IF you haven’t yet read  “The Tyranny of Artistic Modernism” by Mark Anthony Signorelli and Nikos A. Salingaros at The New English Review, I highly recommend it. The authors describe modern art as a totalitarian cult of ugliness. They write:

Whereas earlier traditions of artistic creation embraced symmetry within complexity, modernism has embraced extreme simplicity, dislocation, and imbalance. Whereas earlier traditions sought to bring pleasure to an audience — “to teach and delight,” as Horace’s famous dictum would have it — modern art attempts to “nauseate” or “brutalize” an audience (the terms are from Jacques Barzun’s The Use and Abuse of Art). Whereas pre-modern architecture employed scale and ornament, modern architecture aggressively promotes gigantisms and barrenness. Whereas classical literature was grounded in regular grammar and public imagery, modern literature routinely resorts to distortions of syntax and esotericism. (more…)

MY parents did something when I was young that would be unthinkable to today’s hovering, safety-conscious parents. My two younger twin sisters ate dinner in the kitchen by themselves while we — my parents and their other five children — ate in the dining room. (more…)

SJF writes:

As I’ve mentioned before, we homeschool our six children. One of the subjects we emphasize is history, especially American history. Whenever we travel, we prepare the children ahead of time for historical sites. So, for example, last spring, I took my 12- and 10-year-old to Washington, D.C. so they could visit the sites they had studied over the past year, such as Mt. Vernon.

We are about to leave on summer vacation, and will head into the Colorado Rockies. (more…)

EDWARD BARTLETT, of Stop Abusive and Violent Environments (SAVE), sends the following summary of recent events on college campuses under the new U.S. Department of Education sexual assault directive.

Civil Liberties Took a Beating on College Campuses

The first full academic year following the Department of Education’s release of its Sexual Assault Directive has come to a close. The Directive was announced by the Office for Civil Rights on April 4, 2011 without prior notice or opportunity for public comment. Two days later, civil rights expert Wendy Kaminer deplored the “authoritarian impulse” that gave rise to the Directive and predicted it would occasion, in her words, “tragic deprivations of liberty.” (more…)

JESSE POWELL writes:

Bryan Fischer has spoken out on his radio show Focal Point about the Lisa Miller case. Fischer is the Director of Issues Analysis for the American Family Association. The American Family Association and the recently-attacked Family Research Council were both listed as “hate groups” by the Southern Poverty Law Center in November 2010. Here is a twelve-minute segment from his radio show in which he gives background information on the Lisa Miller case.

It is entitled, “We need an underground railroad to protect children from same-sex environments.”

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  I WROTE in a previous post that the opening and closing ceremonies of the London Olympics featured flashes of the demonic, and among the moments I was thinking of  was this appearance of Lord Voldemort (photo above). At Tradition in Action, Margaret C. Galitzin provides a truly outstanding critique of the opening ceremonies. Her analysis affirms my point and explains how even the dozens of Mary Poppinses who floated down from the sky above the Olympic stadium were part of the ceremony's satanic message.

HOW can a mother abduct her own child and be considered a kidnapper because she refused to hand over the child to the woman who was once her lesbian lover? It can happen when parental rights are defined by the liberal State. The case of Lisa Miller, who presumably fled to Nicaragua with her daughter, resulted in the conviction in Vermont this week of Kenneth Miller, the Amish-Mennonite who is believed to have helped Lisa Miller flee from a court ruling which had awarded partial custody of her daughter to Janet Jenkins.

Below is the story from The New York Times:

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THE STORY OF yesterday’s shooting at the conservative Family Research Council was buried on page 15 in the front section of The New York Times today. Imagine if a tea party member with a gun had sought entry to the offices of a homosexual organization and had shot a security guard. That presumably would have been played differently. At Newsbusters, Tim Graham reports that ABC was the only of the three major networks to offer a complete story.

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PAULA BLANCHARD writes:

I have repeatedly posted my feelings on homosexuality on Facebook and have wondered why I never, ever get any response from my 300 plus friends (positive or negative). And then recently a friend whom I have known for at least 30 years privately messaged me to tell me that she loved reading the articles I post (often from your blog or links that you recommend). She regrets that she can’t comment or even post articles like that herself because she would probably lose her job over politically incorrect comments. Aaahaa! It doesn’t bode well for this country when a person cannot speak their mind. Kind of reminds me of the state of Communist block countries before the wall went down. Thank you for speaking up, but I do wonder if you have suffered any personal backlash? (more…)

THE FITNESS obsession in women is part of their overall loss of identity in the modern world. At her blog, Lydia Sherman explains why women don’t need expensive health clubs or time-consuming physical regimens. Staying fit involves mind and spirit. When a woman is oriented toward higher goods, she is healthier too. The home is a fitness club. Mrs. Sherman writes:

I have been collecting some ideas and techniques for the non-Olympic women who want to be fit but still look feminine. I discovered through viewing 19th century photographs and paintings that women were quite active in golf, tennis, swimming, bike riding, hand ball, hiking and walking. (more…)

FROM The Revelation of St. John the Divine, 11:19 – 12:6:

And the temple of God was opened in heaven, and there was seen in his temple the ark of his testament: and there were lightnings, and voices, and thunderings, and an earthquake, and great hail.

And there appeared a great wonder in heaven; a woman clothed with the sun, and the moon under her feet, and upon her head a crown of twelve stars: (more…)

PORTIA writes:

I saw your post on hiring married women, and the film example reminded me of a novel in which the then-common horror of divorce is central to the story, the first novel I read that made it clear to me on a gut level just how unthinkable divorce was once considered in polite society. The novel was Jane of Lantern Hill, by L.M. Montgomery (author of the well-known Anne novels).

Jane is brought up believing that her father is dead, but eventually learns that her parents are separated. Not divorced: Jane is eleven years old and has to ask what the word ‘divorce’ means. (more…)

CONSTANCE FOSTER writes:

I saw this photo of Mrs. Reagan and Mrs. Obama at a White House luncheon and was struck by the difference in their style of dress. Mrs. Reagan’s formal blouse, jacket, and earrings look elegant and authoritative. Mrs. Obama’s choice of two different patterns for a T-shirt and cardigan look far too casual for the event and would be more appropriate on a middle school teacher than the First Lady! I thought you would find this portrait of contrasts interesting given your previous attention to the decline of formality among public officials.

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KATHLENE M. writes:

  SEE this very funny cartoon at The Onion. The same could be said of today's Olympic boxers.

HERE IS another example of fraktur, the Pennsylvania German folk art that included colorful, handmade renditions of important documents, usually marriage and birth certificates, house blessings and bookplates. This is a “Reward of Merit” given to a student by a teacher in about 1830.

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A READER sent the photos below, one of herself when, as she put it, she was divorced and accepted feminist views of life, and the other when she was pregnant, married and had come to reject her former opinions. There is a striking difference, aside from the obvious change in her hair. The second photo lacks the hard edge and toughness of the first.

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