Leon Kass is neither wizard nor wicked cocksucker. He is simply...
I'm a joy to wake up next to, Labs, and don't act as if you don't know it.
I have trouble with drawing philosophical lessons from complete hogshit like the garden of eden.
But they look so so unhappy. What more proof do you need?
Sex is by its nature unsafe. All interpersonal relations are necessarily risky and serious ones especially so. And to give oneself to another, body and soul, is hardly playing it safe …
This would be a solid argument, but for the inconvenient (for Kass) existence of casual sex, and other kinds of sex divorced from the intermingling of souls. And to the extent he wants to demonstrate those kinds of sex to be illusory, he's begging the question.
>Whether we know it or not, when we are sexually active we are voting with our genitalia for our own demise.
I like to think my penis is smarter than that.
Whether we know it or not, when we are sexually active we are voting with our genitalia for our own demise.
From the upcoming, What's the Matter With Genitalia?
Aleon Kasstani: Is it permissible to place together a hanging chad with a pregnant chad?
Islamofascists are afraid of sex. Islamofascists hate america.
Leon Kass is afraid of sex. Leon Kass is an islamofascist who hates america.
It seems less crazy in first draft: Whether we know it or not, when Leon Kass is sexually active he is voting with his genitalia for humanity's demise. Seems straightforwardly accurate, but it raises questions about the moral responsibility of Mrs. Kass.
Ogged isn't sexless, he's just voting with his genitals for his continued existence.
Is the Great Dangly Bits Plebiscite a simple majority wins contest? 'Cuz if so, I think he's throwing his vote away.
I've heard this before. It's just a vaguely logical reaction to the existence of reliable contraception.
"Don't have sex, you'll get pregnant and shunned!"
"I am on the Pill. I cannot get pregnant, and I won't be shunned."
"Don't have sex, you'll catch a disease and your genitalia will look like [this horrible picture]"
"We've been tested and use condoms, just in case."
"Does the condom protect your emotional health and your level of commitment? Are your genitalia registered Republican?"
It's just trying to find new EVIL BAD consequences of sex when modern life has removed a lot of the traditional EVIL BAD consequences. (No good will come of it.)
we are voting with our genitalia
Ever since my district went to the touch screen machines, that's the only way I vote. Man, those booths are small, though.
Cala, see, I usually see a footnote on these thinks. e.g.,
Don't have hot sex!*
*I am not getting any.
Note to self: Stop by Wallgreen's and buy latex gloves before voting today.
I gots to say, I don't disagree that sex is unsafe -- existentially unsafe, like reading philosophy -- even if you go into it casually. And I like the metaphor to the garden of eden. Sure, sex = death.
But that's not a good argument against sex. We've got the organs, and we've got death, and we were all born to experience pain. Just as it isn't a good argument against philosophy. The fact of mortality isn't a good argument against thinking about mortality.
So I like the passage itself, though it should be followed by another passage that says: go for it! Understand that sex isn't safe, and then go have sex.
apos, please spend today posting variations of 13 on as many right-wing websites as possible.
I think it's the move from the general idea that sex and death sort of arrive on the evolutionary scene at the same time to the particular conclusion that individual sex acts contribute to our demise that bothers me.
Also, do you think I'll be allowed to vote if I show up wearing latex gloves?
text,
I had a similar thought. Life, in general, is not safe. To live it fully, you have to be vulnerable, and that's a risk.
I don't think anyone would deny that sex has emotional risks. I don't think anyone has argued that putting on a condom means that sex has no emotional risks, though, so, I'm not sure what Kass is so worked up about.
Is he hoping that if sex is really physically dangerous, no one will do it? If people know that sex will make them get pregnant, they won't have sex? Has he been looking around the Bible belt lately? If pregnancy isn't enough to scare you off sex, is the possibility of cancer 25 years down the road going to do it?
Seriously, am I being too superficial by reading Kass to be saying, essentially, "I am not getting hott sex."?
Right -- it isn't a good argument for leaving off sex.
But it is a good passage. I don't like the term "safe sex" either, because it isn't sexy.
This is entirely off topic, but look at this statement Sen. Reid's office just put out. I'm in love.
reading Kass to be saying, essentially, "I am not getting hott sex."
Reading? I'd say this picture was proof enough.
I get the sense that Kass thinks that lots of other people must be having fabulous, uninhibited sex lives due to ev0l contraception.
We invented the condom! Caution to the wind! Screw 'em all!
But not only are there a lot of lonely liberals, furiously recording Maureen Dowd on their TiVos, but there are a lot of people who think contraception is dandy who are quite conservative in other ways about sex.
I'm in love.
Boy are you easy. Two things about Harry Reid: he's a Democratic leader, and therefore ipso facto unworthy of you; second, five electoral votes that went GOP.
Ye Gods! Great comments to a load of hogwash.
Some claim, with a certain amount of evidence, that procreation is the most important thing we do in our lives.
We procreate, for the most part, via sex.
Ergo, what? Sex is NOT fun? Nobody dare mess with SEX? There is only one sanctioned way to do it?
When I have sex I'm voting for my own demise? WTF? My mortality exists whether I have sex or not. My demise is a-coming down the mountain whether I want to die or not. Who says I get to vote on this?
Nah, Tripp, if you don't have sex, you'll live forever! (Due to the magic power of semen.)
So long as you stay away from that flouridated water. Purity of Essence.
I think it's the move from the general idea that sex and death sort of arrive on the evolutionary scene at the same time
This makes sense only if you imagine that asexually reproducing beings don't die since their "offspring" are perfect genetic copies of their "parents".
I try to keep a twin in a bunker, "just in case".
31: is that all that's being said? Do bacteria ever really die, given enough sustenance, and the luck to avoid being ingested by another bacteria, or inserted with viral DNA, or something?
I get the sense that something different is going on at the cellular level.
Anyway, it's cool to think that sex correlates with degeneration and death, in that it heightens the fun of sex. As in Zeus envying the mortals -- death grants the ability to live with grace. Then again, Zeus had sex. Thoughts?
Since the topic is sex and death, d'you think the woman at the pool who keeps speaking to Ogged is Maureen Dowd?
d'you think the woman at the pool who keeps speaking to Ogged is Maureen Dowd?
OK, that's awesome.
>Whether we know it or not, when we are sexually active we are voting with our genitalia for our own demise.
I like to think my penis is smarter than that.
Not mine. It keeps voting for Bush.
Arrgh. Why does the anti-spam bot tell me this thread is more than two weeks old and put my comment in quarantine? Could it be that it thinks my joke is too lame?
I'm with Michael: I've always interpreted "the only good sex is procreative sex" as sour grapes.
Cancer cells are immortal.
I'm not sure that's right. Scientists thought the same thing about stem cells, but it's proven to not be the case. These types of cells aren't programmed to die in the normal way, so they do live much longer than ordinary cells. But my understanding is that eventually metabolic junk, oxidation and hell, I don't know, cosmic rays conspire to outpace the cell's ability to repair itself.
What?! the next thing you know we'll be saying digital copies DON'T last forever.
Say it ain't so!
The other odd thing about his quote is that only procreative sex is properly death-oriented sex. Gay sex, sex with a condom and masterbation are insufficiently death-oriented. Like that would be a bad thing.
I am just happy that his ex-students aren't showing up saying what a wonderful teacher he is and how everybody is misunderstanding him. It is easy to misunderstand someone with a habit of saying stupid things.
How exactly did Reid bring about this closed session? There's an AP article that makes it seem as if he just said "I demand a closed session!" and so it was.
I think he, or any other Senator, can. I'm not a Senate Rules maven, but that's the impression I've gotten from the coverage.
Re 45: He invoked the rarely-invoked Rule 21, which apparently can be overruled by Frist, except that Frist was out in the hallway gladhanding the vegetative or something and thus unable to prevent it.
Here's rule 21. Any Senator can make a motion requiring closed-door discussion. From the coverage today, the doors stay closed until a mojority votes to reopen then.
Perhaps Frist was legislating from the bench while everything was happening.
The presiding officer of the Senate must have mastered a lot of arcana.
I wonder how you get that job…
A bit late, and I know youve moved on, but I have to agree with text.
I read the quote first, and thought it was a nice piece of thinking. I never considered that it could be an argument against sex!
I like the swooping finger motion at the end.
I believe the Senate employs at least one Parliamentarian (or whatever it's called) who's in charge of knowing all the rules.
I like the swooping finger motion at the end.
TMI, Standpipe, TMI.
anyone else notice that, the way Kass talks about sex, you have to conclude he's a spider? Or are there other sorts of bugs etc. that, when they have sex, are voting for their own demise?
Very clever, Fmot, writing your name backwards, but not clever enough!
Mantis, bee, mayfly, the list goes on.
Spider, bee, mayfly, mantis
We think Kass is from Atlantis
bees too? and I thought drones had such a happy life. perhaps they're all like little bertie woosters, and the queen's name is honoria glossop...
I have to say I think w-lfs-n would make a natural presiding officer. Calling others to task on arcane rules seems to suit him.
Mayfly, mantis, spider, bee
Who could be as dense as he?
I swear I read the author of 64 as "Standpipe Bridgeplate" straight off. Probably I'm just attending to length of name and pattern of capitalization.
Interesting, since he wrote Bridgestand Platepipe.
I didn't write 64, but I was going to earlier. Spooky!
Now fess up, Epipetalp.
So do we have a no sniotanoserpmi rule?
What is the role of the House and Senate Parliamentarian? (as of 2000)
In the Senate, the Parliamentarian sits on the lower tier of the rostrum just below the presiding officer. He is frequently seen swiveling around in his chair, which faces the Senate floor, to address the Senator presiding behind him. While the Member of Congress presiding is free to take or ignore the advice of the Parliamentarian, most abide by his guidance. Few Members have the independent body of knowledge regarding the chamber's procedures necessary to preside on their own.
...
Parliamentarians both apprentice for and serve in their positions for long periods. Developing the expertise required for the job is an extensive effort, requiring a law degree and years of watching parliamentary maneuvers play out on the House or Senate floors.
Interesting, since he wrote Bridgestand Platepipe.
Yes. Hence, attending to length and capitalization alone.
Too bad about the Parliamentarian needing a law degree.
So do we have a no [snoitanosrepmi] rule?
I'm just curious to know who could have written the very same comment I'd considered writing, and then have attributed it indirectly to me, besides me. We need to talk mutual annihilation.
Or baby names, whichever.
Are you sure I'm not you?
Sometimes, it is hard to tell these things.
How many fingers am I holding up?
But on which hand?
Gee whiz, you're food.
You know about my secret bucket of lady fingers.
If you ignore me, I'll sing!
[mockingbird]
O what has become of Millicent Frastley?
Is there any hope that she's still alive?
Why haven't they found her? It's rather ghastly
To think that the child was not yet five.
[/mockingbird]
Yes, and I know too,
the ladies without fingers.
You must therefore know of my secret tiramisu.
Afraid not.
However, I have a killer recipe for usimarit.
First, it requires finding an usimarit, (a large, stinking bird, much like an ostrich, except that it is 3 meters tall and has claws.) and killing it.
this is turning into the best thread ever. please all, continue.
In the ensuing usimarit carcass fracas, take care not to bruise the wattle.
No! This thread was funny, and I won it prematurely.
What am I, chopped liver?
text, if you ever again fear you've prematurely won a thread, we'd all love to hear more about the fat partner at firm buffet.
What am I, chopped liver?
Even I know the answer to that.
Were the wittle wottle
Bespotted with soot or sottle
Clean the wottle with a bottle
Of bleach-free detergenty Frottle.
Frottle cleans out stains
For it's made of 100% pure Heaven's rains
Is not! Quit trying to pawn off your old bathwater!
001!
(to ninety-nine: shut up, phili-stine!)
I'd appreciate it if whoever's posting as SPQ Arthur would kindly knock it off.
text, I don't think you won the thread just yet. I just can't bring myself to think that my agreement is quite that important. Nearly, though.
And here I thought this was all a clever ruse to lure ogged, he of the crazy IP-tracking skills, back to resolve identities. In fact, he may have done so and just decided not to inform the rest of us, in conformity with his hiatus.
Why text thought he had won the thread.
Well, that does seem a bit more of a sensible reason, I suppose...
(Just when you thought you had this one in the bag, washerdryer!)
I assumed that SPQR was in fact Ben, because he seemed to be horning in on the Etalpepip-Standpipe menage. Well simulated, Michael.
(Ina colloquial sense of victory, I believe eb won at 76.)
Interesting, since he wrote Bridgestand Platepipe.
"Bridgestand Pipeplate" would make an excellent name for a Victorian novel, perhaps one written by Mr. Earbrass.
(Sorry, Lackey.)
It went entirely unremarked that LB claimed Reid's office puts out & she was thus in love.
That is all.
Hey, I'm easy. A Democratic spokesperson gives me a taste of that sweet, sweet, outrage at the nightmarish things that have been done to our government and our society, and I'm begging for more.
Hey, I'm easy.
I'm outraged too, LB. Absolutely filled with hot, sweaty, panting outrage. IYKWIM.
Mmmm -- nothing like some good, passionate, liberal rage. Say something about inequitable school funding, would you?
Have yet to read the comments thread but I just want to note that "voting with one's genitalia" is the best thing I've read in weeks. It needs to be preserved. -- Perhaps when we are talking about the popularity of this or that television program; "How is this season of Baywatch doing?" "Well the public is really voting with their genitalia..." So that doesn't quite work but you get the idea.
Update: will not be able to read the comments thread until I am home from work and can chortle and guffaw with abandon.
Apostropher -- in New Jersey we are still using the little metal levers, which makes for much less comfortable genitalia-voting. Spare me your complaints of cramped quarters.
(Couldn't keep away...)
You think it's difficult for you...
New Jersey clearly needs bigger levers. And while they're at it, a material other than metal might be preferable.
Or at least they could be kind and warm up the metal first.
Jeremy, y'all don't grow 'em prehensile up there in Yankeeland? No wonder everybody up there is so ill-tempered. Don't know how y'all managed to beat us with that handicap - seems like it would add at least 10 seconds to the musket-packing process if you had to use one of your hands to hold the barrel still.
I'm just glad they stopped using butterfly ballots. I must have destroyed 40 or 50 ballots trying to punch out those itty-bitty chads.
Don't know how y'all managed to beat us with that handicap
The opposable thumbs make up for it.
Oh right, forgot about that. Lucky bastards.
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