bodies swinging from trees...

I've written a review of Richard Linklater's latest movie, School of Rock. However, it's awaiting print publication. So I won't post it until then. But I must say that Jack Black, the star of the movie, is indeed a star.

silently closing her bedroom door...

Just got out of two interviews with very different firms....good stuff. For the next three weeks, my life will be usurped by this. So it goes...

oh, by jingo...

Wow. Yesterday, I attempted to watch Tim Hunter's River's Edge, starring Crispin Glover and Keanu Reeves. I say "attempted" because I had to press the STOP button 38 minutes into the film, because I simply could not take any more of Crispin Glover's obnoxious, disconcerting, and utterly unredeeming overacting. It was painful for me to watch him act, and my tolerance for such pain isn't what it used to be. I was shocked by how bad his performance was. I was rendered speechless! Never before had I seen someone so miscast in a film role.

oh virginia, you won't even...

Morality as a God-complex:

All the values by means of which we have tried so far to render the world estimable for ourselves and then proved inapplicable and therefore devaluated the world--all these values are, psychologically considered, the results of certain perspectives of utility, designed to maintain and increase human constructs of domination--and they have been falsely projected into the essence of things. What we find here is still the hyperbolic naivete of man: positing himself as the meaning and measure of the value of things.

Indeed, we are all yet too self-interested for Truth. What is Truth these days? What it has always been: the sadist's most potent weapon! And who was the Marquis de Sade? A literal representation of the pious priest. The effects of both were identical, at any rate. Such is Nietzsche's paradox of Truth-seekers! (Moral philosophy is wildly entertaining at 4 a.m.!)

everything went bottoms up!

I was taking a look at some of my site statistics, and discovered some rather surprising information. Here are my movie reviews ranked by the number of all-time unique hits:

1. Swimming Pool
2. Lost in Translation
3. Bully
4. Freddy vs. Jason
5. Thirteen

How the hell is Swimming Pool the most popular movie review? It was such an obscure film! Blockbusters like The Hulk and Cradle of Life are nowhere close to these top 5 in terms of hits.

It may have something to do with the fact that the blockbuster movies are reviewed by every Joe and Mary, while movies like Bully and Thirteen don't get as much attention by popular critics. Still, I thought it was rather odd.

diosa vestida de saliva y sal...

Added my review of the utterly bizarre Party Monster. If you must watch this movie, watch out for Marilyn Manson's role as Cristina. Oddly comical...

i start the day in the usual way...

Today in our Free Speech class, we were discussing offensive speech that has a high risk of engendering a violent reaction from the listener. Speech might possibly be unprotected if it intentionally, knowingly, or recklessly inflicts severe emotional distress through outrageous means (ones that "offend generally accepted standards of decency or morality").

The hypothetical that preoccupied our class discussion was about insulting a widow. A man sends a an offensive card through the mail to the widow of a police officer who had recently been shot to death while making an arrest. The card had a picture of a pig on the front, and written on the inside was: "Sorry to hear about the dead piggy. No, really I am--I couldn't eat bacon for a week. Keep up the good job frisking those criminals. Rob." Apparently, the card was sent as a response to an incident in which two men were killed by police officers that summer. That is, "Rob" was implying that the widow's dead husband somehow deserved to die because the police had abused their power in the incident with the two men.

So the problem wasn't as easy as it may appear, since you can make a very good argument that Rob's speech was political, and had social value, since he was criticizing the police department. But most of the discussion focused on the idea that Rob's speech didn't contribute to the search for political/moral/social truth (which is a decidedly central theme of the First Amendment) since it was intended to harm the widow, and because calling her husband a "pig" contributes little if any to the exposition of ideas. That is, the card was just an insult, and as such is an instance of "low-value speech," which the Court in Chaplinsky implied would not be protected by the First Amendment.

I would strenuously disagree with that. There is no doubt in my mind that Rob's act, however tasteless, was motivated first and foremost by his own moral/social/political objection to the police department's excessive use of force. He explicitly makes a reference to this in the card, and the hypothetical itself tells us that Rob admitted as much when the police confronted him. If this were not the case, Rob would be sending these kinds of cards to random widows all over the place.

Because his motivation was a political one, I think his speech should at the very least be taken out of the "low-value" category reserved for mere insults. By placing such speech in the "low-value" category, we can only be punishing him for not being more eloquent or intelligent in his speech. Not everyone goes to Harvard. Not everyone can use Mill and Rawls in their speech to bolster their political arguments. I would interpret Rob's actions as blunt, impressionistic expressions of his own political argument. Yes, his action was at base reprehensible, but it was still grounded in an expression of political debate. And that is precisely what the First Amendment was intended to protect. It would be a mockery to say that the First Amendment only protects intelligent, well-informed speech. I believe it protects stupid political speech as well!

Because the exception from protection in Chaplinsky is justified on the grounds that such speech does not contribute to the exposition of political/moral/social ideas, such exception should not apply here. Rob's political idea was crystal clear: He doesn't like the way the police have abused their power. HOWEVER, I would still leave Rob's action unprotected because it intruded upon the widow's privacy, as it was sent to her house. Hence, I would not treat this case as one regarding free speech, but rather one's right to privacy. I would affirm a charge of harassment by mail.

oh my heart...it shines with sorrow!

I was reading Nietzsche's Thus Spoke Zarathustra today, and I came upon a classic passage addressing what Nietzsche refers to as the "preachers of death"--those people bent on denigrating this world in favor of some "eternal life." I thought the following passage precisely addressed my concerns with Gaspar Noe's Irreversible, wherein Noe seems to focus almost singularly on just how horrible life can be (unredeemably so!):

[The preachers of death] encounter a sick man or an old man or a corpse, and immediately they say, "Life is refuted." But only they themselves are refuted, and their eyes, which see only this one face of existence. Shrouded in thick melancholy and eager for the little accidents that bring death, thus they wait with clenched teeth.

In his profoundly ironic and acerbic style, Nietzsche goes on to say that the doctrine of virtue of these preachers of death could only be, "Thou shalt kill thyself! Thou shalt steal away!"

It is this kind of idealistic nihilism that I could not accept in Irreversible. (Indeed, I would argue that all idealism is a masked form of nihilism, but that's another matter.) At best, Noe's viewpoint is myopic; at worst, it's self-destructive. It's a viewpoint that an alienated teen would hold. I expected more from Noe. (Although I stand by my "B" rating of the movie for its sheer audacity--something unseen in film.)

everybody knows that you've been faithful, give or take a night or two...

Added my review of Eli Roth's Cabin Fever. Now there's an unnecessary movie for you.

lately it seems like they're drowning...

On the subway today, on my way to the movie theatre, I was reading Kierkegaard's The Present Age. I encountered this passage that made me laugh out loud:

Our age is essentially one of understanding and reflection, without passion, momentarily bursting into enthusiasm, and shrewdly relapsing into repose...Nowadays not even a suicide kills himself in desperation. Before taking the step he deliberates so long and so carefully that he literally chokes with thought. It is even questionable whether he ought to be called a suicide, since it is really thought which takes his life. He does not die with deliberation but from deliberation.

Kierkegaard was above all a master of irony, and this passage attests to that quite well. I thought his point was an interesting one, for after all, today's leaders retain such a description not for their exuberance of passion or strength of spirit as shown by their actions, but for their thoughts. Unlike our pagan ancestors, whose notions of virtue revolved around physical actions (hunting, sacrificing, conquering), our notions of virtue revolve around ideas, abstractions, and the intellect. We are a much more boring lot on account of this. We don't conquer to assert our will; we merely scheme. We don't hunt for sustenance; we microwave. We don't sacrifice to the gods in order to get in touch with our spirituality; we read philosophy books.

Nothing ever happens. What does "happen" is all-too often an abstraction. We go to school, and earn a degree. Ultimately, it's just a piece of paper with symbolic meaning at best. We go to work and collect a paycheck. The numbers in our bank account change. That's all.

A revolutionary age this is not. Even today's "rebels" and "revolutionaries" (if such people even exist) get to go home to their big-screen tv's and dishwashers at the end of the day. The revolutionary spirit has become laughable in today's world of comfortable abstraction. Nothing enrages in the full meaning of the term. All conflict is addressed through mere argumentation. People bicker, and then go away happily thinking they have won the argument. Nothing actually transpires. Everything is reduced to mere symbolism, and for good reason: Things are simpler to deal with when they're not real--when they're mere representations of reality, but not reality itself. Indeed, today's age is one of indolence, and even cowardice. Thus spoke Kierkegaard!

i knew someone had to lose...

Added my review of Gaspar Noe's shockingly intense film, Irreversible.

things are getting desperate...

Today I saw Gaspar Noe's Irreversible (2003). A word of warning: Do not watch this movie right after you've eaten! I nearly lost my dinner.

i am such a dreamer...

Here are the statistics regarding the previous law schools of those who transferred into Stanford Law School this year:

Harvard - 1
Columbia - 2
Hastings - 2
University of Richmond - 1

You can see the Harvard transfer statistics here.

you know it's true...

Death sells.

test my tether to see if i'm still free...

A good friend of mine recently informed me that he was getting engaged. I was, of course, shocked and happy for him. I suppose we're getting old enough to start contemplating such things. Well, some of us, anyways.

It just so happens that I was reading Nietzsche's The Wagner Case today, and I came across this rather pointedly ironic piece. (Surely, such a description is unnecessary for Nietzsche!) It said:

The Flying Dutchman preaches the sublime doctrine that woman settles even the most unsettled man--in Wagnerian terms, she "redeems him." Here we permit ourselves a question: Suppose this were true--does that also make it desirable? What becomes of the eternal "Wandering Jew" whom a wife adores and settles? He merely ceases to be eternal; he gets married and does not concern us anymore...

So much reason have we for staying single! Eternity is at stake! But seriously, this passage I think reflects more Nietzsche's fallout with Wagner's turn towards religious sentiment, than Nietzsche's own doubts about marriage. Or maybe not. Nietzsche never married. It could very well be a personal justification for that. Or it could be that he was actually on to something. Nietzsche is notorious for praising one's faults because of their capacity to individualize. Robbing someone of their faults is akin to robbing them of what makes them who they are. I found the passage rather provocative at any rate.

never is just what it seems...

Added a review of the highly engaging documentary The Weather Underground, which presents us with a neat little moral puzzle.

maybe you can take this out of my head...

Added a review of Sophia Coppola's new gem, Lost in Translation.

put me on those keys...

Stanford Law School's Associate Dean for Student Affairs recently wrote to me in an email: "I hope you're enjoying Cambridge. It's not like you got to escape all your classmates by transferring. We've lost more people to Harvard this year than any in known memory."

It's not like SLS did anything wrong last year to garner the hatred of its 1Ls. I rather enjoyed my time there. However, the ConLaw faculty shake-up, coupled with my desire to experience something that wasn't Palo Alto, while I still had the chance, was just too much of an incentive for me to transfer.

Oh and today I ate lunch at a self-described Mexican restaurant called The Forest Cafe on Massachusetts Avenue. I think that was the worst meal I've had in Cambridge, almost rivaling the "burgers" at Three Aces. Mexican food in Massachusetts--now there's a formula for disaster. Besides, who names a Mexican restaurant "The Forest Cafe"?

you'll never gain weight from a donut-hole...

A rather somber day...Johnny Cash, who did a very bizarre but interesting cover of Nine Inch Nails' "Hurt" last year (he should be praised for that alone!), has died. And so has John Ritter, the lead of one of my favorite sitcoms of all time, Three's Company. Shocking, really.

i can't believe this violence in mind...

So Blogger has unleashed all the goodies that came with Blogger Pro into the freebie zone. No longer shall my posts be riddled with spelling errors!

Today in our Free Speech class, someone made a comment about how uttering the phrase "Kill the Jews" should not be protected under the First Amendment because it is "morally false." I had never heard that expression before--"morally false." In fact, I was rather shocked to hear it and have the professor expand on the very notion. Indeed, it struck me as a very loaded phrase. Not only does it encompass a framework of morality, in which a particular value system is expressed, but it also encompasses a framework of ethics, in which a system of right and wrong (or Truth) is expressed. "Morally false" therefore implies that ethics and morality modify each other. Nietzsche would find this to be a shocking leap of logic.

Morality is something that we all have by virtue of living our lives--that is, we all place high value on certain things, and low value on others. Morality is an inescapable precept of life, as all action expresses a certain value. For example, going to the movies instead of studying for a test tells us a lot about what a particular person values in a particular situation. Taking a pro-life stance in an argument about abortion tells us what a particular person values more generally. Of course, these values are not set in stone. They suffer from the particularity of one's circumstances and experiences. But it remains that such values, although malleable, at the very least exist.

Ethics, however, is not something that we all possess, or that we are in touch with by virtue of being alive. A system of ethics is a system of "right and wrong," of Truth and Falsity. Not everyone can say what Truth (or Falsity) is, even for themselves! When someone says that something is "wrong," they are saying something more than just "I place negative value on that action." They are saying that the action violates some inherent structure of life (which of course supposes that life has an inherent structure that can be known). Ethicists believe they are in touch with a particular definition of The Good, The Right, The Just--notions that are not susceptible to change, as are one's value system. Ethicists believe they are in touch with a Truth--nay, the Truth--that is wholly outside themselves, but which orders the world in which we live.

Hence, one can see what a leap of logic it is to associate morality and ethics in such a way as to have them modify each other. Morality is a flexible, changing set of values that the individual has on account of his particular life experiences. Ethics is a constant Truth that is always wholly outside and independent of oneself, presumably given to us by some higher will or force (God comes to mind).

Unlike morality, ethics is something that is quintessentially metaphysical, and thereby more deserving of critical analysis and skepticism. Certainly, not everyone can sincerely say they are in touch with something higher than themselves. Indeed, those who do claim to be in touch with some higher Truth (and therefore ethics) can do nothing more than make that statement. For how does one explain something that is bigger than oneself?

I am reminded of the Biblical story of Isaac and Abraham, wherein Abraham could not speak of what he was about to do to his son because it surpassed all of his understanding. The effect of God's command that Abraham kill his son was to silence Abraham, as words and reason were particularly inadequate to express the ethical paradox of faith. I imagine a revelation of ethics to be an experience of this kind, wherein all human thought and reason is rendered superfluous. You can therefore see why having ethics modify morality, or vice versa, seems to me to be highly jarring. First, it presupposes that ethics even exists, which is itself the boldest of claims. But secondly, even if ethics did exist, it would not be something about which you could have an intelligent discussion. Ethical principles would be akin to commands, which have the character of being given (by God, for example) and adhered (by us), but not discussed. One does not question a command from God--one just does it due to the nature of its origin.

(You guessed it--I'm no Kantian. To those who are Kantians, my response is this: Rationality is just another value, and not some inherent Truth. There is nothing to suggest that a rational being is any more in touch with Truth than an irrational one. The same argument would apply to utilitarianism. If anything, I would consider myself an ethical nihilist.)

it seems we're drowning in a drop of water...

As I was sitting in class today in Pound Hall (HLS's main building), I couldn't help but notice the downright bomb-shelter-like architecture of the lecture room. The ceiling was made of bare concrete slabs that made me a little uneasy. It was uglier than the authentic-60s decor of the University of Chicago lecture rooms, if you can believe that. And to top it all off, the room was not air-conditioned. Or if it was, the air wasn't getting past the thick cloud of asbestos above us. Plus, there weren't enough chairs for all in attendance. What struck me as wildly comical, however, was the fact that my computer was telling me that it had picked up a wireless connection in that cavernous hole of a room!

To be fair, I did have a class later on in the newly-built Hauser Hall, where the rooms are modern and resemble those at Stanford. However, I must say that the chairs at Stanford are infinitely better. I couldn't even adjust my chair in Hauser, so I had to keep flipping my laptop's screen (which is huge) up and down just to see the professor. Ha. Alas.

Back to the books...

the gospel changes meaning if you follow john or paul...

This past weekend allowed me to see The Weather Underground and American Splendor, two excellent films that are rather eye-opening, to say the least. I plan to write reviews of them soon, but I have little time what with the start of school, the start of the bidding process for law firms (which ends this Thursday!), and all the reading I have to do for my classes. Blah.

so the city spits you out...

"Violators will be towed perfunctorily," the sign in the parking lot said.

I kid you not. Only in Cambridge...

she sends her regards...

In keeping with Waddling Thunder's list of HLS students by undergrad school, I thought I'd let people know about the somewhat more manageable statistics for HLS transfer students this year. These are the law schools the transfers were previously attending:

Stanford - 3
Chicago - 1
Northwestern - 1
Tulane - 1

That's it! Only 6 transfers. I was really surprised to find that two other Stanfordites were joining me. After all, we made up almost 2% of the SLS class! At any rate, our welcome breakfast was nice and small, with more administrators and deans in attendance than students...

I'm okay whenever you're not okay...

So I was able to get into Professor Volokh's Free Speech class. Very nice...

ve-ri-tas

Tomorrow is the first day of classes for me. I already have a 35-page reading assignment for my Corporations class. I've begun to have unsightly flashbacks of my first week at SLS last year.

I also went to an OCS meeting for all 2Ls interested in on-campus interviewing. (Who isn't?) It was essentially useless, as everything was already stated in a widely-distributed memo that we got last week. However, the meeting was interesting for me because I got to see just how big the class is. Sure, they say it's around 550 or so. But that's just a number that doesn't really mean anything until you see it firsthand. Entering the Ames Moot Court room and seeing the rows and rows of strange faces was rather unsettling, truth be told. Coming from Stanford, I'm used to seeing a tiny fraction of that. There are just so many people here! I fear tomorrow, when I have to go in person to sign up for my classes (haven't they heard of computers?). It looks like it's going to be a zoo out there. Think of it...1000 2- and 3Ls trying to add and drop courses. Wow.

i know you too well...

Added my review of Stephen Frears' Dirty Pretty Things. Beware! The title of the movie sounds much more intriguing than it really is.

this breath is my first, it will all too soon be my last...

Added a review of Catherine Hardwicke's Thirteen.

Classmate Jeremy Blachman has a little review of it here. He also urges us all to see Spellbound. It was good, but not great. (I gave it a B.) Kind of sad, really. What does one do after winning the National Spelling Bee? The movie presented us with kids who were downright obsessed with spelling every word ever written. All the kids seemed to define themselves as National Spelling-Bee contestants. Their entire worlds revolved around that competition. What happens after the competition is over? What happens to them when they can no longer be spelling-bee contestants? That would be an infinitely more interesting movie.