Paul Ryan pretends to care
I find this intensely annoying.
Today we remember a great man and his work. We read his sermons. We recall his sacrifices. We give back. In doing these things, we raise our gaze and renew the spirit in which we serve one another. Such is the calling of #MLKDay. pic.twitter.com/UpNNtZJ8n5
— Paul Ryan (@SpeakerRyan) January 15, 2018
Today we remember a great man and his work. We read his sermons. We recall his sacrifices. We give back. In doing these things, we raise our gaze and renew the spirit in which we serve one another. Such is the calling of #MLKDay
It’s completely empty. He could be talking about anyone. “His work” could be anything. “His sermons” could preach anything – patriarchy, white supremacy, hellfire, anything. His sacrifices for what? We give back what?
Paul Ryan is a very conservative libertarian Republican. King was not. Ryan would have no use for a living King today, and a living King today would be resisting everything Ryan did and said.
In that pictute, Ryan looks less like someone looking at a bust of a great man with respect and more like an art dealer estimating its auction value.
It’s such a ridiculous photo. “Mmm…[scratch chin to look serious]…mmmm.”
I struggle to identify a meaningful “we” that includes him.
Everyone knows that monochrome photos are more serious, heartfelt and spiritual than colour ones.
Also, Dr King’s statue looks kind of like Davros.
Until I looked more closely, I thought Ryan was consulting with Dart Vader just after the latter had arrived from Hawaii.
As if staring at a statue is somehow meaningful or significant. This absurd photo and tweet should be a parody but they’re not.
It’s often hard to tell the difference between the idol and the idle. When you only hear the words. With this illustration, the distinction is distinct: poseur vs penseur. Or vice versa. Black&white. Frames&pedestals. Snakes&leaders.
(Hmm, I think I’ve seen this figure somewhere. Hmm. I’d scratch my head but that isn’t shaved. Hmm.)
Were King alive today he’d probably be in the crosshairs of Me-Too. Much like Ben Franklin, he was a serial flirter and had quite a well-rounded sex life.
To judge by that awful statue, King was half Dalek.
What on earth is that painting in the background on about?
What is that painting on the background?
@8
It’s “Embarkation of the Pilgrims”
https://www.aoc.gov/art/historic-rotunda-paintings/embarkation-pilgrims
Its proximity to MLK’s bust is probably a coincidence, though the prominence of a painting full of white people fearing religious persecution in Ryan’s photo is probably not a coincidence.
John @ 8 – do you really not understand that MeToo is not about flirting? Nor about having “a well-rounded sex life”?
Yes, I know what Me Too is about.
You know it’s discussed by far more than just you Americans, and so there’s quite a diversity of opinions with regards to its nature, goals and overall efficacy.
I shall stand with Canlit incarnate, Margaret Atwood, on this…if only for a show of canadian solidarity against american hegemony…
John #8
Even if King did find himself “in the crosshairs” of #MeToo, what is that supposed to prove? That #MeToo is discredited, because people like King who accomplish great things can’t possibly be guilty of any wrongs? Because humans are split into those who do nothing wrong and those who do nothing but wrong? If not, what’s your point?
Knowing it was Paul Ryan, I assumed he was looking at a statue of Darth Vader. To steal from physicists, Ryan is so empty, so confused, so out of touch, he’s not even empty.
John, it depends I guess doesn’t it. Did King have a reputation of consensual flirting or of pussy grabbing, or of Weinstein like behaviour? Did he have consensual affairs, or did he use his power to force women who were uninterested or unwilling into affairs using threats or coercion.
I don’t know the answer and I’m picking you don’t either. At the moment all I can say is that he was unfaithful to his wife, which I’m sure caused her and other emotional pain. Not an admirable thing, but of a different order entirely.
As for the statue (bust on a plinth really), I’m sure the sculptors intention was to magnify the sense of power and dominance. It’s a very old trick. I can’t help but feel that a life size, or even slightly smaller than life size statue speaking of humility and grace might have worked better, but then again Washington has never been known for subtle architecture or monuments. For that matter Washington has never been known for subtle politics either.
John, I read that article by Atwood, and I didn’t see her making suggestions that there was anything wrong with MeToo. She seemed to be talking about one particular instance, an instance that apparently the information has not been released on, and she is calling for that information to be released. If he was not guilty, then why was he terminated? That seemed to be the basis, not a condemnation of the idea that women should be required to put up with shit while they work and not say anything about it.
I could be wrong, since all I read about it was that one piece that she wrote, but it didn’t seem like she said “oh, MeToo is bad, bad, bad” only that there needed to be some accountability in this case.
I could be wrong, since all I read about it was that one piece that she wrote, but it didn’t seem like she said “oh, MeToo is bad, bad, bad” only that there needed to be some accountability in this case.
No you’re quite correct. However, the ‘revolution’ has gotten a bit ahead of us. Atwood, Canada’s première feminist, is now but an old, reactionary, cis-gendered caucasian female defending *fascist* concepts like Due Process, Presumption of Innocence and other manifestions of White Privilege. She’s ‘Donalda’ Trump!
https://www.theglobeandmail.com/opinion/margaret-atwood-is-a-blood-drinking-monster/article37609895/
It seems to me that right-wing writers approach the MLK holiday mostly in one of two ways. One, they extol MLK individually, and pick a few lines promoting non-violence or cooperation or harmony. Two, they pick out personal failings of MLK, and point to this supposed lack of character as reason not to accept anything he said. Both seem to me to suffer from excessive focus on the man rather than the movement. It is similar to attempts to “destroy” atheism by criticizing Dawkins, or evolution by criticizing Darwin.
In a way the holiday itself creates that situation. I’ve never liked the singling out of King as if he were the Star of the civil rights movement and all the other participants are of radically lower quality. That’s absurd. It’s a human thing to zero in on one Personality, or a few, but it’s very stultifying and ignorance-enhancing.