Episode 297: No Pleasure in Meanness (Flannery O'Connor's "A Good Man is Hard to Find")

Very Bad Wizards

Tamler Sommers & David Pizarro

Society & Culture, Philosophy

4.8 • 3K Ratings

🗓️ 26 November 2024

⏱️ 101 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

David and Tamler face off with the Misfit in Flannery O’Connor’s classic short story “A Good Man is Hard to Find.” We sort through the biblical allusions, dark comedy, nihilism, and the possibility of grace or rebirth (but whose)? Plus why do motorists dehumanize cyclists? Is it the helmets? Sounds like a job for the insect-based "Ascent of Man" scale.

Limb, M., & Collyer, S. (2023). The effect of safety attire on perceptions of cyclist dehumanisation. Transportation research part F: traffic psychology and behaviour, 95, 494-509.

"A Good Man is Hard to Find (short story)" [wikipedia.org]

A Good Man is Hard to Find and Other Stories by Flannery O'Connor [amazon.com affiliate link]

(note: you can google for a .pdf of the story and you'll find some links floating around!)

Transcript

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0:00.0	Very Bad Wizards is a podcast with a philosopher, my dad, and psychologist Dave Vizarro,
0:06.0	having an informal discussion about issues in science and ethics.
0:09.0	Please note that the discussion contains bad words that I'm not allowed to say,
0:13.0	and knowing my dad, some very inappropriate jokes.
0:17.0	So I'm gonna die. I want people to think that I'm this, I'm great, I'm...
0:20.0	No, we're nothing. We're dead. We're dust. We're absolutely nothing. Our legacy is nothing.
0:30.8	The great end boss has spoken.
0:35.6	Pay no attention to that man behind the curtain.
0:43.3	Who are you?
0:45.3	Who are you?
0:47.3	I'm a very bad man.
0:49.3	I'm a very good man.
0:51.3	Good man.
0:59.0	They think deep thoughts, and with no more brains than you have. May no attention to that man.
1:02.0	Anybody can have a brain?
1:07.0	You're a very bad man. I'm a very good man. Just a very bad man.
1:11.6	I'm a very good man.
1:13.3	Just a very bad wizard.
1:16.0	Welcome to Very Bad Wizards.
1:17.2	I'm Tamler Summers from the University of Houston.
1:19.4	Dave, everyone I know on Twitter seems to be moving to blue sky.
1:23.7	Isn't it just ageism to expect people like us to know how to do that start all over on some other app
	...

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