Ixtab
12-22-2005, 11:37 AM
THE COMMUNITY OF THE SENSITIVE
December 21, 2005
Christmas is terribly offensive. At least, that is the consensus of the national media. Secularists are offended by Christmas. The Anti-Defamation League is offended by Christmas. Muslims are offended by Christmas. Bill O'Reilly is offended by everyone taking offense; and Congressman John Dingell (D-MI) is offended that O'Reilly is offended by the pampered elite's love of feeling offended.
National retail chains are so concerned about all this offensiveness that many have forbidden their employees to use the "C" word. They are delighted by the increased trade fostered by the celebration of Christmas; but to speak openly of Christmas risks giving offense.
The media loves a good story, as do we all. But, their recent performance indicates that they are not likely to let actual conditions or honest reporting stand in the way of a good story. In all likelihood, the problem is not as pervasive or weighty as the reports indicate. Having acknowledged that, it is not untrue to describe America as a fevered swamp of competing sensitivities. The commotion over Christmas is but the most recent example of the veto power we accord the community of the sensitive.
One of our state universities up here in the Northwest is on the national radar for having encouraged students to take offense at a dramatic performance. The student playwright warned attendees before his production was staged on campus that it was calculated to "offend everybody"; and indeed some Mormon students who paid their own way to see the play silently protested its content.
Forty other students repeatedly shouted "I am offended" and did everything in their power to shut down the production, including threatening performers on stage with physical harm. These protesting students were all black, as is the student playwright. The play was neither slanderous nor incendiary in any judicial sense. By the admission of the author, it was designed to chafe fragile thin skin. He seemingly wanted to draw attention to the delicate sensitivities so commonplace on our campuses.
When it was subsequently learned that the university paid for the hecklers' admission, the proverbial organic matter hit the rotating device. It seems the Office of Campus Involvement bought tickets for the censorious hecklers and helped organize the disruption. Something had to be done! Just imagine enduring the rigors of college life and add to that the terrible weight of feeling offended. I can't go on without expressing the pride I feel knowing that I support this vital component of university education. How relieved I am to know that our tax-supported institutions of higher learning are staffed by an Office of Campus Involvement!
Bush planned to change the image of right wing politics by casting himself as a "compassionate conservative." In a non-binding resolution last June, the U.S. Senate "apologized" for the lynching of nearly 5,000 people, most of them black, between the 1890s and the 1960s. You could fill a book with examples of attempts by our foolish culture to purchase the endorsement of the community of the sensitive.
None of this is intended to deny the inhumanity of some men to other men. When the Taliban ruled, women in Afghanistan were denied an education and treated as property. Christians in the Nuba Mountains of southern Sudan daily experience cruelty beyond imagination at the hands of their Muslim rulers. Here we have examples of real oppression while our whiney elites fuss that greeting someone with "Merry Christmas" might offend.
And that reminds me. Christmas celebrates the birth of the one who was offended, insulted, cruelly tortured and painfully executed. There is no more shocking example of man's inhumanity to man than the crucifixion of Jesus Christ. Through it all, he never lodged a complaint. Everyone should resolve to take offense less frequently; and none more so than those of us that claim his name.
http://www.lahontanvalleynews.com/article/20051221/Opinion/112210013
December 21, 2005
Christmas is terribly offensive. At least, that is the consensus of the national media. Secularists are offended by Christmas. The Anti-Defamation League is offended by Christmas. Muslims are offended by Christmas. Bill O'Reilly is offended by everyone taking offense; and Congressman John Dingell (D-MI) is offended that O'Reilly is offended by the pampered elite's love of feeling offended.
National retail chains are so concerned about all this offensiveness that many have forbidden their employees to use the "C" word. They are delighted by the increased trade fostered by the celebration of Christmas; but to speak openly of Christmas risks giving offense.
The media loves a good story, as do we all. But, their recent performance indicates that they are not likely to let actual conditions or honest reporting stand in the way of a good story. In all likelihood, the problem is not as pervasive or weighty as the reports indicate. Having acknowledged that, it is not untrue to describe America as a fevered swamp of competing sensitivities. The commotion over Christmas is but the most recent example of the veto power we accord the community of the sensitive.
One of our state universities up here in the Northwest is on the national radar for having encouraged students to take offense at a dramatic performance. The student playwright warned attendees before his production was staged on campus that it was calculated to "offend everybody"; and indeed some Mormon students who paid their own way to see the play silently protested its content.
Forty other students repeatedly shouted "I am offended" and did everything in their power to shut down the production, including threatening performers on stage with physical harm. These protesting students were all black, as is the student playwright. The play was neither slanderous nor incendiary in any judicial sense. By the admission of the author, it was designed to chafe fragile thin skin. He seemingly wanted to draw attention to the delicate sensitivities so commonplace on our campuses.
When it was subsequently learned that the university paid for the hecklers' admission, the proverbial organic matter hit the rotating device. It seems the Office of Campus Involvement bought tickets for the censorious hecklers and helped organize the disruption. Something had to be done! Just imagine enduring the rigors of college life and add to that the terrible weight of feeling offended. I can't go on without expressing the pride I feel knowing that I support this vital component of university education. How relieved I am to know that our tax-supported institutions of higher learning are staffed by an Office of Campus Involvement!
Bush planned to change the image of right wing politics by casting himself as a "compassionate conservative." In a non-binding resolution last June, the U.S. Senate "apologized" for the lynching of nearly 5,000 people, most of them black, between the 1890s and the 1960s. You could fill a book with examples of attempts by our foolish culture to purchase the endorsement of the community of the sensitive.
None of this is intended to deny the inhumanity of some men to other men. When the Taliban ruled, women in Afghanistan were denied an education and treated as property. Christians in the Nuba Mountains of southern Sudan daily experience cruelty beyond imagination at the hands of their Muslim rulers. Here we have examples of real oppression while our whiney elites fuss that greeting someone with "Merry Christmas" might offend.
And that reminds me. Christmas celebrates the birth of the one who was offended, insulted, cruelly tortured and painfully executed. There is no more shocking example of man's inhumanity to man than the crucifixion of Jesus Christ. Through it all, he never lodged a complaint. Everyone should resolve to take offense less frequently; and none more so than those of us that claim his name.
http://www.lahontanvalleynews.com/article/20051221/Opinion/112210013