McSweeny’s has a hilarious parody of David Brooks’ column “style”:

A close look by a disarming columnist/commentator/author at the issues facing the candidates this year shows that one of these groups may decide the upcoming election. That group is the Cheerioians, because the Lucky Charmers are six years old, and therefore cannot vote. More importantly, they can’t read my columns, which unerringly describe the shape and fabric of the America that exists inside my own head.

Seriously though, David Brooks makes me want to chop off my arm. I know it’s appealing to generalize about people, but he seems to actively promote the idea that voting for someone based on superficial features is somehow the American thing to do, and that therefore it’s ok, and indeed the appropriate thing to do.

Arrr, have ye a Happy Talk Like A Pirrrrrrrrrate Day, or me crew’ll make ye walk the plank for a perrrrrmanent visit in Davy Jones’ Locker!

Over at Cultural Sabotage, Ranjit states the following objective:

We seek to decriminalize artistic expression. No graff writer should ever end up in County. Instead, we seek greater opportunities for artistic expression, specifically in the form of funded art programs and MORE LEGAL WALLS, particularly in neighborhoods under threat of gentrification.

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I played a game of checkers with spare change today at Brewed Awakening on one of the square-tiled tables that extend like teeth from the south wall of the coffeehouse. I haven’t played checkers in years, so it was a bit difficult to remember good strategy, but I had a particularly stunning three-jump capture, including a newly-kinged piece of my opponent. Actually it wasn’t a King, it was the Proletariat. In the end, true to life, Marx was toppled like the stack of pennies that was his representative.

We had to play checkers because we lacked the coins to play chess (one side heads, the other tails). Our favored coin-to-piece assignment is:

Pawn — penny
Rook — nickel with a dime on top
Knight — nickel with a penny on top
Bishop — penny with a dime on top
King — quarter
Queen — quarter with a nickel on top

In total, $1.27 per side, which is a bit steep, but the chess set comes rife with symbolism.

The nickel is the thick weight of cultural expectations and mores. The queen is weighed down with the nickel, but it is this burden which makes her strong. The penny is the common person, the Public, pawns in our struggle. The knight then is a person elevated, riding atop the cultural expectations. It is not a glorious position. Regular movement in the straighforward manner of pawns is forbidden. Instead the knight is shifty, representing an individual who manipulates culture and dodges responsibility. The dime symbolizes religion in its multifarious forms. The bishop, high in the hierarchy, uses religion to oppress and keep down the people. The rook represents the high tower on which religion places itself as the arbiter of cultural mores.

As you can see, with this symbology we can see chess for what it really is. It is not a mere game with which to pass the time, but a model for the clash of contemporary societies, slaughtering pawns in an eternal struggle for the board, which in the end is an empty plain, devoid of the corpses which are conveniently whisked away at the instant of death.

UPDATE: spelling fixed — sometimes I wonder what all this “education” was for.

What is up with the ubiquity of “allow 6 to 8 weeks for delivery?” It’s standard on all TV-direct advertising, but also on magazine subscriptions, as I found out recently. Perhaps this is something they cover in marketing classes. The best explanation I can come up with is that it take 6-8 weeks for you to completely forget that you bought something, so that when it finally arrives you are overjoyed at the unexpected blessing of your ginzu knife set/julienne fry maker/Foreman grill/subscription to the New Yorker.

I’ve talked to my friend Liz recently about Sex and the City (SATC) and how it it I think it acknowledges its own unrealism while not addressing it. People love that show because they wish their lives would be like that, but the show seems to take pains to remind people that what they see is not real or necessarily feasible. So do we call that kind of art subversive or not? Does it secretly change cultural norms and reshape people’s views of society despite avoiding directly addressing those issues? Or is it merely pap for the masses to keep the subservient to some dominant state interests (to borrow a little radicalization from Boal).

Liz mentioned an interesting theory to me, which I shall call the safety valve theory. She says SATC “provides the public with enough edge and ‘scandal’ to keep them believing that they are still a part of a free society.” It acts a safety valve for society by using humor to defuse tension and dissatisfaction. So they will show women blowing thousands of dollars on shoes in order for her to live her own independent lifestyle. In the world of SATC, merchantile excess is the key to personal independence

I am not a regular watcher of the show, but I have seen a few episodes. I think that although it proposes a liberated sexual identity for women, at the same time it denies its own reality. That, coupled with the money leading to personal independence noted above presents a dangerous message I think. I disagree very much that in order for women to be independent they must be able to buy expensive shoes, and yet that is what SATC would have us believe.

Perhaps I am reaching too far to find a reason for not liking the show. But watching it leaves a bad taste in my mouth, and I’m trying to figure out why.

Yesterday the A’s gave the royal smackdown to the Reds. This got me thinking about team names and mascots, and how ridiculous and racist they are. Of course, I don’t know where the Reds came from, but the Braves are pretty unambiguous, as are the Redskins, the Fighting Illini, etc. How is this not patently offensive and racist? Is it merely the money invested in the franchise (and appeasing alumni in the case of college sports) that prevents us from looking at these cariacatures and recognizing them as demeaning and offensive? Have we sufficiently marginalized the Native American population that it is now safe to ignore them?
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Suppose you observe something and ascribe to it some specal significance out of scale with the actual event due to the nature of the observation. For example, almost any form of divination, fortune cookies, and the like. Is there a name for that sort of psychological irrationality?

I finally broke down and did the page 23 meme where you grab the nearest book, turn to page 23, read the fifth line, and read your fortune. Mine read “This last relation is Bayes’ rule, and it will play a crucial role in our thinking about the neural code.” I think these things are bunk, but that sentence sounds suspiciously like a forecast for my life.

Another gem from Crooked Timber, written by Belle Waring:

What do you think of when you hear the word “Trojan”? Possibly, you think of the heartbreaking scene of farewell between Hector and Andromache, when little Astyanax is frightened by the nodding plumes of Hector’s helmet. But probably not. Probably, you think: Trojan horse. So consider the context. There’s this big…item outside your walled citadel, and you are unsure whether to let it inside. After hearing the pros and cons (and seeing some people eaten by snakes), you open the gates and drag the big old thing inside. Then, you get drunk. At the height of the party, hundreds of little guys come spilling out of the thing and sow destruction, breaking “Troy’s hallowed coronal”, as they say. Is this, all things considered, the ideal story for condom manufacturers to evoke? Just asking.

I suppose I hadn’t really thought of it before. It might make one rethink one’s brand loyalties. Then again, what do “kimono,” “rough rider” and “lifestyles” suggest?