Post: #1

Nail on the head. I cut and pasted the entire article for ease of discussion, but give the link a click to drive Taki's revenues. They deserve it.

http://takimag.com/article/15_myths_mill...z34wwgSMqe

Last week an everyday group of anti-gun nuts called Everytown published data that claimed there have been 74 school shootings since Sandy Hook. Most of us went, “No there haven’t,” because we’ve only read about a few. The president apparently does not have access to Google, because he ran straight to the papers and bleated, “There’s no developed country on earth that would put up with this. And it happens now once a week … We should be ashamed.” He’s accidentally right. We should be ashamed of these shootings. Gang violence among black youth is totally out of control and the lack of fathers has to be a factor. That’s obviously not the narrative he was going for, however. He was more likely going for the same old “evil, white, American patriarchy” garbage we were all taught in school.

So let’s take a step back and explain to children and the president of the United States that most of the truths they take for granted are completely false. For example …


1. THIS COUNTRY WAS STOLEN FROM THE INDIANS

We fought them for 400 years. They fought against us, alongside us, and behind us. Before we got here they were fighting each other, and yes, it was savage. War Before Civilization: The Myth of the Peaceful Savage describes horrific mass graves from way before we got here. Indians used to shoot arrows into their victims for hours after the guy died so he’d be fucked in the afterlife. The smallpox blankets were likely a myth. The worst we behaved was probably Wounded Knee but the reason everyone knows about it is because it was meticulously documented by outraged whites who were—and still are—disgusted by our behavior there.

“This country was built on legal immigration, and the ones who made it through learned the language and assimilated. … Today’s scenario is 15 million illegals ridiculing those of us who played by the rules.”

2. WE ARE A NATION OF IMMIGRANTS

No, we’re not. We’re a nation of citizens. This country was built on legal immigration, and the ones who made it through learned the language and assimilated. Many didn’t get in. Today’s scenario is 15 million illegals ridiculing those of us who played by the rules. My green card took 15 years to get and I brought a ton of jobs with me. The Statue of Liberty doesn’t say “Give me your tired, your poor, your huddled masses yearning to breathe free, and all their relatives.”

Oh, and don’t give me that old “They’re doing jobs Americans won’t do” line. They’re doing jobs Americans won’t do—for that price. In Canada, there are no Mexicans and the landscaping still gets done. We use teenagers.


3. THIS COUNTRY WAS BUILT ON SLAVERY

Yeesh, this old trope. Some rich Southerners had slaves. Then there was a civil war and America’s bank account dropped to zero. After that the country was rebuilt from scratch without slavery. As Pat Buchanan put it, we didn’t start slavery. We ended it. And don’t get me started on reparations. We’ve already paid them.


4. AMERICA IS RACIST

I’ve already gone through this. I highly recommend you cut out this monitoring hate speech crap. I’m warning you, you’re going to end up censoring the people you’re trying to protect. Studies show that white people are actually the least racist group. Getting rid of all the racists would mean America would be almost all white. Therefore, fighting racism is racist.


5. BLACK YOUTH ARE TARGETED BY WHITE MEN

Zimmerman was a statistical anomaly but that didn’t stop everyone and their dog from wearing a hooded sweatshirt and Tweeting all about it. Black youth are in danger but it’s not Jews from Peru who are killing them.


6. WOMEN MAKE LESS THAN MEN

Obama Tweeted this old wives’ tale recently. Does anyone in the White House have a fucking computer? Women choose to make less than men because they’d rather be at their daughter’s piano recital than stay at the office all night working on a proposal. When they don’t have kids, they actually make more than men. If women were cheaper labor, we’d hire them as often as we hire illegal aliens.

On The Independents recently, Jill Filipovic told me that resumes with female names do worse than the same ones with male names. I’m willing to accept that, but it’s not prejudice. It’s postjudice. Employers have noticed their male employees are more likely to stay at the office all night working, even when their daughter does have a piano recital.


7. PRO-LIFERS ARE SEXIST

Most women are pro-life. To ignore their rights while touting abortion is sexist. Also, gender-based abortion is becoming more popular. We’ve seen how that goes for women in China. It ain’t pretty. So stop using abortion rights as some kind of proof there’s a war on women when the opposite is true.



8. TRANNIES ARE WOMEN

Whether you cut your dick off or just start saying “I’m a woman,” that doesn’t mean you’re a woman. That trivializes what it is to be a woman. These mythical creatures can create life. You can’t just throw on a wig and yell “Me too.” That’s sexist.


9. GAYS LEAD THE SAME LIVES WE DO

I’ve heard Jon Stewart say this and it often comes up when discussing gay marriage and adoption. Do any of these people know any fags? They are perfectly wonderful human beings with whom I spend much of my time, but they are also hair-whiteningly decadent. They call me an amateur for having participated in a couple threesomes. They’ve had dozens of eightsomes.


10. CHRISTIANS ARE ANTI-SCIENCE

Maybe one in ten Americans believes the earth is only a few thousand years old, and most of those people are old ladies and dirt-poor farmers. They’re not shutting down schools and canceling Cosmos. The other 90% of us are totally okay with the big bang theory. Even the pope supports it. We understand there’s evolution and an incredible universe. We just think God is the one who set the whole thing up.

Also, if you love science so much, stop refusing vaccinations for your kid. You’re literally making us sick.


11. WE NEED FREE HEALTH CARE

Not so fast. Have you seen the way this administration handles money? We’re 17 trillion in the hole. That’s a lot. Seventeen trillion seconds ago we were cavemen trying to figure out fire. This country is rife with severe obesity and millions upon millions of illegals. We don’t have the cohesion that other free health care countries have, so this perfectly reasonable idea may be impossible.


12. THE EARTH IS DYING

There is a lot of evidence that says the earth is warming but not a ton of conclusive evidence that it’s our fault or that the warming is a bad thing. We keep hearing about a consensus but it’s ecologists, not real scientists. What all the experts and politicians really agree on is that we need more funding to pay them to look into this terrible problem.


13. THINGS ARE GETTING WORSE

The air has never been cleaner. We’ve never lived longer. Crime is at an all-time low. By virtually every possible metric, life has never been better. Yes, there was a school shooting recently. That doesn’t change the hatefact that schools have never been safer. Traveling, eating, fornicating, fighting—all safer than ever. The list goes on and on. I saw a homeless man today checking his iPhone while he asked for change! Does anyone in this country not have a TV? If you think things were so much better back then, get in a time machine and go there. Make sure you get your shots first though. God help you if you get sick.


14. DIVERSITY IS OUR STRENGTH

When it comes to restaurants this is true, and that is why people always use restaurants to prove it. By any other standard, it tends to go pretty badly. I’m a race mixer but our family has decided to err toward Western values more than the American Indian ones because the West is the best. Assimilation leads to a sense of fraternity and that means a cohesive society. You ever see a wave pool in Japan? They are packed in there like sardines but they don’t mind because they’re all the same. When integration is discouraged you get Balkanization and we saw what happened in the Balkans. They played soccer with human heads.


15. WE’RE ALL EQUAL

You know there’s retards, right? You realize the children of geniuses tend to be smarter than the children of stupid people, yeah? This is why they ask sperm donors questions. That’s what happens when idealists have to practice what they preach. They scoff at eugenics until it’s time to make a baby. They love the gay lifestyle until their son brings home a tranny. They love diversity until it’s time to choose a place to live or a school for their children. They pretend we’re all equal but they insist the government enforce this because they secretly know it isn’t true and in fact see themselves as superior to everyone else. They’re free to think that, but before going on a rant about it, maybe they should look it up first. Better yet, shut up and leave us alone.

Post: #2

Some responses:

1. Depends what you mean by "stolen from the Indians." The Indians really had no concept of land ownership, so you couldn't really "steal land" from them. The smallpox blankets actually did happen at the Siege of Fort Pitt (what is now Pittsburgh). The blankets were taken from the smallpox ward and given to the Indians. Again, this is dependent on what you define as "American." I define it as the colonists and the colonizing country (Great Britain)

Yes, the Indians were not saints in the least. Read up on the River Raisin massacre. Wounded Knee was probably the single worst episode of the US against the Indians, but the US (and European colonizers) did some pretty damned bad things to them (Trail of Tears anyone?)

2. Again, what do you mean by "nation of immigrants?" If you define it as people who immigrated legally, then there's no debate. You can't arbitrarily say that legal immigrants don't count as immigrants.

3. 6% of Southerners owned slaves. Reparations would be a disaster at best.

4. Yeah, the US isn't nearly as racist as Al Sharpton or CNN would have you believe.

5. Yep, next.

6. Good smashing the equal pay myth. It needs to be destroyed more.

7. I fail to see how people who are against abortion are sexist. Sounds like the rationalization hamster at work.

8. Trannies aren't women. There was a good article in the WSJ about this last Friday.

9. In some ways yes, in others no. I'm so indifferent to the whole LGBTQ whatever the fuck the other letters are that I don't really care.

10. People love this myth. The Catholic Church helped keep civilization alive during the Dark Ages.

11. To a certain extent, yes. To another, no. Healthcare is an issue, and Obamacare plugs too few holes.

12. The earth is warming, and there seems to be significant evidence that it's our fault. The Earth clearly goes through cycles, but we seem to have accelerated it.

13. Relative to 100 years ago, some things are better. Some are far worse.

14. "'Diversity' until I have to send my child to a public school"- every celebrity

15. Yeah, this is pretty much bullshit. People are equal in rights. People are not equal in intellect, physical strength, attractiveness, etc. He hits the nail on the head, people love homosexuality until their son comes home with another man.

Post: #3

Great article. The Indians were conquered, 'stolen' is what happens when some guy in a cat burglar getup sneaks into your car hot wires it in the middle of the night. How else is an empire supposed to expand? Marry other countries and then divorce them to take half their land?

Post: #4

(06-17-2014 09:23 PM)Truth Teller Wrote:  He hits the nail on the head, people love homosexuality until their son comes home with another man.

Some people love the positive attention they gather from being viewed as a 'good person' enough to actually want their son to come home with another man, because they get the cheap thrill of showing everyone how tolerant and understanding they are.

It's why lesbians seem to view children as props to show how 'progressive' they are, so you end up with this sort of thing:

Post: #5

(06-17-2014 10:49 PM)AnonymousBosch Wrote:  

(06-17-2014 09:23 PM)Truth Teller Wrote:  He hits the nail on the head, people love homosexuality until their son comes home with another man.

Some people love the positive attention they gather from being viewed as a 'good person' enough to actually want their son to come home with another man, because they get the cheap thrill of showing everyone how tolerant and understanding they are.

It's why lesbians seem to view children as props to show how 'progressive' they are, so you end up with this sort of thing:

That little black girl looks like the most normal human in that photo. She has the look of, "How the fuck did I get here?"

Post: #6

The man on the left needs to find a better barber.

Post: #7

(06-17-2014 09:49 PM)Dr. Howard Wrote:  Great article. The Indians were conquered, 'stolen' is what happens when some guy in a cat burglar getup sneaks into your car hot wires it in the middle of the night. How else is an empire supposed to expand? Marry other countries and then divorce them to take half their land?

If I go up to somebody on the street, knock them on the head with a bat and take their hat, did I conquer their hat?

Post: #8

(06-17-2014 11:07 PM)tarquin Wrote:  The man on the left needs to find a better barber.

How dare you talk about a sports talk legend like that.

Post: #9

(06-17-2014 11:24 PM)soup Wrote:  

(06-17-2014 09:49 PM)Dr. Howard Wrote:  Great article. The Indians were conquered, 'stolen' is what happens when some guy in a cat burglar getup sneaks into your car hot wires it in the middle of the night. How else is an empire supposed to expand? Marry other countries and then divorce them to take half their land?

If I go up to somebody on the street, knock them on the head with a bat and take their hat, did I conquer their hat?

yes. You wanted a resource to protect your eyes from the glaring sun so you clubbed someone who had it and took it. You wore the hat and established defenses on land and sea to deter someone else from doing the same thing to you in the future. Who is the victim going to go and cry to? Britain and France aren't going to white knight for them as they have enough problems with Soup the hat taker as it is.

Post: #10

Didn't disease unintentionally kill a ton of Indians?

Post: #11

I like Gavin's opinions. If more hipsters acted and thought like him we'd be moving in a better direction.

Post: #12

Dr. Howard, if you did that you'd probably be thrown in jail. How'd you like it if someone did that to you?

Post: #13

I think they became lesbians because no man on earth would fuck either of those ugly landwhales.

Post: #14

Steven Pinker wrote a book on how we are living in the most peaceful time: http://www.amazon.com/The-Better-Angels-...0143122010

Post: #15

(06-18-2014 08:51 AM)TheWastelander Wrote:  Didn't disease unintentionally kill a ton of Indians?

Yeah, essentially. The Spanish killed very few Indians relative to how many died from disease.

Post: #16

(06-18-2014 10:11 AM)soup Wrote:  Dr. Howard, if you did that you'd probably be thrown in jail. How'd you like it if someone did that to you?

As an individual yes, but in the context I was providing, one country taking the territory of another (indians) there are no police. One couldn't call the cops on pre-civil war america and send it to the jail of nations...at best they could call their allies for assistance.

As for how i would feel as a conquered person. I am sure I wouldn't like it. I am sure the indians didn't like the trail of tears either.

Thats what I mean though, 'our territory was stolen from us' implies that some sort of law has been broken and the police need to be called. Unfortunately for nations there are no police, only allies and if your nation is invaded, occupied and then subdued the right term is conquered, not stolen.

Post: #17

I don't really worry about global warming destroying the planet, as the climate has always gone through cycles. What I worry about is all the air and water pollution and poisonous shit in the environment.

Post: #18

Quote:3. THIS COUNTRY WAS BUILT ON SLAVERY

Yeesh, this old trope. Some rich Southerners had slaves. Then there was a civil war and America’s bank account dropped to zero. After that the country was rebuilt from scratch without slavery. As Pat Buchanan put it, we didn’t start slavery. We ended it. And don’t get me started on reparations. We’ve already paid them.

To see slavery as a institution only benefiting the direct owners is short-sighted, historically inaccurate, and--frankly--stupid. Northern banks, insurance companies, and shipping companies--for starters--were built and indeed thrived on financing, insuring, and transporting massive cotton exports grown and picked by Southern slaves. The entire Southern economy was structured around its agricultural production of cash crops. The South's selective notion of "states' rights"--for instance, simultaneously asserting its right to not be held to federal tariffs but then demanding a national fugitive slave law--was directly related to slavery and was a major factor in precipitating the Civil War. This is to say nothing of a social hierarchy in which a permanent, and immovable, underclass benefits even the poorest and lowliest members of the greater society by always having someone who is "below" them.

Nothing is more dangerous and irritating than a partially educated person. McGinnis gets several things wrong in this list, using several half thought-out premises to support his "conclusions." He should stick to what he knows.

This is the kind of shit that discredits red-pill writing. It makes all of our assertions sound as half-baked and ignorant.

Post: #19

(06-18-2014 12:50 PM)Dr. Howard Wrote:  

(06-18-2014 10:11 AM)soup Wrote:  Dr. Howard, if you did that you'd probably be thrown in jail. How'd you like it if someone did that to you?

As an individual yes, but in the context I was providing, one country taking the territory of another (indians) there are no police. One couldn't call the cops on pre-civil war america and send it to the jail of nations...at best they could call their allies for assistance.

As for how i would feel as a conquered person. I am sure I wouldn't like it. I am sure the indians didn't like the trail of tears either.

Thats what I mean though, 'our territory was stolen from us' implies that some sort of law has been broken and the police need to be called. Unfortunately for nations there are no police, only allies and if your nation is invaded, occupied and then subdued the right term is conquered, not stolen.

It ain't right to steal.

Post: #20

(06-18-2014 01:09 PM)soup Wrote:  

(06-18-2014 12:50 PM)Dr. Howard Wrote:  

(06-18-2014 10:11 AM)soup Wrote:  Dr. Howard, if you did that you'd probably be thrown in jail. How'd you like it if someone did that to you?

As an individual yes, but in the context I was providing, one country taking the territory of another (indians) there are no police. One couldn't call the cops on pre-civil war america and send it to the jail of nations...at best they could call their allies for assistance.

As for how i would feel as a conquered person. I am sure I wouldn't like it. I am sure the indians didn't like the trail of tears either.

Thats what I mean though, 'our territory was stolen from us' implies that some sort of law has been broken and the police need to be called. Unfortunately for nations there are no police, only allies and if your nation is invaded, occupied and then subdued the right term is conquered, not stolen.

It ain't right to steal.

So how far back to we go to decide what is "stealing" land, and who is the God that gets to set this time frame?

There is still land being fought over daily through out the world. Life is brutal, life is hell, but most blue pill Americans have no clue about any of this because they are insulated from the truth. And they will continue to be insulated until liberalism destroys the safety of the west and they come face to face with a reality they didn't even know existed.

Post: #21

(06-18-2014 01:09 PM)soup Wrote:  It ain't right to steal.

One problem with this argument is, we're judging people in the past by the morality of today. Throughout history, nations and peoples have invaded, conquered, and even destroyed other nations and peoples. England was conquered repeatedly. Great Britain was formed by forcibly subduing the Wales and Scotland ("The problem with Scotland is...that it's full of Scots," as the English king said in Braveheart).

It was the law of the jungle. I'm quite sure Indian tribes invaded and displaced or destroyed other Indian tribes when they could. If Africans had had large ocean-going ships, strong nation-states, and were armed with steel and gunpowder, they'd have colonized and exploited Europe instead of the other way around. In the 16th and 17th centuries, North African slavers raiding the European coast were a huge problem, virtually depopulating some regions.

This morality didn't fully come to an end until WWII, when the absolute destructive results of modern technological nations operating under it horrified the world. Hitler's goal in invading to the East was to displace, enslave, or exterminate the Slavic peoples living there to create living space--lebensraum--for the Germans.

At the time America was colonized, it simply was not seen as wrong or immoral to say "I propose we invade nation X, take their land, and kill or enslave anyone we choose." I am not saying America's European colonists didn't commit atrocities. They did, as did everyone before them. They weren't uniquely bad.

In fact, to the extent that American and the liberal tradition of thought to which we belong was responsible for ending the old way, one could argue that we are uniquely good.

Post: #22

(06-18-2014 01:33 PM)Ryre Wrote:  

(06-18-2014 01:09 PM)soup Wrote:  It ain't right to steal.

One problem with this argument is, we're judging people in the past by the morality of today. Throughout history, nations and peoples have invaded, conquered, and even destroyed other nations and peoples. England was conquered repeatedly. Great Britain was formed by forcibly subduing the Wales and Scotland ("The problem with Scotland is...that it's full of Scots," as the English king said in Braveheart).

It was the law of the jungle. I'm quite sure Indian tribes invaded and displaced or destroyed other Indian tribes when they could. If Africans had had large ocean-going ships, strong nation-states, and were armed with steel and gunpowder, they'd have colonized and exploited Europe instead of the other way around. In the 16th and 17th centuries, North African slavers raiding the European coast were a huge problem, virtually depopulating some regions.

This morality didn't fully come to an end until WWII, when the absolute destructive results of modern technological nations operating under it horrified the world. Hitler's goal in invading to the East was to displace, enslave, or exterminate the Slavic peoples living there to create living space--lebensraum--for the Germans.

At the time America was colonized, it simply was not seen as wrong or immoral to say "I propose we invade nation X, take their land, and kill or enslave anyone we choose." I am not saying America's European colonists didn't commit atrocities. They did, as did everyone before them. They weren't uniquely bad.

In fact, to the extent that American and the liberal tradition of thought to which we belong was responsible for ending the old way, one could argue that we are uniquely good.

Ok next time someone breaks into your house and steals your shit, then don't complain.

Post: #23

(06-18-2014 02:44 PM)soup Wrote:  

(06-18-2014 01:33 PM)Ryre Wrote:  

(06-18-2014 01:09 PM)soup Wrote:  It ain't right to steal.

One problem with this argument is, we're judging people in the past by the morality of today. Throughout history, nations and peoples have invaded, conquered, and even destroyed other nations and peoples. England was conquered repeatedly. Great Britain was formed by forcibly subduing the Wales and Scotland ("The problem with Scotland is...that it's full of Scots," as the English king said in Braveheart).

It was the law of the jungle. I'm quite sure Indian tribes invaded and displaced or destroyed other Indian tribes when they could. If Africans had had large ocean-going ships, strong nation-states, and were armed with steel and gunpowder, they'd have colonized and exploited Europe instead of the other way around. In the 16th and 17th centuries, North African slavers raiding the European coast were a huge problem, virtually depopulating some regions.

This morality didn't fully come to an end until WWII, when the absolute destructive results of modern technological nations operating under it horrified the world. Hitler's goal in invading to the East was to displace, enslave, or exterminate the Slavic peoples living there to create living space--lebensraum--for the Germans.

At the time America was colonized, it simply was not seen as wrong or immoral to say "I propose we invade nation X, take their land, and kill or enslave anyone we choose." I am not saying America's European colonists didn't commit atrocities. They did, as did everyone before them. They weren't uniquely bad.

In fact, to the extent that American and the liberal tradition of thought to which we belong was responsible for ending the old way, one could argue that we are uniquely good.

Ok next time someone breaks into your house and steals your shit, then don't complain.

A better comparsion would be him not complaining about someone stealing from a very distant ancestor of his 300 years ago.

Post: #24

(06-18-2014 01:04 PM)Tuthmosis Wrote:  

Quote:3. THIS COUNTRY WAS BUILT ON SLAVERY

Yeesh, this old trope. Some rich Southerners had slaves. Then there was a civil war and America’s bank account dropped to zero. After that the country was rebuilt from scratch without slavery. As Pat Buchanan put it, we didn’t start slavery. We ended it. And don’t get me started on reparations. We’ve already paid them.

To see slavery as a institution only benefiting the direct owners is short-sighted, historically inaccurate, and--frankly--stupid. Northern banks, insurance companies, and shipping companies--for starters--were built and indeed thrived on financing, insuring, and transporting massive cotton exports grown and picked by Southern slaves. The entire Southern economy was structured around its agricultural production of cash crops. The South's selective notion of "states' rights"--for instance, simultaneously asserting its right to not be held to federal tariffs but then demanding a national fugitive slave law--was directly related to slavery and was a major factor in precipitating the Civil War. This is to say nothing of a social hierarchy in which a permanent, and immovable, underclass benefits even the poorest and lowliest members of the greater society by always having someone who is "below" them.

Nothing is more dangerous and irritating than a partially educated person. McGinnis gets several things wrong in this list, using several half thought-out premises to support his "conclusions." He should stick to what he knows.

This is the kind of shit that discredits red-pill writing. It makes all of our assertions sound as half-baked and ignorant.

If I were McInnes, I would have just pointed out that slavery was used, but it wasn't necessary. Fact of the matter is that slaves are less economically productive than regular indentured servants or just poor farm hands. I cannot find the source right now, but during my Lincoln seminar in Grad school one of the more interesting things I learned was that Kansas was divided between being half-slave, half-free, and the free side was far more economically prosperous than the slave side.

In fact, the north had plenty of farm land that produced cash crops, on top of all the other trade and commerce. Slavery is an insanely expensive, inefficient system that produces very little wealth - except for the slaveholders. The fact of slavery's terrible economic efficacy is why the South lost to the North - because the North was just far more rich and prosperous. This was also the case in the Peloponnesian War - the slaver Spartans could not keep up with the less-slaver Athenians.

So McInnes is correct - the USA was NOT built on slavery. Slavery was holding the USA back from becoming a true economic superpower. Slavery was part of the aristocratic southern class that kept their power entrenched over other poor whites while fueling hatred and racism toward the slave class. It bred ignorance and poverty not just for blacks, but for everyone involved.

Post: #25

Wow, excellent article.

(06-18-2014 02:53 PM)Samseau Wrote:  ...slaves are less economically productive than regular indentured servants or just poor farm hands...

Slavery was holding the USA back from becoming a true economic superpower. Slavery was part of the aristocratic southern class that kept their power entrenched over other poor whites while fueling hatred and racism toward the slave class. It bred ignorance and poverty not just for blacks, but for everyone involved.

Great stuff Samseau. I've made this point many times to people in conversation.


Good responses Truth Teller, though I sighed and rubbed forehead at a couple, below are my responses:

(06-17-2014 09:23 PM)Truth Teller Wrote:  2. Again, what do you mean by "nation of immigrants?"
I suspect he means nations aren't comprised of immigrants or non-immigrants. Nations are comprised of citizens. Some citizens immigrants, some are descendants of immigrants...some lineages have history in America far longer. Regardless, citizens are the cells that make up the organism that is a nation.

13. Relative to 100 years ago, some things are better. Some are far worse.
Ummmm how do you know? I mean, besides statistics, with which it's obvious to qualitatively see how things are better. I suppose some qualifiable things could be worse, but those are subjective anyway and perspective would certainly vary depending on living 100 years ago or today.

15. I'm just dying laughing at the author's one liner.