In conclusion, I mock because I love.

Kara no Kyoukai: Satsujin Kousatsu

A potential interpretation

By Nathan Turowsky

Shiki: I represent the horror genre. While I have an incredibly fucked-up, dark, twisted, hurting heart, I make the conscious choice to contain it and seek a better life.

Mikiya: I represent fans of the horror genre. While the things that I love about Shiki are her best traits, my willingness to tolerate the darkness within her and help her bear her sins makes society regard me as an enabler or even somewhat ‘creepy’.

Touko: I represent Charles Williams, creator of the urban fantasy subgenre and author of Descent into Hell and The Place of the Lion. My interest in Shiki has somewhat ulterior motives but I genuinely do care about her, and although I jerk around with Mikiya sometimes I care about him too.

Shirazumi: I represent Joss Whedon, creator of Buffy the Vampire Slayer and Dollhouse. My goal in life is to reach Shiki’s sick, twisted, dying heart and make it conform to my own nihilistic and unpleasant ideas about what it is.

Azaka: I represent Nasu Kinoko, the author of Kara no Kyoukai. While I think that it is possible to redeem Shiki and even Shirazumi, and in fact get along reasonably well with both of them, my protective attitude towards Mikiya makes me extremely suspicious of them most of the time.

Shiki: I should also mention that I am voiced by Maaya Sakamoto. You will worship me. Build a shrine to me now, geek boy.

Mikiya: Yes, my mistress.

What I realised

What the right wing of the Republican Party is telling Americans, and has been telling them ever since Barry Goldwater fell from grace and took whatever HONESTY was involved in American conservatism with him, is actually very simple. It's simple, and it's clear, and it's what people want to hear because we're so masochistically in love with capitalism in this country: 'You're not a person. You're not a real child of God or of America. You're just a factor to be solved for on a rabid graphing calculator.

'You're not a person. You're just the profiteer class's good little property, and we'll keep you placated with our talk of a 'freedom' that has no sense of either mercy or justice. Chaos except for the profiteer class. Sink or swim. Social Darwinism for everyone!--and by the way, the same theory applied to biology is Satanic. Tough on crime, except when it's by bankers or against women and minorities. It's perfectly fine to fool around with secretaries but if you dissemble and then apologise rather than just denying it we'll impeach you and if you're a homo we'll dehumanise you and use you as an 'issue'.

'America, America! Die for America! Only in America. An America of the banks, a kind of banking that would make Alexander Hamilton spew. America for the insurers who gamble on the right to good health. America for the people who two hundred years ago would have made it just fine in Britain or Germany or anyplace else.' What, then, exactly, is the point?

This doesn't necessarily apply to the right in other countries. Some countries, like Australia and Germany, have (vaguely) more moderate political consensus. Some, like Japan, don't even HAVE left and right, just different interest sections in the Diet. I'm not outright condemning conservatism and calling it inhuman. I'm only condemning American conservatism in the year 2010 and calling it inhuman. There is a difference, and it is chasmal in its depth and breadth and dolorous in the fate that it bespells for a perfectly acceptable word and concept that's being twisted into that special blend of radical libertarianism, I've-got-mine pillaging, and dehumanisation of the Other that, back when 'conservative' meant 'just kind of a killjoy' and 'liberal' meant 'just kind of a dick', Edmund Burke was trying to WARN us about.

Australian conservatives? Okay by me. British conservatives? Go nuts. Japanese conservatives? Fine. Mexican conservatives? Not my thing, but hey, if that's what makes you happy, go for it. American conservatives at other points in history? Probably right about some things.

Newt Gingrich, John Boehner, Glenn Beck, Sharron Angle? It's not even clear that you even like this country, guys. You're certainly not willing to pay for its upkeep, for one thing. Even if you excuse yourself with American liberty you're just fooling yourself because liberty defined in the negative is a Julianic 'no-deed'. Seriously, if you really dislike America and American justice and American mercy so much, get the fuck out.  It'll be easier on us and on you.

My current Big-Ass Writing Project: The first several chapters.

(Don't orry, it becomes more interesting later on when memory-eating tapir spirits, ghosts that can travel at superluminal speeds, and think tanks that employ zombie goons become involved. This is just the NORMAL PEOPLE DOING NORMAL THINGS part at the beginning of any work in this sort of genre.)

1

When Mary Marguerite Cosgrove was twenty-five years old and just the last month ordained in the Church of England, she came to the opinion that she should rent a flat in Jerusalem for some time, from a few months up to a few years, before returning to her family’s home in Great Snoring. A decision like moving from Norfolk to Israel for a change of airs is not one that is or should be made lightly, and upon looking out over the line of brick houses and the weather-beaten war memorial for what would probably be the last time in quite a while, Miss Cosgrove heaved a great sigh. She bent down and picked up a piece of stone from the ground: Norfolk flint, which would serve as a reminder of home.

            Miss Cosgrove had several personal reasons for wanting to go abroad. First, going abroad, as an experience, had intrinsic merit, going to Jerusalem even more so. Second, her parents, Mr Plantagenet and Mrs Amelia Cosgrove (née Random), were both fifty-five years old and as such had seen fit to quit Great Snoring, move to the south coast of England, and leave the house to Miss Cosgrove’s older brother, Mr Henry Cosgrove. Fifty-five was a very young age to retire to the south coast but the elder Cosgroves had been in poor health for a while now and were apparently of the opinion, unfounded or not, that the Norfolk climate was not doing them any wonders. Miss Cosgrove did not think that the south coast would be that different, but her parents said that, well, they could feel it. It made their joints ache less.

            Miss Cosgrove felt a bit depressed sharing the family house with just her brother. Although she had been ordained she had been quietly taken aside and the Bishop of Norwich had told her as gently as he could that she probably would not actually have a parish for quite some time. And so this was the second reason.

            Third, Miss Cosgrove had had a bad relationship. It had never become physical beyond hugging and kissing—just Miss Cosgrove’s luck, no relationship in her life ever had—but it had been emotionally intense, and Helen’s betrayals and privations still hurt quite a lot. Miss Cosgrove did not even want to get into the whole ‘ordained lesbian’ thing. She thought that was part of the reason why the Bishop of Norwich was reluctant to give her a parish. The whole situation made Miss Cosgrove a little disappointed in the people and organisation she loved. So a break was in order.

CHRISTMAS BOOKS, MOSTLY THEOLOGICAL

More books I might want for Christmas:

A Theology of Liberation by Gustavo Gutierrez
Dare We Hope That All Men Be Saved? With a Short Discourse on Hell by Hans Urs von Balthasar
God in the World: A Guide to Karl Rahner's Theology by Thomas F. O'Meara

Books that I'll be reading in the next semester of college:

Five Women Who Loved Love by Saikaku
The Narrow Road to Oku by Basho
Quicksand by Tanizaki
Kokoro by Soseki
Wild Geese by Mori
Something by Akutagawa whose title I can't remember.

WISH ME LUCK!!

Also, Rage Yun.

Why yes, I AM blogging mainly for the benefit of Simoun fans these past couple of days, thank you for noticing.

Introducing COURAGE MAMIINA.

Unlike other Simoun-themed advisors such as Inner Strength Aaeru or Romance Floe, who may lead you astray, Courage Mamiina WILL show you the way to greatness.

What I Want for Christmas by Nathan Turowsky, Age 17 (BY NO MEANS FINALISED SINCE IT'S ONLY AUGUST)

In the Hands of a Happy God: The 'No-Hellers' of Central Appalachia

The minute I learned that there exists something called the 'Primitive Baptist Universalist Church', I gained a tiny bit of faith in the underdeveloped mountain South.

Maria-sama ga Miteru (at least Season 1, I'd hope Season 2)

THIS IS THE FIRST TIME I HAVE EVER ASKED FOR A 'SOCIAL REALISM' ANIME, ONE THAT IS NOT SOME KIND OF SCI-FI OR FANTASY. Yes, it's set in an all-girls' Catholic high school. Yes, there is a reason for this (it's apparently to strip the setting of extraneous elements that would otherwise interfere with the character drama, since Japanese faith schools tend to discourage things like cell phones). Yes, according to everybody I know who has seen any of it including me, it has relationships and drama that rival Ibsen at his best (it helps that it's based on Actual Text Novels). Yes, part of my alleged masculinity dies every time I watch some of it or somebody brings it up to me. Yes, I am TOTALLY FINE WITH THIS.

The Little World of Don Camillo

It's about the friendship between a conservative priest and a communist mayor in postwar Italy. How could I not love this??

In which I explain why I want Etsuko Makioka to be my firstborn

Name a fictional character you would like as your child
Makioka Etsuko (The Makioka Sisters)

(This is actually a picture of the character in question's mother (second from left) and aunts.)

Etsuko is a little like D.W. from Arthur, except older (six to eleven in the story's timeframe), a bit more intelligent and lot more compassionate, and smarter about her brattiness. Also, she lives in pre-war Japan, so that makes some difference as well. I adore Etsuko and she needs somebody to take care of her and smother her with hugs after her aunt Yukiko--who's functionally a second mother or a much-older sister--gets married to Lord Mimaki at the end of the novel. I mean, they imply that Lord Mimaki will let Yukiko more or less do whatever she wants since it's a marriage of convenience, but World War II is also going on. Etsuko will need extra hugs and love as she goes into puberty while bombs fall all over her country.

For God's sake, Mr Fry, no no no.

I mean it's perfectly obvious that if there were ever a God he has lost all possible taste. You've only got to look - forget the aggression and unpleasantness of the radical right or the Islamic hordes to the East - the sheer lack of intelligence and insight and ability to express themselves and to enthuse others of the priesthood and the clerisy here, in this country, and indeed in Europe, you know God once had Bach and Michelangelo on his side, he had Mozart, and now who does he have? People with ginger whiskers and tinted spectacles who reduce the glories of theology to a kind of sharing, you know? That's what religion has become, a feeble and anaemic nonsense, because we understood that the fire was within us, it was not in some idol on an altar, whether it was a gold cross or whether it was a Buddha or anything else, that we have it.

--Stephen Fry, acting like a prick.

The idea that 'religious people aren't creative any more' has absolutely no possible justification or basis in reality outside of the heads of Stephen Fry and people who already agree with him. It's deliberately small-minded ostrich-thinking. Kajiura Yuki is Shintoist and rather devout about serving the gods. Mashimo Kouichi, her frequent collaborator, is Catholic and in a position for the title of 'modern Dante' as far as I am concerned. If he wants to talk about music, and visual art? Philip Glass. Religious omnivore. Olivier Messiaen. Catholic. John Cage. MOTHERFUCKING GAY BUDDHIST ANARCHIST, HELL YEAH. And...honestly, I think most modern painting is bankrupt anyway, but I'd be pleasantly surprised if anybody can point me in the direction of some good stuff.

Let's extend this to the relatively recently deceased in the world of writing. Philip K. Dick and Marion Zimmer Bradley, perhaps a bit surprisingly, were both churchgoing Episcopalians (although both were a little crazy also). Christopher Fry, the greatest modern playwright, was a Quaker who deliberately let it influence his writing. Very surprisingly, Jorge Luis Borges was also a Quaker, at least for some of his writing period. Getting back to the living, we have Catholics Les Murray and Seamus Heaney in the world of poetry and Umberto Eco, who is lapsed but far more disdainful of people like Stephen Fry than he is of the Church, in prose.

For God's sake. I could go on and on.

It's just.

This really pisses me off.

When Mashimo Kouichi gets his hands on lesbians with guns, religion happens.

Church and State

In light of recent legal developments in the United States, a question in law called ‘rational basis’ has seen a lot of discussion both by legal scholars and in the general public. Rational basis is the least stringent test for determining whether or not a law restricting people’s behaviour meets the due-process requirement of the Fourteenth Amendment to the US Constitution. The stricter level of scrutiny revolves around something called ‘compelling state interest’, but it can be generally held that if a law does not stand up to a rational basis test it will not stand up to a compelling state interest test either, simply because rational basis is the lowest and loosest level of scrutiny in such cases[*].

            In the case of the recent developments in case law, which have occurred mainly in the US District Court for the Northern District of California in San Francisco but also in the US Court of Appeals for the First Circuit in Boston, the rational basis and compelling state interest tests have been much discussed as regards the institution of civil marriage. The immediate question at hand is ‘Is there a rational basis for or compelling state interest in restricting civil marriage to couples of the opposite sex?’; the broader question that has to be answered first is ‘What is the state’s interest in registering marriages anyway?’

            Marriage was for most of human history a distinctly ad-hoc and theocratically organised institution—as, indeed, were most institutions, including government itself (the nation-state emerged as a concept in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries and was only substantially divorced from the religious authorities of the country in question from the eighteenth century onwards). Religious organisations performed nuptials, which were then granted a certain legal cachet by relevant authorities, chief among which were property exchange and heritability and, in the next generation down, the right to not have to inquire too deeply into who exactly one’s parents were. This system, since it was administered by religious law, was (and in many jurisdictions still is) defined solely in religious terms. Common church interests in marriage (in Europe) included legitimising sexual behaviour, keeping track of family units for the purpose of parish registers, and advancing what was seen as a series of divine mandates related to reproduction and biological parenthood. Obviously, these interests were at the time and to a large extent even to-day only served through the marriage of opposite-sex partners.