…ranting away in the sunday times.  this time we have a ms. susan behrens, known for her grammar handbook, going off about how noisy restaurants are…  her first paragraph, in itself, summarizes the new social nazism, the hegemony of a select few on the entire society.  ms. behrens states:

“I used to love eating out; I don’t anymore. Even though the smokers have been moved outside and the food is more likely to be from some local, free-range, organic farm, and I can finally afford the “better” places, I would rather stay home — because I am tired of the noise.”

ok, we are rid of the smokers, the non-healthy foods, now it is time to move to the last bastion of free life, fun.  let’s get rid of that as well and the social nazis will finally be happy, eating their tofu steaks in sterile restaurants, away from the riffraff..

one of the first things they teach you in law school is the elusive “reasonable person” standard: a legal fiction purporting to pinpoint the common denominator of social relations and actions.  how would a reasonable person act under the circumstances? that is your bar, your bright line.

this is supposed to be an objective criteria, indicating the “standard” in the society.  standard, in most cases, means the majority: its wrong side being a low standard and right side a higher standard.  higher standard is always good.  lower, you’re in trouble brother.  both the higher and the lower standards are, as logic goes, statistical exceptions.  most people act and relate one way and that is the standard of a reasonable person…

that ain’t the case in modern western society anymore.  modern western society is using a statistical exception, the oversensitive, as its common denominator, as its “reasonable person”.  the highest standard, not the natural median of the society, is becoming the rule.  whereas, elsewhere, such as education, the lowest standard is being accepted as the norm.  it is fucked up if you ask me…

because the oversensitive is filling the shoes of the “reasonable person” smoking is banned everywhere, including public places in NYC, and food diversity is accepted as long as it is healthy and sterile.  now revelry is about to go down the drain if the social nazis have their way.  being boisterous, reveling, getting excited are human traits.  i guess these are not traits ms. behrens wishes to see in the restaurants she frequents.  and, sadder yet, many of the times readers who commented on ms. behrens’ piece agree.

society needs to say a firm “no” to these social nazis, the oversensitive, and should take humanity and the “reasonable person” standard back from them.  otherwise they will continue to have their say and get their way.  if you’re oversensitive to smoke, noise and unhealthy foods, well, stay the fuck away from places where they’re enjoyed.   or live with them, your call.  that’s what being a social animal means: to get along with society’s norms.  not to change the norms based on the hegemony and choices of a select few…

after many years in relative obscurity, qaddafi is back on the saddle as public enemy number 1!  kudos mr. qaddafi– i thought you had no endgame left in you after 2009’s puff pieces about you in commemoration of your UN general assembly speech.  everyone, from the new yorker to the new york times, was going all googly eyed with your  pan african speeches, how you bestowed yourself as the “king of kings” of africa, waxing poetic about how you set your air conditioned tent in all the high places and palaces of the world…  i wonder where those writers are now, a few days away from libya being bombed back to early ’80s…  surely they won’t do it on friday, your holy day, but come saturday, i can already hear those guided missiles screaming by.  such fall from grace in the western eye, such waste of decades of publicity.  all these years on political campaigns and goodwill, not even focusing on your military career, wasting it away, remaining content with the rank of colonel, when all your peers became generals or field marshalls.  sorry it ended like this mr. qaddafi, you were one times article or one new yorker profile away from becoming the prodigal son of africa…