Bad Glacier

Oh dear. I seem to have been put on the spot. Both foxes and CM have laid claim to the title of “Blawgosphere’s Cutest”, and I, being the sole link between the two, the only one who knows their true identities, have been assigned the role of judge. The importance of this task cannot be understated, nor the responsibility deflected. The fate of the blawgosphere–nay, the world–rests on the broad, rippling shoulders of this Atlas. But I cannot bear this burden eternally. I must cast it off soon, before I am crushed by the pressure.

First, we must determine the scope of the contest. So I ask: What is “cute”?

According to
Merriam-Webster Online:

1 a : clever or shrewd often in an underhanded manner b : IMPERTINENT, SMART-ALECKY (don ‘t get cute with me)
2 : attractive or pretty especially in a dainty or delicate way
3 : obviously straining for effect

It seems obvious that number 2 is the definition we’re looking for.

In The American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition, we find this word history:

Cute is a good example of how a shortened form of a word can take on a life of its own, developing a sense that dissociates it from the longer word from which it was derived. Cute was originally a shortened form of acute in the sense “keenly perceptive or discerning, shrewd.” In this sense cute is first recorded in a dictionary published in 1731. Probably cute came to be used as a term of approbation for things demonstrating acuteness, and so it went on to develop its own sense of “pretty, fetching,” first recorded with reference to “gals” in 1838.

This seems to hurt foxes’ case, as he is most certainly not a gal. But we’ve come a long way since 1838. Has our society progressed to a point where “lads”, “chaps”, or “fellas”, not just “gals”, can be considered “cute”? I believe so–not only socially, but legally. In Constitutional law, claims of gender discrimination are subject to a “heightened scrutiny” test. This means that the law in question must be “substantially related to a legitimate state interest.” Certainly, we are not examining a legal question here, but I see no reason to let that fact get in my way. As I can think of no “legitimate state interest” that would justify the withholding of the “cute” label from males, it seems there is no barrier to equal-opportunity cuteness.

But isn’t cuteness a subjective description? Can one man truly declare a person cuter than another? Is cuteness in the eye of the beholder, or have I been given license to create an objective reality for the rest of the world? We can begin to make sense of this riddle by invoking Oliver Wendell Holmes. In several sections of The Common Law, Holmes’s treatise on the development of the English and American legal tradition, the eminent jurist examines the elements of crimes and civil remedies and attempts to distill these elements, which often require difficult, if not impossible, assessments of the defendant’s mental state, down to an external standard that applies equally to all people. Adapting this manner of analysis (but not the wisdom behind it), we start by asserting that cuteness is an internal, subjective judgment. If a man calls a puppy cute while attempting to sell it, is this deceitful if the puppy is only cute to the seller? What if the puppy appears cute to everyone except the potential buyer? Does a merchant call something cute at his own peril? This is obviously problematic, not only because of the prohibitive effect on the puppy and kitten markets, but because such a lack of an objective standard casts doubt on the veracity of all speech. Out of fear of a subjective standard of cuteness, people will hesitate to disagree when one calls another person “cute”, “pretty”, or even “hot”. Without the right to differ, how will we know whether Paris Hilton is “sexy” or “a skanky ho-bag attention-whore”?

For the element of intent in criminal law, the objective standard is based on a “person of average prudence”. If such a person could forsee the harm caused by the defendant’s actions, the criminal act is said to be intended. This “average person” model, applied to cuteness, sets an external standard, applicable to all people, that a person may exceed only at her peril.

In this case, I take the position of the average man. Admittedly, a jury trial would be more in keeping with the legal system, but I assume the right has been waived by both parties for the sake of privacy. Secret identities must remain secret, or else our heroes will be captured and made to fight the Omnidroid.

So the time has come to answer the question put to me, to throw this monkey off my back, harpoon this white whale, glue the chip back onto my shoulder, turn this phrase, subtly split this infinitive, eat the bowl of ice cream that has been placed before me:

Who is the cutest blogger in the blawgosphere, foxes or chickenmagazine?

I say, “Yes.”

Go and marinate on that for a minute.

This entry was posted on Tuesday, May 10th, 2005 at 9:55 am and is filed under General. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can skip to the end and leave a response. Pinging is currently not allowed.