Tuesday, November 27, 2007

Apologize! Apologize!

The scene is a classic one from A Fish Called Wanda. Jamie Lee Curtis (Wanda) wants to get a safety deposit box key from John Cleese (Archie) that he doesn't know he even possesses. She must schmooze him for it and the seduction is working.

Unbeknown to either Wanda or Archie, Wanda's jealous boyfriend Otto (Kevin Kline) has broken into the flat to keep his eye on Wanda whom he suspects is not trustworthy. From his hidden outpost in the corner of the room Otto angrily is subjected to first the heavy petting between Archie and Wanda but loses his temper entirely when Wanda candidly confides in Archie how stupid she believes Otto truly is.

At this Otto jumps from his hiding spot, pushes Wanda out of the flat and demands an apology from Archie to which Archie asks incredulously "Me to you?" The apology is eventually made but only after Otto hangs Archie out of an upper story window by his heels and threatens to drop him on his head. The most polite apology in history is delivered as the world watches from the ground below, completely unaware of what caused the commotion to begin with.



A criminal gets angry over what he eavesdrops during the commission of a crime and demands an apology. What could be sillier than that?

How about a boatload of groveling Christian appeasers begging for forgiveness for crimes of retribution they did not commit, to people against whom the crimes of retribution were not committed. There is no honesty in claiming responsibility when there is none. There is also no benefit in giving ground, whether it is physical or philosophical territory, to people that see appeasement as proof positive of their own righteousness.

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