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Interviews | December 1, 2009

A Meaty Tale: The Powells.com Interview with Julie Powell

1 comment By Megan

Julie Powell charmed readers with Julie and Julia, in which she chronicled her quest to cook, in one year, every recipe out of Julia Child's... Continue »

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1. 
   $17.49 Sale Hardcover add to wish list

   Cleaving: A Story of Marriage, Meat, and Obsession

   Julie Powell

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STEPCON, November 28, 2007

CULTURE FASCISTS


The first time I ever encountered the notion of “culture fascism” was from Pat Buchanan. He was polemicizing on the decline of “American culture.” Bemoaning the dilution of culture by concepts like “Afrocentrism” in schools. I discounted it then as ignorant WASPish ranting and gave it no further consideration. I did not bother to put a name to the concept assuming that no rational individual would ever give it more than a cursory consideration before realizing its ultimate futility. Later, it reappeared in the writings of a noted Japanese professor at Wayne State University who published the hypothesis that “assimilation is equivalent to cultural death.” The fact that the man was a noted expert in the field of culture was disturbing but not of great significance.
Bill O’Reilly of Fox’s “O’Reilly Factor,” has now put the great weight of his considerable media influence behind the concept in the form of his recent publication “Culture Warrior.” I have not read the book. I wouldn’t pay money for something that carries the suggestion of such blatant bigotry.
The fact is that assimilation is the most essential element to cultural life and vigor. Without constant assimilation and adaptation, any culture is doomed. History is filled with examples of cultures that believing themselves to have achieved the ultimate position in world, refused to further assimilate and perished. Once a culture deems itself superior, spurning any contribution from what it determines to be an inferior culture it inevitably declines.
American culture is a perfect example of a culture that gained a position of world prominence primarily by the action of assimilation. America was built by the agglomeration of a multitude of cultures. It grew in a harsh environment in which non-functional elements were quickly discarded and replaced by elements exhibiting greater utility. Whether those elements were Italian, African, Chinese or American Native, the critical factor was functionality. Substance ruled form. This was a radical change from the myriad of older European and Asian cultures that had over the centuries become encumbered by a complex assemblage of rituals and hierarchies that served only to preserve the past rather than to adapt to the future.
The advantage that America possessed was the presence of an unprecedented multiculturalism; a societal heterogeny like no other in history. This was true assimilation.
Assimilation in this form is a form of equilibrium. Any scientist familiar with the term “equilibrium” understands that it is ultimately a relationship of exchange. Chemists understand equilibrium to function as a rate of exchange based primarily on conditions like energy and reagent concentration. In laymen’s terms that can be approximated as how much stuff is there and how hot it is. Extending the analogy, American culture acquired more and more substance until it reversed the greater flow of equilibrium. Rather than primarily absorbing elements from other cultures it became primarily a donor culture. That isn’t a bad or unhealthy thing. It is entirely natural based on the mass action of the cultural equilibrium. The disease comes in the form of the chauvinism propounded by Buchanan, O’Reilly and others.
Now O’Reilly’s warriors want to discard the process that has made America the great nation that it has become. These culture fascists would have us believe that America was birthed fully form into the nation that we now know.

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