If You Can't Talk About Pork, Shouldn't We Ban the Booing of Gary Bettman
Oxford University Press has warned its authors not to write about pork. They don't want to offend Muslims.
Don't these people realize that too much "sensitivity" leads to a passive, compliant people not only unable to create anything interesting, but unable also to punch its way out of a paper bag? Of course, that's the whole point.
May I suggest we all - offenders and offended - resist this sort of pressure by taking our inspiration from the Commissioner of the NHL, Gary Bettman? In a recent article about his tenure as the longest-running Commissioner of any professional sport, the Wall Street Journal notes the fact that despite his success in building the hockey league's fan base, Mr. Bettman is always booed when introduced to crowds of fans. Rather than whine of complain, the Commissioner responded thusly:
...their books must take into consideration other cultures of the world and must avoid mentioning pigs or “anything else which could be perceived as pork,”...I'm not sure what "anything else which could be perceived as pork" might mean besides pork could possibly mean. Then again, perhaps they're parsing the meaning of the word in the fashion of Laurel and Hardy's characters in "March of the Wooden Soldiers," who, philosophers that they must have been in addition to their skill as comic actors, establish for the first time the distinction between "pig" and "pork." (Click HERE.) Or perhaps the addition of this phrase was likely intended to put the fear of - what, Allah? - into their authors, causing them to not only walk and talk, but write in the "pins and needles" style that academics and they're totalitarian allies would like to impose on us all.
Don't these people realize that too much "sensitivity" leads to a passive, compliant people not only unable to create anything interesting, but unable also to punch its way out of a paper bag? Of course, that's the whole point.
May I suggest we all - offenders and offended - resist this sort of pressure by taking our inspiration from the Commissioner of the NHL, Gary Bettman? In a recent article about his tenure as the longest-running Commissioner of any professional sport, the Wall Street Journal notes the fact that despite his success in building the hockey league's fan base, Mr. Bettman is always booed when introduced to crowds of fans. Rather than whine of complain, the Commissioner responded thusly:
The booing “is part of the game” he says. “It’s become part of the ritual, and I’m OK with that,” he adds. “If I’m the one that people want to focus that attention on, I’ll take it—as long as they’re fans.”Perhaps a dose of Gary Bettman's perfectly reasonable insensitivity to criticism is called for here.
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