by Witold | Oct 12, 2020 | Architecture, Modern life
Do we still celebrate Columbus Day? This summer, statues of the intrepid explorer were defaced, beheaded, and toppled. In South Philadelphia, the City shrouded a Columbus statue and recently announced its removal. It is unclear what will happen to the Columbus...
by Witold | Oct 4, 2020 | Modern life
The cancel culture never sleeps. The discovery that Edward Hopper once copied paintings “challenges the notion that Hopper was an absolute original, uninfluenced by others” according to the breathless headline in the New York Times. A rather silly conclusion since...
by Witold | Sep 11, 2020 | Modern life
Although some have claimed that the “cancel culture” doesn’t really exist, a nationwide Zogby Analytics poll of likely voters recently found that a narrow plurality (37 percent) supported cancel culture, with 32 percent opposed and 30 percent “not sure.” Some of the...
by Witold | Aug 10, 2020 | Modern life
Museum directors, college deans, and newspaper editors take note. A few weeks ago a petition spearheaded by a San Francisco Bay Area high school senior was submitted to the Trader Joe’s supermarket company that included the following claim. “The Trader Joe’s branding...
by Witold | Aug 1, 2020 | Modern life
I am a latecomer to the Jordan Peterson phenomenon. I haven’t read any of his books but I have listened to numerous lectures and interviews. A 2018 interview with NYU professor Jonathan Hardt, founder of the Heterodox Academy, about the causes for the unravelling of...
by Witold | Jul 4, 2020 | Architecture, Modern life
Last week, the University of Pennsylvania announced plans to remove its statue of George Whitefield, a famous eighteenth-century British preacher, due to his condoning slavery. What was the statue, made by R. Tait McKenzie in 1919, doing at Penn? Whitefield was a...
