Perversion.
On May 24, I ran an item about the 1941 sinking of the HMS Hood.
On the same day, the same item, had an item about the sinking, on the same day, of the SS Conte Rosso. Those two events both resulted in massive loss of life, with man of those lives being young. The Conte Rosso, a pre war Italian cruise liner, is forgotten, but the Hood certainly is not.
I don't note this to suggest moral equivalency or something in this, but rather to note something completely different.
The Battle of the Denmark Straits is an epic event of World War Two, but like all epic events of the Second World War it resulted in massive loss of life. It's not funny.
One of the things that has occurred since World War Two is the pornification of everything, and across cultural lines. This is bad in the US, but frankly its worse in other countries. Japan, which doesn't have a Western culture, and therefore doesn't have the remaining restraints of the Apostolic faiths and their protestant split offs, has a much different culture in this regard, and indeed in regard to the societal view of women in general. Japan, quite frankly, tolerates a lot of things in this are area that are outright perverse.
One of the things that it tolerates is a pornographic cartoon industry. Unfortunately, with the Internet, that's developed a huge American fan base, predictably. And oddly enough, and it is really, really odd, a feature of Japanese weird cartoon art is the cartoon treatment of World War Two warships, personified as improbably shaped women in the Japanese cartoon style.
I note this as when I ran the item on the Hood I ran across quite accidentally, on a net search, a cartoon depicting the Hood, Bismarck and Prinz Eugen in this fashion, in what I guess was intended to be a cartoon representation of the Battle of Denmark Strait. And its deeply, deeply, weird and perverted.
We have the Internet in part to thank for this. It's not good.
A existential shift?
One of the things about living in one place for a long time is that you both experience changes and aren't aware of them when they're happening. The recent Anthony Bouchard matter brings this to mind.
I've followed Wyoming's politics since I was a teenager. The first election I really recall closely watching was the 1972 Presidential election. I was nine years old at the time. I paid more attention to the 1976 Ford v. Carter election, where I definitely had an opinion (I was for Ford). So I have a long political rear view mirror.
My entire life the Republican party has been the majority party, although we've also had three Democratic governors, one Democratic Senator and one Democratic Congressman in that time frame. And for almost all of that time we've never fit the national mold.
Wyoming Republicans tended to be more like independents elsewhere. Wyoming Democrats, it was often noted, would have been Republicans elsewhere.
Something happened when Clinton was President and its still hard to figure out looking back. Clinton was not, in retrospect, a bad President and he wasn't actually detestable while he served in any real sense. But the Democratic Party simply died here during that period and it reflects the fringe today. The serious Democrats, including the ones in the legislature, pretty much picked up and moved to the Republican Party.
You'd think that would have cemented the party in the center, and for awhile it sort of looked that way. Maybe it has, but we're about to see.
The Wyoming Republican Party of the 1970s, 80s and 90s, was highly centrist and independent. When a Natrona County member attempted to introduce an anti phonography bill in the 80s he was pretty much howled down as messing in other people's business. Efforts by out of staters to move into the Powell region of the state to set up a white enclave met with an open public demonstration. Whether you thought they should or not, the party wouldn't touch social issues. An effort by ranchers to take over hunting licenses met with a near public rebellion.
But something has happened since then.
I'm not sure what it is, but that party has been captured by real right wing populists and they actually openly hate the old party. By accident and without my desire, I ended up being a silent recipient on an email list for at time made up of Republican figures in the state who are fairly well known. I asked the list owner to drop me off as frankly I'm sure that they wouldn't have wanted me there and I don't know why I was included in the first place.
What that revealed, however, is an open contempt of the populist who control the state's GOP for the old party.
The question is, where are the voters and is the old party still around?
Up until recently, I've thought it was. And I still think and hope it is. But I have to acknowledge that something has really crept into the GOP here and taken it over.
Whatever it is, it isn't conservatism.
To some extent, I wonder to what degree this is imported, and if that's the case, to what degree the importation is permanent. Some of the figures I recognized are very much Wyomingites, but perhaps notably of demographics and regions that were outside the mainstream up until now. But other figures in this change are out of staters.
That really matters as out of staters, or more accurately out of the region immigrants, bring their views and politics with them. They often don't know it, however. Be that as it may, people come here for various reasons and instantly set about trying to make this place like the place they left.
In the last Gubernatorial election the state had a candidate that hailed originally from Wisconsin but who had taken an adult trip, so to speak, through Texas and Arizona before ending up here, part, I suppose most, of the year in that county that's the domain of the wealthy, Teton County. His campaign struck me like something out of the South in the 1970s, complete with lightly clad young women in a climate that's cold most of the time. At one time I saw a car licensed in Colorado that had a bumper sticker for him that proclaimed "Christians for ".
Now, I'm a Christian, but prior to the 2018 race you never would have seen that sticker here. Wyomingites aren't anti Christian, but they tend to be "leave me alone" in their view of things. People simply wouldn't have attempted to garner the support of somebody by citing their religious faith prior to that time. Indeed, I know one of the prior Governors somewhat and know that he is very observant in his faith. At least one of the other prior ones had a profound personal conversion. And yet another candidate in the 2018 race was Greek Orthodox but that was largely unnoted.
That's because what's really meant by that claim is "I'm an evangelical Protestant", usually. And that's interesting as Wyoming is the least observant state, religion wise, in the country.
That's not new to Wyoming, it's always been the case. Over the state's century long history there's been an evolution in Protestantism however. The Episcopal Church was once very prominent in the state, but it's now declined massively and continues to. The Presbyterian Church and the Lutheran Church had pretty strong bases in certain demographics. The Latter Day Saints are very strong in certain regions and have been since before the state was a state. And Catholics form a unique demographic as they're a minority in Wyoming by a long measure, but they're a fairly observant one which actually makes them sort of prominent in terms of groups actually going to church.
Fundamentalist Christian faiths have always been here as well, but the real growth of them is quite new. In the 60s and 70s, your church attending Protestant school mates, probably went to a Lutheran, Episcopal or Presbyterian church. I can recall having one friend who went to a Baptist church, but only one. One of the girls I knew in junior high and high school was the daughter of the Methodist minister and I later knew some Methodists. I knew one Mormon. I knew one Jehovah's Witness.
Indeed, of my immediate grade school friends, one was a Baptist (mentioned above), two were Lutherans (although oddly one of the brothers of one of them became an Episcopal, and then Anglican, priest), one a Mormon, and one wasn't of any religion I can recall, which probably means his parents didn't attend church.
Of my close junior high/high school friends, two were Lutheran, one Episcopalian, one Mormon, and one nominally Catholic. In my wider circle, one was the aforementioned daughter of the Methodist minister and one the son of the Greek Orthodox priest.
Well so what, you may ask?
Well, on my work now there's two churches that are of very much different theology, one being a very large Assembly of God church and one purporting to be free of a denomination, which actually puts it into the evangelical protestant arena. Across town there's a very large non denominational church in that category. A person may say, so what, but this is evidence of something. Truth be known, up into the 1970s these latter types of Christian denominations were pretty rare here and had small congregations. That's changed.
And that's evidence of something demographic, and that reflects back to what I've just noted above about politics.
In the 1970s we had an oil boom that died by the early 1980s. When it died, the folks who had come in during it left. This was the age old pattern here. The mainline protestant churches and the Apostolic churches had congregations made up of people who had roots here, or who had sunk roots here. Some were oilmen and oilfield workers, but an awful lot of them had some other long standing base here.
The recent oil booms, there being two, of post 2000 vintage also brought in the oil demographic, which tends to be from Texas and Oklahoma, and that's really when we saw the rise of the evangelical protestant churches. It's also when our politics really began to change as well.
Now, I'm not saying that everyone who goes to one of the evangelical protestant churches is an outsider, nor am I saying everyone in the populist GOP is. As we'll note on the latter, however, some definitely are. But there's a phenomenon in invasions, if you care to look at it, of the outnumbered invader changing the culture of the invaded territory.
Pre Saxon Britain was populated, not surprisingly, by the British, a Celtic people. It was long wondered if the Saxons killed most of them, although there was little evidence of that, when they came in. We now know, thanks to DNA testing, that they didn't. Indeed, the modern English, or the Anglesch, or the Angles, are pretty much Celts, genetically. The Saxons simply took over and their culture became the dominant one.
I wonder if we something like that going on here. The population of Wyoming at any one time contains more outsiders than Wyomingites. A lot of the immigrants are from the region, who largely share the same culture, but not all of them are. Some are form outside and bring their culture with them.
Indeed, I'm personally familiar with just one such example of a transplanted Midwesterner who is pretty much incapable of leaving his big city, Midwestern view, behind him. He can't, as that's who he is, and there's nothing wrong with that. But very few people realize that they have a regional culture, and that the culture is shaped by where they are from.
The traditional Wyoming culture is pretty Woody Guthrie-esque. "This land is my land", in other words. A lot of the imports don't view it that way at all. And most of the old Catholics, Orthodox, Lutherans, Episcopalians and Mormons here pretty much figured that their religion informed their daily actions and politics, but none of them would have said "vote for me, I'm a . . . "
Maybe what I'm noting hasn't really happened. I hope not. But I wonder. One of the current Congressional candidates came out of hte chute announcing he was "pro-God, pro-family, pro-life, pro-gun, pro-business, pro-oil and gas, pro-coal." No Wyoming candidate of the 1970s and 80s, would have dared say that they were "pro God" as it would have been presumptuous in the extreme. For that matter, none would have said they were "pro gun" as that would have been assumed, and statements on the extractive industries would have been more intelligent than that.
That candidate is from Wyoming, but he's backed by the Teton County former candidate mentioned above. Of the remaining field we have one from Florida who has acknowledged, but not really show contrition, for what would amount to statutory rape in Wyoming, followed by what would have been pretty much regarded as a shocking marriage to a child by most Wyomingites prior to 2000, but which doesn't seem to now. One who has made a comment about Liz Cheney not really living here, a fair enough criticism that I've made myself in prior years, isn't from here either, but is at least from a neighboring state. Two have long military careers which by definition puts you out of contact with the state and I'm not sure if one is from here. The other most recently lived in California, supposedly the antithesis of all things Wyoming.
Some have noted that Idaho's politics were basically taken over by the populist wing of the GOP and Idaho has definitely gone through something like this in the last decade. Maybe we have too. [1].
I hope not.
Je ne regrette rein. . . mais peut-être que je devrais
Another thing, I suppose, we have the Internet to thank for is the recent decline of politics and the rise of anger as a virtue.
A lot of the current crop of GOP candidates here, which is all we really have so far, are just hoping pissed off mad.1. Now, being mad in politics can make sense, but it's really gotten out of hand.
It has to be kept in mind that people rarely make rational decisions when mad, and the essential element of a demagogue is keeping his followers mad. Mussolini never went to the balcony, and said, "gee, Romans, its such a nice day. . . let's do what Italians do and just take the day off . . . ". Nope was mad, and so his followers were mad.
While comparing anything contemporary to the Nazis is always fraught with danger, the same is true of Hitler. You can view, and if you speak it listen, to lots of Hitler speeches. And he's hoping mad. He's really mad at the Jews. Mad, mad, mad. His followers were mad too. . . so mad they never stopped to think "what exactly has this tiny minority of people in our country actually done to us. . . oh yeah. . nothing".
As I noted in another post, Wyoming populists are busy accusing old line Republicans of being not Republicans. Some mad person put up a RINO billboard here recently, apparently not realizing that may be the majority of the state. Anthony Bouchard is mad at the "fake press" for reporting news that isn't fake.
In earlier eras it took radio and posters to keep people whipped up to this state of perpetual frenzy. Now its the Internet, and that doesn't take nearly as much effort. In large part, that's why the Trumpites of the GOP are mad, and its' why the left winger of the Democratic party, who really love being mad, are made.
Everyone ought to listen to Gene Shepherd's "Fanatics". Truly.
As part of this, nobody seems to publicly repent of their sins.
Not that everyone has to, but let's be honest. If you are public figure and you acted badly, you ought to acknowledge that. Now, nobody is. Up until recently, they did.
And there's some bridges that you just can't cross. Rape, including statutory rape (which is usually consensual we'd note), is one. If it comes out, you have to confess guilt or it says something about you that's icky. Even if you do the right thing, you have to. You can note that you did the right thing, but you can't blame "the fake news media."
And you can't praise the guilty either. Mussolini did make the trains run on time, and Hitler did fix the rather odd German civil legal structure, supported a modernized highway system, and backed the Volkswagen, but that's not a reason to set his greater transgressions aside.
In other words, you can't really let Roman Polanski off the hook. You just don't want to go where that leads. If you start to try to wipe off the shit, you'll smell like it. No two ways about it.
Retrospect
I typed most of this out on a day that happened to be my birthday.
My birthday tends to be no big deal to me. Indeed, I'm always caught off guard when people note it and to a certain degree, with people that I don't know, it can irritate me to have it noted. I know this is unusual.
I note it here as the past year has been hopelessly odd, globally, and only now things are beginning to become less strained. Be all of that as it may, because of a variety of things, I'm irritated and disappointed, but not at anyone I know. From deep thinkers, however, I do appreciate thoughtful wishes.
One of the things that routinely happens on birthdays where I work is a communal late day birthday celebration. I absolutely dread it. Indeed, I always note to people who aske me what I want, etc., for my birthday that I don't really want anything, or if they are going to get me something, they ought to get me a mule, which I really do want. I'm perfectly serious about the mule, but nobody ever gets me one. I think they think I'm joking.
People don't take seriously the request that a birthday not be observed either.
I suppose that's because most people really enjoy having their birthdays celebrated widely. I don't really.
I always try to keep in mind that this is a view that's personal to me. And it isn't for the reason that you hear some people cite about being closer to death. I'm now 58, and at 58, if you are honest, death can come at any time. Oh well, that's the way that is.
Rather, I think it has to do with my early years, which of course people will always say is responsible for everything. But here it actually is.
When I was growing up, we always observed birthdays, but after your very early years it was an immediate family type of deal. And this was the case for the entire extended family. I get birthday wishes from my cousins, and they're sincere, but we don't have parties or exchange gifts. After I was about 7 or so, there were no birthday parties with friends and I can recall my parents even discussing that. It just wasn't done. You'd always get some gifts, but big gifts were particularly associated with real milestones. They didn't come every year. As my birthday comes during the school year, when I was at university I was usually not home when it occurred, and a phone call was about it, which is about all I expected and frankly I appreciated that. To compound things, after I was 13 my mother was so ill birthdays were really a thing that my father, whose birthday was one day after mine, was really the one observing it, and vice versa.
With that background, birthdays are deeply personal and private to me. I don't expect nor desire light wishes and I really don't want gatherings, particularly at work. One at home with my family is fine. I almost always work my birthday and when I'm at work, I'm working. I don't want to take a break late day to eat something. I know that's weird, but that's the way I feel about it.
I don't mind celebrating other people's birthdays, as they aren't mine. I get that. I get the larger cultural tradition. I'm just not participating in it and I never have.
An added part of that is that personal focus or attention is something that a really private person keeps really private. I don't want to respond to a fully day of birthday wishes as people stop by my office as the day is private and frankly, given my history with it, wounded.
I oddly feel the same thing about my first name. My mother was the only one, when I was growing up, who called me by my entire first name. Everyone else, absolutely everyone who knows me, uses a truncated form of it. My mother and I shared that truncated name as our names are male and female variants of the same name. I note that only her siblings called her by her full name. The same name reoccurs in my extended family and nobody uses the full variant of it commonly.
But at work people do. You can't break them of it, and you can't really tell them to knock it off. Why would they know?
Finally, I suppose, birthdays are a reminder of the things I didn't get done over the past year, which are the same things I didn't get done the year before that, and the same things I made resolutions on at New Years. At this age the things you need to work on are persistent, and even if they'd be easy for a younger person to address, at over half a century, they're not. I suppose the reminder is a good thing, in a way, and the birthday serves as a speedbump in that sense, but being reminded of perennial failure is a bit irritating.
Footnotes
1. Ironically, if this upcoming election is like the last, the real Wyomingite who gets the Democratic nomination may be the real Wyomingite.
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