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AR 21:6 - New York Times recognizes '-phobia' bigotcha tactic
In this issue:
CRITICISM - "an essential aspect of our daily activities"
ESCHATOLOGY - Jonathan Cahn's Harbinger and Mystery of Shemitah taken to task
HOMOSEXUALITY - the "-phobia" accusation and the art of "shaming your ideological opponents into silence"
Apologia Report 21:6 (1,279)
February 10, 2016
READER RESPONSE: "Regarding the Baptist Press article, 'First-Person: Taqiyya, Imam Mahdi & the Iran Deal' [AR 21:3]; this is a nonstory. There's nothing new here. These two beliefs are known to anyone familiar with Shi'a Islam, and that would include the members of the U.S. State Department who have been negotiating with Iran." Elliot Miller, editor-in-chief, Christian Research Journal. (See <www.goo.gl/nDhlZL> for his entire objection at the bottom of the page.)
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CRITICISM
Better Living Through Criticism: How to Think About Art, Pleasure, Beauty, and Truth, by A. O. Scott [1] -- summarized by Library Journal (Sep '15 #2): "Critics can get drubbed as much as lawyers or bankers, but as New York Times film critic Scott argues, critical thinking is an essential aspect of our daily activities."
Kirkus (Jan '16 #1) finds: "His position from the outset is defensive, as he acknowledges the antipathy many seem to feel toward critics, an attitude built on assumptions that critics hate pleasure, are motivated by artistic jealousy, and bring intellectual faculties to bear on material that doesn't warrant such fussy academic attention. Criticism is often seen as an essentially parasitic endeavor, a vulturelike scavenging on the remains of someone else's talent and effort. Scott lays out a taxonomy of meaningful thought (and the meaning of thought itself), and if he occasionally ventures too far into dense theoretical thickets or indulges borderline-irritating gimmicks ... his disciplined reasoning, impressive erudition, and deep commitment to his art (as he defines it) are never less than provocative and elegantly articulated. A zealous and well-considered work of advocacy for an art too often unappreciated and misunderstood." [5]
"This stunning treatise on criticism ... is a complete success, comprehensively demonstrating the value of his art. ... Scott ties criticism to philosophy, most compellingly citing Immanuel Kant ... that 'the judgment of taste ... cannot be other than subjective.' ... His most striking observations come in a chapter entitled "How to Be Wrong," which Scott calls 'the one job I can actually, reliably, do.' He states that 'choosing is the primal and inevitable mistake of criticism' as well as 'the gesture that calls it into being.' ... This is a necessary work that may enter the canon of great criticism." Publishers Weekly, Nov '15 #4.
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ESCHATOLOGY
"Jonathan Cahn's American Revelation" by James Patrick Holding -- summarized: "In his wildly popular books The Harbinger [2] and The Mystery of Shemitah [3], Messianic rabbi Jonathan Cahn offers a mixture of homiletic biblical interpretations and obscure mathematical calculations to show a pattern of biblical prophecy fulfilled in America." Holding contests this and begins by noting that, in relation to Cahn's approach, John Hagee's "blood moons" theory is an "equally contrived end-times scenario."
"Although related, Harbinger and Mystery are poles apart in terms of their presentation models. Harbinger is a novel.... Cahn argues that economic upheavals ... are God's way of enacting [Isaiah 9:10, Lev. 25:1-4, and Deut. 15:1-2] in response to our disobedience.
"It will not be possible in this space to disentangle each of Cahn's mistakes, but his chief methodological error is ... an agenda of generous conceptual expansion to facilitate what appear to be uncanny matches" in his prophetic interpretations. Holding spends most of his time considering what Cahn does with the Isaiah passage.
"Fundamental to Cahn's arguments is that America was seen by its founders as a 'new Israel' that was 'in covenant with God.'" Holding points out the error of thinking that America's founders were unitedly so inclined, concluding that "The intentions of Jefferson [among others, were not] in tune with Cahn's interpretation; as a Unitarian deist, Jefferson could hardly have thought of America as a biblical covenant nation!
"The central thesis of Mystery also rests on generous conceptual expansions, this time related to economic crises of the twentieth and twenty-first century overlapping with Shemitah (Sabbath) years, according to the Jewish calendar." Holding demonstrates that there is no meaningful pattern involved.
"Perhaps the most significant coincidence cited by Cahn is the historic concurrence of economic declines with the Hebrew month of Tishri (September-October), which is a time when debts are forgiven and the economic slate is wiped clean. ... Cahn finds it 'mysterious and inexplicable' that such a pattern should emerge...." Holding offers a reasonable alternative. Christian Research Journal, 38:6 - 2016, pp50-53.
See also "Jonathan Cahn: Man of Mystery" by J. Greg Sheryl in The Quarterly Journal, April–June 2015. <www.pfo.org>
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HOMOSEXUALITY
"How '-Phobic' Became a Weapon in the Identity War" by Amanda Hess -- begins with a frightening story of sexual risk-taking to introduce the term "whorephobic" as a backdrop for reviewing how "The '-phobic' suffix has emerged as the activist's most trusted term of art for pinning prejudice on an opponent. ... When did this particular diagnosis become such a powerful weapon in the identity wars?
"The fuse that would eventually set off the modern '-phobia' boom was lit a half-century ago by a psychotherapist named George Weinberg. He had noticed a curious cluster of psychological symptoms among some straight men. ...
"Weinberg believed that 'discriminatory practices against homosexuals have deep psychological motives....' But Weinberg was not only a therapist; he was also a gay rights activist, and in his book, he hinted at the term's strategic value in furthering the goals of the budding movement. ...
"Bigotry is an emotionally charged phenomenon, and a persistent critique of the political '-phobia' is that it's hooked on the wrong feeling. '[M]ore consistent with the emotion of anger than fear,' [UC Davis psychologist Gregory] Herek wrote in 2004. ...
"Fostering reflective dialogue is one way to go about advancing an agenda. Shaming your ideological opponents into silence is another. That strategy plays particularly powerfully on Twitter, where the one-liner with the most retweets wins the debate round. And just as counting up likes and retweets lends a mathematical sheen to the Twitter contest, the '-phobia' suffix carries with it an air of scientific authority. Adopting the language of the medical establishment imparts a bit of linguistic legitimacy to the activist underdog's cause. Now it lends social legitimacy, too. ...
"Nowadays, we pathologize ideas with talk of memes that mutate from host to host and information that reaches a critical mass by 'going viral.' It's a powerful trope, but it also risks trading one stigma for another: 'Phobia' is now so embedded in our language that it's easy to forget that it is a metaphor comparing bigots to the mentally ill." New York Times Magazine, Jan 31 '16, pp13-15. <www.goo.gl/cy9whL>
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SOURCES: Monographs
1 - Better Living Through Criticism: How to Think About Art, Pleasure, Beauty, and Truth, by A. O. Scott (Penguin, 2016, hardcover, 288 pages) <www.goo.gl/0y4Bqt>
2 - The Harbinger: The Ancient Mystery that Holds the Secret of America's Future, by Jonathan Cahn (Frontline, 2012, paperback, 272 pages) <www.goo.gl/1Sa1tI>
3 - The Mystery of Shemitah: The 3,000-Year-Old Mystery That Holds the Secret of America's Future, the World's Future, and Your Future!, by Jonathan Cahn (Frontline, 2014, paperback, 288 pages) <www.goo.gl/8hzMy3>
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