Category: Modernism

Night Follows Day

Crime, Gummint, Modernism, Vermin

From Knuckledragger, talking about his old neighborhood (happens to be in California, but could have — and has — happened anywhere):

The shooting happened in the 200 block of Semple Street, I used to live at 238 Kimble, one street over. Most of the houses there were built in the 1920s.
…
When I first moved there in 1996, it was a nice neighborhood – quiet with a lot of older folks that would sit out on their front porch in the evening drinking tea and talking with other neighbors that were out for their evening walk. As time went by, those folks either died or sold their homes to go into retirement communities or whatever and younger folks moved in. Then they opened up an apartment complex on Johnson, 2 streets over, to Section 8 [low-income] housing and shit really went downhill after that.

One of the biggest failures of “progressive” philosophy is the “magic dirt” theory:  that transplanting people from a bad place to a better place will somehow magically make them change, and act more like the people in the better neighborhood than they did in their old one.

As any amateur* student of human nature will tell you, that’s completely wrong.  Instead, the transplantees will bring all their old behaviors to the better place, and infect it with thuggery, crime and general lawlessness, to the point where the original inhabitants of that (no longer) “better” area simply pack up and move.  Then that’s referred to derisively by the “planners” as “White flight” or, to be more accurate, as “middle-class flight” (which is what it is).

Then the neighborhoods go to shit, as Kenny observes, the schools start to fail, businesses also leave and voilà!  a shithole is created where no shithole existed before.  By social redistributionism.  (In this case, not of wealth but of antisocial behavior, to make it somehow more “fair”.)

And no matter how often it fails, the Leftists (as always) continue the practice, again and again, because Leftist activity only concerns itself with intentions, and outcomes are always the fault of others rather than of the basic Marxist principle.  (The “others”, of course, being “capitalism”, “greedy businessmen”, “bankers” or, more recently, “racism”.)

*the “professional” students of human behavior are the ones who initiate and perpetuate this foolishness, reminding me of the (paraphrased) expression that so stupid and wrongheaded a precept could only have been produced by an academic — academia, of course, never having to live with the consequences of their folly.

Back To The Classic

Modernism

Thanks to Alert Reader SeanF, I see that I am not alone in my hatred of Modernist architecture:

A new study finds 72 percent of Americans prefer traditional architecture for U.S. courthouses and federal office buildings, including majorities across political, racial, sex, and socioeconomic categories. The survey was conducted by The Harris Poll on behalf of National Civic Art Society and polled more than 2,000 U.S. adults.
These findings come in light of the possibility of a Trump administration executive order, appropriately named Make Federal Buildings Beautiful Again, that would require that new office buildings in Washington, D.C. be classical in design. Among other things, the order would revise the 1962 “Guiding Principles for Federal Architecture,” which forced modernism to be the official government building style.

Indeed, the picture in the article states it better than anything:

Needless to say, the Ungodly have set about trying to stop this most worthy cause:

In response to the leak of the potential order, a bill entitled the “Democracy in Design Act” was proposed by House Democrats to overturn it.

…which simply reminds us that winning back the House in November is Job #2.

One of the most heartening things about this website comes from people who write to me and say, “I thought I was the only one who believed in this kind of thing” , and who were astonished to find a kindred soul in both my writings and the support of my Readers.

Now it’s the Federalist ‘s turn to do it for me.  How gratifying.

King Midas In Reverse

Bad News, Marxists, Modernism, Two-Minute Hate

No, not the awful Graham Nash song.  This is a clear and concise look at how the Left has turned everything it touched — and eventually controlled — into shit.

The hard Left believes its mission is so critical, so morally superior, that all means can be justified to achieve its noble ends. And so almost every institution that the Left has in its line of vision is now petrifying.

Of course, Victor Davis Hanson is too much of a gentleman to say what I said, bless him.  But “petrified” means “turned to stone” (hence his title of the article), and academia, Hollywood, urban centers, sports and the military’s leadership have not been thus transformed.  Turned into stone — at any stage before, say, 2002 would have been fine;  but now it’s all gone to shit, and we have the Left to thank for it.

Read the whole thing.

 

Vanishing Point

Drive Time, Modernism, Traditions

I have spoken often of my distaste for much of modern life, and here’s just one more thing to make me want to pack a picnic lunch and an assault rifle, and go find a tall building somewhere.

Sadly, the end of the manual transmission is near, and the unfortunate truth is few people will miss it. Most young adults don’t know how to drive a vehicle with a manual transmission, and they aren’t interested in learning. Many modern automatics offer better fuel efficiency and quicker acceleration than their manual counterparts. Porsche now delivers 75% of its 718 and 911 sports cars with automatic transmissions. The new C8 Corvette is only available with one. When the stick shift loses Porsche and Corvette buyers, you know it’s quickly heading for the rearview mirror.

But it gets worse.

In the future, cars won’t only be automatics; it appears they’ll increasingly be automated, electric vehicles. The satisfying throbbing of the exhaust and the pleasure of driving will also become victims of progress. Traveling in a personal vehicle will be as exciting as riding in an elevator with windows.

And this guy adds his take, talking about

the dystopian future in which you’ll sit passively in your computer-driven car with government-mandated speed limits and instantly-revocable travel permissions programmed in.

In the next year or so I’ll be needing to get a new car because the old Tiguan has north of 115,000 miles under its belt.  Don’t be surprised if I get something with a stick shift (assuming I can find one, and even if it does limit my choices), if for no other reason than to shake my fist at the Empire.

  

And just let some future asshole government mandate “smart” guns with chips embedded so that they can be “controlled” by some central source — essentially, the same principle as automated cars.

At that point, my prospective trip up to the rooftops won’t just be a joke anymore.

Heart Attacks

Modernism

Apparently, the owner of this house suffered several heart attacks during its construction.  When I saw the pics, I nearly had a couple too, albeit for different reasons.

From the article:

Milkman-turned-builder and artist Barry Surtees began his vision for the glass palace in 2007.

Actually, it looks like something a one-time milkman might have built. As an art gallery, it might have been okay, albeit still high up on a Hillary-Clinton-Industrial-Strength Ugly scale.  As an actual house to live in?  Heart attack material.  It reinforces my hatred of All Things Modern more than does Lady Gaga or rap music .

I think I’m going to need an extra shot of gin with my breakfast today.

Let’s Get Defunding

Military, Modernism

Seeing as how everyone’s getting all “defund this” and “defund that”, allow me to offer a few candidates out of this lot:

A U.S. Army email, sent after the Fourth of July to its military and civilian members, included a graphic which claimed saying the phrase “Make America Great Again” is evidence of “white supremacy.”
The graphic listed other behaviors it deemed evidence of white supremacy, including, “Celebration of Columbus Day,” the “Denial of White Privilege,” “Talking about ‘American Exceptionalism,’” and saying “There’s Only One Human Race.”

Rep. Mo Brooks (R-AL, duh) is all over this, and he:

…has sent a letter to U.S. Army Secretary Ryan McCarthy, demanding an investigation.
Brooks asked McCarthy to answer the following:

1. Who within the Department of the Army is responsible for the creation of the email and document?

2. Who within the Department of the Army approved the email and document?

3. Pursuant to the creation and approval of the document, was there a violation of either the Hatch Act or DoD Directive 1344.10?

4. If a violation of the Hatch Act or DoD Directive 1344.10 is found to have occurred, will those responsible be held accountable for their actions?

5. If it is found that a violation occurred (which seems pretty obvious), how will those federal employees be held accountable for their illegal conduct?

The Army needs to stamp out this bullshit toot sweet, and defund the people responsible (every single one who falls into the above five questions), i.e. either by court-martial and dishonorable discharge, by RIF-ing their asses out of existence or (if some civilian asshole is involved) fire them with loss of all benefits and privileges.  (I leave it to my .dot-mil veteran Readers, e.g. Staff Martin, to offer the precise details in Comments.)

I’m not going to go overboard and throw the “treason” word around — it’s been used way too cavalierly just recently — but if we take on faith that the “MAGA” expression belongs to the C-in-C (and it does), what’s going on here is (at best) gross insubordination.

I’m being quite serious, here.  This nonsense does not belong in our Armed Forces;  their job is to help keep America great, but if they can’t be trusted to do that — and this is a prime indicator that they can’t — there needs to be some kind of ill wind that blows all the non-essential, and even the marginally-essential, REMFs  out into the fucking trash can.

ArmySec McCarthy needs to jump on this quickly, have answers for Brooks with 24 hours, or face termination himself.