Blogger Fie Upon This Quiet Life made the following valuable comment:

Different stages in life will affect the way you view things politically, in my opinion. However, the core principles should stay the same.

I agree completely with Fie. My political beliefs are in constant flux. I keep learning new things and that, obviously, influences my political stance. However, my core political principles stay the same. They are central to my entire worldview, which is why I cannot imagine them ever changing. Here they are:

– the human body is inviolable. Nobody has the right to invade it. Nobody’s beliefs, opinions, religious agendas, and do-gooder concerns should trump an individual’s fundamental freedom to do what s/he wants to do with her or his body. The same goes for people’s sex lives.

– freedom of speech is more important than its capacity to hurt somebody’s feelings (including mine).

– individual responsibility. If everything I do is “conditioned by society”, if I’m nothing but a reflection of societal forces working on me, then said society should have the right to dictate my every move. Those of us who don’t enjoy this prospect, should accept responsibility for our lives.

– equality under the law. This means, among other things, that when Mr. Blankfein mismanages his huge company, he should deal with the consequences the way any owner of a tiny corner store does.

– a civilized society must ensure that nobody has to suffer without adequate medical care.

– children are human beings and their rights should be protected.

I can’t think of anything more right now. Am I forgetting anything?

Do share what your core political principles are.

N and I are settling down to watch a recently released Russian movie. The opening credits say, “Sponsored by the Ministry of Culture of the Russian Federation.”

“Ah!” N says. “This will be another piece of religious propaganda with crosses, prayers and priests in every scene.”

He was absolutely right. Religious imagery was spilling out of every scene in a very jarring way. This happens in every other Russian film that gets released nowadays. It is especially funny to see movies where Communist leaders and party apparatchiks all wear crosses and pray every fifteen minutes in the breaks between party meetings. I’m still waiting for a flick that will show Lenin as a crypto-Christian but I won’t be surprised when it comes out. Why not if Stalin’s supposed religiosity has become a commonplace in every recent biography of his.

It is very curious that the Russian government sponsors this endless religious propaganda in a country where only 2% of people actively practice Christianity.

N. and I stick out like sore thumbs in this region. Everywhere we’ve been yesterday (the spa, the grocery store, the restaurant), we heard, “Wow, you are the first live Russians I’ve ever seen!” Which sounds like the person saying this is in the habit of seeing lots of dead Russians everywhere.

This is an area where you can’t even find a Hispanic person, let alone a Russian-speaker. It’s a little weird to be treated like a very exotic creature everywhere. I mean, everybody is super nice to us but feeling this special gets a little annoying.

A very stupid person arguing that barring corporations from purchasing elections would somehow prevent them from exercising their freedom of speech. What is it with people’s fear and hatred of dictionaries? Why can’t one just find out the meaning of the word “speech” before publishing garbage?

A survey on the exploitation of the contingent teaching faculty. This is what we should be protesting instead of rising up in arms over the firing of some useless paper-pusher administrator. Her drama is that she can’t keep making hundreds of thousands, what a poor victim. These people’s drama is that they can’t pay for basic living expenses and medical care. Let’s show solidarity with them, not with some suffering administrator du jour who has been deprived of yet another palace and a fleet of limousines.

Is this the death of Ukrainian soccer?

“Republicans are the bad guys, but it is beyond frustrating, it is … infuriating and tragic that Democrats allow themselves to be led step by step, cut by cut, through the Republican agenda. Republicans up the ante, Democrats push back a little. They don’t give up everything. But the next time around, the cuts that last time represented upping the ante are now somehow the starting point”

A great series of posts titled “Books I’m Glad I read Before Age 30.” Part 1, Part 2 and Part 3. I now want to write something of the kind, too.

Remember Sarah Palin? I know, who cares any more, right? But there are people who are still as passionate about the shape of her son’s right ear as ever. The right ear isn’t a metaphor of any kind. They are actually obsessed with the kid’s ear. I’ve been following the story of these crazy Palin fans for a while and it is fascinating.

Montreal prostitution in the 1940s.

People were wondering why I don’t read Amanda Marcotte. This article is a perfect example of why I find her extremely annoying. She takes a very rich and promising topic and drowns it in saccharine trivialities. No wonder she is so famous.

Another academic uses translation for therapeutic purposes. It’s great to know I’m in such good company.

Finally, somebody says something useful about gender: “Compulsory gender is often oppressive, whatever someone’s sex. Compulsory gender roles are oppressive. But I think it is the socialenforcement of gender – in particular the arbitrary and discrete attribution of aspects of human gender to binary sex – that is oppressive, not gender itself. In other words, women can express femininity without being oppressed. And men can do so too without being oppressive.” A very good post.

Combating prison rape is “too expensive.” What some people seem to forget is that condemning inmates to rape constitutes an egregious instance of cruel and unusual punishment.

And the post of the week: a brilliant young woman shares her journey away from Conservatism.

A job is like a person. If you are only with it for the money, don’t expect it to give you real love in return.

I don’t think that pursuing money is a worthy life goal and I don’t think that a good job means a job that lets you make a lot of money. I’ve never been more miserable and my life has never felt more meaningless than when I made tons of money at the age of 20.

Studying improves one’s quality of life irrespective of whether it leads to a well-paying job because it allows one to grow as a human being and develop needs, sensibilities and ways of enjoying reality that one would have never suspected existed. Of course, it’s impossible to explain any of this to people who never developed said sensibilities.

Whenever people start saying ““There are no hot (cool, intelligent, nice, worthy, etc.) girls/guys here””, this has nothing to do with the place they are describing and everything to do with their own issues.

I should know. I used to be one of those people.

N. asks why I agreed to accept the final exam after the deadline. It isn’t out of kindness or anything like that, to be honest. I just figure that grading the final and changing the grade online will allow me to be done with this entire issue today. Otherwise, I will be stuck dealing with this for the next few weeks. The student will keep sending whiny emails to everybody in sight, I will have to give explanations, old emails will have to be resuscitated and compared. No, people, life is too short for that. I’m not this student’s Mommy and I’m not willing to sacrifice my time to teach him any life lessons.

A waiter who served us at a restaurant tonight told me he used to study history at my university. And now he’s a waiter.

We have very high dropout rates, unfortunately. And I have no idea what can be done to impress upon our students how absolutely crucial it is for them to take their studies seriously. There are so many among them who plagiarize, cheat, copy-paste and so few who do extra readings and abstain from asking “will this be on the test?”

Our university serves mostly students from very humble backgrounds. Coming to us is a real opportunity for them, yet many don’t seem to understand it.

P.S. I cut my night short, left my coffee unfinished and rushed home because a student emailed me the final exam 27 hours after the due date and is inundating me with hysterical messages about all the reasons why that is my fault. So now I have to grade the exam and change the student’s final grade online.

I’m sorry, people, I’m grading final exams like crazy here, and I need to vent. The course is over today, so bear with me.

“The national identity of the US is that of the President. Every citizen identifies with the President and adopts his worldview.”

“Basing your actions on the US Constitution is the only way to live an enjoyable life.”

“All Latin America and Spain have got to do to make the world a better place is get over their petty differences and unite.”

“The Black Death plagued many Europeans.”

“This resulted in a killing of Jews but for no reason whatsoever. Throughout history, Jews have never been killed for a good reason.”

“Spain was experiencing the Golden Age of Spain where Protestantism had occurred.”

“The US has only managed to become so prosperous through manipulation and dishonesty.”

“Latin America wants to become more progressive and more civilized in society.”

“All American’s are proud of our country’s independence.”

“Latin America was viewed as backwards by many external nations.”

“More often than not, Latin American reality seems ever so hopeless.”

“The Great Mosque of Cordoba was built by the Visigoths. They didn’t contribute much to the Spanish civilization except the word “guerra” and this beautiful mosque.”

“Franco promoted intolerance, racism, fascism, and Semitism.”

And my absolute favorite: “The identity of the US is that we are a country that is pro-choice (meaning, we respect the rights of women.)”