"We believe deeply that the denial of 'life's dark side in ourselves' is the key to what's wrong with the utopianist left world view," we captioned Max Ernst's "L'Ange du foyer" painting above last year. (1937. Oil on canvas. 114 x 146 cm. Private collection)
"To denounce as hate speech that which reveals the presence of hate speech is like arresting the fireman and letting the pyromaniac escape," writes our Herculean blogfriend Richard of Augean Stables re the latest mind-numbing case of politically correct suppression of free speech on campus, the last-minute cancelation of Penn State senior Josh Stulman's this-is-who-I-am art exhibition -- "Portraits of Terror" -- for "violation of Penn State's policies on nondiscrimination, harassment and hate":
Charles Garoian, professor and director of the School of Visual Arts, said Stulman's controversial images did not mesh with the university's educational mission.
"Mesh with the university's educational mission"? Good golly. Last time we checked -- as we wrote recently in our "Reduced by its ignorance into regurgitating regurgitations" critique of the self-appointed "effete corps of impudent snobs" who tend the flickering flame of the Whitney Biennial's delusional "truth-to-power" fantasy:
Weren't artists supposed to be unique visionaries? Can you say groupthink?
"This is also, as one of my students suggested to me last week, a form of left-wing fascism, a manipulation of the public that arrogates to itself the right to make up our own minds for us on what we should be exposed to and what we should feel," continues Richard in his post about that Penn State student's Inquisition Moment:
And it certainly reflects the kinds of problems that plague the MSM right now in their decisions on what we should see, and how to frame it.
As now-retired mega "anchor" Tom Brokaw used to say, "All the news you need to know." Uh, huh. You tell us what to think, we absorb. That segues seamlessly into the MSM's current attempts in the last news cycle to spin the blatantly illegal and politically motivated leak of CIA anti-Bush bigshot Mary O. McCarthy's inside info on alleged secret CIA prisons in Eastern Europe into a "sharing" of information by a noble whistleblower with a "truth-seeking" Fourth Estate. Protein Wisdom issues our marching orders:
If we are to get to the point where many members of the mainstream press see the writing on the wall and begin turning on some of their own -- a point that steady pressure from the blogosphere, the right-leaning press, talk radio, and Goss (along with the White House and Justice Department) will make inevitable -- we need to remain persistent and measured in our analysis and criticisms.
And the MSM has become all-powerful. I remember reading in a sociology class one time that if you keep saying a lie over and over and over and over again . . .eventually people believe it. It's a propaganda strategy. That's exactly what has happened with the MSM and the left.
Posted by: Carol | April 23, 2006 at 10:52 PM
I'm finding it extremely entertaining to see the lefties become the censors. It's amusing to see those who want every Christian symbol dishonored, all sex to be open market for all to see (especially children), anything that is a backlash against "the establishment" tarnished... and if you object, you're just a poor idiot, too simple to understand such elevated things.
But let a piece of art come along that they object to... and suddenly it's the artist who is wrong and if there were only justice in the world - he'd be in jail for a hate crime. Oh it is just too rich. What incredible hypocrits.
Posted by: Teresa | April 23, 2006 at 11:06 PM
Ditto Carol's comment. I was going to say the exact same thing.
Posted by: Janette | April 24, 2006 at 03:19 PM
The arrogance and hubris of many is really pitiful even as it is understandable. Obviously someone who has spent the major part of their time in a narrow field knows more about that subject than most people who haven't. To transpose this limited superior knowledge into supposing one's knowledge is vast and superior in unrelated fields is moronic. That is what many of the "we know what is best for you" class are. Moronic.
Posted by: goomp | April 24, 2006 at 03:52 PM