So, theres this novelist whose work I used to enjoy reading. He was always a right winger, often wrote from that perspective, didnt much bother me; the stories were fun and the main characters iconic. Then he developed an online presence which became increasingly extreme and hateful, till at length he seemed like just one of the pod people who just spouts stuff because its the party line. At that point the fondness wore off and I defriended (quietly; none of his vitriol was directed at me, nobody lost any energy or sleep). But morbid curiosity has me peeking in on occasion to whatever his latest rant is because I play a game with myself, and the game is this: Check The Citation. He loves playing the Obamas-a-Muslim card, recently intimating that Obamas gay as well, and when one of his FB friends took him to task for that, he responded with a link to an item which was supposedly proof — and of course it was no such thing; it was the usual interpretation, innuendo and slander with nothing in the way of genuine reportage. Usual crap, you dont have to read further. But among the latest rants is the denial of climate change and global warming. He links to a long interview with noted meteorologist John Coleman, a retired broadcaster, who has an old-coot-out-to-pasture look that sends up a flag. But I listen a bit. Then I Google. Sure enough, he was a meteorologist but never a climatologist, his last formal education was 50 years ago when he received his degree in journalism, not any kind of science, and his arguments (well and comprehensively refuted by the scientific community at large) dont discuss the science of climatology but — wait for it — the motives of those in the field reporting on the phenomenon. And my thing is ... I understand how someone in the arts, even, as they say, The Lively Arts, can be a Republican and/or conservative and/or any number of other things, because its a wide-wide wacky world and diversity not only happens, its necessary. But you want them at least to make the game worth the candle. I have one friend, for example, who holds many conservative beliefs, but hes a meticulous, even obsessive, reader/researcher, highly articulate, backs up his arguments with hard data (sometimes its an interpretation, but not a Straw Man interpretation) and doesnt follow anybodys party line blindly. I may disagree with him philosophically, but I give him points for doing the work; he comes by his vehemence honestly. But I *dont* understand how an artist, how a guy whose stock-in-trade is/was the written word, on SOME level dramatizing the human condition, a guy whose tool kit includes sharp character portraiture, intricate plot, witty dialogue, rhythm, sophistication, style, all things that cannot be achieved without keen awareness — how the phuque does a guy like that become a trafficker in ignorance? How does he lose his discernment? How does he betray his own gifts at every turn? How does he still give props to Sarah Palin (yeah, that too). Best I can do to make sense of it is wonder what happened in his life that kicked him so hard in the nuts that he lost his mind.
Posted on: Wed, 30 Jul 2014 22:59:07 +0000
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