Why are liberals unable to sympathize with conservatives? I offer three possibilities. First, I often wonder if this “blind spot” for conservatives is similar to the psychopath who cannot comprehend the morality of those who are “normal.” At the present time, there is no known cure for treating the psychopath. Trying to get someone on the left to see where a conservative is coming from may be as difficult as trying to change the mind of a psychopath. […]
[…]
The second possibility is that liberals do have the capacity to empathize with conservatives, but they do not have to do so because of the liberal bubble they mostly live in. Schools, the media, and many of the cities they live in lean left. This means that there is no incentive to understand other ideas and there are no consequences for showing disgust and ugly feelings towards conservatives.
[…]
So what is the prescription here for those of us who are conservative or libertarian? There may be no way to get the “other side” to understand our views, for they may not have the capacity to do so. Until the lack of empathy for conservatives miraculously changes, we might do better to grow our own ranks, getting more of us involved, rather than trying to rationalize our own views to the other side. Giving in only wastes valuable time that could be put to better use and makes liberals more likely to treat us poorly.
At the same time, we should consider that it could be a lack of consequences that allows liberals to lack empathy or understanding for their fellow right-leaning citizens. Expanding right-leaning media and exposing liberals to ridicule and consequences (e.g., Andrew Breitbart) might then be the correct path to take, for the ease with which they attack may decrease once they realize that they will not get off scott-free as they once did.
Finally, and my third possibility, is it could be lack of education that allows the left to lack empathy. They are not exposed to right-leaning and libertarian ideas. For example, how many classes at school are teaching about the ideas of Hayek, Friedman, and Rand? If kids grow up without this information, they may turn into adults who lack the ability to understand other points of view.
Perhaps a combination of all three is needed: expanding right-leaning media, getting more people involved, and making sure consequences are dealt out to those liberals who lie and treat conservatives with disrespect. Yes, this means all of us speaking up wherever we are when we hear false, inflammatory, or just plain mean remarks made about conservatives. And finally, clamoring for more diverse educational topics and literature in the schools and media would be helpful.
Conservatives shouldn’t back down on any of this, ever. For it is persistence and consistency that will eventually win the day. The left did it for decades and it clearly works. The left’s advantage has been that the right caves and is so worried about appearing moral that they back down, conceding any power. The right’s advantage is that we understand how the other side thinks, while they do not. Keep this in mind when you think about strategies to keep our liberties and freedoms intact.
[my emphasis]
Good stuff. And not just because some of it sounds eerily familiar.
Of course, to be fair, the “right” exhibits its share of intolerance — which, like that from the left, generally manifests in a kind of ostentatious public sanctimony. The difference is, for all the worry we consistently hear about the “religious right” threatening to turn the US into a theocracy, very rarely will we see any actual agitation from mainstream conservatives to turn religious doctrine into state or federal law. Whereas the churches of environmentalism and government-mandated “charity” (which isn’t; charity tends not to be backed by fines and guns) have joined up, of late, to fortify the Church of Progressivism, which is very quickly becoming a de facto “official” church of the United States.
How proud the founders would have been…
…
outlaw.
****
update: In the comments, David Thompson writes:
If there is an asymmetry of empathy – and my own experience suggests there is to some extent – it may be worth bearing in mind that a person’s politics often shift away from the left with age and experience. In other words, quite a few non-leftists (whether classical liberals, conservatives, libertarians, etc) were at some point excited by, or surrounded by, leftish assumptions. Possibly as students, and possibly in circumstances where, for some, a leftist outlook was the only recognised indicator of being political at all.
This is an important observation, and one that bears always keeping in mind: from the perspective of the modern academy, the only legitimate politics — bracketing out the hoary old conservatism of, say, Burke, which is studied as a curio — is the politics of “social justice,” that is, the politics of modern left-liberalism or “progressivism.” Being on the “right,” therefore, is not considered being “political” at all — except in the pragmatic sense that those on the right somehow, maddeningly, are still allowed to vote, and so upset the inexorable path of “cultural evolution” toward a progressive singularity. Instead, classical liberals, non-libertine libertarians, and conservatives — more often than not referred to simply as “right wingers” or (and this is one and the same nowadays) “the far right” — are cast as a populist nuisance, a collection of rabble controlled by the basest of impulses, from racism to nativism to homophobia to xenophobia. They are, in effect, outside politics proper — which is now cast as a system in which the State is guarantor of rights and “justice,” included in which is a move toward equality of outcome (and so, like it or not, socialism) — and are dealt with only as a rock in the shoe of the climb toward social Utopia.
To be on the left, then, is (by the rules of the modern academy) to be “political” — and being political carries with it the heady suggestion of being a serious thinker. Whereas to be on the right is to mark yourself as someone in need of re-education, at best — and should that fail, as someone to be either punished or, ultimately, shunned.
Kind of reminds me of the drones that showed up (and are still showing up) on Darleen’s Rape of Liberty thread. I have reached the point of “Screw you, proggy!” Not very forgiving, or understanding, true, but the endless lies, mischaracterisations and bad faith have taken their toll. That Sister Otis really took the biscuit.
Yea, this was a good article. I put it up, hoping to get some of my libs to counter. Alas, they’ve failed so far. I guess, and this is my supposition, because it’s pretty much dead on.
I shan’t back down, ever. I remain polite, almost 100% of the time (cynn seems to bring out a bit of snarling from me aside) – but don’t mistake manners for weakness.
SW, I heartily agree, that thread is almost nothing but this phenomenon in action. It is a puzzle.
liberals who lie and treat conservatives with disrespect
You must mean those teabaggers with the Obama Nazi/Marxist/witchdoctor signs spewing lies about death panels?
Got a link, James?
And you know what a horrible Christian theocracy might look like, according to proggs? That horrible place nobody ever visits known as “Ireland.”
Pubs closed on Good Friday, even for Magner’s League Leinster v. Munster rugby union match:
http://www.belfasttelegraph.co.uk/business/business-news/pub-owners-fury-over-good-friday–munster—leinster–rugby-clash-14704245.html
Just to be clear, there will be government death panels as a result of this legislation, although they won’t be honest enough to name them death panels.
your people
http://www.veteranstoday.com/2010/03/20/tea-party-protesters-scream-nigger-at-black-congressman/
I can’t believe that “rape” conversation is still ongoing, frankly. It’s easy: the comic took the violation of a cherished ideal — a “rape” (using one of the dictionary definitions for the term) — anthropomorphized it (easily done, given the “Lady Liberty” has long been done for us), and came to the rather obvious raping of Lady Liberty by the President, in which the premise was the rather dubious lack of consent, and the President’s attitude toward the vast majority of citizens who didn’t want Obamacare, seeing it as a wrongheaded violation of their personal liberties.
Those who are pretending the use of “rape” is the singular domain of those who’ve experienced it (and, of course, those like Chris who haven’t, but who feel themselves somehow better suited toward empathy than the rest of us) are, sadly, victim squatters; those who pretend to see racism — because of a particular trope about black men and white women (is Liberty white?) — are simply creating their own text to gin up outrage. The President happens to be black. Had the cartoon desired a racialist component, I suspect he’d have been depicted as striped.
So yes, you’re right, SW. Which is why I very early on gave up engaging the visiting outraged. Because whether the outrage was real, or meant to try to close off debate, it was nevertheless incidental to the point of the cartoon.
And there was nothing about that cartoon that was outside the bounds of the tradition of political cartooning, so far as I’m concerned, and so why on earth should I feel ashamed, or apologize for “allowing” it on my site?
I don’t. I’m not Darleen. She can speak for herself.
I ran into an audio from AEI of a lecture by John Tomasi on Hayek’s ideas from his book Law, Legislation and Liberty: The Mirage of Social Justice, which touches in places on these questions of difference. Hayek insists that “Only situations that have been created by human will can be called just or unjust.” and to speak of social justice is the same as to speak of a “moral stone”.
James seems days behind the news cycle, and grades behind graduating as “proficient.”
Pubs closed on Good Friday, even for Magner’s League Leinster v. Munster rugby union match:
Holy Mary Mother of God. That’s gone one step too far, Alec. How is one meant to watch it on wide screen with a pint of stout?
Alec,
No, they won’t be honest about anything. They’ll certainly come up with something Orwellian, like the UK National Health Service’s “NICE”.
“You must mean those teabaggers with the Obama Nazi/Marxist/witchdoctor signs spewing lies about death panels?”
I agree with everything James wrote, except the ‘lies’ part.
1. Nazi? Obama has the Berlin 1936 playbook out and is running it step by step.
2. Marxist? Obama is a Marxist by his own admission. Everything he has ever said (before his candor became an impediment to the acquisition of power) shows that he is proponent of state control of the means of production.
3. Witchdoctor? Obama insists that he can cut costs while covering an additional 30 million people and do it all without raising taxes. Brother, if that ain’t Voodoo I don’t know what is.
I hear they are calling for Cheney’s arrest at the HuffPo, James!
Run, and you might get some sweet sweet digs in based on his first name being Dick!
Wow, even if true, and that has never been proven to be true, who the hell cares if some guy called another guy a nigger? Really? What does that have to do with the legislation? I also didn’t realize that Dr. Helen called all people on the right perfect. James is exceptionally slow.
How do their balls taste, James?
What I loved particularly about the death panels matter was that our supposed unbiased media did a “find” request for the words “death panels” and concluded – “nope, no death panels are in there” – knowing, of course, that “death panels” was a way of characterizing the rationing of care that is inevitable and which was admitted to be so by supporters of the President and the several incarnations of this legislation.
Funny how not one video or audio recording has surfaced to support that claim. Nothing seems to entice anything coming forward; not $10,000 cash offered by Mark Levin, not a $100,000 donation to the United Negro College Fund offered by Andrew Breitbart. Nothing.
It doesn’t matter. The “James” of the world don’t care at all: the lie has been repeated often enough that it has become “conventional wisdom” and proof is no longer necessary.
You have to start with the mindset of the media, wherein all of the fantastical claims made by Democrats in support of the legislation are unquestionably true, which makes the legislation itself an unmitigated benefit to mankind. Having absorbed this mindset, the only remaining reason for opposing this legislation is hatred of the superior sort of people who proposed it for the basest of reasons – ergo, Y’all raciss.
Yea James. That link you provided is what is known as a fail. You prove it happened, and you’ve got $10,000 cash in hand.
Alec, if the “N” word did get bandied about (which I doubt), I’m sure that would have been a mighty scary thing to happen to an elected Representative surrounded by secret service. @@
Alec,
Oh, that little bedwetting Media exercise was hilarious. Anyone who believed that Sarah Palin was actually claiming Obamacare contained something spelled out in that way ( rather than employing hyperbole for effect), is as dumb as… well, as dumb as hf thinks Palin is.
Maybe Snoop Dog and Dr. Dre were there, voicing their support for the bill and for Representatives Clyburn and Cleaver, referring to them affectionately in the now customary manner?
I mean, no one has video to disprove this, do they?
I’m not even sure if I doubt it, Carin. People are pissed. Even assholes can be on the side of liberty and freedom. But as Alec said, the little guy James here has no idea if it happened. He says it did, because his masters told him it did. The greater question, the only one that matters, is the legislation. The eroding of personal liberty and freedom. Somebody, maybe calling someone a nigger or not? A deflection for morons such as james to get his panties in a bunch because he’d rather not come right out and say that he thinks liberty is overrated and too hard.
“Why are liberals unable to sympathize with conservatives? I offer three possibilities. First, I often wonder if this “blind spot” for conservatives is similar to the psychopath who cannot comprehend the morality of those who are “normal.””
In the 1980’s I was at a campus visiting a friend. Both conservatives, we ended up running across a constant feature of the 1980s campus – a bunch of tents camped out ‘protesting’ aparteid… so we engaged one of the activists there. During the conversation, where we challenged them on what this white liberal would be doing if they were in the Afrikaaner shoes, the person we were talking to said: “I don’t recognize the humanity of the white South Africans.”
Same as it ever was. They hate “injustice” and that “injustice” is someone getting ahead of someone else. Ergo, anyone who is not a victim is Evil People.
The only liberals worth a tinker’s dam love America more than they hate conservatives. Are there any of those left anymore?
I seen an injunction recently, quite frequently in fact, that folks who plan to attend protest gatherings or townhalls be sure to remember to take their video recording devices with them and be sure to use them. Which makes sense, of course, however events may fall out. But it is notable that despite plentifully available video disproving hollow testimonial claims, those claims are granted an honest provenance nevertheless. Minds, like umbrellas, only work when they’re open.
Back on topic:
Prepare to be denounced as an “slimy apologist” by a certain formerly-popular “conservative” blogger, who thinks he’s proven that ALL elected Republicans are connected in some way to the “Dominionist” movement.
That is an excellent post. Thank you.
Real liberals were for fiscal responsibility, a strong welfare net, a muscular freedom-based foreign policy and defense, and openness about different varieties of personal mores.
Unfortunately, they all died.
If there is an asymmetry of empathy – and my own experience suggests there is to some extent – it may be worth bearing in mind that a person’s politics often shift away from the left with age and experience. In other words, quite a few non-leftists (whether classical liberals, conservatives, libertarians, etc) were at some point excited by, or surrounded by, leftish assumptions. Possibly as students, and possibly in circumstances where, for some, a leftist outlook was the only recognised indicator of being political at all. Those who recall youthful involvement with – or passive immersion in – leftish politics are perhaps more likely to have some grasp of the arguments and psychology involved. Whereas a person first encountering that exciting leftish milieu, again possibly as a student, may not have a comparable and reciprocal frame of reference.
Which may explain the number of times I have to deal with indignant attacks on a position I haven’t aired, or a caricature of a position I haven’t aired, rather than the argument I’ve actually advanced.
Instalanche and Wifealanche! Who says they don’t love you, Jeff?
Yes, but for me these assumptions died at around the time that I could assume that someone else would wipe my ass and change my nappy. I surmise that, had we had the ability to do so, if we were to inspect the underwear of Leftists we would find that very many would have soiled themselves.
As a lefty myself, I got a kick out of this. In the section of the article you bolded, just swap the words “left” and “right” and it’s exactly how we think of you!
“The right’s advantage has been that the left caves and is so worried about appearing moral that they back down, conceding any power. The left’s advantage is that we understand how the other side thinks, while they do not. Keep this in mind when you think about strategies to keep our liberties and freedoms intact.”
So as a thinking lefty then Sam, how do you propose to leap the chasm? Got any useful ideas?
White South Africans got “ahead” of the black majority by violently subjugating and exploiting them.
Hope this helps.
Really? That must be how you know we’re all inveterate racists, huh?
Seems to me that the point was last seen at a cruising altitude above AJB’s head.
Sam
The problem is, you DO NOT understand how conservatives think, nor do you care to. Strawmen and media stereotypes are much easier to knock down.
@sdferr: Well, first off, I think you need to lose the pop psychology babble of Dr. Helen. One’s political persuasion is not a mental deficiency or pyschological illness, no matter how satisfying it is to call the other side such names. Second, escaping the vacuum of your side’s partisan media is helpful. It’s very tempting to stay in the universe of opinionators who agree with you 99% of the time. Examples: Get off of Protein Wisdom and check out Daily Kos! Get off of Daily Kos and check out a tea party!
My $0.02, anyway.
You’d have gotten the same response if you asked a Good German about the plight of the German Jews, circa 1937. Or a Good Leftist about the plight of the Israeli Jews, circa now.
Yeah, yeah, Godwin… I went there.
Good luck with Sam, kids. I don’t have the energy any more for the Sams of the world.
I think she’s bang on about the lack of education part. And I think I’d actually hold churches more responsible than schools for not explaining the conservative ideas more better. I know my Lutheran pastors were always dirty socialists what couldn’t impart a conservative principle to save their lives. The first one was a very very good and his wife too but they were reds. The next pastor was passionately liberal and gay but very closety about it and we didn’t talk about it til way after he left. He quit and bought a motorcycle and went to central america to do fabulous gay Lutheran pastor biker things. Then he came back but to a different town.
But anyways I think we’re back to that conversation about how conservatives are under-represented in the ideas-imparting industries.
Alec
No, actually, I think he gets the point, and agrees with the anti-aparteid protester you described. I would not be at all surprised if AJB took no issue with a black-dominated South African government forcibly expelling all whites from the country, and murdering those who refuse, Mugabe-fashion.
We understand the conservative’s view, we just don’t agree with it. Not all, but many conservatives are racists and/or homophobes. Not all, but many conservatives have no empathy at all for the sick, the disabled, the poor, the hungry, the homeless, the unemployed, or the rights and freedoms of those they disagree with or don’t approve of. Not all, but many conservatives put money before people when weighing issues of the day. We know conservatives are doing what they think is right and best for the country. Yet, to conservatives, liberals/progressives HATE the US and want to destroy it.
Sam, how about we lose attributions to one another’s states of mind where we have no evidence to tether such projections? For instance, I no more ascribe upon myself Dr. Reynold’s pop psychology than you appear to do upon yourself. Yet here, you could not pause to find out? Rather, you expend your time or typing breath on emptiness generated in your own mind and place these constructs upon me. Interesting method you’ve got there.
Hey, it’s like you ask for evidence, and Bob shows up to give you a data point, right there in the thread itself. Thanks, Bob.
I thought Bob’s comment was sincere. But I’d bet the same percentage of liberals are all those things he says.
@sdferr: Well, first off, I think you need to lose the pop psychology babble of Dr. Helen. One’s political persuasion is not a mental deficiency or pyschological illness, no matter how satisfying it is to call the other side such names.
Isee what you did there Sam. Pity, you don’t.
Right, Bob. It’s the conservatives’ fault that all the Democratic strongholds have turned into hellholes of unemployment, ignorance, violence, and despair over the past fifty years. It can’t be that liberal policies just don’t work. I mean, think of all the good intentions!
And how many is “many”, Bob? By stating “not all, but many” I can only assume you mean a substantial majority. What would that be? 70 percent? 80 percent? How about 99 percent, which seem to be the Media mantra.
By the way, thanks for proving the point.
Bob probably thinks it was a sober self-assessment, rather than the self-congratulatory act of public masturbation that it in fact turned out to be. The point is that he can’t really tell the difference.
Some Code Pink tool tried to handcuff and arrest Karl Rove last night. They’re also expressing great pride in shouting him off the stage. A Teabagger, no doubt. Because of the civility.
Almost all conservatives can explain leftism. It’s drummed into their heads in school and in news and entertainment media. Also, it’s a simple philosophy.
Almost no leftists can write a decent paragraph explaining conservatism. They think it’s hatred and fear of non-whites and foreigners, theocracy, desire to see the poor suffer and ignorance of their plight, and disgust for ways of life other than their own. Or if the conservative is poor, non-religious, non-white, gay or eccentric in lifestyle, then he is supposed to be deluded or living in “false consciousness.” For example, Bob (above) actually is not doing parody. He actually believes what he said. Don’t you, Bob?
Here’s a good statement of conservatism.
Shouting them off the stage is merely doing the non-faculty version of a Kiteley. One of the perks of being faculty is that you can do your shouting down with more of a quiet dignity.
One of these declarations contradicts the other:
There are indeed those who lack sympathy for the less fortunate — but if you think they are not distributed widely across all political affiliations you understand nothing.
@sdferr: Who said I placed any sort of constructs on you? When I said “you need to lose the pop psychology babble”, I meant the group of you (as in “alla youse” or “y’all”). I have no idea whether you specifically, sdferr, agree with any of Dr. Helen’s points in the article, but noted Jeff G’s endorsement and the approval of lots of commenters here. I didn’t feel a poll of all the thread’s commenters was necessary, though.
How about we just agree to leave aside the pejoratives our side typically uses for one another?
I’m pretty sure I’m not going to learn to empathize with lefties by visiting kos. In fact, I’d say the opposite effect would be true. The problem, as Dr. Helen states it and as many of us believe, is liberalism, taken to an extreme, is a mental disorder. How else would you explain Obama Pelosi and Reid acting as if they have to burn the entire country down to save it. the US has been a strong country for a long time but suddenly, liberals want us to be weak. To me, that’s a mental disorder.
I think part of the confuzzlement is how people like Meghan’s daddy what aren’t conservatives get called conservatives.
I didn’t endorse the idea that the left was mentally ill, Sam, no matter how you try to slip in the suggestion that I did.
Having said that, can you please point me to one of those rigorous scientific studies pointing out how conservatives are bed-wetting proto Nazis your side likes to trot out from time to time? I always get a kick out of how some of your “scientists” ass fuck the scientific method until it learns to like it.
@Bob: I wouldn’t say “we” all understand “the conservative’s view”. Hell, I don’t understand my wife’s view half the time. We may understand parts of their talking points, filtered by the media we choose to follow, but that’s very different from understanding the philosophical roots of how people learned their political beliefs.
@Jeff G.: what good would that do?
And Pablo, read those comments. “At least Code Pink wasn’t waiving guns and Nazi signs around like those teabaggers”. I mean, seriously, nobody is that stupid- it has to be insanity. But they lines up and agree with the commentator.
I think one of the things Dr. Helen misses is I believe Americans, especially those on the left, who tend to be a bit more “creative” and a lot less “productive” really really need a villain to hate. The left called Bush Hitler for gods sake. They were intent on making him the villain, so they’d have a target. Next it was Palin and now its the tea parties. To the left, I’m convinced we are as much their enemy as Al Queda or the Taliban. In fact, I suspect the left has more sympathy for both of those groups, as opposed to the conservative movement.
Not all, but many progressives are racists and/or homophobes. So? Bob, there is one thing we are quite aware of and that is you’re an idiot. It’s a binary world and Bob’s the man in it, I guess.
Not exactly an assfucking of the scientific method, but here’s the most recent abuse of honest polling methodologies.
Then you would not have included me in the group you imagined Sam? That wouldn’t have been indicated in your initial reply, where you made no such distinction, nor yet allowed the possibility of such a distinction. Beyond that, my own sense of most of the writers here who I’ve come to know through long experience doesn’t track with your ideation of them. Have I used pejoratives? Are you not speaking to me in answer to my questions? Did anyone other than you speak of polling? Why wouldn’t the best beginning of a conversation be to converse as individuals, since I’ve never seen a group converse as one?
About as much good as suggesting I endorsed the idea of left-liberalism as a mental illness — with the added bonus of pointing out that describing political positions as a mental illness, and attributing that description to “science”, seems to be the purview of left-liberals.
So, you know — two, two, two mints in one!
bh, it’s incredible, isn’t it. The fact that after 8 years of media led invective against President Bush, they have the temerity to go with that tact is ballsy to say the least. No introspection. No self awareness. No shame. The media and the modern progg in a nut shell.
clank
@sdferr: nope! Sorry if I didn’t use the best grammar there. It’s that damned liberal education I got, don’cha know. ;)
I will say that you (sdferr) are parsing things way too literally, to a degree that would make me uncomfortable if, say, we were just meeting each other at a party. My goal is a conversation, not a scientific white paper or the dissection of the conservative philosophy.
@JeffG: so you don’t think “this ‘blind spot’ for conservatives is similar to the psychopath who cannot comprehend the morality of those who are ‘normal.’ At the present time, there is no known cure for treating the psychopath.”? You don’t think that’s “good stuff”?
We may understand parts of their talking points, filtered by the media we choose to follow, but that’s very different from understanding the philosophical roots of how people learned their political beliefs.
No idea how to parse this statement. Sam, care to elaborate?
Yep, OI. And we’ll be hearing about this bogus poll from drive-by trolls for years to come.
So I’m parsing too literally where the object was, I thought, to find a means to jump an evident chasm of understanding, and making you uncomfortable I’d either be left muttering to myself as you made your way across the room to some better discourse or …. ? Just shut up? No that’s too harsh a thing to say. Surely. Better, I should alter my manner of speech to accommodate your comfort. And then, perhaps, we can begin to repair the difference in our respective views of things political. Just so.
You are a riot, sdferr.
Why thank you SW.
@JeffG: so you don’t think “this ‘blind spot’ for conservatives is similar to the psychopath who cannot comprehend the morality of those who are ‘normal.’ At the present time, there is no known cure for treating the psychopath.”? You don’t think that’s “good stuff”?
I thought Sam was against name calling … in the interest of conversation
@Old Texas Turkey: not really, no.
@sdferr: no, I mean you’re getting caught up in semantics. I offered a few ideas to “leap the chasm”, and you’ve taken a misuse of the word “you” and blew it up into some sort of interrogation that has nothing to do with understanding one another politically. If you want to talk about how great or idiotic my ideas are, or perhaps offer a few of your own, that’d be great!
Thank you happyfeet it was sincere. In my personal experience I’ve come across considerably fewer of those types of people and attitudes from liberals/progressives
Squid – I didn’t blame conservatives for anything.
Spiny Norman – I don’t know how many “many” is. Again, I’m just relating my personal experience with people I’ve met, read or heard. I didn’t say most because I don’t know if it’s most or not.
Jim Ryan – Conservatives believe that free markets, small government and low taxes allow everyone to prosper who is willing to work hard.
Sam – You’re right, we don’t “all” understand conservative views.
Stage shouter offers. You’ll often find one running around here. Little green something-or-other, I think was the monicker.
(I think its time someone let Sam know that he is wearing his underwear on his head) I didn’t mention it when he walked in, cause It thought there may be a good story behind it, perhaps even a teachable moment.
Funny, Sam, how you decided to quote from the essay and yet missed this bit: “I am not saying here that liberals are psychopaths, for this would be incorrect for the most part.”
And by funny, I of course mean disengenuous. If you wish to take issue with me or what I argue, try understanding it first and addressing yourself to it second. Otherwise, I have no time for you — and pretty soon, that’s going to be the typical reaction, if I have anything to say about it.
SHorter Sam. I make the rules and change them whenever I get my ass handed to me. And shut up and speak to me in a way that doesn’t make me sound stupid.
“…I mean you’re getting caught up in semantics.”
No Sam, I believe I’m not. I am, on the contrary to your opinion there expressed, caught up in the behavior of human beings in general and in this instance, yours (that’s you Sam, if there be any doubt) in particular. It seems to me that I have offered a view, a specific view, of the way out of our mutual political difficulties. See above.
Free markets, small government and low taxes are the least unfair and most pro-freedom of the available alternatives, none of which are perfect in the sense that worker A puts in effort X and reliably receives reward Y. Have you ever endeavored to ask whether your cures could be worse than their diseases?
@JeffG: no, I just read your blog post, with the parts of the article you chose to emphasize. But, okay. I’ll tell the nice nurses here in the ambulance with me that this blogger guy thinks maybe the straps on my straitjacket shouldn’t be tied so tight. :)
@sdferr: you mean the Yeats quote?
Thanks for asking Sam. No, I don’t. I mean “…how about we lose attributions to one another’s states of mind where we have no evidence to tether such projections?”
I mean it quite seriously.
Conservatives believe that free markets, small government and low taxes allow everyone to prosper who is willing to work hard.
It’s a start, Bob. You have a piece of it, anyway, a component of it shared by libertarianism. You might repair the damage you did to yourself with your first post. However, that would require admitting that your initial characterization of conservatives was wrong.
@sdferr: Fair enough! I think our ideas boil down to the same concept, incidentally.
Have you ever endeavored to ask whether your cures could be worse than their diseases?
The answer is no, they haven’t. If they did, the notion would be quickly scoffed off, because “nothing could be worse than the current system.”
Occasionally, a smattering of intellectual honesty will force them to concede that “I recognize that their are problems with this solution. But we must act boldly anyhow. We must have the moral imagination to press on in spite of practical difficulties.”
That is about as far as it goes.
Not really an important part of the conversation but apropos of the ambiguity used for the funny above:
One of the greatest failings of modern English (not the band) is the lack of a plural you. Ye is for ponces, and y’all is probably racist somehow, what with the southern baggage.
The end.
@sdferr: alas, I must go. Wishing alla youse the best in your liberal troll eradication endeavors!
Oh, rats. I’d hoped to carry on. Well perhaps before you leave you will catch this and can think on it, then return and comment further.
So, let’s suppose for the moment what you say is true, namely, “…our ideas boil down to the same concept…”. It might be helpful if you give this concept a name. I might call it, after our host’s notion, intentionality or intentionalism, though I prefer the former a touch more than the latter as far as the former is more akin to a phenomenon in the raw and the latter a fully developed doctrine with regard to the phenomenon. At our stage, yours and mine that is, I’d prefer to begin with the phenomenon and work our way toward any such doctrine. But you should say your mind as to this.
I’ve become partial to the Pittsburghian “yinz.”
You mean the parts I chose to excerpt. The part I chose to emphasize was bolded and marked with cryptic code “my emphasis”.
I don’t know what kinds of sites you ordinarily read, but I don’t put the orange hyperlinks in merely for show. Use them or don’t, but let’s not pretend they aren’t there.
Sam, the problem is that most of the trolls aren’t anything resembling liberal. That is the problem.
Is the Philly variant properly (which I’ve heard but never spelled) “yunz”?
Pittsburghian Yinz sounds like a really sweet name for an industrial band or something you have to pay extra for at a strip club. Probably not reimbursable either.
“Yous” or “Yous fellas” is proper Philadelphian.
To be sure Alec, but I’ve heard the other too, though maybe it was nothing more than a contraction. There wasn’t an “oo” in there and there was most definitely a “zuh” on the end.
“Yins” is Alabama. Southern Alabama.
“To be on the left, then, is (by the rules of the modern academy) to be ‘political’ — and being political carries with it the heady suggestion of being a serious thinker. Whereas to be on the right is to mark yourself as someone in need of re-education, at best…”
Many people become politically engaged as students, which is to say, when adults are most impressionable. In the UK that most likely involves immersion in a broadly left-of-centre worldview since the left is pretty much the default mode of college politics, and the UK seems unremarkable in this regard. See, for instance, Professor Jere Surber’s claim that the only “intellectually respectable way to interpret the broad contours of history and culture” is one much like his own, i.e. left of centre. Contrary positions are presumably unworthy of respect or, one might suppose, of discussion in good faith.
In such an environment it’s easy to absorb one’s politics by a kind of social osmosis and group identification, with little serious challenge and a fairly caricatured view of what rival positions may be. And, for many, these are also the years of strutting and role-play, which may entail imagining oneself standing radically at odds with some cartoonish hegemony. In such cases, political empathy is not only unnecessary but actually unhelpful.
I think Bob has a case of identification bias. He may well indeed have a tally that most conservatives he’s met are racists and homophobes (ignoring for the moment that the cries of “racist” and “homophobe” are used whenever one does not agree with certain aspects of the progressive agenda). The problem is that conservatives tend to not self-identify as conservative in our society because they often immediately get accused of being racist homophobes. So my argument would be that he’s met a lot more conservatives than he thinks, and that the vast majority did not identify themselves. It may be that he counted those among his progressive brethren, or maybe he didn’t. Either way, he could have an internal count that tells him he’s correct.
I highly doubt there are any racists or homophobes who comment here regularly, though I would imagine that many of us would be accused of such if we disagree with affirmative action or gay marriage. So we also have a definition problem to go along with the self-identification problem.
Indeed, David, which makes Norm Geras such a stand-out exception. There can’t be many such on the left who don’t automatically demonise and misrepresent their political opponents.
yooz guyz read about da iggles in da inkwire t’other day?
Boo hoo!!!
Dos eveel liberuhls are beeng meen to us manly men!!
I can haz hug???
Thor, is that you?
libarbarian, I am intrigued by your ideas and would like to subscribe to your newsletter.
our supposed unbiased media did a “find” request for the words “death panels”
In the wrong bill. The “death panels” were established in the Stimulus bill.
the lie has been repeated often enough that it has become “conventional wisdom” and proof is no longer necessary.
The lie was established as truth even before it was told, so there’s no such thing as proof. Conservatives are racist is as axiomatic as the sun rising in the east.
You can no haz knewsledder!
Silver Whistle,
“…which makes Norm Geras such a stand-out exception.”
I don’t always agree with Norm, but I can’t recall him ever arguing in bad faith.
My $0.02, anyway.
We should give him a refund.
It is a scientific fact that every individual that goes by the name of Bob is a racist homophobic lying douchenozzle that buggers goats. Fact. Except Bob Reed, who is none of the above, and should sue Bob for defamation of character just for having the same name. That is all.
It’s a long slog, however we may wish it otherwise. Long. Even in the microcosm it is long. The arguments, I don’t mean quarrels here, but arguments — the arguments are all long and involved complex things. We will often find ourselves weary. And then, notice ourselves, taking care not to be bested by our own fatigue.
We understand the conservative’s view.
No, Bob, you don’t understand us at all. I’m afraid the arbiter of whether you understand us has to be us, whether you can articulate our views such that it sounds like something we’d recognize.
Haven’t you ever had the experience of talking to someone who totally doesn’t get what you’re about? You can totally tell, can’t you?
So can we.
Not all, but many conservatives are racists and/or homophobes. Not all, but many conservatives have no empathy at all for the sick, the disabled, the poor, the hungry, the homeless, the unemployed, or the rights and freedoms of those they disagree with or don’t approve of. Not all, but many conservatives put money before people when weighing issues of the day
Not one word about where we stand on the Enlightenment and the concept of natural rights; not one word about the Constitution, federalism, rule of law, the proper role of government, statism, liberty, fiscal matters, or anything else. All you did was run down the litany of what you perceive to be our hatreds.
Which, you can’t see into anyone’s soul, so you can’t know what motivates us.
Instead, you have constructed a caricature of who we are that consists of your shadow: you’re against racism/sexism/homophobia and you’re against us; ergo, we must be for all those things. You fancy yourself to be intelligent, sophisticated, and compassionate; ergo, we are stupid, unsophisticated, and cold-hearted.
That’s extremely childish thinking, Bob. Extremely. Grow the hell up.
I don’t always agree with Norm, but I can’t recall him ever arguing in bad faith.
Norm is so reasonable he has been vilified by the hard left, an entirely predictable course of events. We are poles apart on politics, but I admire his reasoning.
A test for progressives to see if they actually do understand us:
1. How do conservatives explain the wealth disparity between Mexico and the United States?
2. Why did Bill Buckley said that he’d rather be governed by the first 2000 people in the Boston phone book than the entire Harvard faculty?
3. What do the Tea Parties want and why do they want it?
4. What are the downsides to Canada and the U.K.’s healthcare systems.
5. Was Hitler a man of the left or the right? Explain by defining right and left without referring to racism.
“Instead, classical liberals, non-libertine libertarians, and conservatives — more often than not referred to simply as “right wingers” or (and this is one and the same nowadays) “the far right” — are cast as a populist nuisance, a collection of rabble controlled by the basest of impulses, from racism to nativism to homophobia to xenophobia. They are, in effect, outside politics proper — which is now cast as a system in which the State is guarantor of rights and “justice,” included in which is a move toward equality of outcome (and so, like it or not, socialism) — and are dealt with only as a rock in the shoe of the climb toward social Utopia.”
This is an excellent synopsis Jeff G. The principle of “political correctness” has been extended from the governance of speech to the governance of ideas. To hold the wrong ideas is to automatically become something less than human; and therefore have no basis for deserving respect whatsoever. It’s very much like the anecdote Alec related upthread where the 80’s protesters denied the very humanity of white S.Africans, but as Spiny Norman observed, probably couldn’t be bothered at any of the atrocious events that went on after apartheid ended.
As you noted, believing in the “wrong” ideas will dictate shunning by thise that hold the “right” ones. It’s an interestingly hypocritical behavior coming from the group that supposedly embraces diversity, is open minded of all cultural dispositions, and, of course, tolerant of all behaviors and practices…
I’d just like to note also that it’s easy for ourt discussions to get into the weeds regarding supposedly moral questions such as abortion rights. But here we are truly talking about American cultural value; equality of opportunity is the cornerstone of “the American way”, not equality of outcome, which is in many ways it’s antithesis. It’s important for all to understand, and be able to articulate, how equality of opportunity relates to the fundamental equality that cuts across all socio-economic strata in our society. And especially how that,as well as the other most basic rights that the founders spoke of in the Declaration of Independance, and strove to codify in the Constitution, are ours simply by birthright, and not bestowed upon us by the benevolence of our government…
The right to govern arises from the consent of the governed!
Great post Jeff.
I’d just like to say that I’ve frequently encountered “he/she/they are not even human to me” from leftists but never from the right. Even Adolf Hitler was human—albeit a severely diminished one, having rejected any humanity he might have had (except toward his dog).
Also, when ties are severed, such as what happened to Jeff, it’s always initiated from the left and not the right.
I don’t care if my friends or associates hold political ideas that I find to be wrong or even abhorrent. If they go places where I can’t follow, I’ll just stop associating with them, but I’ll never, ever, ritually “cleanse” myself of those past associations.
Why? Because there’s no reason to. Absolutely no reason. I’m an adult, not a teenager, and I have no use for cliques and in-groups and shunning.
Thanks for the endorsement JD!
Alec Leamas – I understand conservatives believe liberal policies lead directly to all of the world’s ills. That trying to help the poor, only makes more people poor. That by trying to help the unemployed only makes more unemployed. Basically that government is the problem not the solution. I understand, I don’t agree.
Jim Ryan – I don’t feel the need to repair any damage to myself. I stand by my statements about many conservatives.
Andrew the Noisy – Of course we wieght the pros and cons of proposals. Is doing nothing sometimes the best solution? Probably. Is there some pain on the road to change, sure. Is it a perfect world and everything is fair? Of course not, but that doesn’t mean we should stand pat and not even attempt to improve.
cranky-d – I’m in Alaska. Trust me, conservatives have abosolutely no problem self identifying themselves here. I also understand the distinction between being philosophically opposed to affirmative action and gay marriage, being opposed to them because of racisim and homophobia. If racism never existed there would be no need for affirmative action. Do you really believe that there aren’t racists? I’ve always found it curious how conservatives rail against government intrusition but have no problem letting the government take away the religious freedoms of homosexual couples or the rights of people to do as we please with our own bodies.
I think the problem with statements like this is it assumes uniformity withing a group. There are no such big tents anymore.
For some leftists, the government should run everything. For most, they want no such thing. For some rightists government should touch nothing and strongest should prosper, for others there is a recognition that some regulation will always be a benefit to people (heck, I saw a recent survey saying a substantial number of Tea Party members would favor regulation of Wall Street).
Each group however is continuously fed the idea that the “other” is uniform. When you think about it, that’s never accurate. Broad generalizations like this just further reinforce the idea that it’s impossible for people of both political stripes to work together, which is an outright lie.
Weeeelll, looka here. Bill Whittle explains conservatism to the hipster.
Watch it and learn, lefties.
I understand conservatives believe liberal policies lead directly to all of the world’s ills. That trying to help the poor, only makes more people poor. That by trying to help the unemployed only makes more unemployed. Basically that government is the problem not the solution. I understand, I don’t agree
That’s a shitty argument. It proves you don’t understand. Not a bit.
I’m in Alaska. Trust me, conservatives have abosolutely no problem self identifying themselves here. I also understand the distinction between being philosophically opposed to affirmative action and gay marriage, being opposed to them because of racisim and homophobia. If racism never existed there would be no need for affirmative action. Do you really believe that there aren’t racists? I’ve always found it curious how conservatives rail against government intrusition but have no problem letting the government take away the religious freedoms of homosexual couples or the rights of people to do as we please with our own bodies.
In the nicest possible way, Bob, could you try that again, without the straw men? If you’re not going to tighten up your thinking, there isn’t going to be much hope of dialogue.
I agree completely Dicentra. In fact, I’ve had several torrid romances suddenly come to a grinding halt after a short time in the past owing to my beliefs. Each instance it was the same story; they couldn’t concieve of spending a lifetime with someone who couldn’t support them in their beliefs. It mattered not that I respected their opinins, the fact that I wouldn’t buy into it all, hook, line, and sinker meant that we were through!
Seriously, I often believe a religious difference would be easier to ovecome…
The same is true for a few acquaintances I had over the years. I’ll never get it because I thought that different or opposing beliefs were not necessarily the ultimate measure of the complete person.
Bob, I’m sure someone here can help you with directions to the place you think you are, but really aren’t. Explain a bit more and we’ll have you on your way in no time. I think you might be looking for New York, but I’m not entirely sure yet. Do go on.
Dicentra,
No, Bob, you don’t understand us at all. I’m afraid the arbiter of whether you understand us has to be us, whether you can articulate our views such that it sounds like something we’d recognize.
Given the nature of the article being commented on, I find this funny. You can’t both say that you completely understand someone else and then give them no right to say whether they understand you.
I think both sides have a gap of understanding.
You’re still failing rather miserably. We disagree about the method of helping the poor, and who should deliver the help. You think that the government paying people to be poor – and withdrawing the payments should they make material efforts to become self-sufficient – is the correct method. I do not. You think that unemployment benefits should be extended without end, whereas I see the deleterious nature of these payments.
What “religious freedoms” are conservatives advocating be denied of homosexual couples, Bob?
Are you by chance referring to gay marriage not being forced upon churches in the country?
s/all/many
More like: that depersonalized, government subsidy of the poor tends to mire them in poorness.
Eh? Not sure where you got that one.
More like: that government is not the solution to every problem.
And I seriously doubt that you can generalize any of these caricatures of conservative attitudes onto any general population of conservatives. In other words, you’ve constructed a nice cartoon of conservatives that makes you feel better about your own views, and you’re practically dislocating your shoulder with all the back-patting.
Oh, and please flesh out that “religious freedoms of homosexual couples” argument because I’m completely in the dark on that one.
Slartibartfast,
I think you said it quite well: And I seriously doubt that you can generalize any of these caricatures of conservative attitudes onto any general population of conservatives. In other words, you’ve constructed a nice cartoon of conservatives that makes you feel better about your own views, and you’re practically dislocating your shoulder with all the back-patting.
However, that applies to the caricature of liberals that has been created as well. The concept of belief in an eternal welfare state where government picks up the tab and helps all people… that’s not something most liberals I know believe in.
If racism never existed there would be no need for affirmative action. Do you really believe that there aren’t racists?
I know that there are racists in this country, but they’re not very powerful. And affirmative action is applied in odd ways, which don’t always help the people they’re supposed to help.
Check it out:
Let’s say that back in 1930 there’s a young black man who would love nothing better than to be a doctor. He is absolutely fascinated by the subject, and to that end he goes to the library and pores over all the books he can find about medicine, he fixes injured birds and pets whenever possible, and he even takes a job sweeping floors at a local clinic so that he can be around medical activity.
When he’s old enough, he applies to college. His grades are good enough. He passed the exams. But they say no. Why? Not because he’s not qualified, but because he’s black. Pure and simple. Bigotry distilled.
Ergo, the solution to the problem is what? (a) Prevent admissions boards from knowing the race of the applicants (b) Lower the academic standards for getting into college if you’re black.
If you answered (b), I’m sorry, but you’re a moron.
Because look at what happens: I taught Spanish at Cornell for a few years. When I had black students, they were either at the tip-top of the class or rock bottom. Nothing in between. The students at the top had obviously been raised middle-class or above; the ones at rock bottom came from the inner cities. (Their accents and mannerisms revealed it.)
The kids from the inner cities wanted to do well, but they just weren’t ready for an Ivy-League education. They were in over their heads. They tried gamely to keep up, but they couldn’t because some nimrod in admissions confused cause and effect.
They would have been much better served to have been given a better K-12 education, then let them apply and qualify like everyone else. Those academic standards aren’t there to keep the wrong people out, they’re there to ensure that you don’t get in before you’re ready.
But just like the morons in congress who think that if you all but eliminate the means testing for mortgates, you provide the opportunity for people to become solid citizens (because homeowners usually are), they instead set people up to fail and fail spectacularly.
Is that a good thing or a bad thing, Bob? You said you know that conservatives think some cures are worse than the disease, but can you articulate why?
Hint: This post provides a good example.
“Perhaps a combination of all three is needed: expanding right-leaning media, getting more people involved, and making sure consequences are dealt out to those liberals who lie and treat conservatives with disrespect”
Darn skippy Doc!
A bigger allocation of warheads on foreheads and more soldiers launching volleys down range. Thats what I’m talkin bout.
“James seems days behind the news cycle, and grades behind graduating as “proficient.”
I’ve been without internet for two days and I knew about the Breitbart challenge.” Not very smart to bring a Q-tip to a gunfight James.
“The right’s advantage has been that the left caves and is so worried about appearing moral that they back down, conceding any power”
Here ya go Sam see if you can find the moral concession of power:
http://www.zombietime.com/hall_of_shame/
Gotta warn ya though, there are some real “teabaggers” at this link.
Given the nature of the article being commented on, I find this funny. You can’t both say that you completely understand someone else and then give them no right to say whether they understand you.
I did not say that I completely understood Bob. I said that what he articulated demostrated that he did not understand me.
And what’s this garbage with “no right”? Either he understands me or he doesn’t, and I am the only one who can determine whether he does or not.
It has nothing to do with “rights.”
that’s not something most liberals I know believe in.
It’s what leftists and statists believe in, then.
On the contrary: those views I stated are my own. I know that some others share them, and it’s likely that some others don’t. I certainly can’t pretend to speak for all or even a majority of conservatives, any more than you or Bob can.
Have a nice swim back from Conclusions, Josh.
here is a metaphor for your little thread here
I’m not really interested in what liberals believe in so much as I am in the end products, healthcare legislation for example.
That should be clear as crystal, but in the context of his statement, what he is saying is: …and then give them no right to define you.
One way that Dr. Helen is correct is in stating that we can’t let some of the cartoonish memes to be blathered without challenging them. As Colonel John commented, I virtually always take a polite, calm, but determined tack; but I don’t let the memes slide by.
This weekend in fact my nieces Father-in-law tried to assert the whole, “racist homophobic tea-baggers threatening violence is a fact because it’s on the news” narative. I couldn’t let it slide, and asked him to cite particular instances. And while he stammered trying to do so, I also pointed out Andrew Breitbarts “bounty” that has since increased to 100K for any film of such behavior. And I followed this up by posing a question to the group, “Considering the amount of media, and number if devices there, isn’t it strange that there is no record of it”? And, “Don’t you think if the legacy media had any damning video that they wouldn’t have already played it ad nauseum this whole week”?
The approach worked perfectly. And, although he and a few other family members continued to mutter, “Yeah, but what about that [expletives and derisive terms] Palin!”, there was no more palaver about dangerous tea-baggerz! I may not have changed any minds, but the young adults that are low-information, or sans-opinion may have some food for thought should they here those memes again…
But, you know, ex-military, racist, h8ting, conservatives like me are dangerous! Dangerous to the proggressives grasping for power over us all that is, because I’m educated, regarding the issues and our compacts of governance, I speak my mind (for as long as we still can), I remember, and I vote!
isn’t baracky already doing blind fencing
it is a very handy metaphor in our little country I think… blind fencing and rape take you a long long way
i don’t think putey putin or that i’madinnerjacket do blind fencing
It’s hard to rape a blind guy waving a sword.
But I guess a blind guy with a sword could rape something he just won’t be able to be real picky about it.
He’d need a guide. Or a government program to help him out.
“Do you really believe that there aren’t racists?”
Sure, so I guess Rev Wright owes me some reparations huh Sam.
Pat Buchannan, whiloe not a fave among many here, actually puts the whole “violent racist teabaggerz” meme in pretty good context here by recalling some of the left’s better moments out of the relativly recent historical record.
http://www.wnd.com/index.php?fa=PAGE.view&pageId=133893
I know it’s WND, but they aren’t getting all “birthery”; It’s actually a pretty good piece that I’d recommend to all…
One thing you haven’t considered, they don’t understand us because we are heretics.
Bob is just quoting scripture. How can you have eyes yet see not?
Wow the server lag is glacial here and it’s getting late so I’ll have to sign off for tonight.
Keep firing outlaws!
Lost My Cookies – So you don’t believe liberal policies are the cause of all the worlds ills? That’s refreshing.
Alec Leamas – I’ve said nothing about what I believe or think other than my understanding of conservatives and conservatism.
Bob Reed – Government can’t force Churches to do or not do anything. If they could we wouldn’t have religious leaders involved in politics while they escape paying taxes at every level. The religious freedom I refer to is for those Churches who do or would perform marriage ceremonies for gay couples.
dicentra -“They would have been much better served to have been given a better K-12 education”. Which is why I support the idea of school vouchers even for religious schools.
Danger – Wright is as bad as Buchannan or Van Impe
I suspect that if progressives were all of the kind Josh claims to be the norm, we wouldn’t be having these kinds of discussions.
But then, Josh says he’s hanging out with “liberals,” which only goes to prove what I’ve been saying for some time now. Progressives aren’t liberal; and so Josh’s confusion must stem from inadvertently wandering into a nest of us and not even realizing he’s been living peacefully among them.
“The religious freedom I refer to is for those Churches who do or would perform marriage ceremonies for gay couples.”
Churches who choose to do so can already perform those services Bob. But the problem is that the states don’t recognize those unions. This wouldn’t really be an issue of the gay community would be willing to accept “civil unions”, as opposed to seeking affirmation and mainstreaming of, at best, a fringe minority lifestyle choice.
Don’t misunderstand, I’m not being judgemental; and I’m not down on civil unions for same sex life-partners. But, only in a world of moral relativism is heterosexual marriage the exact equivalent to homosexual marriage.
But this is a digression and outside the bounds of the main subject of this thread…
Bob Reed – I would consider legally changing my name if this Bob-thingie persists in waving his stupidity around in public.
“Wright is as bad as Buchannan or Van Impe”
When did Buchannan become a member of the clergy?
Bob – It might be better to actually list a policy you see as liberal instead of hiding in the safety of generalities. Churches are not prohibited from marrying anyone, it’s just that the state doesn’t have to agree that the marriage is legal in the eyes of the law.
I have to wonder how he found his way here to PW, JD.
Except revoke their tax-exempt status if they talk politics.
Your “understanding” expressed in numbers, would be somewhat comparable to Perez Hilton’s IQ.
rev. wright says it depends on the politics involved
Government can’t force churches to do or not do anything.
Really? I bet my Mormon ancestors would find that surprising.
As would the Methodist church in Jersey that was forced to rent their space for a gay wedding.
And you remember this right here and right now: if/when gay marriage becomes the law of the land, churches will eventually be persecuted for not performing or recognizing them.
Because that’s how the Left rolls.
Yes, Bob, that’s exactly what I said nowhere in what I wrote. Of course there are racists. There are a small number of racists on the right who are up front about it, and a larger number on the left who pretend they aren’t racist when they promote policies based on low expectations for given “races.”
BTW, I really don’t believe that there is such a thing as race, and that has been aptly described, much better than I could articulate it, by Jeff, on this site in many posts over the years.
However, your lack of reading comprehension based on your poor interpretation of what I wrote leaves me little inclined to continue with you. You are also beating so may straw men I am sneezing from the dust. Besides, I have some drinking I need to be doing. I leave you in the capable hands of the site host and the commenters.
If they could we wouldn’t have religious leaders involved in politics while they escape paying taxes at every level
The rules are clear about what churches can and cannot do relative to their tax-exempt status. Churches may not endorse candidates or parties.
They are permitted to speak out on political issues, including specific legislation.
But please take note in the future of how the MSM reacts when a Democrat speaks in a church during a political campaign and when a Republican does it (if they even dare to).
When the Dem does it, it’s “connecting with the people.” When a Repub does it, it’s “impending theocracy.”
Way off topic, but I just got ordained as a Minister in the Church of Spiritual Humanism and the Universal Life Church.
JD – So when you give communion do you offer the “body of man given for you” and to complete the setup what is it that you offer them to put in their mouths.
I feel dirty, I’ll be in the shower.
It’s clear I’ve warn out my welcome here. Good day all.
So to return to Helen’s question or Jeff’s question, “how to deal with disrespect of lack of empathy?”, taking Helen’s essay as a tacit given, are we satisfied with the categories of opponent stances she here sets out? Particularly in light of our own conversations bringing qualified “soft” civil war into our picture of events or circumstances? Helen speaks of those lacking a “capacity” to empathize but what of the warrior-opponent who may have the capacity but has chosen to fight to win whatever may be the cost to his understanding?
Seems to me necessary we have ready some trustworthy sorting algorithm to quickly and dependably tell an opponent engaged in warfare with us (however “soft”) — one from whom we must expect no quarter — from an opponent who does not take that stance, is ultimately amenable to persuasion, even while behaving as an annoyingly closed-minded twit about the issues, but who with better choices on our part may be swayed.
Differentiation is critical. So how, I reckon, is the question?
osama and the strong horse
just stay on message til november the folks in the middle will come are way
taxes are horrific
are = our
I don’t think we’ve really sold the “soft” civil war thing yet. Either that or it’s just very anticlimactic.
Going to the Blues/Blackhawks game tonight.
Seems to me necessary we have ready some trustworthy sorting algorithm
How to tell the clueless from the informed?
Quickly?
Age is one marker: The college student may or may not be amenable to persuasion.
How they respond to penetrating questions from you (e.g., “What do the Tea Partiers want and why?” “How would you describe the value of liberty vs. security?).
You can tell whether they comprehend the question; if they do and hate your answer, then you’re dealing with someone to whom you cannot give any quarter.
If they have a hard time understanding the question because they’re not familiar with the categories you’re using, or they provide only caricatures of answers, then you might have a chance with them.
But it takes a long time once the seed is planted to get them to acquire that much insight into their own minds. Sometimes years of maturity have to come first.
She cited you Jeff.
You are not forgotten.*
*I think the language posts just confuse the heck out of other bloggers who do not come from that background. I am a lawyer, and language is key to my profession, but it is a very stylized use of language. Like how Congress is learning that what they wrote into this healthbill does not – because of the styling – say what they thought it said. Just an example.
‘Let the cobbler stick to his last’.
Let the cobbler stick to his last.
Prov. Do not advise someone in matters outside your area of expertise.*
Let me put this another way.
Why do we turn to war metaphor at all? We do so for a very good reason. War is an existential contest and this is an existential contest though one which has not yet turned to direct violence.
Why?
The cause has been demonstrated often here — the critical analysis of our opponents is to be found in their idea of power. Power, the possession of and will to use power, they understand, short circuits any need for long and complex argument aiming at some end other than the power itself. Once this principle was found, any and all other principles give way, become moot or mere distractions from what counts.
That is why existential. The opponent will have your freedom of choice or he will have failed to achieve his end.
oh a warming denier
Cobbler’s last
(the cobbler’s last is a shoemaker’s model for shaping or repairing a shoe or boot).*
nobody tells me anything cept google
I think existential contests what don’t turn to violence are the most horrifying kind.
I don’t know, but I wouldn’t be surprised if sam wondered over from OTB and quickly found himself in much deeper water than he imagined. He doesn’t get quite the intellectual pushback there that he does here.
Long run? They’re practically unheard of without they end in violence.
What’s OTB?
Being an idiot will do that to you here, Bob. Pat Buchanon is the equivalent of Jeremiah fucking Wright? Yep, you’re an idiot.
That’s comforting.
*shrug* whadda ya gonna do?
Outside the Beltway, which linked the Jeff’s post the other day. Mind you, I don’t know if it is the same sam, but it wouldn’t surprise me.
And I meant wandered in 186, though perhaps it was a Fruedian slip rather than a typo. Sorry.
Thanks charles, I’ll go poke around there to see what’s what.
RNC Sex-Club Flap Only Tip Of Fundraising Iceberg*
this is interesting and probably explains the story really:
i see mr greenfootballs has flag problems
Just curious happyfeet, but are you working under the assumption that most of the people here are Republicans?
normal folks don’t give to blind fencers
OTB = Off Track Betting. A place where the local government is the horse betting bookie. They are all over the place here in NY.
Wanna good tip? Don’t bet on the ponies; at least not the farm…
um not really… I think… I can’t think of any Republicans here per se… maybe Mr. Reed is?
You’re probably right happyfeet, that will be the next scandal spoken of by the MSM in hushed voice, breathless tones. It would be another convenient story to try and derail the national conversation about how pissed folks are over this healthcare bill as well as provide a convient tu quoque argument to counter the rancid rot that is Pelosi’s “most ethical congress-evar!”…
Of course, in my opinion it’s an easy red-herring to deflect. Regardless of how bad anyone says it is, simply point out how it pales in comparison to all of the sleazy stuff that went on with Obama’s financing during the last campaign. And, of course, that the Rethugs! straighten up and fly right…
if you read it they talk about the Team R peeps watching “simulated sex” … which, I don;t know that we know that for sure… I will have to go to this Voyeur place this summer sometime
I have to go change the oil now for reals… I know I said that on Saturday but that proved too ambitious
I consider myself a Republican happyfeet, but first and foremost I’m a classical liberal that believes in the Constitution…
I’m an American first, and then a Republican. Because I believe in states rights, and that our nation is a republic of democratic states, as opposed to an amorphous federal democracy. Maybe I’ll post a longer explanation at POWIP in the coming days, because it might be a good time to re-examine just what it is I believe and whether the Rethugs! stand for that any more…
Thought provoking as always, bro! Are you wrenching on the ride yourself, or going to a garage?
i see mr greenfootballs has flag problems
Good God, Charles Johnson is a moron.
me be elephant rampaging over big gov’t
I dunnoI dunno, Mike. Tennessee is as good as Nazi Germany, ain’t it?
I mean for pearl-clutching purposes and stuff.
#180 haps – that is it!
And why I think many ‘cobblers’ do not link so much to Jeff. Because they are out of their depth when he gets going with language.
That was worth a chuckle.
The girls are pounding the hardwood again. Come on, fess up, you wanna watch.
I dunnoI dunno, Mike. Tennessee is as good as Nazi Germany, ain’t it?
Reckon so. To the libs, Nashville 2010 = Berlin 1933.
I’m not as American as I should like Bob. Not anymore. I need to take a road trip I think. But not California. Maybe through the Ozarks and the Smokies. And Georgia.
And thank you Mikey today I learned about cobblers.
And I got my taxes done and my oils changed… they do it at the EZ Lube.
I thought I was going to have to go shopping but I have perfectly acceptable dry cleaning.
This was a good day.
juan williams has a flag problem
Definitely the Smokies, happyfeet. Take a ride up and down the Blue Ridge Parkway; it’s breathtakingly beautiful. Stop into Cherokee, NC and say hey to some of my relatives! See “Lookout mountain” in Chatanooga, it is really nice, and Grandfather mountain in NC; I could go on and on, more than you’d probably like to hear…
You know, like I usually do! :)
But first maybe you should do a live report from that club where the doofus Rethug guy picked up the $2000 tab. You know, just so we know and all, what with you being in L.A. already.
@sdferr: the concept I was thinking of was that, the more exposure one has to how the other half lives (i.e. visiting websites and events that advocate views that are politically opposite of what we believe), the more one is forced to consider their arguments and be less dogmatic in their approach to political thought. And the more one abandons psuedo-psych armchair analysis of why one side or the other thinks the way they do, the more one abandons attributions to others states of mind in general. It’s not really an earth-shattering concept. You can call this what you’d like, but I wasn’t aware that our host (Jeff G?) had already espoused this. Maybe in a different post?
And no, I hadn’t heard of Outside the Beltway before. I found this post through Memeorandum. But no worries, I can handle intellectual pushback – that’s kind of the point as far as I’m concerned.
I will google and see. The site was down earlier.
@JeffG: now you’re getting ticky tacky. Excerpting from an article is a way of emphasizing the parts of the article you want us to pay attention to. Using boldface is a way of giving further emphasis, but you’re choosing what parts to bring forward when you excerpt. It’s really no big deal – if you say that’s what you meant, so be it. I would have excerpted the next sentence so that there was no confusion over what I meant, but hey, your blog! (This *is* your blog, right?)
But if I find a way top get out of town I will ask for road trip advice for sure.
*to* get out of town I mean
juan williams does blind fencing on foxbor
I need to take a road trip I think. But not California. Maybe through the Ozarks and the Smokies. And Georgia.
I always got a couple of cold ones waiting for you in Athens, hf, still the best place to just hang out and chill I have found.
If you are going to the Final Four this weekend I need someone to cheer on those Mountaineers for me.
Unless you are a Duke fan.
“Nashville, Nashville uber alles…” ;-)
Dicentra: In an article that makes claims of understanding about the left, telling someone that they have no right to claim understanding of the right just makes me giggle a bit. You need to look at the context.
Jeff G: I just go by what they self-identified as. However, I think you were right with what you said. I think everyone is a lot closer than they think. We just see the extremes put in the media and we’re told to judge each other by them.
Slartibartfast – if my conclusion is that both sides of the political spectrum are getting mistaken ideas of each other, then I landed right on target, no swimming necessary.
The news has shown pictures of crazy rightwingers and also crazy leftwingers. These aren’t the norms for either side. Let’s put all the crazies in a third party (let’s call it the crazy party for simplicity) and keep the sane people in the other parties.
not true blind fencer
#218 Sam:
And the full article is linked at the very front of the post. You have both Dr. Helen’s post and Jeff’s post commenting on it.
So what exactly is your complaint?
“Let the cobbler stick to his last.” Bring up a complaint and explain why there is an issue with this post.
I would love to stop and say hi Mr. Moe. Georgia is for sure on the list. I’m telling the family when they come this summer that I want to do an epic road trip so they know I’m saving vacation…
my company does this sick thing where they’ll buy a week of vacation back from you at the end of the year… which is never not an unwise thing to let them do it never seems, but poof there goes a whole week of vacation
Newrouter, silly name calling does no one any credit. Fox shows one thing, MSNBC shows another. Together, both comprise the media. Media literacy means weighing and balancing both sources.
Happyfeet, my sympathies. That sounds like an incredibly tough choice. I’d love vacation, but the money would be hard to turn down as wel.
one side’s source: nyt,wapo,cbs,nbc,msnbc,abc,npr,academia,gov’t unions
the other’s source: talk radio, blogs, maybe fox
get real
it’s… it’s just not a hard choice cause the way it’s rigged it’s like you’re buying vacation from them if you take it
devious fiends
oh… that’s italicky in the wrong places
Really? Have you ever seen anything like this coverage and analysis of left wing protests?
Here, Sam. The kind of stuff you’ll get here when we settle down to discussin’ us some stuff for reals…
Unfortunately, I found that writing stuff like that — and inviting opponents to respond — was generally met with something other than breathless anticipation to join in a discussion about ideas.
Instead, I just got labeled an “anti-feminist,” or told I was a misogynist, and then written off as unclean.
— Much as Professor Kiteley wrote me off recently.
Now, here’s my challenge to you. If you can read that post and conclude that the rhetoric here is not only beyond the pale of academic discussion, but is in fact “alarming,” I ask that you tell me why.
If not, I ask you to explain to me why it is the academic left is in such a hurry to label this a “hate” site — despite its being nothing of the sort.
Newrouter – Any list that forgets to add the internet and the multitude of political analysis websites is an incomplete list. Traditional MSM is hurting in the internet age.
As for listing Academia, I had some wicked right wing profs in my time. My most left wing prof didn’t ever touch on politics after the 1700s.
Pablo, as I would argue that the Internet is the biggest MSM channel in current existence, I would honestly say I’ve seen slanted analysis of both sorts of protests recently.
Incidentally, in that post and thread I linked for Sam, I believe “playah girl” is Nishi, and the Mona in question went on later to call me a cancer, once she followed Greenwald and Jim at Highclearing into the valley of Goldstein hate.
Mona claimed it was over my “(soft) civil war” remarks — she and hilzoy both complained that we could have no such thing (and so suggested therefore that I must really want the streets running red with American on American blood) — but evidently that one post made everything else I ever said or agitated for or argued wrong and heinous.
I should think that kinda proves a point that is, tangentially at least, the point of this thread.
Or not.
Where is this magic land in which you live, Josh, where the liberals aren’t really all that left, and right wing profs — with the courage of their convictions — act up in right wingy ways without fear of reprisal?
Are there Oompa Loompahs there? Everlasting gobstoppers?
I think everyone needs to git ther gun and form a Christian militia for Gawd and git locked n’ loaded for the big dance.
And along comes Glen the Moby to elevate the discourse.
I blame Bush.
Josh, I think you’re confusing people like us who seek news out and discuss it with people who catch the Big 3 news over dinner because it’s on after Judge Judy and the local news. Their margin is sliding, but they’ve still got lots and lots and lots of eyeballs.
OT: for happy.
We need to fight the homosexual liberal agenda and the Muslim alien communist president. Soldiers for Christ – locked & loaded.
I don’t get it I think Joy is setting the coward bar too low.
nah let’s fight the “educated idiots from hardon u”
We need the restroom cleaned, Glen. If you do a good job, you can go on a beer run, ok?
I am the Eggman.
answer: dumb f**kin’ progg
Yep. A good glimpse of Nishi when she was still an adult..
gotta keep the subhumans low right progg
Git your guns ready. Educashun is ruining our chilun. The gays and the blacks and the mexicans and the atheists are takin over if we’r not carful. Listen to Sara Palin, lets git loaded for Christ.
Go bugger a goat, Moby.
but yes I think Meghan’s daddy used to break into a cold cold sweat at the thought of facing an unfawning media … but now that he’s accepted our little country’s judgment that he’s simply not fit for the presidency he seems to feel he’s been granted the freedom to take a less sycophantic tack with his media friends…
this will have to pass for personal growth.
If you’re going to troll, at least do something original, “Glen”. Politicizing Larry the Cable Guy doesn’t fly here. We’re more the “what might be the punchline for a panel showing Umberto Eco fucking Gore Vidal with a Grecian Urn?”-type crowd.
I don’t care who you are, that’s funny right there.
Is Glen looking for a cookie?
Yep. A good glimpse of Nishi when she was still an adult..
Interesting. In that thread Nishi claims to have a BS in Math and an MS in Mathematics & Statistics, yet these days she posts like a barely literate teenager.
Go bugger a goat, Moby.
I think he tried to, Mike. But even the goats hate ’em.
That is why I get so annoyed at her. She used to be literate and funny, and contributed a lot to the conversations. It really pisses me off to see her wasting her and our time like she does now. I really wonder what the fuck happened to her.
Glen sounds like thor doing his hicktard persona.
#239
Glen, try to catch up. The ‘big dance’ started weeks ago, and should be over later this week.
You really shouldn’t mix your metaphors, leave that to professionals.
goats are scary how they live to make you fall down and break a hip
Pablo, the thing is media literacy is a complete travesty on both sides of the political spectrum. For every person who gets their news from ABC and doesn’t question it, there’s someone who actually believes Fox News is fair and balanced.
I’m all for educating the voting populace. However, adding more spin in the opposite direction won’t necessarily do that. I think we need to teach people how to understand the news and intuit the bias that the news is putting forward.
Jeff G. – Don’t misunderstand the university bias. There are some CRAZY leftwing profs in the fields that attracted them when they were in school. I find them largely in the social sciences. Hard sciences were more populated by the conservative profs. My Econ prof was strongly conservative.
Newrouter – Does calling people names make you feel better? What part of my suggesting that the right wing makes better use of the Internet suggested subhuman?
Thor was once an interesting player in the conversation too. It does make you wonder what happens to people.
No, not yet. Soon, though, the way their ratings are going.
BMoe – I am going, yes. I am kind of torn on this one, as I rather like Coach K, but I really like that Butler kid (and the Butler team) that plays for the Mountaineers. However, I loathe Huggins.
Maybe pw is a catalyst. If you’re going to go crazy, all the surreal posts trigger it somehow. Like strobe lights and epilepsy.
Regardless, the only clear conclusion we can draw is that pw is alarming and dangerous.
blind fencing
Duke looked pretty darn good on Sunday; that game with Baylor was like watching the finals. But they weren’t quite in their old school form…
Besides, being a UMCP alumni, I’m torn between wanting to see an ACC team win it all and my reflexive hatred and loathing for the Blue Devils.
Coach K is either one of the greatest of all time, or indeed made that faustian bargain.
Well, holy shit. That sounds like a Duke fan.
Do you have a Christain Laitner poster above your bed, JD?
In that thread Nishi claims to have a BS in Math and an MS in Mathematics & Statistics, yet these days she posts like a barely literate teenager.
The intellect atrophies after extended periods in which the agent cares not about making sure his beliefs are true.
In youth, the bright youngster produces truth for the scholastic rewards; he grows keen. In young adulthood, the rewards go instead to clever mendacity and the mind retrains itself. The truth-conducive channels fall into disuse and decay. The other functionality that remains is something clever, something devious, but not intellect. Growing into a maturity of vice, the mind must serve its master by concealing many things about what constitutes a good life. This practice of concealment accelerates the mental decay begun by passive neglect. The mind may looks for truths but only insofar as they will assist in lying to itself and others.
I always scroll by this Nishi, but take a look at Barack Obama and this Alan Grayson, both with stellar Harvard days. The former unaccomplished save at the con-man’s craft twenty years later, unwise and crude, and the latter raving and demented now.
Christain Laitner sounds like a French clothing designer.
I think I meant to say Christian Laettner.
Here, some cheesecake for JD.
I am assuredly NOT a Dookie. One can admire Coach K and dislike the Dookies, which is what I do. Christian Laettner did make one of the greatest clutch shots in the history of basketball.
Was just reading some comments under Dr Helen’s post. I run a hate site. Who knew?
This like finding out that the nice old man on the end of the block is a Nazi war criminal. No. It’s worse than that.
I comment at a hate site?! And I am a Nazi war criminal?!
I need to take a road trip I think. But not California. Maybe through the Ozarks and the Smokies. And Georgia.
Dude. Utah’s five state parks, or the Grand Circle Tour (Grand Canyon, Bryce Canyon, Zion Canyon). It will fill you with awe and make you glad you belong to this land.
Corey Haim hate, is what it is. I’m a danger. Be alarmed.
I second what dicentra said.
Aber war als Leutnant Laettner nie bekannt.
OK Jeff.
Instead of the old school “love” and “hate” on your knuckles, I guess you’re more of a candidate for “hate” and “hate” instead. Or maybe a la internet parlance, h8te, since it’s owing to your site.
I never knew you were such a h8tey guy, I kinda thought you were ok. Would that also make you a pied piper of hate?
But seriously. They hate you because you’re good…
Dicentra: In an article that makes claims of understanding about the left, telling someone that they have no right to claim understanding of the right just makes me giggle a bit. You need to look at the context.
Again you misunderstand me. Bob sailed in here and made a series of pronouncements about conservatives. I observed that his statements demonstrated his lack of understanding of conservatism.
That is not the same as Bob showing up here and saying in his first comment, “Hey, I’m a lefty and I understand conservatives,” and I reply (knowing nothing more about Bob), “No Bob, you don’t.”
Usually, it’s only schizophrenics whose brains cannot correctly identify a sequence of events. What’s your excuse?
Ah Newrouter, I see you follow the political tradition of never letting a good conversation get in the way of silly namecalling.
If this is supposed to be a hate site, I think you’re doing it wrong, Jeff.
You were pretty sarcastic with your old deadbeat neighbor, I suppose.
For every person who gets their news from ABC and doesn’t question it, there’s someone who actually believes Fox News is fair and balanced.
Actual measurements were taken on Fox news versus the others (not the opinion programs, like Beck and O’Reilly and Hannity) but the proper news. They measured positive and negative statements regarding both sides of the aisle.
And Fox News actually scored as even-handed, whereas the rest tilted considerable leftward.
The man who is floating down the Mississippi in an innertube is barely aware there’s a current. The man whose feet are planted on the riverbed — or who is trying to walk upstream — feels the full force of the water’s weight and force.
If the news seems unbiased to you, it’s because you share the same bias as the reporters.
And if there were no leftward slant in the MSM, Rush Limbaugh et al. would have absolutely no audience.
Dicentra, you said “No, Bob, you don’t understand us at all. I’m afraid the arbiter of whether you understand us has to be us, whether you can articulate our views such that it sounds like something we’d recognize.”
Saying “the arbiter of whether you understand us has to be us” in a thread that “understands” the motivations of the left…
I suppose that you might miss out on the joke, but I do find it funny how you then attempt to accuse me of mental illness in the comments of a post about one political side lacking empathy for the other.
Ahh well, cheers and good evening.
They have one over there in her comments that is just OUT THERE. Hope Pluto doesn’t blindside ’em.
Saying “the arbiter of whether you understand us has to be us” in a thread that “understands” the motivations of the left…
Still misunderstanding me, Josh, but I’ll walk you through it.
Bob came in and said conservatives are X, in order to demonstrate that he knew what we were about.
However, X consisted of cartoonish stereotypes and caricatures that no one who understands conservatives would ever say.
Bob’s statement resonated the same as a white person going to the Navajo reservation and saying, “How. Me paleface. You injun. Here wampum.”
True or false: The Navajo are qualified to say whether a non-Navajo “gets them” or not. Neither you nor I can assert it of ourselves, because we lack the fulness of knowledge that they possess. And if I walked into the Navajo reservation and rattled off a bunch of tired old stereotypes from the movies to prove that I understood them, that would prove that I knew NOTHING about them.
At no time did I attempt to divine Bob’s motivations. I don’t know what makes him tick. I don’t know why he said what he did.
I only evaluated his statements as evidence that he did not understand what conservatives were.
It’s interesting that you’re stumbling over the question of motivations, because we often observe that the Left automatically assumes that the right has bad motives behind their positions and are therefore bad people.
Seriously, what up?
you then attempt to accuse me of mental illness in the comments of a post about one political side lacking empathy for the other.
No, the comment assumed that you did NOT have schizophrenia. Besides, the parting shot was an excuse to post a link to that fascinating article.
If there are not any conservatives in the ‘ideas-disseminating’ industries such as schools, academia, hollywood, etc., it is because they’ve been purged.
“V” just came back on the air tonight not but an hour ago. It wasn’t bad… I’ll keep watching. But they basically shitcanned the dude for having the guts to portray discomforting allegory for Obama.
“what might be the punchline for a panel showing Umberto Eco fucking Gore Vidal with a Grecian Urn?”
Oddly enough I just opened the Amazon package and have Foucalt’s Pendulum sitting on my desk.
But now I’m worried about where it’s been.
You people are sick.
Oh wow, Jeff. I know Ampersand. Been to his house. Peed in his toilet. One of his housemates was a good friend of mine from another forum. A bunch of them live together in a self-styled “commune,” where they pool their resources and stuff. They started as the “Ennead” in college, nine of them, and though a core remains (Ampersand being one of the stalwarts, as is my friend and her husband), people tend to come and go.
That’s also one of the reasons I’m paranoid about my real name: they know my real name, and they know I’m dicentra, and if I ever got prominent, I’m afraid that they would reveal it to their fellow lefties, thus to torment me in person (my friend wouldn’t do it, but I don’t trust all her housemates).
One of the more intelligent lefties, I’d say, but I found he’ll go for the sob-story pretty fast when you corner him.
Pablo, in the link from Jeff’s 235:
You might be as surprised as I was to know that Ampersand is a dude.
I think he’s just in it for the pussy. The juggling isn’t gonna do it.
Ampersand is as gay as an Easter parade. So…
Yeah. I used that post as an example, because to his credit, he did try to debate — at least for a while.
We used to be able to pull that off. Marcotte, though, showed them that it was easier just to dismiss me as a dismal hater and misogynist (my wife, incidentally, did some academic work in women’s studies) — and thus avoid the tedium of having to discuss the issues.
Instead, they’d discuss how they wanted to discuss the issues, but couldn’t with the likes of us, because all we wanted to do is caricature their views, and besides, we were too stupid to bother with.
The brushstrokes were clear to anyone watching honestly. But hey — they figured out the right way to work, evidently, because they’ve all gone on to some notoriety, where I’m just the hatey guy who advocates violence against women, and, when not lynching negroes, am running around the country trying to slap people with my schlong.
Wretchard posts about funhouse mirrors and caricatures, too. Must be the new spring fashions came in.
am running around the country trying to slap people with my schlong.
They say that like it’s a bad thing.
Off to watch the Guy Ritchie Sherlock Holmes. Review tomorrow.
Shelby Steele puts it out there, again. WSJ
I love dicentra a lot.
There’s that one Jill person at Feministe who always seemed to be relatively honest about debating, I think.
Wiki deletes Wretchard.
Hadlowe #93
One of the greatest failings of modern English (not the band) is the lack of a plural you.
Thou shouldst perhaps be aware, that it is the informal singular “thou” form that has disappeared, forsooth.
The “you” form, like the “vous” form in French, is both the plural and the formal singular.
But thou knewest that anyway, if thou hast read the KJV.
Bullying and hate. That’s me.
I read like a (simplistic) book.
[…] Or consider this bit of toxic crosslinking from just this afternoon: “How Should Conservatives Deal with the Left’s Disrespect and Lack of Empathy?” […]
I love dicentra a lot.
You should. Everybody should. :D
Oh, dicentra, we do, we do.
Hey, SW. It’s regular daylight hours where you are, ain’t it?
Don’t ask what I’m doing awake at 4 am.
OK, I’m posting at 4 am. Never mind.
Huh. I followed the link on the trackback at #303 and was going to offer a few words of wisdom, but the density of h8 (in the name of combating h8) was mucking up all my navigational sensors.
Couldn’t go in for a landing without instruments. Nope. Couldn’t do it.
Allow me to clarify for Keid A. I meant a plural “you” as phonically and visually distinguishable from a singular “you.” I’m greatly concerned about the inefficiencies that pimps must deal with in trying to clarify that they want money from all their bitches and not just one.
@JeffG: no, I don’t read anything beyond the pale or alarming. I think I’ve actually read a similar criticism of feminism elsewhere long ago, but for the life of me I can’t remember where. Prolly in one of those boring “book” things that you can’t hyperlink to. As far as why the academic left is hating, that’s not me, so you’ll have to ask them.
I would grant you that there are likely many people who are committed to a propagation of the cause they claim to be fighting, similar to other political dog-whistles (such as abortion rights). But regardless of the possible hypocrisy of these actors, one has to ask if there is still “current, significant, society-wide inequality and sexism which on balance disadvantages women” (to use Ampersand’s first definition). If there is, then there is still a place in society for a feminist movement. The correct aims for what this movement should be are matters I’ll levae to folks smarter than me, and the responsibility of making sure those goalposts don’t move I’ll leave to folks like you.
Also, a minor quibble: I think you meant “third wave” feminists when you said “second wave”. First wave was centered around women’s suffrage in the 19th century, while second wave was more about fighting cultural and social inequities in the 60’s.
Dicentra,
I agree with you on people claiming “to understand” each other. What I’m saying has absolutely nothing to do with Bob though.
You’re looking too closely at this to get the funny part.
The post at the top of the page says “The right’s advantage is that we understand how the other side thinks, while they do not.”
I just find it funny that we’re having this conversation under that post.
Yeah, I had misunderstood the thrust of what you said, but after I noticed that I decided that a retraction might not be necessary. But as it is: retracted.
Slartibartfast,
My thanks for the retraction! Cheers and a good day to you.
I favor the Hanson proposal:
See you out on the ice, greenyskates.
German has the same shortcoming, so to speak (Sie/Sie). The American South has made that problem in reverse, relegating the explicitly plural “you all” (aka y’all) to double duty.
Same problems exist with singular/plural “who/whose”.
In that thread Nishi claims to have a BS in Math and an MS in Mathematics & Statistics, yet
these days she posts like a barely literate teenagershe thinks that human IQ can be raised, in an aggregate way. No one even notionally acquainted with how IQ works AND has extensive math education could possibly make that mistake.I cry fraud.
Math and nishi do not occupy the same plane of reality.
To date, I have never met a racist that liked being called a racist.
None of these feeble, pseudo-intellectual rationalizations comes as any surprise. Those who hate rarely have the courage or the strength of their convictions to openly acknowlege the source of their irrationality.
RACIST!!!
Sorry, buttfucker. It’s played out. Boring as hell. Next.
Oh, dicentra: I just read your first comment over at windsofchange. Excellent, and agreed. Well said!
Someone should tell Danziger that he’s mispelled “Heidegger”, but it’s not worth signing in to do that.
And Scott Jacobs’ protestations ought to be countered with a collection of all the smack talk he emitted in this thread.
Those are things you don’t say to someone in person, unless you’re prepared to make a trip to the parking lot and hash them out manually. Sorry, no self-respecting man would permit that kind of abuse in person. The Internet has permitted Scotty (just indulging in one of Jacobs’ predilections for a moment by way of illustration) the illusion that courtesy doesn’t count. You can call someone a liar, a retard, a psychopath, and all manner of other things, and no consequences at all will come your way.
Lots of people don’t grow up much past their first couple of hours on the Internet.
Oh, also Scott’s reply to Jeff:
Taking
thehis own high road, this one is not.Sorry, no self-respecting human would permit that kind of abuse in person.
Fixed.
@Bob Reed, #152: I read the article, and, no, Buchanan is far from a favorite. And yes, we could pass this “He started it!” game back and forth ad nauseum. But Buchanan’s piece is hollow in the center: he’s absolutely right that it is disgraceful and manipulative to compare this little flare-up to Kristallnacht. But he then de-rails his own argument by not also decrying how disgraceful and manipulative it is to compare an elected public official to a man who brutally murdered 6 million people to achieve his own perverted political ideals. It was wrong to do it to Bush (regardless of how Nazi-like the tactics of his administration), and I said so at the time. It is every bit as wrong to do it to Obama, yet even the most erudite of conservatives remain strangely silent on the matter.
Not sympathetic to conservatives? Who in their right minds would sympathize with someone who constantly demonizes them, all for only political advantage? If the mainstream Republican party made an effort to actually repudiate the actions of the extremists in their party, a case could possibly made that the left is deaf to concerns of the right. But all we see and hear ultimately are petty complaints from a group that resents being measured by their own yardstick.
And, BTW, his Bill Ayers reference was pretty cheap and stupid, considering how long ago and how many times that lie was debunked.
Talk about yelling fire in a crowded theater.
@ Pablo:
What a scathing riposte! I’m going to need a bandaid after that one. Funny how you said nothing other than twist a name around, dismissive…exactly how the racist a-holes around Southern MD behave. What can one expect from a pig except a grunt?
Perhaps Pablo was merely shortcutting a thorough examination of your insight. Let’s start at the start, shall we? “I have never met a “expletive” who liked being called an “expletive”. Let’s assume that if one’s status as “expletive” is true, then his standing in the community will be reduced. That statement is then going to be true in the majority of cases, so no problem thus far
Now let’s take the statement and invert it. “Non-“expletive”s enjoy being called “expletive”s.” Well that can’t be right, now can it? I mean, if your good standing in the community relies on you not being perceived as having sex with farm animals, then someone maliciously labeling you as a goatfucker for rhetorical advantage would probably piss you off, no?
So what must be done to insure that the statement is true as presented and in the inverse? Perhaps if we make the accusation synonymous with the status, we can achieve that. For example, if it is assumed that all people who are called goatfuckers, actually are goatfuckers, then the statement “I have never met a goatfucker who liked being called a goatfucker.” is probably true. In the inverse, we no longer have a problem. For all we know, non-goatfuckers can probably enjoy being called goatfuckers because the act of being called a goatfucker eliminates the messy prerequisite of being a non-goatfucker. Thus there are only goatfuckers, and those who have not yet been identified as goatfuckers.
So if we assume that all people accused of racism actually are racists, then we have no logical dilemma. However, if something should mess up our nice little logical loop, like the ability of humans to lie about events for political advantage, the messiness of interpreting the words of others, or the inability to convey status by accusation without the requisite Star Chamber, well, then we have a problem again.
All of which is an overly long way of saying, “methinks thou dost protest too much” isn’t an argument. Also, the goats are tired and sore, you may want to try something else for a while.
Continuing…
To which feeble, pseudo-intellectual rationalizations do you refer? Your objection comes 300+ comments into a thread where Jeff G. quotes extensively from another blog. A bit of specificity would narrow down the range here. However, if your objective was to dismiss all the right-wing noise with a simple wave of a rhetorical wand, well then bravo, sir.
Allow me to unpackage this a bit because the sentence is a bit wound up. We have haters, that much is clear. The haters apparently lack 1) courage and 2) strong convictions (or is it strong and courageous convictions if we want to go all anthropomorphy with our linguistic ambiguities.) That lacking element that we’ll call courage just for convenience is a “but for” requirement to a recognition of one’s own irrational thought.
The problem therein, is that the emotional response of hate and a rational response are not mutually exclusive. In fact, the coldest hatred of all is that based on a rational decision process. For instance, I really really hate Soviet apologists, not because of an adverse reaction to the way they dress or the way they look, but because of the evil their apologias condone and promote.
In sum, what do we have in your hastily scrawled trollings? 1) A truism that fails unless you make a heroic assumption. 2) A magical dismissal of some ambiguous and undefined opponent as lacking in logic. 3) A convoluted version of “hate makes you stupid, haters.”
All told, I would say that Pablo spent exactly enough time with his brief response.
Yeah, I do that. A lot.
What part of “It’s played out. Boring as hell.” did you not understand? That ground has been well worn around here. You’ve brought nothing new, and no insight whatsoever, keeping in mind that “People who don’t like being called racists are racists.” is not only not insightful, it’s also inane and trite.
And now I’ve spent too much time on you, Buttfucker.
Clearly, people who like being called racists are not racists. Mork is Mindy.
And it is the second-wave mindset that I speak of. Who do you think became the professors after agitating for the new discipline?
To date, I have never met a racist that liked being called a racist.
Please tell me how a non-racist’s reaction differs from racist’s when being called a racist. Or do non-racists enjoy being called racist?
As for the objections to Obama, you can’t call the racist until you’ve controlled for political differences.
Obama is two things: black and a statist (he believes in using the state to solve society’s ills).
Fact: Classical liberals, sometimes called conservatives, categorically object to statists.
So how do you tell if the Tea Partiers et al. are reacting to Obama’s race or his politics?
Easy. First, you look at how conservatives react to white statists, such as Hillary Clinton or Al Gore, and determine if there’s a difference.
There is not. Conservatives were writing books about how to beat back the Hillary juggernaut before Obama even emerged on the scene.
Second, you look at how conservatives react to black conservatives. Do conservatives treat black conservatives with contempt? Do we snicker behind their backs and use racial epithets?
We do not. I dare you to find a racist statement about Condolezza Rice, Clarence Thomas, Michael Steele, Thomas Sowell, or Walter Williams.
I will give you a hint, though. Some people did call Ms. Rice “Aunt Jemima” and “Brown Sugah,” and Clarence Thomas has been called a “house n*ggah.”
Those people are on the left.
Sorry, Bufftrucker, but when you control for politics, you’re not left with racism.
So Sam, this (my emphases)
doesn’t look like this
I don’t know what you’d name your proposal, but for myself it looks a lot like an Anthropological expedition (which you had suggested in your very first response and from which you haven’t moved). Which is why I wrote
And which I wouldn’t characterize as the same at all, I think. The spoof is good though.
But if you still don’t see the similarity, we’ll just have to carry on. I guess that means it falls on me to give my concept a name, as you insist. “Anthropology” is already taken though, as is “iPad.” So we’ll go with your original suggestion of “intentionality,” provided you can give me some sort of example where “our host” elaborated on this concept and we can confirm the similarity you imply.
Shall we continue towards a doctrine now?
Argh, my last post (332) didn’t like my HTML. Will repost in a moment.
@sdferr: Oh, I can think of much better spoofs than that. Especially since this isn’t a spoof. Exposure to contrary political views drives us to consider their evidence (or, their arguments) for why they think the way they do. I contend that it’s key for untethering any untoward projections we might have.
Also, the part of my reply that you cited as this:
[…]
was where I actually wrote this in (216):
And the more one abandons psuedo-psych armchair analysis of why one side or the other thinks the way they do, the more one abandons attributions to others states of mind in general.
which I thought was very similar to this:
how about we lose attributions to one another’s states of mind
But if you still don’t see the similarity, we’ll just have to carry on. I guess that means it falls on me to give my concept a name, as you insist. “Anthropology” is already taken though, as is “iPad.” So we’ll go with your original suggestion of “intentionality,” provided you can give me some sort of example where “our host” elaborated on this concept and we can confirm the similarity you imply.
Shall we continue towards a doctrine now?
Huh. I don’t see the similarity? Or you don’t see the distinction?
Sam. What difference does it make that anthropology is already taken, if anthropology is what you would want to call your approach or if anthropology is what you care to do? Surely that I’d called it that shouldn’t matter.
What are you talking about with this: “the similiarity you [I] imply”? Imply? Similarity as between what and what?
Further, if you desire to delve into Jeff’s writings on the subject of intentionalism, you can’t go wrong with the heading “language/intentionalism” on the sidebar left under the Greatest Hits banner (I highly recommend that you do read there, though as I do, I’d note that the link will lead you to a chronological listing from most recent first and oldest last, yet it would perhaps be best in terms of intelligibility if one were to start with the older matter first and work one’s way toward the newest last.)
Doctrine can wait. What’s the hurry?
“And the more one abandons psuedo-psych armchair analysis of why one side or the other thinks the way they do, the more one abandons attributions to others states of mind in general.”
That is verging on the insulting, which gives me pause. What’s the point, when I’ve long ago indicated I hold no court with such views?
Bufftrucker is a smart one eh? He reminds me of this:
‘Contrariwise,’ continued Tweedledee, `if it was so, it might be; and if it were so, it would be; but as it isn’t, it ain’t. That’s logic.
Only without the humor and nostalgia.
@sdferr: Well,
– Anthropology is the study of humanity, which is pretty far off of our topic.
– WRT “the similarity you imply,” that would be the similarity you’re implying between my concept and “intentionality”/”intentionalism” you mention in (95).
– I found the intentionalism tag (thanks), but that’s quite a bit of writing to digest for something as ancillary as what to call a concept. You can’t give me or point me to a quick and dirty definition to consider?
– What exactly are you (nearly) insulted by?
I’m not implying any such similarity though Sam (that seems to be your notion, that is, that there is a similarity), as between this “…and the more one abandons pseudo-psyche armchair analysis of why one side or the other thinks the way they do…” and intentionalism as a description of the making of meaning in communication or analysis of intent. What made you think I was?
This: “something as ancillary as what to call a concept” is a tad dismissive, if you find yourself in doubt as to what is being referred to in these parts (on this blog) or in this conversation (by me) as intentionality in speech acts or by Jeff as an idea or theory of intentionalism as such. The question may be fundamental, in the sense that we human communicators can’t escape it, try though we might, while yet simple (as “natural”), insofar as communication seems to work most of the time and falls onto us from our earliest days as communicators and recipients of communication, though astoundingly complex as the neurological structures and brain mechanisms of communication come to light. And then we have error (another topic) yet to deal with.
Read Monkey Shines for the fun and demonstrable abuse. Or see Darleen’s controversial cartoon and the silly uproar thereon for more of the same in a current setting. Or just wander in to the list on your own.
As to the rest, I’ll leave that for you to sort out, if any of it still is of interest to you.
was #250 “Glen” hammer boy?
Mikey NTH:
Doubtful. For Thor’s legion of failings, he didn’t lack creativity. Glen demonstrates all the creativity and wit of a tapeworm.
thor is a wonderful writer
#342 Haps:
Thor was an utter ass; and that destroyed any wonderfulness of writing he may have had. And vile invective isn’t wonderful any way it is looked at.
I just get attached to people
@sdferr: Yes, of course you implied a similarity. In (95), when you said “It might be helpful if you give this concept a name. I might call it, after our host’s notion, intentionality or intentionalism…” – why else would you suggest calling my concept intentionality/intentionalism if you didn’t think it was identical to intentionality/intentionalism, or nearly the same thing?
And after following your links above and getting a sense of what you mean by intentionalism, I don’t see the similarity myself. It seems to be a linguistic theory that seeks to denigrate the role of the listener in conversation. It might be useful in absolving one from being politically correct, but at any rate, it’s nothing like the so-called “anthropology” I’m suggesting. So you’ll have to explain.
But really, is what you call a concept more important than what it is, and what it might mean, such that any evaluation of the concept must wait until it’s named? I think not, and that’s why I’m saying this digression is ancillary. Your thoughts?
Obama isn’t being compared to Hitler or called a Nazi for the most part. What he is being accused of is fascism, which is a very different thing, and for which no one has submitted a real defense.
Other than accuse us of name-calling and then calling us racists.
“Yes, of course you implied a similarity.”
Which you demonstrate after excising the hypothetical context I had placed it into (which hypothetical I’ve already drawn to your attention!). Or does “suppose for the moment” indicate lack of doubt? And imply certainty? Ha!
“why else would you suggest calling my concept intentionality/intentionalism if you didn’t think it was identical…?”
Due solely to the fact that you had said you thought “I think our ideas boil down to the same concept”, and the hypothetical approach allowed us both to take up your belief and examine it for verity. Or consider it only a mannerism of hospitality, if you’d rather. In any event, we seem to have discovered a distinction that may have been passed over unnoticed, had we not taken the digression.
“…denigrate the role of the listener…”
Denigrate? (En-blacken!?) Hardly. Laughably hardly, even. In fact, the status of an interpreter may be somewhat elevated from a passive lump of listener, given the daunting task of interpretation with which a faithful interpreter is charged. What it doesn’t do is grant an interpreter a higher status in the chain of meaning creation than an originary source of signification.
As to naming, the naming act won’t change the being of the thing named (much) I suppose, so of course naming doesn’t take particular precedence in distinguishing, but does assist communication. Part of the purpose of naming is to enable sorting one thing from another in communication, putting the same things in one pile and other things in another pile so to speak. If two names are given to one thing, our sorting of same and other will or may be faulty, were we to depend on the name alone. (So also in an instance of one name given for two things.) So naming affords an opportunity to examine the thing to be named, an opportunity to question, to come to grips. And as our digression has demonstrated in discovery, can be useful in aiding distinguishing.
Now this thread, it seems to me, is growing weary, lagging the ever forward flowing wave. Let us leave it.
sdferr – Perhaps if Sam were not being intentionally obtuse, it would not be lagging?
Nah, it’s the newer posts that cause the lags. Further, I don’t think Sam is intentionally obtuse, if obtuse at all JD. These endeavors aren’t easy, after all, for anyone. (I’m pointing at myself here. Take my word for it. I’m also lighting another smoke. Word.)
@sdferr: Even with couching your premise in supposition, you still chose “intentionalism” of all things in the world to suppose a comparison to. Out of manners of hospitality myself, I then proceeded to indulge the comparison, and with the well drawing empty, we find ourselves here.
Now you deny that this was your implication, then? I must wonder why you would bring intentionalism up to begin with, seeing that, the merits of the theory notwithstanding, it has no similarities to my thoughts on how to “leap the chasm,” which was the starting point for our conversation. You may feel that my first impressions of intentionalism yielded a distinction or discovery, but not a discovery that’s germane to our discussion.
It’s a shame to abandon our dialogue, before even returning to the topic at hand! But, so be it.
Well then, if not, then not. So we’ll stay awhile then.
“I must wonder why you would bring intentionalism up to begin with”
Only because this is what I would call refusing “attributions to others” not grounded in some evidence. Or what I would call the attitude I take toward interpretation.
The starting point, I thought, was my question to you “how?” and your reply to (who? not me, as it turned out!)
Chock-a-block with attributions to some indistinct “you”, meaning (I take it now, as opposed to then), the crowd here (who you don’t know, being new here, so how could you? but not myself, as you explained and I wondered upon) or Jeff, (who, it turns out, doesn’t agree with your characterization of his stance!). Why bring up intentionality! Indeed! Very odd.
Mikey NTH
Could you send me an email. I had a system crash that wiped all my emails and addresses out.
wrong thread