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The political satire column, "Flatiron Letter" by Marcia Pally has been published in the "Frankfurter Rundschau" since 2001.
Marcia Pally Flatiron Letter
October 5, 2006
“Idomeneo” fans unite! Finally, public recognition for an opera no one has been able to pronounce. Google is overloaded with clicks on “Print Libretto.” Ticket sales around the world are up, which is not difficult, as there has not been an uptick in interest since opening night in 1781. People for whom “classic” means the Beatles are clamoring for new Idomeneo productions, and the fox-collard widows of Wilmersdorf, who would normally be outraged by severed heads, are banging their canes for more. Normally, bloody brains on plates would be lambasted by conservatives as a degenerate violation of art, decency, and European tradition. But today, every CDU-er in Germany is for severed-heads rights, against the “Infidel.” Never mind that the “Infidel,” in this case, was too busy parsing the first official “German Islamic Conference” to check out opera productions. For defenders of Leitkultur, Decapitation Art is a banner issue. Save the Dolphins! Save the Heads!
The US press is for decapitation, too. Not of course when the “Infidel” does it to US soldiers on Al Arabia TV. But we generally love anything that makes Europe look “old” so the Idomeneo cancellation was immediately news here. In the New York Times, one Letter to the Editor likened the Idomeneo production to Holocaust denials; another wondered why Berlin was surrendering to the terrorist enemy and censoring it. It seems you guys just can’t get it right: if you cancel the show you’re fascists and if you perform it you’re… fascists. You see why we love Germany? You remind us of when we were the good guys and not the guys whose botched invasions are inspiring decapitations on Al Arabia TV.
But no matter—Idomeneo has finally gotten the recognition that its quality has never deserved. Censorship is underappreciated. There is no better publicity. For two weeks, the not-to-be-seen heads of Muhammad, Jesus, Buddha and Poseidon brought the world’s attention to the opera’s otherwise botched attempt to lambaste religion as anti-Enlightenment. At last, someone cares what Idomeneo is about. I am offended only that the head of Moses was omitted. Aren’t our prophets worthy of being symbols of the evils of religion?
With Idomeneo’s sudden renown in mind, I propose an international effort to revive mediocre and rightfully-ignored works by issuing fatwahs against them. The resulting censorship will surely bring them fame. All may suggest their amour foux; send your submissions to me. The name of the list is Salieri’s Revenge.
I will start with Leviticus, an exceedingly long book of picayune laws, the recitation of which gives folks an occasion to nap in synagogues worldwide. Let’s give it a boost--fatwah Nr. 1. My second suggestion is Puccini’s tremendously weak La Rondine, rightfully rarely performed as it takes place entirely in what today would be a Starbucks where people drone on about yet another beautiful, consumptive prostitute and her bourgeois lover, separated by propriety. Let’s give it a helping hand: fatwah Nr. 2. There are warehouses of completely forgettable Madonna and Childs that neither the world nor God needs, and legions of 16th century Neopolitan paintings that should stay in Naples. Let’s get ‘em back in the limelight: fatwah Nr. 3. Any really dumb utterances of Confucius that have been thankfully buried for two millennia—let’s get ‘em out in the open: fatwah Nr. 4. Farwah’s 5 through 9,578,036 are for all the turgid, derivative novels you’ve wasted money on. Ever hear of the middling and derivative painter Benjamin West? Rightfully not. But we can change all that: fatwah 9,578,037.
Please add your own choice of lousy art. We welcome your contribution to the list.There are, of course, serious things to say about the Idomeneo flap. For one, many Germans—white people, as the un-PC say—seem to be defending freedom of expression as a white-people’s identity marker, without knowing what it is for. That is, to defend the views of unpopular minorities. For another, Europe’s unpopular minorities don’t seem to know it, either. So they imperil the very right that guarantees them a voice in Europe. Why doesn’t either group know it? Maybe fatwah Nr. 1 should be a good history of the Wars of Religion and the 300-year fight for democratic civil rights. So we can get it back on the best-seller lists and podcasts of the world.
Marcia Pally Flatiron Letter
August 20, 2006
The first emails I got after the British police announced they’d foiled a plot to blow up 10 ten planes over the Atlantic were not about Connecticut. Neither was the second or third, but by the seventh or so, Connecticut was beginning to appear. The first emails were about carry-on, a Rorschach, it turns out, for everyone’s anxieties. Tell me what a person worried he would lack if he were limited to a clear plastic bag with passport, money, and keys, and I’ll tell you what page he’s on in the psychiatric diagnostic manual, fourth edition. I hear they’re opening shops all along Broadway where you can bring in the worry-information and get a diagnosis in 15 minutes, on your lunch break. A heck of a lot cheaper than going to couples therapy. For $12 extra bucks, you get a neck-massage too (per person).
The fifth anniversary of the Sept. 11th attacks is nearing, but in the summer splash of beach, hammocks, and out-of-town trips, we New Yorkers hadn’t settled into being worried yet. That was scheduled for after Labor Day (New Yorkers can’t really function outside their date-organizers). But that was before the clear-plastic-bag fatwah. Now, we are worried. It’s one thing to die over the Atlantic and quite another to survive for 9 hours.
My friend Nancy had a meltdown over the no-book rule, which she emailed to me on her Trio, from an airport lounge, apparently forgetting that there was a no-Trio rule too. What are five million flyers per day supposed to do if they don’t like the in-flight movie? If you end up being entertained by salt-water fish, you have nothing to worry about. But if you’re 37,000 feet in the air with people who want to show you their vacation pictures . . . Are the airlines going to provide laptops so we can illegally download movies for free? For Bill, it was the jihad against water — those 1,5 liters bottles that we buy at airport shops for 156 euros each. He was on the phone with me, frantically figuring: each one of those little plastic cups we get from the beverage cart is about 35cl; 150 cl divided by 35 is. . . . How many little plastic cups does that come to? If we pile up enough, could we get a deal on a urinalysis?
The loss of moisturizer pushed Bali over the edge. If you end up in the Atlantic, you don’t have to worry about dry skin, but if you stay in the air . . . Would airlines give out hand- and face-lotion along with those foil-wrapped towlettes? How many earned “miles” would entitle me to full spa services?
Stuart, Bali’s husband, worried about Connecticut. Ned Lamont, who opposed the war in Iraq, won against Senator Lieberman, who supported it, in the Connecticut primary for the Democratic party. The Republicans screamed it was a betrayal of the country. Cheney said Connecticut-ers were supporting Al Qaeda. Just days later, the Brits uncovered a major terrorist plot, which boosts the Republicans who, if nothing else, are considered at least better than the Dems on security. Are these events connected? Stuart tends to conspiracy theories, but then again, he writes for left-wing Nation. But why pay attention to his priorities anyway — he’s not flying anywhere.
In all this, I noticed that international travel had been thrown into a tizzy, emiserating the world’s vacationers, without any actual attack taking place. Where were the years of planning in dumpy Florida, and more years eating dust in Afghanistan? Where were the hundreds of thousands of dollars, like the sums spent on 9/11? Or even like the crappy little accounts for the Madrid and London bombings? What is this — budget terrorism?
Do they think if they fly enough planes into buildings they get “miles” that entitle them to a bonus? Is this an end-of-summer sale: buy the Madrid and London bombings and get one free? Are they doing a time-share with Hezbollah — you do this summer while we’re on Ruegen and next summer, the place in Greece is all yours? I was traumatized by 9/11, but now I’m pissed off. If I’m going to live under a clear-plastic fatwah, I want the real thing — not just some “chatter” on their Nokia cell phones. On their monthly flat-rate, what does that cost them, anyway?
I used to respect the Arab-Muslim culture — the civilization that shown when Europe was a benighted, barbaric heath. I was against the war in Iraq. But no more. Now I think we should go in there and teach them a bit about the Protestant work ethic.
Marcia Pally Flatiron Letter
August 2, 2006
Josef Joffe — editor and publisher of Die Zeit—has a new book in America, on Überpower, which Joffe thinks the US has too much of when it’s doing what he doesn’t like, and not enough of when it isn’t doing what he does like. If you found the previous sentence confusing, don’t worry; it’s just representative of the sort of case Joffe makes. Now you’re used it, and prepared for the book, which, US critics, including Roger Cohen of The New York Times, correctly note is a Wonderland of Wortspiele, An Avalanche of Alliterations and of political naivete.
But certain Americans will love it, because it tells them, like Jeremy Rifkin tells Europe, that America is really really good, if only it would be its really really good self again. The bad America is power unilateralism. Translated into reality, that means Bush’s disinterest in the 60-year-old façcade that European opinion has an impact on US policies. The good America, in Joffe’s view, is . . . power unilateralism Plus Politesse (never Pass uP an oPPortunity for a doPPle “P”). That is, the US should be the world’s hegemon, make Europe feel important, provide the planet with "international public goods (anything that provides "benefits all can enjoy once they exist"), and foot the bill for it all. In the meanwhile, Europe — a “matter of practicality, not of pride" — is too “post-heroic” to be asked to do much besides be rich and adolescently pouty about America.
To Joffe’s credit, he smacks Europe for its hypocrisy, noting that Europe would not be "so postmodern if it had to guarantee its own safety." But he fails to see that his own recipe for the US leaves post-heroic, practical Europe no global role, because he gives all the roles to America. In short, the Democrats should force-feed this book to America as the elections come up. They should scream, “Here’s a guy who says we’re the good America! We can be the hypepower and have the whole world love us — like with Clinton, JFK, and FDR” (except that the guy is European; see above, European opinion and impact on the US).
But herein lies the problem. Joffe wants America to be what Europeans thought America was post WWII. The US should "Balance, Bond and Build" Alliances with its Allies, and carry the biggest guns so that the “Belgrade-Baghdad-Beijing Belt” doesn’t take over the world. The US book critics have noticed that such a policy is unlikely to work against terrorists who are highly effective with small guns (and box cutters). But they have not noticed the deeper problem: America never was what Europe thought it was postwar and US policy in Europe was in any case not normative. There is no “good America” template to return to.
America’s postwar policies emerged from Western Europe’s special role in America’s cultural heritage and as a key market that would simultaneously be a buffer against the Soviets. By WWI, Europe was buying 77% of US exports; Europe was critical to the US between the wars. No other region could be expected so quickly to develop a market large enough to buy up US agricultural and high-end manufactured goods. (Key markets and buffer against the Soviets and China pertained also to Japan.) Why was the Marshall Plan funded? Out of fear of communism and economic depression in America. Here’s US labor in 1945: “We cannot possibly maintain full production and full employment unless we have a world pool of free and prosperous consumers” (United Auto Workers Union). Here’s Secretary of State Dean Acheson in 1949, “The problem that confronts us can be stated very simply: To maintain the volume of American exports which the free world needs and which it is our national interest to supply as a necessary part of building a successfully functioning political and economic system.” Since in the first world, America associates economic liberalism with political liberalism, Europe got both. The rest of the world got “stability” politics, where access to materials and opportunities for infrastructure development for American (and Allied) companies was paramount and worth US support for regional strongmen--and worth US military intervention and proxy wars when they weren’t strong enough, and access was threatened.
America’s European performance postwar has not been not repeated — not in the Asian “Tigers,” where the US supported dictatorships into the 1990s, not elsewhere in the developing world. Not under JFK, who was running covert CIA operations round the globe and who nearly got the planet into WWIII by backing the Bay of Pigs invasion into Cuba and moving nukes into Russia’s backyard in Turkey. And not under the genial Bill Clinton, who greatly expanded the number of US military bases and engaged in more “small wars” than during the entire Cold War period. America’s European performance postwar is not a template to which the US can return.
Joffe says Bush is a freedom man. Joffe likes Bush’s idea that "the defense of freedom requires the advance of freedom.” He just wants a bit more R-E-S-P-E-C-T, as Aretha said. Joffe believes that Bush believes his freedom call. So do I. But it is Joffe’s job, his German critics’ and his American critics’ to notice that “freedom” is not the policy the world usually gets. A feel-good book about the “good America” is not the good book that America needs.
Marcia Pally Flatiron Letter
July 7, 2006
Over the last month of the WM, Hyun and Ji-Min wanted to know if I would join them in watching. Both are former students of mine at New York University, and they sent lovely, polite emails.
JiMin wanted to take me to her Korean church, the Full Gospel New York Church in Flushing, Queens, where JiMin says, “We love Jesus and soccer.'' Around 800 people will be there, she explained, for the a pre-game prayer in Korean (not my best language) and there will giant screens, traditional Korean drummers, and the famous-in-Flushing “Promise to Praise” dance troupe, which will swirl legs and hips for the Lord and the game. I checked these girls out on the Web. Their motto is “Here I am, send me: God tells me what to do, and I serve.” I’m jealous: why doesn’t God tell me to swirl my hips? All I get is injunctions to sit on my derriere and pray. Maybe I should get a new God. On the other hand, 12 of the Korean team-members are Christians (according to JiMin) and the WM didn’t work so well for them. Maybe I should stay on my derriere.
I normally don’t go to evangelical churches but a Korean evangelical church I thought worth visiting. Yet, the competing offer from Hyun was also tempting. How about Korean beer with shots of vodka at the open-air viewing in Koreatown (32 St. near Broadway)? Thousands of uptight Korean businessmen ready to let their hair down were expected to be there. Sound like fun to you? The game was in the morning in NY; I passed on the vodka. But pictures of 32 St. were on the news. My favorite was a businessman’s wife decked out in red cowboy boots—a well-known tradition in Korea--red opera gloves, red bow tie, and red sunglasses the size of a billboard. I guessed the team color.
The third invitation I got was from Sarya Inc. Sarya is my 17-year-old Orthodox Jewish cousin. “Inc.” is the 8 or so guys he hangs out with. They travel in a pack, as 17-year-olds do, and they haven’t done anything in a month besides watch the games. I asked, does their synagogue “Love Jehovah and soccer?” No. I guess Jehovah will have to wait.
This, I hope, puts an end to the European view that soccer is unimportant in America. We are as stuck on the WM as anyone else, though what we are impressed by may be a bit…American. We are very impressed, for instance, by German efficiency. Pre-games, the press kept telling us that 11 of the 12 stadiums were ready a year early and that 300 towns had created vast public viewing areas. Is this a good thing, Americans wonder, or is this how the Final Solution was organized? We are impressed by the idea of lurking fascism, first by racist thugs who create “no go” zones. This makes us feel multicultural and democratic by comparison. Second, it you try to stop racist thugs, we see lurking fascism in the police. 280,000 police officers plus NATO surveillance planes!! — the NY Times blared. Both German and Polish youth were placed in “preventive detention.” (Do you think it would help America’s international image if that’s what we called Guantanamo Bay?)
We’ve been doubly impressed that the German team is multicultural — 2 Poles and 3 East Germans!! — as if you had a secret Aryan admission test rather than the usual greed for the best player buy-able. And we worry about German nationalism. What does it mean, Americans wonder, when the WM slogan has to officially tell Germans to “make friends”?
The US press is happy to say, however, that Klinsmann prefers the American approach to training ''because they are positive there [in America]. Here in Germany, people like to find the negative. They like to criticize.'' This bit of US nationalism went unnoticed.
Marcia Pally Flatiron Letter
June 19, 2006
I have been most relieved since the US Senate approved a National Language Bill, America’s first. Even if it does not become law, many Americans feel it will encourage immigrants to learn the national tongue. My aspirations are different: I hope it will encourage Americans to learn it.
At present, my compatriots seem to be unclear about the word “national” in the phrase “national language.” The New York Times hoped to clear up the confusion by quoting a Professor Linton: a ‘national’ language ''recognizes it as part of a national culture and not something enforced in terms of education or government.” But my government just approved a national language. And if the national language is not enforced, why have it? Will America soon have a national language it can’t use? Perhaps we could pass a National Language Law that says we can use English at least to pass coherent laws.
I assumed this linguistic confusion was only Ms. Linton’s, until I read that neither the senators who approved the bill nor the intellectuals debating it could agree on whether it would have any effect. Some say the bill will not affect present regulations requiring emergency information and official government documents to be printed in several languages. Others say that language in the bill removes the right to have government services in any language other than English. Perhaps we could have a National Language Bill that requires legislators to know the language in their bills.
I’ve been trying to figure out how the bill will affect my daily life. For instance, when I ask a clerk in my local supermarket where the tofu-based sausage is, it takes roughly 1/2 hour to get an answer, because the clerk never knows and must ask another clerk who has to ask the supervisor, who is not around and so the second clerk must as a third where the supervisor is, and so on. This all proceeds relatively quickly because the clerks all speak Spanish and so understand each other. How much more than 1/2 an hour would this take if the clerks had to do this in the national language which they didn’t speak?
And the building where I live: Repairs take only a fleeting year or two because the supervisor can speak Spanish and Haitian Creole to the laborers. If they have to speak a language they don’t speak, will my roof be repaired by winter?
Then there’s lunch. I get fantastic salads-to-go is because the Koreans, who have an absolute monopoly on the salad bars of NY, can both chop vegetables and talk at breakneck speed, in Korean. Given the knives they use, do we really want to risk linguistic confusion about what they are to chop?
In response to the current anti-immigrant hysteria, a group of Latino artists have created a new, Spanish-language national anthem. This goes a bit further than translating the German national anthem into Turkish, as it’s an additional song entirely, an additional way to hail the US of A. I understand why Latino immigrants want to push back against the national language idea. (Perhaps they even know what it means.) But let’s consider the potential results of having two anthems:
It’ll take twice as long to finish singing and begin the school day — a plus.
It’ll take twice as long till we hear the president speak — a plus for those of us who care about the national language.
It’ll take twice as long till sports events begin.
Throw the immigrants out!
Marcia Pally Flatiron Letter
May 18, 2006
The letter of Mahmoud Ahmendinajad to President Bush was taken by most to be a political matter. But I teach in the Department of Mulitlingual Multicultural Studies at New York University. For my colleagues and I, it is a text — just the sort of thing we love to dissect in academic journals to the utter boredom of our (few) readers.
I of course read with interest the comments of the American political classes. Most responses were dismissive. On the day the letter arrived, Bush said, "It looks like it did not answer the main question that the world is asking, and that is, 'When will you get rid of your nuclear program?' Condi Rice disregarded it; administration spokespeople called it a “screed.”
Ditto, the State Department. ''There was not a single substantive proposal in the letter, but it was a revealing insight into their mentality,'' a senior State Department official said. That made me wonder, perhaps because of my mentality of multicultural studies, if it wasn’t the job of the State Department to already know about Mahmoud’s mentality. But I was soon distracted by the response of the Wall Street Journal in an editorial titled “Crazy Mahmoud.” “Flaky is being kind,” it said.
The New York Times’s Elaine Sciolino compared Ahmendinajad’s letter to one sent by Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini to Mikhail Gorbachev in 1989. They both were written, she said, with “a tone of pure effrontery. Both include heavy doses of lecturing and use religious knowledge with an air of moral superiority.” But at least she compared the two texts, for which she might at least pass my class.
Tally all those responses up, and I guess a US state dinner for Mahmoud is out. But I loved Mahmoud’s letter. I am a patriotic gal, and it reminded me of my president Bush.
Mahmoud had not only a lot of God-talk, as Bush does, but he specifically asked, “If the prophets Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, Ishmael, Joseph or Jesus Christ were with us today, how would they have judged such behavior?” In Christian America, we call that WWJD? (What would Jesus do?)
Mahmoud also wrote, ''We increasingly see that people around the world are flocking towards a main focal point that is the Almighty God.”
And George, in his Second Inaugural Address, said, “we have proclaimed that every man and woman on this earth has rights, and dignity, and matchless value, because they bear the image of the maker of heaven and earth.”
Mahmoud accused George of bad behavior: “. . . because of the possibility of the existence of WMDs in one country, it is occupied, around one hundred thousand people killed, its water sources, agriculture and industry destroyed, close to 180,000 foreign troops put on the ground.”
But George, in an October, 2005 speech, already accused them of “their cold-blooded contempt for human life. We've seen it in the murders of Daniel Pearl, Nicholas Berg and Margaret Hassan and many others. . . . they have banned books and desecrated historical monuments and brutalized women.”
Mahmoud said this bad behavior was done “On the pretext of the existence of WMDs.”
George said they had pretexts, too. “Its leaders pretend to be in an aggrieved party, representing the powerless against imperial enemies.”
Mahmoud says Iran has been unfairly attacked in “the coup d’etat of 1953 and the subsequent toppling of the legal government of the day, opposition to the Islamic revolution, transformation of an Embassy into a headquarters supporting the activities of those opposing the Islamic Republic . . . support for Saddam in the war waged against Iran, the shooting down of the Iranian passenger plane, freezing the assets of the Iranian nation, increasing threats, anger and displeasure vis-à-vis the scientific and nuclear progress of the Iranian nation . . . ”
George is equally the victim: “We still remember the men who rejoice in every death [on Sept. 11th] . . . Yet the evil of that morning has reappeared on other days in other places — in Mombasa and Casablanca and Riyadh and Jakarta and Istanbul, in Madrid, in Beslan, in Taba and Natanya and Baghdad and elsewhere . . . in London, Sharm el-Sheikh and a deadly bombing in Bali once again” (Oct., 2005).
Mahmoud wants to destroy the Jews in Israel: “why is this [Israeli] regime being supported? Is support for this regime in line with the teachings of Jesus Christ or Moses or liberal values?”
George’s evangelical Christianity also sees Jews gathering into Israel as a precursor to the Coming of the Messiah, whom Jews will accept or go up in smoke. Either way, the Jews are toast. The difference between Mahmoud and George is one of timing.
Mahmoud posed as the defender of the downtrodden worldwide. “The people of Africa are hardworking, creative and talented. They can play an important and valuable role . . . Poverty and hardship in large parts of Africa are preventing this from happening.”
George, according to George, is also the poor’s defender: “We show compassion abroad, because Americans believe in the God-given dignity and worth of a villager with H.I.V./AIDS or an infant with malaria or a refugee fleeing genocide or a young girl sold into slavery” (2006 State of the Union address).
Mahmoud, as a defender of peace, rhetorically asks, “How much longer will the blood of the innocent men, women and children be spilled on the streets, and people’s houses destroyed over their heads?”
George too is on the side of peace: “Since the day President Ronald Reagan set out the vision for this endowment, the world has seen the swiftest advance of democratic institutions in history. And Americans are proud to have played our role in this great story. . . . We spoke for the rights of dissidents and the hopes of exiles. We aided the rise of new democracies on the ruins of tyranny. And all the costs and sacrifice of that struggle has been worth it (Oct., 2005)
Mahmoud knows what will not work: “Liberalism and Western style democracy have not been able to help realize the ideals of humanity. Today these two concepts have failed.”
As does George: “Some call this evil Islamic radicalism. Others militant jihadism. Still, others Islamo-fascism . . . . This form of radicalism exploits Islam to serve a violent political vision: the establishment, by terrorism and subversion and insurgency, of a totalitarian empire” (Oct., 2005).
Mahmoud: “History tells us that repressive and cruel governments do not survive.”
George: “We seek the end of tyranny in our world.” (2006 State of the Union)
Amen.
Amen.
It’s a good thing for the world that Mahmoud and George agree on so much.
Marcia Pally Flatiron Letter
May 4, 2006
I recently spent several days running around the PEN World Voices Festival of International Literature in NY, trying to learn a great deal from renowned authors and get as much wine and song as possible. The score on the latter is, the German parties are better than the Hungarian for wine but not song. What I have learned from the renowned authors — Hans Magnus Enzensberger, Salman Rushdie, Felicitas Hoppe, Huang Xiang, David Grossman, Amartya Sen, Neclas Kelek among hundreds of others — is this.
First, panel discussions about revolution can be witty, moving, grim or juridical, but not practical. After hundreds of discussions, I have no idea how to start one. Second, no matter how angry people are before a revolution starts, only after a revolution is successful have hopes been aroused and therefore only after it is successful are people really angry. (This, from Adam Michnik.) Third, I learned that Yassir Arafat’s body guards were both erotic and alert. Well, that is a surprise. But also that Israeli body guards are erotic and alert. This, from different speakers, as you might imagine. Fourth, I’ve learned that if you are desperate for a smoke in NY, the one place you can light up indoors is in the home of the German consulate. (This from Enzensberger.) Fifth, I learned that Mexican evangelicals are preparing to sneak into the US, illegally if necessary, to finally convert America to Protestantism.
But I haven’t told you the name of the Festival. It is “Faith and Reason.” And this is why the Mexican missionaries were a topic of discussion. Richard Rodriguez, on a panel organized by the German Internet site “Sign and Sight,” complained that there was much talk about reason at the Festival but that, among this international set of loquacious rationalists, no one had much to say about faith.
But he was misinformed. Jeanette Winterson told us two important things about life which she learned from her very religious Pentecostal mother. One is that “The trouble with books is that you don’t know what’s in them until it’s too late.” The second is that, when Jeanette fell in love with another girl, mum said, “Why do you want to be happy when you can be normal.” Do not underestimate what you can learn from faith.
A student of mine, inspired by Mrs. Winterson’s words, had this to say about the religion of his boyhood. The tradition in most Catholic families, he recalled, was to send the smartest boy to the priests to be educated and have a career in the Church. This was a path to upward mobility in the days before one could make a bundle selling Viagra and summer lawn furniture on the Internet. This of course meant, my student pointed out, that the smartest boys were the ones forbidden to have children. And so, he concluded, the Catholic church has been systematically depleting itself of its intelligent genes. It’s been getting dumber for centuries.
But my student was misinformed. Evidence of perfectly good Catholic intelligence can be found in the new condom policy under consideration by Rome. (Full disclosure: to my knowledge, this was not a topic at any PEN panels.) The new idea from Rome is that, if you have AIDS, you can use a condom to prevent spread of the disease. However, if you don’t have AIDS, you can’t use a condom. If I follow this correctly, it means that one can use a condom to protect others from AIDS but not to protect yourself. As this will raise the likelihood of your getting AIDS, this mean that you can’t use condoms until you are dying, when you may use them. In short, you can’t use condoms until . . . you can, grimly.
It seems to me that Rome’s new policy provides a motive for lying, which is a sin. In a world where only those who have AIDS use condoms, few would use them. For that would immediately brand a person as having AIDS, and few would have sex with him or her. This would result in their having no occasion to use condoms at all. But it also might mean that such a person might lie a bit to have sex. In fact, a person with AIDS may reason that s/he might as well not use a condom because this will likely infect one’s partner who then could use condoms, which is now medically and doctrinally the right thing to do.
This new condom policy is a bit Jesuitical. I hope I haven’t lost anybody in the explanation.
Now I’m afraid I must apologize. I have been misinformed. At one of the PEN events, I was given another bit of evidence of Catholic intelligence and even the wisdom of its condom policy. I learned that priests had bastards, which they got by not using condoms. Genes carrying Catholic intelligence have been preserved and passed on through the ages. So here we have it: not using condoms has worked for the church. Why not for you?
Marcia Pally Flatiron Letter
April 20, 2006
It was the recent protests in France that showed me how to solve the mess in Iraq and unemployment in the US, all before summer. You may have noticed that the reigning Republicans haven’t solved these matters yet. If you didn’t notice, six recently retired generals have rocked the press to let you know — at least about the mess in Iraq, if not about the mess in employment. Declaring what has been obvious for years, the retired generals — including the commander of key forces in Iraq, the director of operations on the staff of the Joint Chiefs of Staff from 2000 to 2002, and the chief of the U.S. Central Command in Iraq and the Middle East in the late 1990s — announced on April 14 that Iraq is a political and military debacle, and they have called for Donald Rumsfeld’s resignation. So now you know.
Interestingly, the generals and their supporters think that a new Bush appointee for Rumsfeld’s job will solve the problem — which is something like having a venereal disease and continuing to go to the doctor who doesn’t fix it. But if the Democrats could solve these matters, they’d be in much better standing with the public. They might even win an election or two.
So here is my proposal for the Dems. Unemployment first. Unemployment and low wages are linked to immigration, at least for America’s poor. According to the National Bureau of Economic Research, immigration over the last 25 years lowered the wages of American high school dropouts by 8.2 percent. The Center for Immigration Studies found that from 2000 to 2005, immigration by workers with high school degrees or less rose by 1.5 million and employment of citizens with the same education fell by 3.2 million. It appears that the low-skilled immigrants take jobs from low-skilled citizens. Nearly half of American children are supported by those with high school degrees or less.
It might seem to you that the solution lies in better educating America’s poor. But Republicans in the House came up with a superior idea: criminalize illegal immigrants and build a 700-mile military fence between the US and Mexico. (Note: not between the US and Canada. Apparently, people who have jobs don’t want to come to America.) A milder proposal in the Senate would have established a path to citizenship for long-time immigrants and created a guest-worker program, which is also supported by Bush. Apparently, Bush and the Senate saw how well guest-worker programs have solved Europe’s immigration issues, and decided to do the same. But the Senate proposal got lost in in-fighting.
So the nation was left with the House bill — which two million people in 140 cities came out to protest on April 10th, in one of the largest social actions in US history. Seeing this opportunity to win the hearts of the nation, the Dems quickly did nothing.
France--always a beacon to the world, in its errors if not in its wisdom — showed me what the Dems should do. France, like the US, lacks jobs for its low-skilled youth. Yet millions of people over the last few months got very busily employed protesting Chirac’s proposal to lower unemployment. Obviously, people don’t want the jobs Chirac’s idea might have yielded. They want to protest. It’s what they do best. So rather than take taxpayer money for job-development programs, France should pay people to protest on a regular basis. These would be full-time jobs with benefits — after all, it takes time to find a complaint, organize protests, and line up the rock concerts and the hashish. They would raise employment not only for protestors but for police and the army, who will be needed to control the professionally angry on France’s streets. Best of all, protesting is the sort of work you cannot outsource to China and India.
America should do the same. But not with employment/immigration protests. Folks kept those going only for a day or two. Obviously, it’s not the occupation of choice as in France. What America needs are professional Bush bashers. Why should only retired generals tell you that Iraq is a mess when millions of unskilled Americans could do the same? Rather than take taxpayer money to educate these low-skilled workers, the government should pay them to critique Bush’s policies on a regular basis. As above, these would be full-time jobs with benefits. They would raise employment not only for the bashers but for Bush spokespeople, who will be needed to answer the professionally oppositional on America’s streets. Best of all, while Bush-bashing can be outsourced to the Chinese and Indians (who could email in their complaints), China won’t do too much because it needs our markets and India won’t do it because we just gave them new nukes.
I think we should try out my plan with the following event of major political importance. Several families headed by gay and lesbians parents announced that they would attend the annual Easter Egg roll on the White House lawn. Bush has been highly vocal in his opposition to gays. Laura Bush, however, said “all families are welcome to attend.” So, we need people to bash Bush and another cadre to bash Laura, and people to respond to both. Why should only Scott McClellan and Peter Watkins, his-and-her spokesmen, get paid for the same yatter that millions of unemployed Americans can produce? Spread the wealth around.
Marcia Pally Flatiron Letter
April 7, 2006
I got an email today from Amazon.com telling me I could save 58% on subscriptions to Christian magazines. I’m accustomed to email-retail. I get startling notices of not-to-miss clothing sales from Bluefly ever since I once bought a pair of gloves there. I get endless offers of cheap Viagra, which I have never bought. I must get those for reasons that the FBI and US biometrics department know but I don’t. And now, there are offers of God. For Jesus: click here to SHOP NOW.
The sale offered 41 magazines in all. “From Biblical Archaeology Review to Christianity Today, Amazon.com has dozens of Christian periodicals to choose from. Check out our handpicked list of titles.” And so I did. Below is a thoroughly scientific study of My Clicking.
Biblical Archaeology Review, which I can get at a double discount of $28.94 if I also buy Bible Review, is non-denominational. So far, not much Christianity here. First Things “covers religious and cultural issues that encompass politics, economics, ethics, education, science, and literature and the arts,” so we’re weak on Christianity again. Ditto for The Bible Translator, which focuses on linguistic and translation issues, and ditto again for Biblica, “devoted to the scientific study of sacred scriptures.”
But I suspect that Bible Review (the one bundled with the Biblical Archeology Review) may not be so ecumenical. I am offered Bible Review doubly discounted at $34 if I also buy Christian History — definitely not non-denominational. So I’m worried about the shopper who innocently wants the non-denominational Biblical Archaeology Review but keeps getting “double-discount also-buy” offers and ends up with exhortations to LOVE JESUS and Pray! The magazine that “will ignite your prayer life.” Am I worrying too much? Perhaps I’m paranoid.
But should I be, I can subscribe to Angels on Earth, where “Each bimonthly issue is filled with the amazing stories of angels appearing to people and acting in their lives.” It also “Provides information on United States Army logistics plans, policies, doctrine, procedures, operations, and developments to the Active Army, Army National Guard, and United States Army Reserve.” (No kidding. That’s what the Bible according to Amazon says).
I think I prefer the paranoia in SpiritLed Woman, which asks “Is Allah the same as God?” (What happens to our foreign policy if he is?) SpiritLed Woman, comes bundled with Disciple Journal, which focuses on “your relationship with Jesus Christ.” But SpiritLed Woman, with a gal in a slinky black dress on the cover, seems to be focusing on relationships of a different sort, in “What’s Lust got to do with it?” Today’s Christian Woman, equally well-coutured, tells you about how to “Play Cupid: 5 savvy ways of setting up your single friends” and about “Fresh hope for a loveless marriage.” I was hoping for “5 savvy ways of setting up your friends stuck in loveless marriages” but Christian Single solved my problem in “How to Master 5 Dating Dilemmas.” It also ran the article, “Should We Be Hyping Jesus as Our Home Boy?” Indeed, a pressing question.
For the Christian woman who wants to make sure her kids also get in on the sex scene, there’s Campus Life, whose summer issue featured “Top Hiking Trails, Best Beach Camps… and Most Romantic Locations.” “Hollywood’s Heaven and Hell” sounds informative too, doesn’t it. My favorite advice for teens, however, is “The Superhero’s Guide to Living with God.”
I must admit, I kept being pulled back to SpiritLed Woman, which tells you “all the juicy details of avoiding office gossip” and about the “Spa Girls—they’ll tell you how to pamper yourself for pennies!” I don’t know a woman who would turn that down—or a man who would turn down New Man, featuring Bono on the cover, with earring, sunglasses and Euro-trash beard. (Men of Integrity: Your daily Guide to the Bible and Prayer somewhat confusingly had football on the cover; another issue had baseball). New Man features articles on “Joe Christiano’s 56 Keys to Total Health,” “Eight myths of male authority” and “The Read Deal on Men and Depression.” If Jesus says men are depressed and male authority is a myth (8 of them), who am I not to believe?
Getting down to business, New Man ran a cover story on “How to Succeed in ANY Economy,” which got me interested in Christian Retailing (at $75 per subscription). Apparently The Wall St. Journal of Christian America, it includes articles titled, “Steady Sellers Promote Healthy Bottom Line,” “Global Group Ready for Business” and “Zondervan Named Top Supplier Again.” (Way to go, Zondervan!) The magazine aims at keeping retailers “informed of the latest Christian publications, music, videos, multimedia, apparel and gifts on the marketplace, and help then to make educated decisions regarding the needs of the their customers.”
I didn’t know the market for Christian music, videos, multimedia and clothing was so complex as to require its own journal. But I’ve just received another email from Amazon.com telling me that since I have CLICKED on Christian magazines, I can now save 34% this week on Christian CDs, T-shirts and coffee mugs, if I click here to SHOP NOW.
Marcia Pally Flatiron Letter
March 13, 2006
Who is right and who is wrong in the Dubai Ports World (DPW) controversy? America has been up in arms over whether the nation’s ports should be protected by a firm that is a owned by the United Arab Emirates (UAE). It that a reasonable concern about US security or is it mere anti-Arab racism? Is it: why outsource national security outside the nation? Or is it: we let a British firm guard our ports for years and we never worried about terrorist infiltration — even though the “shoe-bomber” was a Brit. Why are we screaming about DPW running our security now?
And screaming there has been. (D-NY) for one screamed she would block the sale of port security to any foreign entity. (Never mind that most port security is foreign-run--more than 80 % of the terminals in Los Angeles, to take one instance). The Democratic mayor of Baltimore, Martin O'Malley, declared that never while there was a breath in his body would "the home of the star-spangled banner be turned over to the United Arab Emirates."
Not to be rhetorically outdone, California Republican Duncan Hunter, chairman of the House Armed Services Committee, said he wanted foreign divestment not only in American ports, but also in electricity plants and other infrastructure critical to U.S. security. "Everything in this country can't be for sale," said the Alabama Republican and Chairman of the Senate Banking Committee Richard Shelby.
Elections are, I thought. Why not ports?
As of last week, the Congressional consensus was that, since two of the 9/11 hijackers were from the UAE and since Dubai is to Al-Qaeda what Switzerland was to the Nazis, the deal was off — in a spectacular 62-2 vote in a House of Representatives committee.
That makes the DPW flap the biggest political loss of Bush’s tenure — bigger than the crumbling situation in Iraq, than the debacle in New Orleans, than the use of torture in US prisons, and the erosions of civil liberties in the USA Patriot Act (just re-newed) and in the National Security Agency spying on citizens without the required court order.
The Ay-rabs must have pushed a button.
On the other side of the controversy is the argument that the Democrats are simply being politically opportunistic and the rest of the nation, racist. The usually anti-Bush National Public Radio reported that a dozen top US security experts found no problem with DPW. The equally anti-Bush NY Times columnist Nicholas Kristof called Dubai pro-American and pro-business. “If we want to encourage Arab modernization, we should be approving this deal — not . . . rejecting and scorning a modernizing ally like the United Arab Emirates . . . that would be a gift to Qaeda propagandists.” In The International Herald Tribune Saleem Ali went so far as to say that, the White House, by supporting the DPW deal, had “taken a principled stance” regarding Arabs, after all its years of Arab-bashing.
Two things are missing from this discussion. First, Americans can’t be blamed for being racist when it’s so hard so hard to tell who is “with us” and who “against.” Think of what we ordinary Americans have had to deal with: Pakistan used to be against and is now with; Saudi Arabia used to be “with” but is now “half against”; the Palestinian Al-Fatah used to be “against” but is now “with,” at least in comparison to Hamas; Libya used to be a “big against” but is not so bad these days; Jordan used to be “against” but is now “with” and Lebanon may soon be “with” too, maybe. Russia used to be a “very big against,” then it was “with,” and now it is “sort of against,” except when it helps us with Iran, who is “against,” though it used to be “with” in the ‘70s when Russia was “against.”
Germany, who was the “biggest against,” was then a “very big with” until America went to war with Iraq, which used to be “with” when Russia and Iran both were “against.”
Is it any wonder that we’re racist about everybody?
The second thing missing from the discussion is Bush’s real motive. Some have said it’s to boost trade with the Mideast, which has money to buy US products since we’re giving it all our money in oil prices, and since its population is so poorly educated it can’t possible steal US jobs as China or India do. But that’s not it. The real motive is to find a final solution to America’s cities. Who lives in cities? Democrats. How do they vote? Democrat. Why is this bad for Republicans? Too many people in cities. What happens when you try to cheat with the voting machines? Too much bad publicity. But what happens when, instead, you don’t protect a city from an outside disaster? A lot of Democrats die. And then they don’t vote any more.
You think this is an exaggerated and paranoid idea? Look how well it worked in New Orleans.
Marcia Pally Flatiron Letter
Feb. 21, 2006
The Danish cartoon flap reached the US with a flurry of articles—four in one issue of the New York Times, for instance-- which mirror the debate in Europe: sympathy for a discriminated minority is pitted against freedom of expression. As the lines of battle are drawn, if one supports Muslims in Europe, one must also hold that the Danish newspaper Jyllands-Posten should have withheld the offending cartoons. The press regularly self-censors, the argument goes, for reasons of social and political responsibility. It was therefore anti-Muslim prejudice that led Jyllands-Posten not to censor the satirical depictions of Mohammed.
Two things are missing from this picture: one is that the polarization between free speech and support of a minority is a false one. Second is the attention that needs to be paid to the lack of “pull” factors that might move Muslims in Europe to becoming Muslim Europeans.
First, the polarization between free speech and support of minorities is unhelpful because historically, freedom of speech has been the basis for minority protest against the status quo and advocacy of their ideas--not only racial and religious minorities but also those whose ideas are considered sinful or dangerous, in the way many Europeans think the preaching in radical mosques is. When anarchists, socialists, atheists, women etc. held rallies and published their unacceptable views, they were relying on free speech, and when governments stopped them, they stopped both freedom of speech and minority rights.
It is no surprise that Bush, no friend to dissenting voices, expressed his sympathy for the protestors. Picture that: Bush, crusader against Islamism, defending Denmark’s radical Imams.
Had Muslims in Denmark taken up the free-speech model, they could have used their rights to publish satires of Christians or racist Danes. It appears that Jyllands-Posten had earlier rejected material for fear of its being offensive to Christians. Why not expose that double standard? It would have made the paper’s editors look like racist hypocrites and garnered the sympathy of the world--without stomping on freedom of speech and without giving the right wing the “legitimate” rallying cry of protecting civil rights. Denmark’s Muslims could have further used the press to create a furor over discrimination and prejudice — the kind of furor that Gandhi and Martin Luther King Jr. used to push political and social change. They would have had Europe’s sympathy without fueling the view that Muslims are Other, undemocratic and lacking in respect for human rights. The Danish Imams’ trip to the Mideast to press for boycotts of Danish goods was high irony, as countries like Egypt, Syria, and Saudi Arabia, which lack protections for minority rights, stepped in to defend the rights of Denmark’s minority.
The idea that the best guarantor of my rights is a guarantee of yours is a principle from the European Enlightenment formulated against oppression and special privilege. It could be deeply attractive to Europe’s radical Muslims, yet seems not to be. Why not? Another way of asking this question is, why do radical Muslims in Europe not see the value of being Muslim Europeans — as devout as any Catholic or Orthodox Jew but also enthusiasts for European civil rights?
Many grave impediments to Muslims in Europe becoming Muslim Europeans are Europe’s doing. Having not been immigrant countries until the last few decades, much of Europe is not very porous to newcomers. I don’t mean only high barriers to citizenship and other forms of discrimination (Denmark’s immigration laws are among the most restrictive in Europe; Muslims have difficulty building mosques and cemeteries). I mean also a lack of social porousness that lets newcomers into the schools and networks which bring good careers and positions in politics.
But there is another piece to immigration, the cultural “pull factor.” In the American example, immigrants who come here — or their children — want for reasons having little to do with law or economics to be hyphenated Americans: Irish-American, Mexican-American, Muslim-American, Iranian-American. This sounds self-congratulatory, but let’s say it another way: America can afford to admit its immigrants, permit their religions and Websites, and applaud its multiculturalism because almost all who come here think America is cool — from the sneakers to the movie stars and slang. The relative porousness of our economy and politics abets immigrant participation but importantly, immigrants do not become a fifth column because they want to be cool too.
This is not something the US or any government can do. Likely enough, it is American self-confidence that does it. We think we’re cool. Look at American culture — its music, dance, wacko talk radio, parade of menus and churches, and its naively bullish patriotism. It is a culture in love with itself.
What is Europe in love with in itself? Personally, I think the Enlightenment is breathtaking, and it is yours. But I suspect that until Europe falls more in love with itself, radical Muslims won’t either.
Fortunately, you have an ally in love. Naser Khader, a Syrian-born representative in the Danish parliament, along with other Muslims, is forming a network of secular, “cultural Muslims” whose dislike for both Islamists and for European racism is a model of tolerance that may come from their interpretation of Islam but perhaps also from their appreciation for Europe’s Rights of Man.
Marcia Pally Flatiron Letter
Feb. 7, 2006
But I don’t see what the fuss is. Anyone who reads the questionnaire can see that it mirrors the principles of our Christian government, which is the model and standard for beneficent government everywhere. One question on the B-W form asks, "What is your opinion [of the practice] that parents force their children to marry?" Why is this question objectionable to Germany? Patriotic Christian Americans don’t let their children marry any old heartthrob they happen to fall upon (and certainly not fall upon physically). Why do you think there is such a boom in evangelical colleges that guide youth to meeting the right sort of people? Of course you should ask Muslim parents if they intend to monitor the mating habits of their children. You don’t want them mixing in with German blood, do you—not any more than American evangelicals want their kids mixing in with Jews, for instance, or secularists.
Another question on the form asks, "Your daughter of full age . . . would like to dress like other German girls and women as well, but your husband is opposed to this. What would you do?" This is confusing question: do German parents want their girls looking like whores in the fleshpots of Babylon? Good Christians over here certainly don’t—and we don’t let those sorts porno of movies in our houses, either. And another confusing question: "Imagine that your son of full age approaches you and explains that he is homosexual and would like to live together with another man. What's your reaction?" My reaction is this: Leviticus 18:22, "Thou shalt not lie with mankind, as with womankind: it is an abomination." Of course you should ask this of applicants for citizenship; you don’t want sons who are abominators, do you? That’s why our president opposed gay marriage: so gays won’t have children who commit abominations.
As for the question, "What is your position on the statement that a wife has to obey her husband and that he is allowed to beat her if she doesn't obey him?" The beating part may be bad for PR, but it is Christian doctrine that the man is the head of the household. Of course the women of B-W should obey their menfolk. The all-male evangelical group, the Promise Keepers, puts it this way: “Sit down with your wife and say something like this: “Honey, I’ve made a terrible mistake. I’ve given you my role. . . Now I must reclaim that role.’ I’m not suggesting you ask for your role back, I’m urging you to take it back. . . There can be no compromise here.” [from the pamphlet, Seven Promises of a Promise Keeper; emphasis original].
A key part of the Baden-Württemberg questionnaire asks applicants to comment on this: "Humanity has never experienced such a dark phase as under democracy. In order to free himself from democracy, man has to understand first that democracy cannot offer anything good to him." The bureaucrats of B-W are brilliant: that’s exactly what Samuel Alito said in his confirmation hearings for the US Supreme Court: the American presidency is “imperial.” Forget checks and balances; forget an independent judiciary and other democratic drivel. Of course you should ask the future citizens of Germany if they will follow the US example.
And Alito isn’t the only one who has freed himself from democracy. Our president has worked tirelessly against it. He has, in Guantanamo Bay, fought against Habeas Corpus. His military has tortured prisoners against US regulations and flown others to secret interrogations centers in the Mideast, Poland and Romania. He has spied on his own citizens, violating the 1978 Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act. In doing do, he has put himself above the law—a first step towards freedom from democracy.
And more: Bush has operated with greater secrecy than any other modern president. In fiscal year 2004, the federal government classified a record 15.6 million new documents. Bush not only lied about Iraq’s possession of WMDs but withheld from Congress his Daily Briefs and other reports that repudiated the WMD claims and the claims about Saddam working with Al-Qaeda. At the end of 2005, Bush still refused to release the 2002-2003 Daily Briefs, and moreover, he made secret a 2001 National Security Agency report about government secrecy during the Vietnam War.
Bush and Cheney kept from Congress the membership and papers of Cheney’s Energy Commission, which decided the nation’s energy policy. During John Roberts’s Supreme Court confirmation hearings last fall, Bush kept from Congress Roberts’s legal writings as Deputy Solicitor General. He is now keeping from Congress records of White House discussion during the Katrina debacle. He disdains a free press and says that those who criticize his policies are “aiding the enemy.”
As well he should, to free himself of democracy.
B-W is an ally of the US. We are grateful its leaders are making sure its citizens agree with our policies and follow our Christian example. We hope all of Germany does one day. Amen. God Bless the Fatherland.
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© marcia pally, new york 2005