John C. Wright's Blog, page 67
May 23, 2014
Quote
The moral imagination is the principal possession that man does not share with the beasts.
–Russell Kirk
(from an article Kirk wrote in 1968 on Ray Bradbury)
Originally published at John C. Wright's Journal. Please leave any comments there.
May 21, 2014
The Wright Perspective: 3 Rs of Conservatism: Right, Reason and Reality
One of the most frequent criticisms leveled at Conservatives is that we lack ideals or guiding principles — that we are merely men of pragmatic character, asking not what is ideal in a perfect world, but only what is possible in an imperfect world.
Indeed, many a conservative quotes (with apparent favor) that conservatism “is not an ideology but a disposition.” By this they mean that we conservatives are disposed in favor of calmness, reason, civil order, civility, experiential knowledge gained painfully through centuries of trial and error, piety toward ancestors, reverence toward Heaven. Conservatism, by this definition, is merely a mistrust of ideological theory and a trust of precedent. Conservatism is disbelief in Utopia.
The criticism is not true; it is not close to truth; it is the diametric opposite of truth. The untruth seems plausible only when words are used for their emotional connotations, but never defined.
In truth, so-called Conservatives are revolutionaries who believe in the principles of the American Revolution: that all men are endowed by their Creator with certain inalienable rights, including the right to life, liberty and property; that to secure these rights governments are instituted among men; and when any government becomes destructive of those rights, it is the duty of patriots to rise up in arms and overthrow it, and create such institutions anew which will return their native rights to them.
They have faith in God.
The so-called Liberals or Radicals or Progressives or Morlocks or Whateverthefudge they are calling themselves this month are revolutionaries who believe in the principles of the French Revolution: Liberté, Egalité, Fraternité.
For those of you who do not speak French: Liberté means all men are slaves of the frenzied mob; Egalité means success is punished and failure rewarded until all outcomes are equal and all efforts are vain; Fraternité means all “comrade citizens” are wards of the Napoleon, the Fuhrer, the Lightworker, or whatever they are calling the Glorious Leader this month.
They have faith in Guillotines.
Read the rest here: http://www.everyjoe.com/2014/05/21/politics/3-rs-conservatism-right-reason-reality/
Originally published at John C. Wright's Journal. Please leave any comments there.
The 3 Rs of Conservatism: Right, Reason and Reality
One of the most frequent criticisms leveled at Conservatives is that we lack ideals or guiding principles — that we are merely men of pragmatic character, asking not what is ideal in a perfect world, but only what is possible in an imperfect world.
Indeed, many a conservative quotes (with apparent favor) that conservatism “is not an ideology but a disposition.” By this they mean that we conservatives are disposed in favor of calmness, reason, civil order, civility, experiential knowledge gained painfully through centuries of trial and error, piety toward ancestors, reverence toward Heaven. Conservatism, by this definition, is merely a mistrust of ideological theory and a trust of precedent. Conservatism is disbelief in Utopia.
The criticism is not true; it is not close to truth; it is the diametric opposite of truth. The untruth seems plausible only when words are used for their emotional connotations, but never defined.
In truth, so-called Conservatives are revolutionaries who believe in the principles of the American Revolution: that all men are endowed by their Creator with certain inalienable rights, including the right to life, liberty and property; that to secure these rights governments are instituted among men; and when any government becomes destructive of those rights, it is the duty of patriots to rise up in arms and overthrow it, and create such institutions anew which will return their native rights to them.
They have faith in God.
The so-called Liberals or Radicals or Progressives or Morlocks or Whateverthefudge they are calling themselves this month are revolutionaries who believe in the principles of the French Revolution: Liberté, Egalité, Fraternité.
For those of you who do not speak French: Liberté means all men are slaves of the frenzied mob; Egalité means success is punished and failure rewarded until all outcomes are equal and all efforts are vain; Fraternité means all “comrade citizens” are wards of the Napoleon, the Fuhrer, the Lightworker, or whatever they are calling the Glorious Leader this month.
They have faith in Guillotines.
Read the rest here: http://www.everyjoe.com/2014/05/21/politics/3-rs-conservatism-right-reason-reality/
Originally published at John C. Wright's Journal. Please leave any comments there.
May 20, 2014
HARD MAGIC by Larry Correia
Larry Correia’s HARD MAGIC is a novel that everyone who likes a feast of awesome with a side order of awesome slathered in awesomesauce should like, if not love. Anyone who has lost the vital connection with his inner ten-year-old is not allowed to read this book.
The time is 1930′s after the Great War, smack in the middle of a Great Depression, and nothing is great. The place is a world next door to our own, where random members of the population are ‘Actives’ who have magical talents, everything from telekinesis to teleportation to pyrokinetics to summoning demons to superhuman strength to the ability to control gravity. Imperial Japan has discovered more about this Power, what it is and where it came from and what it wants from mankind, than anyone in the West, and Japanese have ruthless global ambitions, and the winds of war are beginning to howl.
Prohibition is still in force, Oklahoma is a dustbowl, and John Moses Browning is still making guns that are works of art. Like all good alternate histories, there was no Hindenburg disaster, and so blimps and zeppelins are the favored method of travel, and, of course, they are equipped with cannons and machinegun blisters.
Originally published at John C. Wright's Journal. Please leave any comments there.
The Problem of Evil in Spooky Stories
This is a reprint of a column first published here in 2010. I am reprinting it now, just in case I ever talk Castalia House into publishing another volume of my nonfiction articles.
___________________________
“It is the eve of St. George’s Day. Do you not know that tonight, when the clock strikes midnight, all the evil things in the world will have full sway?”
With these words, an old Irish peasant woman to Jonathan Harker in Bram Stoker’s novel Dracula (1897) gives him a crucifix.
“I did not know what to do,” Harker writes, “for, as an English Churchman, I have been taught to regard such things as in some measure idolatrous, and yet it seemed so ungracious to refuse an old lady meaning so well and in such a state of mind.”
But later, terrified and alone in Count Dracula’s Transylvanian castle, he is grateful:
Bless that good, good woman who hung the crucifix round my neck! For it is a comfort and a strength to me whenever I touch it. It is odd that a thing which I have been taught to regard with disfavour and as idolatrous should in a time of loneliness and trouble be of help. Is it that there is something in the essence of the thing itself, or that it is a medium, a tangible help, in conveying memories of sympathy and comfort? Some time, if it may be, I must examine this matter and try to make up my mind about it. In the meantime I must find out all I can about Count Dracula. . . .
As Leo Grin comments: Over a century later, Stephenie Meyer managed to write four bestselling books concerning vampires (later translated into a quartet of popular movies) without the word crucifix appearing even a single time in her hundreds of thousands of words.
Vampires without crucifixes. Ponder the sense of that.
Fan that I am BUFFY and ANGEL and of much of Joss Whedon’s work, I have always been disappointed and offended at how weak, silly, inept or arbitrary the supernatural Powers of Light have been portrayed in the seasons I watched. (A confession: I gave up watching BUFFY when Spike became Buffy’s BFF. At that point, I realized that Mr. Whedon was just interested in jerking my chain, and no longer interested in telling me a witty, gripping and entertaining tale of vampire-slaying derring-do.)
I seem to recall that when Cordelia went to Heaven, she was simply bored by it, and wanted out. On the other hand, when Buffy returned from Heaven, she could not revert to normal life, because Earth seemed like Hell compared to that enervating bliss. So here in the same show are two opposing views of the Power that opposes Hell, demons and vampirism, and in the first case, it is as bad as anything Achilles in Hades laments, and in the second, it is no better than what the Buddha seeks.
The Council of Watchers in BUFFY (which I am secretly convinced is one and the same as the Council of Watchers in HIGHLANDER, and is probably run by Methos and Vandal Savage together) is the nominal good guys, but they are portrayed as ruthless, bureaucratic, and unworthy of anyone’s trust or loyalty.
In a similar vein, the angels or angelic hosts as portrayed in other spooky stories, such as the SANDMAN by Neil Gaiman, or the Alan Moore run on SWAMP THING, or even the angel in SPAWN (who is, of all absurd things, a bounty-hunter) are portrayed as being about as admirable as the Watchers of BUFFY: namely, either indifferent or harmful to human affairs, and not someone you can turn to for help, and certainly someone you would never turn to in prayer.
(I might also mention Phillip Pullman’s ‘His Dark Materials’ trilogy has the same type of evil or unappealing portrayal of Heaven, but that was deliberately written as an anti-Narnia and ant-Christian diatribe, so any similarities between these stories and his are not to their credit. Whether deliberately or not, these other tales reflect the same world-view, not unchristian, but antichristian.)
In none of the stories I just mentioned, even stories where the image of Our Lord in His suffering nailed to a cross is what drives back vampires, is any mentioned made of the Christ. Is is always an Old Testament sort of God ruling Heaven, or no one at all is in charge.
So why in Heaven’s name is Heaven always so bland, unappealing, or evil in these spooky stories?
Originally published at John C. Wright's Journal. Please leave any comments there.
Against the Spirits of Wickedness in the High Places
A guest post by by a reader with the noetic and obsessive name of Concept Junkie:
In a world where everyone cries “Wolf!”, the legitimate wolf attack will go unnoticed.
In a world where accusations of racism and sexism, etc., are hurled more commonly than people ask about the weather, does it do any good to make accusations of racism, sexism, etc., _even if you are absolutely correct_?
Having finished “Transhuman and Subhuman” last night, I have explored Mr. Wright’s musings on the philosophical and psychological underpinnings of liberal thinking that drive its symptoms of racism, sexism, etc. His thinking is, in my opinion, very clear, and he reaches many of the same conclusions I’ve reached (although much more thoroughly), and he correctly points out that this is much more than a disagreement about how to govern, or about different choices in lifestyle.
Even though it’s much harder, I think this is the strategy we need to take in trying to develop an approach to combating the evil thinking that is pervading our society. Honestly, this obsession with race, sex, sexuality, etc., isn’t the problem, it’s just a symptom of a deep-seated and non-obvious problem, one I feel I can’t really explain, and definitely don’t understand.
While I can appreciate the liberal idea of paying attention to viewpoints and kinds of people that are often ignored, the fact on the ground is that in doing so, they almost inevitably focus attention on bogus viewpoints, stupid ideas, or kinds of people that don’t have anything constructive to offer, or if they do, focus on aspects (sex, race, etc.) that are completely orthogonal to the merit under which they are judged (e.g., the ability to write a good book).
This is the great challenge in our culture war, and unfortunately everything, even the friggin’ science fiction awards has become a battlefield in that war.
Originally published at John C. Wright's Journal. Please leave any comments there.
May 19, 2014
Nebula Awards 2014
The Nebula Awards were announced over the weekend:
Novel
Winner: Ancillary Justice, Ann Leckie (Orbit US; Orbit UK)
Nominees:
We Are All Completely Beside Ourselves, Karen Joy Fowler (Marian Wood)
The Ocean at the End of the Lane, Neil Gaiman (Morrow; Headline Review)
Fire with Fire, Charles E. Gannon (Baen)
Hild, Nicola Griffith (Farrar, Straus and Giroux)
The Red: First Light, Linda Nagata (Mythic Island)
A Stranger in Olondria, Sofia Samatar (Small Beer)
The Golem and the Jinni, Helene Wecker (Harper)
Novella
Winner: ‘‘The Weight of the Sunrise,’’ Vylar Kaftan (Asimov’s 2/13)
Nominees:
‘‘Wakulla Springs,’’ Andy Duncan & Ellen Klages (Tor.com 10/2/13)
‘‘Annabel Lee,’’ Nancy Kress (New Under the Sun)
‘‘Burning Girls,’’ Veronica Schanoes (Tor.com 6/19/13)
‘‘Trial of the Century,’’ Lawrence M. Schoen (www.lawrencemschoen.com; World Jumping)
Six-Gun Snow White, Catherynne M. Valente (Subterranean)
Novelette
Winner: ‘‘The Waiting Stars,’’ Aliette de Bodard (The Other Half of the Sky)
Nominees:
‘‘Paranormal Romance,’’ Christopher Barzak (Lightspeed 6/13)
‘‘They Shall Salt the Earth with Seeds of Glass,’’ Alaya Dawn Johnson (Asimov’s 1/13)
‘‘Pearl Rehabilitative Colony for Ungrateful Daughters,’’ Henry Lien (Asimov’s 12/13)
‘‘The Litigation Master and the Monkey King,’’ Ken Liu (Lightspeed 8/13)
‘‘In Joy, Knowing the Abyss Behind,’’ Sarah Pinsker (Strange Horizons 7/1 – 7/8/13)
Short Story
Winner: ‘‘If You Were a Dinosaur, My Love,’’ Rachel Swirsky (Apex 3/13)
Nominees:
‘‘The Sounds of Old Earth,’’ Matthew Kressel (Lightspeed 1/13)
‘‘Selkie Stories Are for Losers,’’ Sofia Samatar (Strange Horizons 1/7/13)
‘‘Selected Program Notes from the Retrospective Exhibition of Theresa Rosenberg Latimer,’’ Kenneth Schneyer (Clockwork Phoenix 4)
‘‘Alive, Alive Oh,’’ Sylvia Spruck Wrigley (Lightspeed 6/13)
Ray Bradbury Award for Outstanding Dramatic Presentation
Winner: Gravity
Nominees:
Doctor Who: ‘‘The Day of the Doctor’’
Europa Report
Her
The Hunger Games: Catching Fire
Pacific Rim
Andre Norton Award for Young Adult Science Fiction and Fantasy Book
Winner: Sister Mine, Nalo Hopkinson (Grand Central)
Nominees:
The Coldest Girl in Coldtown, Holly Black (Little, Brown; Indigo)
When We Wake, Karen Healey (Allen & Unwin; Little, Brown)
The Summer Prince, Alaya Dawn Johnson (Levine)
Hero, Alethea Kontis (Harcourt)
September Girls, Bennett Madison (Harper Teen)
A Corner of White, Jaclyn Moriarty (Levine)
Originally published at John C. Wright's Journal. Please leave any comments there.
A Comment I had to Share
Over at Monster Hunter Nation some no-talent stalker harassing Larry Correia, our feared and beloved International Lord of Hate, left this comment:
“I’m curious about the legality of hiring a paramilitary organization to go shoot up Boko Haram. Is that against some international law? ”
I am a lawyer, but this is not my field, so I cannot answer the question authoritatively. I can tell you this: that when the British put their mind to wiping out the slave trade (and it was wiped out during the first half of my lifetime, mind you) they hired privateers to hunt down the slavers.
You heard me. Pirates verses slavers! What a great movie that would make.
Jake replied with this comment:
For the record, the last instance of an actual privateer I’ve heard of was surprisingly recent. Within living memory, in fact: the US War Department commissioned the Goodyear Blimp to patrol coastal waters, on the lookout for German U-Boats during the Second World War. In an age before radar and nuclear submarines, this made sense: long visual range, good radio conditions, extreme loiter times – it was a natural fit. I think they carried a rifle or two, but their biggest weapons were binoculars and radios. Congress drew up a full-on Letter of Marque to make it official.
So, that means that the last time anyone commissioned a privateer, they wound up with an airship hoisting the black flag to hunt Nazis.
Truly, it does not get better than that.
Of course I agree.
Originally published at John C. Wright's Journal. Please leave any comments there.
May 16, 2014
SF to English Dictionary
This is also a reprint of an article from 2008:
In a previous post, I used some nonstandard terms specific to the genre subculture known as Slandom.
“as thick as a padawan in kemmer trying Rishathra on a Deltan nerf-herder.”
For those of you muggles who cannot grok our Slan L33tspeak, I will provide a translation.
Originally published at John C. Wright's Journal. Please leave any comments there.
Contraterrenogenesis
This is a reprint of an article from 2008:
Over at Lorem Ipsum, Jed Hartman observes:
A common problem in fantasy and science fiction stories is drowning the reader in made-up words at the start of the story.
In fantasy, this most often takes the form of a few paragraphs of High Fantasy Names, both of places and people:
It was the seventh day of Rilrak, and Vesnalorm the Mighty, Ess’lor of Nyeang, stood in Yerale Pass by the broad swift-flowing Undh, looking down over Warawe Valley to the golden towers of Soelmwar. “Alas,” thought Vesnalorm; “King Dukeko will die this day at the hands of his brother, Lllarod, and his sister, Ightch, and his cousins Nudah and Worler, if my Knights of Banismos do not act quickly.”
Originally published at John C. Wright's Journal. Please leave any comments there.
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