Archives for December 2007

I got a nice note from my friend Amy, who writes, “While cleaning out my closet, I found an old issue of Merlyn’s Pen from when I was in high school. And it turned out to have a story by you in it! (“Pomegranate Heart.”) The funny thing was, I actually remembered the story from when I read it when I was 15. So I guess it was pretty good :).”

I had kind of an interesting conversation with my mom after I posted a link to the clip of Richard Dawkins & Douglas Adams. My mom said, “Who was that other guy in the clip? Dworkins?” I said, “Dawkins. He’s the world’s most famous atheist.” My mom said, “Wait, who’s the one who’s the really aggressive, wild-eyed, extremist atheist?” I said, “Um, yeah, that’s him.” My mom said, “That’s him? Really? He seems pretty mild-mannered in that clip.” I said, “Yeah, actually he is pretty mild-mannered.” My mom said, “So why does he have such a reputation for being so extreme?” I said, “I don’t know. That’s the American media, I guess.” So I was thinking about that, and seriously, in order for a religious figure to get labeled “extremist” or “militant” by the American media, that person has to blow up a lot of people, or at least threaten to do so with some credibility. But apparently all it takes for an atheist public figure to get labeled “extremist” or “militant” is for that person to robustly defend his beliefs and maybe occasionally employ a sarcastic or condescending tone of voice.

It was the same thing with Michael Newdow, the guy who went to the Supreme Court over the words “Under God” in the Pledge of Allegiance. I thought he had a pretty decent case, since Supreme Court precedent stated that Congress could not pass laws for the express purpose of “promoting religion,” and when Congress passed that law they stated in the record that “We’re passing this law in order to promote religion.” But whatever. What really struck me was that within minutes of the story breaking in the media, Michael Newdow’s phone was ringing off the hook with death threats, and yet all the media coverage was about what a fanatical wacko he was.

EDIT: It just occurred to me that Phillip Pullman always gets described as a “militant” atheist too. You’d think he was muling suitcase bombs on behalf of AUSCS. Seriously, he’s just a professor who writes books, and they’re fiction books for children. Get a grip, people.

* * SPOILERS FOR I AM LEGEND * *

I Am Legend is one of my favorite books. It’s a compact, harrowing vision of utter loneliness in a hostile world (something author Matheson also captured brilliantly in his novel The Shrinking Man), and its conclusion is memorable and thought-provoking. I had basically given up all hope of the movie being anything other than mindless entertainment when I heard that Akiva Goldsman (who is mediocrity made flesh, and who previously travestized another old favorite of mine, Asimov’s I, Robot) was involved. I was still hoping the movie would at least be entertaining, and it is for about two-thirds of its running time, carried by terrific performances by Will Smith and his dog. (The dog is genuinely talented; I wish the dog had written the screenplay.) Unfortunately, the final act is filmmaking that’s as bad as any I’ve ever been subjected to. Not only is absolutely everything about the final half hour of the movie absurd, incompetent, and feebleminded, but, as was exactly the case with the I, Robot adaptation, the movie replaces the thought-provoking theme of the book with a cliche theme that makes exactly the opposite point as the book, and that is exactly the sort of reflexive witlessness that the book was written to critique in the first place. I also may have a new candidate for stupidest movie line of all time (replacing Starship Troopers‘ “I don’t mind that I was eviscerated by a giant beetle because at least I got to have sex with you first” — that’s a paraphrase), which is when the miraculous and ludicrous female survivor tells Will Smith, “I know there’s a colony of survivors living in the mountains of Vermont. How? God told me.” She quickly adds, “I know how that sounds,” to which I was unable to restrain myself from remarking aloud, “Yeah, like bad writing.” The last act of the movie is so nauseatingly terrible that it casts a cloud over the whole thing, unfortunately. The first two thirds are rather enjoyable, so if you see this movie I urge you in the strongest possible terms to leave the theater/kill your DVD player as soon as Will Smith drives to the pier at night. It’s at that point that the movie suffers the most precipitous decline in quality of any movie I can think of.

This evening, as I was sitting out on the 3rd Street Promenade having a snack, a crazy-looking guy walked past me, glared, and spat on the ground at my feet. I was like: Whoa, what did I do? Then later I saw him on the sidewalk and noticed that it wasn’t just me — he was spitting at every single person who walked past. So then I felt better.

A nicely-dressed, nearly-spherical gentleman just walked past my apartment singing opera at the top of his lungs, and he was pretty good. Made me think of this.