Play Us A Hymn, You’re D’Souzaphone
I just bought an XBox, so I’ve generally lost interest in political discourse that doesn’t involve hitting a zombie in the face with a TV set. So I can’t comment on, for example, this piece over at Big Boy Jammies. Having lost Crazy Pammy to the vagaries of ad rates, Rog and Chuck have unearthed a slightly less famous Reverend Moon, who tends a flock in Mexico City and misuses big words in an attempt to blame America’s failure to take the sinister nature of ragheads seriously enough on hippies, donuts and rap music. But how can I be expected to care about this dimwit when the living dead are running rampant in Willamette, CO?
Still, a few things manage to seep into my consciousness during potty breaks. For example, there’s Dinesh D’Souza. Having given this sex-with-Ann-Coulter-having foreigner pride of place in their wingnut cosmology, certain elements of the tidy righties are finding it difficult to look away when he says things that border on outright blasphemy. First he ran around saying that we have to clamp down in our sinful culture because it’s pissing off the imams, and now, in a piece stingingly entitled “A Canadian Philosopher Worth Reading” (take that, Northrop Frye, Mario Bunge and Ted Honderich!), the D’Souzaphone dares to express pleasure at the awarding of a Templeton Prize to a man who doesn’t think Bill Clinton is the Antichrist!
Above: “I’d hit that” — Ann Coulter
While a few commenters, aware of philosopher Charles Taylor’s extremely devout Catholicism, praise D’Souza’s celebration of the man, others — particularly the Clenissarries who can’t imagine anyone being feted in the pages of Town Hall who doesn’t spend every waking moment foaming at the mouth that we live in a world where that man continues to breathe our air and the rabid Randroid libertarians who can’t countenance the existence of any religious thought, particularly if it leads you to claim that individualism and self-reliance may not be all they’re cracked up to be — are saying “Dinesh, you so crazy!”.
Honestly, I don’t care one way or another about Taylor. He’s a second-rate thinker and a third-rate philosopher (as opposed to, say, Ayn Rand, who was a 792nd-rate philosopher), and his receipt of the Templeton Prize is a lot less impressive when you consider that previous winners include such philosophical heavy hitters as Billy Graham, Campus Crusade for Christ founder Bill Bright, and Watergate criminal Chuck Colson. The Templeton Foundation itself is a bad joke, awarding large sums of money to anyone willing to gunk up the culture with nakedly religious appeals to sentiment; it gave its Epiphany Prize in 2004 to The Passion of the Christ, it’s taken a lot of heat for boosting the careers of pro-religious scientists, and it’s provided wingnut welfare to people like Milton Friedman, Gertrude Himmelfarb and Walter “Williams!” Williams.
The funniest part of the whole piece, though (well, apart from the woman in comments who says that proof of God exists because amino acids can play classical music), is where D’Souza hopes the money Taylor gets from the Templeton prize will liberate him from the drudgery of having to “make his own bed or clear his dishes”. At the end comes the big kicker:
Eventually I think this prize will come to be seen as more important than the Nobel. Charles Taylor is one of the reasons why.
The Templeton Foundation obviously agrees that their awards are more important than the Nobel Prize — they always raise the dollar amount to be slightly higher than that of the Nobel award amount — but this sort of circular logic is perfectly D’Souza. Charles Taylor is a great philosopher. How can you tell? Well, he just won the Templeton Prize! What’s the Templeton Prize? Why, it’s the most important award there is! How can you tell? Because Charles Taylor just won it! I hereby grant myself the Sadly, No! Cornshucker Award for Outstanding Achievement in the Field of Terlet Philosophizin’, which is the most important intellectual accomplishment in the history of human thought, as evidenced by the fact that I am the one who won it. I thank you, the little people, and also my baby daddy, God.
ZOMG!
This is really funny, man. I’m glad you’re here.
I also liked learning that D’Souza’s new book will be What’s So Great about Christianity? He doesn’t care whose toes he steps on, that man.
The funniest part of the whole piece, though (well, apart from the woman in comments who says that proof of God exists because amino acids can play classical music)
Wow. I can’t play classical music. You sayin’ those amino acids are smarter than me? Or does that mean that I’m God?
Okay, the verdict’s in: I’m God. I hereby declare that naps are compulsory. Go to it, oh ye devout. Snooze in my holy name.
Ah, those winger commenters. It’s PROTEINS that play JAZZ. (Amino acids play chords.) Details, people, details…
I did almost throw up in my mouth a little (had a blueberry muffin for a barrier, thank FSM) over the shocking allegations that both Ann and Dinesh somehow manage to get it on. Eeeeesh. Give me zombies, any day.
Not to be overlooked, Pastor Bruce Mo[r]on recounts his first psychedelic encounter with Ann Coulter!
As a child of the 70’s, I took my turn experimenting with metaphysics and mind-altering substances. Carlos Castaneda’s teachings on seeking your “spirit-guide� (nahual) through peyote use was my particular goal one afternoon as I lay on a rock on the shore of Lake Travis near Austin, TX., to await for the third time the arrival of my nahual. Castaneda taught that you had to be persistent for the spirit teachers wanted sincere seekers of wisdom. That day it did happen, but not in the way I’d expected.
My nahual came in the form of some strange pterodactyl-like creature, hovering over me to lead me into the deeper mysteries of the universe. My initial positive reaction quickly changed into sudden fear as I intuitively recoiled from its grasp. [Yeah, I don’t think I’d want to be molested by AC when I was stoned, either!] With a telepathic sneer, the thing flew away from me, and all my peyote buttons and Castaneda books soon made their way into my university dorm dumpster. [Did they walk there on their own? Why doesn’t he state this more clearly? What is he trying to hide?] No more playing with psychotropic substances for me. I always felt grateful for having exercised my will at that moment, for I sensed that it likely saved my life from insanity (although some might contest the last part.) [Yes, some might, based on the available evidence!]
Let’s see … insanity, working for pantloads media … insanity, working for pantloads media … insanity, working for pantloads media … I dunno, Pastor Bruce, I think you need to ask for a do-over!
I can’t play classical music on any instrument either. But as God of my body, I’ve become a good delegator and therefore I allow my intelligently-designed digestive system to play the butt oboe once in a while, especially after consuming a couple of chili dogs and a few cans of PBR.
PS–isn’t D’Souza about as teh unctuous and creepy as one can imagine?
Oh geez. I knew a guy who was a hardcore druggie in college and during his eleventy-zillionth acid trip, had a sudden religious conversion. Ended up making him even creepier.
Since we didn’t hear about how the peyote buttons ended up n the dumpster, I won’t even go into the connections between psychedelics, schizophrenia, and excessive religiosity—but, like the peyote buttons in the dumpster, rest assured, they are there.
I know this post is about D’Souza, Taylor, the Templeton Prize, and wingnut welfare, but like Ann Althouse’s Right Breast, I was captivated by the Rev. Moon of Mexico City. And by his commenters, especially Chip:
and dimitri (sics throughout):
An army of Davids, indeed.
As a teenager in the 70s I took buttloads of acid and peyote and mescalin, and while tripping I’d have deep intellectual conversations with my weenie, whose voice sounded amazingly similar to the dude who played Mr. FrenchFamily Affair, and who narrated Winnie the Pooh for so many years.
Crazy? Sadly, No! It was the drugs, man. The drugs!
mat–
Your weenie sounds like Sebastian Cabot? That’s class!
I could read comments like dimitri’s all day, from Sacked Rome to the quotes around pentagon and jews, both lower case. It’s poetry, I tells ya.
Qetesh–
I was planning to worship you anyway, but with this new edict re naps, I’m going Orthodox. Naps rule.
Your weenie sounds like Sebastian Cabot?
Think that’s cool, you shoulda heard Mr. Happy opine about Quantum Mechanics, Michel Foucalt, or Existentialism. Priceless, I tell ya, priceless!
“how the West went from the ancient idea of the soul to the modern idea of the self.”
I want to know how we went from the ancient idea of crapping in a hole in the ground to the modern idea of Terlet Philosophizin’.
“Crazy? Sadly, No! It was the drugs, man. The drugs!”
Once after taking large amts. of LSD,I had a voice in my head telling me to kill everyone in the house. This insight did not lead me to become a republican or to throw my drugs away. And what kind of twisted soul has an evil pterodactyl as a spirit animal, doesn’t he know they never existed?
And what kind of twisted soul has an evil pterodactyl as a spirit animal, doesn’t he know they never existed?
Methinks Moon is full of shit and he stole that imagery from Hunter S. Thompson’s Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas.
I knew certain shady drug dealers back in the day who’d put a couple grains of pop rocks in tinfoil and sell it to dorks as “microdot Acid.” I think Moon was one of those dorks and his “hallucinations” were his hysterical attempts to feel high when he was, in fact, as sober as Anita Bryant at an anti-gay rally.
Just a theory.
HS Thompson: We were somewhere around Barstow on the edge of the desert when the drugs began to take hold. I remember saying something like “I feel a bit lightheaded; maybe you should drive…â€? And suddenly there was a terrible roar all around us and the sky was full of what looked like huge bats, all swooping and screeching and diving around the car, which was going about a hundred miles an hour with the top down to Las Vegas. And a voice was screaming: “Holy Jesus! What are these goddamn animals?â€?
Since I didn’t win the coveted Cornshucker Award, I blame God, Liberals, and immigrants…
PS – I rather off zombies with those shower head thingees
i just won the award for the best comment in this comment thread. this comment thread is the best comment thread in the history of comment threads, therefore i have just made, and indeed currently continue to make, the most profoundly bestest comment in the history of right now.
still.
haven’t stopped yet.
done.
I’ve generally lost interest in political discourse that doesn’t involve hitting a zombie in the face with a TV set.
Is’nt that what this site does daily?
“hitting a zombie in the face with a TV set” – which xbox game? Sounds like Grosse Point Blank crossed with 28 Weeks Later (in which unlike other zombie films, the zombies can move at something more than a crawl)
How exactly does one recognize a telepathic sneer? Especially one conveyed by a pterodactyl?
As a grad student in philosophy and once upon a time very frequent tripper, lemme add my two cents.
First off, Charles Taylor? Decent translator, mediocre thinker. Not a guy who’ll be seriously studied or treated reverently in the future. Analytic types are moving past his kind of limited worldview, finally, and continentals? Shit, we wonder why anyone bothers to read him.
Only folk I know who’ve any interest in him are medieval types who are just as much students of the history of Christianity as philosophy.
As for tripping, well, shit.
Just more proof stupid people can’t handle the good stuff. Religious conversions on acid make me laugh so damn hard. That kind of narcissism always does. If you see God on acid you’ve just started worshipping yourself. More honest, I suppose, than a fictional character whut only exists in print, but….
Oh, and my thesis advisor knows Taylor well, I should admit, but that’s because he’s fond of Bernard Williams and needed context for the smackdowns. Catholicism and philosophy don’t mix anymore, despite MacIntyre’s desperate fumblings.
If you’re going to read a so-called analytic philosopher, make sure it’s Williams, or Rorty, tho I doubt many still think of him as an analytic at this point.
Dead Rising!
J–, wow, that Dmitri. I’m surprised he managed to spell his name right.
Mat, I bow to you as the only man who has a weenie that can discourse upon quantum physics while sounding like Sebastian Cabot. Did it also look like Sebastian Cabot? Extra funky points if so.
Mr Wonderful, I think the Orthodox Church Of Qetesh will be a big hit. There will be compulsory naps, lying about looking cool, and staring idly out of the window thinking Big Thoughts. Dreaming idly of chasing small animals is, of course, required of the truly devout.
Oh, and fish dinners for everyone!
Oh, one further item in the world of weenies: I dug up a news item this morning that might interest some…
Apparently, according to Julien Temple, Brit film director and cool dude, when Fitzcarraldo was being filmed in 1982, Mick Jagger tried something a little unconventional. He’d apparently been told by an ex-lover that his willie was weeny, so, as any man would, he set about increasing the size.
He did this not by any conventional methods, however. Noooo, the brave Mr Jagger, he of the wiggly bot, tried “an old Amazonian marriage ritual”. Said ritual apparently involved the following:
1) Build bamboo structure around wille;
2) Fill bamboo structure with stinging bees;
3) Profit!
Okay, not exactly profit. More like a very swollen willie, and a determination never to be so butt-stoopid again.
Still, it’s a good story to tell the grandkids. Mr Temple is silent as to whether or not Mick was tripping at the time.
There was a time in the 70s when my husband and I dropped acid while driving up California 1 to Big Sur and I came up with the “brilliant” insight: “You know, life is like a road.” We started laughing about how stupid it was approximately 1/10 of a second after the words came out of my mouth. Just imagine what a great religious leader I could have been if I’d only taken myself seriously instead.
“sex-with-Ann-Coulter”
AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHH