Ask Nathan Anything: Quarantine Edition

[FEMA Camp Administrator]

Got dammit, Mikado, stop turning everyone in this thread into weebs!

LOL. I can't help it. LOOK at that poster. Doesn't it just scream Nathan to you?

I imagine so. But more to the point, this sh#t’s gonna corrupt anyone here who can appreciate A E S T H E T I C or illustration (I’m sadly in both camps here).

[President Punxsutawney Phil]

And I thought I was bad...

[Okay, maybe Mike Johnson is a competent parliamentarian.]

*snip*

I'm familiar-ish with Gundam Wing, which I more or less like, and (unfortunately?) with Garzey's Wing, Tomino's infamous foray into the isekai genre, which I've seen two or three times. To my eternal shame, I've allowed certain Garzey-isms to infect my everyday speech ("please do so"; "present mental condition").

Just sent you a PM asking for a pitch.

[The Mikado]

*snip*

I'm familiar-ish with Gundam Wing, which I more or less like, and (unfortunately?) with Garzey's Wing, Tomino's infamous foray into the isekai genre, which I've seen two or three times. To my eternal shame, I've allowed certain Garzey-isms to infect my everyday speech ("please do so"; "present mental condition").

Just sent you a PM asking for a pitch.

Sent you a thing. For everyone else, it's loosely based on War of the Worlds, right down to the mecha design (by Syd Mead, of Blade Runner/Tron/Aliens fame). Earth is in an 1890s-1920s state of tech and is invaded by humans living on the moon piloting mobile suits inspired by the tripods from War of the Worlds, like this:



The Moonrace says that they were originally from Earth and after Earth was devastated in a catastrophe 2,000-odd years ago, they have a right to return to Earth now that it's fixed, and besides, they have a superior, more advanced civilization and can do more with the land than the relatively primitive people of Earth. The Earth people are all "screw your right of return, you've been gone for two millennia, this is our land now." The show's conflict is between doves on both the Earth and Moon factions who think that it's possible to reach a peaceful and mutually satisfactory compromise and that it's possible for Earth people and the Moonrace to live side by side vs the hardliners on either the Moon side who want to rule over Earth due to their superior civilization or hardliners on Earth who want to drive the Moonrace off the planet entirely.

[FEMA Camp Administrator]

Eff the moonmen, this is Earth, bay-bee.

[Okay, maybe Mike Johnson is a competent parliamentarian.]

Eff the moonmen, this is Earth, bay-bee.

I'm going to interpret this as a question and say that I think Neil Armstrong was a strong lean FF.

[FEMA Camp Administrator]

@Mikado those things look nuts. You got the hookup on viewing options? (And, as this has been discussed before, I did make what I felt was a good ways into LotGH; put it on pause for unspecified reasons)

[Okay, maybe Mike Johnson is a competent parliamentarian.]

What are your thoughts on the Avignon Papacy (both in its legitimate and schismatic incarnations)? Did anything good come out of it, theologically, culturally or politically, or was it the unmitigated moral and PR disaster that it's usually portrayed as?

I honestly don't know quite enough about it to say. I do know that Clement VI, the Pope during the Black Death, was an Avignon Pope, and from what I know he handled the plague about as well as any continent-wide leader could have and made an effort to stop the worst of the social reactions to it (such as the various pogroms). Characteristically for an Avignon Pope, he was also wildly corrupt and appointed dozens of members of his extended family to high Church positions, in addition to being hackishly pro-French even by Avignon Pope standards. So I wouldn't be surprised if there were other Avignon Popes too who, while staggeringly corrupt, were also on some level public-spirited and even devout.

Bumping this to give a shout-out to Avignon Pope John XXII, a decidedly mixed bag who persecuted the Franciscan "Spirituals" and is one of very few popes known to have held views (on the nature of the afterlife) that were later determined to be heretical...but he also canonized Aquinas, attempted (by the standards of the day) to exist on good terms with the Islamic world, and is traditionally credited with composing the "Anima Christi", a prayer about the Eucharist that people still say today.

[Okay, maybe Mike Johnson is a competent parliamentarian.]

I'm back on the forum and just as vain as ever, so why not bump this?

[Gracile]

I would still like a response to this post in greater depth:

I'm left with the wistful "if only" feeling that it would have been nice if someone as awful as Lipinski had lost over something other than not being a loyal footsoldier on abortion.

That's a pretty big oversimplification. For one, Lipinski was hit just as much for voting against Obamacare as he was being anti-choice. He had a ton of liabilities that Newman easily played to her advantage.

As someone from the area (ignore my memeish MA avatar), I can tell you that your assertion was not correct.

[Okay, maybe Mike Johnson is a competent parliamentarian.]

I would still like a response to this post in greater depth:

I'm left with the wistful "if only" feeling that it would have been nice if someone as awful as Lipinski had lost over something other than not being a loyal footsoldier on abortion.

That's a pretty big oversimplification. For one, Lipinski was hit just as much for voting against Obamacare as he was being anti-choice. He had a ton of liabilities that Newman easily played to her advantage.

As someone from the area (ignore my memeish MA avatar), I can tell you that your assertion was not correct.

I misunderstood the dynamics of that race due to a bias in favor of pro-life Democrats, plain and simple. You were right and I was wrong.

[𝕭𝖆𝖕𝖙𝖎𝖘𝖙𝖆 𝕸𝖎𝖓𝖔𝖑𝖆]

So... I have more than some questions.

How long have you been a Catholic?

Your thoughts on contraception?

Describe a political compromise on abortion you would be willing to take.

If I recall correctly you mentioned a grandmother Pasqualina and an uncle Ciro in another thread some days ago, so I'll assume you are Italian American. Did your ancestors come from Naples? Have you ever been to Italy?

Your favourite Pope of the 20th or 21st century?

Are you knowledgeable about Italian literature?

Where did you take your display name "The scissors of false economy" from?

[Okay, maybe Mike Johnson is a competent parliamentarian.]

So... I have more than some questions.

How long have you been a Catholic?

Baptized for social reasons as a baby, raised generically Christian and mostly going to mainline Protestant churches, drifted into the Catholic Church via the Episcopal Church in early adulthood. I was confirmed three and a half years ago--during my last semester in a master's program at a Protestant school of theology!

Your thoughts on contraception?

I accept Humanae vitae, but I definitely wouldn't say I'm enthusiastic about it.

Describe a political compromise on abortion you would be willing to take.

At this point, I would actually prefer a political compromise on abortion to any morally consequent series of abortion policies. I definitely don't want abortion to be more proliferated (and especially not more socially acceptable) than it is now, but I'm also not exactly chomping at the bit for the Central Americanization of US abortion policy that various state-level GOPs seem newly committed to. I'd be comfortable with a situation like Italy's where abortion is more or less freely available early in pregnancy but conscientious objection to it is widespread and widely accepted, if such a situation would successfully render The Abortion Issue a third rail and allow the American body politic to move on to new topics.

If I recall correctly you mentioned a grandmother Pasqualina and an uncle Ciro in another thread some days ago, so I'll assume you are Italian American. Did your ancestors come from Naples? Have you ever been to Italy?

Yes, several of my great-grandparents came from Naples and from small towns in the Campanian hinterlands. Others were Eastern European Jews or lace-curtain Baltimore Irish. I identify primarily as Italian-American and secondarily as an assimilated Jew--the Jewish identity would probably be the more salient of the two if I weren't a practicing Christian, especially since I have a Jewish last name. I've been to Italy twice: first on an extended hiking and sightseeing trip through Umbria, Lazio, and Campania a couple of years ago, second on a day trip to the Val d'Aosta during a vacation last winter the rest of which was spent in France. I love the landscapes, the art, the food, and most of the people--it's one of two countries I can see myself returning to again and again throughout my life, along with Japan.

Your favourite Pope of the 20th or 21st century?

John Paul I, whom I like for the tragicomic aura that his very brief, very what-could-have-been papacy gives off. I feel obliged to rep Paul VI as well since I actually attended his canonization during the first of the two trips to Italy mentioned above, but I have a mixed view of his actual record as Pope. (Love the way he implemented most of the Vatican II documents, hate the way the clerical abuse phenomenon seems to have reached its apex on his watch.)

Are you knowledgeable about Italian literature?

Not as much as I'd like to be, but I've read most of Umberto Eco's novels, as well as the Commedia and Vita nuova, various early Franciscan writings, and much of Umberto Saba's poetry. Next on my docket are Giambattista Basile and maybe Alberto Moravia. I wish Grazia Deledda's work was readily available in translation.

For future reference, my bachelor's degree is in Japanese literature, so that's the literature I'm most familiar with.

Where did you take your display name "The scissors of false economy" from?

It's a reference to a local Western Massachusetts issue. The worst COVID outbreak at any long-term care facility in the United States (so far) happened at a veterans' center called the Holyoke Soldiers' Home that had had its budget cut under both Charlie Baker and his awful corporate Democrat predecessor Deval Patrick. Over 100 of the veterans living there--veterans of WWII, Korea, Vietnam, men (and a few women) whom the US allegedly sees as its greatest heroes--died, and many more are still deathly ill. The scope of the human tragedy, and of the moral idiocy from policymakers that caused it, are without precedent in recent Western Mass history, and are especially galling given that when the HSH first opened in 1952 then-Governor Paul Dever specifically promised that "the scissors of false economy will never be used to cut the appropriations needed for the maintenance of this outstanding institution erected for the veterans of Massachusetts". Turns out the scissors of false economy were used for just that after all.

[Devout Centrist]

How are you doing?

[Okay, maybe Mike Johnson is a competent parliamentarian.]

How are you doing?

Stressed as hell from a new job. One of my supervisors consistently refers to children (the job is in a school system) as "kiddos" and it's driving me nuts; in my private notes I wrote "Beatrix Kiddo, Kill Bill. Uma Thurman knew?" She also speaks to adults in a tone of voice that even kiddos tend to find infuriating, and she refers to the Spanish language as a "dialect". On the plus side, I like all my other colleagues and I'm going to be able to make my paychecks go a long way since I'm living with family for at least the next eight or nine months and thus won't have to worry about making rent till next summer. I'm going to sock a few hundred dollars each month into my savings account and hopefully have enough by next May or June to establish myself in a decent post-pandemic living situation.

[Devout Centrist]

How are you doing?

Stressed as hell from a new job. One of my supervisors consistently refers to children (the job is in a school system) as "kiddos" and it's driving me nuts; in my private notes I wrote "Beatrix Kiddo, Kill Bill. Uma Thurman knew?" She also speaks to adults in a tone of voice that even kiddos tend to find infuriating, and she refers to the Spanish language as a "dialect".

My God

Well, best of luck saving up for a new place after COVID! Honestly living with family might be the best option right now.

[𝕭𝖆𝖕𝖙𝖎𝖘𝖙𝖆 𝕸𝖎𝖓𝖔𝖑𝖆]

So... I have more than some questions.

[...]

Rewriting as I forgot one question and also you may have missed this.

Funnily I was originally going to craft my third question above as "would you accept a situation like Italy's as a compromise on abortion?"

Since you mentioned John Paul I, have you ever read Illustrissimi?

And, which of these would you apply the adjective "fascist" to?
Franco's Spain; Metaxas's Greece; Salazar's Portugal; Pinochet's Chile; Hirohito's Japan around WW2.

[Okay, maybe Mike Johnson is a competent parliamentarian.]

So... I have more than some questions.

[...]

Rewriting as I forgot one question and also you may have missed this.

Funnily I was originally going to craft my third question above as "would you accept a situation like Italy's as a compromise on abortion?"

Since you mentioned John Paul I, have you ever read Illustrissimi?

Parts of it. There was a beautiful early hardcover edition of it (credited to Albino Luciani rather than to Pope John Paul I, so it was put out during his lifetime) in a used bookstore in a town in New Jersey where I used to live, but I moved away from that town before my serious interest in Catholic theology developed and I haven't been able to find another good copy of it.

And, which of these would you apply the adjective "fascist" to?
Franco's Spain; Metaxas's Greece; Salazar's Portugal; Pinochet's Chile; Hirohito's Japan around WW2.

Franco's Spain was clearly fascist until the early 1950s or so; most serious attempts that I've seen to finesse a difference between Falangism and fascism are ideologically motivated and are usually part of a broader project of justifying or even advocating clerical authoritarianism. Metaxas's Greece was fascist. Imperial Japan was not fascist but only because it did not present itself as a break from the traditional Japanese hard right (i.e. did not make revolutionary claims) and lacked a compelling mass-mobilizing Party (nobody felt the fanatical loyalty towards the Imperial Rule Assistance Association that people felt towards the PNF or NSDAP). I don't know enough about the Estado Novo to say for sure, but my instinct is that it was right-wing authoritarian but not quite fascist. Pinochet's Chile was not fascist, but was still an irredeemably evil system on its own merits.

[Torie]

What are your favorite haunts in the Berkshires?

Here is one of mine:

[Okay, maybe Mike Johnson is a competent parliamentarian.]

What are your favorite haunts in the Berkshires?

Greylock, a few stores in Adams where I know the proprietor, various restaurants in North Adams and Williamstown, some of the scenic lookouts going east on Route 2 towards Franklin County. As you can tell, I'm more of a North Berkshires guy than a South Berkshires one. The only South Berkshires town I'm really familiar with is Great Barrington, a community I dislike. I'd like to check out Stockbridge sometime but I haven't gotten around to it.

Here is one of mine:

Oh, lovely! Where is it? It looks like maybe Lanesborough or thereabouts?

[Okay, maybe Mike Johnson is a competent parliamentarian.]

So... I have more than some questions.

[...]

Rewriting as I forgot one question and also you may have missed this.

Funnily I was originally going to craft my third question above as "would you accept a situation like Italy's as a compromise on abortion?"

Since you mentioned John Paul I, have you ever read Illustrissimi?

Parts of it. There was a beautiful early hardcover edition of it (credited to Albino Luciani rather than to Pope John Paul I, so it was put out during his lifetime) in a used bookstore in a town in New Jersey where I used to live, but I moved away from that town before my serious interest in Catholic theology developed and I haven't been able to find another good copy of it.

And, which of these would you apply the adjective "fascist" to?
Franco's Spain; Metaxas's Greece; Salazar's Portugal; Pinochet's Chile; Hirohito's Japan around WW2.

Franco's Spain was clearly fascist until the early 1950s or so; most serious attempts that I've seen to finesse a difference between Falangism and fascism are ideologically motivated and are usually part of a broader project of justifying or even advocating clerical authoritarianism. Metaxas's Greece was fascist. Imperial Japan was not fascist but only because it did not present itself as a break from the traditional Japanese hard right (i.e. did not make revolutionary claims) and lacked a compelling mass-mobilizing Party (nobody felt the fanatical loyalty towards the Imperial Rule Assistance Association that people felt towards the PNF or NSDAP). I don't know enough about the Estado Novo to say for sure, but my instinct is that it was right-wing authoritarian but not quite fascist. Pinochet's Chile was not fascist, but was still an irredeemably evil system on its own merits.

I'd like to elaborate on my assessment of Pinochet's Chile a bit more.

While I (and all right-thinking students of politics and of history) entirely reject the assertion that fascism is/was somehow left-wing or even "extreme upper-center" just because it involves state direction of the economy, I do think that fascism by definition implies a regimented economy as part of a regimented society. For that reason I don't think the various free-market fundamentalist Latin American strongmen, either historical ones like Pinochet or current ones like Bolsonaro and Áñez, are fascist. A genuinely fascist Latin American regime would look more like Perón or Vargas at their respective worst, or even some of Mexico's more heavy-handed "perfect dictatorship"-era Presidents. It might genuinely not look right-wing at all to observers used to the Anglo-American or Western European political spectrum.

[Okay, maybe Mike Johnson is a competent parliamentarian.]

As a Catholic, do you believe that premarital sex is immoral?

As a Protestant, do you believe that Marian devotion is a bunch of nonsense? Because my sister is convinced it is.

Is your sister straight? I think there's an element of psychosexual sublimation to a lot of Marian devotion that people who aren't attracted to women sometimes have a harder time seeing the point of. Everyone I know with a really intense Marian devotion is either a straight or bisexual man or a lesbian or bisexual woman.

Not your AMA, but might this be a way that certain folks who don't really know their own sexuality, or deny it, find a way of expressing themselves?

And is this all (both your post and mine) a way of saying that it's similar to the Winona Ryder fandom?

Answering this here so as not to derail Battista Minola's AMA.

I think Marian devotion can absolutely be a way for lesbian and bisexual Catholic women to avoid confronting certain things about themselves. In my experience there are also plenty of out gay women who just straight-up admit that they have a quasi-erotic relationship with her (I know one woman, a lapsed Brazilian Catholic, who openly admits she'd go down on Mary if she could), but I know a wildly disproportionate number of lesbian Catholics in general so my experiences are not universal. There's also Victorian poetry, some of it by women, that has--in my opinion--uncomfortably yonic imagery of the wounds of Christ. ("Once, twice, and thrice—as I crept close/Into the ark, the nest, the bride,/Into the pulse, into the life, into the wounded side/Sealed with the love‐kiss,/By His own inner token His;/So, in the night I rose; not I,/Where is there any longer one, Christine,/Of the dim years floated by,/One you held lovingly,/One of the happy twain?"--Eliza Keary.) But this is less common than the Marian stuff.

The gay male equivalent is of course a devotion to the wounds of Christ and/or St. Sebastian. Keary is remarkable partly for being a possibly-gay woman who used an especially graphic form of the usually gay male "penetrating the wounds of Christ" motif.

Second question: Yes, I know tons of people who want to sleep with Winona Ryder but won't admit it.

[𝕭𝖆𝖕𝖙𝖎𝖘𝖙𝖆 𝕸𝖎𝖓𝖔𝖑𝖆]

How do you feel about same-sex marriage as a Catholic?

Your favourite saint?

[Okay, maybe Mike Johnson is a competent parliamentarian.]

How do you feel about same-sex marriage as a Catholic?

I'm strongly in favor of it for all the purposes modern, value-pluralist societies have legal marriage for, as the one unorthodoxy-on-a-sex-issue I allow myself. I don't think the Church is obliged to be willing to solemnize same-sex marriages itself, though.

Your favourite saint?

Our Lady, Oscar Romero (although I think the Catholic left has a tendency to stylize and over-idealize him; he died for and with the poor but he wasn't actually an untouchable paragon of all personal and political virtues while he was alive, even after his late-in-life conversion experience), Francis of Assisi, Catherine of Siena, Edith Stein, Teresa of Avila, Therese of Lisieux, various Welsh and Anglo-Saxon saints, various Japanese and Chinese martyrs.

[Antonio the Sixth]

How does your personal experience inform your analysis of class in America? Is there anything in particular you think the American left is getting seriously wrong about it? And what do you think of the new brand of conservative class analysis that seems to be developing around, say, Michael Lind?