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Arts & Entertainment, Film and TV

Not even a transplant could save this half-hearted action film

by Sam Jessula on

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Getting your car or house repossessed is one thing, but getting your new liver repossessed is quite another. In the dark, not-so-distant future of Repo Men, medical advances have led to a manufactured organs market – which is great news, but only if you omit the price tag, of course. You can always set up a financing plan, but if you fall short in your payments, a hired thug and wannabe surgeon will break into your house and slice you open to legally reclaim their property.

The movie centres around Remy, a repo man who, while reclaiming a heart, fries his own. Ironically, his new bionic organ seems to function better than his original, as Remy develops a conscience and realizes his job will not get him citizen of the year. Unfortunately, Remy does not seem very fit for any other line of work, and the clock is ticking on his heart mortgage. Pursued by his colleagues, Remy and his newfound girlfriend have to fight to survive.

Redundancy seems to be the main theme of the movie. The topic is all too familiar, and the message of an inevitably terrible future unless humans start acting more humane has become background noise in science fiction. Also redundant are the fight scenes in this so-called action film. Every confrontation seems to involve only two characters, Remy and his partner Jake (Forest Whitaker), who only fight with knives and tasers. Doesn’t the future have cool new toys to play with? The main futuristic development seems to be that advertising has sky rocketed, which seems like a shrewd prediction, considering the film has product placements in almost every frame.

Despite a complex premise, the plot features too many unexplained twists, and components to be coherent.

The actors’ performances are mediocre at best, although the script did not give them much to work with. Liev Schreiber is quite remarkable as the evil boss, yet his role remains minor. It would have been nice to see a bit more of a metamorphosis in Remy, whose struggle with his growing conscience seems as interesting as doing laundry.

At a time where health care reform is on everyone’s mind, the film meant as a wake up call ends up putting the audience to sleep. In the end, this picture can be avoided by seeing an episode of Nip/Tuck alongside 10 minutes of Kill Bill.

Arts & Entertainment, Music

CD REVIEWS: Aidan Knight: Versicolour

by Ryan Taylor on

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Until now, if the name Aidan Knight sounded familiar, it’s likely because of his numerous backing contributions to bands in the Victoria/Vancouver music scene. But take a few listens to his debut Versicolour and it’s hard to imagine Knight backing up any musician other than himself.

A mix of folk and acoustic pop, Versicolour moves through many different moods. Some songs are light, others are dark and often they’re both. Opener “The Sun” starts out feeling gloomy before a glockenspiel and back-up vocals hint at the full-on release to follow, courtesy of a crescendo of strings and horns. Conversely, “Knitting Something Nice For You” begins with hauntingly delicate finger-picking before Knight’s tortured vocals and driving drums turn it into something more sinister. And then there’s “Jasper,” the sunny and uplifting finale whose joyous hymn-like refrain is damn near perfect.

Part of what makes this album so strong is the excellent arrangements and orchestration, both of which are brought out through an impeccable mix and are best listened to on a quality set of headphones. Clearly a mature songwriter, Knight shows that it’s possible to craft songs that are dense without being overwhelming and sparse without being boring.

To put it bluntly, Versicolour is a collection of beautiful songs from a promising new artist. If there’s but one complaint it’s that with eight songs in only 28 minutes, it’s over far too soon.

Arts & Entertainment, Books

The Canadian War on Queers tells personal accounts of prejudice

by Carolyn Yates on

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Gary Kinsman and Patrizia Gentile’s The Canadian War on Queers: National Security as Sexual Regulation discusses the under-the-radar – and sometimes officially sanctioned – targeting of gays and lesbians as security threats from the 1950s to the 1990s.

Written from – and told through – a series of first-hand accounts combined with documents obtained under the Access to Information Act, Kinsman and Gentile discuss the history of queer Canadians in a way that is passionate and personal.

In the second half of the 20th century, queer women and men were interrogated, spied-on, and harassed. Others were fired from their jobs, put through the “Fruit Machine” – a test that measured the supposed erotic response to a series of images – and declared to be national security risks.

First person narratives form the core of the book, providing both the most informative and the most interesting segments. While materials for The Canadian War on Queers did in part come from documents released under the Access to Information Act, Gentile says that it was important to look beyond the officially sanctioned – and officially censored – information.

The declassified documents tell a chilling tale in which queers were seen as having character weaknesses, and therefore as unreliable, disloyal, and subject to blackmail, making them threats to national security. But the most interesting part of the book is the recounting of the experiences of those who experienced the purges first-hand.

“They become the highlight of the book,” says Gentile.

The Canadian War on Queers also aims to be, in Gentile’s words, an act of rebellion. Not only does it tell the stories of those who were purged, interrogated, and spied upon, and who resisted, it also, in Gentile’s words, is an act of rebellion.

“Most people don’t learn about queers in Canadian history and they certainly don’t learn about how the Canadian state was trying to get rid of homosexuals working in the federal government and the military,” says Gentile. “My political motivation is not as a queer person wanting to write this history, but as a historian wanting to record the voices of people who have been silenced.”

One of the book’s main weaknesses is its “In this chapter we will show” style, which non-academic readers will find frustrating. Kinsman and Gentile sometimes get bogged down by using particular phrasing instead of just saying what they mean, and by summarizing the personal accounts instead of leaving them to speak for themselves. That said, they do a fantastic job of leaving excerpts from their interviews long enough to give context in a self-contained manner, which adds a lot to the narrative.

In one of the most enlightening – and most worrying – parts of the book, Kinsman and Gentile draw comparisons between the past War on Gay and the present War on Terror. Arguing that the indiscriminate targeting of Arab and Islamic-identified peoples is very similar to a non-specific fear of gays and lesbians, they show that the Cold War world is still uncomfortably close.

“The national security ideology is not something that happens in the past; it’s something that’s very active and has a very contemporary character to it,” says Gentile. “Although we’re talking about queers, we can extend the analysis that we make in the book to what’s happening today.”

 

Arts & Entertainment, Music

CD REVIEWS: Jimi Hendrix: Valleys of Neptune

by Steven Hoffer on

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Where would Jimi Hendrix fit into today’s music scene? Seasoned but pushing into the mainstream like Eric Clapton? Playing Super Bowl halftime shows like Pete Townsend and The Who? The release of Valleys of Neptune, a posthumous follow up to 1968’s Electric Ladyland, may convince you that Hendrix was simply too much of a psychedelic, blues-thumping, break-through-the-boundaries-of-your-brain invention to ever escape the “27 Club.” “Fire” and “Red House” offer avid fans the chance to experience a fresh Hendrix take on the classics and revisit the rhythm section of Noel Redding (bass) and Mitch Mitchell (drums). The “king of slide guitar” Elmore James would be proud of the Hendrix interpretation of “Bleeding Heart,” which peaks with the lone hollers of a “sold my soul to the devil” guitar solo that Hendrix fans have grown to expect. Producers have also uncovered a lively rendition of “Lover Man,” a raw, acid-rock jaunt that is among the never-before-released studio tracks, despite having held its own during the Hendrix live performance heyday. The title track, however, is the album’s crown jewel. “Valleys of Neptune” has the insightful songwriting, soul-soothing guitar riffs, and virtuosic playing that seats Hendrix on his throne in the mythologies of music history. You probably shouldn’t buy the hypotheticals on what Jimi Hendrix would have become, but Valleys of Neptune is one album worth getting your hands on.

Sports

McGill gears up for Nationals

by Kailan Leung on

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Fresh off of winning their second Queen’s Cup in three years, the McGill men’s hockey team is primed and ready to challenge for a National Championship. The OUA East champions received a number-two seed in the six-team tournament last week, and will butt heads against the Manitoba Bisons and the Saint Mary’s Huskies in pool play. Redmen Head Coach Jim Webster took some time to talk to the Tribune about preparation for Nationals.

How important was it to win the Queen’s Cup, both in terms of seeding and overall momentum? It was important. The seeding is key, [because] it allows us to not play three days in a row. We’ll play on the first day, and if we win, we’ll play Thursday, Saturday, Sunday instead of Friday, Saturday, Sunday. [The Queen’s Cup] was also important just for our mindset, [to see] how we react in big games, in that arena. We played in that arena and won a big game, so I think [winning the Cup] was very important for our mental preparation. We wanted to win the championship; we didn’t want to go in the back door [to Nationals], and that speaks to the competitiveness of our team.

What were your initial reactions to the pool your team is in? I like that we haven’t played either team so far. I don’t worry about the other team as much as a lot of coaches, I worry about our team. But I think a lot of the teams that have played us this year decided that we’re good, and that they have to slow us down – use a trap, or try other tactics to slow us down. If they go into a game saying, ‘Let’s see what you’ve got,’ then I like our chances. I think our team’s speed is hard to measure if you haven’t seen it.

You play Manitoba in the first game of the tournament. Any specific preparations for that team? No specific things, although I’ll identify to [our team] that Manitoba doesn’t take a lot of penalties – they’re the least penalized team in the West. And they have good goaltending. We should be ready to try to win a low scoring game, play good defence, and not just naturally think we can run and gun, and score six or seven goals. I think we have to be prepared for a tough, low-scoring match.

Has this team exceeded expectations from the beginning of the season? It’s hard to say. I didn’t get the impression from [former head coach] Martin [Raymond] that we would be as good. All of the returning rookies improved their stats and played better than last year. Maybe that’s to be expected, except that every single one of them [improved]. The projected team this year had [former captains] Ken Morin and Benoit Arsenal. We lost Benoit to a detached retina, and that was a blow. Morin ended up going to Royal Military College. Losing those two guys, we were a little less [impressive] than we should have been on paper. So yes, I think we’ve exceeded expectations. I know our players, though, are very demanding of themselves. I don’t know exactly what they expected, but I’ve been the one telling them from the beginning of the year that they’re good, and that the National Championship should be their goal. I’ve been trying to pound that into their heads, and I truly believe it.

What are the major strengths of this year’s team? I think our depth from start to finish. All seven, eight defencemen can play, and all four lines of forwards can play. We have talent. Not only hardworking players, but we [also] have scorers, playmakers, and powerplay defencemen. We’re tough, competitive, and fast. I think we’re a good team.

What’s the team’s mood like in the locker room? They’re excited to get started. This little layoff here? No. Let’s get at it. We’ve been thinking about it for some time and they all want to get it on.

The Redmen tip off tournament action against Manitoba this Thursday at 2 p.m. SSN Canada will stream live webcasts of all tournament games, and the championship final will be televised on Rogers Sportsnet on Saturday.

Arts & Entertainment

POP RHETORIC: Getting Serious

by Alex Knoll on

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After seeing the preview for Ben Stiller’s new indie-drama Greenberg, the first thing I thought was, “Wow, that looks awesome.” The second thing I thought was, “Wait, has Ben Stiller acted in a serious movie before?” In Greenberg, Stiller is an irritable, cynical, and on the verge of a midlife crisis. It sounds pretty off-beat compared to his usual ridiculous, idiotic – albeit hysterical – roles (think male model and gym owner). So the question is, will we be able to appreciate him in a more serious light, or will we be constantly preoccupied with the thought of his circumcised foreskin being plunged into a pot of fondue?

Of course, this isn’t a rare phenomenon in the movie industry. We’ve seen it many times: Adam Sandler, Jim Carrey, and Robin Williams are all perfect examples of slapstick actors who have transitioned to serious roles. It always seems to work the same way: it’s all or nothing. Either the switch will turn out to be an epic failure or a great success, but nothing in between.

Jim Carrey is a good example. When I think of Jim Carrey, I picture the grotesque scene in Ace Ventura: Pet Detective in which he’s born from the ass of a robotic rhino. But he’s also appeared in a few psychological dramas, such as Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind and The Number 23. As expected, the former was a knockout while the latter was the complete opposite.

How about Adam Sandler? His comedic roles are so legendary I don’t even have to refresh your memory with character descriptions. And then came along Spanglish. I loved this movie, and not just because Paz Vega is hot. Sandler delivered a heartfelt performance that wasn’t interrupted by thoughts of Happy Gilmore even once.

And Robin Williams? Perhaps he’s proven to be the most versatile. He will forever hold a fond spot in our memories in Mrs. Doubtfire and as Peter Pan in Hook (not to mention his stand-up). But he’s established himself as an exceptional jack-of-all-trades when it comes to acting. Good Will Hunting and One-Hour Photo are just two examples of Williams’ serious side, and he nails both acts brilliantly.

In addition to these notable multi-faceted actors, there are others like Bill Murray, Woody Harrelson and Ashton Kutcher that have shown that we shouldn’t expect the worst from them in out-of-character roles. Audiences tend to have the mentality that people, including actors, should stick to what they know. Maybe part of this is because some people think that comics take on funny roles for a reason, starting out playing up their funny side to mask the fact that they don’t have the talent to act in more serious roles. But this clearly isn’t always the case.

Should actors be restricted to a certain domain just because that’s what they’re known for? Well, it all comes down to what they can pull off. As mentioned before, Robin Williams is a clear-cut example. He will always be recognized for his classic portrayal of hilarious characters, but he will be remembered just as much for his talented performances in other genres. On the other hand, I tend to think that Adam Sandler will be celebrated much more for his comedic work than for his more dramatic work in Spanglish or Punch-Drunk Love (even though both performances were terrific).

Comedic actors often have more up their sleeve than we give them credit for, and I’m very excited to see Greenberg. I love Ben Stiller playing goofy roles like Gaylord Focker, and it will be interesting to see how he does in a serious role – he has as good a chance as any other actor at pulling it off.

Sports

McGill one win away from QSSF indoor soccer championship

by Kailan Leung on

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For Head Coach Marc Mounicot and the McGill women’s soccer team, there’s nothing surprising about being in two provincial finals in the same academic year. In early November, the team’s hopes of a berth at Nationals were shattered when the Martlets lost a 2-1 decision against the top-ranked Montreal Carabins in the conference championship game. Fast forward five months, and the Martlets are once against poised to capture the Quebec crown. This time, however, they’ll be leaving their cleats at home.

Freshmen Laura Bland-Lasso and Sophia Horricks each notched goals to catapult McGill into the QSSF indoor soccer finals, with a 2-1 victory over the Sherbrooke Vert et Or on Sunday at the Stinger Dome.

While many McGill soccer fans assume that the season ends before the first snowflakes hit the field, both the Martlets and the Redmen practice and compete all year round – once the outdoor season finishes, the teams relocate to Tomlinson Fieldhouse to train for the equally competitive indoor season. Mounicot believes that the chance at an indoor championship in March provides his squad with all the motivation they need to stay in game-shape.

“We give three weeks off to the girls after the fall season, then we have a few practices during exam period just as a stress reliever,” he said. “They have to stay in shape, go to the gym, [and] lift weights. As soon as January starts we have five days of activity per week: two practices, one game on the weekend, and the weight room two times a week.”

Mounicot even implemented yoga sessions during the winter as a means of keeping his players physically and mentally fit. And the hard work the Martlets have put in since November has certainly paid off – McGill finished the regular indoor season with a 5-1-1 record, and is now 2-0 in postseason play.

“[The success] has just carried over from the fall season,” Mounicot said. “We use only first and second-year players in the winter … and we have a few second-year players who are used to playing with each other [already].”

“We set the goal for next year to be one of the two teams in Quebec to go to Nationals in the fall. So all the work is done for that. The girls are ambitious and they really want to win something this year. We came close during the fall and if we can’t win the [outdoor] final for the provincial championships, even if it’s an indoor championship, we’ll take it. [A championship now] would help us get back to a winning [track] and get back to the winning mentality that we need to have for next year.”

Fielding a young team has not put McGill at a disadvantage, either. Katherine Green, a sophomore defender from Ontario, garnered second-team all-Canada honours after the outdoor season, and was recently named MVP of the indoor league. Mounicot anticipates that the indoor season will not only help facilitate better technical skills, but also greater camaraderie among his younger players for next year. The development of Green, in particular, has been a huge source of excitement for the McGill coaching staff.

“She understands perfectly what I’m asking from her,” Mounicot said. “She’s the perfect link between the players and myself. She brings leadership, and she brings confidence to the team. She is gaining experience and is only in her second year. She’s the MVP of the indoor season. She is leading the team the way I want her to lead.”

Green was not the only Martlet to receive attention prior to the start of the indoor playoffs. Goaltender Shimone Slomowitz, forward Alexandra Morin-Boucher, midfielder Anna Smith and defenders Carolyn Bell and Julia Bahen joined Green on the QSSF first team.

“I was quite surprised to have six players on the first team,” Mounicot said. “It means that people recognize that we have some talent, and that talent needs to grow and get experience for us to do what we want to do next year.”

With a host of talented players and a dedicated coaching staff, the Martlets have the ingredients necessary to improve on last season’s outcome and make a strong run at Nationals in the fall. For now, though, the team’s attention is turned towards March 28, when McGill returns to the Stinger Dome to take on Montreal for a shot at an indoor championship.

News

McGill alum Christian Lander talks blogs, books, and bagels

by Matt Essert on

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Christian Lander delivered the keynote address yesterday at the second annual BASiC Ampersand Conference. Lander, who graduated from McGill in 2001, is the founder of the popular blog Stuff White People Like, which netted him a publishing deal two years ago. During his address, Lander talked about his own experiences being creative in the digital age and how to excel in this new environment. The Tribune sat down with Lander before his talk to discuss his experiences at McGill and how he managed to transition from blogger to author.

Were you excited to come back to McGill?The second I was told that there was interest to bring me back, I was just like, “Are you serious? Really?” I couldn’t wait to go back [to McGill]. This was something that I always thought would be amazing to happen. I mean, I wasn’t a really popular dude at McGill when I was here. I didn’t really tear up the campus. So, I was really, really excited to come back. I also wanted to come back to Montreal with my wife. I needed bagels. I was dying.

You worked at the Tribune for several years. Do you think your experiences at the paper helped you to get where you are now?Well, yeah. The Tribune journalism program – which is, you take five classes and you work on the paper – is pretty intense. The amount of time you spend writing and editing and reading and going through that whole process is absolutely helpful. It was huge to go through all that. For me, trying to make it as a freelance writer, I came out with a portfolio – an actual printed portfolio you can take with you.

Your blog, Stuff White People Like, has become very successful and very popular. When you started it did you ever thing it would become this big?No. I like to use the analogy of a lottery ticket. When you buy a lottery ticket, you’re thinking, “I know I’m not going to win, but wouldn’t it be nice if…” There wasn’t even a “wouldn’t it be nice if” in the back of my head. It was really just to make my friends laugh. That’s all I thought it was going to be.

Was there a point when writing in the blog when it went from “making my friends laugh” to “making everyone out there laugh?”I think the moment it set in was when I would meet people for the first time and I would tell them about the blog, and they had already heard of it. That was a really odd experience. It’s hard to say when that exact moment hit, because every time something really positive or big happened, it felt like, “That was it. This is awesome, [but it’s] never going to get any bigger than this.” But it kept getting bigger.

Your blog is pretty accessible. Do you think that the broadness of the topic helped make it more accessible and more popular?Yeah, of course. Even when celebrities, who are already famous, write blogs about what they did today, people still don’t read them. I mean, I unfollowed Ashton Kutcher on Twitter. I don’t care about his dumb-assed kabala meetings, and he’s famous. [Stuff White People Like] doesn’t try to do a million things. It does just one thing well, and that’s it.

You seem to have come along at quite a good time for people trying to be funny on the Internet and capitalize on that. Do you think that’s a big part of your success?Absolutely. Without a doubt. Luck is such a huge, huge, huge part of it. It started up right as Obama stuff was taking off and these white people were getting all excited again because Bush was finally going to end. I don’t know how all of the things mashed up like that. I was really, really lucky that it did and that was it.

What’s next for you?The publishers would definitely like to do a second “Stuff White People Like” book: “More Stuff White People Like.” The only reason I’m a little resistant to that is I’m not sure I can keep the quality up, because you can get a little burned out writing about white people. It’s the same thing TV shows go through with jumping the shark. One of the things that I’ve wanted to be for a long time is a comedy writer in Los Angeles for television and things like that. I think that’s something I would like to do next more than anything else.

News

Five Days for the Homeless fundraiser comes to McGill campus

by Theo Meyer on

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As most McGill students went to bed on a rainy Sunday night last week, Jennifer Sault, Andreas Mertens, and a handful of other students huddled in sleeping bags under an overhang outside the Bronfman Building.

The students had committed to spending the next five nights sleeping outdoors on campus as part of the Five Days for the Homeless, an annual campaign to raise money and awareness for the homeless. This year is the first time that the event, which began at the University of Alberta in 2004 and is now held at many Canadian universities, has come to McGill.

“It’s so easy to walk by the homeless and not see them or get conditioned to [ignore them],” said Sault, U2 microbiology and international development studies. “We want this to be a reminder that homelessness is real.”

The event, organized by the McGill chapter of End Poverty Now, raised $4,933 last week. The funds will be donated to the Projet Autochtones du Quebec, a homeless shelter near Montreal’s Chinatown.

The campaign’s rules, which are the same at each participating university, are fairly simple: students are allowed no pocket money, can only eat food that is donated to them, aren’t allowed access to showers, and can only venture indoors to attend class or extracurricular activities. Though the students are allowed to come indoors if temperatures reach dangerously low levels, last week’s near-balmy weather made that unnecessary.

“It’s actually not as bad as you would think,” said Mertens, U3 education. “The weather’s been fantastic, and all of our friends are really supportive.”

After spending the first night outside the Bronfman Building, the students moved to the Roddick Gates before finally settling on a patch of concrete near the Milton Gates. Though the area is harshly lit and a bit loud when trucks pass on University Street, it does receive a lot of foot traffic.

“It’s guarded from the wind, so it’s fairly warm at night,” said Sault, who is also the national director of End Poverty Now. “It seems to be a good location. We’re reaching a lot of people here.”

Because they could only eat donated food, the participating students subsisted on Tim Horton’s and peanut-butter-and-jelly sandwiches given to them by friends and passers-by. Enough food was donated, however, that the students had trouble polishing it all off.

“We don’t know what to do with all the food,” Sault said during the event. “We actually went and gave it to homeless people yesterday because we had too much food here.”

In addition to the six students who spent all five nights outside, approximately 25 guest sleepers spent a night or two in the cold to show support for the cause. According to Sault, a homeless man named Jean joined the group one night and even offered to donate some food, which the students refused.

The event’s organizers initially had some trouble obtaining permission to hold the event on campus, as the administration does not normally allow overnight events. The request was forwarded to the office of Deputy Provost (Student Life and Learning) Morton Mendelson, however, who looked into the event and signed off on it.

“There are certain kinds of events – certain kinds of fundraisers, typically – for which we feel, under certain circumstances, we can make exceptions,” Mendelson said. “That’s what we ultimately told the group.”

According to Sault, the university was “very supportive” of the campaign. She and the other organizers hope to expand the event in the future, perhaps by recruiting semi-famous guest sleepers such as Justin Trudeau, who spent a night outside at Concordia’s event this year.

Both Sault and Mertens were careful to emphasize, however, that spending five nights outside on campus is just a small taste of the conditions the homeless face on a daily basis.

“I don’t consider it living like a homeless person,” Mertens said, “because we’re certainly still very privileged.”

Opinion

THE SITUATION: The Irish have no class

by Mookie Kideckel on

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I went to class on St. Patrick’s Day.

I’m not proud of it. Society decided that this particular day would be the one where we say “the hell with it” and go AWOL – and I spat in its face. I crossed the picket line of our collective alcoholic breakdown.

But then, sometimes we all have to make tough decisions. To realize that “right” has always been a relative term.

Take this whole “roll up the rim” thing, for instance. I use a reusable mug to get my coffee (well, four reusable mugs would be more accurate. They become disposable when they fall out of the poorly duct-taped water bottle holders on the side of my backpack and crumble on the sidewalk). But you can only participate in the “roll up the rim” contest if you get one of their earth-killing cups with your coffee. The I-want-my-children-to-know-what-flowers-are side of me says I shouldn’t. But if I don’t take a cup, that leaves more prizes for the non-environmentally conscious. Why do they get rewarded with cars and free coffees? From that messed-up perspective, it’s pretty much my duty to take that disposable cup and roll up its rim. Also, I could really use a free coffee.

Or food. I’ve seen Food, Inc. I’ve read about agribusiness, organics, local farming, fair trade and everything in between. And right now my moral compass is pointing towards starvation as the only decent option. Between chemicals, transportation, giant corporate monopolies, animal cruelty, farmer mistreatment, government subsidies, land misuse, antibiotics in cows, and all the things we haven’t found out about yet, I can’t even eat my peanut butter and banana sandwich without wondering if I’m hurting somebody. It’s a heavy burden to bear.

Or even writing. I’d like to hope that if I had been writing at some point in the past my views would have been on the “right” side of history, consistent with the morals that were heresy then and gospel now. And I’d like to imagine that my current opinions, especially the unpopular ones, are morally righteous and will one day be vindicated by history. But of course there’s a big difference between believing in our own virtue and having whoever creates history decide we had moral clarity. All I can really do is the same thing any moral luminary ever did – use the available information to try and fathom some sort of reasonable conclusion knowing that I may well be spouting absolute bull.

It’s almost enough to make me want to give up.

Almost.

There’s something comforting in the knowledge that we’ll never be burdened with a monopoly on truth. There’s also comfort in appreciating that people who believe with equal conviction in opposite beliefs are probably necessary in the same sort of way Jack Nicholson was necessary in A Few Good Men. There’s a lot of balancing involved in trying to come to terms with the idea that morality, right, and wrong, and designations like liberal, conservative, extreme, and moderate only exist in relation to each other. But balancing helps keep us humble and focussed. It adds perspective. And if my Wii Fit is telling the truth, balancing builds great abs.

We won’t stop believing in our not-quite-right opinions. We probably can’t – otherwise we would never be sure of ourselves when me make those hard decisions between lousy and lousier. And a life spent in total self-doubt sounds a lot worse than one constantly approaching the truth. Whatever that is.

All of which is to say that within twenty minutes of my class ending I was in Gert’s, beer in hand. I don’t know if going to class was the right decision, but at the very least I got a column topic out of it – and I did have one hell of a St. Patrick’s Day.

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