This is rare literature, Mr. Kunnath. I cannot imagine a finer eulogy for a sporting relationship than this fine piece that dropped out of the ether just 30 minutes ago; my favorite part was noting, after the fact, the irony of being done in by Bear and MarShawn. Oh, and: No justice. Just Cal.
This is rare literature, Mr. Kunnath. I cannot imagine a finer eulogy for a sporting relationship than this fine piece that dropped out of the ether just 30 minutes ago; my favorite part was noting, after the fact, the irony of being done in by Bear and MarShawn. Oh, and: No justice. Just Cal.
This is why I return to Write for California, because of the excellent writers. This is why it pains me to see comments from people, whose personas I have come to like and respect, laden so frequently with f-bombs and s-bombs and gd this and gd that.
I get it — heat of the moment stuff — but if we really are the finest learning institution and they really are just a bunch of morons, why do we speak like the morons when we all have at least varying degrees of the exquisite tools wielded so well by Avi and his team?
I loved the Halloween meme about what does and does not come with being a Cal fan. Biting wit with nary a profanity to be found.
My larger point is a question: Are we willing to raise our kids and grandkids on a steady diet of such foul language that it becomes the norm? Will the President one future day literally swear an oath, adding a “fer f’n sher” at the end?
Another: Are we capable of holding ourselves to a higher standard?
I’m no prude. I often quote a line from my late dad, who would solemnly intone, “Profanity…is just a crutch…for inarticulate melonfarmers”, except he didn’t say melonfarmers. But when
I do, I’m aware of my audience and never in front of kids. In a wide open forum we have no way of knowing our audience or to whom we are giving our blessing to litter public places with unnecessary and vulgar forms of speech.
There is freedom in having a pen name, too, which provides a measure of protection. Sort of like throwing rocks from behind a hoodie and a ski mask. This is why, some years back, I dropped StandupBear and all my other online euphemisms. I try to make sure what I contribute has value, humor, or at least enough self-integrity to where I wouldn’t mind or be embarrassed by my grandsons and granddaughters, our yours, reading it with my actual name attached.
I will close in pointing again with pride to my fellow Cal alum Avinash Kunnath, whom I have never met, and his most excellent think piece today.
Thank you, if you read this far, for indulging my soapbox homily on profanity. I’ve thought about it for a long time, admonishing and reporting here and there along the way.
But that doesn’t work. So I’ll throw this plea to the better angels of our nature and be done with it. It is a great article you wrote, Avi, and I’m better for having read it.
I get your admonition about the foul language and that we should set an example for our kids.
I, myself, am guilty.
Should we set a higher standard for ourselves?
Maybe.
But, maybe, the notion that we are "above" such vulgarity may be holding us back from winning the smashmouth part of smashmouth football?
I like that we can engage a "common people" parlance that is more universally understood and speaks to our passion. Academics is our head, while sports is our heart. Frank words, spoken in the heat moment, become a rhetoric of pathos, which is apart from logic and ethos.
One thing I do have a hard time accepting is seeing adults on $C's sideline who appear to have one job: Twirling a f'ing towel as though possessed and enthralled. Such pathos, is, well, pathetic.
BTW- It never occurred to me that kids may be reading these pages. I wholeheartedly agree that W4C's wit and eloquence should make us all proud. As in this case, yes, indeed, Avi., the perfect final words on our Hundred Year Trojan War.
I like your comment, and hasten to note the clear distinction between spoken and written. With all the pathos in the Western Hemisphere, one still can avoid typing the foul stuff —pixels live forever— far more easily than one who utters them.
This is rare literature, Mr. Kunnath. I cannot imagine a finer eulogy for a sporting relationship than this fine piece that dropped out of the ether just 30 minutes ago; my favorite part was noting, after the fact, the irony of being done in by Bear and MarShawn. Oh, and: No justice. Just Cal.
This is why I return to Write for California, because of the excellent writers. This is why it pains me to see comments from people, whose personas I have come to like and respect, laden so frequently with f-bombs and s-bombs and gd this and gd that.
I get it — heat of the moment stuff — but if we really are the finest learning institution and they really are just a bunch of morons, why do we speak like the morons when we all have at least varying degrees of the exquisite tools wielded so well by Avi and his team?
I loved the Halloween meme about what does and does not come with being a Cal fan. Biting wit with nary a profanity to be found.
My larger point is a question: Are we willing to raise our kids and grandkids on a steady diet of such foul language that it becomes the norm? Will the President one future day literally swear an oath, adding a “fer f’n sher” at the end?
Another: Are we capable of holding ourselves to a higher standard?
I’m no prude. I often quote a line from my late dad, who would solemnly intone, “Profanity…is just a crutch…for inarticulate melonfarmers”, except he didn’t say melonfarmers. But when
I do, I’m aware of my audience and never in front of kids. In a wide open forum we have no way of knowing our audience or to whom we are giving our blessing to litter public places with unnecessary and vulgar forms of speech.
There is freedom in having a pen name, too, which provides a measure of protection. Sort of like throwing rocks from behind a hoodie and a ski mask. This is why, some years back, I dropped StandupBear and all my other online euphemisms. I try to make sure what I contribute has value, humor, or at least enough self-integrity to where I wouldn’t mind or be embarrassed by my grandsons and granddaughters, our yours, reading it with my actual name attached.
I will close in pointing again with pride to my fellow Cal alum Avinash Kunnath, whom I have never met, and his most excellent think piece today.
Thank you, if you read this far, for indulging my soapbox homily on profanity. I’ve thought about it for a long time, admonishing and reporting here and there along the way.
But that doesn’t work. So I’ll throw this plea to the better angels of our nature and be done with it. It is a great article you wrote, Avi, and I’m better for having read it.
President F'ing Camacho.
https://s.hdnux.com/photos/51/32/20/10855441/4/1200x0.jpg
I get your admonition about the foul language and that we should set an example for our kids.
I, myself, am guilty.
Should we set a higher standard for ourselves?
Maybe.
But, maybe, the notion that we are "above" such vulgarity may be holding us back from winning the smashmouth part of smashmouth football?
I like that we can engage a "common people" parlance that is more universally understood and speaks to our passion. Academics is our head, while sports is our heart. Frank words, spoken in the heat moment, become a rhetoric of pathos, which is apart from logic and ethos.
One thing I do have a hard time accepting is seeing adults on $C's sideline who appear to have one job: Twirling a f'ing towel as though possessed and enthralled. Such pathos, is, well, pathetic.
BTW- It never occurred to me that kids may be reading these pages. I wholeheartedly agree that W4C's wit and eloquence should make us all proud. As in this case, yes, indeed, Avi., the perfect final words on our Hundred Year Trojan War.
I like your comment, and hasten to note the clear distinction between spoken and written. With all the pathos in the Western Hemisphere, one still can avoid typing the foul stuff —pixels live forever— far more easily than one who utters them.