Barbara Tuchman’s opening paragraph describing the funeral of the King of England on the eve of WW1 is an unparalleled description of a dying age.
“ So gorgeous was the spectacle on the May morning of 1910 when nine kings rode in the funeral of Edward VII of England that the crowd, waiting in hushed and black-clad awe, could not keep back gasps of admiration. In scarlet and blue and green and purple, three by three the sovereigns rode through the palace gates, with plumed helmets, gold braid, crimson sashes, and jeweled orders flashing in the sun. After them came five heirs apparent, forty more imperial or royal highnesses, seven queens–four dowager and three regnant–and a scattering of special ambassadors from uncrowned countries. Together they represented seventy nations in the greatest assemblage of royalty and rank ever gathered in one place and, of its kind, the last. The muffled tongue of Big Ben tolled nine by the clock as the cortege left the palace, but on history’s clock it was sunset, and the sun of the old world was setting in a dying blaze of splendor never to be seen again.”
I very much doubt anyone thought in 1910 their world would change. The war was not yet on the horizon. Today’s America feels more like an aristocracy that knows its moment is fading, like France before its revolution. I don’t think we’ll have a French style revolution - god forbid - but clearly what can’t continue won’t continue. We’re at the end of something, call it the Boomer era. The American aristocratic class is dying, and has failed to replicate.
No, civilizations and empires die when the people no longer believe in them. The loss of duty, faith, respect, trust, etc. is followed by the loss of obedience. Young men don't sign up for the army or the police. People cheat on tests, job applications, loan applicants, taxes.
The entire project of a civilization is a shared understanding that makes cooperation possible, when that cooperation ceases so does the civilization. We are at that point. Complex coordinated activites are increasingly slow, expensive, contested, inept, and fall far short of their original ambitions. The west can no longer inspire and its elites are actively using coercion to cling to power, censorship, madates, cancel culture, fake news, lawfare, etc. That's a strategy with a limited shelf life.
There were very few people, black or white, who looked good. Mostly they looked like clowns or whores. And obviously they are completely hated by their “stylists”.
I have to assume these people know what "The Hunger Games" was about - ferchrissakes, there were movies even for those of them who don't (can't?) read. In which case, they either absolutely tone-deaf, or deliberately flipping off the plebes.
I wonder who will utter this era's equivalent of "Let them eat cake"* before the tumbrils roll down the streets.
*(And yes, Marie Antoinette most likely didn't say that, but when the legend becomes fact, print the legend.)
Yes, the citizens have always been like Met Gala guests. Extravagant (cross) dressing, colorful hair, surgically alterted physiology (eg. tiger woman), it's uncanny. Presented as insulated from the rest of the Panem (12 rural districts).
BTW, the story and the bird symbol likely took inspiration from Ukrainian Holodomor Monument in Kyiv that honors victims of the man-made famine/hunger in the 1930s.
She reminded me of the black and white cookie in the Seinfeld episode, but not nearly as appealing as the cookie itself; nor was her dress as symbolically meaningful as when Jerry explained to Elaine the racial harmony that the cookie promises but still eludes us all.
The problem was the theme. Dandysm is a male thing and Met Gala has always been a parade of dresses. Hard to turn something masculine into a show-stopper dress. Not to mention that good 80% of the attendants didn't understand the assignment. And the less said about Rosa Parks crotch courtesy of Blackpink's Lisa the better. I don't know what's worse, that the designer thought it was a good idea or that she wore it, probably oblivious who the woman on her crotch was, which is not an excuse.
If Kamala thinks that giving paid speeches for women organizations in Cali and getting an invitation to Meg Gala are going to re-animate her dead career, I have a bridge to sell her. It's all smoke and mirrors designed to make her feel important without actually making her important. The dress was rightfully mocked as a tent. I guess the idea was a coconut tent.
The video with all the libs dissing Kate Mackz get is about right. I'm not sure what sort of illness popped into existence five or six years ago and infected half the country, but it's not good - not sure if it is an actual illness, social-media induced psychosis, or the devil itself, but it is bad.
The only diversity allowed in our local blog/news site in my lovely northeastern town is a diverse group of people expressing an identical opinion. Any time one implores the readers to consider other viewpoints or expresses an opinion out of the hard left mainstream, they are greeted by threats, vicious insults, and more. Same argument: "why does this publication allow fascist/sub-humans/MAGAts/nazis to express themselves?!?!? These viewpoints are wrong, these people are bad, and platforming them in any way in unacceptable!" These are people who 5-10 years ago I talked to at the train stop, stood next to at the 4th of July parade, laughed with while watching our kids play baseball together. What happened?
I agree the Right should not become the Left, but at some level, the fight has to be evened out. I cannot go through life fearing for my job, listening to my wife (non-white, but apparently "colonized") being insulted by strangers, having my kids mocked and threatened by adults. I think the impetus to push back hard comes from being exhausted and having no choice at some point.
One of Bertran Russels 4 motivators for human behavior is vanity.(other 3 - acquisition, rivalry, and love of power). You can certainly see the performance preening (vanity) in tik tok videos, but to get likes (acuisition) you have to be outrageous or indignate or have a meltdown in your dismissal of MAGA / MAHA (rivalry). All designed to try and reverse (love of power) the reality of middle America rejecting the lunacy of woke equity victim hood. Sad to say, but it will be years if ever when these misguided brain washed (by legacy media nudge narrative inputs) acknowledge the error of their ways.
The approaching tipping point will come when the FDA withdraws the mRNA death shots from the market because of the upside down risk reward ratio. Imagine having a cornerstone of your smug superiority thrown in the garbage....lots of mental health issues on that horizon.
Mark Halperin predicted before the election that if Trump won, it would trigger the greatest mental health crisis in American history. I thought that was more than a little overblown at the time, but the more I see how the Left appears convinced that Trump and half the nation are actual fascists, the more I think Halperin was prescient. They believe they’re the good and sane people, when they’re the vicious and irrational people.
If you actually believe voting for Trump is like herding Jews onto cattle cars bound for Auschwitz, then you’re the one with the problem.
If we truly lived in an authoritarian fascist state, how could they possibly spout their anti-Trump publicly? How is MSNBC still on the air? How can the NYT and WaPo still exist?
If they truly believe we are an authoritarian/fascist state, then why don’t they get visas and take advantage of any of the flights out of here and go somewhere, anywhere else?
Jewish people all over Germany were scrambling to get out of Germany, then Austria, etc before the worst hit in the 1930’s. The historical record is clear. Many Iraqis and Arabs didn’t stick around their countries during the war on terror to see how things would go, they got out when they had an opportunity.
What I’m saying is that there is historical precedent for populations shifting to avoid war and danger zones.
Why are they sticking around if things are so bad here and our country simply can never be redeemed? I just don’t see the same kind of urgency from the American Left. They say words, but do they really know what they mean?
I have questions about how sincerely they believe in their rhetoric.
I’m really sick of all the cosplaying from the political Left.
The Met Gala. A waste of money. The money could have been used for the homeless they so adore and care about. They are frauds that live very chaotic lives and deep down they are narcissistic and actually stupid. Being a singer or actor makes you smart? Most Americans live their lives struggling to make ends meet, raise families, work hard and provide for their future. The decadence of these people only makes us dislike them and their dimwit ideas even more. !one of like Marie Antwonett
The video from the producers of the Met Gala, exploring this year's theme of "Black Dandyism", includes a picture of Frederick Douglass and other prominent and successful black Americans dressed in contemporary 19th and early 20th century bourgeois style.
Frederick Douglass was not a Dandy. He dressed according to what any serious person at that time would be expected to dress for important occasions. Occasions which might include political agitation, going to church, conducting business etc. Male 19th century bank tellers in Canada would dress in suits. There was a kind of egalitarianism which this popular embrace of sartorial seriousness exemplified.
For Met event curators to conflate the world of the Dandy with the world of evolving bourgeois seriousness is to turn someone like Frederick Douglass into a clown. And given that the Met attaches the word "Dandy" to this lazy, sophomoric, false and tendentious presentation makes it an exercise in racism. There's almost an echo of the celebration of minstrelry. Apropos of the end of nowhere.
I wasn't the only one who noticed that the black dandys looked cool and sophisticated. And these people look like they had a craft day at the lunatic asylum.
I am a Republican, a black, dyed in the wool Republican, and I never intend to belong to any other party than the party of freedom and progress. I recognize the Republican party as the sheet anchor of the colored man's political hopes and the ark of his safety
We who live in flyover - not LA or Acela - do not care one whit about any 'gala' of overpaid cidiots who don't understand where their food comes from. No hate here and not ripping Sasha, just we do not care about their events.
It is interesting that we live 40 miles from MPLS and have nothing in common with them either; they never came our here to 'protest' and grift off of Floyd. Hmmm... I wonder why?
Great ending with BB who also came from a very different flyover; one of my guitar and life heroes.
Watching our beaver carry a smally tree across the bay...
I've found the Met Gala a disgusting, completely over-the-top bacchanal for several years. It's 100x more loathsome than the Academy Awards. I became aware of it when Rihanna wore that hideous gold coat by a Chinese "designer" ... it required the deaths of something like 80 or 100 foxes to achieve the "look." Stupid elites with more money than brains or heart.
I thought they were supposed to wear that fake leather in honor of the little furry ones.....OH wait thats like Save the Whales,,,I remember now its F the whales build a Wind Turbine in the ocean,,,No lets build a population of twirly birds and screw the dolphins...Too,,,,,,,,after all I feel and I'm an empath!!!!! Aren't I wonderful and better then you!!!!
Barbara Tuchman’s opening paragraph describing the funeral of the King of England on the eve of WW1 is an unparalleled description of a dying age.
“ So gorgeous was the spectacle on the May morning of 1910 when nine kings rode in the funeral of Edward VII of England that the crowd, waiting in hushed and black-clad awe, could not keep back gasps of admiration. In scarlet and blue and green and purple, three by three the sovereigns rode through the palace gates, with plumed helmets, gold braid, crimson sashes, and jeweled orders flashing in the sun. After them came five heirs apparent, forty more imperial or royal highnesses, seven queens–four dowager and three regnant–and a scattering of special ambassadors from uncrowned countries. Together they represented seventy nations in the greatest assemblage of royalty and rank ever gathered in one place and, of its kind, the last. The muffled tongue of Big Ben tolled nine by the clock as the cortege left the palace, but on history’s clock it was sunset, and the sun of the old world was setting in a dying blaze of splendor never to be seen again.”
I very much doubt anyone thought in 1910 their world would change. The war was not yet on the horizon. Today’s America feels more like an aristocracy that knows its moment is fading, like France before its revolution. I don’t think we’ll have a French style revolution - god forbid - but clearly what can’t continue won’t continue. We’re at the end of something, call it the Boomer era. The American aristocratic class is dying, and has failed to replicate.
how will it die? they control everything?
Elections have consequences - defund the liberal backdoor finances...
Trump (along with Elon) is wrecking their deep state grifting scheme. Hopefully the Republicans have the spine and sack to bury them for good.
No, civilizations and empires die when the people no longer believe in them. The loss of duty, faith, respect, trust, etc. is followed by the loss of obedience. Young men don't sign up for the army or the police. People cheat on tests, job applications, loan applicants, taxes.
The entire project of a civilization is a shared understanding that makes cooperation possible, when that cooperation ceases so does the civilization. We are at that point. Complex coordinated activites are increasingly slow, expensive, contested, inept, and fall far short of their original ambitions. The west can no longer inspire and its elites are actively using coercion to cling to power, censorship, madates, cancel culture, fake news, lawfare, etc. That's a strategy with a limited shelf life.
They are old
... said the small but agile mammal of the dinosaur ...
SUCH a great book! I've read it only twice so far...
Great take, William!
...thanks Carlson. Good stuff.
There were very few people, black or white, who looked good. Mostly they looked like clowns or whores. And obviously they are completely hated by their “stylists”.
The Capital in The Hunger Games has to be based on The Met Gala - the resemblance is uncanny: https://yuribezmenov.substack.com/p/the-hunger-games-capitol-recasting-dc-swamp
Yes! I've been comparing Blue Society to the Capital District ever since first reading The Hunger Games.
I have to assume these people know what "The Hunger Games" was about - ferchrissakes, there were movies even for those of them who don't (can't?) read. In which case, they either absolutely tone-deaf, or deliberately flipping off the plebes.
I wonder who will utter this era's equivalent of "Let them eat cake"* before the tumbrils roll down the streets.
*(And yes, Marie Antoinette most likely didn't say that, but when the legend becomes fact, print the legend.)
Yes, the citizens have always been like Met Gala guests. Extravagant (cross) dressing, colorful hair, surgically alterted physiology (eg. tiger woman), it's uncanny. Presented as insulated from the rest of the Panem (12 rural districts).
BTW, the story and the bird symbol likely took inspiration from Ukrainian Holodomor Monument in Kyiv that honors victims of the man-made famine/hunger in the 1930s.
Agreed. Extremely unflattering. Kamala’s looks like a burka.
She reminded me of the black and white cookie in the Seinfeld episode, but not nearly as appealing as the cookie itself; nor was her dress as symbolically meaningful as when Jerry explained to Elaine the racial harmony that the cookie promises but still eludes us all.
She looked like a tub.
Tub of ice cream.
I'd never heard of the Met Gala until this week.
Give them no press.
The problem was the theme. Dandysm is a male thing and Met Gala has always been a parade of dresses. Hard to turn something masculine into a show-stopper dress. Not to mention that good 80% of the attendants didn't understand the assignment. And the less said about Rosa Parks crotch courtesy of Blackpink's Lisa the better. I don't know what's worse, that the designer thought it was a good idea or that she wore it, probably oblivious who the woman on her crotch was, which is not an excuse.
If Kamala thinks that giving paid speeches for women organizations in Cali and getting an invitation to Meg Gala are going to re-animate her dead career, I have a bridge to sell her. It's all smoke and mirrors designed to make her feel important without actually making her important. The dress was rightfully mocked as a tent. I guess the idea was a coconut tent.
The assignment was "make an ass of yourself and a spectacle". Seems like they all get an A+!
The video with all the libs dissing Kate Mackz get is about right. I'm not sure what sort of illness popped into existence five or six years ago and infected half the country, but it's not good - not sure if it is an actual illness, social-media induced psychosis, or the devil itself, but it is bad.
The only diversity allowed in our local blog/news site in my lovely northeastern town is a diverse group of people expressing an identical opinion. Any time one implores the readers to consider other viewpoints or expresses an opinion out of the hard left mainstream, they are greeted by threats, vicious insults, and more. Same argument: "why does this publication allow fascist/sub-humans/MAGAts/nazis to express themselves?!?!? These viewpoints are wrong, these people are bad, and platforming them in any way in unacceptable!" These are people who 5-10 years ago I talked to at the train stop, stood next to at the 4th of July parade, laughed with while watching our kids play baseball together. What happened?
I agree the Right should not become the Left, but at some level, the fight has to be evened out. I cannot go through life fearing for my job, listening to my wife (non-white, but apparently "colonized") being insulted by strangers, having my kids mocked and threatened by adults. I think the impetus to push back hard comes from being exhausted and having no choice at some point.
Hope it all gets better.
The illness has always been there since the French Revolution. It just becomes visible when they think they are winning.
One of Bertran Russels 4 motivators for human behavior is vanity.(other 3 - acquisition, rivalry, and love of power). You can certainly see the performance preening (vanity) in tik tok videos, but to get likes (acuisition) you have to be outrageous or indignate or have a meltdown in your dismissal of MAGA / MAHA (rivalry). All designed to try and reverse (love of power) the reality of middle America rejecting the lunacy of woke equity victim hood. Sad to say, but it will be years if ever when these misguided brain washed (by legacy media nudge narrative inputs) acknowledge the error of their ways.
The approaching tipping point will come when the FDA withdraws the mRNA death shots from the market because of the upside down risk reward ratio. Imagine having a cornerstone of your smug superiority thrown in the garbage....lots of mental health issues on that horizon.
Dick Minnis
removingthecataract.substack.com
What happend to God?
Your well-written response suggested the TDS could be driven by “social-media induced psychosis, or the devil itself,” to which, I say… why not both?
Brilliant writing. You put into words about reality that I cannot. I can always tells something is off and phony but your laid it out so well. Thanks!
Agreed. Sasha has the gift of helping us perceive the water we swim in unawares.
Mark Halperin predicted before the election that if Trump won, it would trigger the greatest mental health crisis in American history. I thought that was more than a little overblown at the time, but the more I see how the Left appears convinced that Trump and half the nation are actual fascists, the more I think Halperin was prescient. They believe they’re the good and sane people, when they’re the vicious and irrational people.
If you actually believe voting for Trump is like herding Jews onto cattle cars bound for Auschwitz, then you’re the one with the problem.
If we truly lived in an authoritarian fascist state, how could they possibly spout their anti-Trump publicly? How is MSNBC still on the air? How can the NYT and WaPo still exist?
If they truly believe we are an authoritarian/fascist state, then why don’t they get visas and take advantage of any of the flights out of here and go somewhere, anywhere else?
Jewish people all over Germany were scrambling to get out of Germany, then Austria, etc before the worst hit in the 1930’s. The historical record is clear. Many Iraqis and Arabs didn’t stick around their countries during the war on terror to see how things would go, they got out when they had an opportunity.
What I’m saying is that there is historical precedent for populations shifting to avoid war and danger zones.
Why are they sticking around if things are so bad here and our country simply can never be redeemed? I just don’t see the same kind of urgency from the American Left. They say words, but do they really know what they mean?
I have questions about how sincerely they believe in their rhetoric.
I’m really sick of all the cosplaying from the political Left.
"Well.....
Bye!"
I'd like them to finally live up to their proclamations that if Trump is elected, they'll leave the U.S.
They can just hop on the planes heading to El Salvador. Probably wouldn’t even need a visa!
The cosplaying line sealed my upvote.
Using the people they’ve exploited for years to shield themselves from the consequences of what they’ve done? Sounds just like Hamas.
The Met Gala. A waste of money. The money could have been used for the homeless they so adore and care about. They are frauds that live very chaotic lives and deep down they are narcissistic and actually stupid. Being a singer or actor makes you smart? Most Americans live their lives struggling to make ends meet, raise families, work hard and provide for their future. The decadence of these people only makes us dislike them and their dimwit ideas even more. !one of like Marie Antwonett
These are the same people who abhor the idea of DOGE.
For the homeless? That's so yesterday! Today it's all about illegals!
If a white person wears black person garb, it's "cultural appropriation!" If a black person wears white person garb, it's what..."black dandy"...?
The video from the producers of the Met Gala, exploring this year's theme of "Black Dandyism", includes a picture of Frederick Douglass and other prominent and successful black Americans dressed in contemporary 19th and early 20th century bourgeois style.
Frederick Douglass was not a Dandy. He dressed according to what any serious person at that time would be expected to dress for important occasions. Occasions which might include political agitation, going to church, conducting business etc. Male 19th century bank tellers in Canada would dress in suits. There was a kind of egalitarianism which this popular embrace of sartorial seriousness exemplified.
For Met event curators to conflate the world of the Dandy with the world of evolving bourgeois seriousness is to turn someone like Frederick Douglass into a clown. And given that the Met attaches the word "Dandy" to this lazy, sophomoric, false and tendentious presentation makes it an exercise in racism. There's almost an echo of the celebration of minstrelry. Apropos of the end of nowhere.
I wasn't the only one who noticed that the black dandys looked cool and sophisticated. And these people look like they had a craft day at the lunatic asylum.
I am a Republican, a black, dyed in the wool Republican, and I never intend to belong to any other party than the party of freedom and progress. I recognize the Republican party as the sheet anchor of the colored man's political hopes and the ark of his safety
Frederick Douglass
We who live in flyover - not LA or Acela - do not care one whit about any 'gala' of overpaid cidiots who don't understand where their food comes from. No hate here and not ripping Sasha, just we do not care about their events.
It is interesting that we live 40 miles from MPLS and have nothing in common with them either; they never came our here to 'protest' and grift off of Floyd. Hmmm... I wonder why?
Great ending with BB who also came from a very different flyover; one of my guitar and life heroes.
Watching our beaver carry a smally tree across the bay...
Have a wonderful night!
Reminds me of something I might read about in "The Hunger Games"
All American victims are invisible to the Swamp enforcers.
Didn't you have $75,000 to attend this event and snap a few pictures? Shucks.
It reminded me of the The Hunger Games books. Real people are struggling and they celebrate themselves and their absurd costumes.
I thought the whole thing had a "Hunger Games" Metropolis look to it. May the odds never be in their favor.
I've found the Met Gala a disgusting, completely over-the-top bacchanal for several years. It's 100x more loathsome than the Academy Awards. I became aware of it when Rihanna wore that hideous gold coat by a Chinese "designer" ... it required the deaths of something like 80 or 100 foxes to achieve the "look." Stupid elites with more money than brains or heart.
I thought they were supposed to wear that fake leather in honor of the little furry ones.....OH wait thats like Save the Whales,,,I remember now its F the whales build a Wind Turbine in the ocean,,,No lets build a population of twirly birds and screw the dolphins...Too,,,,,,,,after all I feel and I'm an empath!!!!! Aren't I wonderful and better then you!!!!