Suzanne Fields

Saying ‘goodbye’ in a changing world

Saying goodbye is never easy. Every school child quotes "parting is such sweet sorrow" from "Romeo and Juliet," which has become a sentimental cliche.

July 31, 2019

Politics can be sordid, but it’s the barrier against the barbarians

In the Age of Trump, a growth industry of commentators and critics is in search of a mythical image, a graphic insight, a metaphorical phrase to capture our fragmented politics and culture. "Make America Great Again" worked as a campaign slogan, but it's about process, not essence.

July 10, 2019

Political debates dominate social, intellectual landscape, much to our peril

Summer is the time for conversation, at the beach or in the mountains, on the front porch or park bench, wherever we find the change of pace that pleases. It's a time for stretching and refreshing body and mind, to look at things with a fresh focus. At least that's how it used to be when friends and family gathered together for lively talk after jumping waves, hiking new trails or climbing the stairs of an old lighthouse.

July 3, 2019

The culture gets weirder with grim transnews

Love is bustin' out all over. It's summer and June is the favorite month of brides. Or it used to be. Nothing is what it used to be, including brides. Sex, if not necessarily love to die for, gets weirder and weirder.

June 26, 2019

Jury rebuke of Oberlin College suggests a limit to campus political correctness

Oberlin has lost a major lawsuit for abetting what might be described as "a collective hate-crime hoax," and the case could be a tipping point against political correctness.

June 19, 2019

Happy Father’s Day: Paternity leave gaining support

Bonding with a newborn baby isn't just women's work any longer. Men now say "what's good for the goose is good for the gander." Fathers want in on parental leave.

June 12, 2019

When Democratic candidates talk sense

When the sacred cow is a pet and you twist her tail you can expect booing, not mooing, from the cow's friends. That's what happened at the California state Democratic convention in San Francisco over the weekend when two presidential candidates took a turn twisting the cow's tail.

June 5, 2019

Moe Berg risked his life against the Axis

Once upon a time in America baseball was not only the National Pastime, but the national obsession, an idyll of summer. Every town and city had a team. Abbott and Costello made their bones with their classic routine, "Who's on First?" Baseball was the great equalizer on sandlot and ball park. Everybody knew the words to "Take Me Out to the Ball Game" and everybody shared in the enthusiasm for the "home team."

May 29, 2019

Liberation from student loan debt for one Class of ‘19 teaches a universal lesson

Pomp and circumstance depends a lot more on circumstance than pomp. The 396 graduates of Morehouse College in Atlanta learned that in an unforgettable way the other day at their commencement ceremony. The graduates with their families and friends whooped it up, with plenty to whoop it up for. The commencement speaker surprised them with the announcement that he was paying off all their student loans.

May 22, 2019

Doris Day did it her way

Doris Day, who died this week at age 97, was a revolutionary who did it her way. She was the buttery blond beauty with the tantalizing silken voice that could light up lyrics with seductive directness. Hard-core feminists hated her for how she did it, and have been trying to bury her image for years.

May 15, 2019

We’ve got the horse right here

The less imaginative among us are calling it "Gait-gate." Not as clever as "Watergate" -- derivatives never are -- but it's about horses, not humans. Jonathan Swift might have included this story in "Gulliver's Travels." A horse goofs, humans whine, and the Kentucky Derby disqualifies the winner for the first time in its 145 years.

May 8, 2019

The affluent woman falls into a new gender gap

Freud was supposed to be a wise man, but he could never answer the question, "What do women want?" When he suggested that women who want the power and authority to be like men suffer "penis envy," he coined a modern myth. He didn't get it quite right, but the meaning behind his diagnosis became a driving force of modern feminism. (You could ask the women running for president.)

May 1, 2019

Women who seek meek men have something to learn, too

Identity politics revives sexist stereotypes, and like most stereotypes, they diminish us all to a multitude of prejudices. Generalizations seek the simplest common denominator and usually sink to the lowest.

April 24, 2019

Benjamin Netanyahu is neither loved nor particularly liked in Israel, but necessary for survival

Benjamin Netanyahu just won his fifth term as prime minister of Israel. He's not the most beloved in the pantheon of Israeli leaders. As a patriarch, he has no aura. In this re-election he was haunted by allegations of corruption and his political rhetoric of expediency lacks trustworthiness. He's not loved, or even that well liked.

April 17, 2019

Being both ‘woke’ and ‘hot’ confuses the soldiers of the war between the sexes

Between the Sexual Revolution of the 1960s and the #MeToo movement of the present day, lies a battlefield strewn with bodies and minds battered by the changing weapons of physical and psychological destruction. The war between the sexes, like all wars, exacts an unexpected price.

April 10, 2019

A revival of the Puritan bewilders the Joe Biden generation

Generation gaps become generation ditches, with glitches.

April 3, 2019

Sexual politics in the Age of Trump

The Mueller report ought to bring an end to the obsession that Hillary Clinton was robbed of the presidency, but it won't. Donald Trump beat her fair and square. He didn't get any help from the Russians.

March 27, 2019

We feel both pity and fear, but at a distance after attacks in New Zealand

The good news is that the technological revolution and social media have produced the swiftest and the most expansive means for the communication of ideas that man has ever known. The bad news is that we pay a high price for it. Fact and opinion linger long after proven wrong, as they often are, and the coarsening of the culture continues apace as every Tom, Dick and Henrietta taps a keyboard or speaks into a microphone, magnifying fleeting misinformation.

March 20, 2019

When anti-Semitism is reduced to bitter farce

Politics has always exploited the pop culture to reach "the people," but in our identity-conscious time, employing social media as the mode of communicating, pop references can be hazardous to the health of your political party. Those using such new ways of talking must know the audience, like a traveling salesman must "know the territory."

March 13, 2019

Lost in the muddled middle

The definition of who's a suitable friend, lover or lifelong mate has changed over the years. As racial prejudice has done a slow fade from the bad old days — it's still with us but it's no longer respectable anywhere — the new, respectable prejudice is political.

March 6, 2019