RoR: Forum

*Just* a New Zealander?!

Lindsay Perigo: Le Grande Fromage de Objectivism de Nouvelle Zealande (et Le Monde?) utters these words?

Sacre bleu!

"rather than brute glorification of mother-fucking and jungle-voodoo"

Well, Lindsay finally comes 'round and fucks mightily with best of us :-)

Re the Frogs and their cuisine: I have a killer garlic bread recipe that'll clog your arteries simply by reading it's mises en place. I'll share it if you'll sign an indemnity clause :-)

What was that joke about the French army in WWII? How do the French advertise their guns? Dropped once, never fired.

America need not motherfucking-apologise for anything. The French revolution, although inspired by the American, replaced a semi-malignant dictatorship with a socialist variant. Adumbratively, America rose in absolute glory and later accepted La Femme de Liberte with surety and vindication. France staggered from crisis to crisis, Les Amis de Bastiat, et al, notwithstanding.

America lives and dies on it's own merits. The French fall upon their own sword again and again. Their latest equivocation over the EU constitution is exemplar. The protectionists win, the one-worlders lose. Nothing is gained.

Only America remains.

Vive Amerique!!

Ross Elliot

((my apologies to French Objectivists for my unsubtle, coarse and innacurate use of their language :-) After all, I'm an American at heart. Mort!)

(Edited by Ross Elliot
on 6/02, 1:53am)

(Edited by Ross Elliot
on 6/02, 1:57am)

(Edited by Ross Elliot
on 6/02, 2:04am)

Post 1

Thursday, June 2, 2005 - 2:37am

Ahh, but your assumptions about the French revolution are a bit too general, because it was rather a totalitarian dictatorship than a socialist society, starting with Robespierre to Napoleon Bonaparte. The only socialist era in this was the time of the White council, which again was more of a military tribunal with a huge police apparatus.
The true revolution ended when Robespierre started to built his regime terreur and it was not only inspired by the US revolution, because both revolutions had many interconnections. The problem of the French revolution was its closeness to its neighbours and the too well established monarchy. Both are factors the US hadn't to consider, because they lived miles away from the English crown and there next neighbours were spanish settlers.
I think circumstances and pressure played a major role in the demise of the French revolution. The second French revolution had even worse chances, because it fell into the era of socialist rise and thus was perverted before it could gasp the idea of individual freedom.

But still, your text is pretty hilarious :)

Post 2

Thursday, June 2, 2005 - 3:05am

Well, thanks, Max. Keep it up. SOLO needs as much O'Rourkian input as it can get.

My point was that France was never as locked and loaded, never as fully committed, never as, well, trigger-happy as America was to rid themselves of the cloistered redundancies that masqueraded as civil government.

America had big balls. Always.

Tom Paine nailed it. America was the great hope, France in support. Jefferson knew it. France was the one true European hope. But alas, she succumbed and failed. America prevailed. There is much about modern France (despite their godammed, well, Frenchiness!) that can be admired. They are the most American of Euros. Yes. Their arrogance and ego is supreme. If only they could embrace Le Femme de Liberte from afar.

Ross

Post 3

Thursday, June 2, 2005 - 3:17am

Oh God! Mon Dieu! I have a sinking feeling of deja vu. I'm trying to sound a warning here, but already the thread is hijacked. As with the article I wrote about the late Pope & the best within ... folk ignored the point & launched into knee-jerk diatribes about religion & Catholicism. Now this thread is turning into France vs America, complete with relitigation of the history of the two. My use of "The French Paradox" was merely illustrative. My article is no more about France than The Fountainhead was about architecture, if I may be so arrogant. It is about ... well, dear reader, please identify what it's about & address that.

Yikes! Horreurs!

Linz

Post 4

Thursday, June 2, 2005 - 3:28am

Actually, Linz, I think there is an explanation for at least part of the paradox, going back to the doctrine of "The Stranger" by Camus. Nihilists commonly indulge in the "decadent" pleasures of the flesh -- sex and food -- because they think those are the *only* values to be had in life. So, yes, the French savor their meals, but that's all they look forward to. (That and their vacations.) The phenomenon is quite observable in all chic nihilists, as is its opposite in Americans. Ambitious, spunky, purposeful Americans are often so occupied with their long-term, more profound values, that they can (sometimes vulgarly) overlook the importance and details of finer things. Their jumbo-size attitude and bluntness, so charming in an overall sense, simply don't work so well when applied to food, for which optimal tastiness is arrived at through subtlety.

All of this, as I say, is very easily observable. I've seen many examples of both all around me.

None of which is to say that the perfect combination isn't possible. I actually admire the way in which the French savor their food -- savoring is savoring, after all, and the fact that something is your only passion doesn't take away from its intensity. Americans can learn from this; it's all a matter of context, and getting the *most* out of life, finding enjoyment wherever it is to be had. But I would be careful before equating the savoring of food (or even sex) with the savoring of life, as nihilists have a history of doing the first without the second.

Alec

P.S. The horrors of America's therapeutic culture, I believe, are part of a seperate issue.

Post 5

Thursday, June 2, 2005 - 3:43am

Interesting article Linz.

The US is still a country of immigrants with the pioneering spirit. This is a good thing that drives business, productivity, and that "can do" attitude. However, the negative side of this is when the "living" is neglected by what you call NOSA. When one does not actually enjoy the living, but lives only for the expectation of things to come. One is chronically unsatisfied. Fuck this and fuck that.

The French on the other hand, feel as if they are already are at the end product, they want to live to enjoy what they already have. They want to be protected from change and taking risks by the Government - wrapped and tucked in by nanny. They have neglected the journey.

I remember once Joe quoted "Life is a journey and not a destination" - but it is also important to love the Journey. If you don't, you will never appreciate the destination.

We only get one chance to live this life and we should seize it while we can. Life is for living (US), but also enjoying (French).

Post 6

Thursday, June 2, 2005 - 3:47am

No, no, Alec! Nihilists savour nothing.

And my critique is not of spunky, purposeful, authentically confident Americans who have an eye to the long term. Au contraire. It is of the culture of self-pitying psychobabble & infantile (short-term gratification at any cost) self-obsession that has been on the ascendancy for decades.

Alec, if you didn't get it, and you clearly didn't, then I have clearly failed.

I'm off to see my therapist. Crying all the way. I just hope someone can feel my pain. After all, I am the only person in the universe who matters. :-)

Linz

(Edited by Lindsay Perigo
on 6/02, 3:51am)

Post 7

Thursday, June 2, 2005 - 4:00am

Lindsay has a soft spot for the Christian ethic. I concur.

He believes, correctly, that just because you have the right to do so something it doesn't mean you should. Wine, for example, may be abundant but what is it that prevents one from becoming a lush?

The dilemna is instructive. The French, of course, don't have the answer.

The startling truth, also, is that FREEDOM itself, doesn't have the answer. Freedom only provides the opportunity to experience the consequences of immorality.

Something else is needed to provide the answer.

Ross

Post 8

Thursday, June 2, 2005 - 4:03am

C'est magnifique, Monsieur Perigo! And even I, who spent time analyzing Monsieur Eminem for Le Free Radical, can see a different joie de vivre at work in the things you note. I should note too that the difference is not just a question of food or academics either. Any culture that can generate Berlioz, Debussy, and Monet on the one hand and Legrand and Grappelli on the other, knows something about cultivation, savoring, and refinement.

Post 9

Thursday, June 2, 2005 - 4:12am

Just a few points on the food issue. I also saw the 60 Minutes programme. Whilst I found it very interesting, for me it was one of those situations where you think 'this is all very interesting, but how realistic is it to apply it to my own life?'

For instance, it was stated that the French not only *go home* for lunch, but take *two hours* off to do so! While the idea of savouring my food etc etc sounds very nice, I personally would rather have a sandwich at lunchtime, get back on with my work and then come home at a fairly early hour if possible. In other words, as with everything else, there is a trade-off here. And clearly there must be some effect on the economy and productivity if everybody disappears for 2 hours at lunch! I imagine France is perhaps not the best place to live if you really want to get ahead.

Post 10

Thursday, June 2, 2005 - 4:12am

Well, I get it, Linz, so hold off that visit to the therapist :) Of course I realise your article isn't about the French per se, but simply the inexplicable austerity with which some avowed freedom lovers grimly live their lives. Your rallying cry for sensualism over a diet of mung beans is much appreciated.

Post 11

Thursday, June 2, 2005 - 4:18am

Linz, you said, "Alec, if you didn't get it, and you clearly didn't, then I have clearly failed."

Well I got it, and I'm pretty damn dim. But then I had already blogged about it. :-)

Life is for living. France might be one of the most heavily-regulated countries in the world -- on paper -- but, far from taking seriously all the anti-fun killjoys as we do down here in the South Pacific, when it comes to personal freedoms Frenchmen and women ignore the wowsers and get on with enjoying their pleasures, and they do it with gusto.

And it turns out it's good for them. Here's a case where 50 million Frenchmen actually can't be wrong.

Enjoying life is good for you.

Chris: "Any culture that can generate Berlioz, Debussy, and Monet on the one hand and Legrand and Grappelli on the other, knows something about cultivation, savoring, and refinement."

Damn right too. And dont' forget Offenbach and Django and Ravel and ..

(Oh cripes, I'm agreeing with Chris again!)

Anyway, great to see you back into article action again, Linz.

Post 12

Thursday, June 2, 2005 - 4:33am

hehe... this is an alarming trend, Peter. And I agree completely about Offenbach and Ravel, and I was going to say Django too... but I figured the purists would claim that he was born in Belgium. But being the most influential jazz guitarist of his generation with the Quintet of the Hot Club of France should count for something! :)

Post 13

Thursday, June 2, 2005 - 4:48am

Chris, Derek and PC—thank you, merci beaucoup for getting it, as indeed it's obvious you did. (Diabolical, this hasn't spared you a whipping on the How Did Rand Become Rand? thread!! :-)

Actually, what I'm repairing to is probably very Sciabarrian when I think about it: in the complex interaction of disparate forces in a world of mixed premises, the outcome could be surprising, if not disastrous, if we're not vigilant. The essentially good guys are not only complacent, but are increasingly succumbing to the bad premises in their mix. While the bad guys are displaying a hitherto-unsuspected affinity for the good premises in their mix. (Of course, concepts such as "good guys" & "bad guys" are profoundly non-Sciabarrian, but that minor detail aside ... :-))

Post 14

Thursday, June 2, 2005 - 8:06am

Linz,

"[T]he culture of self-pitying psychobabble & infantile (short-term gratification at any cost) self-obsession that has been on the ascendancy for decades"

It would be more accurate to say "was on the ascendency". It's peaked and is on its way to the proverbial dustbin of history. Mark my words and the date.

Post 15

Thursday, June 2, 2005 - 8:16am

Bravo, Monsieur Linz, for getting to the heart of a very important issue.

Your rallying cry for sensualism over a diet of mung beans is much appreciated.

I could not agree more, and join wholeheartedly in the resounding battle cry. Too many people consider this approach to be flagrant hedonism, when in fact it is living.

Post 16

Thursday, June 2, 2005 - 11:05am

Very interesting and well written article Linz. I don't have it figured out yet as to why exactly it is I increasingly feel more alive and am better able to revel in the meat of *life* in countries that on paper are *less* free, than the US, my chosen home.

Post 17

Thursday, June 2, 2005 - 11:43am

I'd also like to point to another "freedom-loving" country in Europea: the Netherlands. They actually voted strictly against the EU out of the right reasons and their standings to most things is quite refreshing and unrestricting. I think that one should closer examine this country, that has established itself as the most liberal country inside the heartland of Europe.

http://www.vrijspreker.nl/blog/?itemid=2257

Even Ayn Rand was involved in the Netherlandian NEE-vote (figuratively speaking)

(Edited by Max on 6/02, 12:17pm)

Post 18

Thursday, June 2, 2005 - 11:52am

Thanks, Linz, for this thought-provoking contrast of the pluses and minuses of two cultures. When I go to France and certain other parts of Europe, I'm often struck by the fact that each culture has its pluses and minuses. Contrasting Americans with French in many ways is like contrasting (in the ancient world) Romans and Greeks. The Greeks were refined, intellectual, philosophical. The Romans were coarse, crude, not intellectual innovators, practical. The Greeks succeeded in the world of ideas, but not in stable societies. The Romans, anti-intellectual in many ways but respecting of Greek intellectuality often, conquered the Greeks. The Americans are like the Romans in many ways.

However, and here my analogy breaks down, it is a bit much to compare the French (Sartre, Derida) etc. to the Greeks. Maybe at one time, the times of Voltaire, Hugo, etc. Or in some arts.

Phil

Post 19

Thursday, June 2, 2005 - 12:02pm