive comment.
I thought over this for a few days now and though I cannot control ir influence how you react to my writing or thoughts, here your own assessment is quite off the mark.
Your recommendation that I read previous posts, or deal with an issue of other people disagreeing with you starting an ethics-focused blog, has no relevance to the comment that I just made and which you took offense to. Again, I do not intend offense. If i did intend it, I suppose that would be wrong.
This site (unlike your comments, for the most part), supports its opinions, points to established ethics tools and systems in the process, and encourages good faith participants to employ the same tools to rebut or offer alternatives to the analysis. Denigrating the entire project as the whines of “pseudo-conservative complainers” is a mass insult to not just me, but everyone here, and, again as usual, there are no facts in put in evidence, only your typically eccentric world view.
I believe that the “line” I crossed with you personally and politically has to do with my views about Israel’s destructive influence on the US; and my views that Donald Trump has betrayed a segment of the base that voted him in to office. I view your views on this topic as morally wrong and strategically negative. And I noted as well that you describe my views as “antisemitic” which means that you regard me as an antisemite. This is wrong, and it is also “offensive” yet I do not get offended. I respond by saying that your too simplistic views, which label critics of recent Israeli policy , and the American Jews who make the criticism as antisemitic, is itself part of a problem. It is absolutely necessary for Jews to cone out strongly against Israeli policies. And because you discourage this, you are encouraging anti-Jewish animosity.
There are two other issues I have wrote about that (I think) irritate you somehow personally. One being my views on the Northern War of Aggression against the South as the starting-point of general American aggression in the world (the Spanish-American War being an example of this). I can only imagine that this view, given your patriotic view if the North’s war as a “good”, is offensive at a personal-political level.
The other (again, I suppose) is my view that race-integration as a “good” and necessary national policy for the Nation, this being one of the trends and outcomes of the Civil War, can perhaps be examined critically (this is my position in fact). Again, I am less interested in specific ethical situations and I am looking for reasons (the causal chain) as to why things have gotten to such negative points (in this Republic). I do not see anything morally wrong with my area of concern. But I think that you do.
Political rants are not welcome.
I did not ever make any political rants. Not once, not now, and not ever. What I did write about was very different. I used a Christian-Catholic base in metaphysics to make a statement, dealing in cause and effect, to further bring out my view about why things have got so bad in the country. Media, movies, sexual liberation, and a great deal else that can and should be talked about, are in my view a large part. There is nothing wrong or immoral in having this view.
I personally have determined that you have strongly anti-Catholic views. You are fully and absolutely entitled to have such view and all views! And I am fully and absolutely entitled to explain why it is that the essence of Catholic morals, ethics and metaphysics is very worth defending and explaining — because that is what I think.
“I did not ever make any political rants.”
Thanks for the good laugh!
“I am not a crook”—Richard Nixon
“I did not have sex with that woman…” William Jefferson Clinton
“I am the Lizard Queen!”—Lisa Simpson
Again, I have not posted any “political rant” and what I have posted have been — are — socio-cultural commentary with an interest in religious ethics and morality.
I admit to have been too tolerant of your weird and bloated commentary for far too long, as you accumulated privileges by contributing content in good faith. However, you haven’t just crossed the line, but charged over it. Questioning the integrity of EA and the seriousness of its analysis is not legitimate commentary, it is just unjustified abuse.
You can describe me and what I write and think in any way that feels true. This goes nearly without saying because this is your blog. But you cannot say something or bring an insult and expect no response, can you? That certainly would not be fair. So, my views may be to you, to anyone, and maybe to the world “weird”, and that is fine with me, but this I say in response: You do not understand much of what I write about because in certain categories you are 1) limited and 2) ignorant. (I use that word in the Spanish sense: unknowing, uninformed, uninterested in.
You long abiding sycophant (well-meaning Steve Witherspoon) has quoted something you wrote once about what you (at that time and in fact likely now!) think of me and my ideas. I would myself be embarrassed is someone quoted continuously a thing I had wrote about some other person. But I do not react! I am not offended!
I know that you regard the very essence of Christian metaphysics (I have reasons why I use this term) as irrelevant to intellectual and rational ethical philosophy. I do not. But if you desire to dismiss me ir my thought I also have no problem! But don’t expect me not to defend myself or my views. That is my entire purpose.
The greater influence on my thinking and the reason I came to Ethics Alarms a decade ago (gasp!) is Richard Weaver and his book Ideas Have Consequences. It was natural to google ethics and to have found this Blog and, at that time, to encounter “Conservatives” of a centrist sort.
That is to say mostly men who really are Classical Liberals who have been shove over to the Right just a wee little bit but in truth accept and embody the radicalizing trends in our present and which are inherent in American philosophy. This sounds like a senseless criticism or perhaps mean-spirited? It is NOT intended that way. To get somewhere you got to tell the truth. To establish a proper beginning-point.
Because you-plural are incapable of the Rx (the diagnosis and the remedy) and only COMPLAIN that things are bad (like Howard Beale in Network!), and because you are not really conservatives because you will not define what must be conserved! and therefore, in fact, are part of the problem — that is why I must act like an asshole in order to make my points.
And then? Silence! You won’t even fight back. “No Aliza, I assure you, we are warriors of restoration! And you better shut your (former) Venezuelan mouth!”
So here is the interesting detail: It is true that it was clerical Catholicism that tried to establish a moral code, and that is because only Catholicism has sufficient grounding in an articulated metaphysics to be able to detail the reasons why a metaphysical grounding is not only necessary but essential and crucial. But even Catholicism’s strict metaphysics not only was attacked by internal agents of rebellion (Vatican ll) but Catholic influence was relatively minor within a sea of Protestantism that was far easier to pervert because, sad to say, Protestantism is itself a species of rebellion in itself, and easily allows metaphysical principles to be put to the side and forgotten.
Traditional Catholicism (the Catechism) is in essence an attempt to train the child, the young adult, in metaphysical principles. But a child cannot actually reason at that level, so it turns into a thousand rules that must be followed. And once the surrounding culture not only cannot understand the principles, but actually wills to become rebellion to them, then the child (young adult, adult) no longer feels the reason to remain committed, and falls away. Then, ‘the rules’ become like a garment of lead: an oppression on the “freedom” of that child.
The Chaos in our present, which has been increasing and getting more intense, must have a cause, must it not? Well then: describe to me this causation. You have to be able to define an immobile point, don’t you? from which the chaotic movement can be assessed. But what is that point? I assure you it is defined by way of metaphysics and that it cannot be located merely physically and materially. Metaphysics is not part of material substance. It is only known in the mind and in the soul.
Intellectus:
(Latin intelligere — inter and legere — to choose between, to discern; Greek nous; German Vernunft, Verstand; French intellect; Italian intelletto).
The faculty of thought. As understood in Catholic philosophical literature it signifies the higher, spiritual, cognitive power of the soul. It is in this view awakened to action by sense, but transcends the latter in range. Amongst its functions are attention, conception, judgment, reasoning, reflection, and self-consciousness. All these modes of activity exhibit a distinctly suprasensuous element, and reveal a cognitive faculty of a higher order than is required for mere sense-cognitions. In harmony, therefore, with Catholic usage, we reserve the terms intellect, intelligence, and intellectual to this higher power and its operations, although many modern psychologists are wont, with much resulting confusion, to extend the application of these terms so as to include sensuous forms of the cognitive process. By thus restricting the use of these terms, the inaccuracy of such phrases as “animal intelligence” is avoided. Before such language may be legitimately employed, it should be shown that the lower animals are endowed with genuinely rational faculties, fundamentally one in kind with those of man. Catholic philosophers, however they differ on minor points, as a general body have held that intellect is a spiritual faculty depending extrinsically, but not intrinsically, on the bodily organism. The importance of a right theory of intellect is twofold: on account of its bearing on epistemology, or the doctrine of knowledge; and because of its connexion with the question of the spirituality of the soul.