Albert Pinkham Ryder, With Sloping Mast and Dipping Prow, ca. 1880-1885

“LOOK AT a pilot in a storm, a soldier on the field of battle, an athlete in the arena. No one can tell what you are capable of, no, not even your ownself, unless you are exercised with afflictions of various kinds. There is need of trial in order to become acquainted with oneself. No one has ever learnt what he could do except by trying. Great men rejoice at times in adversity, just as brave soldiers exult in battle. Virtue is greedy of danger, and thinks of whither it is advancing, not of what it will have to endure, since whatever it endures is a part of its glory. How can I tell what advance you have made in Trust towards God, if all things turn out as you desire? How can I tell what courage you have to bear poverty, if you are rolling in riches? How can I tell what constancy you have to endure ignominy, and disgrace, and universal hatred, if you reach old age amid the approbation of all, and pass your life without an enemy? In good truth, there is need of trial for the knowledge of self. There is no great difficulty in saying in prosperity, ‘The Lord  is my Firmament, my Refuge, and my Deliverer.’ If a beggar begins for the first time to say,’I am now easy in my mind; this week, at least, I shall not be starved,’ when he has a bag bursting with bread, he shows that he is a man destitute of hope.’Hope that is seen is not hope; for what a man seeth, why doth he hope for? But if we hope for that which we see not, we wait for it with patience.’ [Rom. VIII. 24, 25] Our Trust, therefore, shines most conspicuously at that time when flowing blood proclaims wounds, when waves beat into the frail ship, when we are enclosed in difficulties; this is the place, and this is the time for Trust.

— Fr. Jeremias Drexelius, Heliotropium: Conformity of the Human Will to the Divine, Book Five, Chapter Three

“IT IS, therefore, not a matter of indifference what religion a man professes; he must profess the right and true religion, and without that there is no hope of salvation, for it stands to reason, my dear people, that if God reveals a thing or teaches a thing, He wants to be believed. Not to believe is to insult God.

Doubting His word, or believing even with doubt and hesitating, is an insult to God, because it is doubting His Sacred Word. We must, therefore, believe without doubting, without hesitating.

I have said, out of the Catholic Church there is no Divine faith —– can be no Divine faith out of that Church. Some of the Protestant friends will be shocked at this, to hear me say that out of the Catholic Church there is no Divine faith, and that without faith there is no salvation, but damnation. I will prove all I have said.”

— Fr. Arnold Damen, S.J., “The One True Church“

RABBIS call for eating kosher food in response to “global warming.”

MY latest comments on a recent review of the 1975 movie, The Stepford Wives, can be read at the bottom of this entry.

E. MICHAEL JONES, in this interview at the Patriarchy Podcast, has interesting thoughts about the effects of pornography, including social isolation and passivity in men. Increased personal indebtedness and pornography are “two sides of the same coin,” he says.

Start the interview at minute 26:00.

I WAS in the dentist’s chair today, undergoing torture, when the announcer on the pop station playing overhead interjected between two songs, “If your wife’s angry, tell her she’s over-reacting! Try it!! It works.”

I had to laugh at the way he just tossed that in there and moved on to other things. I bet electricians, roofers and other tradesmen listen to that particular radio station all day. As they are working, some of them are probably thinking, “What did I do wrong?”

I don’t mean to make light of men who have lost almost everything because their wives are mad. Those serious cases aside, is this a good suggestion for the ordinary kind of anger a husband may encounter? No, I don’t think it is — even if she is over-reacting.

Men may be genuinely perplexed or taken off guard when a wife gets mad at them. They may truly not understand why she is so upset. The worst thing they can do in response is 1) get angry themselves or 2) just dismiss a wife’s feelings. Saying, “You’re just over-reacting,” is a form of dismissal. I think it will just make things worse. Read More »

One of many books written in the 50s and 60s  about flying saucers

In Saucerology, as in much else in modern life, there was a passionate desire not to know and not to learn.  I saw this in the way journalists and Saucer Fans reacted when it was determined that a certain Flying Saucer incident involved the planet Venus. It was typical for them to say “It was just Venus” or “It was only Venus.” The key words there are “just” and “only.”  

****

ALAN writes:

Nearly half a century has gone by since I last spoke with my friend Arthur. He was a chemist who worked for a company in south St. Louis. I never called him Arthur. He called himself “Art” and encouraged me to do likewise, even though he was old enough to be my father.

He was born in St. Louis but at one point moved to California and attended Hollywood High School. He then came back to St. Louis and worked as a teacher, swimming instructor, and with the Boy Scouts.

We met in 1967 because of our mutual interest in science and the Flying Saucer controversy. Separately, each of us had read many accounts by people like military and commercial airline pilots who said they had seen extraordinary objects in the sky.  Each of us had read the 1956 book The Report on Unidentified Flying Objects by USAF Captain Edward Ruppelt, whose job it had been to investigate and evaluate such accounts.  I bought my paperback edition at a small bookshop next to the Ritz Theater on South Grand Boulevard (both demolished years ago).  I remember reading that book in my bedroom on the night in January 1967 when a tornado struck St. Louis County.

I was a misfit at age 17. Nearly all teenage boys liked sports, cars, and girls. I liked girls but had zero interest in sports and cars. I preferred to read and to think. The Saucer Mystery provided an opportunity to do both.

While eating breakfast on the morning of Nov. 2, 1966, I heard a radio news announcer say that a UFO was in the sky at that very moment.  So I went outside to see it, and there it was: A small silvery object high in the clear, blue southwestern sky.  But it wasn’t a UFO.  It didn’t even have the letters “UFO” painted on it. I was rather disappointed that no alien beings were standing on the top deck and waving to me. Read More »

“IT IS much to be regretted that persons who have many important things concerning their spiritual welfare on their minds, from pride and false shame, would rather go to perdition than ask advice, solely for fear of showing their ignorance.”

— Leonard Goffine, 1871 Read More »

AMERICAN-style feminism has met a serious foe in the patriotism of the British.

Social media and newspapers comments sections continue to show stinging condemnation of Meghan Markle for the decision by her and Prince Harry to set off on their own. “Megxit” is an insult to the queen and taxpayers who support the monarchy, many say. Buckingham Palace is reportedly in crisis mode. A meeting is scheduled between the Queen and her grandson tomorrow.

Many believe Meghan is responsible. “Meghan is blamed for the couple’s bombshell move, with just 4 per cent saying it was Harry.” (The Daily Mail)

It’s ironic that a beautiful woman and feminist should be at odds with an institution that has produced some of the most powerful women in the world. Here’s the 93-year-old, indestructible queen driving her Land Rover on the grounds of Sandringham House yesterday.

Women’s rights are Meghan’s burning cause. The new foundation she and Harry have created emphasizes that mission. She is reported to have been deeply unhappy in her role as royal emissary and wanting to put her own stamp on her future — even though she hasn’t been with Harry, pseudo-marriage that it is, for two years [yet].

Feminism has been a sort of religion for Meghan since she was a young girl — and who can blame her since she was surrounded by it at an impressionable age? Even at 11, she was swept up into the cult. Her efforts to get Palmolive to stop associating its dishwashing liquid with women show a truly touching idealism. Read More »

Irvin Kline, c1910 Postcard

I DON’T approve of racial discrimination in hiring, but the literary star Louisa May Alcott most definitely did.

Curiously, this did not affect her sensational success. A new movie version of her novel, Little Women, is showing in theaters now — and yet no one is suggesting a boycott. Very few people even know about Alcott’s racism.

Her main beef was with the Irish. After working with Irish maids, Alcott decided never to hire them again.

In 1874, Alcott wrote an article, “The Servant Girl Problem,” recommending that other women not hire Irish servants too. She apparently wanted to make this discrimination global.

 Last spring, it became my turn to keep house for a very mixed family of old and young, with very different tastes, tempers and pursuits. For several years Irish incapables have reigned in our kitchen, and general discomfort has pervaded the house. The girl then serving had been with us a year, and was an unusually intelligent person, but the faults of her race seemed to be unconquerable, and the winter had been a most trying one all around.

My first edict was, “Biddy must go.” “You won’t get any one else, mum, so early in the season,” said Biddy, with much satisfaction at my approaching downfall. “Then I’ll do the work myself, so you can pack up,” was my undaunted reply. Biddy departed, sure of an early recall, and for a month I do the work myself, looking about meantime for help.

“No Irish need apply,” was my answer to the half-dozen girls who, spite of Biddy’s prophecy, did come to take the place.

I would like to know more about those “faults of her race,” but Alcott does not specify. She eventually found competent American women:

Dear ladies, don’t say this is sentimental or impossible, but try it in all good faith, and take the word of one who has known both sides of the mistress and maid question, that if you do your part faithfully you need never again have your substance wasted, your peace destroyed and your home invaded by foreign incapables.

I have no problem with Alcott’s hate crimes. In finding fault with the Irish, I actually think she had a point. But then I’m Irish.

Not all big-shot literary figures disliked Irish maids. Emily Dickinson was said to have been inspired by hers. For myself, I’d happily employ a defective Irish housekeeper, if I could afford it. Better to have one than be one. Read More »

AFUA HIRSCH, author and barrister, adds to the chorus of those who say Meghan Markle, the Duchess of Sussex, has been driven from her royal duties by the racism of the British people. Writing in The New York Times, Hirsch says:

I am not at all surprised. This was the bitter shadow of their sunny May 2018 wedding. How many of us suspected — hoping but doubting we were wrong — that what would really initiate Meghan into her new role as a Briton with African heritage would be her experience of British racism. And ironically, by taking matters into their own hands, Harry and Meghan’s act of leaving — two fingers up at the racism of the British establishment — might be the most meaningful act of royal leadership I’m ever likely to see.

Ms. Hirsch, who is black and Jewish, comes up with not one serious attack on Markle’s heritage. Everything, including a supposedly offensive brooch worn by Princess Michael of Kent and a stupid joke by a BBC journalist who was instantly fired, is petty. A woman of African descent is welcomed into the British Royal Family and given a $32 million wedding. And the British are racist!?

The Ashanti Royal Family of Ghana (below) does not look any more racially diverse than the British royal family. Would Hirsch consider it racist if it treated a foreign-born white woman with the same level of respect that Meghan has received?

Racial consciousness is part of human nature. But few societies have eliminated its overt expression for one particular group as much as modern Britain. Hirsch’s screed reads like a rant of jealousy. And behind this dark envy is a desire to get people to focus on race more, not less. Hirsch, who has argued that Nelson’s Column in Trafalgar Square is a symbol of white supremacy, is the author of  Brit(ish): On Race, Identity and Belonging and is a product of British elite schools. She seems to have done well for herself in racist Britain. If highly altruistic whites didn’t get a masochistic thrill out of being accused of racial hatred and if they didn’t have genuine goodwill toward non-whites, she surely would not be enjoying such success. The very existence of her article proves that what she says is not true and that the opposite is true: white Britons are surrounded by a sea of resentment.

The Ashanti Royal Family of Ghana

If the media paid more attention to Britain’s communities of color, perhaps it would find the announcement far less surprising. With a new prime minister whose track record includes overtly racist statements, some of which would make even Donald Trump blush, a Brexit project linked to native nationalism and a desire to rid Britain of large numbers of immigrants, and an ever thickening loom of imperial nostalgia, many of us are also thinking about moving.

How about it, Ms. Hirsch? Why not go?

THE BRITISH people welcomed her with open arms even though she was a divorced, 37-year-old American actress whose bridal expiration date was fast approaching. Now they are accused of “racism” after Meghan Markle and Prince Harry take the “unprecedented” step of announcing they are moving to Canada for part of the year and abandoning many of their royal duties. Their action, which has met with heavy criticism, was preceded by a significant downturn in the Duchess of Sussex’s public reputation.

Race, it seems, was not the cause of her alienation from her role, at least not on the part of the British. Meghan, who is biracial, is more of an American celebrity than a British royal. Her advocacy, for instance, of global menstruation rights for women was more in tune with the vanity politics of Hollywood stars than British royalty, as much as the two cultures resemble each other. As Sam Greenhill of The Daily Mail writes:

Their (Harry and Meghan’s) preaching to ordinary people about how they should lead their lives — particularly about climate change — and what has come to be seen as a drip, drip, drip of complaints about how they are treated, has led to a real disconnect.

A woman who believed her baby’s movement in the womb was “the embryonic kicking of feminism” and championed transgenderism might be too much for even the British to take. Or is that too idealistic a view? In any event, in one poll, she was only exceeded in unpopularity by Prince Andrew.

Richard Kay, also with The Daily Mail,  examines Meghan Markle’s tenure so far in the House of Windsor.

Meghan’s decision to hold an extravagant baby shower in New York didn’t just shock people, it offended them, too. What possible justification could there be for the private jets — no matter who picked up the bill — as well as luxury hotels, lavish parties and expensive baby gifts?

It was the kind of look associated with the Kardashians, not the Windsors.

Then came the biggest shock of all — the secrecy over the birth of baby Archie.

Here, not just tradition but common sense was upended. They announced there would be no bulletins on when or where the baby would be born, no traditional photograph and they even declined to say who was in charge of delivery.

This didn’t just upset royal fans but the Royal Family, too. Read More »

IS AMERICA THE real target of Trump’s latest aggression against Iran?

Instantly-activated protestors gathered within 24 hours of the drone strike against Iranian General Quassem Soleimani last week. They were complete with pre-printed signs in big cities across America.  (Some conservatives followed suit in welcoming a decline in American power.)

The protestors included activists from the feminist peace group Codepink, which supported the Castro government in Cuba and many Cultural Marxist causes. ResistFascism.org, another major organizer of protests, supports Castro, Communists in Nicaragua and socialists in Venezuela. Resist is funded by the Soros-backed, Communist-affiliated Alliance for Global Justice

Communismpink has an annual income of about $1.4 million and is also connected to Soros’s Open Society Foundations,  as well as other tax-exempt foundations. Its founder is Medea Benjamin.

According to Influence Watch:

Originally named Susan, Medea Benjamin was born in 1952 to a Jewish family in Long Island, New York. She changed her name to Medea, a Greek mythological character that murdered her children,^[6] due to her studies after high school.^[7] She has never legally changed her name.^[8]

Benjamin lived in Fidel Castro’s Cuba from 1979 to 1983, marrying a pro-Castro Cuban during her time in the country.^[9]  During her time in the country, Benjamin praised the Castro regime in print, but after she wrote an article against certain policies of the regime,^[10] she was deported.

Medea!? What a great role model! Not exactly a peaceful character for these pinko peaceniks:

According to Euripides‘ version, Medea took her revenge by sending Glauce a dress and golden coronet, covered in poison. This resulted in the deaths of both the princess and the king, Creon, when he went to save his daughter. Medea then continued her revenge, murdering two of her children herself. Afterward, she left Corinth and flew to Athens in a golden chariot driven by dragons sent by her grandfather, Helios, god of the sun. [Source]

By the way, why do women fall for this sickening politicization of the color pink? It’s patronizing and juvenile! It’s crass political branding, the kind of thing that could only be thought up by people with too much money and contempt for the people. It also contradicts the feminist message. I mean, shouldn’t women be rejecting pink? The whole thing almost seems to be making fun of and caricaturing women, but then feminism has been one long war against female dignity. I support the cause of peace, but I wouldn’t be caught dead in a sugary-pink hat.

Communism and feminism never were primarily grassroots movements, though the grassroots have volunteered by the millions. It’s revolution from above, as the author Kerry Bolton put it.

If both Muslims and Westerners saw America as the epitome of evil and civil war broke out here, who would most benefit? That’s an interesting question.

Daily Mail

I’m not even believing Soleimani was killed until I know more. I’m not believing America is the greatest threat to world peace until it initiates another war. I’m also not believing Trump’s statements about Iran, which are right from the neocon playbook.

Please join my poorly-funded Organization for the Rejection of Mass Hysteria, which doesn’t even have an office. Don’t fall for Trump Derangement Syndrome or Trump Devotion Syndrome. Don’t rush to conclusions.

Chicago/ Daily Mail

Washington/ Daily Mail

The Appearance of the Star, Giovanni da Modena; 1412

MY HUSBAND, older son and I went to a caroling party a couple of weeks ago. The party was mostly adults, but a couple of teenagers were there too. And there were two children, a sister and a brother, under the age of 12. Everyone was cheerful and determined to have fun. The children, both dressed in dark sweatshirts, were restless, almost agitated. They roamed about the rooms until the singing began.

We went to a basement room and the adults began belting out all the popular carols to a keyboard accompaniment. Everyone sang louder than usual. There had been a death in the family of our hosts just a few months before.

The singing continued when the girl, who was about nine or ten, sat down on the floor close to the center of the room. As I remember it now, no one else was sitting on the floor. She crossed her legs and adopted the lotus position. She placed her upward-turned hands on her knees, brought her index fingers and thumbs together, and closed her eyes.

As she sat there with her eyelids tightly shut and partook of lofty, Asiatic detachment from the scene around her, I remembered another caroling party of many years ago.

At that party, children outnumbered the adults by at least two to one. We were gathered in the basement of a modest suburban house to celebrate the Epiphany, the girls in party dresses and the boys in pants and collared shirts. One of the mothers had made three crowns and a large, gold foil-covered star. I was no more than four years old and by some miracle, I was chosen to wear the star on a string around my neck. I walked slowly around a post in the room followed by three boys wearing crowns.

We three kings of orient are,
Bearing gifts we traverse afar
Field and fountain, moor and mountain,
Following yonder star.

Oh, star of wonder, star of night,
Star with royal beauty bright.
Westward leading, still proceeding,
Guide us with thy perfect light.

Everyone sang. I was astounded at my good fortune to be a character — a very important one too — in this drama, so intense and mysterious. I was not sure what “moor and mountain” were, but I was a human star showing the wise men the way, over difficult terrain. That I knew.

Oh, star of wonder, star of night,
Star with royal beauty bright.

I did not want this night — or stardom — to end, not ever. And my small heart overflowed with a hope and wonder I will never forget.

[Don’t miss the “March of the Kings” by British composer Vaughan Williams, a great piece of Christmas music for the Epiphany.]

IN Calvinist America (remember, the Puritans didn’t even celebrate Christmas), the Christmas season doesn’t last much past the busy season of preparation and shopping. It’s a festive time before Christmas, but it doesn’t leave much room for the observance of Advent. Then there’s just one week of celebration between Christmas and New Year’s. It’s kind of topsy turvy. Discarded trees appear on curbs right after New Year’s Day. There is no room in packed calendars and work lives for one of the greatest feasts in the Christmas calendar, the Epiphany on January 6, which marks the day when three highly cultured philosopher kings came from the East to Bethlehem. Their systems of thought now exhausted, these intellectuals were drawn by a mysterious revelation to search for a child who was  a manifestation of divine light. And they found a helpless baby. Here was no symbol or sign. Here was Wisdom itself. Here was no illumination of the mind alone. Their hearts were enlightened too. Their search ended, they fell to their knees and adored.

Today, as Eastern mysticism and the cult of “mindfulness” spread in the West, let’s remember that these ideas are not new, but very ancient. This road was traveled by the Magi.

G.K. Chesterton wrote, in The Everlasting Man:

It is still a strange story, though an old one, how they came out of orient lands, crowned with the majesty of kings and clothed with something of the mystery of magicians. That truth that is tradition has wisely remembered them almost as unknown quantities, as mysterious as their mysterious and melodious names; Melchior, Caspar, Balthazar. But there came with them all that world of wisdom that had watched the stars in Chaldea and the sun in Persia; and we shall not be wrong if we see in them the same curiosity that moves all the sages.They would stand for the same human ideal if their names had really been Confucius or Pythagoras or Plato. They were those who sought not tales, but the truth of things; and since their truth was itself a thirst for God, they also have had their reward. (The Everlasting Man, Ignatius Press; p. 176)

Here is more from Dom Prosper Guéranger’s Liturgical Year:

The Feast of the Epiphany is the continuation of the mystery of Christmas; but it appears on the Calendar of the Church with its own special character. Its very name, which signifies Manifestation, implies that it celebrates the apparition of God to his creatures.

For several centuries, the Nativity of our Lord was kept on this day; and when, in the year 376, the decree of the Holy See obliged all Churches to keep the Nativity on the 25th December, as Rome did – the Sixth of January was not robbed of all its ancient glory. It was still to be called the Epiphany, and the Baptism of our Lord Jesus Christ was also commemorated on this same Feast, which Tradition had marked as the day on which that Baptism took place.

The Greek Church gives this Feast the venerable and mysterious name of Theophania, which is of such frequent recurrence in the early Fathers, as signifying a divine Apparition. We find this name applied to this Feast by Eusebius, St. Gregory Nazianzum, and St. Isidore of Pelusium. In the liturgical books of the Melchite Church the Feast goes under no other name.

The Orientals call this solemnity also the holy on account of its being the day on which Baptism was administered, (for, as we have just mentioned, our Lord was baptised on this same day.) Baptism is called by the holy Fathers Illumination, and they who received it [are] Illuminated.

Lastly, this Feast is called, in many countries, King’s Feast: it is, of course, an allusion to the Magi, whose journey to Bethlehem is so continually mentioned in to-day’s Office.

The Epiphany shares with the Feasts of Christmas, Easter, Ascension, and Pentecost, the honour of being called, in the Canon of the Mass, a Day most holy. It is also one of the cardinal Feasts, that is, one of those on which the arrangement of the Christian Year is based; for, as we have Sundays after Easter, and Sundays after Pentecost, so also we count six Sundays after the Epiphany.

The Epiphany is indeed great Feast, and the joy caused us by the Birth of our Jesus must be renewed on it, for, as though it were a second Christmas Day, it shows us our Incarnate God in a new light. It leaves us all the sweetness of the dear Babe of Bethlehem, who hath appeared to us already in love; but to this it adds its own grand manifestation of the divinity of our Jesus. At Christmas, it was a few Shepherds that were invited by the Angels to go and recognise THE WORD MADE FLESH; but now, at the Epiphany, the voice of God himself calls the whole world to adore this Jesus, and hear him.

I APPRECIATED comments by readers on a video review I posted of the 1975 movie “The Stepford Wives.” As readers pointed out, the reviewer failed to mention the major plot twist in the movie. I don’t think this failure affected his basic point. It appears to have truly been a movie that portrayed housewives as conformist robots, but he didn’t mention that the men in the movie killed the housewife characters and replaced them with real robots.

For another reason, however, I removed the video. A possibly blasphemous comment in the review couldn’t be edited out by me.

I’ll have to review this movie myself. The later 2004 version probably was not as influential as the 1975 version. Stay tuned. And thank you to alert readers. Their comments are below.

By the way, according to Wikipedia, feminists gave the movie mixed reviews:

Initial reaction to the film by feminist groups was not favorable,^[8] with one studio screening for feminist activists being met with “hisses, groans, and guffaws.”^[8] Cast and crew disagreed with the perceived anti-woman interpretations …, recalling “Bryan [Forbes] always used to say, ‘If anything, it’s anti-men!'”^[8] Despite Betty Friedan’s The Feminine Mystique being a major influence on the original novel upon which the film was based, Friedan’s response to the film was highly critical, calling it “a rip-off of the women’s movement.”^[21] Friedan commented that women should boycott the film and attempt to diminish any publicity for it.^[22]

Writer Gael Greene, however, lauded the film, commenting: “I loved it—those men were like a lot of men I’ve known in my life.”^[22]

Read More »

THE NEW YEAR is here and that means it’s the time of year to reprimand one of Europe’s most famous arts institutions: the Vienna Philharmonic, known for its famous New Year’s Day concerts.

This year, the philharmonic got hit from two directions: on one side, for long playing a particular arrangement of Johann Strauss’s famous Radetzky March. The arrangement was written by a member of the National Socialist Party. Leopold Weninger wrote it in 1914, decades before the National Socialists existed. Despite the immense, worldwide popularity of the march, which always ended the New Year’s concert, the orchestra’s most famous annual event, the philharmonic for the first time this year replaced it with another, less rousing arrangement. You can see the former version, with all that disgusting, patriotic clapping, in the video above. Unfortunately, I don’t have a clip of the new one.

That the famous orchestra prefer to disassociate itself from Nazism by undermining a jubilant celebration that has nothing to do with Nazism is not unreasonable, I suppose, but then could we have some balance please?

For instance, could the orchestra stop performing the works of Russian composer Sergei Prokofiev and other artists who had connections with the Soviet government, under which tens of millions of innocent people were sent to their deaths and killed in deliberate famines? Prokofiev voluntarily returned to Soviet Russia after living in the West for two decades; he wrote music meant to boost the morale of the Soviet army; won Stalin prizes and in 1937 composed a cantata celebrating the 20th anniversary of the Bolshevik revolution, featuring musical settings of texts by Stalin, Marx and Lenin.

Now I don’t believe Prokofiev’s beautiful compositions should be banished, but if musical works are to be judged by the political connections of musicians, then we have to roll up our sleeves and get to work, not just with connections to Nazism, but with connections to Soviet Communism, which killed far more people and is still alive today. (We hear far less about Soviet atrocities. Is that because they were so often committed under Semitic leadership?)

Sergei Prokofiev wrote for the Soviet government and never publicly resisted Marxist Communism.

The Vienna Philharmonic was also scolded, as it has been many times, for having once been an all-male ensemble. The New York Times, to its credit, admits in this year’s critical piece that women were not excluded from performing classical music in the last three centuries.

For the most part, however, women performed in private, not in public, except in all-female ensembles ….

Yes, that’s very true, and one could even say that through their informal role, women performed more than men and did more to promote classical music. However, Farah Nayeri, author of The Times piece, trivializes the reason for the exclusion from orchestras:

Entire sections of the orchestra remained male because their instruments were considered unladylike.

The cello was deemed indecorous because it had to be placed between a player’s legs. Flutes and horns were thought to make a woman’s face look funny; percussion instruments were viewed as exclusively male.

That’s ridiculous. Women do look undignified with a cello between their legs, but professional orchestras were entirely or primarily male because men had the duty to financially support their families, a burden which women did not have to the same degree. The main thing that distinguished the professional orchestras from the private groups in which women played was that the musicians were paid, often enough to support a family.

Women are now part of the Vienna Philharmonic. And we live in a world where the family struggles far more. The point never was that women were inferior musicians. Eventually, the arts decline, as does civilization in general, when the family does. If you read through the lives of famous musicians and composers, you will find that many of them were inspired by mothers who loved music. The burden of proof rests with the believers in equality. No society has produced great art without great sacrifices — and one of those sacrifices is female success in the world, rather than the home.

Yikes! The horror! An all-male Vienna Philharmonic, back in the ages when women were hated even though men spent all their working lives supporting them.

Read More »