Carol:
The Pundit, the Pig, the Protester, and the Philosopher
The word “Curmudgeon” sort of means what it sounds like, disagreeable with a personality like a cudgel, another great word. In fiction, curmudgeons are often comic characters—think Mr. Wilson or Mr. Magoo. In the real world, they challenge our patience but they can also jolt us out of complacency. We need disagreeable people.
William F. Buckley Jr. comes to mind, one of America’s best known and influential American conservatives. I hear he was an affectionate friend, but he used his New England accent and cranky-looking persona to great effect at my 1970 graduation from UC Riverside. Buckley was a controversial choice for the keynote—several months after Governor Reagan temporarily closed down the UC campuses to quell increasing anti-Vietnam unrest, after Kent State. What were they thinking?
The event was entertaining if lacking the usual pomp and solemnity of most graduations. There was the pig, the stink bomb, the purple bikini, all those mortar boards with big peace signs on top of them, and there was Irving Wesley Hall. A gadfly is a curmudgeon with a purpose, and that was Irv Hal, a well-known and vocal student activist. In the UCR newspaper The Highlander, Richard Maxwell described Hall with vivid detail:
William F. Buckley Jr. comes to mind, one of America’s best known and influential American conservatives. I hear he was an affectionate friend, but he used his New England accent and cranky-looking persona to great effect at my 1970 graduation from UC Riverside. Buckley was a controversial choice for the keynote—several months after Governor Reagan temporarily closed down the UC campuses to quell increasing anti-Vietnam unrest, after Kent State. What were they thinking?The event was entertaining if lacking the usual pomp and solemnity of most graduations. There was the pig, the stink bomb, the purple bikini, all those mortar boards with big peace signs on top of them, and there was Irving Wesley Hall. A gadfly is a curmudgeon with a purpose, and that was Irv Hal, a well-known and vocal student activist. In the UCR newspaper The Highlander, Richard Maxwell described Hall with vivid detail:
Hall is not a leader, more a kind of glorified scapegoat, who takes people's sins and aspirations on his shoulders and makes them dramatic or startling. Or annoying, since he has no sense of timing, substituting a bouncy energy, bouncing in on everybody, starting the hell out of them and telling them the wrongs of the world. A good act: Irv Hall can talk (source: website Notinkansas).
So, Irv Hall, UCR’s most vocal protester, decided to express his opinion of William F. Buckley’s inclusion on the podium with symbolism--donning a shirt, tie, suit jacket, and red and white boxer shorts to receive his Master’s diploma.
Apparently, William F. Buckley thought my graduation was unforgettable. He wrote about it several times, including a March 30, 2001 column about Hillary Clinton : “…I looked down on a cardboard box brought up and dropped on my lap by a dissenting student. The wiggling betrayed a live presence; from the box, offloaded from my lap, a small pig emerged and scampered over to the [UCR] university president…” The column was a commentary on whether or not Clinton should be “disinvited” from speaking at Yale’s graduation. Decades earlier, Buckley had successfully fought to rescind a similar invitation from Yale to Communist Party head Gus Hall, noting “That was worth high moral and intellectual exertion, but Mrs. Clinton isn’t in that category…”(source: National Review online).
Socrates, often called “The Gadfly of Athens,” defended himself at his trial:
For if you put me to death, you will not easily find another, who, to use a rather absurd figure, attaches himself to the city as a gadfly to a horse, which, though large and well bred, is sluggish on account of his size and needs to be aroused by stinging (Source: Harper’s Magazine online).
What are the uses of disagreeable people? They make us laugh, they make us mad, they make us uncomfortable, but they also make us think and, hopefully, they make us move.
Sources:
Irving Wesley Hall: We’re Not in Kansas Anymore.
Socrates: Harper’s Magazine online June 18, 2010
Socrates: Harper’s Magazine online June 18, 2010
William F. Buckley: WFB Crestomathy Feb 28, 2008
Megan:
Uses of Disagreeable People
1. Signposts along the way.
("I believe that certain people in life are meant to fall by the wayside… to serve
as warnings for the rest of us. Signposts along the way." --Igby Goes Down.)
I was at this dinner party once. It was a nice Ladies Only sort of affair and we were dressed up, eating little bits of cheese and drinking wine. Another woman showed up who hadn’t explicitly been invited, and she plopped down at the table and took off one of her knee-high boots. “Just getting my stash,” she said. “Anyone want a line?” And she proceeded to snort several lines of cocaine right at the dinner table, next to all the food. Nobody had drunk enough to overcome the traditional British reserve, nor did we want to embarrass the hostess, so the woman was ignored.
as warnings for the rest of us. Signposts along the way." --Igby Goes Down.)
I was at this dinner party once. It was a nice Ladies Only sort of affair and we were dressed up, eating little bits of cheese and drinking wine. Another woman showed up who hadn’t explicitly been invited, and she plopped down at the table and took off one of her knee-high boots. “Just getting my stash,” she said. “Anyone want a line?” And she proceeded to snort several lines of cocaine right at the dinner table, next to all the food. Nobody had drunk enough to overcome the traditional British reserve, nor did we want to embarrass the hostess, so the woman was ignored.
2. Someone with whom you can quarrel.
See Topic #6.
3. Someone to fear.
There was a inmate at the prison we called Crazy Legs Smith (to distinguish him from other Smiths). He had tattoos all over his legs and he wore really short shorts. We did not call him Crazy Legs to his face because he was crazy in his head too. He used to be in the Special Secure Unit, but had graduated back to the main wing. You could tell when he was going through a bad patch, psychologically, because his hygiene deteriorated. He’d grow his hair and a matted beard and stop washing himself. He once asked me to get him a book that was 30 years out of print. I told him it was not available, but he continued to ask me for it week after week for at least 6 months. Finally he snapped at me that he thought I had the book, but just didn’t want to give it to him for personal reasons. He was jumped in the shower once by a group of other prisoners and his leg was broken. The assailants were transferred to other prisons for their protection.
4. Someone to unite against
I knew this officer when I worked at the prison who was suing the service for not defending him against what he termed a consistent pattern of racist bullying. He was, he told me, a member of the 'smallest minority' of British citizens. He was from Northern Ireland (like my friend Sean). He was trying to sue everyone who ever called him a Paddy – not because he thought it was a racist term but because it refers to Irish (Republic of) people. He was angry that people mistook his accent; he wanted to be treated as a British citizen, not an Irish citizen. He wanted lots of money in his settlement. He couldn’t understand why no one liked him or would talk to him, and took that as further evidence of their bigotry. I wanted to tell him, “People don’t hate you because they think you are Irish, they hate you because you’re a jackass” but I didn’t want to get sued.
5. Entertainment value.
See above.
See Topic #6.
3. Someone to fear.
There was a inmate at the prison we called Crazy Legs Smith (to distinguish him from other Smiths). He had tattoos all over his legs and he wore really short shorts. We did not call him Crazy Legs to his face because he was crazy in his head too. He used to be in the Special Secure Unit, but had graduated back to the main wing. You could tell when he was going through a bad patch, psychologically, because his hygiene deteriorated. He’d grow his hair and a matted beard and stop washing himself. He once asked me to get him a book that was 30 years out of print. I told him it was not available, but he continued to ask me for it week after week for at least 6 months. Finally he snapped at me that he thought I had the book, but just didn’t want to give it to him for personal reasons. He was jumped in the shower once by a group of other prisoners and his leg was broken. The assailants were transferred to other prisons for their protection.
4. Someone to unite against
I knew this officer when I worked at the prison who was suing the service for not defending him against what he termed a consistent pattern of racist bullying. He was, he told me, a member of the 'smallest minority' of British citizens. He was from Northern Ireland (like my friend Sean). He was trying to sue everyone who ever called him a Paddy – not because he thought it was a racist term but because it refers to Irish (Republic of) people. He was angry that people mistook his accent; he wanted to be treated as a British citizen, not an Irish citizen. He wanted lots of money in his settlement. He couldn’t understand why no one liked him or would talk to him, and took that as further evidence of their bigotry. I wanted to tell him, “People don’t hate you because they think you are Irish, they hate you because you’re a jackass” but I didn’t want to get sued.
5. Entertainment value.
See above.
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