Who's more extreme?
I want to place equal blame, but I just can't
The beauty of Facebook is that it expands the notion of—and I hate this word in this context, but I can’t deny its fitness—community. I can easily get friends from distinct periods of my life, who would never otherwise have the opportunity to meet, talking. Such was the case on Monday, when a former journalism colleague from my time in Chico, Calif., and a musician friend in San Diego engaged in a conversation about the potential perils of online public education.
The vehicle for the encounter was my first-ever Facebook call for ideas for this week’s editorial. I’d been unable to settle on a concrete idea, so I tossed the matter to my friends. Amid suggestions such as decrying the “madness” of “mayonnaise in squeeze bottles,” advocating the distribution of free ponies for every man, woman and child and discussing “how the celebutard phenomenon is a direct refutation of the very idea of Heaven, since it proves that an existence free of want is intolerable” (?) was a serious recommendation from one of my more conservative friends.
He wanted an exploration of the death of genuine dialogue in American discourse. He cited right-wing freak-outs over “death panels” and “socialists” and left-wing responses that dismiss the Right as “racists.” He pointed to a study by The Project for Excellence in Journalism that showed that 55 percent of press coverage of the healthcare debate has been about politics while 8 percent has been about policy. “We are actively promoting, like Christians and lions, the fight, but actively and purposely avoiding responsible dedication to honorably stating our position,” he concluded.
I expressed my general agreement, but then, as expected, one of my liberal friends jumped in and said the Right has been a far worse offender than the Left. “I think there is a tremendous difference between lambasting Bush for his administration’s violations of the Constitution, and the knee-jerk labeling any of Obama’s policies as socialist.”
I had to agree with that, so I asked my conservative friend for examples of the Left’s ad hominem attacks other than charges of racism. He said the Left is more “passive aggressive” in its rhetoric, failing to acknowledge the values on which this country was founded (personal responsibility and free-market economics) and labeling those who adhere to those values as “haters” who want to see the weakest among us suffer.
I can truly empathize with any conservative who feels unjustly labeled as an uncaring beast—that must be frustrating—but try as I might, I simply can’t conclude that both sides are equally at fault in the irrational-rhetoric arena.
Even amid the Left’s angriest critiques of George W. Bush and Dick Cheney, I can’t fathom anything as nutty and scary as what’s been coming from the Right over healthcare and Barack Obama’s address to students. Bush & Co. entered us into an unnecessary, brutal, astronomically expensive war and trampled all over international law, the U.S. Constitution and the very foundation of the American judicial system (is that crazy rhetoric?); Obama is only slightly left of center (if that) and has only tepidly pushed the concept of launching a government insurance option to compete with private insurance. When Republicans controlled the federal government it took a hard-right turn; when the Democrats took over, there was no discernable shift whatsoever (whether Obama’s responses to the economic crisis were left-leaning is debatable and too complex to explore in this small space). Hell, we on the left can’t even get a fair hearing on single-payer healthcare because Obama took it off the table before the get-go.
Last weekend, Obama quietly accepted the resignation of green-jobs policy advisor Van Jones, who was outed as a left-wing extremist. I don’t recall anyone holding extreme right-wing views being kicked to the curb by Bush. The most right-wing radical of them all was allowed to remain vice president for eight years!
The Left doesn’t have anything equal to Glenn Beck or Rush Limbaugh. The closest we can come is Keith Olbermann, but I would argue that he has annoyingly ratcheted up his rhetoric as a response to Beck and Limbaugh and the high-office holders who parrot their loony, dishonest ravings (I much prefer the moderated leftist tones of Rachel Maddow).
I value honest debate with folks like my conservative friend—nay, I revel in it—and I welcome the counterargument that I am so entrenched on my side that I’m blind to the sins of my cohorts. Please let me know what you think—and let’s all take the high ground.
Write to editor@sdcitybeat.com.
Comments
I run into this particularly in Global Climate change (GCC). I work in a different field, but I have a degree in Geography from Cal, and though it was a long time ago, we were doing work in climatology and oceanography that pointed to increasing global temperatures (work that built on Roger Revelle's, he of UCSD fame, seminal discoveries. Always include a San Diego angle!). So I've kept in touch with the research and the more distressing scenarios that are playing out.
In response to a tweet on GCC , the CEO of one of the companies I work with posted a retort from a professor Jonathan Katz that "It is not possible to engage in rational discussion with irrational beliefs". Huh? This was the first time I had ever had any exchange with him on this subject. Why would you attack a co-worker (and an investor) like that?
(BTW, a quick google shows that Jonathan Katz is quite a character http://wuphys.wustl.edu/~katz/)
What's the motive behind placing blame, Dave? Do you really intend to use your hallowed pages to launch a Truth & Reconciliation review of outlandish comments made by these media entertainers who are the news-equivalent of reality TV?
By participating in this type of conversation where you essentially troll people into a O'Reilly/Olbermann style finger-pointing-fest, I think you run the risk of further marginalizing CB's editorial significance. I don't know what possible benefit you see coming from a successful conclusion of that debate, even if it is in your favor. After a "high-road" debate about which wing offends the worst, you achieve, what? "You're right, Dave"? Really? Does the editor of CB really crave that kind of basic validation of his personal beliefs?
I would much prefer to see an editorial about the faltering status of the fourth estate, how entertainment companies are posing as news organizations and are taking advantage of the floundering news media's impotence to change the average tone of debate in this country from one of reason and consideration to one of zealotry and hard-lines, simply because the ensuing drama creates publicity and sells more advertisements (a situation that CB is not exempt from).
And, finally, I would love to read about what CB's vision of how modern journalism should be, and what role CB is going to play in either participating in the aforementioned farce or resisting it.
I think my take on this is that the right has a certain privilege it enjoys with corporate backing being so firmly behind their economic outlook. Their advertisers are often the target of policy changes when the left is in command. This means that, regardless the hateful rhetoric their most bombastic personalities hurl, the advertisers stay put. The essential nastiness of the right's rhetoric comes from its need to appeal not just to the corporate "greed is good" types, but the need to enlist the lower-brow, guns-and-trucks, stereotypical reactionaries.
A discussion of Keynesian principles with the less educated mass of their audience would have many turning to whatever other channels they might like. Worse, the fact that some working class stiff might be offended at being economically expendable would perhaps see them turn away forever. So, we see the right using code words and emotionally charged language and outright fabrication to whip up the passions of those they know are vulnerable to it, their audiences.
The left, on the other hand, has become more interested in pointing out the fallacies and pitfalls of the right's arguments. That this makes them seem always on the defensive is a side effect of that tendency. However, the passive aggression your friend believes is there is not that per se, but a matter of audience maintenance as well. Liberals care about conservatives and also about not being played for fools, so snappy slogans and vaporous logic does not fly as well. When there are good slogans, they often do not get the exposure they deserve because producers, directors and media personalities will turn their noses up. Add in the need to be wary of advertiser loss, and it becomes clear that a left point of view must carefully construct itself for media presentation.
But this softness of tone is not just in the media. While marching for universal marriage rights last year in the wake of the election, I showed up with a sign in Hillcrest that said 8=Hate. The organizers took it away and gave me a sign that said, "Marriage is for all."
The left just seems to not throw it in the face in general. Maybe that's a good thing, but maybe someone should point out that the death squads are working for the insurance companies, cutting dad and mom off from care when they get sick, and betting they will die.
The left must becomes more interested in enlisting that part of the base of the right which can respond to their best ideas. To do this, the educated and powerful have to learn to appeal to the less so and provide a few more personalities across the range of the left-tending. Unjust vilification and nastiness, deceit and trickery are not the best ways to cultivate trust, and the left should not follow the right in that regard.
Then again, it wouldn't. There are ways to win the arguments the left capitulates on, but they start with not being afraid to call people the names they earn, like liar, insurance murder profiteer, and poverty promoter. The left will need to use accessible and repeatable, even viral, memes to spread both their positive message and their responses to the right's hatred. They need to bring it down to earth, put it out and make sure that some bumbling Hollywood type isn't the only messenger reaching for a wider mass.
Regardless, it seems to me that the right is very comfortable with the boundaries they were allowed to stretch under the last president. They still push the limits, with political people even joking about hunting the president. They lie outright to the people, and their lies reverberate through the media landscape unchecked, and they vilify anyone who points out truth.
Perhaps decency is no longer a conservative value. I don't know. But the left needs to care less about its image and more about its aims.
If a conservative, insurance murder profiteering, poverty promoting liar gets hurt in the process but nobody used vitriol, deceit or epithets, nor called for them to be killed, then the left keeps everything how it likes it. That is to say, civil and honest.
" value honest debate with folks like my conservative friend—nay, I revel in it—and I welcome the counterargument that I am so entrenched on my side that I’m blind to the sins of my cohorts...."
LOL!
Maybe someone would actually engage you if they thought the exchange was more meaningful than the childish (You're a doody head - No you're a bigger doody) sort of discourse that your publication seems to thrive on.
First, show me one sign that you and your staff have the intellectual capacity to engage in the sort of elevated dialogue you yearn for and then maybe we can talk.
Or how about offering an alternative perspective each week since the one thing you all appear to crave is a pseudo-villain upon which to project your pathological hatred.
Who is "you all"? And why do they want any villains at all? I think the point of the editorial is quite about not vilifying and why it seems inevitable among certain people right now.
That might be the "crewlest" truth for a real villain, forgiving the pun, I hope. And the tongue-in-cheek aspersion?
For "you all"; If the shoe fits...
"And why do they want any villains at all?" The simple answer is that is makes you feel better about yourself. It helps validate the "self" in some circles and in other circles it's a tactical political weapon. And the list goes on and on, but you knew that right?
"I think the point of the editorial is quite about not vilifying "
My advice to you is to wake up to reality. The whole point of my response what that his position was insincere based on his premise and the straw arguments provided therein and amply on display herein.