From the article:
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By RUSSELL SMITH
Thursday, January 12, 2006
A week ago, the on-line journal Slate published the most interesting
summing up of the year that was: It asked a handful of U.S.
intellectuals to rate their "most amazing -- or disappointing --
cultural happening" of 2005. The funniest contribution was from
Christopher Hitchens, who chose the "intelligent design" court
decision, which rejected the teaching of that Christian myth in public
schools in Dover, Pa. "Just for once -- for once," wrote Hitchens,
"the raucous, boring, bullying noise of the religious morons is turned
off, and one can hear the lucid tones of reason, detachment, culture,
and irony. . . . Please don't wake me up."
Hitchens's scorn, along with recent news about the controversy over
the screening of Brokeback Mountain in certain conservative states in
the U.S., reminds us of how lucky we are not to be living in the
particularly charged and polarized cultural atmosphere of our
monolithic neighbour. We don't have to fight fundamentalist school
boards here very often; nor do our broadcasters have to survive
boycotts of advertisers who have been intimidated by Christian
proselytizers.
The gay-cowboy romance movie has not provoked the dimmest flicker of
controversy here, unless it's over whether American cinema is growing
simply too dull to watch. Whereas in Salt Lake City, Utah, the
Megaplex has refused to screen it, and Christian groups with
frightening names such as the Utah Eagle Forum are praising the
decision. The Los Angeles Times quoted one Peter Sprigg, a
representative of a Washington-based Christian lobby group calling
itself the Family Research Council, as saying, "I really don't think
America is ready for a homosexual love story like this. I'm sure it
has a great deal of appeal within the Hollywood community itself,
which is already committed to a pro-homosexual ideology, but I can't
see it as a big box-office success."
Major newspapers in the United States have to quote people like this,
and take seriously the concept of a "pro-homosexual ideology," just as
they have to report on the homicidal ramblings of Pat Robertson when
he advocates assassinations and divine retributions, because these
people are actual players on the intellectual scene down there. They
must be taken seriously. There are religious conservatives up here,
too, of course, and they rant away in their temples and on street
corners. But we don't invite them on to TV shows for "balance," any
more than we invite representatives from Hamas or Islamic Jihad or the
Baader-Meinhof gang.
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Read it at
http://www.theglobeandmail.com/servlet/ArticleNews/TPStory/LAC/20060112/RUSSELL12/TPEntertainment/Columnists
J. Spaceman
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