Wednesday, February 09, 2005

Civil Discourse---NOT!!

The great Kim Du Toit has a link on his site to an article worth reading, from the Belmont Club.

The upshot: there can be no civil discourse between the Left and the Right, and it’s only going to get worse. I posted on this same subject a couple of months ago, and I tend to agree. There’s just no common ground.

I add a caveat: I think some lefty moonbats are actually motivated by the best of intentions. They aren’t deliberately communists, they just happen to land in that camp with their social concerns. Those people I can get into a civil discourse with, usually.

Then there’s the rest of them. With this lot, I find the following preventing us from having any sort of meaningful conversations:

1. Elitism of the worst sort: They are smarter than the rest of the country, and they must save us from ourselves. They look down their noses at the so-called Red States, or anyone who espouses a conservative point of view. This ties in to #2.

Basically, the liberal view is that we are not smart enough to understand how wonderful communism really is, and they have to force it down our throats.

Since they view us as little better than talking amoebas, liberals have no respect for our points of view. It’s hard to respect anything an inferior creature has to say, isn’t it?

The elites think that allowing all of us to vote is like allowing the animals at the feedlot to cast a vote.

2. Educated idiots: I have learned from painful experience that an education doesn’t do squat about teaching people the way the real world works. My law school experience highlighted this. We were drilled in theory more than practicality. Some of this isn’t a bad thing: knowing why our laws are set up the way they are is pretty important. Understanding why the Framers set up the Constitution the way they did is pretty important. However, there was not as much emphasis on actually teaching me how to practice law. I didn’t learn anything about that until I worked for other lawyers. I came out somewhat unprepared for the actual job I was supposed to be doing. I didn’t really know how the legal world worked.

Most of the liberal elite have no idea what day-to-day living is like in America. A trust fund baby has no business telling a rancher in South Texas how to do his job. Liberals seem to have little experience with how the real world works. They instead want to impose a socialistic utopia on the rest of us, with no idea why it will never work. The theory just looks good in a book.

This is also why we need to hire electricians, cowboys, and small business owners to represent us in Washington. They actually know how bad professional politicians screw things up for the rest of us. Enough of the Kennedys and other political families. Unless you work for a living, you have no business telling the rest of us how to run our lives. Even worse, you have no business passing laws that tell us how to run our lives.

3. Intolerance and Bigotry: Sorry, but you liberals are the most intolerant buttholes I’ve ever come across. I mean that in the nicest way one could possibly mean “butthole.” For example, look at how conservative groups take fire on universities. If they don’t march lockstep with the pinko-commie agenda, they are silenced by the moonbats who run the universities. So much for the free exchange of ideas. Free speech for everybody but conservatives.

I think the universities do this sort of thing for a reason: they know their idiotic ideas can’t survive in the real world. Unless they ruthlessly suppress conservative thought, their ideas will die in the cold light of logic and common sense.

At any rate, liberals are quick to call conservatives racist, elitist, uncaring, or anything else that sounds in the pejorative. I call to your attention the shameful conduct of Robert Byrd against Condoleeza Rice. If the Democrats really were the progressive party they’d like you to think, why wouldn’t they celebrate the first black woman to hold the office of Secretary of State? Answer: because she’s not a liberal.

This ties into point #1, but basically: they hate us.

That’s why they will never acknowledge when conservatives pull things off like free elections in Iraq or Afghanistan. Their hatred blinds them to the good things conservative thought brings about.

4. Cognitive dissonance: Every time the Right proves itself right, it creates a headache for the lefties. They can’t believe the ignorant barbarians of the Right actually have ideas that work. It kills them. They are seeing their whole commie utopia collapse around their ears. It’s like a kid finding out the truth about Santa. Instead of facing the truth, they stick their heads in the sand and deny it vehemently.

Even the presentation of cold hard facts will not deter them. Some moonbat posts in my comments section on occasion. Look at those discussions. Even documented facts don’t deter these people from their beliefs. That’s because they can’t stand the thought of conservatives actually being right.

5. No respect for the Higher Power: It sort of puts a cramp on the style of liberalism if there is a God. Consequently, it’s much easier to justify sex and drugs if they just pretend God doesn’t exist. If there’s not an afterlife, and if your deeds here on Earth go unanswered for, why not do whatever feels good? One of the worst aspects of our society is the marginalization of God.

Sorry, atheists. But we got where we are in this country by the principles of the Judeo-Christian tradition. We don’t expect you to believe in or worship what we do. But we do expect, and rightly so, some respect for it. You wouldn’t be free to protest the Ten Commandments if the Founding Fathers hadn’t been God-fearing men.

Anyway, it’s going to come down to out and out war between the commies and the conservatives. There’s really no middle ground where both sides can find commonality. This country ain’t big enough for the both of us. This is also why space exploration is so important. Everybody needs their own planet, if we’re to keep from killing each other.


2 comments:

Anonymous said...

Okay, I have to throw a “bullshit” flag on the play. This kind of talk irks me to no end. There CAN be civil discourse. You quote Kim Du Toit’s site, and I find one sentence in there particularly telling. “I for one don’t give a rat’s ass about the fact that civilized debate has all but disappeared in this country.”

Instead the far left and right demonize the “other side”, (“moonbats” and “pinko commies” anyone?) ignoring the fact that we all live together in the same country, work side by side, go to the same movies, watch the same little league games, and generally share the same day-to-day lives outside of the world of politics. Why would anyone want to enter serious, civil discourse with someone who has already referred to you as a poop-head?

Assuming you are correct and a war between the left and right is imminent, why now? Is the country really in any worse shape than during the Vietnam era? Are there riots in the streets? Public assassinations of civil and political leaders? THOSE were difficult times, and arguably the sides had much more pretext for “out and out war between the commies and the conservatives”. Yet somehow we all pulled through just fine. (Except for having to endure the decade of Disco. Bleah!) Out and out war, indeed. The far left and right want you to believe that they hold all the answers, but while they’re shouting pithy slogans the moderates keep things running.

If civil discourse is no longer possible, it is only because we have forgotten how to be civil. Among other things to blame, I look to the transformation of politics into commercial entertainment. Whether it is cable tv shows, radio talk shows, or blog sites, politics has become commercial entertainment. I never answered your earlier post about the motives of talk show hosts because frankly I never had the time. Here it is:

I will ALWAYS question the motives of someone whose livelihood derives from delivering me their political opinion. Radio shows (or tv, or even some websites) rely on advertising to remain viable. I saw quite a few ads on Kim’s site, for that matter. Advertising rates are based on the number of people who tune in. The more who tune in, the more money a station can charge for a 30 second spot. If a show does not bring in enough listeners to draw advertisers, the show is dropped in favor of another one that does. After all, radio stations have bills to pay, too.

That puts pressure on the show producers, and the host(s) in particular, to draw listeners. How does one draw listeners? By being the voice of reason and reconciliation? Of course not! Any writer or actor will tell you that CONFLICT sells. People tune in (or log on) because the rhetoric stirs their passions. These pundits-for-hire are paid to titillate us as surely as a Sugars lap-dancer. We have fully entered the age of infotainment.

But what is so wrong about getting a job doing what you already believe in, you might (and did) ask? Surely those who were drawn to pundit-hood did so because they genuinely believed in what they said, right? Yes, you’re probably right. But what happens when they run out of things to say? What happens when the other side just hasn’t done anything particularly boneheaded lately? If their livelihood (or even a decent portion thereof) derives from their continuing to draw an audience, they HAVE to find some way to draw an audience (entertain). As we have already established, conflict is entertaining. So whether or not there is anything worth creating a fuss over, the infotainer is there to manufacture one. If there’s nothing current in the news, harp on the past. If that gets old (stops being entertaining) then predict dire doom and gloom at the hands of the opposition. That one is especially nice, because it is entirely speculation with little or no means to refute. If the apocalypse-of-the-week never comes to pass, then clearly it is because of the brave infotainers who brought it to the attention to the masses. If it does come to pass, then they can say “I told you so.”

In short (which this post is not), civil discourse is being discouraged by the far left/right fringe who do not want compromise AND by media manipulation (driven by market forces) that tends to polarize opinion and discourage moderation. This CAN be reversed, with a healthy dose of skepticism of media and a return to placing value in civil discourse and compromise.

-Paul

Anonymous said...

Your premise is flawed. It ignores the fact that sometime, you're going to have to make a value judgment. Which side is right or wrong? When you've made that decision, then what?

Is it demonization, or is it that the lines have been drawn, and the battle now engaged? Both sides are firing their shots in the arena of public opinion?

Which goes to your point. You can look at it like politics is just an interesting aside, which goes on while we live our day to day lives. But politics allows us to live our day to day lives in this country that we have. It affects how we live our day to day lives.

Yes, your communist neighbor might take his kids to little league with yours, but he's working to steal your wealth and have the government redistribute it where it thinks it needs it. They may live and work in our system, but they're sure trying to change it.

There isn't a middle ground, because there is no commonality in the ends both sides are trying to achieve.

We've avoided it so far, but the war is coming. We've stayed together because the Constitution is still in force and effect, but for how long? The left wants freedom of speech for everyone except conservative thought. The left assaults our religion, our morals, our Bill of Rights, and our very identity as a nation.

I'm all for the civil discourse. I want everyone to throw out their produce into the marketplace of ideas. But we've got to have a marketplace where this can go on.
That just doesn't exist anywhere else like it does in America today. I see the system coming under attack by leftists.

It is worse now than it ever was before. Just because we're not burning down Watts doesn't mean there's not a pretty nasty undertone to the whole thing. I think there's outlets such as blogging, talk radio, various activist groups, etc. that have allowed a safety valve to bleed off some of this pressure. Everybody is at least free to voice an opinion nowadays. That helps keep the revolution factor low. For now.

What the whole thing comes down to, as it always does, is right vs. wrong. One side's right, the other isn't. Hence the conflict.

You can play "shades of gray" all you want to, but that's what it comes down to. You don't compromise with evil. Ever.

Black and white. Good and evil. It always comes down to that, in the end. If you pussyfoot around calling something bad that's bad, you do no service to what you hold dear. Sorry, but liberals are socialists. Pure and simple. Socialism is evil. Pure and simple. This is the way I see it. I'm going to call it evil, and speak out against it. I'm going to try and persuade others to my point of view. And I'm going to call it like I see it. And I'm going to demonize the hell out of it, pun intended.

If that offends somebody, fine. I've been offended enough in my time, and there's no law protecting my feelings.

You are incorrect when you say people are flocking to hear about a made-up conflict. The conflict was there, has always been there as long as there's been good and evil. It's the classic struggle.

Is it simply drawing attention to the conflict, and making money at it because it resonates true with so many people? The conflict is there, and has been all along. Why not capitalize on it? The issues are not manufacutred, and they're not going away.

By your logic, Rush Limbaugh should be off the air. Instead, his listenership is up higher than ever. His side won. The problems are still there to confront, however, and people know it. Again, the conflict is still there. This is why talk radio is flourishing, and conservative media outlets like blogging are taking off.

You seem to think there is no conflict out there, that it's manufactured for commercialism. While there is a commercial element, the conflict is very real. Pay closer attention to the bills introduced, and what they could possibly mean for your day to day life. Look at what the leftists want this country to become. Then tell me its pure titillation. I don't believe that for a second.

Lest you think it's Republican media vs. Democrat media, look at the potshots conseravtive talk radio takes at Bush over immigration. Look at the shots they took at themselves over the Armstrong Williams debacle.

It's either right or wrong, black or white. It's not wrong to call it evil if that's how you see it. If people want to tune in to see you call it evil, more power to you. I don't think for a second that the basic conflict between right and wrong is manufactured, and I firmly believe it won't go away until the end of time.

But the struggle between good and evil IS a war, and has always been so. It may be in a more civilized forum, but it won't stay there. It can't, by its very nature. And it's not wrong to call attention to it, in the strongest terms possible.

You do not compromise with evil. Ever. And you identify it as such, and deal with it accordingly. Ask Neville Chamberlain about that one.

Kyle