The Other McCain

"One should either write ruthlessly what one believes to be the truth, or else shut up." — Arthur Koestler

Stuff You Can’t Make Up

Posted on | July 30, 2014 | 35 Comments

From Beca Grimm (@becagrimm):

Have I ever mentioned my insanely obsessive curiosity?

When something catches my attention, it is my habit to research the topic within an inch of its life, pursuing random footnotes and the biographical details of the authors of the works cited in the bibliography, in order to satisfy my maniacal desire to know.

Do not tell me your opinions. Tell me what you know — give me facts, quotes, something genuinely useful to me as knowledge.

Exactly how I developed this habitual hyper-curiosity is a long story. Remember that the Internet did not become a mass phenomenon until I was in my mid-30s, so that by the time I first logged onto the Web, I’d spent more than three decades seeking knowledge in books, magazines and newspapers. Young people — i.e., anyone under 30 — can scarcely imagine that world, where you couldn’t just Google up anything you wanted to know, where being knowledgeable required one to commit facts to memory, to develop skills and habits of checking indexes and bibliographies and learning how to cross-reference sources. At any rate, the development of my mental habits occurred before there was an Internet, and the advent of the online world provided a sort of turbo-boost to my pre-existing curiosity, and the effect is this: My mind is crammed with facts, and I am unable to break the habit of acquiring new facts, so that there is a somewhat disorganized encyclopedia inside my mind, to which I add new information every day.

The name Inga Muscio rang no bells for me, and because I’ve spent the past six months immersed in a study of radical feminism, the fact that I did not recognize the name of this feminist author led me to do some quick research: Here’s her Wikipedia entry, here’s the “About” page of her blog, here is her personal FAQs. You can take the time to scan those pages, and you will then know as much about Inga Muscio as I do. Why would I ask you to undertake that research?

In college, a friend who didn’t shave her armpits lent me her copy of Inga Muscio’s feminist treatise Cunt: A Declaration of Independence. Paging through it instantly gave me a ton of great ideas, like supporting female-run businesses and LGBT rights and checking out my vagina with a compact mirror. Then there were some I wasn’t immediately sold on, like abortion via reflexology and, more specifically, using menstrual blood as plant fertilizer. . . .

Read the rest of that, if you care.

My insane curiosity kicks in: Who is Beca Grimm? It was easy enough to learn she is a music journalist who was living the dream in Brooklyn, N.Y., but is now moving to Atlanta. What I wanted, however, was the specific context of the phrase, “In college …”

Where did she go to college and when?

University of North Florida, Class of 2010, a journalism major. Let’s quote from an article she wrote as a junior in 2009:

The green movement has recently become one of nation-sweeping proportions. Vegetarianism is strongly linked to environmentalism because abstaining from ingesting meat greatly helps our planet. . . .
Of course, one of the most popular reasons people boycott meat is in support of animal rights. Although the meat industry has improved somewhat since the times of Upton Sinclair’s “The Jungle,” what with the growing popularity of free-range options, there are still an astounding lack of ethics. . . .

Let’s not be too critical of Beca’s collegiate output, eh? The relevant point is that when she refers to her college days, Beca is a 27-year-old talking about what she did when she was 19 or 20 or 21. One wonders what other books she read in college, or what books she has since read, but somehow this one book gave her “a ton of great ideas” — e.g., gazing at her genitalia with a mirror — and thus Inga Muscio’s Cunt can be described as a formative influence on Beca.

OK, then: Vegetarian environmentalist animal-rights feminist.

Am I the only one who notices how many young people seem to care more about their beliefs and attitudes than about knowledge?

That is to say, despite their intelligence, their sense of themselves is almost entirely about membership in an ideology/identity group — to which they give a cult-like loyalty — and they never pursue knowledge except to reinforce their own beliefs. This is not merely intellectual sloth, but deliberate self-imposed ignorance. They are determined to know nothing outside the confines of their own narcissistic identity bubble, and are therefore so ignorant that they have no concept of how much they don’t know.

It is impossible to educate self-absorbed people who lack curiosity. “Checking out my vagina with a compact mirror” is a  perfect metaphor for the lives of this hopelessly ignorant generation.

 

Category: Education, Feminism, Intellectuals

Comments

35 Responses to “Stuff You Can’t Make Up”

  1. Evi L. Bloggerlady
    July 30th, 2014 @ 4:30 pm

    I am sure this is a great marketing strategy for your local farmer’s market.

    And on the plus side, they say blood discourages deer and rabbits from eating your vegetables. Of course, fertilizing your veggies with menstrual blood would also discourage most people from eating your veggies too.

  2. Animal
    July 30th, 2014 @ 4:33 pm

    I ran into this woman’s spiritual sister when I was researching and writing Misplaced Compassion. The nutbar I encountered on Usenet went by the screen name “RadFemAR” and probably had more teeth than IQ points. She also ascribed to such things as the therapeutic benefits of foot massage and believed that a city of superhuman aliens was flourishing under an extinct volcano in (where else?) California, and that they were eventually going to emerge and stop us eating animals.

    Uh huh. As you so aptly pointed out, Mr. McCain, you can’t make this stuff up.

  3. RS
    July 30th, 2014 @ 4:34 pm

    . . . and checking out my vagina with a compact mirror.

    Right then. I can’t even get through the whole post without stopping to comment. May I suggest Model Railroads as a hobby?

  4. Animal
    July 30th, 2014 @ 4:34 pm

    Well, there’s a mental image I could have done without.

  5. Evi L. Bloggerlady
    July 30th, 2014 @ 4:35 pm

    It is an alternative to navel glazing.

  6. texlovera
    July 30th, 2014 @ 4:38 pm

    Batshit crazy…

  7. vermontaigne
    July 30th, 2014 @ 4:38 pm

    Objects in the mirror are looser than they appear.

  8. Evi L. Bloggerlady
    July 30th, 2014 @ 4:38 pm

    I hear there is a site for that exact topic!

  9. RS
    July 30th, 2014 @ 4:40 pm

    This is not merely intellectual sloth, but deliberate self-imposed ignorance.

    Plus ça change, plus c’est la même chose. These people are the intellectual Ned Ludds.

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    […] Stuff You Can’t Make Up. […]

  11. Mike G.
    July 30th, 2014 @ 5:11 pm

    Are you saying you’d have to strap a 2×4 to your ass before going in?

    ( I denounce myself in advance.)

  12. Matt_SE
    July 30th, 2014 @ 5:14 pm

    Menstrual blood for fertilizer.
    Has this person never heard of pathogens? How many produce scares/epidemics have there been because some bracero took a crap in a field, giving hepatitis to consumers downstream?
    Not to mention the pagan angle.
    Ignorance this deep is utterly depressing.

  13. Buffalobob
    July 30th, 2014 @ 5:25 pm

    Well I’m guesting she is using one of those recyclable menstrual sponges that use to be advertised in Mother Earth mag. Advertisement, ” use it, just rinse it out in a fresh mountain stream”. Now you have the benefit of intruding those blood borne pathogens directly into your food supply. Remember the episode of Cramer installing a garbage disposal in his shower so that he could prepare his salads while bathing.

  14. reliapundit
    July 30th, 2014 @ 5:52 pm

    brilliant analysis and conclusion!

  15. FenelonSpoke
    July 30th, 2014 @ 8:13 pm

    Yep; Becca’s pretty grim alright

  16. The Daley Gator | Well, I WAS going to have a salad tonight but………….
    July 30th, 2014 @ 8:34 pm

    […] I had the salad mix, tomatoes, cucumbers. some really good Greek vinagrette, and some good turkey and ham from the deli. I was going to mic all of those in a big bowl and dig in…………..…………Then, I read this at The Other McCain […]

  17. Colorado Alex
    July 30th, 2014 @ 8:42 pm

    Meanwhile, a lesbian married a man that she fell in love with and is pregnant with his child. But she’s still a lesbian, apparently.

    http://www.salon.com/2014/07/29/im_a_lesbian_marrying_a_man/

  18. Quartermaster
    July 30th, 2014 @ 8:53 pm

    “Have I ever mentioned my insanely obsessive curiosity?”

    I have no idea what you’re talking about. I have noticed you’re posting on the same subject quite a bit recently. Does that have anything to do with this self diagnosis of insanity?

  19. OrangeEnt
    July 30th, 2014 @ 9:37 pm

    Sort of brings new meaning to the light at the end of the tunnel….

  20. DonaldDouglas
    July 30th, 2014 @ 9:38 pm

    I don’t think these tools can get any more disgusting, but they never disappoint, so there’s that.

  21. DonaldDouglas
    July 30th, 2014 @ 9:38 pm

    Heh.

  22. Adjoran
    July 30th, 2014 @ 11:48 pm

    I’m making up a bunch of signs reading

    “KEEP YOUR VAGINA
    OFF MY VEGETABLES!”

    Pickets needed. Also, lots of really absorbent towels and shit.

  23. charles w
    July 30th, 2014 @ 11:52 pm

    I thought vegans could not use animal products.

  24. M. Thompson
    July 31st, 2014 @ 12:41 am

    And a cleaning crew for the aftermath of skull explosions.

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  26. Käthe
    July 31st, 2014 @ 2:47 am

    Inga Muscio’s foully-named book contains instructions for how to give yourself an abortion via ~mind control.~ As far as insanity goes, it is the creme de la creme.

  27. Käthe
    July 31st, 2014 @ 3:28 am

    You know, this isn’t the first time someone has made this claim. My best explanation for it is that it’s like leaving a cult. The viciousness with which they descend on people who disavow membership in the lgbt group, the plain out denial that it’s possible to leave in the first place…some people may find it easier to be a “bad lesbian” or “weird lesbian” and hang onto the sentimental cultural artifacts (acoustic guitar music, etc) and old friends than to try to make a clean break with the vengeful clan.

  28. Jeanette Victoria
    July 31st, 2014 @ 7:56 am

    I’m going to repeat myself….these whackos belong at Happy Acres not publicly posting about their bizarre lunacy and taken seriously. We are a sick sick society these days!

  29. Jeanette Victoria
    July 31st, 2014 @ 7:57 am

    Do we need more poof that liberalism makes one even crazier

  30. Pablo
    July 31st, 2014 @ 8:24 am

    Sure. For a deeper sort of girl.

  31. pabarge
    July 31st, 2014 @ 12:44 pm

    Inga Muscio? Did someone say Inga Muscio? Well, then:

    http://thewinonan.winonastateu.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/03/Inga-Muscio-RGB.jpeg

    Aieee, the hamster, it spins the cage.

  32. pabarge
    July 31st, 2014 @ 12:45 pm

    If you like Scottish Highland long-haired cattle.

  33. pabarge
    July 31st, 2014 @ 12:51 pm

    Beca Grimm? Did someone say Beca Grimm? Because,

    https://lh5.googleusercontent.com/-zwDBoquUcGo/UGNlF_7KIYI/AAAAAAAAAj4/ie15pbFEuwc/s346/527094_10102589515407181_1517564495_n.jpeg

  34. pabarge
    July 31st, 2014 @ 12:53 pm

    HI Beca, here you go girl:

    http://tonyhaletest.files.wordpress.com/2013/07/walken-morecowbell.gif

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