The Great International Philosophers’ Soccer Match

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1. Yvonne Siu-Runyan says:

   October 14, 2017 at 2:40 pm

   FUNNEEEE! Thank you, Diane.

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2. LeftCoastTeacher says:

   October 14, 2017 at 6:06 pm

   Now that’s what I call the most beautiful game. What a peaceful sport, philosophy is. Those Ancient Greeks were good. By the way, I had to wonder what Lenin was doing on the German side. Weird. We Americans could stand to improve. I would stop selecting players from the Silicon Valley and Wall Street teams for our national squad. They don’t know how to share the ball. We need Matt Damon. He was good for Invictus. He could captain a team of public school teachers. Lots of hidden philosophical football talent in the schools is being wasted while we overpay pseudo-intellectual players like David Coleman and Campbell Brown.

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   • SomeDAM Poet says:

     October 14, 2017 at 8:38 pm

     Bill Gates should keep his ball to himself, thank you very much.

     “Foul Ball”

     Sharing got us in a mess
     Common Core and VAM and test
     Billy Gates should keep his ball
     Naught but trouble for us all

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     • LeftCoastTeacher says:

       October 14, 2017 at 10:39 pm

       Gatesey at the Bat (with apologies to, well, everyone)

       The Outlook wasn’t brilliant for the profiteer that day:
       The score stood for teachers, with but one inning more to play.
       And then when small schools died at first, and Common Core the same,
       A sickly silence fell upon the bankers of the game.
       A straggling few disinvested in deep despair. The rest
       Clung to the greed which lives eternal in the reformster’s breast;
       They thought, if only Bill Gates could get but a whack at that –
       We’d put up even money, now, with Billy at the bat.
       But Broad preceded Billy, as did also Michelle Rhee,
       And the former was a lulu and the latter eating bees;
       So upon that stricken hedge fund crowd grim melancholy sat,
       For there seemed but little chance of Gatesey’s getting to the bat.
       But Broad payed for a single, to the wonderment of all,
       And Rhee, the much despis-ed, used her broom against the ball;
       And when the dust had lifted, and the Boys saw what had occurred,
       There was Michelle safe at second and Eli hugging third.
       Then from 5,000 throats and more there rose a lusty yell;
       It rumbled through the mansions, it rattled in the dell;
       It knocked on Martha’s Vineyard and recoiled big oil flats,
       For Billy, mighty Bill Gates, was advancing to the bat.
       There was glut in Gates’ manner as he stepped into his place;
       There was in greed Billy’s bearing and a twisted, smiling face.
       And when, responding to the roars, he sneered and doffed his hat,
       No mogul in the crowd could doubt ’twas Gatsey at the bat.
       Ten thousand eyes were on him as he wrung his hands in plot;
       Five thousand bankers yelled when he bought umpires he sought.
       Then while the writhing teacher ground the ball into her hip,
       Defiance gleamed in Gates’ eye, a sneer curled Billy’s lip.
       And now the public funded sphere came hurtling through the air,
       And Bill Gates stood a-watching it in haughty grandeur there.
       Close by the nerdy batsman the ball unheeded sped-
       “That ain’t my style,” said Gatesey. “Strike one,” the umpire said.
       From the benches, black with DFERs, there went up a muffled roar,
       Like the beating of the storm-waves on a stern and distant shore.
       “Kill him! Kill the teacher!” shouted someone on the stand;
       And its likely they’d a-killed her had not Ravitch raised her hand.
       With a smile of techno hubris great Billy’s visage shone;
       He cheered the rising tumult and bade the game go on;
       He signaled as if thinking, and once more the spheroid flew;
       But Bill Gates still ignored it, and the umpire said, “Strike two.”
       “Kids First!” cried the maddened thousands, and echo answered fraud;
       But one great parent Opt Out and the audience was awed.
       They saw his face grow stern and cold, they saw his muscles strain,
       And they knew that Gatesey wouldn’t let that ball go by again.
       The sneer is gone from Gatesey’s lip, his teeth are clenched in hate;
       He pounds with cruel violence his bat upon the plate.
       And now the teacher holds the ball, and now she lets it go,
       And now the schools are shattered by the force of Gates’ blow.
       Oh, somewhere in Bill’s fantasy the sun is shining bright;
       The music app playing somewhere, union resistance light,
       And somewhere bankers laughing, and somewhere moguls shout;
       But there’s no joy in charters – mighty Bill Gates has struck out.

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     • SomeDAM Poet says:

       October 15, 2017 at 7:55 am

       Excellent!

       DAM, wish I’d written that😀

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     • LeftCoastTeacher says:

       October 15, 2017 at 9:24 am

       It’s a fun game, what you’ve invented. I enjoyed cutting up a poem last night while I watched the ballgame on TV. Thank you, Poet. Could be rather addictive. I’ll have to be careful not to cut up my students’ papers too much while I grade them this morning.

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     • SomeDAM Poet says:

       October 15, 2017 at 11:43 am

       Have you tried this with your students?

       I have found that when I modify someone else’s song or poem, I really have to pay attention to both the way it was put together and the meaning. I think what is most fun of all is to make the absolute minimum modifications to a poem or song so that it makes sense in a whole new context. That one can do that is a sign of a great work, I believe. I have found that Robert Frost’s poems are very good for this.

       For example, a friend of mine wrote a book called Good Water ableout his experiences in a small town in Southern Utah where there were canals and ditches to distribute irrigation water. It reminded me of Mending Wall, by Robert Frost, so I rewrote the poem as “Mending Canals”. Good fun.

       I actually think it would be a very good way to teach poetry because it allows students to take a poem and make it their own. It’s a lot like the way they used to teach painting by copying the Masters. People would copy but still put their own creative imprint on the painting. Many of the greatest painters actually learned by this method.

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     • SomeDAM Poet says:

       October 15, 2017 at 11:48 am

       By the way. The poems that can easily be modified to speak about something other than that of which they originally spoke are precisely the ones that are most universal in their message.

       I think that is the true sign of a great poem.

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     • LeftCoastTeacher says:

       October 15, 2017 at 12:04 pm

       As a matter of fact, yes. Well, sort of. I annually have my students translate Shakespeare into their own language. I never thought to have them keep the language and change the meaning. Fantastic idea! Thank you. See there, more teachers need to read this blog. There are already many, but there needs be more.

       Regarding what makes a great poem, I can’t top the definition in “Ars Poetica” by Archibald MacLeish.

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     • LeftCoastTeacher says:

       October 15, 2017 at 12:07 pm

       By the way, it’s been bothering me that I didn’t change “Kill him” to “Kill her! Kill the teacher!” in Gatesey at the Bat.

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     • SomeDAM Poet says:

       October 15, 2017 at 1:12 pm

       Yes, the lack of edits with WordPress is especially frustrating for the poet, who is never satisfied and hence never finished.

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     • Bob Shepherd says:

       October 17, 2017 at 1:52 am

       LOL

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   • Bob Shepherd says:

     October 17, 2017 at 1:51 am

     OMG, LeftCoastTeacher, that Gatesy at the Bat is just WONDERFUL. Thank you, thank you, thank you. Such fun!!! Well crafted and hilarious.

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3. LeftCoastTeacher says:

   October 15, 2017 at 12:22 pm

   SomeDAM teacher.

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   • SomeDAM Poet says:

     October 15, 2017 at 3:00 pm

     Or SomeDAM clown 🤡

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4. Duane E Swacker says:

   October 15, 2017 at 1:19 pm

   Philosophizing, according to Andre Comte-Sponville, is thinking/communicating without the benefit of proofs.

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   • SomeDAM Poet says:

     October 15, 2017 at 2:58 pm

     Well, Descartes believed that thinking was proof enough.

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5. markstextterminal says:

   October 16, 2017 at 7:16 am

   This one is always a favorite, but so is the Australian Philosophy Professors’s Song…. I’ve been stuck on the “Pirahna Brothers” sketch lately.

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6. Bob Shepherd says:

   October 17, 2017 at 1:36 am

   One of my all-time favorites:

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   • Duane E Swacker says:

     October 23, 2017 at 10:51 am

     Gracias.

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     • Bob Shepherd says:

       October 23, 2017 at 4:02 pm

       De nada, hermano!

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7. Bob Shepherd says:

   October 17, 2017 at 1:38 am

   More philosophical funnies:

   The Tractatus Comico-Philosophicus: Martin Heidegger

   The Tractatus Comico-Philosophicus: Rene Descartes

   The Tractatus Comico-Philosophicus: Søren Aabye Kierkegaard

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