Couldn't Hurt.

The Goy's Teeth (scene from A Serious Man) 

from Diegech on Vimeo.

"....But then, we also talk about removing  information that is Problematic, y'know?

Of course, so, anything that is 
Medically Unsubstantiated :

Like, People Say :

"Take Vitamin C."

"Take Turmeric"



"Those Will Cure You."

Those are The Examples of 
Things That Would Violate Our Policy :

Anything That Would Go Against World Health Organisation Recommendations 
would be a violation of Our Policy.

And so, "REMOVE" is another really important part of Our Policy.

Rabbi Nachtner: 
You know Lee Sussman. 

Larry Gopnik: 
Doctor Sussman? 
I think I - yeah. 

Rabbi Nachtner: 
Did he ever tell you about the goy's teeth?

Larry Gopnik: 
No... I- What goy? 

Rabbi Nachtner: 
So... Lee is at work one day; you know he has the orthodontic practice there at Great Bear. 

He's making a plaster mold - it's for corrective bridge work - in the mouth of one of his patients, Russell Kraus. 
The mold dries and Lee is examining it one day before fabricating an appliance. 
He notices something unusual. 
There appears to be something engraved on the inside of the patient's lower incisors. 
He-vav-shin-yud-ayin-nun-yud. 

"Hwshy 'ny". 
"Help me, save me". 

This in a goy's mouth, Larry. 
He calls the goy back on the pretense of needing additional measurements for the appliance. 

"How are you? 

Noticed any other problems with your teeth?" 

"No." 

There it is. 
"Hwshy 'ny". 
"Help me". 

Son of a Gun. 

Sussman goes Home. 

Can Sussman eat? 
Sussman can't eat.

Can Sussman sleep? 
Sussman can't sleep. 

Sussman looks at the molds of his other patients, 

goy and Jew alike, seeking other messages. 

He finds none. 
He looks in his own mouth. 

Nothing. 

He looks in his wife's mouth. 
Nothing. 

But Sussman,

is An Educated Man -- 

Not The World's Greatest sage, maybe, no Rabbi Marshak, 

but he knows a thing or two from 

The Zohar and The Qaballah. 

He knows that every Hebrew letter has its numeric equivalent. 
8-4-5-4-4-7-3. 

Seven digits... a phone number, maybe? 

"Hello? Do you know a goy named Kraus, Russell Kraus?" 

"Who?"

"Where have I called?" 

"The Red Owl in Bloomington." 

"Thanks so much." 

He goes. It's a Red Owl. 
Groceries; what have you. 

Sussman goes home. 
What does it mean? 
He has to find out if he is ever to sleep again. 

He goes to see... 

The Rabbi Nachtner. 

He comes in, he sits 

right where you're sitting right now --

"What does it mean, Rabbi? 
Is it a sign from Hashem, 'Help me'? 

I, Sussman, 

should be doing something to help this goy? 

Doing what? 

The Teeth don't say. 

Or maybe I'm supposed to Help People generally, Lead a More Righteous Life? 

Is the answer in Qaballah? In Torah? 
Or is there even A Question?

 
Tell me, Rabbi --
What can such A Sign mean?" 

[pause as the Rabbi drinks his tea] 

Larry Gopnik: 

So what did you tell him? 

Rabbi Nachtner: 

Sussman? 

Larry Gopnik: 

Yes! 

Rabbi Nachtner: 

Is it... relevant? 

Larry Gopnik: 

Well, isn't that why you're telling me? 

Rabbi Nachtner: 

Okay. Nachtner says, ‘Look, —

The Teeth, we don't know. 

A Sign from Hashem? Don't know. 

Helping Others... 

Couldn't Hurt. 

Larry Gopnik: 

No! No, but... who put it there? 

Was it for him, Sussman, or for whoever found it, 

or for just, for, for... 

Rabbi Nachtner: 

We can't know everything. 

Larry Gopnik: 

It sounds like you don't know ANYTHING! 

Why even tell me The Story? 

Rabbi Nachtner: 

[chuckling] 

First I should tell you, then I shouldn't. 

Larry Gopnik: 

What Happened to Sussman? 

Rabbi Nachtner: 

What •would• happen? Not much. 

He Went Back to Work. 

For a while he checked every patient's teeth for new messages. He didn't find any. 

In time, he found he'd stopped checking. 

He returned to Life. 

These Questions that are bothering you, Larry - 

Maybe they're like a toothache. 

We feel them for a while, then — 

They Go Away. 

Larry Gopnik: 

I don't want it to just go away! 

I want An Answer! 

Rabbi Nachtner: 

Sure! We all want The Answer! 

But Hashem doesn't owe us The Answer, Larry. 

Hashem doesn't owe Us anything. 

The Obligation runs the other way. 

Larry Gopnik: 

Why Does He Make Us feel The Questions 

if He's not gonna give Us any of The Answers? 

Rabbi Nachtner:

[ He leans forward, slightly, conspiritorially ]

He hasn't told me. 

[Larry puts his face in his hands in despair] 

Larry Gopnik: 

And... what happened to the goy? 

Rabbi Nachtner: 

The goy? 
Who cares?

The Daddy Problem

Now one of the criminals hanging there reviled Jesus, saying, 

“Are you not the Messiah? 

Save yourself and us.”

The other, however, rebuking him, said in reply, 

“Have you no fear of God, for you are subject to the same condemnation? 

And indeed, we have been condemned justly, for the sentence we received corresponds to Our Crimes, but This Man has done Nothing Criminal.” 

Then he said, 

“Jesus, re-member me when you come into Your Kingdom.”

He replied to him, 

“Amen I Say to You ‘Today you will be with me in Paradise.’”

Paglia: 

I take a very firm position, which is that I want college administrations to

stay totally out of the social lives of the students. If a crime is committed, it should be

reported to the police. I’ve been writing that for twenty-five years now. But it’s not the

business of any college administration to take any notice of what the students say to

each other - say to each other - as well as do with each other. I want it totally stopped.

It is fascism of the worst kind.

Peterson: I agree. And I think it’s fascism of the worst kind because it’s a new

kind of fascism. It’s partly generated by legislation, like the Title 9 memo that was

written in 2011. I recently got a copy of that goddamn thing. That was one polluting

bit of legislation. That memo basically told universities that unless they set up a

parallel court system, they were going to be denied federal funding. It is absolutely

unbelievable.

Paglia: Incredible. And the leftists are supporting this? This shows there is no

authentic campus leftism. I’m sorry, it’s a fraud. The faculty should be fighting the

28

administration on this. Federal regulation of how we’re supposed to behave on

campus?

Peterson: Well how can you be so naive and foolish to think that taking an

organization like the university, which already has plenty to do, and forcing it to

become a pseudo legal system that parallels the legal system could possibly be

anything but utterly catastrophic.

It would mean you have to know absolutely nothing about the legal system and about

the tremendous period of evolution that produced what’s actually a stellar system and

an adversarial system that protects the rights of the accused and of the victim. And

to replace that with an ad-hoc bureaucracy that has pretty much the same degree

of power as the court system with absolutely none of the training and none of the

guarantees.

Paglia: Kangaroo courts. That piece that I wrote about date rape - it was in January,

1991 Newsday - was the most controversial thing I ever wrote in my entire career.

I attacked the entire thing, and demanded that colleges stand back and get out of

the social lives of the students. The reaction. People tried to call. . . They called the

president of my university, tried to get me fired. You can’t believe the hysteria.

Peterson: I can believe it.

Paglia: Yeah, you can believe it. Anything that says to women that they should be

responsible for their own choices is regarded as reactionary? Are they kidding me?

This is such a betrayal of authentic feminism in my view.

Peterson: Well it’s the ultimate betrayal of authentic feminism because it’s an

invitation of all the things that you might be paranoid about with regards to the

patriarchy back into your life. It’s an insistence that the most intrusive part of the

tyrannical king come and take control of the most intimate details of your life.

Paglia: Incredible. Absolutely incredible.

Peterson: And the assumption is that that’s going to make your life better rather than

worse.

Paglia: And not to mention this idea of the stages of verbal consent, as if your

impulses based in the body have anything to do with words. That’s the whole point of

sex is to abandon that part of the brain that’s so trammeled with words.

Peterson: It’s actually a marker of lack of social ability to have to do that. Because if

you’re sophisticated. . . It’s not like if you’re dancing with someone, it’s not like you call

out the moves. If you have to do that, well then you’re worse than a neophyte. You’re

an awkward neophyte, and anyone with any sense should get the hell away from you.

29

So if you’re reduced to the point where you have to verbally negotiate every element of

intimate interaction. . .

Paglia: What a downer.

Peterson: Yes, but what an unbelievably naive and pathological view of the manner in

which human beings interact. There’s no sophistication in that.

Paglia: What I’m worried about also, in this age of social media. . . I’ve noticed that as

a teacher in the classroom that the young people are so used to communicating now by

cellphone, by iPhone, that they’re losing body language and facial expressions, which I

think is going to compound the problem with these dating encounters.

Because the ability to read the human face and to read little tiny inflections of emotion.

. . I think my generation got that from looking at great foreign films with their long

takes. So you’d have Jeanne Moreau and Catherine Deneuve in like potential romantic

encounters, and you could see the tiniest little inflections that signal communication or

sexual readiness or irony or skepticism or distance or whatever.

The inability to read other people’s intentions. . . I think this is going to be a disaster. I

just notice how year by year the students are becoming much more flat affect. And they

themselves complain that they’ll sit in the same room with someone and be texting to

each other.

Peterson: Yeah, well there’s a piece of evidence, too, that supports that to some

degree. Women with brothers are less likely to get raped. And the reason for that is that

they’ve learned that nonverbal language deeply.

Paglia: Not only that but I have noticed in my career that women who have many

brothers are very good as administrators and as business people, because they don’t

take men seriously. They saw their brothers. They think their brothers are jokes. But

they know how to control men while they still like men. They admire men. This is

something I have seen repeatedly.

Peterson: So that would be also reflective of the problem of fewer and fewer siblings.

Paglia: Yes, that’s right. I’ve noticed this in publishing. The women who have the job of

publicist and rise to the top as manager of publicity - their ability to take charge of men

and their humor with men. They have great relationships with men, because they don’t

have a sense of resentment and worry and anxiety. They don’t see men as aggressors.

And I think that’s another thing, too. As feminism moved into its present system of

ideology it has tended to denigrate motherhood as a lesser order of human experience,

and to enshrine of course abortion. Now I am a hundred percent for abortion rights. I

belonged to Planned Parenthood for years until I finally rejected it as a branch of the

Democratic Party, my own party.

30

But as motherhood became excluded, as feminism became obsessed with the

professional woman, I feel that the lessons that mothers learn have been lost to

feminism. The mothers who bear boy children understand the fragility of men, the

fragility of boys. They understand it. They don’t see boys and men as a menace. They

understand the greater strength of women.

So there’s this tenderness and connectedness between the mother and the boy child

when motherhood is part of the experience of women who are discussing gender. So

what we have today is that this gender ideology has risen up on campuses where all. .

. None of the girls, none of the students have married. None of them have had children.

And you have women, some of whom have had children. . . But a lot of them are like

lesbians or like professional women and so on.

So this whole tenderness and forgivingness and encouragement that women do to

boys. . . This hypersensitivity of boys is not understood. Instead, boys are seen as

somehow more privileged. And somehow their energy level is interpreted as aggression,

potential violence, and so on. We would do better if would have. . . I have proposed

that colleges should allow. . . The moment a woman has entered, she has entered that

college for life and that she should be free to leave to have babies when her body wants

that baby, when it’s healthy to have them. And then return, have the occasional course,

and build up credits. And fathers might be able to do it as well.

To get married women and women with children into the classroom. The moment that

happens, as happened after Word War II where you had a lot of married guys in the

classroom. . . Not that many women. The experience of a married person with a family

talking about gender. . . Most of the gender stuff would be laughed out of the room if

you had a real mother in there who had experienced childbirth and was raising boys.

So I think that’s also something that has led to this incredible artificiality and hysteria of feminist rhetoric.

Peterson: 

There’s another strange element to that, which is that on the one hand the

radical feminist types, the neo-Marxists, postmodernists, are very much opposed to the patriarchy, let’s say, and that’s that uni-dimensional, ideological representation of our culture.

Paglia: 

That has never existed. 

Perhaps the word could be applied to Republican Rome and that’s it.

Peterson: 

Maybe it could be applied usefully to certain kinds of tyranny, but not to a society that’s actually functional.

Paglia: 

Victoria England, arguably. But other than that, to use the word ‘patriarchy’ in a slapdash way, so amateurish. It just shows people know nothing about history whatever, have done no reading.

Peterson: 

So what confuses me about that is that despite the fact that the patriarchy is viewed as this essentially evil entity, and that that’s associated with the masculine energy that built this oppressive structure, the antithesis of that, which would actually be femininity as far as I can tell, which is tightly associated with care and with child-rearing, is also denigrated.

So it’s like the only proper role for women to adopt is a patriarchal role, despite the fact that the patriarchy is something that’s entirely corrupt. So the hypothesis seems to be that the patriarchy would be just fine if women ran it. So no changes. It would just be a transformation of leadership, and somehow that would rectify the fundamental problem, even though it’s hypothetically supposed to be structural.

Okay, so I’m going to close with something. So, you know, there are elements in my character that are optimistic. I’ve looked, for example. . . I’ve worked for a UN Committee on the relationship between economic development and sustainability. 

And I found out a variety of things that were very optimistic like the fact that the UN set out to half poverty between 2000 and 2015 worldwide, and actually hit that by about 2010.

So we’re in the period of the fastest transformation of the bottom strata of the world’s population into something approximating middle class that’s ever occurred.

And there’s all these great technological innovations on the horizon. 

And it looks to me like things could go extraordinarily well if we were careful. 

But I’m not optimistic, and maybe that’s me. 

I’m pessimistic because I also see that there’s five or six things happening, all of which appear at the level of catastrophe, that are all happening at the same time.

To Nurture or To Safeguard — That is The Question

“Tufts University psychologists showed people headshots of white Democrats and Republicans. Participants guessed the political affiliation significantly above chance, about 55 to 60 percent. That's better than the house advantage in blackjack. 

The Key Difference? The Study, published this January, found that Democrats projected “Warmth" and Republicans projected "Power."

This contrast between "Warmth" and "Power" characterizes our politics. The health care debate appears mired in innumerable details. But it has always concerned a far deeper debate over two competing ideas of government – To Nurture or To Safeguard. 

The dynamic is so intimately familiar to us because it is conventionally familial. The health care clash, like American politics, remains rooted in our Mommy and Daddy Parties.”

PSYCHOPOMP

"Beatrice is The Psychopomp — a wonderful medieval word for 'Soul Guide' — who leads Dante through The Deep Levels of Purgatory into The Vision of Heaven, a journey of Wholeness and Healing. 

Dante owes his success initially to Virgil, but primarily to Beatrice, who leads, inspires, and awakens him spiritually."

GEOFFREY: 
Yes?
[pause]
Is it about the hedge?
[pause]
Look. I am awfully sorry, but--

GRIM REAPER: 
I am The Grim Reaper.

GEOFFREY: 
Who?

GRIM REAPER: 
The Grim Reaper.

GEOFFREY: 
Yes, I see.

GRIM REAPER: 
I am Death.

GEOFFREY: 
Yes, well, the thing is, we've got some people from America for dinner tonight, and--

ANGELA: 
Who is it, darling?

GEOFFREY: 
It's a 'Mr. Death' or something. 
He's come about the reaping(?) 
I don't think we need any at the moment.

ANGELA: 
Hello. Well, don't leave him hanging around outside, darling. 
Ask him in.

GEOFFREY: 
Darling, I don't think it's quite the moment.

ANGELA: 
Do come in. Come along in. 
Come and have a drink. Do. Come on.

GUESTS: [mumbling]

ANGELA: 
It's one of the little men from the village.

GUESTS: [mumbling]

ANGELA: 
Uh, do come in.

GUESTS: [mumbling]

ANGELA: 
Please.

GUESTS: [mumbling]

ANGELA: 
This is Howard Katzenberg from Philadelphia...

HOWARD KATZENBERG: 
Hi.

ANGELA: 
...and his wife, Debbie,...

DEBBIE: Hello there.

ANGELA: ...and these are the Portland-Smythes, Jeremy and Fiona.

FIONA PORTLAND-SMYTHE: Good evening.

ANGELA: This is Mr. Death.
[spooky music]
Well, do get Mr. Death a drink, darling.

GEOFFREY: Uh, yes.

HOWARD: Mmm.

ANGELA: Mr. Death is a reaper.

GRIM REAPER: The Grim Reaper.

ANGELA: Hardly surprising, in this weather. Ha ha ha.

EVERYONE: [laughing]

HOWARD: 
So, you still, uh, reap around here, do you, Mr. Death?

GRIM REAPER: 
I am The Grim Reaper.

GEOFFREY: 
That's about all he says.

DEBBIE: 
Heh.

GEOFFREY: 
There's your drink, Mr. Death.

ANGELA: 
Do sit down.

DEBBIE: 
We were just talking about some of the awful problems facing the thir-- [gasp]
[crash]

ANGELA: 
Ohh. Would you prefer white? 
I-- I'm afraid we don't have any beer.

JEREMY PORTLAND-SMYTHE: 
The Stilton's awfully good.

GRIM REAPER: 
I am not of This World.
[spooky music]

GEOFFREY: 
Good Lord.

GRIM REAPER: 
I am Death.

DEBBIE: 
Well, isn't that extraordinary? 
We were just talking about death only five minutes ago.

ANGELA: 
Yes, we were.

HOWARD: Mmm. Mm.

ANGELA: You know, whether death is really the end.

DEBBIE: 
As my husband, uh, Howard, here, feels, or whether there is-- and one so hates to use words like 'soul' or 'spirit', but--

JEREMY: 
But what other words can one use?

GEOFFREY: 
E-- exactly.

GRIM REAPER: 
You Do Not Understand.

DEBBIE: 
Ah, no. Obviously not.

HOWARD: 
Let me just tell you something, Mr. Death.

GRIM REAPER: 
You do n--

HOWARD: 
Just one moment. I'd like to express, on behalf of everybody here, what a... really unique experience this is.

JEREMY: 
Hear, hear.

ANGELA: 
Yes, we're so delighted, uh, that you dropped in, Mr. Death.

HOWARD: 
Can I just finish, please?

DEBBIE: 
Mr. Death, is there an after-life?

HOWARD: 
Dear, if you could just wait, please, a moment,--

ANGELA: 
Are you sure you wouldn't like some sherry?

DEBBIE: [mumbling]

HOWARD: 
Angela. Angela, I'd like to just say this at this time, if I could, please. Really.

GRIM REAPER: 
Be quiet!

HOWARD: 
Can I just say this at this time, please?

GRIM REAPER: 
Silence! I have come for you.

ANGELA: 
You mean... to--

GRIM REAPER: 
Take you away. 
That is My Purpose. I am Death.

GEOFFREY: 
Well, that's cast rather a gloom over the evening, hasn't it?

HOWARD: 
I don't see it that way, Geoff. [sniff] 
Let me tell you what I think we're dealing with here: 
a potentially positive learning experience to get an--

GRIM REAPER: 
Shut up! Shut up, You American! 

You always talk, you Americans. 

You talk and you talk and you say 

'Let me tell ya something' 
and 
'I just wanna say this....' 

Well, you're dead now, so shut up!

HOWARD: 
Dead?

GRIM REAPER: 
Dead.

ANGELA: 
All of us?

GRIM REAPER: 
All of you.

GEOFFREY: 
Now, look here --
You barge in here, quite uninvited, break glasses, and then announce, quite casually, that we're all dead. 
Well, I would remind you that you are a guest in this house, and--

[whack]
Ah! Oh.

GRIM REAPER: 
Be quiet! 
Englishmen, you're all so fucking pompous, 
None of you have got any balls.

DEBBIE: 
Can I ask you a question?

GRIM REAPER: 
What?

DEBBIE: 
How can we all have died at the same time?
[silence]

GRIM REAPER: 
The salmon mousse.

GEOFFREY: 
Darling, you didn't use canned salmon, did you?

ANGELA: 
I'm most dreadfully embarrassed.

GRIM REAPER: 
Now the time has come. Follow. Follow me.
[clunk]
[bang bang bang bang bang]

GEOFFREY: Just... testing. Sorry.

GRIM REAPER: 
Follow me. Now.
[deathly music]
Come.
[eerie music]

ANGELA: 
Well, the fishmonger promised me he'd have some fresh salmon, and he's normally so reliable.

RANDOM: 
Stumm. Stumm.

JEREMY: 
Can we keep our glasses?

RANDOM: 
Mmm hmm.

FIONA: 
Oh. Good idea. [hiccup]

RANDOM: 
Come on.

GUESTS: [mumbling]

HOWARD: Okay.

GUESTS: [mumbling]

DEBBIE: 
Hey, I didn't even eat the mousse.

GUESTS: [mumbling]

ANGELA: 
Honestly, darling, I'm so embarrassed. 
It really is embarrassing. I mean,...

HOWARD: I suppose... [mumbling]

ANGELA: 
...to serve salmon with botulism at a dinner party is social death for me.

GEOFFREY: 
Well, all right.

GUESTS: [mumbling]

JEREMY: Uh, shall we take our cars?

FIONA: Do we need them?

GEOFFREY: Why not?

ANGELA: Yes. Why not?

HOWARD: [mumbling] ...is my vote.

ANGELA: Good idea.

RANDOM: Yes. Why not?

GUESTS: [mumbling]

RANDOM: Shall we go separately?
[car sounds]

GUESTS: [mumbling]
[spooky music]

GRIM REAPER: Behold... Paradise.
[elevator music]