Hitchens: Still Good for a Laugh
Germanicus sent me this link to a great Hitchens piece on Christian soldier Mel Gibson and his recent, drunken, lunatic rantings about the Malibu Jews. While you might expect that drunken, lunatic rantings could only endear a person to Hitchens, their anti-semitic nature (as well as Gibson's famous adherence to the most popular oriental death cult of our age) definitely rubbed him the wrong way.
Before he went mad with drink and starry-eyed neo-Trotskyite idealism, Hitchens was, bar none, the premier political polemecist of the Western world. His greatest line ever was from the opener of his (highly unfair) essay on Paul Johnson, former lefty journalist turned darling of the "popular conservative history" genre, on the occasion of revelations by the latter's mistress of many years that Johnson was into spanking:
"There is almost no English surname, however ancient and dignified, that cannot be instantly improved by the prefix 'Spanker.'"
That's how it should be done!
Before he went mad with drink and starry-eyed neo-Trotskyite idealism, Hitchens was, bar none, the premier political polemecist of the Western world. His greatest line ever was from the opener of his (highly unfair) essay on Paul Johnson, former lefty journalist turned darling of the "popular conservative history" genre, on the occasion of revelations by the latter's mistress of many years that Johnson was into spanking:
"There is almost no English surname, however ancient and dignified, that cannot be instantly improved by the prefix 'Spanker.'"
That's how it should be done!
posted by Mockrates at 12:55 PM
8 Comments:
I've always liked Mel's work. My three favorite enduring memories:
1. When he's hanging from the ceiling in the first Lethal Weapon movie, getting electro-shocked by some torturer, whose neck he breaks with his legs
2. When he ends the second act in Hamlet, with the line "The play's the thing, wherin I'll catch the conscience of the King"
3. When he leads the troops into battle in The Patriot, and actually kills a redcoat using the American Flag
That Endo had it coming.
Having not too long ago said some things while drunk that I would not have meant sober (not anti-Semitic, mind you--or so I'm told), I have a bit of sympathy for this guy.
He was endangering people's lives while driving drunk. Call me quirky, but I think that's a little bit more of an issue than he's unfortunate anti-Semitic rants. I will play the conservative card here and ask whether more attention is being paid to Mel Gibson or to the Muslim who killed someone in Seattle.
Mel Gibson has never spoken for me, but I want to rush in and say that Christians expect people to do bad things. That's why Jesus had to die in the first place. If Mel Gibson and the sexyretard weren't given to Herculean acts of assholery, there would be no need for a Savior.
"If Mel Gibson and the sexyretard weren't given to Herculean acts of assholery, there would be no need for a Savior."
Good point. There would be no need for Braveheart, for that matter.
We don't need another hero;
We don't need to know the way home.
All we want is life beyond thunderdome.
No, noble Germanicus, there would always have been the need for Braveheart.
I have noticed this Gibson's apparent anti-anglicism in Braveheart and the Patriot, but being as though I thought the anti-french sentiment in Jack of all Trades was hysterical, I guess I can't fault him. Je deteste les francais. Beaucoup.
The difference, I think, is that anti-semitism seems to be a worldwide malady. Every place the Jews have wandered to there have been groups waiting there to hate them. I could imagine being a bit gunshy, particularly with the developments in the middle east, and the holocaust no less than 70 years removed.
"Every place the Jews have wandered to there have been groups waiting there to hate them."
Mel, and many others, might contend that everywhere they've wandered, they've pissed people off.
I won't contend this, though. Besides being insupportable, it is also counterintuitive. Every culture finds a strange newcomer repugnant. Witness our own country's treatment of immigrant populations: the antipathy once hurled at the Italians was later redirected towards the Irish, then the Japanese, and so on down to the Mexicans.
And some take it as a point of pride. There is an English Premier League football team, the Tottenham Hotspurs, who have several nicknames, one of them being "The Jews." It is an apparent reference to the ostracism the team and its fans have encountered during years of play.
One further thought on the Int'l Zionist Conspiracy[tm]: on CNBC yesterday the talking heads were gushing forth about how Mel will effectively be blackballed by Hollywood now, as his comments have made him untouchable. Let's assume his sentiments are the run-of-the-mill anti-Semitism, and he contends (among other things) that a giant conspiracy of Jews run Hollywood (Though from my reading of it, he made no such explicit contention). Isn't the automatic blackballing of him and his projects proof of this very claim?
The Hollywood Jewish community should consider doing some PR work by aggressively welcoming Mel back into the fold. Anything else will just fan the flames.
"The Hollywood Jewish community should consider doing some PR work by aggressively welcoming Mel back into the fold. Anything else will just fan the flames."
As I understand it, PR is war by other means. If that's the case, and if the Hollywood Jewish Economic Juggernaut has the power to actually crush him, then they should just cruch him, and not worry about the PR.
"Having not too long ago said some things while drunk that I would not have meant sober (not anti-Semitic, mind you--or so I'm told), I have a bit of sympathy for this guy."
I don't believe I've ever said anything while drunk that I wouldn't have silently agreed with while sober.
Jeff,
I'm not sure how to frame this, but I have known people with very unfortunate views who nevertheless would treat people as they would be treated by them--my mother's father went to great personal risk to fight for the rights of non-whites at Fort Stuart (sp?) in New York, but if he were drunk, I would not be at all surprised if he would have had a few things to say about pinko commies or what-not. My father's father was an outright racist who nevertheless treated everyone really, really well. When asked about the inconsistency (because it was obvious) between his charity in action and his lack of charity in speech, he would utter that famous phrase "well, that's different."
CS Lewis speaks of the Englishman who would loudly proclaim that death is too good for the Germans, and then whenever a German actually shows up, they are treated well. I think this is a very common thing.
I'm not suggesting that Mr. Gibson's words are the least bit acceptable, but rather that he needs to ask forgiveness and then it's on those offended whether or not to give it. People who are drunk will certainly exaggerate--how many times has a plan for world peace at 3 am that "couldn't possibly fail" turn up ludicrous after the marijuana wears off?
The linked Salon piece is a true gem. Hitchens's final line is as devastating as his first: "But not all the perfumes of Araby can sweeten that spanking hand; nay, not all the genius of the Pfizer Corporation can make this Johnson rise again."
I've never heard of this Johnson guy. His History of the American People sounds like the whining right-wing response to Howard Zinn's People's History of the USA. If Zinn weren't so densely unreadable, I'd suggest we pair them side by side for some upcoming month.
Post a Comment
<< Home