His good buddy, Skeptic Tank - or whatever he's calling himself after I pointed out that, like him, a Skeptic Tank could be expected to be full of shit - used the occasion to ask why I didn't propose one about a Cardinal involved in sexual abuse who is protected by the Vatican. Well, why not Vern Bullough, a man who openly advocated child rape and, even as they acknowledged his role in a group that called for the legalization of child rape was honored by atheists as "Humanist of the Year" and was the chair of the International Humanist and Ethical Union, and given the position by Paul Kurtz as the "human sexuality editor" at his Prometheus publishing label, the Regnery of American atheism.
Of course, they didn't have to protect him because in that period famous atheists who openly advocated or practiced pedophilia were never made the subject of a scandal in the same way that someone in the clergy was. I believe I've mentioned the letter in The Nation when, after their cartoonist Edward Sorel did a panel about "Religion In The News" dedicated to incidents of ministers and priests and church employees accused of pedophile abuse, someone asked him why he never mentioned the many people in secular jobs who were convicted of the same or similar crimes. As I recall Sorel said that they didn't hold that the rape of children was a sin, as if that's a real answer instead of a dodge. I do have to say that in the past two decades, as I've learned more about him, my opinion of Edward Sorel has suffered. I hadn't known he'd adopted his pseudonym from Julian Sorel, the central figure in the pretty silly novel, Le Rouge et Le Noir, due to Julian's anti-clericalism. Considering that Julian Sorel was a social climber who used the church and the favor of many clerics, one his greatest patrons being a Jansenist, and when he wasn't doing that he was sleeping around, the results of which led to his execution.... Geesh, I could write a whole post on how Edward Sorel's hero's story parallels that of Cardinal Law, except Law didn't shoot one of his mistresses. Holding him as a hero is typical of an atheist "ethics".
I can't say I wasn't a bit gladdened to have heard that Cardinal Law possibly now had to face a judgement over his crimes in the pedophile sex abuse scandal. If he really believed what he claimed to, Law would have had to fear such a judgement over his many earthly sins of the kind an ambitious cleric might commit, just as anyone with ambition is tempted to. Even if he had never been involved in his most famous scandal, his sins in other things were serious and many. I never was a fan of Law whose sins in relation to the Reagan-Bush era terrorism in Central America were openly known and which should have led to his defrocking decades before the pedophile scandal broke. I doubt anyone at Eschaton was ever as critical of him, of Pope JP II and Benedict XVI (and Ratzinger as he was then). And I have always been in favor of the criminal prosecution of men who have sex with children and a responsible age of consent. For an atheist asshole to imply I wouldn't on a blog of a man who has a record of whining about the age of consent being too high is something I can't help but point out.
If "Daleks in Drag" were a thing and if it became a smash hit, Simps and the other Escatots who love the glitter and crap of musicals would be it' biggest fans. After the right critics had told them what to think about it. I doubt I'd bother to see it. I wouldn't even go to see Duncan in Drag. Especially if there was choreography, fitted costumes and special effects, involved.
So... we can add Stendahl and Edward Sorel to the list of genuinely creative people -- which includes Oscar Wilde, the Beatles, Leonard Bernstein, Richard Wagner, John Ford, Spencer Tracy, H.P. Lovecraft, Lin-Manuel Miranda and Raymond Chandler -- that you inexplicably feel superior to.
ReplyDeleteQuel surprise.
Stups, you have never read any Stendahl, you've certainly never read Le Rouge et Le Noir, though you may have seen the movie.
ReplyDeleteI challenge you to give a description of the plot, with all its twists, turns, etc. and the major characters without looking up the Cliff Notes version, the closest you ever got to reading anything that long.
It is so funny that someone who made their life writing about how things were crap to characterize criticism of the arts as a feeling of superiority. Granted, the shit you wrote about is generally not hard to feel superior to. I think other than Wagner, JOhn Ford, Spencer Tracy, Lovecraft and Miranda, I've said good things about some of them. I have said that I will admit that people who I respect see something I don't in Wagner - though his plots were absolute shit, especially the Ring. So, Simps, tell me, what is great about Wagner's plots. Including the anti-Semitic content of such as Parsifal. You must think his plots are great, otherwise you must feel superior to him.
Oh, and, I did once say that Rubber Soul wasn't half bad in places, though it doesn't wear well.