Hernandez (middle) performing Future Folk with her
Sulong Theatre Collective, which is a play based on:
"The experiences of Filipino women who come to Canada to work as nannies.
They send their wages back home, and hope after 24 months of employment
to become citizens and bring their own families to Canada."[Source]
In a Catholic high school in Scarborough, Ontario, amidst low-income housing, difficult race relations, and poverty, a young woman struggles to find her sexual identity. In this sincere portrayal of high-school kids pitting the voice of God and thousands of years of scripture against the voice of their own bodies, Kilt Pins cheekily asks “Is your kilt pin up or down?”
Scarborough is a low-income, culturally diverse neighbourhood east of Toronto, the fourth largest city in North America; like many inner-city communities, it suffers under the weight of poverty, drugs, crime, and urban blight. Scarborough the novel employs a multitude of voices to tell the story of a tight-knit neighbourhood under fire: among them, Victor, a black artist harassed by the police; Winsum, a West Indian restaurant owner struggling to keep it together; and Hina, a Muslim school worker who witnesses first-hand the impact of poverty on education.
And then there are the three kids who work to rise above a system that consistently fails them: Bing, a gay Filipino boy who lives under the shadow of his father’s mental illness; Sylvie, Bing’s best friend, a Native girl whose family struggles to find a permanent home to live in; and Laura, whose history of neglect by her mother is destined to repeat itself with her father.
Arsenal Pulp Press is a book publisher in Vancouver, Canada with over 300 titles currently in print, which include literary fiction and nonfiction; cultural and gender studies; LGBT and multicultural literature; cookbooks, including vegan; alternative crafts; graphic novels; visual arts; and books in translation. We are interested in literature that engages and challenges readers, and which asks probing questions about the world around us.
Of course these welfare artists insist that they get their financial sources from tax payers money courtesy of the Canadian Government (don't let the meek word "suggests" deceive you):
Catherine Hernandez suggests several strategies to redress...deep-seated inequities: hiring more diverse teaching staff; educating teaching staff in anti-oppressive values; implementing a “much more aggressive diverse application process to ensure the student body is multicultural”; and diversifying the curriculum beyond the canonical (white) narratives that dominate it [Source].
Here is one such publisher which has produced Hernandez's children's book, that petitioned successfully to get LGBQT children's books into the school curriculum through the Toronto District School Board:
"Flamingo Rampant is a micro-press with a mission – to produce feminist, racially-diverse, LGBTQ positive children’s books. This is an effort to bring visibility and positivity to the reading landscape of children everywhere. We make books kids love that love them right back, bedtime stories for beautiful dreams, and books that make kids of all kinds say with pride : that kid’s just like me!" tells us the publisher
Hernandez has had a lot of practice with her own daughter who is now around thirteen years old. Hernandez appears to have been married to a male from whom she separated soon after her daughter's birth. She writes: "I parented Arden with little to no help from friends, family and my spouse at the time." She says that her children's book M is for Mustache: A Pride ABC Book was inspired by her daughter.
"Based on my many marches with my own child during what she called “Rainbow Time”, the book will follow in an ABC format, a small child as she gets ready to march alongside her mama at Pride.“
Just shy of Arden’s 12th birthday, she approaches my partner, Nazbah, in the kitchen. “I’m so glad you’re my stepparent,” she says. Nazbah considers spearing a fork into their own heart in order to stop the tears of joy.[Source]
Below is a brief book review I wrote on James Kalb's Against Inclusiveness: How the Diversity Regime is Flattening America and the West and What to Do About It.
He mentioned my contribution here on his website.
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Brief Book Review: Against Inclusiveness: How the Diversity Regime is Flattening America and the West and What to Do About It
July 30, 2013
I hate to copy full texts from any book, especially one newly published, but sometimes that is the best way to make a point.
I've got Jim Kalb's new book Against Inclusiveness: How the Diversity Regime is Flattening America and the West and What to Do About It. It arrived at the bookstore where I placed the order far quicker than I expected (about four days). I think that is faster than Amazon.com's delivery time, unless one pays extra for overnight shipment.
In any case, I went to the table of contents first, and found in Chapter 10:
Making it Real
Difficulty of the Struggle - Towards an Anti-Inclusivist Right - Fundamental Needs: Ideals (The True, The Beautiful, The Just and Good, Religion); A Favorable Setting - Making the Case - Limits
I went to the "The Beautiful" section on pages 170-171, and below is what I read:
For modernity, beauty is no less a problem than truth. Since it makes man the measure, the scientistic view assimilates beauty to personal preference. It puts beauty in the eye of the beholder, and so makes pushpin as good as poetry. Such a view is contrary to all intelligent experience. Beauty is evidently part of how things are. It forces itself on us as something of indubitable value that cannot be reduced to personal preference. That is what it means to recognize it as beauty. Our perception of it may depend on taste, but a personal element does not make a perception merely subjective any more than the dependence of knowledge on qualities such as intelligence, experience, and good sense makes truth merely subjective (5).
Beauty falsifies the dogma that denies reality to whatever is difficult to analyze and impossible to measure. It connects the material world to something beyond itself and gives us an immediate perception of something transcendent that is worthy of our love. It gives pleasure, so it attracts and pleases, but it is no less at odds with the technological outlook than fasting and prayer. It cannot be forced, and technique serves it, but does not create it. You have to wait on it and let it be what it is.
So anti-technocratic education must emphasize the beautiful. When those who appeal to tradition and the transcendent lack a sense of beauty, what they propose seems less an absorbing way of life that leads us to a grasp of the reality of things than one arbitrary ideology among others, a matter of rules, team spirit, and group dominance and not much else.
I think beauty is even more problematic than truth. There is truth, based on facts, objective, scientifically obtained facts, but how does one objectively establish beauty?
The problem may be less difficult for scholars and (honest) artist, but how does an ordinary person identify and accept beauty?
One's children are "beautiful" however ugly they may be in reality. One's religion is beautiful. Look at the beautiful mosques that Muslims build to express the beauty they see in their religion. One's language has beauty, however gutteral it may sound. An ugly outfit designed by a prestigious designer is considered beautiful by the high-society woman who wears it.
Yet, these same people will recognize truth, and reject lies, if they are truthful to themselves. An ordinary person can identify truth and lies, and will often discern lies even when sugar-coated with what seems like truth.
Beauty, in modernity, is far more problematic, and far easier to misidentify, than truth. It requires a different level of discernment. It may indeed really be the territory of experts who can identify it, and who relay that information to others. People can live without beauty for a longer period than truth, as long as they have some basics fulfilled like a family life, a comfortable income, shelter and food, and even find it acceptable to live without beauty.
But, ultimately, lack of beauty is far more insidious, because it drains people's objective reality slowly. One can fight against an obvious lie, but how does one fight for beauty? Walking by an ugly building, day after day, will numb the soul. Perhaps we can be saved by small acts for beauty, like Winston in Orwell's 1984, when he bought a paperweight simply because he found it beautiful amidst the soul-numbing ugliness around him.
Winston looked round the shabby little room above Mr. Charrington's shop. Beside the window the enormous bed was made up, with ragged blankets and a coverless bolster. The old-fashioned clock with the twelve-hour face was ticking away on the mantelpiece. In the corner, on the gateleg table, the glass paperweight which he had bought on his last visit gleamed softly outof the half-darkness...
[Julia] brought the glass paperweight over to the bed to have a look at it in a better light. He took it out of her hand, fascinated, as always, by the soft, rainwatery appearance of the glass.[1984, Part 2, Chapter 4]
And here is the seemingly innocuous paperweight being smashed to pieces by the thought police:
Something crashed on to the bed behind Winston's back. The head of a ladder had been thrust through the window and had burst in the frame. Someone was climbing through the window. There was a stampede of boots up the stairs. The room was full of solid men in black uniforms, with iron-shod boots on their feet and truncheons in their hands...
There was another crash. Someone had picked up the glass paperweight from the table and smashed it to pieces on the hearth-stone.
The fragment of coral, a tiny crinkle of pink like a sugar rosebud from a cake, rolled across the mat. How small, thought Winston, how small it always was!...
There was another, lighter step in the passage. Mr. Charrington came into the room. The demeanour of the black-uniformed men suddenly became more subdued. Something had also changed in Mr. Charrington's appearance. His eye fell on the fragments of the glass paperweight.
'Pick up those pieces,' he said sharply. [1984, Part 1, Chapter 10]
Charrington knows that beauty is revolutionary. It can ignite the rebellion of the weakened and submissive, like Winston. Once Winston realized the possibility of acquiring beauty, he started to gain some strength.
Kalb makes similar observations about the re-creation of language and meaning in liberal society in his new book:
To some extent, the new standards are based on the view that the old ones were bad, because they had to do with the non-commercial and non-bureaucratic arrangements of the old society. Reversing and violating those standards has therefore become a virtue. Central and marginal have changed places: Islam has become a religion of peace, homosexual couples stable and loving, blacks wise and spiritual, immigrants the true Americans. In contrast, Christianity is presented as a religion of war and aggression, Middle Americans as violent and irrational, Republicans as the Taliban, and traditional marriage as hateful, oppressive, divisive , and pathological. When women and minorities do well, they deserve the credit, when they do badly, white men deserve the blame. Any flaws in the groups promoted from the margin to the center are whitewashed, the more glaring the flaws the thicker the coating. [P. 8]
She did say “I am American, not Asian-American. My rejection of hyphenation has been called race treachery, but it is really a demand that America deliver the promises of its dream to all its citizens equally.” But her rejection of the hyphen was not a rejection of her roots at all. She loved going to Durga Puja celebrations.
Scroll.in is an independent news, information, and entertainment venture. We bring into sharp focus the most important political and cultural stories that are shaping contemporary India. Our goal is to add critical perspectives to these stories through rigorous reporting, objective analyses, and expert commentary.
I recently wrote this brief (unpublished) commentary on "Third World" writers in their "First World spaces:"
Oppositional Aesthetics: Readings from a Hyphenated Space
By: Arun Prabha Mukherjee
Although this collection of essays...demonstrate the topics that the majority of Third World writers and essayists broach. Mukherjee presents a harsh and racially negative view of the Euro-Canadian arts and literary world.
Here is an excerpt from Larry Auster's more extensive commentary from his article in Frontpage Magazine: How Multiculturalism Took Over America from July 2004.
Moderate Myth [Number Five]: The Pro-Western Multiculturalist
Another soothing fiction that has helped advance multiculturalism is a personality type rather than an idea. It is the friendly Third-World immigrant, who warmly professes his or her love for America, yet who, on closer examination, reveals a desire to do away with America as an historically distinct country. Such a moderate is the novelist Bharati Mukherjee, an immigrant to the U.S. by way of Canada, who had this to say in a public television interview with Bill Moyers in 1990:
What I like to think, Bill, is that you and I are both now without rules, because of the large influx of non-Europeans in the '70s and '80s, and more to come in the '90s. That it's not a melting pot situation anymore, and I don't like to use the phrase melting pot if I can help it, because of the 19th century associations with mimicry; that one was expected to scrub down one's cultural eccentricities and remake oneself in the Anglo-Saxon image. If I can replace melting pot with a phrase like fusion vat, or fusion chamber, in which you and I are both changed radically by the presence of new immigrants, I would be much happier. So that you are having to change your rules, I like to think, and I am certainly have to change my Old World rules.… [Emphasis added].
There are no comforts, no old mythologies to cling to. We have to invent new American mythologies. Letting go of the old notions of what America was shouldn't be seen as a loss.… I hope that as we all mongrelize, or as we all fuse, that we will build a better and more hopeful nation.(16)
Underneath Mukherjee's confiding and civilized tone, she was informing her American audience that they must "mongrelize" themselves in order to accommodate non-Europeans. In this new dispensation (unchallenged by her supremely passive and "open" interviewer, Bill Moyers, who piously hung on her every word), the preservation of America as a historic nation and people was not even an issue any more. To grasp how unnatural this situation was, imagine an immigrant in some relatively sane country—say Japan or Italy or the pre-1965 America—who, shortly after his arrival, announces to his new countrymen: "Oh, by the way, you people must—in order to make me comfortable—give up everything that has constituted your culture and identity. But don't worry! You shouldn't see this as a loss!" He would be thrown out on his ear. Yet by the 1990s America had become the sort of decadent place where a smooth-talking "moderate" could make a career saying exactly that.
Like most imperialists, Mukherjee seemed complacently oblivious to the culture and people she wished to dominate. At one point in the Moyers interview, she predicted an increase in ethnic violence, "because there's a kind of disinvestment in America.… [P]eople have not invested in the country. There's been a 'What part of the pie is for me?' kind of an attitude …" It didn't seem to occur to her that the disinvestment in America that she regretted may have had something to do with the devaluing of America's historic identity that she applauded. Indeed, if anyone was wondering, "what part of the pie is for me," it would seem to be Mukherjee herself and her fellow immigrants, whom she spoke of as "we, the new pioneers, who are thinking of America as still a frontier country."
I think that the original American pioneers had to have been in many ways, hustlers, and capable of a great deal of violence in order to wrest the country from the original inhabitants. And to make a new life, new country, for themselves. So that vigor of possessing the land, I like to think, my characters have.
16. 16. Bill Moyers interview with Bharati Mukherjee, PBS, 1990.
Full transcript of the interview is here
...has been married since 1963 to writer Bharati Mukherjee. They met as students at the Iowa Writers' Workshop at the University of Iowa and have two sons. In 1978, Blaise and Mukherjee moved to Toronto. However, Mukherjee felt excluded in Canada, attributing it to racism and publishing an essay in Saturday Night.In 1980, the couple decided to return to the United States, moving to San Francisco.
[Source: Wikipedia]
The perfect multicultural grandchild:
Mukherjee's son Bart Anand, of Indian and Canadian heritage, married Kim, who is half Irish and half German American and they have just adopted a baby girl from China. Says Mukherjee, "So it's a very poly-national American family that we represent. What I want to get across is that I hope this will be the way American society goes, that we are all going to be embracing so many different ethnic and racial groups within our families that this whole anxiety about ethnic origin - what does it mean to be a hyphenated American - I hope will disappear."
[Source: Little India Half And Half: Just how authentic an American are you?]
Arthur Rimbaud has his own house/museum in the city of Harar. Perhaps it is in the name of literary tradition that Canadian novelist Camilla Gibb has made a special ode to this walled, Southern Islamic city in Ethiopia in her new book Sweetness in the Belly.
It is always curious why writers pay such high praises to this city. Although Rimbaud initially said he was living in boredom, he stayed in Harar on-and-off for ten years.
Sir Richard Burton preferred to investigate Harar in his First Footsteps in East Africa rather than travel to the northern Christian Highlands of the Amhara people. And even Evelyn Waugh couldn’t see the ancient strength of this Christian civilization, and in his journalistic travelogues Waugh in Abyssinia and Remote People at times appeared much more complimentary toward the Southern Harare/Somali Muslims. His novel Scoop, based on his journalistic experience of the fascist invasion of Ethiopia, is centered around the fictional "East Africa" country of…Ishmaelia. This is all the more surprising in light of Waugh’s recent conversion to Catholicism. But it could just be that he was temporarily side-tracked by the Catholic (yet fascist) Italians. And such a basic Christianity may have been too much to handle.
I suspect that it is mostly atheist/pantheist/agnostic writers who are lured into the facile spirituality (sensuality) of places like Harar. As always with exotic works, the subject rings of the writer/traveler himself, in his spiritual (or similar) quest to find some meaning in his life. Usually, the farther away from home, the better.
The disciplined, ancient and exclusive Christianity of the highlander Amhara is too difficult and too demanding, and too close to home. I think this Biblical fear drives these writers away. It is easier to wallow in the accessible sensuality of a Southern Muslim city, in search of a generalized spirituality.
The Islam of Harar may be beguiling, and easier to enter. But it is far less forgiving and far less compassionate than the Christianity of the austere Highlanders.
In Chapter 1 : Sitcoms, Cultural Translation and the Paradox of Saleable Diversity
---------------------------------------------
2. Women and Comedy: History, Theory, Practice
Ed. Peter Dickinson et al.
Fairleigh Dickinson University Press, Mar 27, 2014
I am referenced in Chapter 16 in an essay by Regina Barreca: Layla Siddiqui as Holy Fool in Little Mosque on the Prairie:
Baber and his continual critique of Canadian morality no doubt inspired the claim of columnist Kidist Paulos Asrat that the show's intention is to convert North Americans to Islam.
This is once again based on my article How Canada's Little Mosque on the Prairie is Aiming for our Souls, but it is an incorrect interpretation of what I wrote. This is the usual hyperbole of multiculturalists who wish to find a demon in any critic of multiculturalism.
What I wished to communicate was that the show's intent was to make North Americans sympathetic towards Islam, and not to convert them. Little Mosque on the Prairie was still an exotic sitcom then. The show came out in January 2007 as Canadians were learning about it, and was cancelled in April 2012 as the novelty wore off, and not because of "Islamophobia."
Barreca is a feminist academician (no oxymoron there) who also wants to be funny. She quips:
“I used to assume my students were feminists,” she says. “It seemed like everyone got my jokes and laughed. Now I have to explain myself.”
For more on Baber (and his daughter Layla) see their character descriptions on Wikipedia
Layla Siddiqui (Aliza Vellani) is... a portrait of an average teenage Muslim girl struggling to find the right balance between her desire to be a good Muslim and her desire for the lifestyle of a regular Canadian teenager who's into music, clothes and boys. She can be rebellious and sarcastic, especially at her father's foibles (she refers to their home as "Baberistan"), but is also very perceptive and insightful. [
The book is a compilation of lectures at symposium at Simon Fraser University in British Columbia in 2011. The essays collected in Women and Comedy: History, Theory, and Practice, originally presented and discussed at a 2011 symposium held at Simon Fraser University.
---------------------------------------------
3. Baz Luhrmann
By: Pam Cook
British Film Institute; 2010 edition (July 6 2010)
I am cited in the end notes (104) of Baz Luhrmann, which I presume is in reference to my article: Australia: Whose Land is it Anyway, by Austral filmmaker Baz Luhrmann, in American Thinker. I write about the difficult integration of aboriginal mysticism with British pragmatic colonialism. I come in favor of Nicole Kidman's austere but brave femininity, and her kindly adoption of an aboriginal orphan, rescuing him from being interned in a mission school.
I have been thinking, writing and teaching about moving image culture since the 1970s, and these pages are a record of my work up to the present. Since 2006 I’ve been Professor Emerita in Film at the University of Southampton [UK].
Above, I am at around age 13 when we stayed at a small B&B in Eastry, a village in Kent, England. I was a pupil at the nearby Betteshanger School with the lofty title of "Head Girl." Eastry was the closest place near our school where we could find a few places to visit. By our last year, "seniors" were allowed to go out to the village. Our favorite was the village shop were we could buy "gobstoppers," huge hard candy balls which we would buy in threes or fours, with the kind store lady dipping into her large jar to fish them out . I'm not sure why we liked them except that they lasted a long time. Some of the younger staff at the school would also take senior prefects and head girls and boys to the local pubs. I'm not sure if we were allowed to drink beer (I never did), but I'm sure I could have a shandy (lemonade and beer, with a higher lemonade concentration for us "children").
I'm not sure what I was reading in that idyllic garden covered with daisies, but I always had a book with me. I was a loyal fan of those historical romances, but of the more sophisticated kind (I've never read a complete Harlequin romance). The book could be an Anya Seton romance (Katherine was my favourite). Seton wrote about individual women who seemed to make a presence in their surroundings.
I remember a school friend and I having a discussion about these books. "You should just enjoy them," she said. "There is time to read other books." I'm not sure I fully agreed with her. In any case, this blimp didn't last very long. I was an eclectic reader, from Dickens to Laura Ingalls.
I just looked up Anya Seton. For such a proponent of "romance" Seton married twice and divorced twice.
This is the book cover that I remember. It is a first edition and revised cover from 1954.
I cannot find the B&B online and it is probably closed by now, but this home resembles it and it is close enough to the school that it might be the one. In any case, it is a close resemblance.
Laura Wood of The Thinking Housewifequotes from Anthony Esolen’s Ten Ways to Destroy the Imagination of Your Child [ISI Books, 2010].
Here is one part that stood out in my regard:
Sometimes they climbed trees.
I never really climbed trees, but I did find one tree with a seat in its trunk that was low enough for me to climb into. I would sit there even in the cold of those English winters, put on my mittens and scarf, and read my books, which carried me to distant woods and forests, oceans and continents. I climbed metaphorical trees perched in my secure trunk.
Jane Austen's desk in her Cottage in Chawton, Hampshire
where she lived for eight years,
and worked on 'Emma', 'Persuasion' & 'Mansfield Park'
c. 1809
Chawton Cottage was a household of ladies - Mrs Austen, her daughters and their friend Martha Lloyd - all taking part in the work of the house and garden. But Jane was allowed private time. Having no room of her own, she established herself near the little-used front door, and here "she wrote upon small sheets of paper which could easily be put away, or covered with a piece of blotting paper". A creaking swing door gave her warning when anyone was coming, and she refused to have the creak remedied.[Source]
I am happy to say that I have a few of Jane Austen's book:
Pride and Prejudice Sense and Sensibility
and Emma
Below are my recent purchases (within the past three or four months).
I haven't read all of them (actually the majority). Perhaps I am waiting to win the lottery to go to some island repose where all I do is read (and contemplate - the important and often neglected part that goes with reading).
Reading is a tough call these days. The home television is on all the time (imagine trying to read with a CNN report with "HILLARY.....TRUMP.....SYRIA....!!!!" interjecting, or with The Price is Right's audience screaming its enthusiasm.
I often wonder how Jane Austen wrote her books in the midst of the bustle of family life. But in her time, the sounds of the home were the clutter of her mother and sisters taking care of the home - preparing meals, sweeping and dusting, writing notes to friends and neighbors. And "talking" didn't come from some gadget but through quiet conversations with family members and visitors. The radio or the gramophone were not invented yet (or available for public use) so music and discourse were presented during evening socials by family members and guests. Sound had its time and place, and its (reduced) volume. There was none of that 24-hour schedule we have for everything now.
The modern world is making us more stupid, more narcissistic and more callous. It is a capitulation to unGodly schedules and impulses. It is the grip of the Devil.
Still, I get a couple of hours in the late afternoon and now I have started to get up at 5am (4:45) where I have my morning coffee and a chapter to get through. Of course this competes with my writing time, so I guard these hours jealously.
Here is my current list of books, in no particular order:
- Words Overflown By Stars: Creative Writing Instruction and Insight From the Vermont College of Fine Arts M.F.A. Program: Edited by David Jauss
- Religion and the Rise of Western Culture: The Classic Study of Medieval Civilization: Christopher Dawson
- The B Side: The Death of Tin Pan Alley and the Rebirth of the Great American Song: Ben Yagoda
- Who is that Man? In Search of the Real Bob Dylan: David Dalton
- Someday, Someday, Maybe: Lauren Graham
- Talking as Fast as I Can: From Gilmore Girls to Gilmore Girls (and Everything in Between): Lauren Graham
- Sunshne Sketches of a Little Town: Stephen Leacock
- Little House on the Prairie: Laura Ingalls Wilder
- A Good Day's Work: In Pursuit of a Disappearing Canada: John DeMont
- The Moment: Wild, Poignant, Life-Changing Stories form 125 Writers and Artists - Famous and Obscure: Edited by Larry Smith
- Designs for a Happy Home: Matthew Reynolds
- Scent of Triumph: A Novel of Perfume and Passion : Jan Moran
- Sydney and Violet: Their Life with T.S. Eliot, Proust, Joyce, and the Excruciatingly Irascible Wyndham Lewis: Stephen Kladman
And the book that started this flurry of purchases:
- How to Write a Memoir in 30 Days: Step-by-Step instructions for Creating and Publishing Your Personal Story: Roberta Temes, PhD
The "30 days" are long gone but I found these two bits of wisdom which have shaped my "drafts" ever since I got this book:
A memoir is not an autobiography. An autobiography is strictly factual and chronologically covers your life from birth until today. It is accurate and full of facts and explanations. An autobiography states facts, whereas a memoir describes your reactions to those facts. For example, an autobiography might discuss social and political ideas of the times, but your memoir would discuss your emotional responses to those ideas. Your autobiography s a photograph a picture, showing precise detail. Your memoir, on the other hand, is an impressionistic painting - a canvass conveying a general impressions using free brushstrokes to create a general feeling.
My next question of course was: Should I write a work of fiction as had Lauren Graham before she delved into her memories? Or as this author says was the source of many novels:
The Self as Object in Modernist Fiction: James, Joyce, Hemingway (but am NOT a "Modernist"!)
I like the idea of a memoir. Afterall, that is what my blogs have been in some way: a record of the things I saw, observed, and was attracted to, not necessarily on an intellectual level but often on a visceral one.
Perhaps I should simply publish my blogs!!! (There are many online advisors out there showing just how to do that!).
Another important advice I got from Dr. Temes was to find a category for the memoir:
Memoirs fall into different categories. Perhaps you already know in what category your memoir belongs. It might be:
(and here is a list including - a relationship memoir, an animal memoir(?), an illness memoir - etc..)
I think mine fits well with: A Call to Action Memoir. After all, I have called my blog Reclaiming Beauty: Saving Our Western Civilization.
One final insight from Dr. Temes inadvertently showed me this:
A memoir is not a confessional! Everyone has some harrowing story to tell (some much worse than others) but I really don't think people like to read some psychologically difficult or traumatic premise of anyone's life. It is now the norm or the trend to find such kinds of memories publicly discussed. We are in the era of Oprah after all. Bookstores will happily cater to such clientele with these quick-read books to fill their shelves (as opposed to say a Hemingway) and publishers will be glad of their busy schedules with "writers" seeking their services (they charge steep prices too!). But how lasting, how important and how insightful are such "memoirs?" What do they really have to say?
So this Dr. Temes discouraged me from this personalized confessional and challenged me to write something "bigger" than myself!
I am reposting an article I wrote in 2013, three and half years ago. I titled it Book Project: Writing although Book Project: Reading wold have been more appropriate. I wrote about my attempts to find good contemporary books and how difficult that was. Nonetheless I managed to find a few which is what I was describing in the post below. I have a corresponding post here where I list the books I recently bought mostly at my local Chapters/Indigo (through various discounts "point bonuses," sales and occasionally fully-priced purchases). I am so glad to find that I can find books that may enjoy reading.
I've been away from books. It used to be that I would have a couple of books on the works, usually one fiction and another cultural/art/biographical book. At school, I would find a quiet place to read a chapter, or half a chapter, before returning to school projects. My favorite place as a young girl was the seat of a tree-trunk. At work, I would use my lunch breaks, or coffee breaks, to read. At home, I would reduce the number of hours sitting in front of the television to resume a chapter I had to leave to return to other pressing matters.
In the past few years, it could be that I became disappointed with the selection of new books available these days, or that I had read enough of the classics that I wanted something modern and fresh. Yet almost all the modern books disappointed me, and I stopped buying books. I left off re-reading the classics. I started to spend more time on short on-line articles on the internet. And I started watching movies, and literary adaptations on television. I read fewer and fewer books.
Recently, I have gone back to books. I sit at a restaurant, or a coffee house, and bring my books, often two at a time, as I explained earlier my reading habits: Ernest Hemingway's The Sun Also Rises, C. S. Lewis' Mere Christianity, Brian Morton's Starting Out in the Evening (a contemporary book which nonetheless won me over with its writing), Edith Hamilton's Mythology, Candice Bushnell's One Fifth Avenue (a witty contemporary book whose writer is of Sex and City fame), Roger Scruton's Beauty, Ron Chernow's Washington, and Nancy Berner's and Susan Lowry's Garden Guide: New York City.
I bought all but one of these books within the last year, so there's hope yet, except for Hemingway's which is an old edition which I bought at my undergraduate university's used book store (the bookstore's stamp - Paper Back Junction - is still on it, as well as an inscription by a reader dated '71, who wasn't a fan of the book, but I do disagree!).
It looks like I went into a flurry of buying, and reading, to make up for lost time, these past couple of years.
People seem to have some respect for books, and book readers. At the coffee house or restaurant which I visit more frequently (just a drink at both, and occasionally a meal at the restaurant), the owners/waiters/managers don't seem to mind that I choose a seat in the back, and that I could be there for an hour or more with just a coffee refill, or a plate of french fries, reading a book or taking and making notes. They seem to think I bring prestige to their place, and are kind and serviceable towards me.
Well, I did tell them something else, partly to alert them toward my long sit-times. "I am in the process of writing a book." I told one manager. I told him I come there to refresh my ideas, sometimes by reading another book, and other times by going over the notes I've made.
Since then, if he's not busy, he takes me to the quiet back area himself. And waiters (who desire to be writers?), actually sit down to chat with me. One in particular is too polite to ask direct questions, so I fill him in on the latest, if I can, and if I want to.
I wondered about this attention.
I think people are interested in those who do things, or who say they do things. And since I am coming into their premises to do something creative, they seem to want to make that as easy as possible for me.
I am often touched and surprised by their attention.
But, there is something else. I think there is a great deal of prestige given to writers. A writer, whether a fiction writer, a biographer, a political/social/cultural writer, invents something new through the sheer determination of his mind. It is creativity at the cerebral level, using the imagination of the writer and the reader to bring the work to life.
It is perhaps like the Bible. We have our created world, yet, in order to make sense of it, to analyze it, to make it a reality, God then created the Word. But the Bible is not just simply a descriptive account of the world around us. Its words create a myriad of things, from a literary masterpiece, a daily guideline, a family saga, a message bearer, a sin-identifier. Without this ability of the written word to convey so much, our Bible would be just another artifact, a prolonged magazine article, convincing no-one it is worthy to spend years to decipher its alphabets and words in order to read it, understand it, and make sense of our world through it.
I think that is what books are trying to do. And in a modest way, that is what I am trying to do.
"The Local Authors" table at the Square One Mississauga Chapters/Indgo Mega-Bookstore
[Photo By: KPA]
My neighborhood mega-bookstore, the Square One Chapters/Indigo, is now displaying the beginnings of its Fall collection. It has various tables set up with specialized themes. One that intrigued me was the "Local Authors" table, and after I did a brief tour of the store, I settled down to studying the table's displays. Perhaps I can find something to buy toward my collection of fast-growing books, to which I add every couple of months.
The running theme in all these "Local Authors" (seven of whom I have profiled below) is that they are all "from somewhere else," literally, psychologically, psychically, or in any other way to enhance their stories. And each uses Mississauga, or a nearby suburb, as a springboard to accentuate this "somewhere elseness." Most of these "somewhere elses" are Third World countries in Asia, Africa and Latin America. But some are right here in Canada, in ethnic ghettos from Toronto to Mississauga to Montreal.
Camilla Gibb, one of two white writers in the list that I've put together below (two out of seven is a very low odd, for a country which is still majority white), may not have been born in the Third World, but she is certainly "foreign-born" and her "somewhere else" is England. As she states in the interview below, "I find resonance in stories of upheaval and dislocation. I find myself in them." Even though she came as a young girl from England, and even though Canada has strong cultural and historical affiliation with Britain, and even though there is a large body of Britons in Canada, especially in Toronto where she settled, she still managed to find "upheaval and dislocation" with this move.
The fascinating information I found about her is that she is a lesbian, whose "wife" (yes, they were "married") left her while Gibb was ten months "pregnant." So, her "somewhere else" is truly a psychic displacement, where she doesn't belong anywhere, even in those African villages where she briefly lived as an anthropology doctoral student, villages who would have no sympathy at all for her lesbianism, and about which she wrote her first book Sweetness in the Belly.
Her book Sweetness in the Belly is set in the Muslim region of Ethiopia, a country which is predominantly Christian. Why did she chose this outpost as the center of her tale? She has a spiritually rebellious reason for this choice. The novel's main character Lilly, who is clearly some form of autobiographical representation of Gibb
...has anything but a stable childhood. The daughter of English/Irish hippies, she was "born in Yugoslavia, breast-fed in the Ukraine, weaned in Corsica, freed from nappies in Sicily and walking by the time [they] got to the Algarve..." The family's nomadic adventure ends in Tangier when Lilly's parents are killed in a drug deal gone awry. Orphaned at eight, Lilly is left in the care of a Sufi sheikh, who shows her the way of Islam through the Qur'an. When political turmoil erupts, Lilly, now sixteen, is sent to the ancient walled city of Harar, Ethiopia, where she stays in a dirt-floored compound with an impoverished widow named Nouria and her four children.
In Harar, Lilly earns her keep by helping with the household chores and teaching local children the Qur'an. Ignoring the cries of "farenji" (foreigner), she slowly begins to put down roots, learning the language and immersing herself in a culture rich in customs and rituals and lush with glittering bright headscarves, the chorus of muezzins and the scent of incense and coffee[Source].
Was it the glittering headscarves the women in Harar wore which tugged at Gibb's/Lilly's heart? Was it the exotic of scent of incense and coffee? It is more basic, more fundamental, than that. "I was not always a Muslim," says Lilly, "but once I was led into the absorption of prayer and the mysteries of the Qur’an, something troubled in me became still [Source]."
Gibb/Lilly is no different from the hundreds of white European Western women who find this stillness through Islam. Their own cultures had failed them spiritually, destroying or demeaning Christianity. Lilly filled this abyss with Allah.
Gibb never defines her religious affiliations, despite her overt sympathy for Islam. Rather, she seems to fill her spiritual void, as thisToronto Star article states, "by the mentally salubrious effects of companionship." Hence her incessant search for "community."
Although Sweetness in the Belly is not a particularly outstanding book (I have read several of the beginning chapters), I'm sure Gibb's personal story is much more interesting. It would provide an intriguing lens into the lives of modern (postmodern) white women who hate their own cultures and try to find salvation in other remote and exotic ones.
For that reason alone, Gibb's book and background is the most interesting of the lot, which induced my long analysis of her and her world.
Liz Worth is another such prime example in my list of a white woman who once again uses a counter (or anti) cultural affiliation to guide her story-telling style, and whose book (this time a non-fiction book about punk rock) tells us more about her inner workings than would have a straight autobiography. Worth's punk rock cultural focus is a masochistic, sadistic, misogynistic culture, and was no haven for women. When asked why she chose Treat me Like Dirt as the main title for her book she gave a roundabout answer with nothing left for us but to psychoanalyze:
I was thinking ‘yeah, treat me like dirt - what a great title.’It's provocative and defiant, and captures a lot of the sentiment in the book. [Source]
But is it provocative and defiant to say over and over again, as do the lyrics to the song Bullet Proof Nothing by the Toronto "proto-punk" band Simply Saucer?
Treat me like dirt, drive me insane,
Treat me like dirt now, tear out my brain,
Treat me like dirt, I'm losin' my mind,
I said treat me like dirt now, cause you're so fine.
Simply Saucer
"Bullet Proof Nothing"
Perhaps Worth also likes this song (these lyrics) because of the mild pleasant melody that connects the words to song. They don't mean "treat me like dirt, surely. They mean "love me!!!" Simply Saucer is a male group (at least the singer is male). It is a woman he is singing to, which in the world of competitive men, the worse a woman treats a man (in the dance of courtship) the more interested in her the man gets. But how badly can she treat him, other than to ignore him or not answer his text messages? And how seriously will she take his treatment with that bouncy melody?
But men treat women differently than do women men. Treating a woman like dirt is a serious activity. It could lead to physical or verbal, injuries, or even death.
And such is the thought process of women who think abuse (physical injury?) has something to do with love.
Treat Me Like Dirt is about the ultimate fringe of society: The violent, abrasive, loud subculture which deliberately aims to be on the outside of white civilized society, forever with a chip on its shoulder. Anything that would find fault with (or even hate) this white civilized society is welcomed.
All these writers have no desire, interest, or a sense of obligation to make Canada the main "character" in their books, using it merely as a springboard to travel back into their psyches and memories to those lands they abandoned in search of greener pastures. They rushed eagerly into the haven of Canada's towns and cities, escaping whatever financial, political or psychological woes they have suffered. But, once safely here, they show no (or little) thanks for the country that opened its hands out and helped them at their time of trouble. In fact, they persistently and continuously demonize it, as though it should have given them more, and more and more. Their dissatisfaction becomes a raging anger (however quietly some may express it), which is woven into their stories.
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
List of books
List of books from the image above:
1 Could You Please, Please Stop Singing
By: Sabyasachi Nag
In Could You Please, Please Stop Singing?, Sabyasachi (Sachi) Nag takes a step away from skepticism, blending humour with shock and surprise, seeking a return to childhood in “Mamuda’s Fries,” innocence in “Conversations with the Country Activist” and fractals for the future in the yet to be invented “Seedless Avocado.” In attempting what Tomas Transromer calls “walking through walls,” Nag hurts and sickens himself with awe and rage. The title poem “Could You Please, Please Stop Singing?” purposely evokes the famous Hemingway line from Men Without Women and is central to the overall tonality of this collection, that straddles a path alternately mocking and dead serious, and that occasionally yields to contrary pulls between the banal and the sublime.
Sabyasachi Nag...lives in Mississauga with his wife and son. Nag immigrated to Canada from Calcutta, where he was born, and many of the poems in this collection are about this city.[Source]
2 13 Ways of Looking at a Fat Girl
By: Mona Awad
Born to an Egyptian father and French-Canadian mother, Awad grew up in Montreal with a high school stint in Mississauga (or as dubbed in 13, “Misery Saga”). In a predominantly white, protestant school, being an Arab was rare enough. Yet with her mixed heritage, ambiguity made her “an outsider even to outsiders”. Neither fully here nor there, Awad finds respite in the broader identification of ‘Canadian’. Awad affirms that this does not erase the influence of her parents’ culture upon her own identity, but rather allows for its greater complexity.
13 Ways of Looking at a Fat Girl, in the simplest of terms, is about a woman’s body and self. Awad traverses into a thorny landscape of weight anxiety and desire, illustrating it through the particular nature of key relationships - to other bodies, to female friends, to mothers, lovers, clothing, and food. [Source]
3 Weather Permitting and Other Stories
By: Pratap Reddy
Indian-born author Pratap Reddy captures the immigrant experience, highlighting all the rewards and frustrations facing a newly arrived immigrant to Canada, in his new book entitled Weather Permitting and Other Stories.
4 Treat Me Like Dirt: An Oral History of Punk in Toronto and Beyond, 1977–1981
By: Liz Worth
Full of chaos, betrayal, failure, success, and pure rock 'n' roll energy, this layered history is assembled from interviews with those now recognized as innovators, pioneers, and outright legends in their genre. Their accounts go beyond run-of-the-mill anecdotes, venturing into the uncharted territory of sex, drugs, murder, conspiracy, violence, criminals, and biker gangs. Bold and brazen, this compilation also includes a wealth of previously unpublished photographs as well as one of the last interviews with the late Frankie Venom, lead singer of Teenage Head [Source].
Worth herself has contributed to this "noise art" as a performance artist with the duo Salt Circle: Her website describes Salt Circle:
Salt Circle (feat. Sam Cooper/Liz Worth) is an experiment in frenetic spoken word and haunted, broken sound. Channelling dreams and ethereal invocations, this Toronto duo creates occultish noise and approachable weirdo art that connects poetry, rituals, and hypnotic structures.
5 Seven Nights with the Chinese Zodiac
By: Anna Yin
In her newest poetry collection, Seven Nights with the Chinese Zodiac, Yin brilliantly takes the reader through the seasons of the zodiac year by intertwining Eastern and Western images. She alludes to Sylvia Plath, Margaret Atwood, and Dante—Western poets that influenced her own work—and incorporates them into pieces inspired by traditional Chinese poetry. The blending of the two worlds is congruent with the immigrant identity she explores in “Accent,” where the negotiation of two cultures should not result in one overtaking the other—like yin and yang, both exist in harmony[Source].
Anna Yin was born in China and immigrated to Canada in 1999. She has authored five poetry books, including Wings Toward Sunlight (2011) and Inhaling the Silence (2013) and Seven Nights with the Chinese Zodiac (2015). Anna has won a number of poetry awards, including the 2005 Ted Plantos Memorial Award, the 2010/2014 MARTY Literary Arts Awards and a 2013 CPAC Professional Achievement Award. Her poems in English & Chinese and ten translations by her were in a Canadian Studies textbook used by Humber College. Anna has been interviewed by CBC Radio, Rogers TV , CCTV and TalentVisionTV etc . Her poem “Still Life” was displayed across Canada for the Poetry In Transit project in 2013/2014. Anna was a “Living book” for the Living Library at the Mississauga Campus of University of Toronto. Anna is Mississauga’s First Poet Laureate (2015-2017) and Ontario representative to the League of Canadian Poets (2013-2016). Her “Poetry Alive” events and workshops are welcomed at schools, colleges and libraries, especially for the Poets in Schools Program. Anna holds a B.Sc. degree from Nanjing University and a Creative Writing Certificate from the University of Toronto. She lives and works in Mississauga, Ontario [Source]
I recently posted (or re-posted) on Anna Yin's accent and my take on her "immigrant" experience here, but I don't think she will be ready any time soon to loose her accent, or her immigrant experience.
I wrote about Yin's accent and her migrant experience here and here.
6 This is Happy
By: Camilla Gibb
In 2012, while eight weeks pregnant with her first child, Camilla Gibb was faced with devastating news: her spouse of more than 10 years announced she had fallen out of love and was leaving their relationship. In her new memoir, This Is Happy, Gibb reflects on rebuilding her life as a single mother and creating a new ad-hoc family for herself and her baby. Gibb, who holds a PhD in social anthropology from Oxford, and is author of the novels The Beauty of Humanity Movement and Sweetness in the Belly, says her unexpected situation made her realize her life had become “unrecognizable,” and forced her to face “urgent and imperative” questions about herself.
Interviewer: Your work has focused on the idea of the outsider, on belonging and identity. Why?
Gibb: I’ve thought a lot about this question over the years, and given myself, and others, various answers to it. But the truth is, I think it’s constitutional. I find resonance in stories of upheaval and dislocation. I find myself in them [Source].
7 Struggles of a Dreamer: The Battle Between a Dream and Tradition
By: Yahaya Baruwa
In Struggles of a Dreamer: The Battle between a Dream and Tradition, the stories of Tunde, a beggar on the streets of New York City, and Toku'te, the son of a farmer in a faraway land, are woven together in a charming tale full of intriguing characters and adventure. You will encounter the struggles of a dreamer as he faces the challenges of the limiting boundaries of his tradition. You will laugh, cry, experience romance, be frightened, and be held in suspense as you find out how Toku'te manages to remain afloat in a world that requires everyone to fit the same mold[Source].
Yahaya is a Nigerian-Canadian Author and Entrepreneur who was born and raised in Kano city, Nigeria till the age of 13. He migrated to Canada with his family of ten in March of 2001 to pursue greater academic and career opportunities. Upon arrival to Canada, Yahaya resided in both Flemingdon Park and Regent Park for the first three years in Canada; however he now lives in Scarborough, Ontario with his family [Source].
Some of these books (or recordings) are online and here are excerpts from a couple:
13 Ways of Looking Fat
Mona Awad
Growing up in the suburban hell of Misery Saga (a.k.a. Mississauga), Lizzie has never liked the way she looks—even though her best friend Mel says she’s the pretty one. She starts dating guys online, but she’s afraid to send pictures, even when her skinny friend China does her makeup: she knows no one would want her if they could really see her. So she starts to lose. With punishing drive, she counts almonds consumed, miles logged, pounds dropped. She fights her way into coveted dresses. She grows up and gets thin, navigating double-edged validation from her mother, her friends, her husband, her reflection in the mirror. But no matter how much she loses, will she ever see herself as anything other than a fat girl?
The sun makes its orange way east from Arabia, over a Red Sea, across volcanic fields and desert and over the black hills to the qat- and coffee-shrubbed land of the fertile valley that surrounds our walled city. Night departs on the heels of the hyenas: they hear the sun’s approach as a hostile ringing, perceptible only to their ears, and it drives them back, bloody lipped and panic stricken, to their caves.
In darkness they have feasted on the city’s broken streets: devouring lame dogs in alleyways and licking eggshells and entrails off the ground. The people of the city cannot afford to waste their food, but nor can they neglect to feed the hyenas either. To let them go hungry is to forfeit their role as people on this wild earth, and strain the already tenuous ties that bind God’s creatures.
I went to my (second) favorite spot to read - the Whole Foods Market cafe - my newly acquired (for TEN dollars, down from FORTY EIGHT dollars!) book, The Big New Yorker Book of Dogs.
...the amused insouciance, the self-deprecation, the gentle unfolding of a structural irony, the skip and reveal of the final sentence, the knowledge of Not Too Much that seems intrinsic to the New Yorker. And cartoons.”—Edmund De Waal, The Spectator
But, above all, it's funny, in that canine way, where all things are about the dog.
Thurber Dog With Butterfly for Nora, 1937 Illustration by James Thurber
Dogs, I am confident, would have arranged many, many things better than we do. They would have in all probability averted the Depression, for they can go through lots tougher things than we and still think it's boom time. They demand very little of their heyday; a kind word is more to them than fame, a soup bone more than gold; they are perfectly contented with a warm fire and a good book to chew (preferably an autographed first edition lent by a friend). James Thurber, from "Dogs I Have Scratched"
------------------------------------------------------------------------------ Posted By: Kidist P. Asrat
George Washington, 1780 Charles Willson Peale (American, 1741–1827) Oil on canvas; 95 x 61 3/4 in. Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York
Part of what makes his live story so gripping is that he shaped himself into the world-historical figure he became, in the quintessentially American tradition of men who spring, as F. Scott Fitzgerald famously wrote, from their own Platonic conception of themselves. But his self-conception was extraordinary: it began as a worthy ideal and evolved into a magnificent one. In his fiercely ambitious youth, he sought to win acclaim for his for his heroism and savoir faire. In his maturity, he strove to be, in his own conscience even more than in the eyes of others, virtuous, public-spirited, and (although his ethic wouldn't allow him to claim the word (noble). He did hope, however, that posterity would recognize and honor the purity of his motives; and Americans, who owe him so much, do him but justice in understanding not only what he did for them but also what greatness of soul he achieved to do it.
I browsed through the books at my local Chapters bookstore, and I found this: The New York Dog (not The Dogs of New York) by Rachael Hale McKenna, going for a mere $21 online ($32 in-store).
Common Name: Lenten Rose, Hellebore Botanical Name: Helleborus Type: Perennial Soil Preference: Will grow in moist to wet soils. Prefers a well-drained soil with a pH of neutral. Light Requirements: Partial Sun, Partial Shade, Full Shade Attributes: Deer resistant, rabbit resistant, likes moist soils, good for naturalizing, rock garden plant Pests: None serious Diseases: Root rot, leaf spot Good Companion Plants: Astilbe, Bleeding Heart, Columbine, Coral Bells, Corydalis, Japanese Painted Fern, Foamflower, Forget-Me-Not, Wild Ginger, Lungwort, Hosta Care: Do not move often, as these plants are slow to re-establish. Seeds can be collected in late spring or early summer. Planting Instructions: Perennials [Source: Dayton Nurseries]
More information on growing requirements:
A great plant for the woodland environment. It dislikes summer heat, so avoid afternoon sun. Once established, do not move as they are slow to re-establish. Blooms late winter or very early spring. [Source: Dayton Nurseries]
- pH should be about 7 - The Lenten Rose plants are cold hardy in USDA zones 4-8 - Expect your plant to grow about 18" tall and 18" wide. - If the evergreen leaves begin to look like they are dying, simply cut them off before the flower stalks begin to stretch. [Source: Hubpages: [An] open community of passionate people - writers, explorers, knowledge seekers, conversation starters.]
Title: Lenten Rose (Helleborus orientalis) Artist: Paul Jones Nationality: Australian Publication: Flora Magnifica, 1976 Image Source: Panteek Antique Prints
A Muslim would never say this. Trust a Christian to do so. This is what Michael Coren says in an interview here on his book Hatred: Islam's War on Christianity:
LOPEZ: People understandably don’t want to offend people and their religion. Is that the wrong way to be looking at things?
COREN: Why? Why, why, why? I couldn’t give a damn if you offend my religion! I am a Catholic and my beliefs are far too strong to be damaged by some cartoon or joke or argument in a book. This fatuous modern notion of “being offended” is a moan, an annoying weep. I am offended, therefore I am. If you don’t like something, don’t read it or watch it. We are not made of glass and we won’t break. All I ask for is an even playing field. What happens now is that it’s fine to offend Christians but not to offend other religions. We have to be careful here. What matters in a healthy democracy is not the protection of feelings but the right to speak one’s mind. Remember, it’s the Left who tend to complain about being offended while habitually abusing the Right.
This is false and wrong. How can anyone stand by and let something sacred to him be desecrated? I have a whole section on "Desecration" in Reclaiming Beauty, where I discuss various artistic attempts at destroying that which is beautiful, and Godly.
In the modern West, we are all to be equal offenders and equally offended: Christians, Muslims, Jews, and so on. But the reality is that very few cultures are willing to allow their sacred things to be tarnished, and least of all by outsiders. That is why Muslims behave the way they do. ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Posted By: Kidist P. Asrat -------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
[H]ere is an email I sent to Michael Coren, who has written a new book titled Hatred: Islam's War on Christianity, and whose lecture I attended last week at the Jewish Defense League. I wrote this reply to his email after he told me to say he cannot find any way to have me on his nightly show.
I gave him good reviews [here and here] for his book at my website, since I didn't want to pick too much at the details.
But, unfortunately, he is of the same ilk as Robert Spencer, Jamie Glasov, David Horowitz, et al. The Islam apologists/Islam destroyers, who never quite took it seriously enough to take what the Koran said as what Muslims really do believe, and who would say things like "destroy radical Islam."
It was a long shot, trying to contact Coren, and perhaps to guage if he really can go the distance with Islam, conservatism, etc, since I really do need supporters here in Canada, and links to publishers. But, it looks like I will have to keep focused on what I'm doing, and doing it as authentically as possible.
Best,
Kidist
Correspondent:
I don't know much about this Coren fellow, but much of what drives commercial broadcasting, Tv, and print, is very specific and needs to fit their niche and attract viewers. Perhaps you're viewed as not controversial enough, or too controversial, or too-much-this-and-not-enough-that. It's hard to know. You're not famous and controversial, two things which can help drive media attention. But do keep plugging away. Recall those authors who submitted their book to 30 publishers and were turned down by all, and then one publisher picks it up and has some success. Persistence pays off. Your follow up to Coren is very good. Maybe you could get yourself arrested, or something, to drive some media attention. Just kidding. It is difficult to penetrate the media barrier....
Kidist:
I think I'm TOO nice and proper! When I breach out of that, people are actually surprised. Even Laura (of The Thinking Housewife) once said to me that I was full of surprises, and someone else said (it was actually at Jim's (Kalb) dinner) that I don't look like my blog...
Yes, I will start to be difficult, obnoxious etc. I thought of reporting Coren for "racism" or better "discrimination" or something. He is discriminating against me because I dare to say that Islam has no place in Canada. He daren't have me say what I think we should do about that (i.e. present Larry's carefully outlined program for how to deal with immigration and Muslims, and Islam). Coren has all kinds of other "minority" groups on his show. How about an Ethiopian, Christian, Westerner!!! I will send an email to that Jamie Glasov of Horowitz and Frontpage Magazine, and other pseudo conservative sites which Coren idolizes.
Now that I'm over the disappointment, I will just "have fun," as the saying goes. And keep on plugging.
And here, my correspondent goes through my email, giving his views, and advice:
KPA:
I think I'm TOO nice and proper!
Correspondent:
You do come across as being nice and proper, and a fine thing it is, too, in our liberal culture of abrasive and improper women. I wouldn't like to see you as yet another loud-mouthed, obnoxious chick. A proper conservative man, in a proper conservative society, would properly deplore that. But then, this is hardly a proper conservative society. And then, there was Joan of Arc. And I think Phyliss Schlafly is a fine model of a woman who stands up for civilized values against the rising tide of liberation.
KPA:
When I breach out of that, people are actually surprised. Even Laura [of the Thinking Housewife] once said to me that I was full of surprises, and someone else said (it was actually at Jim's [Kalb] dinner) that I don't look like my blog...
Yes, I will start to be difficult, obnoxious etc.
Correspondent:
I think you can be effective without having an obnoxious manner. Larry was a good example of that. He always (well, almost always) said what he had to say in a calm, deliberate voice, reasonable, factual, and with great conviction.
KPA:
I thought of reporting Coren for "racism" or better "discrimination" or something. He is discriminating against me because I dare to say that Islam has no place in Canada.
Correspondent:
We shouldn't try to use illegitimate leftist arguments like "discrimination" against our opponents. It would look like a cynical ploy.
KPA:
He daren't have me say what I think we should do about that (i.e. present Larry's carefully outlined program for how to deal with immigration and Muslims, and Islam). Coren has all kinds of other "minority" groups on his show. How about an Ethiopian, Christian, Westerner!!! I will send an email to that Jamie Glasov of Horowitz and Frontpage Magazine, and other pseudo conservative sites which Coren idolizes.
Correspondent:
You're at the place Larry arrived at long ago -- the greatest obstacle to defeating liberalism is our own so-called-conservatives, who accept liberal principles like diversity and non-discrimination and merely try to ameliorate the worst symptoms rather than opposing liberalism on fundamental ground.
KPA:
Now that I'm over the disappointment, I will just "have fun," as the saying goes. And keep on plugging.
Correspondent:
You do have the unique advantage of being a non-Westerner, and a woman, who opposes liberalism. We tend to feel guilty when one of our own, a white man, tries to defend us. But people will be more open to listening when one of the "other" -- a chick! an Ethiopian chick!! -- says non-liberal things. Say it in a quiet, yet firm voice of conviction -- "you so-called-conservative leaders are one of the reasons we're losing". Unfortunately, you'll find the liberals are especially hate-filled towards anyone they perceive to be one of "their own" (and that includes Ethiopian chicks) who goes off the reservation and starts denouncing them and their false religion. It really gets under their skin. Oh, you could get yourself arrested on hate charges, don't you think, in Canada?
KPA:
Agreed, 100%.
Thanks for the reality check.
Getting arrested in Canada for hate charges? The sheer confusion would just kill everyone!
Correspondent:
"The sheer confusion would just kill everyone!"
Yeah, and you'd probably get a lot more hits at your blog! And then Coren and the rest would be falling all over themselves to get you on their shows. Asrat, La Cause Celebre! :-)
------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Posted By: Kidist P. Asrat -------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Here is some of what he said at the interview. You can view the rest a Coren's site, or in the Youtube posted above.
When you tune into a TV show every week, what Hollywood does better than anybody else on earth is they create a set of characters that you want to be with, a set of characters that you want to hang out with, you have sympathy for. And then after you've developed sympathy for the character, they'll have the character do something that you find personally abhorrent, but they'll say to you,"OK, well, you know, you like the character, so how can you find their behavior so abhorrent? Are you a hypocrite?" It's the same sort of argument that you in your personal life have encountered, the idea being that you have a relative who you love and your relative happens to be gay, therefore you must be pro-gay marriage, which is not an argument. It is an emotional appeal. Hollywood excels at emotional appeals. They're in the business of having you pay them for them to make you laugh or cry. So it's no surprise that they can use that enormous power over emotion to wield in on behalf of certain political causes ranging from leftist internationalism to social liberalism on the home front.
One of my favorite shows used to be Will and Grace, but as I wrote here:
...it is not "the gays" who make that show but the two ditzy straight women Grace and Karen, with their perennial gaffes (and as an addendum, it was also Karen's impeccable fashion sense)
Eventualy, the two likable gays, who were friends, accomplices, and "saviours" of these straight women were like those brothers and other male family members, whom I couldn't help liking.
Eventually, I just stopped watching the show.
But, Shapiro has written another book: How to Debate Leftists and Destroy Them. A speech he made on this is found here, but this site has listed them.
1. Walk Toward the Fire
The left knows this is war. And they know you are the enemy. You will be castigated. You will get punched. That’s the way it will go because that’s how the left wins: through intimidation and cruelty. You have to take the punch, you have to brush it off. You have to be willing to take the punch.
2. Hit First
Don’t take the punch first. Hit first. Hit hard. Hit where it counts. Mike Tyson used to say, "Everybody has a plan ‘til they get punched in the mouth." That’s exactly correct. But throwing the first punch requires game-planning. Walking through the door, you have one shot – one! – to put someone down for the count from the beginning of a debate. If done properly, any debate on a single topic can be over within the first 30 seconds.
3. Frame Your Opponent
I have argued that the left’s entire playbook consists of a single play: characterizing the opposition. It’s incredibly effective. And the only way to get beyond character arguments is to frame your opponent – make it toxic for your opponent to slur you. Then, hopefully, you can move the debate to more substantive territory. This is the vital first step. It is the only first step…There is no way to convince someone that you don’t hate him or her. You can convince him or her, however, that your opposition is a liar and a hater.
4. Frame the Debate
It’s important that you neuter those buzzwords quickly, because otherwise you will be arguing against nonsense terms that can be used against you. You can’t argue against empty terms. So don’t accept the premises of their arguments, which are largely buzzword based…It’s important that you neuter those buzzwords quickly, because otherwise you will be arguing against nonsense terms that can be used against you. You can’t argue against empty terms. So don’t accept the premises of their arguments, which are largely buzzword based…As a general matter, the left’s favorite three lines of attack are (1) you’re stupid; (2) you’re mean; (3) you’re corrupt. Sarah Palin is supposedly stupid; Mitt Romney is supposedly mean; Dick Cheney is supposedly corrupt. Take away those lines of attack and watch the discomfort set in.
5. Spot Inconsistencies in the Left’s Argument
The left’s arguments are chock full of inconsistencies. Internal inconsistencies — inconsistencies that are inherent to the left’s general worldview. That’s because very few people on the left will acknowledge their actual agenda, which is quite extreme. Leftists prefer to argue half-measures in which they don’t truly believe…There are almost invariably unbridgeable inconsistencies in the left’s publicly stated positions that are at war with their actual fundamental principles. Your goal is to make the left admit once and for all what they believe about policy by exposing those inconsistencies.
6. Force Leftists to Answer Questions
This is really just a corollary of Rule #4. Leftists are only comfortable when they are forcing you to answer questions. If they have to answer questions, they begin to scratch their heads. The questions they prefer to ask are about your character; the questions they prefer not to answer are all of them. Instead, they like to dodge issues in favor of those character arguments.
7. Do Not Get Distracted
You may notice when arguing with someone on the left that every time you begin to make a point, that leftist begins shouting about George W. Bush. It’s like Leftist Tourette’s Syndrome. “Why did Obama blow out the budget?” “BUUUUUUUSHHHH!!!!!” Don’t be fooled. You don’t need to follow the idiotic rabbit down into his Bushy rabbit hole…Arguing with the left is like attempting to nail jello to the wall. It’s slippery and messy and a waste of resources. You must force them to answer the question.
8. You Don’t Have To Defend People on Your Side
Conservatives get trapped in this gambit routinely, because they figure that the enemy of their enemy is their friend: if the left is attacking someone, he must be worth defending. But that’s not true…Don’t follow people. Follow principle.
9. If You Don’t Know Something, Admit It
Don’t get caught in the trap of believing you have to know everything about everything. Your opponent will undoubtedly know something you don’t. It’s fair to simply state, "I didn’t know that, but I’ll be happy to research and get back to you." Another side-note here: don’t bring up a topic with which you aren’t passingly familiar.
10. Let the Other Side Have Meaningless Victories
Leftists prize faux moderation above all else; by granting them a point or two, you can convince them that you aren’t a radical right-winger at all. After all, everyone can admit both parties are terrible!…If the left engages you on immigration reform, your answer should be that you are for immigration reform. Now, how do they define immigration reform? That’s the key question. But because you’ve always granted the premise that you like the idea of immigration reform, you don’t look like a naysayer off the bat…The conversation is meaningless until you force the left to define terms. Until then, we can all agree on useless platitudes.
11. Body Language Matters
The Left is expert at imagistics. The right is not, because the right falsely believes that shallow imagistics can be beaten with substance. Which has worked out fabulously for every great actress who is 300 lbs. in Hollywood — all two of them who are working…Leftists prize faux moderation above all else; by granting them a point or two, you can convince them that you aren’t a radical right-winger at all. After all, everyone can admit both parties are terrible!
------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Posted By: Kidist P. Asrat -------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
