SPENGLER, a.k.a. David Goldman, has an interesting piece at Asia Times about the proliferation of horror films. He writes:  

[W]hat accounts for the six-fold increase in the total number of horror films released since 1999? Subgenres such as erotic horror (mainly centered on vampires) and torture (the Saw series, for example) dig deep into the vulnerabilities of the adolescent psyche. Given the success of these films over the past 10 years, the number of Americans traumatizing themselves voluntarily is larger by an order of magnitude than it has ever been before.

There are any number of possible explanations for this phenomenon. What the bare facts show, however, is that moviegoers are now evincing a susceptibility to horror. People watch something in the theater because it resonates with something outside the theater. To see the cinematic representation of horrible things may be frightening, but the viewer knows that it is safe.

His point that this has to do with 9-11 and violence in the Muslim world does not seem plausible, but he also writes: (more…)

YEARS AGO, when I was in my twenties, I was driving one winter night along a four-lane highway near the city of Camden, New Jersey. It was bitter cold, windy and it had snowed the day before. The city of Camden, for those who are not familiar with it, is one of the most dangerous cities in America. I had spent time there. As a newspaper reporter, I had walked its streets during the daytime, visited its courtrooms and talked to its police officers. I had been in schools, I had interviewed teenage mothers and I had gone to the wretched home of the relatives of a murder victim. I spent time in the rectory of a group of priests who worked with the poor. I knew the area where several prostitutes had had their throats slit and were dumped in a ditch. (more…)

THOMAS F. BERTONNEAU writes:

Sweden illustrates better than any country I know the parasitic character of liberalism-socialism. In the mid-twentieth century, Sweden built itself up into a regional industrial power with a robust export-economy in goods ranging from grain and dairy products to heavy machinery and ships. Sweden’s role as a “neutral” in World War II was somewhat morally ambiguous (neutral now in favor of the Axis and neutral now in favor of the Allies), but it enabled the nation to survive the conflict without going to war. Because of that, Sweden entered the postwar period with intact industries and one of the most educated and disciplined populations in Europe. The decision not to import armaments after the war but to draw on domestic industry for defense needs was sound and had positive effects for the nation. (more…)

  THE Center for Work-Life Policy is a "think tank" based in New York City that devotes its considerable efforts to the ongoing transformation of society. The Center advocates, among other things, the replacement of the male corporate worker, particularly the white male professional, with the female corporate worker. Even though the income of working women has risen by about 30 percent since 1975, while the income of male workers has stagnated or declined slightly, the CWLP promotes continuing favoritism for women workers and feminist corporate policies. Given the extent to which women rely on male income, the case for female affirmative action is, and always has been, an intellectual hoax of the highest magnitude. Nevertheless, the CWLP receives sponsorship for its work from more than 60 corporations and federal agencies. They include Alcoa, PepsiCo, Pfizer, Time Warner, Siemens, General Mills, General Electric, GlaxoSmithKline, Google, the Central Intelligence Agency, the Federal Reserve Bank, the International Monetary Fund, Credit Suisse, Johnson & Johnson, the World Bank, and Vanguard. These corporations do not give to CWLP out of ideological committment. They are much less likely to suffer heavily from discrimination suits on behalf of female workers, suits often initiated by our own government, by supporting CWLP initiatives. At a CWLP press conference earlier this year to announce its report on subtle forms of discrimination keeping women from top corporate positions, Kenneth Chenault, CEO of American Express, was among those present to provide their endorsement. Why do I bring all this up? To remind you that those of use who oppose institutionalized feminism are up against massive commercial and…

JESSE POWELL writes:

I have heard Sweden referred to as a paradise many times. In Sweden, which is famous for its generous parental leave policies, everything is supposedly wonderful and the Swedish have no problems. In fact, Sweden has many of the same social problems found in the rest of Europe.

For instance, there was a radical decline in the proportion of women of reproductive age who were married from 1970 to the year 2000; even the 40-to-44 year old age group declined greatly in the proportion who were married. In addition, there is evidence of a remarkable growth in psychological and cognitive problems among the nation’s young, a phenomenon which cannot be attributed solely to the influx of foreign immigrants. Swedish parents now seem to lack normal parental skills, such as the ability to discipline their children.

The below table gives the proportion of women in Sweden who were married for each age group from 15 to 44 years old from 1970 to 2010.  (more…)

EDWIN RUBENSTEIN writes at VDare:

From January 2009 to August 2011 both whites and blacks suffered employment declines: Black employment fell by 540,000, or 3.5% and white employment fell by 2.5 million, or 1.8%.

By contrast, more Asians and Hispanics held jobs at the end of the period than at the start of the Obama years.

Particularly hard hit: Black teenagers. (more…)

WRITING in response to this post about a journalist who claims it is immoral to have children because they will harm the “environment,” Regina Hess writes:

Last week, my husband and I took our five children on a field trip to Plymouth Plantation in Massachusetts. I had forgotten how politically correct Plymouth had become, but was rudely jarred awake as we chatted with a Native American woman in the Crafts’ Building. (more…)

KAREN I. writes:

I quit Facebook after going to an old friend’s Facebook page and finding a death announcement. The family had posted a childhood picture of the deceased individual, with graphics of glittery stars around it. Along the top of the photo was “R.I.P.” I was stunned at the news and absolutely disgusted at the way it was announced. I deleted my account after that because I never want to learn awful news that way again. I still get upset thinking about it.  (more…)

THE WESTERN educated woman is so afraid of having children – so afraid of what it might require of her, so afraid of no longer breathing, thinking, and acting like a man, so afraid of losing friendships based on her status as careerist – that she reaches in her desperation for all kinds of popular superstitions to justify her psychological malformation.

Here is one of the most extreme examples. Lisa Hymas, writing in The Guardian, says she is not having children because of the effect they may have on the environment. To Hymas, human beings – not Third World human beings, but white Americans – are engaged in nothing more than environmental plunder. She writes: (more…)

FRED OWENS writes:

The dominant media is not CNN, The New York Times, or The Washington Post. It’s not FoxNews either. It’s Facebook. That’s where the nation and the world meets, connects, and relates. (more…)

AT VFR, Howard Sutherland writes:

Isn’t every Pope’s primary mission to proclaim the Gospel of Jesus Christ to all nations and call people–all people–to the Christian faith? Rather than make statements that imply an equivalence between Christianity and Islam, Pope Benedict should exhort those Moslems who have moved into Christian (or once-Christian) lands to enter into the life of those lands fully by embracing the Christian faith. (Of course, I would prefer that the Pope exhort Moslems in Europe–and everywhere else, for that matter–to embrace Christianity and then return to their ancestral homelands, there to proselytise among their kin still benighted by Islam. But if expecting the Pope to call Moslems to convert is unrealistic, how unrealistic is it to expect him to tell them to go home?) (more…)

THOUGH the federal government does not officially recognize the fraudulent institution of same-sex “marriage,” a major federal agency does. The Census Bureau issued revised 2010 figures yesterday for the number of same-sex couples, which it derives from respondents who say they are “married” to a member of the household of the same sex. (more…)

A WOMAN I know taught her son at home until he was eight. She was then considering sending him to a small private school. In order to apply to the school, the boy had to take an entrance exam. (more…)

  [T]he Captain had brought the Pinnace in near the Place where I at first landed my Rafts, and so landed just at my Door. I was at first ready to sink down with the Surprize. For I saw my Deliverance indeed visibly put into my Hands, all things easy, and a large Ship just ready to carry me away whither I pleased to go. At first, for some time, I was not able to answer him one Word; but as he had taken me in his Arms, I held fast by him, or I should have fallen to the Ground.                                              -- Robinson Crusoe, Daniel DeFoe, (Chapt. 27)

ALYCE writes:

I think you are wonderful. 

You are a friend of women, and make me proud to be a woman also. You are a friend to those I love most – my sons, my daughter, my husband, my father.  (more…)

THOMAS writes:

I am a third-year student at a major law school. Since family law is tested on the bar exam, I decided that it would be smart to take a family law course. The professor is a woman who is a Brigham Young University law school graduate (although I seriously doubt she is Mormon).  She has published several articles on gender, sexuality, and family law. (more…)

TEXANNE writes:

In this New York magazine article, “Parents of a Certain Age,” a piece about older mothers who conceive artifically, there’s not even a passing glance at possible emotional and psychological implications for the real live children themselves. There are millions of these Brave-New-World children who make up the next generation — particularly prevalent among the class which will be shaping and enforcing thought. What concept of the connection between love, sex and procreation (let alone the very definitions of male and female) will these children have? How does a person feel when he realizes that an order was placed for him, with genetic material delivered at a convenient time for the discerning customer? (more…)