BY SEAN WALSH Let’s get smoking again, if only to help the easily offended “I believe that pipe smoking contributes to a somewhat calm and objective judgment in all human affairs.” —Albert Einstein If we’re serious about arresting our spiritual, cultural, moral, and aesthetic decline—and if we wish to push back against the general entropy of good manners—then we need to get people smoking again. Not … Continue reading Light Up, Children
BY SEAN WALSH The amusingly Dickensian Lord Sumption, doubtless still writing that final ruling on the perduring Chancery matter of Jarndyce vs Jarndyce, has temporarily removed his wig in favour of a clerical collar, to better sermonise on the state’s treatment of Lucy Connolly. “I shall not waste any sympathy on Mrs Connolly” he reassured us last week, as if “sympathy” were some auditable or … Continue reading The Tragic Cleverness of Lord Sumption
BY SEAN WALSH US punditry has learned nothing from its Biden cover-up For the first three years of his Potemkin presidency the US legacy media, as always under instruction from the Democratic Party, colluded in the lie that Joe Biden was sharp as a tack. One election defeat and millions of lost viewers later the DC punditry fellowship has realised that this might have been … Continue reading The Biden Cover-Up
BY SEAN WALSH Dostoevsky was right on the money when he wrote about how some people straight-up enjoy taking offence at the most trivial things: “A man who lies to himself is the first to take offence…he likes feeling offended, it gives him great pleasure, and thereby he reaches a point of great hostility” – The Brothers Karamazov Dostoevsky’s novel is an unsurpassed literary dissertation … Continue reading We Need to Become More Offensive
BY SEAN WALSH I have instructed my solicitors Phillips, Schofield, and Childs to issue a “cease and desist” letter to Mr. Professor (Emeritus) Richard Dawkins on the grounds that the title of his book “The God Delusion” could be considered libellous. I will set out my reasons to myself below, while reminding myself, Mr. Peter Hitchens, that I am not a lawyer. It is what … Continue reading Diary of Mr Peter Hitchens
BY SEAN WALSH For competent plagiarists this could be the best of times In 1976 a New York court decided that George Harrison had committed “subconscious plagiarism” by passing off My Sweet Lord as his own work. It ruled that the Quiet Beatle’s paean to peace, love and understanding was more than coincidentally similar to the Chiffons’ 1963 hit He’s So Fine. The decision must … Continue reading He’s So Fine?
BY SEAN WALSH Trigger warning: contains references to Catholicism. No politician does casual spite quite like Bridget Phillipson. In a Seasonal message to the struggling but aspirational middle-class family she has decided to cancel the Latin Excellence Programme. This, you may know, is a provision introduced in 2022 to around 40 non-selective state schools. From February the resource will no longer be available to the … Continue reading The Value of Latin Best Appreciated Sub Specie Aeternitatis
BY SEAN WALSH Did the Mob “Wise Guy” Bring it Home for Trump? I knew that he was going to win when he secured the endorsement of the respected and much-loved former Mafia hit-man Sammy “the bull” Gravano (pictured). These embraces are always the result of a negotiation. No doubt a shadowy Trump consigliere had met for a “sit down” with Gravano’s people in … Continue reading On Celebrity Endorsements
BY SEAN WALSH “A serious and good philosophical work could be written consisting entirely of jokes” – Ludwig Wittgenstein. * “Man is the only animal that laughs…for he is the only animal that is struck by the difference between what things are and what they ought to be” – William Hazlitt. We have been told that it would be unfair to take any pleasure in … Continue reading Why The Left Hates Laughter
BY SEAN WALSH “When people feel at home, they allow themselves freedoms, hobbies and eccentricities.” – Sir Roger Scruton Occasionally, the broiling cesspit that is social media stills itself for just long enough to reveal a gem. Here’s an example, a tribute to the conservative academic Michael Oakeshott, posted on Twitter by the philosopher Ferenc Horcher: Oakeshott’s style was enchanting. Here was a man … Continue reading Why conservatives Should Prize Eccentricity
BY SEAN WALSH We live in Devizes, a town which nudges the contours of Salisbury Plain: an army redoubt devoted to the prevention of significant war, and home not just to military training exercises but to strange goings on. Ghostly goings on, actually, and there is a supernatural component to life here which is pretty undeniable. It is a weird but wonderful place, bifurcated by … Continue reading My Hometown. And Water
BY SEAN WALSH “Then Jesus said to Simon: don’t be afraid. From now on you will catch men. So, they pulled their boats up on shore, left everything, and followed Him” (Luke 5) I think this song is a beautiful recuperation of the Gospel message. He walked the shore of Galilee and invited Peter and Andrew into Mission. Not that they could refuse. And then … Continue reading Always Be The Fisherman
BY SEAN WALSH Olivia Pratt-Korbell, 9 years old, posed no threat to anybody outside the normal, trivial, transactions of decent and loving family life. And that is no threat at all. 9 years old. Let us remember that bit. What does a 9 year old child wonder about? The only thing a 9 year old should be thinking about is what it is like to … Continue reading Yet Another Form of Wickedness
BY SEAN WALSH It’s not possible to have a “debate” about abortion The US Supreme Court has done what it’s charged to do and interrogated the Constitution of the United States in order to reach a majority decision. It’s X-factor on stilts, given the nonsense presented to it. Those of us who lack a familiarity with the legal fetishism which is the default jurisprudential rhythm … Continue reading Roe V Wade
