In the morning mail we find this story, in which Elizabeth Warren, granted the great boon of seeing Pope Francis address the United States Congress, offers her granddaughter Warren's one and only "guest ticket." Granddaughter declines, because school.
Huh? A once-in-a-lifetime chance to see a pope -- even a Commie pope -- address the United States Congress, and freaking school is the conflict? This is elevating a given day of school, which for almost everybody, including no doubt Warren's granddaughter, is trackless hours of nonsense punctuated by occasional real learning, to a status it does not deserve.
It is tempting to pin this on Warren somehow, since I am sorely tempted by any opportunity to pin anything on her, but the ugly truth is that a huge proportion of aspiring and educated parents of the striving class would make the same foolish decision (recognizing, because the milk of intellectual honesty flows through my veins, that I actually have no basis for knowing why school was a conflict in this case -- perhaps it was on the day of a stage production for which the granddaughter was to be center stage, so to speak, or some shit like that), regardless of the consequences for actual learning, curiosity, or, most importantly, the urgent and permanent need to acquire stories with which to entertain kith and kin over the decades.
That is all.
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12 comments:
Why bother sending your grandpapoose to see a civilian religious leftist when she can spend a day in the care of government atheist leftists? I see no leftist downside with her reasoning. From a "rightest" perspective, I wouldn't get up from folding my socks if this pope came right up to my front porch and I wouldn't call of my dogs from chasing him off my property either so no matter what one's affiliation, going to see this pope is a waste of one's time.
Don't ever let learning get in the way of "education".
I took my kids to the Pate automotive swapmeet. I expect they learned more there than they would at school.
I'm with Mudge. What is the pope to me, and why should he be anything to my children or Elizabeth Warren's? Obviously the average school day isn't that important, but neither is the average papal pronouncement. It might be different for a Catholic, but I don't think Warren is one, nor am I.
Nothing to see here, Serene Police State Totalitarians, everyone Move Along.
I'm Catholic and I'm not interested in seeing Pope Francis either, although "school" wouldn't be my reason/excuse. I have wonderful memories of going to see both Pope John Paul II I(Boston, 1979) and Pope Benedict (NYC, 2008). Something is not quite right with the current pope.
Maybe she doesn't want to do time with Grandma Fauxcahontas. I wouldn't.
We must always remember what we're fighting for -- gentility, an extended pinky and crustless canapes. And shit like that, Poindexter, shit like that. Isn't it ironic? No, in fact it's bathetic.
Politics is downstream from culture. If culturally we accept the hegemony of the gutter, all our political striving will be in vain. Go now, and sin no more.
I think seeing the spectacle of Pope Francis address Congress would be a great learning experience, and that Warren was a good grandmother here. The elevation of school over learning among highly educated people, though, continues to baffle me.
School takes care of the kid so the parents don't have to.
I'm with Jack on this. I have no great affection for the politics of this Pope, but he represents a strain of thought worth understanding--as well as 2000 years of Tradition worthy of respect. Or have we as conservatives thrown over even this last vestige of what it means to be a conservative?
I'm with granddaughter. Would be a gross waste of time. Read some Shaksper (I know, but he spelled it that way sometimes).\
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