Reflections, Reflections

Double good commentaries from J.Rice - which might seem disparate at a first glance, but are very much a mirror view of the same problem.

First, a reminder about some problematic consequences of the Olympics as a distracting spectacle.

Which is why, no doubt, the Olympics have begun to pall for a lot of people. Poor judging, crybaby Olympians, a monster monopoly on Olympic stories that you have to pay to cover, the whole Olympics has become just another ineptly run Internationalist boondoggle. There is something obscene about a country as poor as Greece spending $10 billion on the Olympic facilities that are unlikely to ever be used again. And there is something unwholesome about pictures of well-fed athletes with unflattering leaf crowns that make them look like bacchanal, waving in triumph of banality. That these pictures crowd out those of the victims in the Sudan who are still waiting for the U.N. to do something -- anything, isn't the athletes' fault. It is, though, a symptom of the sickness that old media focus on such frivolity to avoid focusing on the wholesale corruption of the international organizations they would have us defer to on our decision to go to war.

The Olympics have become the gladiator contests that serve to amuse the masses and distract them from the serious business of self-governance. There isn't even the pretense of an Ideal anymore. Pity. If the world needs anything right now it is idealism.

Next, Rice blogged a case that was widely featured in the conservative media, about a psych professor that faked "hate" crime actions against herself.

Hate crime on campus -At least we now know where the hate comes from on campus.

Her gold Honda was sprayed with racial and religious epithets March 9 in a parking lot at Claremont McKenna College. She reported discovering the damage after speaking at a forum on hate speech.

The college canceled classes for a day of anti-hate rallies.

Only thing was, the psychology professor faked the crime, spray painting her own car, slashing the tires herself. She was found guilty of the hoax.

"Mike" asks (comment on above blog):

First of all, what sort of significant crime _isn't_ a hate crime? I just don't understand that whole concept.

The "hate" crime framing is a profound mimicry of Orwell´s Animal Farm tale, when the pigs take over power.

And this faked "hate" crime post and Mike´s comment couldn´t make for a better tie to what Rice wrote regarding the distraction that the Olympics represents from other much, much more serious issues.

Homo activists have pumped up the propaganda for their "plight" and people love to be distracted with this instead of facing how many serious problems with sexual violence and dysfunctions we have in society, not to mention all the other serious problems, such as mass hunger, etc.