A long rant by Ace you must read
Having chided him in private (not personally) for letting himself be gulled into promoting Rod Dreher's Benedict Option book campaign yesterday, let me turn about and post a long rant by Ace you really must read if you hope to prevail religiously in America. Whining and screaming and hoping Teacher stops them from pulling your pants down on that hotel room floor is probably not going to cut it anymore, no matter how productive that sort of marketing might be in flogging book sales for someone else. There are naughty words involved, for any who need such warning.
Dear Bill Quick...
Of course, if your life is only of the mind, you can just retreat there and hope others take care of things for you the way you instructed them to through your megaphone from deep inside there.
Exactly and precisely. Well said by Ace.
ReplyDeleteAnother excellent piece on this very topic is this from Kevin Williamson at NRO. My pull quote:
The self-styled progressive sets himself in rhetorical opposition to Big Business, but the corporate manager often suffers from the same fatal conceit as the economic étatist — an unthinking, inhumane preference for uniformity, consistency, regimentation, and conformity. It is no surprise to see Apple and Walmart joining forces here against the private mind. There is a reason that the atmosphere and protocols of the corporate human-resources office are a great deal like those of the junior-high vice-principal’s office: All reeducation facilities have a little something in common.
Too bad, it appears I was just as right originally: Ace may have succumbed lately to a tendency to respond to whomever puts a tongue in his ear the deepest. Here's Ace falling head over heels for a typical Dreher anonymous anecdote served up only to conclude as an outpouring of mob demand from Dreher to himself that Dreher write his own BO book. Ace used to be far too sharp to fall for that sort of thing.
ReplyDeleteAce now rationalizes why the siren song of the BO sounds so sweet. He needs a change of pace, a pick-me-down, gliding into the BO will be it.
DeleteAnd today, after focus-grouping criticism of it, Rod Dreher's Benedict Option (TM) means the Joy of Resistance, the diametrical opposite of what it meant a month ago.
ReplyDeleteThe important thing for any author in the marketplace is not what his signature principle means, but that it means what the largest spread of potential purchasers would like it to mean. So meaning anything and everything still may not be enough.
Well, just as in the case of Crunchy Cons*, it all comes down to what Rod Dreher likes at any given time. And as we've often seen, Rod Dreher likes what the cool kids like.
DeleteOne constant with Dreher is his conflation of matters of taste with matters of truth. Or, to put it another way, he's a stylist with delusions of grandeur.
*And, one could say, in the case of TLWORL in which Dreher extols the virtue of going home, but later reflects that sometimes home means a new place to go, and also reflects that one can over-inflate home and try to make it Disneyland when it's not....
I'm beginning to think one could just as easily satisfy those falling head over heels for Dreher's BO with any other equivalent mood stabilizer like oxytocin or aromatherapy - "and, best of all, gang, with the Benedict Option, there'll always be pancakes, too!". Why bother even critiquing it rationally any more? Just pass the syrup.
DeleteJudging from Dreher's latest dump of anonymous narratives - meaning, written by him, or maybe not - there seems to be a vast, unmet need for cult relief from the personal religious and political responsibilities of actually being and living as the supposedlyly orthodox and conservative Christians who support such posts, a mass yearning for cult absolution and dissolving relief from the ordinary negotiations of everyday life that L. Ron Hubbard could have only dreamed of.
DeleteAnd, of course, the natural and inevitable teleology of these unmet needs is not to be found in the thousand-year-old faiths or in the contemporary political activities of the respective needys - for that would require contant, ongoing real life effort and difficulty, and who has the time or energy for that these days? - but in the works of Rod Dreher, the Mahdi, the Expected One, and his Emperormetrics gospels of Ruthie, Dante, and the Benedict Option.
The tiny horror of our days is that anyone here could have written that same post themselves filled with the same crypto-credentialed testimonies, all inevitably shaping a path, rspectively, toward Keith's Real Good Beer Remedy, or Pauli's Perfect Video Relief, or Diane's Dynamic Word Solutions, or Pik's Practical Picks for Purposeful Living, or Jonathan's Just Right Questions, and each of us in turn would be wiping away the same cult slobber from eager consumers. Where, oh where, did we go so wrong? The sin of Pride in starving before reducing oneself to such abject hustling?
From Crunchy Cons to the Emperormetrics of RDBO(TM) Krunchy Khristianity(TM), there is nothing new under the sun.
Taking Dreher's post at face value (risky, I know), it doesn't seem like much of a culture "war", much less "trench" warfare, when one side surrenders without a shot.
DeleteI know, right? At the risk of putting my tribal card in jeopardy, this is pretty much what I've been trying to say: taking one Dreher-prescribed Dreher and retiring to the grumpy sickness couch until the cramps subside really isn't going to cut it, enriching as it may be to Dreher, Inc.
DeleteFor example, everybody knows the name Memories Pizza. Who knows the name of the girls' golf coach who threatened to burn it down? It's Jess Dooley. What about Arlene's Flowers, sued for not agreeing to supply a gay wedding event at the request of a long time gay customer? Well, a lot of people probably know Baronelle Stutzman's first name because she sounds like a WW I ace or something. But what about the complainants, the ones who created the whole situation? Anyone? Robert Ingersoll and Curt Freed.
Obviously, no one is advocating threatening or harassing these opposite parties in any way, but the point is, why should Memories Pizza and Arlene's Flowers exclusive carry the burden of public notoriety and social media scrutiny? Why shouldn't those who thrust these situations from the private sphere into the public share equally as objects of scrutiny and interest, day and night, day in and day out? Where do they live? Everyone knows where the defendants live. What is going on hour by hour in their lives? Equal public scrutiny for creating a public issue isn't harassment, it should be an honor - or think twice before provoking one.
But instead of going to the trouble of putting the same social pressure on those supplying it as one is receiving or, far better, being Memories Pizza or Arlene's Flowers at any given opportunity, the reflex instead is to recline on the fainting chaise and read phoned-in crap like this for the quick nitrous huff it provides, not caring that it conflates purely illegal discrimination of a protected class as a class with compelled speech against a believer and his right to uninfringed practice.
The consequences of the latter - sucking up to Dreher for the easy drug rush - might be analogous to going to the dentist for the nitro, only to discover that he's spent your time drilling holes in your teeth and packing them with highly fermentable, cavity-inducing carbs - IOW, conflating your good arguments with bad ones to render them all unpersuasive to others wholesale - in order to leave the only avenue remaining to you then in your nitrous-dazed, rotten-mouthed shape subscribing to his Benedict Option, Mahdi the BO Prophet enterprise, IOW, bare gums or dentures.
There's really no way for the right to practice the sort of hashtag activism/victim resignation implicit in everything Dreher advocates any more than Michelle Obama's cute Twitter sign will really bring "our girls" back. Everyone interested is going to have to put up. Neither Dreher nor Dante nor the BO is coming to "save" anyone.
Last time I checked, lovingly admonishing the sinner and instructing the ignorant while bearing wrongs patiently are Spiritual Works of Mercy. Hunkering down from society in a "safe" enclave isn't on the list.
DeleteThis
Delete“That generation is superseded by Social Justice Warriors in their thirties who don’t believe that they should respect anybody who doesn’t respect them,” Kingsfield* said. “Those people are going to be in power before long, and we may not be protected.”
Bottom line: the Benedict Option is our the only path forward for us. Indiana shows that. “Write that book,” he said.
OK, I will.
is a bi-polar Frank Booth - NSFW! astride an Arabian stallion, rearing and cutting the air with his front hooves on a ridge line, silhouetted before a David Lean desert sunset, as dimly perceivable masses of robed followers without number stretch to every horizon below murmuring "Benedict Option!" and "Save us, Oh, Mahdi!"
What alarms me, frankly, is not Dreher and his periodic, feverishly soaring multi-thousand word blog posts (this one was 4,600-something, this one was 6,100-something) interspersed with entire and partial days immobilized by some equally low corresponding process in the cycle, it's that people like AOSHQ and others latch on to these ejacula without the slightest critical pause, as if they tacitly believe, like puppies, that anything not immediately perceived to be a stick upraised to beat them must instead then be a loving embrace without future cost or strings. The term for individuals and movements no smarter than that is "foreseeable loser".
*The fake name Dreher has assigned to the unverified anonymous emailer he is quoting as commanding him to write the book he wants to write which he is here now agreeing to write because his anonymous source just now commanded him to. Get that?
What one is ultimately doing by endorsing Dreher's BO is declaring,
Delete"I am following Rod Dreher because I am like Rod Dreher, a moral coward who requires the shelter of a herd of other moral cowards to survive socially. I fear the disapprobation of others for acting on the basis of my individual conscience. I fear that if I refuse to use the word "marriage" with respect to state-sanctioned homosexual cohabitation licenses, people might jeer or laugh at me and no longer invite me to dinner parties. It is not the law I fear, but the non-acceptance of others pivotal to my self-esteem. I fear that if I dump my iPhone for a Samsung in protest or otherwise relieve myself of Apple products, people might point at me as That Guy, unfriend me on Facebook, and cause my page rank to drop from fewer blog hits.
But if more of us declare we are like Rod Dreher and embrace the Benedict Option, we will immediately be sheltered from this cruelly non-supportive society by a Magical Cloak of Invisibility within which everything will now be different. We can then refer to state-sanctioned homosexual cohabitation as "marriage" without fear of conscience or disapprobation, because one day a meteor will come and vindicate us; in the meantime, there will still be those fabulous dinner parties. We can still use our iPhones instead of Galaxies, not even because they are better technologically, but because they say something important about us at those dinner parties that Samsung just doesn't say, and because one day the meteor will justify the sacrifice we thought about but never made. Within the Magical Cloak of Invisibility the Benedict Option provides, we won't have to be That Guy, people will still friend us on Facebook because we are now Magically Invisible Christians, and, best of all, our page ranks will remain high. For what doth it profit us to remain Christian if we are to become Unfollowed?
But most importantly, if we resign and surrender ourselves to the Benedict Option we will finally and truly know and share in the lifelong suffering of our Mahdi, Rod Dreher, the Expected One who delivered this prophecy unto us, and because of that shared knowledge we will finally be one and at peace with ourselves within this cruelly non-supportive society that ultimately will get what's coming to it because meteors or someone else or something."
LOL!!!
DeleteJust for the record, though,Page Rank's not as important as it used to be, At least according to my SEO Guru chums. Now relevant, quality content supposedly plays a bigger role. Which kind of lets Dreher out. Dunn' it?
So what the BO (Benedict Option) amounts to is a cop-out sort of like the old PO (Personal Opposition), viz, "I'm personally opposed to abortion, BUT...." Those PO politicians were mostly on the left, but there have always been these conservatives who think the pro-lifers are a little bit yucky and unruly….
DeleteThis uppity territory is the domain of the BO as I see it, sort of an uneasy mix between libertarian basement dweller and country-clubbing Rockefeller winger. But no doubt I'll be told that I really don't understand what BO really is. I'll never be graced with the gnosis... sigh.
So... "I'm personally opposed to abortion—in fact I have built a huge commune for people who agree with me—but I'm not going to interfere with anyone's right to abort their baby." or "I'm personally opposed to the redefinition of marriage—in fact I have built a huge commune for people who agree with me—but I'm not going to interfere with anyone's right to force their definition of marriage on anyone outside my commune."
Conclusion: BO is just PO with more cowbell. The Benedict Option goes way overboard to be personally opposed to something only to not really oppose it at all. Keep hiding that light under the bushel basket, and keep wearin’ those ol’ emperor clothes, Mr. Dreher.
Conclusion: BO is just PO with more cowbell. The Benedict Option goes way overboard to be personally opposed to something only to not really oppose it at all. Keep hiding that light under the bushel basket, and keep wearin’ those ol’ emperor clothes, Mr. Dreher.
DeleteIf so - oh, dear - that sort of leaves us at best with a remote, purely academic Christianity, doesn't it? Not a Christianity of loving, Dantean engagement at all.
Or am I wrong, and Dantean salvation is in fact a purifying-from-the-taint-of-the-world preparative for the Benedict Option?
Or am I wrong still and our either/or choices become (A) Dantean salvation OR (B) Benedict Option salvation?
Bottom line: the Benedict Option is our the only path forward for us. Indiana shows that. “Write that book,” he said.
ReplyDeleteOK, I will.
Oh my gosh. If this were any more grandiose and over the top, it would have to be set to music. By Verdi. Or maybe Wagner. Yeah, Verdi would gag. Definitely Wagner.
Who on earth does this guy think he is? You're right: He really does imply that he's been anointed for an Exalted End-Times Mission, like the mahdi.
OK, now I will read the rest of your comment, Keith. I was choking on that first bit and just had to say something.
Question: Who else but Dreher writes like this? Would someone with even a grain of self-awareness write like this? How can someone write like this without guffawing? How can anyone read it without guffawing?
DeleteThere's another aspect to this, Diane. I doubt I'm the first to notice that
Delete- the Dante book has been scheduled to launch (pre-orders & shelf sales) at Easter, the Christian holiday most focused on redemption and salvation
- the BO book to follow was hurriedly announced within this same contextual time frame. Why should we trust the BO writer? Because he knows how to save you. If you don't believe me, buy his Dante book and find out.
- for any doubters remaining, an absolutely pivotal event in the prerequisite Dante saving happened to occur, at least by the author's unverifiable account, this past Friday, April 3, 2015, which was...
Diane, if you don't believe now that Rod Dreher is the Mahdi, Prophet of God, bringer of the Benedict Option, what in the world is wrong with you? What sort of evidence would you believe? About anything. Gravity, for existence...
Diane, there's absolutely no downside to operating a venue according to the standards of a closed hermit kingdom (or cult) like North Korea the way Dreher does.
DeleteNo meaningful internal dissent is permitted; what is permitted only serves to validate, not contradict.
Little of what Dreher himself originates is verifiable, so he can't be exposed for any sort of falsehood (or truthhood, unfortunately), and to doubt, as I do, is clearly rude.
Thus, when Dreher launches on the dubiously grounded epiphanies, all within the kingdom already believe, and any who don't are already without it.
That "absolutely pivotal event" post you mention, Keith, gave me pause. It was striking how Dreher mentions that his priest told him he (Dreher) didn't need to "win" because it wasn't a contest, yet Dreher spikes the football and yells "Scoreboard!" by casting himself as the generous Hero who makes lions lay down with lambs:
DeleteThe conversation I had with my father was too private, too intimate, too precious to write about here. But I can tell you that the conflict is now over. Really over. And the reason it ended, I now see, was because against my own nature, I walked the difficult way of love instead of justice.
Note the reference to justice, in that Dreher maintains that no matter what he was right all along but bravely and magnanimously let that go (for now, anyway) for the sake of harmony.
Next will be a VFYT photo with his poor dad eating that damn bouilliabaisse.
I believe that in the process the jury was also privileged to get another unsolicited summary of why Dreher was the victim of injustice rather than vice versa, no? This - such unsolicited full disclosure of the injustice visited upon Dreher - may be the touchstone by which we can successfully determine which Divinely inspired love happening uncannily on Good Friday out of all 365 is truly the gift of God and which may be imposters instead, e.g., such events which occur on a random Wednesday without such accompanying judicial revelation.
DeleteThe picture accompanying the Good Friday reconciliation Rod's dad looked like a POW likely to be happy about just about anything short of death. I'm not visualizing intense negotiation from his side - whatever you want, son. Smile for the nice camera? Fine. Whatever. Let's eat. Even your damn bouilliabaisse.
DeleteDreher is the Great Exploiter. He exploited The Scandal; he exploited his dead sister; he exploited the Dante Trend-let; and now he's exploiting Indiana.
ReplyDelete"The moment has arrived for the Benedict Option. Behold, the Great Sign: Indiana!"
It's positively apocalyptic.
Only the Benedict Option can save us from the Wrath to Come. Too bad no has a clue what the Benedict Option actually is.
*Too bad no ONE has a clue....
ReplyDeleteDiane, that's why you should forget the Benedict Option and opt for The D'Hippolito Option. Nobody knows what that is, either (my minions are working on that), but I can emphatically guarantee that's it's far superior. ;)
ReplyDeleteHere's the unfortunate conclusion I'm drawing from all of this, that there's an manifestly visible number of Christians, many in positions of reasonable importance inside the academy and out, who are gobbling up a clearly and demonstrably inchoate cultish Dreher tonic as the mixer necessary for them to fully connect with and pursue their Christian faith.
ReplyDeleteWhy? And what does that say about, first, their true reasons for being Christian (e.g., merely psychological or political* vs. spiritual), and, second, how those less than spiritually Christian urges (e.g., psychological resignations into victimology such as the BO) might be transmitted to their students, peers, employees, recipients of policy, etc.
In other words, the cult leader is only the first problem of cultism. Everyone else ends up having to deal with the radiating effects and pieces.
*To be clear: Christianity conformed to political values, not politics conformed to Christian values
I'll offer a more benign reason for such thinking, Keith.
DeleteDreher is tempting at first, when viewed superficially. As I've said before here, I thought Dreher was onto something way back in the Crunchy days, b/c I too wanted to take back some of the things in the culture that the moral relativists and statists had taken from us. And like in American Hustle, "you believe what you want to believe, Richard." So it takes awhile until it dawns on you that Dreherism is exactly that -- all about Dreher.
It took me awhile, anyway.
I don't see any serious conflict between our positions, Pik. My overall takeaway is that Dreher simply cannot function in a vacuum: like Scientology or any other cult, he requires the unmet needs of others as a medium in which to replicate.
DeleteMy more specific point, though, was that the approved medium now - in contrast to back in those Crunchy days - is overwhelmingly trained academics and clergy, critically acute professional classes which presumably should be professionally equipped to know better earlier and, unlike conservative foodie urban chicken wranglers, are charged with teaching the young as well. For example, the Dante book has now become required reading at a Houston university care of a Dreher-smitten gatekeeper with that power.
So to sum it up, it logically ends up being the case that it's not just one irritating little man that I see as a problem, but the phenomenon of cultism itself which he's chosen as his vehicle.
I see what you mean and agree, Keith.
DeleteDreher is tapping into the concept of the "anointed" (See Thomas Sowell's Intellectuals and Society) who are trained in one field and as a result believe themselves to be expert in whatever they touch. Among that group, there is no external accountability for their ideas, in that it doesn't matter whether the ideas square with reality. Their only accountability is among themselves, which is satisfied by recognition of their fine work by others in the bubble (for which the price is back-scratching in return).
Yes, exactly. By obsequiously stroking academics that having to stand up for their own religious beliefs is really the responsibility of others - ultimately and ideally the mysterious forces of his very own Benedict Option - this good ole boy from LSU who could never be bothered to earn anything beyond a J-School BA but who can teach everyone else about Dante after a quick read through has found a cheap and easy method of buying his way into the clerisy.
DeleteSee also: lichen