Category: Culture

The American Spirit of Gratitude

Mike CotéLeave a comment

Thanksgiving is the best example of the confluence between America’s pioneering spirit and our national penchant for thankfulness.

Thanksgiving is perhaps the quintessential American holiday; we have feasting, we have football, we have family and friends, and we have gratitude. The last line item on that list may seem odd to associate with ‘Americanness’ as much as the others, but it fits in just fine. In fact, it is deeply embedded in American history, dating back to the colonial era, before the founding of the United States. The strong focus on thankfulness – to the point of dedicating a whole holiday to it – is peculiarly American, but can feel at odds with the classic stereotype of Americans as self-absorbed and entitled. In this case, the stereotype is dead wrong; gratitude is an American tradition that dovetails perfectly with our historic national culture of self-reliance, risk-seeking, and innovation.

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Skip This Corrupt Cup

Mike CotéLeave a comment

Boycotting the Qatar-hosted 2022 World Cup is the right and moral thing to do, for myriad reasons.

If you’ve been following this site for awhile, you may recall my piece in January urging you to boycott the Winter Olympics being held in Beijing. In the end, that was an easy choice for me, despite my love for the event itself; China is a brutal totalitarian dictatorship which is committing genocide and actively seeks to destroy the American-led world order. Missing out on some hockey and skiing was a small sacrifice compared to the suffering of those persecuted by the CCP regime.

As with the Winter Olympics, I love the World Cup, the globe’s most important and prestigious soccer tournament, and enjoy watching it every 4 years. I have fond memories of watching my favorite teams – Italy and France – win the tournament in 1998 and 2006, and was very happy to see Les Bleus take the title during my bachelor party in 2018. But I won’t be tuning in this year.

The 2022 World Cup is starting today in the Middle Eastern host nation of Qatar. This year’s version of the quadrennial tournament is an outlier in many ways, not least of which is that it is being held in November, whereas the Cup is traditionally awarded in July. The other reasons, however, are far more disturbing – Qatar is a corrupt, autocratic, discriminatory regime which has no reason to host such a major international sporting event. To be sure, Qatar is no China, but it is still deserving of the boycott treatment. Here’s why.

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Twitter is Dead; Long Live Twitter

Mike Coté1 Comment

To paraphrase the great Mark Twain, “Rumors of Twitter’s death have been greatly exaggerated.”

[Note: This post may be a bit inside-baseball if you don’t follow tech news or aren’t active on Twitter. But it’ll be fun nonetheless!]

If you have been on Twitter recently, especially Thursday night, you would be forgiven for thinking that the world was coming to a rapid and violent end. Bluecheck journalists and media figures have been gnashing their teeth and rending their garments at the purported demise of Twitter now that billionaire entrepreneur Elon Musk has taken over the site. The Washington Post is on “Twitter death watch,” while the New York Times claims that the microblogging site is “teetering on the edge.” The BBC asked if this really “is the end of Twitter,” and the American equivalent (in terms of public funding, not quality) NPR stated that a Twitter meltdown could be “likely.” Other news outlets have said that the site is in “chaos,” in the process of “imploding,” and “in tatters.” Journalists, pundits, and the so-called “Resistance” accounts who made a name for themselves on the back of their opposition to President Trump treated Thursday night on Twitter like it was the sinking of the Titanic, complete with the band playing on the way down while the lifeboats floated over to Mastodon, Instagram, or Post.News (whatever that is). #RIPTwitter was trending on the site, as users saw the writing on the wall and said their goodbyes to dear friends and random acquaintances.

Of course, all of those people are still on Twitter today, tweeting their daily activities and opinions as though nothing at all had happened. But why were they so terrified and certain that Twitter would completely collapse, and why are so many still saying the same thing?

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On Columbus Day

Mike Coté1 Comment

A brief defense of a quintessentially American holiday.

Columbus Day has largely been a minor national holiday with deep local roots since it was federally recognized in 1971. It was first celebrated long before that, however. Starting off in New York City in 1792 as a commemoration of the 300th anniversary of Christopher Columbus’s arrival in the Americas, the holiday has kept this identity over the centuries but has also been adopted as a celebration of Italian-American heritage. Most people think of it as the one day off from school in October before the deluge of holidays in November and December. Recently, it has gained in prominence – or infamy – due to a progressive crusade to label Columbus a genocidaire and to rechristen the holiday as Indigenous Peoples’ Day. These campaigners accuse Columbus of perpetuating a deliberate genocide of native peoples and label the European interaction with the New World as irredeemably bad. This activist campaign has gained ground over the past decade and several states have officially changed their calendars accordingly. As useful and proper as it is to memorialize the contributions of Native Americans to the United States, the defenestration of Columbus Day is a terrible mistake. In many ways, Columbus Day is itself a perfect encapsulation of our amazing country and its evolution over the centuries into a “more perfect union.”

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Requiem for a Queen

Mike Coté1 Comment

Mourning the last true link to the twentieth century, and perhaps the institution she so faithfully served.

Queen Elizabeth II, constitutional monarch and head of state for the United Kingdom since 1952, has died at age 96 in Balmoral, Scotland. She was the longest tenured monarch in British history, celebrating her Platinum Jubilee (70 years on the throne) earlier this year and nearly eclipsing the absurd 72 years King Louis XIV spent ruling France (unlike Elizabeth, he acceded to power when he was a boy of 4; she became Queen at age 26). From all accounts, Elizabeth was a kind woman who would often speak to anyone who she encountered, from any station of life. This care for the regular folks of Britain spoke to the Queen’s essential character aspect: her sense of duty.

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