Sunday, July 23, 2006
An Apology for Sloppy Writing
I regret that the last few posts I have put here haven't been well-written. Of course, it's understandable when you consider that I try to get all my ideas written down before I forget some of them. However, I haven't been constructing essays that logically stick together.
My idea about organizing separate ideas in an essay is to create a circle or polygon, with an idea at each intersection. The structure that I admire is exemplified by the folk song about the man who has a hole in his bucket. He needs to whittle a peg to fill the hole, but his knife is dull. He would like to sharpen the knife on the farm grinding wheel, but he has no water with which to lubricate the interface between the rotating wheel and the knife blade. He would like to carry water from the pump to the wheel, but there's a hole in his bucket.
In a previous essay, I started out grousing about how conservatives seem to view everything as moral or immoral, and that preoccupation with morals, or conservative traditions, attracts religious fundamentalists. As a result, the conservatives and fundamentalists form a majority that blocks any attempts at universal health care, true social security reform (rather than simple abolition), and other things that we progressive liberal pinkos have been waiting for. However, in my essay I failed to connect the progressive frustration with morality. That is, the circle was not complete.
I promise to try to do better in the future.
My idea about organizing separate ideas in an essay is to create a circle or polygon, with an idea at each intersection. The structure that I admire is exemplified by the folk song about the man who has a hole in his bucket. He needs to whittle a peg to fill the hole, but his knife is dull. He would like to sharpen the knife on the farm grinding wheel, but he has no water with which to lubricate the interface between the rotating wheel and the knife blade. He would like to carry water from the pump to the wheel, but there's a hole in his bucket.
In a previous essay, I started out grousing about how conservatives seem to view everything as moral or immoral, and that preoccupation with morals, or conservative traditions, attracts religious fundamentalists. As a result, the conservatives and fundamentalists form a majority that blocks any attempts at universal health care, true social security reform (rather than simple abolition), and other things that we progressive liberal pinkos have been waiting for. However, in my essay I failed to connect the progressive frustration with morality. That is, the circle was not complete.
I promise to try to do better in the future.
