"Reds" Relevant? Really?

"Reds," Warren Beatty's enormous 1981 movie about American Communist icon John Reed and the left of a hundred years ago, has been re-released with some fanfare. Beatty says it is even more relevant now than it was when it came out at the beginning of the Reagan administration – when it was so harmless, Beatty says, that the Reagans themselves showed it in the White House. The current occupant is not likely to do the same.

Beatty says the film is about political opposition during wartime. And it is true that most of the action follows American communists and socialists attacking World War I as simply about profit. They are all excited about the Russian Revolution and the new burst of freedom in the Soviet Union.

But seriously – is a movie about communist revolution at all relevant now? I think the excitement in Los Angeles about the DVD release of this film tells us more about Hollywood's idea of politics than about real politics. What they are excited about is sheer activism, sheer opposition to the government. The actual communists in the film, though, cared more about the kind of society they were trying to create (very misguidedly) than in the drama of the revolution. Hollywood revolutionaries, on the other hand like the drama – and the difference between the kinds of wars that were being fought then and now, and the kind of society the opposition envisions – doesn't register as important.

On Not Getting "Second Life"

I am a nerd, but not a geek.

When a student introduced me to the elaborate virtual world of Second Life, my first instinct was not to go there, but to ask geeks to explain it to me and send me things to read. I am grateful to same, especially to my brother-in-law. This helpful guide from Wired may help other nerds and pre-n00bs get the lie of the land.

As a sociologist I am interested in how people think the world is made and how it could be made. Second Life is a wonderful experiment in free market social engineering. Its great appeal is that you can do and make just about anything you can imagine.

My main concern, as readers of this blog know, is with family life, so I was curious about how family life is made there. I asked helpful student Nora "Do you court, marry, and have children?" in Second Life. Her answer is instructive.

Yes and no. You can choose a partner, but to make this official, I think you pay an extremely small fee to LindenLabs so that they can change your online profile. Anything beyond that is the decision of the users. There are definitely wedding places in SL and there are of course people who met in SL and who married in real life. There are no SL babies, though. … But there aren't babies built into the game, unless you get really smart and figure out how to script that! :) You can actually change your avatar to look like a young child, but anyone younger than 17 or 18 (i forget which) isn't allowed into SL. They have their own separate grid to use.

I used to be very interested in narratives of alternative worlds. Science fiction got me through high school. But I have found that since becoming an official sociologist, and most especially since having a wife and children of my own, I am much less interested in virtual or alternative worlds, and more interested in the real one.

I think it is wonderful that Second Life exists, and that the half million people who regularly work and play there have found a place for their passions. I celebrate the wonderful variety of this world, including the alternative worlds it contains.

But I don't find it to be something that I want to do myself. So I very much welcome responses from people who do "get it" to elaborate on why.

The Evolving Upper Class: Smart or Handsome?

Oliver Curry, an evolutionist at the London School of Economics, has gotten some notice recently for his prediction that humans are slowly evolving into two sub-species divided by class. He thinks that the full split into a tall, good-looking, healthy, smart subspecies and a short, ugly, short-lived, dumb subspecies will take 100.000 years. But even by the year 3000 he thinks there will be a noticeable division. Race differences as they now exist will be ironed out by intermarriage. The new and larger split would be by class, rendered more and more biologized.

Pierre Bourdieu, the late French sociologists who I have written about several times recently, notes that the ruling class is divided into a monied side and a cultured side. Bourdieu's work is not concerned with evolution, but I think he might accept that the upper classes would be increasingly likely to marry within their class, inching toward speciation. I think, though, that people in these different class fractions tend to marry on their own side of that divide. Over a many generations of such selections, the two fractions would divide.

What we are talking about is still at the level of a parlor game, so let me take a wild guess here. Many observers of the rich have noticed that they use their money to select attractive mates. I have noticed that the smart tend to use their smarts to select smart mates. (Yes, there are ugly rich people and pretty smart ones; we are talking big trends here.) SO, if Curry is even a little right, perhaps the Eloi of the future will be themselves divided into the smart and the handsome. And that might be a fair fight.

Do Unmarried Households Reign? No, Not Really

"For First Time, Unmarried Households Reign in U.S." reports a current story in Yahoo! News by Maxim Kniazkov. The article notes, correctly, that in the Census Bureau's 2005 American Community Survey 50.2% of American households do not include a married couple, while 49.8% do.

Does this mean marriage is now the minority "lifestyle?" No, not really. When we do an apples-to-apples comparison, the survey shows that of family households (which have, or had, kids), 74% are married.

Some of the bare majority of unmarried households is made of single parents. Kniazkov rightly notes that most of the unmarried households, though, are what the Census Bureau calls "non-family households." He interprets this to refer "primarily to gay or heterosexual couples cohabiting out of formal wedlock." This, however, is not so. As the Survey's tables show, 82% of those non-family households – some 30 million households altogether – are people living alone.

Put another way, of the 50.2% of American households that do not include a married couple, more than half are single people living alone. And one thing we know about single people living alone is that the overwhelming majority of them want to get married, and the large majority of them will someday.

So, yes, most American households now do not include a married couple. Does that mean marriage is on the outs? No, it means America is a very rich country. In America, 30 million adults – 10% of the total population – can afford to live by themselves. But they don't want to do that forever. They want join their single household with another, and join the married majority of adults.

Scholar Says Lobby Suppresses Criticism; Lobby Gets Scholar's Speech Cancelled, Thus Proving His Point.

I am a centrist, an academic, and a friend of reasoned debate and the marketplace of ideas. I think the story told in this headline is wrong, wrong, wrong. It doesn't matter which lobby.

Imagine if the Lobby in question were for evolution, creation, tobacco, health, free trade, protection, faith, secularity, or anything. If the speaker were a racist, or a sexist, or flat earther, or pro-plagiarist (hey, every profession has its pet hates), using political pressure to make another organization rescind an invitation is just wrong.

In this case, the scholar is Prof. Tony Judt of New York University, who was invited by the Polish consulate in Washington. Judt had been critical of the Israel lobby for suppressing dissent and misdirecting U.S. foreign policy. Here is the Washington Post's account of the dirty deed:

An hour before Judt was to arrive, the Polish Consul General Krzysztof Kasprzyk canceled the talk. He said the Anti-Defamation League and the American Jewish Committee had called and he quickly concluded Judt was too controversial.

If you don't like what someone is going to say, pushing them off the rostrum is wrong.

The cure for bad speech is better speech.

Mayberry Machiavellis Exploit Evangelicals – Still

John DiIullio was the first director of the Office of Faith-Based and Community Initiatives early in the Bush administration. When he quit in frustration, he accused Karl Rove and crew of promising evangelicals every kind of cooperation in order to get their votes, but delivering nothing. He called them that wonderful insult, Mayberry Machiavellis.

David Kuo was deputy director of the Office of Faith-Based and Community Initiatives in the second Bush administration. In 2003 he quit in frustration. In a new book, Tempting Faith: An Inside Story of Political Seduction, Kuo says that Rove's staff promised evangelicals every kind of cooperation in order to get their votes, but delivered nothing. To make matters worse, the Rovers were privately condescending toward conservative Christians – like Kuo – who they described as "nuts," "ridiculous" and "goofy."

In a Christian Post story, White House spokesman Tony Snow denied everything.

I don't know what Karl Rove's staff said and says about the evangelicals who vote for them, but Kuo's and DiIullio's version sure would explain why President Bush's faith-based initiative has amounted to so little after six years.

Becoming "The Man"

Last night I caught up with a former student, now working hard on a fascinating doctoral project in sociology. She is a feisty black woman who has succeeded in elite white schools because she is smart and funny. I always enjoy talking to her. She was recounting her difficulties with her department chair, who she critically resists. The difficulty is not that she critically resists – she does that to everyone in authority; it is what sociologists call a structural critique, as opposed to a personal critique. The difficulty is that he does take it personally. She is not criticizing him. She is criticizing The Man. That is how she got to be a good critical thinker.

She keeps rising in all these institutions because she is a good critical thinker. Teachers in every school she has ever attended have asked her to teach, and I am no exception. So it is inevitable that someday she will be The Man. And then I will laugh.

No, said she, "then you will point and laugh."

True. I look forward to that day. Secretly, so does she.

Governor Warner is Out for Good Reasons – But I am Still Bummed

Former Virginia Governor Mark Warner has decided not to run for president in 2008. I am disappointed – he was My Guy. However, I fully respect his reasons. He made the decision after his father's 81st birthday. My father, were he living, would be 82. Warner was showing his daughter, Madison Warner, colleges that she might soon go off to. My MW is in college now, and I am at them moment on the road showing colleges to daughter #2, NW (who delightfully signs herself Endub). Indeed, as Gov. Warner says, these days will never come again. Even the presidency can wait and, if necessary, pass.

So I am bummed out. But I understand.

And I still want a successful governor as our candidate for president.

Will Immigrants Renew Marriage?

Los Angeles County has shown an increase in its marriage rate this past year. This wouldn't seem like a big deal – except this is first time this has happened in a populous county in more than thirty years. No one has analyzed the numbers yet, but David Popenoe, one of the country's best marriage trend counters, thinks that this reflects the greater commitment of Asian and Latino immigrants to marriage.

Los Angeles County also brings us the normally sorry spectacle of the Hollywood Marriage. They say that a Hollywood marriage is like an African democracy – if it lasts five years, we call it a great success. (Ok, I said that – but maybe it will catch on.)

Perhaps to counterbalance the Hollywood Marriage, Southern California will also bring us the East L.A. Matrimonio and the Orange County Danh Tu (which I hope is the right Vietnamese word for marriage).

Under New Management

I am on the road with Junior Gruntled #2 for a college search. We saw a wonderful example of the right understanding of family life. Driving down the highway was a black SUV, probably his, with this legend painted on the back window in bright colors:

Just Married.

Under New Management.

I think they will go far.

The Invisible Christian Movie Line Makes the "Cosmopolitan" Cities the True Parochial Backwaters.

The most interesting production story about movies at the moment is about "Facing the Giants." Made by amateurs from Sherwood Baptist Church in Albany, Georgia, the film is about a high school football team that enjoys divine help after committing to God. To almost everyone's surprise, it has been released in 400 theaters and is doing pretty well.

The Washington Post reported the story. But, of course, the film is not actually playing in Washington. What I found most interesting was the explanation of where the movie was and was not playing. Reporter Peter Whoriskey lets the distributor tell why:

According to Julie Fairchild, a spokeswoman for Provident Films, "There's a sort of imaginary line where Christian films don't play." Where it is showing, she says, is the "flyover country that Hollywood has been ignoring."

I wish Provident films well in serving this ignored market.

The real loss is to Washington, DC, and all the other blue-state metropolises that shield themselves from the discomfort of films that don't fit their worldview. A similar cultural censorship is not so common in flyover country. The little town I live in showed both "The Passion of the Christ" and "Fahrenheit 9/11." I expect that "Facing the Giants" may get to us, too. Which is more than can been said for our "greatest cultural centers." This is a pity, as we could all benefit from balance in our culture, as well as in our politics.

Harvard Gets Religion

Harvard is considering adding a new course in "Reason and Faith" to its core curriculum.

Zachary Steward's Wall Street Journal article quotes Prof. Louis Menand, co-chair of the curriculum committee, as saying "I think 30 years ago, people would have said that religion is not something that everyone needs to know. But today, few would disagree that religion is supremely important to modern life."

Harvard, whose original motto was Veritas pro Christo et ecclesia, seems to have forgotten some things about how the other 99% of humanity lives and what we value. It is refreshing to see them catch up with what is customary at most liberal arts colleges, like the one I teach in.

Seriously, Harvard is often a curriculum leader, especially for the secular research universities. I am glad that they have given up on the fantasy that religion will just go away, and are trying to bring their students "in the center of contemporary religious debates."

No Scruples in Sacramento

Sacramento Presbytery had a special meeting on September 9 to consider and adopt four strong resolutions. The presbytery is now committed to
1)not ordaining anyone who has a scruple about any of the church's constitutional standards;
2) not to accept a minister ordained elsewhere with such a scruple;
3) not to make up money due the national church that any congregation withholds in protest; and
4) not to contest any congregation that wants to leave with its property.
Leslie Scanlon's solid article in the October 9 Presbyterian Outlook covers the whole meeting in more detail.

The intent of these resolutions I judge to be a serious attempt to find a middle way of keeping the constitution of the church whole. The presbytery commits to upholding a strong standard of the constitution, but it also makes room for those who do not find even this strong stand to be enough.

The first resolution, which was adopted on a vote of 87 to 59, says:

To promote the peace, unity, and purity of our presbytery, we resolve that the Sacramento Presbytery holds that all candidates for ordination, installation, and/or membership in this Presbytery shall comply with all standards for ordination set forth in the Constitution of the (PCUSA) (G-1.0500), or shall be ineligible for ordination, installation, and/or membership.

I have long wished that the church would take its whole constitution more seriously. We attend minutely to the Book of Order, but neglect the first book, the Book of Confessions. Yet the confessions are supposed to be the real meat of our constitution. If the first Sacramento resolution means that they will now take all the confessions seriously, I applaud them.

But I think Sacramento Presbytery bit off more than it can chew.

The Book of Confessions contains hundreds of tenets. I keep hoping that we will have a serious discussion about usury, prohibited by the Westminster Larger Catechism. Any up for the "undue delay of marriage" fight? Keeping "stews?"

$100,000,000 Ego Houses

The "Veblen Effect" is when people pay way more than they have to for something to show how rich they are. Among the mega-egos with big bank accounts, there is always a competition to have the Most Expensive of Them All. This is not at all the same thing as having the Best of Them All.

When we think of mega-egos with money, one name may leap instantly to mind. Right. Donald Trump has led the way in building a nine-figure house, just to beat all the other guys. His 80,000 square foot monstrosity in Palm Beach has a "price" of $125,000,000, which is a makeover of a quaint little cottage that he bought for a mere $41,000.000.

And what would one call such a theater of intimidation? Maison de l'Amitie.

The punchline, though, is that Prince Bandar of Saudi Arabia, who has even more ego and less sense of propriety than Trump, already has a $135,000,000 house is Aspen.

Amish Class

In a week of horrible school shootings, the deadliest and most graphically awful were the five young girls killed in the Amish schoolhouse in Pennsylvania. Four of them were buried today.

The Amish are very serious Christians. So they turned the other cheek. They have tried to comfort the dead murderer's widow and her children. They urge her stay in the community. They pray for the crazy person who molested and murdered their children before killing himself as the police closed in. The grandfather of two to the dead girls was asked by a reporter if he had forgiven the killer. "In my heart, yes, " he said, "through God's help."

That is the class of humble people.

Nobel Prize Colleges

The count of the colleges that produced our new Nobel prize winners so far:

Berkeley
Brown
Harvard
MIT
Swarthmore

Stay tuned.

The Euston Manifesto I

A new venture in sensible center-left politics has begun in Britain, and spread to America. The British version begins with the "Euston Manifesto," to which a group of Americans has signed on.

I am always in favor of sensible centrist politics. I am working through the details of the manifesto and its amendments, to see what I think about it.

To start with, though, I was struck by the different ways of describing themselves that the British framers and their American cousins adopt.

The preamble to the Euston Manifesto begins "We are democrats and progressives." They go on to say that they are mostly from the Left, but not exclusive. So, who are they trying to reach? "We reach out … beyond the socialist Left towards egalitarian liberals and others of unambiguous democratic commitment." The left-of-center barrier is the fixed point of their identity. They are not aiming to join liberals and the center. They don't even imagine a center. Instead, the new line they are trying to draw is "between the forces of the Left that remain true to its authentic values, and currents that have lately shown themselves rather too flexible about these values." The Euston Manifesto alliance is not distinguishing itself from the Reactionary Right – that is a given – but instead from the Looney Left.

The "American Signers of the Euston Manifesto," on the other hand, have views that "range from those of centrists and independents to liberals of varying hues on to the democratic left." The Americans see the Euston movement as a center-left alliance. The line they want to draw is somewhere right of center. There could be an enemy on the left, too, but it is not named.

The Euston alliance is made by the Left. The American counterpart is made by the left.

As the old joke says, Britain and America are two countries divided by a common language.

Black Incomes Surpass Whites in Queens

That is the title of a fascinating article in the New York Times by Sam Roberts. We can see the point quickly with some numbers:

$46,000 = average household income in the United States

$50,960 = average white household in Queens
$51,836 = average black household in Queens

By contrast, in neighboring Manhattan,
$86,494 = average white household
$28,116 = average black household

What is the difference in black achievement in the two boroughs? First, blacks in Queens are more likely to be immigrants. Second, blacks in Queens are more likely to be married.

Within Queens, the immigrant difference is clear:
$45,864 = average black native-born household
$61,151 = average black immigrant household

Married households in Queens have an even bigger advantage:
$70,324 = average black married native-born household
$84,338 = average black married immigrant household

And which factor matters more, marriage or immigration?
Clearly, marriage is the more important factor in raising household income. Married couples make about 50% more than unmarried households, even though many of the unmarrieds have two or more adults in them.

Queens shows the future of black achievement in America. Immigrants are likely to lead native-born African-Americans. But married couples, wherever they were born, will lead more.

Is the Global Presbyterian Fellowship Schismatic?

The Global Presbyterian Fellowship is a new project by some of the leading congregations of the Presbyterian Church (USA) to get beyond the endless internecine struggle, and get on with the business of spreading the gospel. They had an initial gathering in Atlanta this past summer that generated a major buzz. Something good might be coming, a way forward out of the old mess.

However, the GPF also raises a disquieting parallel. In the 1930s disgruntled conservatives, led by J. Gresham Machen, created an Independent Board of Presbyterian Foreign Missions. In its brief life, the Independent Board was aggressively critical of the existing church leadership. They asked congregations to give their mission money to the Independent Board instead of to the official mission agency of the church. The denomination ruled that the Independent Board was schismatic, and ordered all officers of the church to quit it. Machen and the other board members had, in my judgment, created the Independent Board in order to create a schism. Naturally, none of them quit the Independent Board when ordered to. They were tried, convicted, and, in 1936, removed from the ministry of the Presbyterian Church. By prior arrangement, they immediately created a new denomination, now known as the Orthodox Presbyterian Church.

When the call for the Global Presbyterian Fellowship was issued, it raised a red flag for me and others who know this history. We were relieved, therefore, to see that the first point of the initial invitation proclaims:

We choose to remain within the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.), and we encourage congregations to continue to relate to their own presbyteries in the manner that they deem best. This is not an effort to start a new denomination or to write a new constitution.

At the Atlanta meeting, the GPF adopted a covenant. The language of the covenant is a little less reassuring than was the initial invitation. Gone is any explicit assurance that they choose to remain within the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.). Instead, we find this more ambiguous proposal:

To invest our financial resources only in those local and global mission efforts that we believe are biblically faithful and accountable, within the Presbyterian family and through other partnerships into which the Lord calls us.

That is not a call to schism, but it is not a proclamation of loyalty, either.

On the whole, I do not think the Global Presbyterian Fellowship is, or will be, schismatic. I say this partly out of trust for the initial impulse that created the GPF. I also believe, as I have written earlier, that the New Wineskins initiative has been the magnet for the schismatic forces in the church.

There is plenty of discontent in the Global Presbyterian Fellowship. So far, though, it is trying to build up the church from within.

If Pirates Oppose Zombies, Do Ninjas Support Them?

Austin had a wonderful "March for Zombies' Rights." You know, "Brains – The Other White Meat," and "Zombies Was People, Too." The zombie march drew some protesting pirates. Which raises the important question, if pirates oppose zombies, do ninjas support them?

Junior Gruntled #2 says yes, because ninjas help create zombies. I think they would, because ninjas can hide among zombies while sneaking up on protesting pirates.

The long war goes on …