Tool: ‘Fear Inoculum’

Just to prove that there’s no sacrifice I won’t make for my readers, I listened to the new Tool album. Twice. (I always make a point of listening to albums at least twice before I review them, and I’m a glutton for punishment.) Well, as I suspected, I needn’t have put myself through the ordeal. …

The slow murder of Christianity by the zealots of Mammon

In Arthur C. Clarke’s The Songs of Distant Earth, the SF writer imagined a human society expunged of religion. It was worth it, Clarke claimed in a thinly-disguised self-insertion, despite conceding that the richness of human experience, particularly literature, had been all but erased. Lost in the great purge were virtually all the great works …

The Deadly Cost of Bad Science

If you’ve ever been taught about the scientific method, you’ve almost been certainly told that it goes like this: Observation-hypothesis-experiment-theory. The only problem is: that is idealistic bullshit. Scientists hardly ever proceed from dispassionate observations to formulating and testing hypotheses, and, finally, constructing a testable theory. Invariably, hypotheses precede everything else. Just as often, observations …

Is America Really on the Verge of Civil War?

The American left have never been able to reconcile themselves to losing the 2016 presidential election. Having quickly moved past denial, they’ve become permanently lost in the second stage of grief: anger. Such violent and unrelenting anger, in fact, that many, on both sides of politics, have been moved to wonder if America stands on …

Billie Eilish: ‘When We All Fall Asleep, Where Do We Go?’

Because, yes, I do reviews, too. There are a few records I’ve bought solely on the strength of the cover art. For instance, I’d never heard of Jane’s Addiction in 1988, but couldn’t resist the striking cover art for Nothing’s Shocking. It didn’t let me down. Billie Eilish’s debut album, When We All Fall Asleep, …

The Golden Trio’s Feet of Clay

"Why is it always you three?" In the Harry Potter mythos, “the Golden Trio” has become the fan sobriquet for the stories’ central protagonists: Harry, Hermione and Ron. Somewhat appropriately, given their loud-mouthed social justice warrior author, the Golden Trio have acquired real-life counterparts in the world of SJW politics. Justin Trudeau, Jacinda Ardern and …

The Marxists and the Globalists: How the Enemies of our Enemies became Frenemies

In Irvine Welsh's The Acid House, a middle-class couple name their baby boy “Tom”, because Middle-class, professional, socially-aware, politically correct people … use those old proletarian craftsperson names. This anecdote does much to explain the otherwise puzzling the bromance between globalist mega-business and Marxist radicals. How did the Masters of the Universe get into bed …