December 1, 2009, here on slacktivist: The fatuous foolishness of ‘The Manhattan Declaration’
The Manhattan Declaration provides a hilarious, real-world example of the kind of wince-inducing misplaced self-importance and lack of perspective that I’ve always enjoyed when it’s performed by people like Ricky Gervais or Rowan Atkinson or Steve Coogan. The document begins with the authors comparing themselves to those who defended Christendom against the onslaught of “barbarian tribes.” Then they declare themselves the heirs of John Wesley and William Wilberforce and compare themselves to all those who suffered injustice during the long struggle for civil rights. And they’re still just warming up on their primary subject — their righteous courage and courageous righteousness. By the end of the document, they’re presenting themselves, without qualification or perspective, as a combination of Augustine, Aquinas and Martin Luther King Jr. and comparing their document to King’s “Letter from a Birmingham Jail” — blissfully disregarding the ways in which a “Press Release from the National Press Club” isn’t quite the same thing.
Their own awesomeness is a topic the authors address with relentless relish. Everything else in the document is merely a foil for this central subject. The threat of The Gay is grave, ominous and potentially world-altering, they warn, repeatedly, before reassuring us that their heroic resolve and moral superiority will save the day. Even the passages in which they luxuriate in their own massive humility are saturated with this swaggering self-regard.
This all-consuming self-absorption coupled with an utter lack of self-awareness plays like something from a Christopher Guest movie. I’m only half-convinced at this point that Robert George is even a real person and not a Fred Willard improv run amok. The authors possess that same remarkable knack for straight-faced seriousness while making uproariously ridiculous assertions.
Ad-Free & Subscriber Log-In