See, Mark, now you're betraying your convert status.
A cradle would be screaming "Exorcism Needed! Bell, Book, and Candle Probably a Good Idea Too!"
Seriously, though, the Ivy League schools seem to be in a race to be the first to prove how utterly disconnected they are from actual scholarship of any sort. The triumph of modernity in action is the complete failure of the university to lead its students toward anything but the sensational, trivial, banal, and cheaply disgusting--which is all that is left when you reject as the sole and discriminatory province of the White European Male the study of the universal, ancient, beautiful and true.
One of those links said there was no blood found in her studio. What about in her "artwork"? That seems like the "first" place an investigator would look.
It is truly ironic that so much of modern education is focused on teaching students that truth is unknowable or nonexistent.
"Daniel Ribas of Tujunga, Calif. Still, Ribas said he is still trying to figure out how to approach the project: 'I know that art shouldn’t really have boundaries, but there’s definitely a line that shouldn’t be crossed.'"
Wow, that's deep, Ogre. 
"Modern society fundamentally requires that its citizens be able to decide when they are ready and willing to raise children. Put another way: A woman should never have her life completely uprooted just because her boyfriend’s condom happens to break. Making abortion an option for women allows them the freedom to pursue careers and lives of their choosing, rather than having biology choose for them."
Instead she should have a person who violates the Hippocratic Oath (or is it Hypocritical Oath?) stick some instruments in her uterus to scramble her eggs. Yes, that's what a Modern Society needs, I mean the ancient peoples that Modern Society disdains so much never did anything of the sort... We moderns need to kill our babies to fulfill our selfish needs!
Good Lord!...(I went to one of the rival schools, so yeah--close that hell house down, I say!)
Shvarts has gotten everyone to do what she wanted. We're all talking (writing) about her. She now has our attention, just like a toddler who takes off his diaper and smears the contents all over the wall.
Bravo!
"Shvarts has gotten everyone to do what she wanted. We're all talking (writing) about her. She now has our attention, just like a toddler who takes off his diaper and smears the contents all over the wall."
Just because she wanted this attention doesn't mean that we should ignore the situation.
Dr. Acula -
I don't know about other ancient peoples, but I do know abortion was fairly common in the pagan Roman Empire. From the Hippocratic Oath itself , I would assume it was done in ancient Greece as well - why put in 'I will not give a woman an abortive device ' if such things were unknown ?
Hey, where'd my sarcasm thingy go. I know that the ancients aborted babies.
I also know that Shvarts is good at manipulating people.
I don't think that she is a good person or even an artist.
"The discourse initiated by Shvarts’ project has been written off by pro-choice proponents as harmful and unproductive because it exposes the unspoken limits and hypocrisy of the language of choice and in our culture."
The one sentence of any value in that screed. Anyone else feel like repeatedly kicking Andrew for his cutesy-poo use of "(re)production"?
The last link, the article by Andrew Dowe, is a pellucid example of the kind of dense and opaque jargon which today completely dominates discourse in the humanities.
When I was a literature major in the early 80s, I ate it up, and talked like that myself. I thought it meant I was thinking deep thoughts. But gradually I came to mock it whenever I encountered it, because it seemed so phony and juvenile, like kids talking in code around grown-ups. (Of course, its use in those days wasn't nearly as widespread as it is now.) It seemed then, and seems even more now, to obscure rather than reveal -- by design.
Notice the weird, self-conscious use of the expression "(re)productive." In the first sentence, I thought the author was just making a pun, and a fairly pedestrian one at that. Then as the article progressed, I realized that he was very seriously and chin-strokingly trying to "say something."
Of course, he would probably deny it, as it is impossible to "say anything" because our individual narratives are increasingly dissociated and irreconcilable...etc.
Good Heavens, I hate that kind of crap.
GKC, thanks for clearing that up. My eyes typically glaze over after about 2.5 sentences of that stuff. Glad to hear it ain't just me.
Yale - "Lux et Veritas" - is no different than any of the other top schools - or really "brand name schools". These places are just money making entities. They have nothing to do with the old idea of a university. People spend lots of money to buy these brands based on their own ignorance and pride - it is really one of the best scams going.
GKC - I'm in law school now, and there seems to be an emphasis (at least in my school) to push the students toward more clear, plain language rather than the more arcane forms of writing ("wheretofore the said party of the first part partied with the aforementioned party of the second part..."). Maybe in another decade or so that same mindset will trickle down to the undergrad institutions. One can only hope.
"Modern society fundamentally requires that its citizens be able to decide when they are ready and willing to raise children. Put another way: A woman should never have her life completely uprooted just because her boyfriend’s condom happens to break."
This kind of thinking makes me want to beat my head against the wall. If an effect is unwanted, then the most efficient way to eliminate it is to eliminate the cause. If you do not want a baby, then do not copulate. But this would be unrealistic. And for "unrealistic" read "difficult." And for "difficult" read "something I don't like because it keeps me from doing what I want to do."
You say: That's double-talk.
And they say: No, I'm too deep for you to understand.
I used to laugh a lot at Professor Irwin Corey, Professor of double talk.
Professor Irwin Corey accepts the National Book Award Fiction Citation for Thomas Pynchon and Gravity's Rainbow
Thursday, April 18, 1974, Alice Tully Hall, Lincoln Center, New York
Ralph Ellison's introduction:
Thank you, Jack, my apollogies if we're as...if you were as confused as I was. The jury has determined to divide the prize between two writers. To Thomas Pynchon, for GRAVITY'S RAINBOW which bridges the gap between the two cultures and puts the world of manipulation and paranoia within the perspectives of history. To Isaac Bashevis Singer for A CROWN OF FEATHERS and a life-time of distinguished work revealing a skeptical, philosophical and mischievous obses- sion with human and demonic character. I present this not to Mr. Singer, but to Mr. Pynchon.
Professor Irwin Corey:
However... accept this financial stipulation - ah - stipend in behalf of, uh, Richard Python for the great contribution and to quote from some of the missiles which he has contributed...Today we must all be aware that protocol takes precedence over procedure. Howewer you say - WHAT THE - what does this mean... in relation to the tabulation whereby we must once again realize that the great fiction story is now being rehearsed before our very eyes, in the Nixon administration... indicating that only an American writer can receive...the award for fction, unlike Solzinitski whose fiction doesn't hold water. Comrades - friends, we are gathered here not only to accept in behalf of one recluse - one who has found that the world in itself which seems to be a time not of the toad - to quote even Studs TurKAL. And many people ask "Who are Studs TurKAL?" It's not "Who are Studs TurKAL?" it's "Who am Studs TurKAL?" This in itself as an edifice of the great glory that has gone beyond, and the intuitive feeling of the American people, based on the assumption that the intelligence not only as Mencken once said, "He who underestimates the American pubic - public, will not go broke." This is merely a small indication of this vast throng gathered here to once again behold and to perceive that which has gone behind and to that which might go forward into the future...we've got to hurdle these obstacles. This is the main deterrent upon which we have gathered our strength and all the others who say, "What the hell did that get?" - We don't know. We've got to peforce withold the loving boy... And as Miller once said in one of his great novels- what did he ... that language is only necessary when communication is endangered. And you sit there bewildered, and Pinter who went further said "It is not the lack of communication but fear of communication." That's what the Goddamn thing is it's we fear - communication. Oh - fortunately the prize has only been given to authors - unlike the Academy Award which is given to a female and a male, indicating the derision of the human specie - God damn it! But we have no paranoia, and Mr. Pynchon has attained, and has created for himself serenity, and it is only the insanity that has kept him alive in his paranoia. We speak of the organ...of the orgasm...Who the hell wrote this? And the jury has determined to divide the prize between two writers - to Thomas Pynchon for his GRAVITY'S RAINBOW. Now GRAVITY'S RAINBOW is a token of this man's genius...he told me so himself...that he could...in other words, have been more specific, but rather than to allude the mundane, he has come to the conclusion that brevity is the importance of our shallow existence. God damn. Ladies and Gentlemen. To the distinguished panel on the, on the dais and to the other winners, for poetry and religion and science. The time will come when religion will outlive its usefulness. Marx, Groucho Marx, once said that religion is the opiate of the people. I say that when religion outlives its usefulness, then opium...will be the opiate...Ahh that's not a bad idea... All right...However, I want to thank Mr. Guinzburg, Tom Guinzburg of the Viking Press, who has made it possible for you people to be here this evening to enjoy the Friction Citation - the Fiction Citation. GRAVITY'S RAINBOW - a small contribution to a certain degree, since there are over three and a half billion people in the world today. 218 of them ... million live in the United States which is a very, very small amount compared to those that are dying elsewhere...Well, I say that you will be on the road to new horizons, for we who live in a society where sex is a commodity and a politician can become a TV personality, it's not easy to conform if you have any morality...I, I, I said that myself many years ago...But I do want to thank the bureau...I mean the committee, the organization for the $10,000 they've given out...tonight they made over $400,000 and I think that I have another appointment. I would like to stay here, but for the sake of brevity I, I must leave. I do want to thank you, I want to thank Mr. TurKAL. I want to thank Mr. Knopf who just ran through the auditorium* and I want to thank Breshnev, Kissinger - acting President of the Unites States - and also want to thank Truman Capote and thank you. ___________________________
Pavel: Priceless and peerless!
"Pavel: Priceless and peerless!"
Actually, the Professor and I are at opposite ends of the political spectrum. But he is a very funny man at blowing smoke.
Anyone else feel like repeatedly kicking Andrew for his cutesy-poo use of "(re)production"?
Yes.
In my experience, anyone who takes to repeatedly encapsulating parts of words in parentheses and employing alternative spellings of words to make a point is usually not making a point worth reading.
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