Emory Archives - Ashley F. Miller

Alright, admittedly, I made the mistake of clicking on a CNN headline about Newt Gingrich and "atheists". Atheists is in quotes there because CNN seems to only share that word when it's in quotes. I know better than going to CNN, and I know better than reading stories about Newt Gingrich, and I really should know better than to read any story about "atheists", but I couldn't help myself.

Ol' Newt is worried that the country is going to become a "secular atheists country" overrun by "radical Islamists."

Now, I know Newt isn't stupid, he's just a craven ass. And I'm allowed to say that because we went to the same undergraduate institution. Newt must know that being an atheist and being an "Islamist" are mutually exclusive positions. Unless he fears the domination of this country by those fundamentalist atheist Christianists.

HEADDESK

On the other hand, it's refreshing to see how far we've come as a nation to think that being a Catholic is American and not indicative of a political devotion to papistry that will lead this nation into the fiery pits of hell. Because, as we all once knew, Catholics aren't proper Christians, and Merka is a Kristyen Nayshun.

I'm sorry, it's just the dumb appeal to the lowest common denominator. It burns. It burns because I know that it works. I know that someone is reading that stupid CNN article and thinking, "God, you know, that Newt Gingrich has a point. This country is under threat of Muslim Atheists. And hell, the only thing worse than a Muslim, is an Atheist, and the only thing worse than an Atheist, is a Muslim one."

Excuse me while I go weep.

I also applaud your sturdy good sense in not swilling INCEPTION’s pretty kool-aid. Superbly executed hustle, but pretty paper thin (as, come to think of it, was Leonardo’s performance). – Eddy Von Mueller

I just friended and got a message from a professor of mine from undergrad. He was probably the snarkiest professor I had throughout my entire education, which was quite a prolonged experience. I still tell people stories about him, so it’s sort of cool that someone who’d been flattened into some stories is now real again.

The first day of class, he walks in, he’s wearing a jaunty hat, has a cane and a goatee sort of thing. “Call me Eddy, because Professor Von Mueller sounds like some madman who keeps blondes locked in his basement.” Half evil/half nervous laugh. It was brilliant.

My other favorite line of his “If I have to watch Keanu Reeves try to put an emotion on that plastic face of his one more time, I’m going to kill myself.” It was a very early, gen ed fulfilling class on film he was teaching and he was absolutely brutal in his assessment of people’s taste. Which I enjoyed because I enjoy people being mocked mercilessly and his taste and mine tended to overlap. He also, as a Formon™ himself, made fun of Mormons a lot.

He also taught my favorite course that I took in all of undergrad “History of Television”, which is not a subject I even cared about, I literally took it because he was hilarious and teaching it. I hated TV at the time, but it gave me a very different perspective and of course now I think TV at its best is probably better than film at its best. (WHAT!)

Also, I googled him and found this hilarious “review” of him.

Even with this in mind, I still think the Social Network trailer was ham-fisted and melodramatic and made me giggle when I shouldn’t have.