Conn Carroll

Husband, father of three. Commentary Editor for @dcexaminer.
Author of Sex and the Citizen:

[Conn Carroll @conncarroll]

@JeromePandell Please do point me to all this Christian morality in Homer's Odyssey.

[Anna Giaritelli @Anna_Giaritelli]

ICE and CBP arrests soar to new high in July https://t.co/Oa2BmyrsNM

[John Arnold @johnarnold]

"each dollar they deposit into online sports betting apps reduces their investment deposits by about 20 cents"

The conflation of investing, trading, and gambling is deeply troubling.

[Liza Libes @pensandpoison]

Ben's analysis is 100% correct—but that's just the problem.

Nolan imposes a Biblical moral framework onto an epic that predates Christianity by centuries, completely altering the moral universe of Homeric Greece.

[Conn Carroll @conncarroll]

@neoavatara It’s not the “one place” Nolan diverges.

[Conn Carroll @conncarroll]

lol Odysseus is the main character. His guilt over sacking Troy is a complete invention. In the poem he brags about it often. Nolan also completely corrupts Zeus's law into a Christian Golden Rule. Homer’s Odysseus sleeps with both Circe and Calypso while Penelope remains faithful at home. Nolan removes or heavily suppresses those sexual relationships. Homer celebrates Penelope’s chastity while tolerating Odysseus’s affairs. Nolan largely eliminates that double standard. Homer’s recollections of Troy largely glorify Greek victory and heroic cunning. Nolan directly depicts or recalls rape, murder, slaughtered women and children, and the moral corruption of the victors.

[Conn Carroll @conncarroll]

Um... yes?

[Conn Carroll @conncarroll]

@neoavatara I mean if you can't see these huge differences I don't know what to tell you.

[Conn Carroll @conncarroll]

lol Odysseus is the main character. His guilt over sacking Troy is a complete invention. In the poem he brags about it often. Nolan also completely corrupts Zeus's law into a Christian Golden Rule. Homer’s Odysseus sleeps with both Circe and Calypso while Penelope remains faithful at home. Nolan removes or heavily suppresses those sexual relationships. Homer celebrates Penelope’s chastity while tolerating Odysseus’s affairs. Nolan largely eliminates that double standard. Homer’s recollections of Troy largely glorify Greek victory and heroic cunning. Nolan directly depicts or recalls rape, murder, slaughtered women and children, and the moral corruption of the victors.

[Conn Carroll @conncarroll]

@neoavatara But that is not what Nolan did. He does not take the heroic virtues of ancient Greece compatible with modern Western values and celebrate them. Instead he takes Christian values and falsely inserts them into a non-Chrostian story. The movie is a lie.

[Conn Carroll @conncarroll]

@Holden114 I'm not terribly concerned about whether or not Nolan movies make money. I am concerned about people not appreciating what a truly world changing event Christ and the spread of Christianity were.

[Conn Carroll @conncarroll]

@neoavatara If your project is - as Rich wants - to show continuity between the heroic virtues of Homer's pagan age and the modern west, then celebrate those virtues. But do not, as Nolan does, take Christian values and falsely insert them into pre-Christian world where they did not exist.

[Emily Jashinsky @emilyjashinsky]

John makes this argument at length here

[Conn Carroll @conncarroll]

I haven't seen the movie, but to the extent Nolan inserts Christian morality into a pre-Christian world I think he undermines the revolutionary importance of Christianity.
If the pre-Christian world had its own Golden Rule and monogamous norms then why did it need Christ?

[Conn Carroll @conncarroll]

Um... yes?

[Congressman Brandon Gill @RepBrandonGill]

I asked the Smithsonian’s Director of American History Museum five times if it’s appropriate to sell ‘Latina Power’ merchandise.

Five times, she wouldn’t answer yes or no.

[Rod Dreher @roddreher]

"These are not just children being born in a hospital. These are warriors." This, abt the Islamic birth rate in the US being three times that of white Americans. He also says that Allah is telling Muslims "you are better than everybody else. Let's work towards that." Listen:

[Christopher F. Rufo ⚔️ @christopherrufo]

The conservatives who believe that the founders rejected the “common good“ would be shocked to read how many times they used that phrase in their writing and in the state constitutions. But that would require reading the original texts, instead of 20th c. libertarian revisionism.

[Bethany S. Mandel @bethanyshondark]

I don’t think using your own writing published elsewhere is plagiarism?

[Billy Gribbin @BillyGribbin]

A few other men Marc disqualifies from leading our country:

"Government is instituted for the common good; for the protection, safety, prosperity and happiness of the people; and not for the profit, honor, or private interest of any one man, family, or class of men." -John Adams

“It is too early for politicians to presume on our forgetting that the public good, the real welfare of the great body of the people, is the supreme object to be pursued; and that no form of government whatever has any other value than as it may be fitted for the attainment of this object.” -James Madison

“The aggregate happiness of society, which is best promoted by the practice of a virtuous policy, is or ought to be the end of all government.” -George Washington

[Anna Giaritelli @Anna_Giaritelli]

NEW — ICE daily arrests reach new all-time high, hitting 1,593 average in July (figure includes CBP's interior arrests)

[Steve Deace @SteveDeaceShow]

Wow, the UK finally found some Muslims they were willing to arrest.