The couple’s vision, as articulated in their published writings and their buildings, was beyond Utopian. It sought not merely better living — but, ideally, eternal living — through design.
Their work was underpinned by a philosophy they called Reversible Destiny. Its chief tenet, as the catalog of a 1997 joint exhibition at the Guggenheim Museum SoHo put it, was, “Reversible Destiny: We Have Decided Not to Die.”
Eluding death through design could be accomplished, the couple believed, through a literal architecture of instability — a built environment in which no surface is level, no corner true, no line plumb.
I once lived in a building like that, although overall, it was much better looking that the Reversible Destiny Lofts in Tokyo.
We probably should take this with a grain of salt, anyway, since it’s from the architect’s obituary. She was preceded in death by her husband, too.
Still, there’s an interesting thought experiment here: If you could live forever, but at the price of living in one of their lofts, would you want to? Does that mean their lofts were hell?
I’ve been intending one more brief sequel or update for a few days on my “last acceptable prejudice” item from last Thursday. This provided the reminder. My afterthoughts:
- The eventuality of a win by the Little Sisters of the Poor on the abortifacient mandate is not necessarily an erosion of “Obamacare.” Those who are rooting for the Little Sisters under that impression should think again. (That the Administration is taking on the Little Sisters is dumb politics, but that’s regardless of who wins.) A likelier eventuality is that the the federal government will end up directly paying for or providing contraceptives, IUDs and “morning after pills,” since that tidily disposes of the Little Sisters and Hobby Lobby objections.
- I don’t think for a moment that realizing what I just wrote would change the Little Sisters’ course, because I don’t think their position is a tactic to erode Obamacare. It’s a category mistake (or closely akin to one) to think that politics is what they’re up to. It’s also a category mistake that the popular press returns to habitually, like a dog to it’s vomit.
Taken broadly, equality is incoherent as a measure of social justice. Equal with respect to what? Religious people have a more mature vocabulary. Social justice involves respect for the dignity of the person, subsidiarity, and solidarity.
We can use these concepts to transform current anxieties about inequality into more focused and fruitful reflection. Globalized economies dominated by mega-bureaucratic states inadequately protect human dignity. They discourage self-governance (subsidiarity) and fail to sustain a robust sense of solidarity. These lines of analysis should be the focus of our efforts, not defending capitalism or free markets.
(R.R. Reno in First Things) I don’t expect First Things to attack capitalism or free markets, but as Reno notes, nobody with power is opposed to capitalism and free markets these days.
But those of us with Distributist leanings would welcome any support on human dignity, subsidiarity and solidarity.
Dana Gioia had a long, much-cited piece in First Things on The Catholic Writer Today. I guess I should have expected some pushback, and even that it might come from another source toward which I’m friendly: D.G. Hart at Front Porch Republic. Bear with me as he winds his way toward Gioia:
How the papacy or the bishops could have stopped the embourgeoisement of U.S. Roman Catholicism is a predicament that arguably only the Holy Ghost could solve. To be sure, one way of reading the church’s social teaching is to see it as a rebuke to the kind of market forces that have allowed Roman Catholics to leave the close knit neighborhoods described in Alan Ehrenhalt’s Lost City for the anonymous existence of places like Levittown …
But that doesn’t seem to be Francis’ point. Lots of critics of capitalism and suburbia fault its obvious materialism – if not hedonism – and monotony. Few seem to be willing, however, to give up their own affluent existence and recreate the kind of communities that gave ethno-religious identity to the ghettos and neighborhoods that produced the writers for whom Gioia longs. Is Francis advocating a recovery of the Roman Catholic working class neighborhoods in Ireland and North America? If he is, won’t that cut into the budgets of Roman Catholic charities, not to mention the fund raising efforts of Roman Catholic universities, magazines, and presses? Maybe charitable giving is not a zero sum game. That is, at least, what the prosperity gospel preachers among Protestants tell us. “If you give, God will give you even MORE!” But it seems obvious to someone like me (without a lick of training in economics) that the Roman Catholic attorney, father of two, living in Montgomery County, Pennsylvania, has more disposable income than the Italian-American father of six who lived in South Philly and had to take extra shifts at the docks to pay for his kids’ parochial education. Suburbanization is a blessing and a curse. It means more money for church causes and less religious self-consciousness – more tax deductions, fewer poets.
I’d recap, but if you need a recap you should read it again instead.
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“The remarks made in this essay do not represent scholarly research. They are intended as topical stimulations for conversation among intelligent and informed people.” (Gerhart Niemeyer)
Tipsy Teetotaler ن 