While doing my best to figure out how to wrap up any number of mostly-done posts for Escamoteurettes, I get a notice that Penn Jillette has commented on the State of the World. It’s not that I planned to pen two Penn posts back to back, but that’s the way the world works sometimes. I just stopped asking “why.”
I don’t know Penn. I spoke with him for maybe five seconds at MAGIC Live! in Vegas last year (in between shoving David Blaine out of the way so I could talk to Michael Close, and lusting over some exceptional posters for sale.) We do share a couple of things in common, one of which is an enthusiasm for free speech rights.
So when he calls “an absolute hellhole” every country outside the good old U S of A, I can only say, “God bless the right to free speech and God bless the USA.”
Powered by FireStats
I certainly respect the ‘right’ to ‘free speech’ (is any speech truly free ie without cost to someone?) but I must say that Mr Jillette is getting on my nerves somewhat – as long as he is able to run roughshod over others feelings and ‘rights’ then that’s OK. He seems to embody all the worst stereotyping we ‘hellhole’ types hold about Americans – if it ain’t America it ain’t.
There is a wider (and somewhat older & wiser) world outside the States. Be careful Mr Jillette that you become so busy with others motes that you miss America’s beams.
Thanks for keeping going John.
Simon
This is a refreshing point of view. Most luminaries seem to tread ever so lightly around these issues possibly fearing some reprisal from those who despise democracy and freedom. When that kind of fear becomes preeminent and arrests comments like these, those who perpetrate the fear win. That’s not freedom’s way.
I like it when Penn Jillette wins. I like it when freedom wins. I like it a lot.
Best,
Ray
Penn is no shrinking violet, that’s for sure. And I perfectly understand why brethren from other countries might get tweaked by the sentiment. Sure, we have our warts and we have our problems, but I have a hard time coming up with an argument to what he meant. We have it so very good in the USA.
Here’s an argument: define “hellhole”.
You’d be hard pressed to get the citizens of England, Canada, Sweden, Australia, Spain, Fiji, Iceland, etc., etc, to consider their residences anything like hellholes.
Then again, ask them to define “ugly American” and they are apt to come up with something very close to Mr. Jillette.
Are you using Penn’s definition, or your own? When you read the article you find the context within which he made his remarks is largely centered on freedom and equality. Are you suggesting “England, Canada, Sweden, Australia, Spain, Fiji, Iceland, etc., etc,” exceed the quantity and quality of freedoms we enjoy here in the USA? I don’t think so.
Does that mean all other countries are undesireable in all ways in comparison to the USA? Hardly.
Penn’s comments — like his magic — were meant to be provocative.
John
Fine, let’s talk about the “quantity and quality of freedoms” in the USA. Both you and Mr. Jillette are white, educated and make above the average income. If you were a person of color living below the poverty level, especially in certain parts of the USA, both the quantity and quality of your freedoms would be greatly reduced.
You’ve mentioned the word “provocative” before as if it’s always a good thing. Sometimes “provocative” is just synonymous with “stupid.”
But then again, neither of us is likely to sway the other, are we?
I’ll admit it’s a little late for me to be non-white, but I have lived below the poverty level several times in my life and in some of the less desireable parts of this country, too. For many years I worked three different jobs to earn enough money to pay our bills, feed my family, and get ahead. It wasn’t easy, it sure as hell wasn’t what I wanted to do with my time, but I did what I had to do. Today, I am reaping the benefits of that.
There’s no question I am certainly wealthy, but it’s Henry Ford’s definition of wealthy: if I woke up tomorrow morning and everything I have today was taken away from me, I’d have it all back in less than a year. I’ll leave it to you to figure out why that is and, just a hint, it has nothing to do with skin color. To suggest it does makes you a racist as well as a fool.
Make no mistake: slavery is alive and well in the USA. The difference is that today’s slave masters are often heard to say, “If you aren’t white, you don’t have a chance to get ahead.” Disagree? Call Thomas Sowell and ask him for his opinion and a few other references for you to follow up on.
Freedom in this country also means today’s mental slaves can tell their slave masters to go to hell.
Equality does not mean everyone in this country has the right to three televisions, two cars, two credit cards, and broadband access. That’s called communism.
Equality means everyone has an opportunity to make out of their lives whatever they wish, so long as they are willing to work hard, sacrifice, and put in the time required. Every legal resident of this country has the right and opportunity to become a millionaire if that’s what floats their boat. That cannot be said of any other country on this planet. That opportunity has nothing to do with race. It has everything to do with “want to” — the only thing harder to find in some people than “common sense.”
Finally, I have no interest whatsoever in convincing anyone of anything. I have far more productive and personally rewarding things to do with my time. There are plenty enough examples of success in this country to adequately demonstrate what an utter fundamental lack of understanding you have of the freedoms and equality we enjoy in the USA.
Thanks for visiting, though.
“Every legal resident of this country has the right and opportunity to become a millionaire if that’s what floats their boat. That cannot be said of any other country on this planet.”
Huh?
-Travis
That probably wasn’t phrased well. What I meant by that is nothing stands in the way of anyone in this country becoming monetarily rich if that’s what they want to be, and are willing to apply themselves to the task.
We in this country have more millionaires among us today than ever before. And being monetarily rich is not a zero-sum game where if “the rich get richer” conversely “the poor get poorer” — as if there’s (effectively) a finite pile of money to go around. And there’s plenty of place all along the money-spectrum between poverty and millionaire for anyone to earn what level of income they want.
Those are my personal observations. They aren’t made from a high tower and they certainly aren’t unique to me.
John
John – it wasn’t your phrasing that trigered the “huh?” – it was the “That cannot be said of any other country on this planet” comment. Perhaps you don’t realise, but out here in the hellholes of the rest of the world we don’t have blanket bans or compulsary deportation orders on millionaires (in fact we have more millionaires in Western Europe than you do in the US).
The US has a lot of things to be proud of, but constant gloating and putting down of other countries highlights that modesty is not one of them.
Ian
This is swaying from the original comment (dealing with freedoms and equality) and that’s partly my own fault.
It may or may not be that Western Europe has more millionaires than the USA, but I’m speaking of a single country in which individual people have created their own path from “rags to riches” as the saying goes. They have because the impediments to doing so are less here than they are elsewhere. It’s one of the reasons that 1 in 125 Amercians is a millionaire (which refers to liquid assets, not including real estate holdings.)
I don’t consider anything I’ve stated to be gloating and I haven’t put down any other country. For some, however, seeing the word “hellhole” as a description of countries outside the USA without considering the context within which the comment was made will naturally lead to a kneejerk reaction to whatever it is they hold as a definition of “hellhole.”
Do you believe there is another country on the planet that offers a greater number and quality of opportunities and freedoms than does the USA to its citizens? Because I don’t believe there is. That doesn’t mean other countries do not have desireable attractiveness in some areas. On the whole, I’m happy I live here.
Is Penn Jillette’s comment based in fact or fantasy, and why?
John
Jillette’s comments are based on his own subjective assesment of the countries he’s visited. It’s difficult to argue with because his definition of “hellhole” is very subjective and undisclosed. Even your more reasoned criteria of offering a greater number and quality of opportunities and freedoms is quite subjective – how do we measure that?
On the commonly available economic and social measures of well-being (GDP per head, life expectancy, infant mortality, literacy, etc.) the US does well – but not as well as countries like Sweden, Norway, Switzerland and Luxembourg. Having worked in three of those countries as well as the US I would also say that there are as many freedoms and certainly less censorship too.
Like you I love my country (the UK) and wouldn’t want to live anywhere else. It has many fantastic strengths, but that doesn’t mean I am going to fool myself into thinking it’s somehow the greatest country in the world – especially as there’s no way I (and you) can have enough knowledge of other countries to make that statement definitively.
Ian
For some, however, seeing the word “hellhole†as a description of countries outside the USA without considering the context within which the comment was made[…]
Very true. In fact, once you’ve seen The Aristocrats, practically any profanity Mr. Jillette decides to say is going to sound a little watered down.
There ‘may’ be no country in the world that offers more freedoms than the US, but there are plenty who offer equal freedoms and opportunities. The same opportunities (and similar obstacles) towards becoming a millionaire exist in many other countries than the US. Rupert Murdock wasn’t born in the US and was a billionaire before he took out US citizenship.
I really dig my American friends, but boy, some of their citizens can be very parochial. Unfortunately this is perceived as arrogance and Imperialism, and hence many of the image problems the US faces in the wider world today.
The problem here is the same problem faced elsewhere: entertainers who obtain celebrity status that turns them into geo-political commentators despite the lack of any serious credentials or expertise. It’s like Tom Cruise commenting on psychology. Or Mel Gibson visiting Oz and commenting on Australian trade matters because he lived here once.
Still. At least those big dumb over-inflated “luvvies” are good at making movies and doing magic tricks. If not for that, we wouldn’t feed them, right?
America! God, I love it!
Europe… God, I stepped in it!
Austrailia… Nice zoos. Half bird half beaver and five vaginas.
Canada those nice polite mayonaisse loving freaks!
Mexico, cant drink the water but they know how to get the best from a cactus.
Japan… God bless em they have more different kinds of porn than ANYONE… But they cant show pubic hair…
This has been brought to you by the council on magical equality.