AUKUS vs. FRUG (Continuous War)

The new, seemingly redun-dant, anti-China “alliance” between three countries already allied—Australia, the UK and the US—a.k.a. AUKUS—reminds me of “Oceania” in Orwell’s 1984. “The war,” Orwell observes, “is not meant to be won, it is meant to be continuous.” Thus, in 1984, alliances between super-blocks change abruptly, enemies become allies, history is rewritten, but the essential thing—war—continues: never fought on territory belonging to any of the three superstates, but always in the “neutral” zone of North Africa, the Middle East, Southern Asia. Victory is not a goal—that is impossible, indeed unthinkable. No, WAR, itself, is the goal—the only way to preserve the political and economic status quo.

Analogously, in making its deal with Australia and the UK (one wonders why the British were included,  since they have very little presence in the Pacific these days), the U.S. treated France—and Europe—with the same casual/cynical disregard that Oceania displayed in dumping Eastasia and allying itself with Eurasia, its adversary as recently as the day before. This was shitty, yes, but—you know—it was a “necessary” maneuver to ensure that temporarily absent, but absolutely vital, WARFARE will be promptly resumed and will continue—this time with China and its proxies. French submarines just weren’t nasty enough, don’t you see? They just weren’t sufficiently bellicose to really make the the Chinese squeal.

So, you’ll have to get over it, M. Macron. Or perhaps play a little of the continuous war game yourself. For starters, Mr. Putin would undoubtedly be happy to ally himself with you and maybe Germany against perfidious AUKUS. You could call your real-life version of Orwell’s Eurasia FRUG—FranceRUssiaGermany. With a bit of pot-stirring, a nice war could probably be arranged in, say, Lebanon—which is already a wasteland anyway. Just a suggestion.

Or, alternatively, you could insincerely accept the U.S.’s insincere apology for throwing you under the bus. Honestly, we feel really, really bad that you just don’t seem to understand (despite France’s own distinguished history of self-serving betrayals) how these things work. Of course, we send our thoughts and prayers. At least, you can always count on them.

AMERICA THE BOOTYFUL (Obesity Version)

America the Bootyful

Oh beautiful for spacious thighs

For ample belly gains

For purple mounds of flesh to be

Tucked miserably in Hanes.

America, America,

God shed his grease on thee, 

And crown thy good

With blubberhood,

From knee to bulging knee.

Transgenderism Is Natural: Get Over It.

Yuval Harari, in his book Sapiens, makes this irrefutable observation about the “nature” of nature: “Whatever is possible,” he writes, “is by definition also natural. A truly unnatural behavior, one that goes against the laws of nature, simply cannot exist, so it would need no prohibition.”

In short, what is “natural” is, in its mere existence, physically true, but morally neutral—neither good nor bad. Rather, it is humans who assign morality to natural phenomena—and we do so (or should do so) based upon the effect—positive, negative, or zilch—they have on our species’ well-being. It is humans who decide if a particular “possible” behavior is good for humans (useful to humanity at the present time), bad for humans (harmful to humanity at the present time), or tolerable for humans (of no particular consequence to humanity at the present time). 

 Nothing could be more dishonest or irresponsible, therefore, than for individual humans to conjure up some supposedly objective and eternal “nature” that they fancy accords transcendant moral value to their own subjective and time-constrained prejudices. Let us rein in our hubris! Human beings themselves have only existed (and thus participated in nature’s possibilities) for about 200,000 years or so. A mere flicker of time: other “possibilities” will undoubtedly arise to follow us. But let us nonetheless endeavor to delay that replacement as long as possible—by making sound judgments now about how to play the hand nature has dealt us.

As an admittedly modest step toward realizing this goal, I’d like to propose that we acknowledge transgenderism/transsexuality as a very real possibility that does indeed exist at the present time and that is therefore entirely natural. As for its “morality,” i.e., its relative value for homo sapiens, I also propose that we accept it as—at the very least—tolerable (inoffensive) for humanity in general and, moreover, clearly good for those individuals for whom it is not just a possibility, but an incontrovertible fact.

In short, let’s stop fussing about this particular natural phenomenon. It’s here, it’s true, it’s OK. Let’s move on, humanity.We have many other, much more genuinely dangerous, “natural” behaviors to declare immoral and, for our common good—perhaps even salvation—regulate. Racism? War? Gun love? Misogyny? Child abuse? 

It’s time to be more sapiens, people.