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Talk:Essay:Best New Conservative Words (view source)
Revision as of 16:45, May 19, 2009
, 16:45, May 19, 2009→Further suggestions
::: According to M-W, ''yahoo'' as a noun dates to Swift's book in 1726; ''yahoo'' as an interjection (synonym for "yippee") dates to 1870. But I disagree with both as conservative terms: ''Gulliver'' is extremely rooted in the attitudes of the [[Enlightenment]] and the glorification of Reason above all else - hardly conservative IMO. (Yes, I know that the Enlightenment produced some conservative ideas also.) [[User:Carillonneur|Carillonneur]] 12:34, 19 May 2009 (EDT)
::: According to M-W, ''yahoo'' as a noun dates to Swift's book in 1726; ''yahoo'' as an interjection (synonym for "yippee") dates to 1870. But I disagree with both as conservative terms: ''Gulliver'' is extremely rooted in the attitudes of the [[Enlightenment]] and the glorification of Reason above all else - hardly conservative IMO. (Yes, I know that the Enlightenment produced some conservative ideas also.) [[User:Carillonneur|Carillonneur]] 12:34, 19 May 2009 (EDT)
:Carillonner has a point. Swift is regarded as one of the greatest satirists of all time - I am personally a fan of him. You shouldn't adopt his words unless you have read the book from which they come, and understand exactly what they intend to mean. The entire country of Lilliput was a criticism of the trivialities that dominated british and european politics - much of which is lost on a modern reader, unfamiliar with the subject. That the people were tiny was but incidential to the real significence of them, the way in which they would turn the tiniest event or question into a source of great conflict or debate while entirely ignoring far more serious issues, culminating in a war fought over which way up an egg should be placed in an eggcup before breaking it open. If you're looking for a section good for criticising liberals with, I suggest the third country visited by Gulliver: Laputa. The floating island satirises scientific and artistic accomplishment performed for it's own sake without thought to practical benefits, and a community of academics who posess vast knowledge of subjects entirely useless to anyone else. [[User:Suricou|Suricou]] 12:45, 19 May 2009 (EDT)