Even academics I respect reacted to Ferguson’s comments as if they bordered on unimaginable, unheard-of madness. I understand that we live in a moment where any negative comment connected to homosexuality is not only wrong but “gay bashing.” But Ferguson was trafficking in an old theory that was perfectly within the bounds of intellectual discourse not very long ago. Now, because of a combination of indifference to intellectual history and politically correct piety he must don the dunce cap. Good to know.Perfectly within the bounds of intellectual discourse not very long ago.
If that's what intellectuals were doing — kicking members of an out group when they were on the outside — before the outsiders were on the inside and it became awkward to disrespect them to their face, then why should I be impressed by this history of intellectual discourse?
Maybe times change and it's hard to keep up, but let's not cry over a Harvard professor's difficulty keeping up.
Posts
372 comments:
1 – 200 of 372 Newer› Newest»It does seem to me that AT THAT TIME that a gay man might be more willing to repudiate his society, not care about the future, et cetera. Because he was so mistreated, viewed as such an outcast, why not show no concern about such a civilization? "You reject me, I'll reject you!"
Again, AT THAT TIME.
There's a much better way of arguing that perhaps Keynes' homosexuality played a part - AT THAT TIME - in his views of how the world works.
Ferguson is a scholar, he should know how to make this argument now as opposed to previous times.
... kicking members of an out group when they were on the outside...
Feel free to explain how any part of this old hypothesis about Keynes constitutes "kicking" him.
When did you start denouncing speculation about the influence of personality on policy beliefs? Are you going to recant your innumerable posts about the specialness of women's views on politics? If not, why can't Ferguson speculate on the existence of a particularly gay perspective?
^That doesn't explain Keynesian economics, though.
If Keynes rejected the world around him why care about coming up with solutions, even short term, for such a world?
As I said elsewhere, leave this type of psychobabble to the ridiculous Maureen Dowd. She's much better at it.
On balance, I think Goldberg's column was a good one. And I also think that the passage from it quoted (which falls at the end of Goldberg's piece) in this post isn't particularly a good representation of the column as a whole.
The gay psyche is absolutely focused on the present moment. In Wilde, characters barely have memory. In Kerouac the drive is toward immediacy & combustion, often leaving him broke & broken. That such values would be stimulating to a nation's economy but ultimately mistaken seems so obvious I'd better not deny it.
Why wouldn't Keynes sexuality figure into his thoughts on economics? Also, since Keynes was married to a ballerina, why is he considered a gay standard bearer? The sexual orientation of the Bloomsbury crowd was extremely variable and subject to change without notice. According to current gay theology, one's sexual orientation is not a choice, but among the Bloomsbury crowd it manifestly was.
People just can't help themselves. It was en vogue so recently to make snide comments about gay people that you're going to continue to see people wandering into sticky webs like this. And yet they'll be utterly shocked when those sticky webs manage to stick.
I surprised Goldberg took such a strong stand. Usually, he lives up to Coulter's description:
Girly Man
Also, one can't help but noting that while participating in bombings and murders is not an insuperable barrier to a career in academia, making a mildly hostile observation about homosexuality is.
Goldberg goes wrong on the "that was perfectly within the bounds of intellectual discourse not very long ago" business.
What was OK then is irrelevant.
We have always been at war with Eastasia.
Ferguson made the obvious point that homosexuals don't have chips in the posterity game. That's "disrespecting" them? All together now: it's more important to self-censor than to hurt the gay mafia's feelings.
There's a much better way of arguing that perhaps Keynes' homosexuality played a part - AT THAT TIME - in his views of how the world works.
You completely fail to understand the point Ferguson and others have posited.
Nobody--repeat, nobody--has ever argued that Keynes wrote out of malice, resentment, or a lack of concern.
The issue is how one balances the long term against the short term. We are having that same argument today, w.r.t. "stimulus" vs. "debt burden". It's one of the fundamental ways that reasonable people can disagree about policy.
Since it's obvious that people do in fact disagree over policy in precisely this way, people are naturally drawn to wonder why they do. Ferguson's argument may well be wrong, and it may even be silly, but it is simply not anti-gay.
To argue otherwise is to assert that it's manifestly better to take a long-run perspective over a short-run one. Since that's a matter of preference, I don't know how you could argue that claim rigorously.
I haven't read Ferguson's exact words but if he tied Keynes' homosexuality to the Bloomsbury group's hedonism, it's rejection of conventional morality, then he may have a point.
As others have noted, we engage in a sort of psychobiography of prominent individuals all the time. How their relationships with their parents, siblings, lovers, religion, society, et cetera affected their views and philosophies. Human sexuality is certainly a major influence, isn't it? Or can be.
Yes, we generalize and make larger conclusions.
But at this time, discussing homosexuality that in any way is viewed critically is simply not permitted.
If one were to speculate that childless hetersexual persons were less concerned about the future that would be okay, though?
Gays are now a protected class and cannot be singled out - except to praise them.
A new Keynes biography in the works detailing how he rose to greatness despite homophobia and all those "English Gays need not apply" signs.
"The gay psyche is absolutely focused on the present moment. "
I watched a movie in which all these straight people were killing each other. This obviously has immense implications for the straight psyche.
Perhaps the Althouse bio should be prefaced with, "I am a tiger momma!"?
The idea that it's out-of-bounds and gay-bashing to say that gay culture as currently practiced, and in some sense as initiated by the Bloomsbury group of which Keynes was a member, raises present comforts and satisfactions above the health of our shared posterity, is PC censorship at its worst.
After all, it's similarly unthinkable to imagine that Professor Althouse has formulated any of her positions based on her love for her son....
Lost in the noise is what Keynes actually said: "In the long run, we are all dead."
Well he's long dead and we're living the long run, and it is far from pleasant.
"You completely fail to understand the point Ferguson and others have posited."
If you have it, please, give me Ferguson's full comment.
The Bloomsbury group certainly rejected Victorian English standards, right? They were hedonists who believed that convention was ill-suited for themselves.
It's that type of "rejection" - in part caused by the treatment of homosexuality at that time - that I'm proposing.
Proposing. I haven't a clue whether there's evidence that explains any of Keynes' views. I'm not, by any means, a scholar on Keynes' life.
More congratsturbation from Althouse about gaydom.
No, Althouse. We straight men did not carry out a campaign of persecution against gay men. Everybody gets razzed and humiliated. It's the human condition.
You're lying again, both through commission and omission.
The AIDS epidemic was what persecuted gay men, Althouse. They killed themselves with their own sexual behavior.
Stop the fucking congratsturbation and lying for a moment sister. You can't pull this hustle on me.
Althouse you are a fucking outrageous liar when it comes to feminism and the gay worship.
1) I don't have biological children of my own, and I think that does lessen my concern for the future to some degree.
2)Being gay does make that combination more likely.
3)Keynes did set off some gaydar alarms.
That doesn't mean all people with kids are more concerned with the future than those without - clearly they all are not. But, it is not crazy to suggest what Ferguson did. The only problem is that "you can't handle the truth!" if it roughs up your pet pony.
"If that's what intellectuals were doing — kicking members of an out group when they were on the outside — before the outsiders were on the inside and it became awkward to disrespect them to their face, then why should I be impressed by this history of intellectual discourse?"
What was said about Keynes is no more noteworthy than feminists describing the world as a patriarchy. Why should gays be inured from a critique of their lifestyle and/or worldview? (if that's even what it was).
Non gay men aren't. White men aren't.
Why are gays being such cry babies?
Making a statement about Keynes' homosexuality and how that may have affected his economic/political views is not the same as saying that all homosexuals' have similar views because of their sexual orientation.
Yes, I understand that gay men and women have had to endure such ugly generalizations.
But that's not what is being done here, I don't think.
Goldberg sounds Jewish.
Blaming gays for an economic theory I disagree with used to be mainstream!
Shorter Pantsload
What I see going on with this story--and it's insidiously evil--is that criticism of Keynesian economics is being equated with homophobia.
Unless, you want suggest that having a child doesn't change your concern for the future one iota. Wanna make that assertion?
Not just wanting one, but actually having one.
"Feel free to explain how any part of this old hypothesis about Keynes constitutes "kicking" him."
It was kicking the whole group that wasn't present, like making sexist remarks when there are no women in the room. It's a thing people do, get in the habit of disrespecting the people who are not represented in their circle. It's very bad character, by the way, as you should have learned when you were a child. If they didn't notice they were doing it, because they were lazy and having their fun, so much the worse.
Ferguson's conjecture can be traced back to Joseph Schumpeter, another famous Harvard economist (such a hotbed of homophobia!). Feel free to point out the personal attack on Keynes to be found in this:
After Keynes's death Schumpeter wrote a brief biographical piece called Keynes the Economist - on a personal level he was very positive about Keynes as a man ; praising his pleasant nature, courtesy and kindness. He assessed some of Keynes biographical and editorial work as among the best he'd ever seen. Yet Schumpeter remained critical about Keynes's economics, linking Keynes's childlessness to what Schumpeter saw as an essentially short term view.
I'm worn out with Althouse's spoiled brat bleating. Too much.
Clearly, Daddy told her she was a darling little princess who should get everything she wanted. She ran with this and converted it into a complaint against the world whenever she didn't get what she wanted, i.e., feminism.
Now, she's pulling the same shit over the gaydom. Anytime her son doesn't get want he wants, basic human rights are being violated.
Stop this spoiled brat performance, Althouse. It's always been a travesty. You were making an ass out of yourself when you were a kid. You're doubling up on that performance now.
I feel sorry for anyone who becomes more concerned about the future because they had a child.
It was kicking the whole group that wasn't present
He was speaking at a straights-only event?
"like making sexist remarks when there are no women in the room."
What would be the point of that?
Note, once again, how Althouse refuses to even acknowledged the horrific catastrophe gay men brought on themselves and the rest of us with the AIDS epidemic.
There is no lie of omission or commission that is not vile enough for Althouse when she gets into this bullshit.
If this was Ferguson's best shot against Keynes and Keynesian economics, Keynesians have little to fear.
And Keynes's comment about the long run wasn't an insouciant disregard for the future, it was him pointing out that waiting for the market to sort itself out over the long term isn't going to do much to address an immediate crisis.
Ann Althouse wrote:
t was kicking the whole group that wasn't present, like making sexist remarks when there are no women in the room. It's a thing people do, get in the habit of disrespecting the people who are not represented in their circle. It's very bad character, by the way, as you should have learned when you were a child. If they didn't notice they were doing it, because they were lazy and having their fun, so much the worse.
And what were you saying about feminism only yesterday? Do you think, when feminists are laying the charge against the male patriarchy that men are sitting in the room? Isn't THAT bad form?
WHy are men fair game, but gay men off limits?
Jonah Goldberg invokes traditional values, but he's forgetting about the traditional value everyone's parents used to teach. The traditional value of crap intellectuals always used to say to each other because they were and elite exclusive group who amused themselves at the expense of those they excluded?
That's what "traditional values" means to people who hate arguments based on traditional values.
"I feel sorry for anyone who becomes more concerned about the future because they had a child."
So your life and priorities don't change after the birth of your child?
"And what were you saying about feminism only yesterday? Do you think, when feminists are laying the charge against the male patriarchy that men are sitting in the room? Isn't THAT bad form?"
I don't know, what was I saying about feminism yesterday. Quote what I said and I'll say why I'm being consistent.
Goldberg sounds Jewish.
The latent yenta will out!
Name calling wounds gay men to the core.
Dying of AIDS... eh?
Gay men belong in the closet, Althouse. Coming out killed them and other people by the millions.
Quit lying. Your lies are damnable.
Gay men need to be afraid of their own behavior, not of straight men.
You've slandered straight men again. You've been doing that your whole life. Awful, Althouse.
somefeller said...
If this was Ferguson's best shot against Keynes and Keynesian economics, Keynesians have little to fear.
It wasn't.
It sounded more like exasperation.
And Keynes's comment about the long run wasn't an insouciant disregard for the future, it was him pointing out that waiting for the market to sort itself out over the long term isn't going to do much to address an immediate crisis.
Worked better for Silent Cal than all the "intervention" has for all the Lefties since.
"So your life and priorities don't change after the birth of your child?"
If that's what it takes to be concerned about future generations...I'm glad it took place somehow.
"like making sexist remarks when there are no women in the room."
Look at the tits on that contradiction.
Althouse, feminism came along at just the wrong moment for you.
Coupled with the Daddy's darling little girl thing, feminism has plunged you into an abyss of stupidity and lies. You slandered the fathers to get what you wanted. Now, you're constantly slandering straight men for the harm gay men did to themselves.
You can't stop lying.
"If this was Ferguson's best shot against Keynes and Keynesian economics, Keynesians have little to fear."
Too bad it's probably the weakest attack he could possibly come up with. The truth of history is what you Keynesians have to fear. That and the possibility that people my learn the history, or understand the present. That's the Kryptonite.
Damn, I was hoping that Shouting Thomas had died.
There's no indication that Keynes was particularly interested in the future vs. the here and now. Speculation that it was due to his being Gay and childless seems reasonable.
Amazing how much of "news" on the internet consist of the MSM PC Nannies wagging their fingers at someone - as opposed to anything meaningful.
Kchiker said...
I feel sorry for anyone who becomes more concerned about the future because they had a child.
Why? That's just absurd.
When did you start denouncing speculation about the influence of personality on policy beliefs?
Must have been sometime after this:
Well, my experience in legal academia is that people who try to get into the idea geek zone need to get their pretensions punctured right away. The sharp lawprof types I admire always see a veneer on top of something more important, and our instinct is to peel it off. What is your love of this idea really about? That's our method.
If this was Ferguson's best shot against Keynes and Keynesian economics, Keynesians have little to fear.
You do know that Ferguson is a historian, not an economist, don't you?
Keynesians should be a lot more concerned about the apparently tiny size of the multiplier effect of fiscal deficits than anything a historian says about Keynes's rate of time preference.
I haven't heard gay people who are not Keynes shouting about how in the long run we are all dead. What a shitty philosophy by the way, and logically wrong. Who's we kimosabe? Clearly it must be people who are alive today. He's baldly saying fuck the people of the future.
There's gay people and there's gay culture. This is a criticism of current gay culture, not current or past gay people.
Plus, gay culture can change. Vincent Minelli and Shakespeare married and had children (even if Edward DeVere the 17th Earl of Oxford was Shakespeare, because he had kids too).
In fact, Shakespeare was obsessed with the need to extend one's line. That was the main thrust of the Sonnets, persuading his young male lover to marry. And it's a theme throughout the plays.
Why can't we have a gay culture that offers gay men (in particular) the chance at fatherhood, and a fatherhood that does not deprive their children of the chidren's mother?
All this "concern" is costing a fine population of people one of life's main chances at happiness.
Goldberg is Jewish and its obvious that criticism of him is driven - at least in part - by antisemitism.
Of course, 99 percent of Americans don't know who Keynes is, or understand his economic philosophy, so the only way to get them interested is to play the 'You can't say that, you Homophobe !' angle.
If this was Ferguson's best shot against Keynes and Keynesian economics, Keynesians have little to fear.
Keynesians rightly only fear the economic future they've wrought for us. But they're all in deep denial.
Goldberg is Jewish and its obvious that criticism of him is driven - at least in part - by antisemitism.
I've heard that Keynes was pretty anti-Semite himself. Has this been debunked?
I'm childless, and if someone made this assertion about me, I'd have to be honest and say it's quite possible, because it's ridiculous to assert that someone without kids has the same concerns for the future. Our concern may be sufficient, decent and lead us to correct priorities anyway, but having kids makes it much more real, personal and for good people, non-negotiable.
Ferguson was making a very weak argument verging on silly, but it was not unfounded bigotry. It was just piling on a few extra bits of argument he had lying around in the junk drawer to sweeten the deal. Sometimes that backfires.
Why can't we have a gay culture that offers gay men (in particular) the chance at fatherhood, and a fatherhood that does not deprive their children of the chidren's mother?
Fear of HIV and its normalization.
Well, I don't cry about your self interest here either, I factor it into my understanding of your posts. I think many will testify that having children changes their outlook on life, so I think it is a perfectly valid proposition. I'll bet it affects voting patterns also. Whether it affected Keynes economics is a separate question.
I had thought that what he said, more or less, was that a gay person might not care about the future.
It may be equally wrong to say that a childless (or child*free*) person doesn't care about the future, but would it be kicking an out-group?
What does it mean when one of those child-free types makes a crappy remark about breeders? (Or just uses the word "breeders?")
There is a strong anti-natal faction, and an even larger portion of the population that accepts without question that people are bad and there are too many of us.
Also, not to long ago I had thought it was accepted and normal to discuss how homosexuality might or might not be an evolutionary plus (more adults contributing to fewer children, etc.,) but is it now the case that we can't even discuss the interest (or not) that "non-breeders" have in the next generation?
It's all devolved into.... shut up.
So if I understand Ann's argument, we should not offer up theories based on any group not represented at the discussion. A bit of negative truth expressed about women for instance without any of them present becomes a sexist lie.
"Ferguson was making a very weak argument verging on silly"
Yes...it's like proclaiming yourself the winner of a chess match because you have a goldfish and your opponent does not.
Vanilla Ice already addressed this in "Get Wit'it":
Pow! holy cow!
it’s like a bang or a boom
Mc’s see me comin’ and they’re clearin’ the room
Ouuta my path ’cause they’re scared of the result
Don’t wanna battle ’cause to me that’s an insult
Man, I wouldn’t even lower myself
I got your record and put it on the shelf"
"On the Shelf": Traditional Values that are Put Away as Civilization moves Forward with a "bang or a boom ."
"It's all devolved into.... shut up."
Exactly, and even the people who imagine themselves free speech advocates have their silly exceptions.
Yeah, Professor, you've become wedded to your cultural blinders. I'm reading a book right now that blames Keynes' book on the Versailles Treaty for WWII, no shit. I think it's a little over the top, but there's nothing inherently discreditable about a no-children bias against long-term thinking. We're talking about the man who famously said "in the long run we're all dead". Saith a man with no progeny, and I write that as a man who will, indeed, have no progeny either.
If heterosexual men cannot face criticism without whining they are being abused, it's time for some serious self introspection. Why is this person, Shouting Thomas so angry? He acts as if he is cut to the quick. His behavior today is absurd, he demeans himself, it's embarrassing to watch, cringeworthy actually.
Damn, I was hoping that Shouting Thomas had died.
I am mortally wounded by your words, Palladian.
So, now that I'm a victim of your heterophobia, what do I get?
Althouse, what's my reward for these tears I must cry because my feelings are hurt?
Why is this person, Shouting Thomas so angry?
This is a stupid political tactic. It's become the standard.
I'm having a great day. About to go for a two hour bike ride. Did my work as a church organist this morning.
Why is slandering straight men as the cause of gay men's problems not "anger?"
Is Althouse consumed with anger? She's been slandering the fathers and straight men to get what she wants throughout her entire life.
"I feel sorry for anyone who becomes more concerned about the future because they had a child."
I feel sorry for anyone who thinks their dog is like a child. Because they really think so. They love it, and its part of their family, and they think that's like having a child.
Because they don't have a clue.
Vanilla Ice also touched on this Subject in "Boom":
Crude as oil
unrefined but slick
I’m gonna get you from behind
like a gay convict
Precise and Relevant Commentary, indeed.
Our problems are with Kenyan economics not Keynesian.
That is where they think everything is great if all of America is on Food Stamps.
Let me be as blunt as possible for what I'm saying about Althouse.
She's deflecting the blame for catastrophe of the AIDS epidemic onto straight men.
Damnable behavior.
Althouse said:
I don't know, what was I saying about feminism yesterday. Quote what I said and I'll say why I'm being consistent.
Yesterday you asked the question:
"Remember when feminism was about consciousness-raising?"
Feminism, is taught by intellectuals pushing a world view of men as oppressors and a patriarchy. When they are making those charges are they doing so with men in the room? Wasn't the consciece raising you were talking about kicking members of an out group when they were on the outside. So why should we be impressed by your example of feminism as conscience raising?
As bagoh pointed out:
So if I understand Ann's argument, we should not offer up theories based on any group not represented at the discussion. A bit of negative truth expressed about women for instance without any of them present becomes a sexist lie.
As Ferguson should shut up about gays, so should feminists shut up about men. SHUT UP ANN!
Why is this person, Shouting Thomas so angry?
He hasn't gotten laid in years?
"He was speaking at a straights-only event?"
Who was?
This thread has a wonderful level of disagreement, not just the usual two sides, but multiple overlapping points of view.
He hasn't gotten laid in years?
You'll be happy to know that I got laid just last night, Palladian.
Would you like to be the first to offer your congratulations?
All this talk about getting laid!
At least nobody can call S.T. "passive aggressive."
"Gays are now a protected class and cannot be singled out - except to praise them."
No, but they and people who care about them are now listening and powerful enough to criticize what you say. That's part of free speech too. If you only like your free speech when your opponents aren't around to fight back, you deserve criticism for bad character. The complaining about how you can't get away with saying the mean things that used to be okay? It's completely lame!
You're asking for something like political correctness: an immunity from criticism!
Say what you want, but other people speak too, and if they don't like it, they criticize you.
That's the marketplace of ideas, and if people don't like your product, you lose.
Deal with it!
Althouse wrote: If that's what intellectuals were doing — kicking members of an out group when they were on the outside — before the outsiders were on the inside and it became awkward to disrespect them to their face...
I'll call bullshit on that paragraph.
Now that all right-thinking folk have suddenly discarded the idea that biography determines perspective, I don't expect to hear one more word from them about Diversity.
I got laid once. It didn't change anything. It just gave me the munchies and then I fell asleep.
Paeonia said...
Why is this person, Shouting Thomas so angry? He acts as if he is cut to the quick.
If Shout wants to be angry, he's got a right.
If he wants to tell us all he got laid, well..., it's maybe more than we need to know.
What worries me is the next step in this conflict.
"You're asking for something like political correctness: an immunity from criticism!"
No, were saying make an argument beyond saying it's bigotry, or sexist, or whatever. It's either true, false or somewhere in between, but it's not just wrong to say it.
No, but they and people who care about them are now listening and powerful enough to criticize what you say.
Althouse, I have no idea how a woman who is so intelligent and accomplished transforms herself into an absolute fucking idiot over this shit.
There is no person on this earth who does not "care" about some gay person. You've defined "caring" as agreeing with your political agenda, which just makes you a cunt.
You've got your head so deep up your ass on this, I wonder how you breathe. Lies on top of lies on top of lies.
The original Keynes quote, in context:
Now 'in the long run' this [the quantity theory of money] is probably true ... . But this “long run” is a misleading guide to current affairs. “In the long run” we are all dead. Economists set themselves too easy, too useless a task if in tempestuous seasons they can only tell us that when the storm is long past the ocean is flat again.
The quote is from an early work of Keynes, "A Tract on Monetary Reform": http://203.200.22.249:8080/jspui/bitstream/123456789/2209/1/A_tract_on_monetary_reform.pdf
The quantity theory of money:
http://www.investopedia.com/articles/05/010705.asp
I am not an economist, but Keynes seems to be agreeing that, in the long term, pouring money into an economy will simply increase the price of goods, but that in the short term there may be some positive results. This doesn't seem to be a result of any 'gay' thinking on the part of Keynes.
This might mean that Ferguson was making a stupid remark, but of course we don't know what Ferguson said or the context of his remarks.
Speculating about motive is standard practice in any discussion of politics or crime (but I repeat myself) isn't it?
Ann Althouse wrote:
No, but they and people who care about them are now listening and powerful enough to criticize what you say. That's part of free speech too. If you only like your free speech when your opponents aren't around to fight back, you deserve criticism for bad character. The complaining about how you can't get away with saying the mean things that used to be okay? It's completely lame!
What if he said it about childless people who weren't gay?
What if he said people who say "Hope I die before I get old" have a short term view of the world, rather than a long term view of the world.
Can you make that critique of Roger Daltry? What if Roger Daltry were also gay, could you then NOT make the argument?
Something about the proximity of "got laid" and "gave me the munchies" in a single comment" conjures up oddly vivid imagery, unbidden.
So, as you can see, Althouse has resorted to the standard bullshit tactic.
You don't "care" about the gay people in your life if you don't agree with her political agenda.
It's the fucking "bigot" argument.
No fucking awareness at all that others may "care" about gays and see a different political agenda as being best for them.
Godawful.
I am tired of Althouse's pretense that this is some intellectual issue for her. She's a loon when it comes to this crap.
Experiences in your life - your sexuality, your parents - plays no role in how you see the world as an adult?
Sure, it varies from person to person. No one says all "A" believe in "B".
Well, liberals and progressives do. If you're black or gay or female you must believe "B."
Ferguson is talking about Keynes. No one else.
Others are making generalizations - things we do all the time - but not saying all gay men and women don't care about the future. Or all childless people don't care about tomorrow.
A generalization is just that.
This shouldn't be that hard.
""Now that all right-thinking folk have suddenly discarded the idea that biography determines perspective, I don't expect to hear one more word from them about Diversity."
His biography, perspective, or opinion on boxers vs. briefs has no bearing on whether or not the multiplier effect exists. Comments on his sex life or his unsuccessful attempts to bear children just add a sour frosting to a failed cake."
Althouse wrote:
Maybe times change and it's hard to keep up, but let's not cry over a Harvard professor's difficulty keeping up.
That presumes a world view that must be adopted and must be kept up with. Why must Ferguson adopt your world view?
Who was?
Ferguson. How was that not blindingly obvious?
I even pasted the quote from you that was being addressed. But since you claim befuddlement, here's an extended version:
You claimed that Ferguson felt free to say what he said b/c he was talking about people who weren't present to hear him. That implies that he knew there were no gays among the hundreds of financial advisors he was speaking to at the Altegris Conference.
Why would anyone think that was an exclusively hetero audience?
The greater question is why is he angry. Yes, he most assuredly has aright to express himself, but his anger is irrational. Feminists have been put under the microscope numerous times on Althouse, are heterosexual men untouchable? Why should they be exempt from critisim? I believe anyone who has engaged in the behavior Althouse describes, man or woman should be made to face what they have engaged in the past. How can we learn, without facing our own mistakes?
Keynes seems to be agreeing that, in the long term, pouring money into an economy will simply increase the price of goods, but that in the short term there may be some positive results.
He actually argues just the opposite in the General Theory--that in a "liquidity trap" monetary expansion is completely ineffective. Deficit spending by the government is the only way to increase aggregate demand.
The "long run" Keynes refers to the time it would take for deflation to restore full-employment equilibrium. He's arguing that it's better to use fiscal stimulus right away than to wait for prices to fall.
We don't discuss gay issues in a rational way in this country. Reagan is still getting blamed for not spending infinite amounts of money to fight AIDS. Yet the primary cause of AIDS (unprotected anal sex) had been known for decades. It's a totally (or near totally) preventable disease.
At the very least, it's far more preventable than breast, colon, or prostate cancer. Virtually all a person has to do to remain uninfected is not engage in unprotected anal sex with strangers or share needles.
And yet for decades AIDS has soaked up research money which otherwise would have gone into studies those cancers, which kill far more people but, unlike AIDS, are so far unpreventable.
If the county of Los Angeles can require actors in porn movies to wear condoms on public health grounds, it can also require that people who engage in anal sex with strangers wear condoms too.
From Jonah Goldberg's article:
"There’s a brouhaha a-brewin’ over comments by Niall Ferguson at an investor conference. Ferguson suggested that because John Maynard Keynes was gay, effete, and childless he might have lacked concern for posterity. After all, Keynes famously proclaimed ”in the long run we’re all dead.” In a nigh-upon hysterical and terribly written item, Tom Kostigen of Financial Advisor says Ferguson took “gay-bashing to new heights.” He adds, “Apparently, in Ferguson’s world, if you are gay or childless, you cannot care about future generations nor society.”
Can I ask Althouse, first off, why lacking concern for posterity MUST even be considered a negative trait?
For Ferguson it is, but he's trying to explain Keynesianism an economic principle that doesn't seem to put much truck into thinking of long term consequences. And applying some pop psychology to the mix that may or may not be accurate.
But even if it isn't accurate why is it HOMOPHOBIC to suggest?
John Lennon wasn't a homosexual and wasn't childless had a song called "Living on Borrowed Time" (without a thought for tomorrow).
If I said John Lennon doesn't seem to care about posterity that much since he is living for today, is that even a negative trait? Well on one hand yes, (since he's not thinking of the long term) but on the other hand no (because he's living for today).
Keynes argued that in the long term we're all dead speaks for a lack of care for posterity.
Keynes also had no kids and was gay. And generally gays don't have kids,so don't think about the legacy of carrying on the family name. As such, Keynes lack of kids and gayness (or lifestyle) could have some bearing on his worldview. Why is that crazy to think?
Paul Zrimsek said...
"Now that all right-thinking folk have suddenly discarded the idea that biography determines perspective, I don't expect to hear one more word from them about Diversity."
Boom goes the dynamite. Threadwinner.
Paeonia said...
The greater question is why is he angry. Yes, he most assuredly has aright to express himself, but his anger is irrational. Feminists have been put under the microscope numerous times on Althouse, are heterosexual men untouchable? Why should they be exempt from critisim? I believe anyone who has engaged in the behavior Althouse describes, man or woman should be made to face what they have engaged in the past. How can we learn, without facing our own mistakes?
I think we just found where the She Devil of the SS has been hiding.
PS Why he's angry is his business. And I don't find him irrational, just a little self-absorbed on occasion
And, if said She Devil is trying to tell us heterosexual males are not criticized here, it's about the lamest hijack attempt since Richard Reid.
He hasn't gotten laid in years?
As the proverbial 40-year-old virgin, I call bullshit on your bigoted, hedonistic, hormonally-driven bullshit, Palladian. Maybe I'm gay, maybe I'm straight. Maybe I'm asexual. But this? This is rot, pure and simple, bigoted bullshit from someone *proud of the wrong thing*. Grow up, and stop defining yourself by your genitals, your glands, and your worst impulses.
If our past and present experiences plays no role on how we live, how we act, what we do, then the field of psychiatry is out of business.
The anti-intellectualism of the left is on clear display here.
"When did you start denouncing speculation about the influence of personality on policy beliefs?"
That's a question that assumes a fact that hasn't been established. Like "When did you stop denouncing your wife?"
I never denounced such speculation. Look closely at what I've said and have not said and ask a better-grounded question. Quote something I have said and explain why you think it's inconsistent with something else. I'll respond honestly.
Edutcher, I don't know who you are confusing me with, but my hunch is that you don't care for her very much. Why are you so angry? I'm making an observation about Shouting Thomas, not you.
If our past and present experiences plays no role on how we live, how we act, what we do, then the field of psychiatry is out of business.
The topic being discussed was an economic theory, not the psyche of a specific individual. Thus, the issue of Keynes's sexuality was at best irrelevant.
The anti-intellectualism of the left is on clear display here.
Yes, because saying "Keynesianism - that's so gay!" is a very intellectual position.
Earlier, jr565 quoted me saying "It was kicking the whole group that wasn't present, like making sexist remarks when there are no women in the room.... It's very bad character..." And then he asked "And what were you saying about feminism only yesterday? Do you think, when feminists are laying the charge against the male patriarchy that men are sitting in the room? Isn't THAT bad form?
WHy are men fair game, but gay men off limits?"
That sounded all garbled to me. Still does. But I said: "I don't know, what was I saying about feminism yesterday. Quote what I said and I'll say why I'm being consistent." And jr565 came up with a question that I asked yesterday: "Remember when feminism was about consciousness-raising?"
I don't see how that question, which implied that it was better when feminism was about sharpening observation and insight than when it does the opposite. Jr565 then asks another jumbled set of questions: "Feminism, is taught by intellectuals pushing a world view of men as oppressors and a patriarchy. When they are making those charges are they doing so with men in the room? Wasn't the consciece raising you were talking about kicking members of an out group when they were on the outside. So why should we be impressed by your example of feminism as conscience raising?"
I didn't say anything about the value of speaking within a closed group and getting lazy about what you can say about outsiders when they're not around. Maybe some weaselly feminists behaved that way, but I never praised them. I haven't given feminists a pass when they demonstrate bad character (such as cowardice and dishonesty and repressiveness). It seems to me that consciousness-raising went on in the public debate. We've been engaging in that debate in the public marketplace of ideas for the last half century. It's not some behind-closed-doors conversation. It seems to me that women have been willing to air their grievances and so forth, and the other perspectives have been heard.
"Now that all right-thinking folk have suddenly discarded the idea that biography determines perspective, I don't expect to hear one more word from them about Diversity."
The word "determines" is far too strong for the point you want to make.
Oh, this is just getting silly now.
Paeonia said...
Edutcher, I don't know who you are confusing me with, but my hunch is that you don't care for her very much. Why are you so angry? I'm making an observation about Shouting Thomas, not you.
It's her.
And I'm hardly angry. You have yet to see me angry.
"What if he said it about childless people who weren't gay?"
But that's what's so telling! He didn't!
Why pick on gay people? It suggests it feels right somehow or amusing to kick the gay guy. That's how the bad character really shows. He's taking the man less seriously precisely because he's gay, and one gets the feeling that seemed like a good idea -- when it was, in fact, a terrible idea -- because that is the sort of thing that's been happening within a closed circle.
"The topic being discussed was an economic theory, not the psyche of a specific individual. Thus, the issue of Keynes's sexuality was at best irrelevant"
And a person's psyche, his emotional makeup, his experiences, doesn't affect one's political and economic views?
James Baldwin, to choose an example?
There's a long, long list of how the private lives of public figures affected their public views.
This is not new.
What is new is that somehow if the examination involved homosexuality that's it's forbidden.
That's anti-intellectualism.
Jonah Goldberg invokes traditional values, but he's forgetting about the traditional value everyone's parents used to teach.
No. They way I read Goldberg's article is not that he condemns or defends Furgason.
Rather, he points out that Furgason is being condemned by other intellectuals for saying things that they themselves said not that long ago.
Remember, Biden (that goof) forced Obama into publicly supporting gay marriage. So now, well-behaved intellectuals are supposed to lock elbows and match stride while marching forward together with him. Furgason was too slow in matching stride.
The complaining about how you can't get away with saying the mean things that used to be okay? It's completely lame!
Goldberg's point was that Ferguson wasn't saying anything new, and a good part of the shocked, shocked! reaction to Ferguson's comments appears to come from people who have never heard such things about Keynes before, or are at least pretending they haven't.
So, there's that. But I'm stuck on the professor's insistence that the speculations about Keynes' motivations were "mean" then and still "mean" now.
People used to tell ethnic jokes all the time. Some people will still tell blonde jokes, but ethnic jokes have completely fallen out of favor -- exactly the kind of "mean" thing no one would say anymore, if they're "keeping up," as Althouse would have it.
But I have to agree with the posters above who have pointed out that the previous historians comments were not "mean", but exactly what we expect biographies to do, illuminate a person's work through their personal experiences. We have Keynes' own writings to go on, here, and his Bloomsbury membership and rejection of traditional values certainly was a major influence on all aspects of his life. Why does pointing that out suddenly become "mean"? Because part of his personal history is that he was gay and had no kids?
I see a connection to the Benghazi cover up here: we're not allowed to talk about what's really going on because if we did, we'd have to admit that we made mistakes, we were wrong, and everyone knows we never make mistakes and we're never wrong, so we just won't talk about it and everything will be just fine. Our administration and our culture are now centered on denial and avoidance.
Whodathunk that the new Gaytriarchy would be more oppressive than the old Patriarchy?
I'm shocked!
James Baldwin wasn't the creator of a fairly abstract economic theory, he was someone promoting civil rights for people like himself. So biography obviously underlied his positions. And in this case, homosexuality wasn't brought up as an interesting psychobiographical point, it was brought up as something that in and of itself should be seen as a damning point for an economic theory. That's anti-intellectualism, as well as some other things.
"'Who was?' Ferguson. How was that not blindingly obvious?"
It seemed like what you might want to say, but it didn't fit with what I said, so your question was unintelligible. I suggest you trace back a few steps and make your question accurate, so that it asks me about something I actually said.
You quoted me saying "It was kicking the whole group that wasn't present." You then said "He was speaking at a straights-only event?" I said "Who was" because my statement referred to the post about "what intellectuals were doing" — Jonah Goldberg's presentation of the "intellectual discourse not very long ago." In that context, the intellectuals believed the gays were not there and they enjoyed the privilege of not having to think about that. They are now brought up short as the privilege is gone. Ferguson forgot where he was.
Now, you did quote me in the comments, saying "It was kicking the whole group that wasn't present," so maybe my "it" wasn't that obvious in referring to the post. I was responding to your previous line "Feel free to explain how any part of this old hypothesis about Keynes constitutes 'kicking' him." Goldberg's post was about the "intellectual discourse not very long ago" giving examples of people who were able to kick him in the past, back when the intellectuals felt free to kick gay people around when they weren't or didn't seem to be around.
You shifted forward to the recent event with Ferguson, which didn't connect with what I was saying. You did it with sarcasm "He was speaking at a straights-only event?" And I gave you a shot at seeing where you made the disconnect. You responded again with sarcasm: "How was that not blindingly obvious?"
Now, I've spelled it all out and I've taken a lot of time to do it as clearly as I can. I hope you can give this comment the respectful attention it deserves, because I've really tried to explain this to you, despite your repeated sarcasm.
I haven't seen a comments thread this ugly in a while. To avoid further inflaming the perpetually inflamed, I'll let Old Goat and Young Goat bash out their daddy issues with each other, on their own.
But it's a good thing that I don't have to let Goldberg off the hook that easily. When he says:
"But Ferguson was trafficking in an old theory that was perfectly within the bounds of intellectual discourse not very long ago... "
I think it's safe to say that while one "traffics" in drugs, money laundering and other illicit trade, sound ideas are not the sort of thing to ascribe this verb to.
So I think its safe to say that I'm well within the bounds of intellectual discourse to accuse Goldberg of showing his hand and the hands of those he'd protect, as an illegitimate one. One that he, knowingly or unknowingly, admits to as illegitimate with language that can't be interpreted in any other way.
Thanks for giving yourself away like that, Jonah. Now go find a whale bigger than yourself to be swallowed by so that you can have that epiphany-causing, morality seeking life event that you so badly need to happen.
Ferguson is, was and always will be a sophistry spewing hack.
His words are always intricate, detailed and intriguing, but as shallow and shaky in their foundations as a sandcastles built on stilts.
As are all attempts to merge conservatism with reason.
"Whodathunk that the new Gaytriarchy would be more oppressive than the old Patriarchy?"
Someone who says stupid things may just have to hear others indicate that they had said stupid things.
Oh, the oppression! Surely there must be something in the first amendment that can be used to silence those who call others' statements stupid!
The word "determines" is far too strong for the point you want to make.
Since you're having the characteristic Althousian vapors over the idea that biography has anything at all to do with perspective, it really doesn't matter how strong the word is.
Why pick on gay people?
At its core, conservatism relies on authoritarian structures that separate the "inferior" from the "superior".
It suggests it feels right somehow or amusing to kick the gay guy.
I guess it's become less fashionable than relying on merely the poor to kick around.
"But Ferguson was trafficking in an old theory that was perfectly within the bounds of intellectual discourse not very long ago... "
This is like protesting that you've been pulled over for speeding ... By indicating that you speed every day and had never before been pulled over.
"And a person's psyche, his emotional makeup, his experiences, doesn't affect one's political and economic views?"
I think it's fine and important to delve into any thinker's psyche if we can, but if, in doing so, we rely on stereotypes about the group he belongs to, we're responsible for the stereotypes we are using. That is subject to challenge.
It's certainly idiotic to say gay people can't have children. They can and often do.
There might be a way of saying that those whose sexual impulses don't take them into the activity that causes pregnancy might think about life in different ways, but figure out something worth saying and say it well. Don't just tell a one-liner that invites troglodytes to giggle at the gay guy!
Althouse is about as intellectual on this issue as a drunk living in a dump on the second floor of a flophouse.
She gave it all away with the concealed "bigot" bullshit.
She wants society to police what people say about the people she likes. Free speech, my ass.
I grew up with three spoiled brat sisters, and my Dad did the little princess routine with them, too. Yes, and they cried about how mean I was when I used their own tactics against them, too.
No, I'm not angry. I'm tired of Althouse's lies. An entire lifetime of unjustly scapegoating our fathers to get what her spoiled brat heart desires. Now, she's moved on to relentlessly scapegoating straight men for the problem of gays.
Althouse, you have a lot to answer for. It is you who owes the explanation for your bad behavior here.
Gay people with children care more about the future than heterosexuals who do not.
That, I believe is what Ferguson meant.
American Conservative Delusion #1: Free Speech = Uncriticized Speech.
Althouse, you have a lot to answer for. It is you who owes the explanation for your bad behavior here.
In other words, you've been a bad, bad girl!
Shorter You-Know-Who:
I have an absolute right to say anything I want without anyone ever being able to so much as CRITICIZE it! It's written right there in the Bill of Rights, Gawdammit!
"Since you're having the characteristic Althousian vapors over the idea that biography has anything at all to do with perspective, it really doesn't matter how strong the word is."
That isn't a characteristic of mine. And nothing here suggests that I have the "vapors" (which, by the way, smells of sexism).
You are making inaccurate statements.
In other words, you've been a bad, bad girl!
Precisely.
The feminist tsunami came along at just the right time to ratchet up the spoiled brat bitch.
She rode it for everything she could get.
Now, it's on to scapegoating straight men for the problems of gay.
You're a dreadful brat here, Althouse.
"I have an absolute right to say anything I want without anyone ever being able to so much as CRITICIZE it! It's written right there in the Bill of Rights, Gawdammit!"
"And respect my AUTHORITAH."
Behold, the Cartmanization of a whole political perspective.
The whole sideshow resembles an enormous balloon which spontaneously inflated to protect Keynesian economics. Ferguson made some intemperate remarks about Keynes' sexuality. Goldberg's reasoned analysis brings the focus back to Keynes's economics which I assume is what some people are really defending.
Althouse, we're all complicated mixes of good and evil. Who knows what the sum of your life is in these terms? I certainly can't judge.
But, in this arena, you're just plain no damned good.
Althouse you are a fucking outrageous liar when it comes to feminism and the gay worship.
I think that, when it comes to internet speech, it's actually "teh gays". Or, "teh gayz".
Either way, this point of order was needed before proceeding. Carry on.
Authoritarians often try to infantalize their opponents.
Michael said...
Gay people with children care more about the future than heterosexuals who do not.
That, I believe is what Ferguson meant.
Translated for the masses, but yes.
Goldberg's reasoned analysis...
Lol.
"Trafficking".
Ferguson made it about his rude attitude. Keynes point about the inability of conservative policy-makers to focus on the present over the distant future stands.
Authoritarians often try to infantalize their opponents.
First, there's nothing inherently wrong with being authoritarian. Depends on the circumstances and the speaker.
And, yes, Althouse is just a loony spoiled brat when it comes to this shit.
Sometimes people act like infants. The shoe fits here.
Authoritarians often try to infantalize their opponents.
I applaud your observation that this was exactly what Ferguson, knowingly or not, was doing to his long-dead opponent, Keynes.
First, there's nothing inherently wrong with being authoritarian.
This quote needs to be memorialized and immortalized in granite, somewhere...
It is totally unfair to say that Keynesian economic theories suck because he likes to suck.
It's like blaming Aaron Rodgers for losing the big game all the time because he is gay.
That's not fair.
I think it is called the Butt-hurt Transference.
It least it was in that episode of Star Trek when Sulu and Kirk beamed down to that planet without any green woman on it.
Althouse, you shouldn't ask for respect from your commenters when you regularly withhold it, most notably when discussing gay issues.
This quote needs to be memorialized and immortalized in granite, somewhere...
Get to work, Ritmo the Retard.
As stupid as you are, you probably still won't understand it after you've sculpted the granite.
American Liberal Delusion #1: Free Speech = saying only what I allow you to say.
Dude you get no respect because you are not "Decent."
Sharpen up loser.
Ann Althouse said...
"That isn't a characteristic of mine. And nothing here suggests that I have the "vapors" (which, by the way, smells of sexism).
You are making inaccurate statements."
Doubling down.
Did ( do) men have the vapors too? Be careful what you say in upsidedown world because people are listening. Making notes.
Who are you addressing, Baron?
The only person who should take umbrage is Keynes....and he's dead.
Sheesh...calling this a tempest in a teapot gives it more weight than it deserves.
Michael said...
Did ( do) men have the vapors too?
Yes.
They are called farts.
So you can justly say that the Nutty Perfessor is just having a brain fart. Just sayn'
The President's economic policy, in so far as it relies on Keynes' distant theories--has failed so far. No one can predict the future, though.
I made the point in the earlier thread on this topic that a certain amount of accountability has been lost since golden years of "Keynesian Authority" (wink to Inga). Unprecedented meddling in the stock markets for example. This will all blow up in Ben Bukakkee's face soon enough.
Oh, well, that's enough for today.
I'll leave Althouse to her congratsturbation over her incredibly evolved views on gaydom.
Why Ritmo haven't you been following the Perfessor's logic. On a previous post she called anyone who did not swallow gay marriage in it's entirty were just not "Decent." In fact if you do not sign on to every single part of the agenda promulgated by "teh
gays" then you are not a decent person.
But I was specificly teasing "I have Misplaced My Pants" which is great screen name and what Ted Kennedy used to say all the time when the cops picked him up wandering drunk in Georgetown.
Save those ad-homs for the racist libertarians, people. The Mascots of the Anointed are off-limits.
Oh, ok. ;-)
In that case, party on.
Did you ever see that SNL episode where they mocked Ted Kennedy's satirical attempts to host Spring Break MTV parties in Florida? With the pants down?
Good times.
I mean to say "in it's entirety" but I was eating a calzone at the time and I was distracted. Sorry.
No one can predict the future, though.
Keynes can ("in the long run, we're all dead")....which is how this whole ludicrous topic started in the first place.
Keynes can ("in the long run, we're all dead")....which is how this whole ludicrous topic started in the first place.
Accepting that logic, rotmo et al. should back off their stridency regarding evolving away from carbon fuels to avoid global warming. After all, it serves our present needs better to "drill, baby, drill!" n'e cest pas?
"What I find interesting about the Ferguson controversy is how disconnected it is from the past."
It's also disconnected from the present.
In this diverse and interconnected world, we must not allow our western prejudices to blind us in our judgement of right and wrong.
Keynes's homosexuality was the only good thing about him.
Homer Simpson, Ted Kennedy, whatevs : )
This dynamic gets more clownish every time you post about gay stuff, Althouse. You get shrill, arrogant and imperious; many of your commenters either push back or laugh at you; you get shriller, rinse and repeat.
At some point, maybe you will apply your sense of humor to this and see the absurdity of your continual attempts to lecture and cajole others into Right Thinking.
n'e cest pas?
Pardon my atrocious French. I'm francophobic.
Hey I just had a frank with kraut and mustard at the street fair?
Isn't it funny how the Kraut always ends up on top of the Frank?
It's like historical or something like that there.
You get shrill, arrogant and imperious; many of your commenters either push back or laugh at you; you get shriller, rinse and repeat.
You don't think commenters like Shouting Thomas are shrill, arrogant and imperious?
My reaction, increasingly, is to completely bypass these "gay" threads, because it's going to be the same tiresome people bleating the same tiresome things, at higher and higher volume. On one hand you have the limp-dicked queer-haters whining in their usual manner. Then you have the hateful so-called "liberal" Democrat types preening and pretending that they had something to do with the increased acceptance of gay people in this country, when they're the same common opportunists they've always been, who would throw gays to the lions if it meant scoring a couple of cheap political points.
On one hand you have the limp-dicked queer-haters whining in their usual manner.
Same bullshit again. You agree with Palladian, or you're a hater. He's resorting more and more to this pinhead tactic.
In other words, Palladian is just a fucking asshole who likes to pretend he speaks for somebody besides his own lonely self.
What a waste of a beautiful afternoon. I've got a garden to plant.
OK, Baron, I can *barely* see eating a hot dog right after a calzone, but sauerkraut, too? Uh uh. Not buying the flavor combo. Why not just have settled for a pickle and saved the money for another day? Or are you a actually a Keynesian at heart, too?
It's just as accurate to say Keynes had no concern about the future because he was gay as it was to say W wanted to go into Iraq to "avenge his daddy".
There might be a legitimate discussion to be made about which theories are more present or future oriented and to what degree they depend on the psyche of those who hold them.
But one would think an academic like Ferguson would be at least slightly acquainted with, say, Henry James or Cecil Rhodes. Two men most probably gay, who certainly can't be said to be have been only present-focused with no thought for the future.
I think we must conclude it was a malicious ad hominem. And that Ferguson is stupid.
OK, Althouse, here's a serious reply to this statement of yours (emphasis added):
If that's what intellectuals were doing — kicking members of an out group when they were on the outside— before the outsiders were on the inside and it became awkward to disrespect them to their face, then why should I be impressed by this history of intellectual discourse?
If you're not talking about the main subject of your two posts--Ferguson--then I'll confess that I don't know what you're referring to here. Who was talking behind the backs of whom? I can't tell from what you've written.
If you're saying that economists were talking about Keynes's sexuality to mock gays, then I say that you're way out of bounds. What evidence could you possible have of that?
Maybe you're saying that economists talked about Keynes's sexuality to keep him in the "outsider" class. If that's what you're saying, then it's completely wrong.
The notion that Keynes was an "outsider" is totally contrary to well-known facts. Indeed, he could hardly have been more of an insider: son of famous Cambridge economist, a member of the Apostles while a student at Cambridge, then a lecturer at Cambridge, editor of the leading scholarly economics journal of his time, financial representative of the British government to the Versailles peace conference, then author of a best-selling book criticizing the Treaty of Versailles. At the end of his life he played a key role in the development of the "Bretton Woods" institutions that shaped much of postwar international economic policy.
In short, Keynes was one of the best-known and most influential intellectuals of his time. And his affiliation with the Bloomsbury group was quite open. He was also known for his dominating personality and withering debate style. People didn't mock him, they feared him.
And, although insiders knew of his personal life, no one used it as a cudgel against him. AFAIK, Schumpeter was the first person to mention it in print, and his discussion of it was in the context of the history of economic doctrine, on which he wrote a famous treatise.
Subsequent references to Keynes's sexuality and its possible influence on his economic thinking all simply followed Schumpeter's lead. No one uses the topic to undermine Keynes's analysis, but simply to look at it in one possible way.
That last part above is the basic point that I and others have made in two different threads on this subject. I have not seen you address those points directly at all. Instead, you continue to argue that even mentioning Keynes's sexuality is a sign of hostility toward him and, by implication, toward all gays.
Of course, if Keynes's sexuality were hushed up, I suspect that would be held up as evidence that heteros were unwilling to acknowledge that one of the most famous of all 20th-century intellectuals was anything but totally straight.
First of all it was not "right after." It was twenty minutes later. Big difference there girly.
I am not a Kensyian.
I am an Oliver Hardyian. A Arbucklian. A James Coccoian. A deluded Don of Deluisian.
In other words a fat fuck who enjoys his food..... I am popping out to the street fair and hitting the stands and then coming back to drop insightful comments here!
So far I have had a calzone, a rice ball, a frank with kraut, a grilled mozzarella sandwich on cornbread, a slice of pizza and this new pastry made with black olives and onion that is really good.
Palladian, of course I think people like ST are shrill and irritating which is why I skip over them. I hold Althouse to a higher standard and am disappointed when she fails to deliver her usual levelheadedness.
More germane to your point, though, Althouse kicks off these jackass festivals in the first place, and maintains this ridiculous nanny posture of telling smart people who disagree with her particular formulations that they are either stupid or evil. She's better than that, but for whatever reason can't discuss homosexuality's place in culture or academia like a rational person, so she should stop talking about it on her blog altogether. Not only is her writing on the topic often absurd, but as you rightly observe so is that of some of those who disagree with her. I should just skip over these posts as you have begun to do, but I keep holding out hope that she might quit being an asshat, and thus inspiring asshattery in others, over perceived slights against gays.
I mean sheeze Louise, if I am a nonpracticing bisexual, as I recently mentioned here, and I don't lose my frickin' mind over homosexuality, and you don't, what the hell is her excuse, other than a misplaced white-knighting impulse?
I may be francophobic, but I still admire Joseph Louis Gay-Lussac (1778 – 1850) who was a French chemist and physicist and nominally the world's first openly gay chemist. He is remembered mostly for two laws related to gases and other forms of hot air. But he is most admired by other chemists such as myself for his pioneering work on alcohol-water mixtures.
But he is most admired by other chemists such as myself for his pioneering work on alcohol-water mixtures.
No good gay ever waters down his alcohol.
So far I have had a calzone, a rice ball, a frank with kraut, a grilled mozzarella sandwich on cornbread, a slice of pizza and this new pastry made with black olives and onion that is really good.
If you could take all that, roll it together and chicken-fry it, you'd really be onto something.
But he is most admired by other chemists such as myself for his pioneering work on alcohol-water mixtures.
How dare you imply that all gays are drunks.
Why are folks getting all wound up over what Ferguson said--and who Keynes made eyes at?
The real reason to get wound up is Keynes theories--as applied and misapplied by later generations of politicans.
Accepting that logic, rotmo et al. should back off their stridency regarding evolving away from carbon fuels to avoid global warming. After all, it serves our present needs better to "drill, baby, drill!" n'e cest pas?
Economic trends are easier to quickly change and reverse than are planetary geochemical ones, you silly goofball.
The real reason to get wound up is Keynes theories--as applied and misapplied by later generations of politicans.
That's the whole point of this ridiculous charade, to keep people from learning or thinking about the enormous destruction that Keynes's economic theories have wrought. If he can be turned into a gay "martyr", then the low-information voters will defend him and, implicitly, his ideas.
As I said, his sexuality was the only good thing about him.
I may be francophobic, but I still admire Joseph Louis Gay-Lussac (1778 – 1850) who was a French chemist and physicist and nominally the world's first openly gay chemist.
Dude. Duuuuuude! And Lavoisier?
I mean sheeze Louise, if I am a nonpracticing bisexual, as I recently mentioned here, and I don't lose my frickin' mind over homosexuality, and you don't, what the hell is her excuse, other than a misplaced white-knighting impulse?
Perhaps a missionary impulse to teach and improve the savages? Or an attempt at discussing law and public policy with something other than hand-waving? That may be a waste of time in many cases, but it's worth a shot. And her comments have a lot more intellectual meat to them than anything you've ever written, so you really shouldn't make comments about her losing her frickin' mind on this or any other topic.
That's the whole point of this ridiculous charade, to keep people from learning or thinking about the enormous destruction that Keynes's economic theories have wrought.
An example of said destruction would be nice.
Not expected, mind you. But nice.
Dude. Duuuuuude! And Lavoisier?
You are correct, Ritmo. Men like Gay-Lussac stood on the headless shoulders of Lavoisier.
In other words a fat fuck who enjoys his food..... I am popping out to the street fair and hitting the stands and then coming back to drop insightful comments here!
So far I have had a calzone, a rice ball, a frank with kraut, a grilled mozzarella sandwich on cornbread, a slice of pizza and this new pastry made with black olives and onion that is really good.
Oktoberfest in Little Italy (which, I know, I know! has moved much further north!) must be like heaven to you.
Ann Althouse wrote:
I think it's fine and important to delve into any thinker's psyche if we can, but if, in doing so, we rely on stereotypes about the group he belongs to, we're responsible for the stereotypes we are using. That is subject to challenge.
It's certainly idiotic to say gay people can't have children. They can and often do.
Not in the context of a gay relationship they don't.
Men like Gay-Lussac stood on the headless shoulders of Lavoisier.
The only real big mistake the French ever made.
Well, that and Napoleon's attempt to invade Russia.
Lavoisier married a 13 year old when he was 28. And people call Keynes's sex life scandalous!
Is that true about the 13 year old?
Well, live fast, die young.
And you thought I was going to dispense with the usual immaturity regarding "grass on the field, play ball", or "old enough to bl--"...
Ok. I'll stop.
Lavoisier left behind a brilliant and attractive widow, Marie-Anne Paulze (a brilliant light in her own right) whom Count Rumford (a rival) married: link
Oh, and the whole Vichy thing.
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