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24 March, 2006
Get 'em while they're young!
This is deeply fucked up.* A children's book to teach little kids about "Democrat values". OH MY GOD. OH MY GOD. I mean, look at this sample page:
Truly abominable. Instead of teaching kids that praxis of good values has merit in itself, these authors (and apparently their readers) will tell them that merit is derived from their association with the correct tribe.†
I'm not some sort of shameless individualist, but herd mentalities give me the heebie-jeebies. An incisive observer of the world is one who appreciates nuance and does not cut the world into broad swathes. The opposite tendency is the hallmark of dullards. "You should all grow wheat," Stalin says to the peasants in the USSR. "Oh, crap," say all the Kyrgyzstanis, who have herded sheep for eons, and promptly starve to death.
I found this kind of shit-flinging tribalism especially offensive after the 2004 election, when plenty of Democrat associates of mine fulminated about those troglodytes in the "red states" and their lack of basic human decency. A message to you, Rudy: get over your need to draw battle lines over political allegiances. Baring your teeth and snarling at each other is what dogs do. Just be humans.
* Incidentally, is there any more powerful way to express condemnation than to say that "shit is fucked up"? I don't think there is!
† Especially when this particular tribe contains some notably virtue-less individuals.
Truly abominable. Instead of teaching kids that praxis of good values has merit in itself, these authors (and apparently their readers) will tell them that merit is derived from their association with the correct tribe.†
I'm not some sort of shameless individualist, but herd mentalities give me the heebie-jeebies. An incisive observer of the world is one who appreciates nuance and does not cut the world into broad swathes. The opposite tendency is the hallmark of dullards. "You should all grow wheat," Stalin says to the peasants in the USSR. "Oh, crap," say all the Kyrgyzstanis, who have herded sheep for eons, and promptly starve to death.
I found this kind of shit-flinging tribalism especially offensive after the 2004 election, when plenty of Democrat associates of mine fulminated about those troglodytes in the "red states" and their lack of basic human decency. A message to you, Rudy: get over your need to draw battle lines over political allegiances. Baring your teeth and snarling at each other is what dogs do. Just be humans.
* Incidentally, is there any more powerful way to express condemnation than to say that "shit is fucked up"? I don't think there is!
† Especially when this particular tribe contains some notably virtue-less individuals.
Comments
if you were a chipmunk, wouldn't you keep an elephant from stepping on your brood? but yeah, that book looks kind of silly...
Posted by Pete Bogs
Posted by Pete Bogs
Yeah, that's pretty terrible, not to mention very cheesily illustrated. WTF are chipmunks doing there??
But there is realy nothing cuter than a mother rhodent carefully herding her brood across the street and away from traffic.
Posted by Saheli
But there is realy nothing cuter than a mother rhodent carefully herding her brood across the street and away from traffic.
Posted by Saheli
wake me when they publish why aunt sophie is a syndicalist
"syndicalists control the means of production, just like aunt sophie has uncle bob by the nuts." no wait that's not right...
"syndicalists organize by job not by territory, just like aunt sophie thinks it's okay for her to stay here forever if she does the laundry sometimes."
"syndicalists make their decisions by consensus, just like when aunt sophie makes us talk and talk and we do the same thing anyway."
Posted by hibiscus
"syndicalists control the means of production, just like aunt sophie has uncle bob by the nuts." no wait that's not right...
"syndicalists organize by job not by territory, just like aunt sophie thinks it's okay for her to stay here forever if she does the laundry sometimes."
"syndicalists make their decisions by consensus, just like when aunt sophie makes us talk and talk and we do the same thing anyway."
Posted by hibiscus
So are any of you going to change your registration, if you're registered Democrats? I've been thinking about it for a long time, and it seems more and more like it's just a matte rof time rather than whether or not I do it.
I'd like to vote in the primaries and all, but not if I have to choose between several different varieties of $hit.
In New York, we have fusion voting, so I could at least switch to the Working Families Party line. Or the Green party. Or the "Rent is Too Damned High" party (that actually exists).
-se
Posted by someone else
I'd like to vote in the primaries and all, but not if I have to choose between several different varieties of $hit.
In New York, we have fusion voting, so I could at least switch to the Working Families Party line. Or the Green party. Or the "Rent is Too Damned High" party (that actually exists).
-se
Posted by someone else
i'm registered green but am torn. frequently the important election in SF is the democrat primary. also regardless of what i feel, left-ish-but-not-socialist parties beyond the dems are 99.44% white. if there is a political place to talk seriously about reversing economic atomization, social troglodism, and environmental negligence, the only place where everybody is - well it isn't in the democrat tent but it's a table just outside. non-dems are so disgusted by the money flowing in and out of the dem tent they won't even get near those tables. problem.
Posted by hibiscus
Posted by hibiscus
My high school history teacher, who was registered as an independent, would vote in both Republican and Democratic primaries. In Kansas, if not in other states, the poll workers are required to have the change of party affiliation forms on hand so you may do so. Other states may have similar rules.
Posted by Emily
Posted by Emily
It's not a hoax. Check out http://littledemocrats.net/, where you may purchase the book via paypal. Just because it's not on Amazon doesn't mean it's not being sold. There are many small independent publishers (or self-published authors) who can't be bothered with ISBNs, etc.
Posted by saurabh
Posted by saurabh