June 23, 2009

Thomas Friedman Clogged My Toilet.
posted by homunculus 15 years ago
  • At least he didn't shit in the litter box.
  • Now wait a beat - how do we know what it was that went down that poor guy's toilet? We ought not to assume the worst. For example: suppose Mr. Friedman chose simply to feed his book, The World Is Flat, down there? The problem with his book is that it assumes that globalization is a linear progression, versions 1.0, 2.0, 3.0, etc., that can't, or won't be stopped or turned back on itself. The toilet test refutes all of that. Stopped, stoppered, simplistic through sheer lack of sustainable diversity, the tiniest, most insipid, flat earth would eventually want to swell again. Consumer peasants with flaming torches may yet pen the devils in their towers, demanding protectionism from, say, Walmart. The forest of local products and character will again grow tangled, globally impenetrable...
  • Dan, I think you're right. The whole story is embellished allegory.
  • What's the meta-narrative here? Friedman is full of shit.
  • I think you mean empty(ied) of shit.
  • He had a lot of shit to unload. A huge dump. His books are huge dumps that he takes into society.
  • I have to admit, I'm a little disappointed that it's only an allegory. I despise Friedman - his random, uneducated enthusiasms, his wretched writing - so much that I was hoping for some real schadenfreude and/or gossip. For those who are out of the loop on the Friedman hatred: he's what would happen if Wired magazine had a baby with C*ry D*ctor*w, and it was adopted and raised to adulthood by the cast of your local morning television news breakfast show.