Saturday, April 08, 2006
Illuminating
Stan Marsh and Oriana Fallaci don't look much alike, to put it mildly.
But they say the same thing.
Here's a passage from Fallaci's latest book, The Force of Reason.
Today's secular Inquisition is shrewd, you see. It fights death penalty and instead of the body it tortures the soul. Instead of the pincers or the ropes or the axes it uses bloodless tools: newspapers, radio, television, journalists, politicians, unsucecessful academics, movie starlets. Instead of the jails controlled by the Holy Office it uses stadiums, squares, marches which -- taking advantage of freedom -- kill freedom. Instead of cowls (but often you see the cowls too) it uses djellabahs and chadors and the tracksuits of the rainbow-flaggers who call themeselves pacifists, or the blue suits and red ties of their puppet-masters (Members of the Parliament, writers, trade-union ringleaders, reporters, bankers, prelates. The new valets of the Holy Office, in short, the Fra' Accursios who serve a power smuggled in as anti-Power.) In other words, it has changed its face. But its essence is unaltered. And if you write that the Earth is round, you become an outlaw rightaway. A heretic to be burned.
South Park has been illuminating Fallaci's manuscript for the last couple of years, using an art form that may reach more Americans than Oriana's slightly out-of-phase English. At the end of most episodes Stan tells us that the Earth is round.
It will be interesting indeed to see what our modern Inquisitors do with next week's episode. ¶ 3:28 PM
Stan Marsh and Oriana Fallaci don't look much alike, to put it mildly.
But they say the same thing.
Here's a passage from Fallaci's latest book, The Force of Reason.
Today's secular Inquisition is shrewd, you see. It fights death penalty and instead of the body it tortures the soul. Instead of the pincers or the ropes or the axes it uses bloodless tools: newspapers, radio, television, journalists, politicians, unsucecessful academics, movie starlets. Instead of the jails controlled by the Holy Office it uses stadiums, squares, marches which -- taking advantage of freedom -- kill freedom. Instead of cowls (but often you see the cowls too) it uses djellabahs and chadors and the tracksuits of the rainbow-flaggers who call themeselves pacifists, or the blue suits and red ties of their puppet-masters (Members of the Parliament, writers, trade-union ringleaders, reporters, bankers, prelates. The new valets of the Holy Office, in short, the Fra' Accursios who serve a power smuggled in as anti-Power.) In other words, it has changed its face. But its essence is unaltered. And if you write that the Earth is round, you become an outlaw rightaway. A heretic to be burned.
South Park has been illuminating Fallaci's manuscript for the last couple of years, using an art form that may reach more Americans than Oriana's slightly out-of-phase English. At the end of most episodes Stan tells us that the Earth is round.
It will be interesting indeed to see what our modern Inquisitors do with next week's episode. ¶ 3:28 PM
