“Patriotism is your conviction that this country is superior to all others because you were born in it.” — George Bernard Shaw
Conservative media person Jesse Kelly tweeted:
“People love to sound sophisticated and brag about European art and architecture. I’ve seen America’s and I’ve seen what they’ve got.
Theirs can’t touch ours.”
To illustrate his point, Kelly added a picture of the Statue of Liberty. I had assumed that most Americans knew America’s most iconic symbol was not an American creation. I guess I was wrong.
The Statue, of course, is a gift from the French. It was the brainchild of Frenchman Édouard René Lefèbvrede de Laboulaye. Designed by French sculptor Frédéric Auguste Bartholdi. Its metal framework was built by Gustave Eiffel (the tower guy). Perhaps Kelly was referring to the base, which was built in America.
Less well known — and obviously a completely blank page to Kelly — is that Laboulaye was President of the French Anti-Slavery Society. He conceived of the work as a salute to the Union victory in the Civil War and the subsequent emancipation of American slaves. Hence “liberty”.
Bearing that in mind, let us consider Kelly’s contention that European art and architecture “can’t touch ours”. Is there an empirical metric that could put the debate to rest? Of course not.
The aesthetic quality of art and architecture is in the eye of the beholder. If someone says that the St Patrick’s Cathedral in New York is “better” than St Peter’s Basilica in Rome, they are entitled to their opinion.
Is the White House a superior building to Versailles? I suppose some might argue so.
I cannot think of an American statue with the reputation and quality of Michelangelo’s David, but that might be due to my lack of knowledge of American statues.
Does America have a school of art that beats the Impressionists, the Dutch masters, or Renaissance Art? Maybe.
More to the point, why do we need to have a winner? I do not think of art and architecture as being a competition. Every European country has fabulous art and architecture. So does America. Is it required that we have to anoint one nation the gold medalist?
If Kelly thinks there has to be a winner — and that the victor is America, I wonder which American art and architecture he would feature as examples of the New World’s superiority?
Kelly is firm in his position. When Twitter added a note to his tweet outlining the conception and creation of the Statue, Kelly did not acknowledge his error. Instead, he got defensive. And aimed venom at Elon Musk (who is discovering that when you have conservative friends, you automatically acquire enemies.) He retweeted his foolishness with a defiant message.
“I thought @elonmusk taking over would let freedom ring on this site. Guess I was wrong.
Sorry, but these colors don’t run.”
Not to worry, if Kelly wants to let his stupidity run free, he can always post on Truth Social — if that is still in business.
Jesse Kelly describes himself as “Host of the nationally syndicated Jesse Kelly Show. Host of ‘I’m Right’ on The First. Anti-Communist. World Famous Author.” I will have to him at his word that he is famous because I have never heard of him. I am familiar with conservative media’s A-team, so I assume he is a minor leaguer. However, he does have 685K followers on Twitter — so some people must be paying attention. And let us note that 2.9K have liked his statue tweet.
Kelly will also be more famous tomorrow than yesterday — although his new name recognition will not do much to promote his intellectual bona fides. But IQ is just a number. MAGAs have short attention spans. And another conservative will soon offer something so stunningly stupid Jesse’s dumbassery will be forgotten.
Until he throws up on himself again.
