Latin Should be Abolished, Says (Another) Nut Job

This I jumped out of bed and got my morning newspaper, The Sunnyrise Asylum Gazette. Once they had undone my straightjacket, I was able to read the paper and I realized that, although dot-to-dot, still challenges me, it really is a load of rubbish.

But then let’s face it all newspapers are trash these days. In fact the only newspaper that is any good would be one I wrote myself. (Note To Self: After world domination had been successful, must start own newspaper)

What particularly upset me and caused my minders to shovel pills down my throat like I was Heath Ledger enjoying a good evening in, was an article which suggested that Latin should be abolished.

Yes.
Latin.
Should.
Be.
Abolished.

This is obviously crazy. You cannot abolish Latin. Even his more lucid suggestion that we invent a time machine and go back to Latin times and kill all the Romans before they invented Latin was clearly flawed. The logistical problems involved in killing all teh Romans with only primitive weapons does not make thsi feasible.

You might say that the trouble with modern communication in this 24 hour hours age is that any crank or nut job can write what is on his oblatantly deranged mind and then publish it. Isn’t it best just to ignore it? Well yes, I (obviously) have a point, but by a strange co-incidence, I had two visitors, who know something about the world, around for coffee and cake that morning who said that the world needed to hear my response.

“Derk, you’re a, um, Latinist” He began.
“Actually, I am a Latinystor.”
“What?
“Well, it’s like I am an educationalystor, I am as Latinystor.”
“Ok, but the point, um, I wanted to make was that you should respond to this stupid, insane article.”
“You think?”
“Yes, I do. The world needs to hear what you have to say.”
“True,” I reflected, “But sorry, how rude I haven’t offered you any cake. Would you like some?”
“Yes, pecan. And what do you want Hillary?”

But I digress, and as regular readers of my blog know, I like to get straight to the point without getting distracted by attempting to remind people of the obvious near divine levels of intelligence that I obviously have.

So why shouldn’t we abolish Latin?

Point One
I speak Latin. This is a good reason. There are clearly hundreds of thousands of people who want to speak latin so that they can converse with me as a near intellectual equal. To abolish Latin would be to take away the illusion which these deluded people have that they migfht actually be able to speak any language with the fluency that I do.

Point Two
The article says that people do not understand Latin so it should be abolished. If they learned Latin then they would be able to understand it. Easy.

There I have just solved the problem in two easy steps. But I think I need to go on and make a positive case for Latin.

Why study Latin?
Study Latin why?

See, already I am messing with your minds and talking about English grammar and you are so stupid that you didn't notice. Latin is really important to how we understand english. English comes from Latin! Latin has the same relationship to English that Woody Allen has to Soon-Yi Previn.

Clever people like me have been able to speak Latin for a long time. They should be allowed to continue. Even stupid people can become less stupid by learning some Latin. They also get self-awareness as we can patronize them by speaking them language of Cicero, Horace and Virgil much better than they can. They realise they are not as clever as people like me.

And for those of you who are intimidated by my genius, do yourself a favor.

Learn Latin.

Latin is the nervous system, the linguistic spinal cord, of our language.
I am the heart. Pumping Latin into the bloodstream of our body.

ddb iv