Tea at Trianon: Confuciaphobia

John Wilson Croker on Marie-Antoinette

"We have followed the history of Marie Antoinette with the greatest diligence and scrupulosity. We have lived in those times. We have talked with some of her friends and some of her enemies; we have read, certainly not all, but hundreds of the libels written against her; and we have, in short, examined her life with– if we may be allowed to say so of ourselves– something of the accuracy of contemporaries, the diligence of inquirers, and the impartiality of historians, all combined; and we feel it our duty to declare, in as a solemn a manner as literature admits of, our well-matured opinion that every reproach against the morals of the queen was a gross calumny– that she was, as we have said, one of the purest of human beings."

~from History of the Guillotine by John Wilson Croker, 1844

Edmund Burke on Marie-Antoinette

"It is now sixteen or seventeen years since I saw the queen of France, then dauphiness, at Versailles; and surely there never lighted on this orb, which she hardly seemed to touch, a more delightful vision. I saw her just above the horizon, decorating and cheering the elevated sphere she had just begun to move in, glittering like a morning star full of life and splendor and joy. Oh, what a revolution....Little did I dream that I should have lived to see such disasters fall upon her, in a nation of gallant men, in a nation of men of honor and of cavaliers! I thought ten thousand swords must have leaped from their scabbards, to avenge even a look which threatened her with insult. But the age of chivalry is gone; that of sophisters, economists, and calculators has succeeded...."

~Edmund Burke, October 1790

Monday, September 20, 2021

Confuciaphobia

From Crisis:

Confucianism clearly is not a religion; it is but a dedication to the sayings of a wise man, a wisdom rooted primarily in natural law. And yet, it was perceived as a threat by the Red Guard, who saw all culture as a threat to the new culture, that is, the teachings of Chairman Mao. They desecrated the tomb of Confucius and burned his books. And now, with its Confucius Institutes creeping into all the right places, the Chinese Communist Party would have us believe that they seek only a renewal of Chinese culture. But the world’s greatest purveyors of monoculture are less than convincing.

The first dictionary definition of monoculture is that of the cultivation of a single crop on a farm or in a region or country, and the second is that of a single, homogeneous culture without diversity or dissension. In regard to the second, one is soon led to admit the absolute brilliance of the demonic, for only they would or could lead an assault on diversity in the name of diversity.

Everywhere we turn we see this phenomenon at work. Women weightlifters make the roster of weightlifters more diverse, while laying waste to the natural diversity of maleness and femaleness. Extreme exercise makes men more virile, while the same makes women stop ovulating and lays waste to that lovely subcutaneous fat layer that softens their curves. Simply put, extreme exercise makes women more virile. How is that more diverse? (Read more.)