When we were teenagers, my sister and I used to discuss how the people around you affect how you look. She was very short, and a little 'plump' and seemed to have girlfriends that were tall and skinny. I pointed out (just being argumentative, I was the older sister by a…
We recently received this comment from Scholar:
Erich or Grumpy,
May I please have some more links to the discussions here at dangerous intersections which you have found to be most interesting, *must read*, or highlights in general.
Thanks,
Scholar
—
I took Scholar’s request seriously and went back to review many of our posts. I still can’t get over how many topics we’ve addressed in nine months, covering 592 posts!
Rather than call these posts the “best of,” I would merely call them the more memorable posts to me, keeping in mind the triple asterisk that comes with the assembly of this list: 1) I simply didn’t have the time to review each of the posts again. Therefore, this list is only representative, not complete. 2) It is difficult to determine any meaningful criteria on which to base such a list, other than (as I’ve already suggested) the idea that this list includes many of the posts I found memorable. Other people will certainly have different ideas of what posts are worthy 3) Scholar’s request puts me in an awkward spot, given that I write for the blog.
To the extent that I’ve included my own posts, then, it should be with the understanding that I am not trying to judge the writing so much as considering whether the ideas addressed are memorable to me, whether the ideas expressed therein seemed important or whether they moved me. Here’s another way of looking at it: if you want …
Everyone knows that the United States was first settled in 1620. Everyone is wrong.
We celebrate a wildly distorted history of Thanksgiving year after year. On Thanksgiving, we solemnly give thanks that we have enough food to allow our families to overeat. For the sake of holiday decorum, we avoid the thought that we could actually be doing something to help millions of people starving to death elsewhere in the world. We could splurge a bit less on the big holiday meal, for instance, then send life-saving donations to relief agency to save some real lives. But that would be such a downer on the holiday. Instead, let’s spend time with those people we love and think happy thoughts about Thanksgiving.
After all, we celebrate holidays to be happy, to bond family and friends. And it is a good thing to keep in touch with family and friends. To keep the room happy, though, we need to focus mostly on happy things and to avoid thinking about facts, memories or courses of conduct that might interfere with that happiness. Other than watching our favorite football team lose the big game, what could possibly interfere with the flow of happiness on Thanksgiving? Here’s one thing: the truth about Thanksgiving.
With Thanksgiving approaching, I decided that it would be good medicine to re-read the chapter on Thanksgiving in James Loewen’s iconoclastic classic, Lies My Teacher Told Me: Everything Your American History Textbook Got Wrong (1995). It was well worth the …
MSNBC reports that Americans would be required to sign up for the military draft after turning 18 under a bill that will be introduced by Charles Rangel, a Democrat, the incoming chairman of the House Ways and Means Committee. Rangel states that bringing back the draft is a way to…
I know, a catchy title. A little unfair maybe, since there’s nothing particularly titillating in what follows. Or maybe there is, depending on what–what’s the saying?–“pumps yer nads!” But in view of Erich’s post about our newly appointed head of Family Planning, I thought this might be the time to indulge more than a little in a topic rather close to my heart (depending on where one locates said metaphorical organ).
Did you know that the last week of October is national Protection From Pornography Week? Yes, indeed, signed into law by our illustrious president, Mr. Bush back in 2003. I for one had no idea I needed to be protected from it. How reassuring to know that we are being defended from dangers both real and imagined by the ever watchful gaze of our very own homegrown clerics.
We’ve spent tax dollars on this. Here is the link to the official White House proclamation.
Seems innocuous enough, even homey. All that stuff about the destructive effects of porn on children, who can argue?
Has it occurred to anyone throughout the last two decades (beginning, in my opinion, with Ed Meese–anyone remember him?) of the war on pornography that–like alcohol and tobacco–pornography is simply not for children? It seems a ludicrously simple idea to me–it was never intended for them. We manage to have reasonable laws about things not intended for children. We don’t let them drive cars (except at amusement parks, in specially constructed rides), we don’t let …