While I was writing for a blog belonging to someone else and often getting blog mobbed over what I said, I came to realize that there was organized trolling of comment threads by atheists and, especially in those years as the "new atheism" was still relatively new and ubiquitous that posting their comments was doing half of their work for them.
I'd been trolled by and, on one hilariously wrong occasion, the target of an attempted doxing by some on the basis of some fairly mild criticism by 2006. Personally, twelve-years-ago, I was going from being a kind of wishy-washy believer, the kind which reading John Dominic Crossan's Historical Jesus could produce in the late 1990s to seeing that both the core of the Mosaic tradition and the Gospel were persuasively true.
That discovery of the truth, for me, is an ongoing effort. Being a political blogger, I was already well on the way to realizing that the ubiquitous secular-anti-religious-atheist, libertarian-liberalism-leftism was wrong and was, in fact, demonstrated as a failure by its being pushed for more than a century. The only success it had in real life was to make things steadily worse since the middle 1960s.
Confronting, over and over again, the same old lines and lies of atheism, like the same old, same old lines of Republican-fascism, I decided that instead of posting them, yet again, that I would, generally, answer them without reinforcing the lie by repeating them in the form the atheists found most convenient to their ideological program. Quite often it was possible to rephrase their claims so as to make them less dishonest before answering them.
Since the rise of Donald Trump I have come to see that decision as being validated by journalists such as Rachel Maddow who, correctly, refuse to post much in the way of Trump verbiage or the lies of Sarah Huckabee Sanders or Sean Spicer because it wasn't necessary and it only lent credibility to them that wasn't warranted.
I do frequently post comments from Simps and, on occasion, others because
a. they are typical in their wrongness,
b. they are generally direct and personal misrepresentations of what I've said posted at Duncan Black's blog or elsewhere and so require an answer,
c. they're useful to show how anti-intellectual and stupid the mix of lazily absorbed modernistic-kewlitude obtained through commercial pop culture as opposed to the truth gained through study and thought is.
That mix of crap is, actually, what informs most of secular American culture, both left and right, the team colors and teams cheered for are the major difference, not the veridical character of what is held. That was something I was horrified to learn from interactions with many thousands more self-declared lefties and liberals of that type online, in online discussions, in blog posts, etc. Even those who held PhDs and taught at prestigious schools and scribbled for influential journals were formed by and lived their lives of the mind within it.
The only other surprising thing about it is how stupid and stubbornly wrong it is no matter how many times it is confronted with fact.
Defeating that form of secular- materialist-anti-religious-leftish-libertarian BALLOT BOX POISON is, in fact, essential for the success of the American tradition of liberalism, the heritage of the abolitionists, those who campaigned against wage-slavery, for Womens' suffrage, for equality and justice, including economic justice. The history of anti-religious, secular "liberalism" proves it is the enemy of that traditional American liberalism, that traditional kind of liberalism being the only likely opposition to corporatist-oligarchic Mammonism which will succeed in the United States or, I hold, anywhere.
Interestingly, a parallel can be drawn to reporting Trump's continuous lies. Should the press even be the conduit for such trash?
ReplyDeleteThey make a big mistake if their goal is the truth, in letting him get his words out with his stagecraft (for want of a better word) because that's how he was sold to his supporters to start with. Steve Colbert's reading of his tweets might not be appropriate for a news show but it's better than just using clips of him.
DeleteThat time I've written about, when I found a "skeptic" on Lindsay Beyerstein's blog calling out their fellow flying monkeys to mob me made a big impression on my thinking about that. I'd suspected there was organized trolling by atheists (of which "skeptics" are a subset) was going on but that was proof of it.
How do you phase the idea "the core of the Mosaic tradition and the Gospel were persuasively true" with your overt political and social biases? Your obsessive dwelling on identity politics? Your constant kneejerk rebuttal to any and every criticism of the left's most obnoxious habits that aren't related to their secular mindset?
ReplyDeleteShoot, you make ad hominum attacks with relish and ease then, when asked to explain yourself, refuse. I've read the Bible with attention and care, but nowhere do I find anything that encourages bigotry, political double-standards, nor the droning sense of resentment you often voice for anyone who is not you.
Matthew 15:9 "in vain do they worship me, teaching as doctrines the commandments of men."
How the hell do you read what I write and fail to miss the huge percentage of what I write that is a criticism of the left?
DeleteLike so many, you seem to not understand what "ad hominem" means. It doesn't mean saying mean things about people, it means basing an argument on an attack of the character of someone. About the only thing I've said recently that you might mistake for ad hominem is when I used Gore Vidal's self-attributed pederasty and the evidence of his frequent trips to Thailand - rightly infamous as a venue of child sex slavery - and his well documented use of rent boys as an example to impeach him as an authority in questions of morals.
I think you're confused because my positions don't neatly fit into the kind of crude categorization you seem to practice. "Identity politics" is a catch phrase, it doesn't mean much of anything - thanks, by the way, I'd forgotten I had started a post on that topic Sunday - what it generally is is white men who are upset that people don't take them as the default definition of human beings and being considered in the way that they consider other people, in terms of their gender, their race, their ethnicity, their sexual orientation, etc. Let me tell you as a gay white man I've never experienced NOT being identified by my sexual orientation by guys like you or, in fact, by members of other "identity groups" just as people like you classify people like Amber Ruffin, Samantha Bee, etc. on the basis of their identifiable personal characteristics, getting worked up when such people make those identifying characteristics the substance of their discourse instead of letting those be defined and made the matter of comment by straight, white men.
I think the opposite of "identity politics" as you use it, as it is generally used in the age of Trump, what you correctly sense is the opposing category is "privilege politics" of which there are no larger group of recipients and proponents than straight, white males. That's what's eatin' you Bunky, that all those "others" aren't taking it anymore.
I understand what ad hominum means, and your words are frequently peppered with attacks against the individual. When I quoted Dr. Johnson, you responded not by arguing against the substance of his quote (“Hell is paved with good intentions”) but by calling him “frequently an ass.” Which, means, what, as it relates to his point about how deeds are far more important and telling than our desires?
ReplyDeletePer Gore Vidal, qui tacet consentire videtur. I didn’t even know about the boasting of his trips to Thailand. Ay caramba, indeed.
Actually, no, “Identity politics” does have a meaning. It is defined as “a tendency for people of a particular religion, race, social background, etc., to form exclusive political alliances, moving away from traditional broad-based party politics.” Pretty self-explanatory.
Why did Samantha Bee, a relatively reasoned and focused voice in political comedy, go so wildly off the rez with her condemnation of Aziz Ansari and Ashleigh Banfield? Because, identity politics: As a woman, she was expected to side with the woman no matter how absurd her claim and, furthermore, call out other woman who don’t echo similar sentiments.
Now, your point on that matter, condemning hookup culture, is one I applaud. But, people like Bee, dyed-blue liberals, would never dream of taking that position because they don’t want to be seen as a wet blanket. She was trying to argue that Ansari should, indeed, have read the young woman’s mind. I will repeat D.L. Hughley’s take on the matter, because it is the perfect retort: “Ladies, ‘no’ means ‘no,’ but you have to say, ‘No!’”
Per Ruffin, I explained this already. For her to insist that as a black woman she thereby understands and speaks for everyone with the same melanin levels and 23rd chromosomal structure as her is identity politics all day, all night, all week long. When I commented that people in New York are very different from people in Alabama (the group Amber was claiming to speak for in her routine), you insisted that Ruffin is from Nebraska! As if that means she understands Southern people because she is not from New York or Los Angeles…
Bill James, who is from Eastern Kansas, observed that Truman Capote understood something very few New Yorkers do: That Western Kansas is very different from Eastern Kansas. Or, if you will, that Omaha is not Tuscaloosa. When Capote wrote ‘In Cold Blood,’ he made sure to live in the community that Clutters did, and not just anywhere in the Sunflower State. For you to argue that just because Amber is black and not from New York that she must therefore understand Alabama voters is just…identity politics bullshit.
The road to hell is often paved with bad intentions, I'd bet you my entire bank account that that's true more frequently than it's paved with good intentions. Good intentions have an odd way of preceding good results. There, I refute your use of him. Johnson was frequently an ass.
DeleteI didn't accuse you of arguing about Gore Vidal, I gave it as about the closest I've come to committing ad hominem in an argument and as the point I was using was his amorality to refute the use of him as a moral authority in an argument you had nothing to do with, I don't know where you got the idea I was talking about something you said.
I don't "insist Amber Ruffin is from Nebraska" I state the fact that she is. As I recall your argument was that she doesn't understand the mythical "heartland" because you said she was from NYC. I have yet to meet someone who understands more than about two parts of the United States, I'll bet you'd be totally confused 'bout where I live, I'll bet you don't even understand the difference between the Maine coast and inland Maine, not to mention that different parts of each are distinctly different. Nor would I expect you to nor would I use such reasonable ignorance in an argument the way you have. I will point out there is one big difference between my state and "The South," Maine has had and has a Senator and other major office holders from the South (Angus King is from Virginia, Libby Mitchell, the former Democratic majority leader in our legislature sounded like what she was, a woman from South Carolina) I once bet people online they couldn't point to a Southern state you could say the same about, Electing governors and Senators from New England.
There is no more pervasive form of identity politics than that played by and on behalf of straight, white, conservative men, especially when they've got money. They are the major beneficiaries of that form of identity politics which precedes the establishment of the United States. In case you don't get that, look at the fact that Nancy Pelosi is the first woman to have been in the direct line for the presidency in our history, all others in that office or in that line being straight, white men, mostly conservative, mostly rich. That's the identity politics which no one notices because such men are held to be the default of humanity.
I think you’re missing Dr. Johnson’s point. Good intentions likely create more good results than bad ones, but people too often excuse the negative residue of actions, no matter how horrible, as being understandable because of...good intentions! And Sam lived well before eugenics was a thing.
ReplyDeleteI never said you accused me of arguing in favor of Eugene Vidal. I was agreeing with you.
No no no no no. I said Ruffin’s claim that she understood black voters in Alabama is absurd because the statement rests entirely on the premise that, as a black woman, she clearly knows how other black women think even if they live a thousand geographic and a million cultural miles away.
And regarding your comments about Maine, you are making my point. I agree, I don’t know the difference between coastal and inland Maine anymore than I Ruffin understands Alabama. I never said she COULDN’T, nor that I can't, I said she didn’t say anything to convince me otherwise. Because everything she said was based on racial identity politics nonsense.
Per SWCM w/$, I NEVER said they are immune to the practice. Identity politics is not just something minorities do and you’ll search in vain for any statement I made that says otherwise. But the alternative to that is not more of the same. When absurd, empty, too nebulous statements like “white privilege” and “cultural appropriation” are tossed about, it only serves to further divide. Cui bono? Those in power, because the unhappy majority is fighting amongst themselves.
Where did I link Samuel Johnson with eugenics?
DeleteHow do you get that from the passage from Boswell?
As I recall it, you accused Amber Ruffin of being from NYC, which is why I looked up where she was from and found out she was from Nebraska. You seem to believe you have some insight into the thinking of white men all over the place, I'd certainly take what Amber Ruffin said about Black Women from Alabama as probably more accurate than what a white guy from Arizona or Maine or Washington State said about it.
I think your point about regional resentment has more to do with the mythical oppression of people by those hated North Eastern elites (of which there are few less elite than yours, truly) which is absurd.
I think I said enough about how the term "identity politics" as the rallying cry of white racists enough this week. I don't recall any of them using it when they weren't being challenged in their enclaves of straight, white, male privilege - aka "most of American history in almost all places". It's only when the Black, the Latino, the Female, the LGBTQ etc. react to that privilege that the term is used.
You didn't, I was just commenting that he lived long before what I would consider one of the most appalling uses of "good intentions" to wreck havoc on people. I imagine Davenport & Co. thought themselves architects of a brave new world.
ReplyDeleteI read it.
Yes, because she does live in NYC. That is not Alabama. I've been to both places and the only thing they have in common is the Atlantic.
You're desperately dodging here. I never claimed to know what black women in Alabama think, but I'd love it explained to me how someone so distant in terms of miles and milieu from a location can be immersed in someone's thinking just because they have similar skin tone? Of course one person can't speak for an entire race/sex of people, but the only reason she thinks she can is...identity politics!
Resentment? I think you're confusing that with ignorance. To repeat, Ruffin's entire routine was hinged on, "I am a black woman and therefore know how black woman think and act." When I went down South, I did not assume, "I know how these white people are, because I am white!" Why? Because it's ridiculous to think that way!
That is final paragraph is empty sloganeering. Nonsense about "privilege" is just that, and your illogic is dizzyingly circular - The solution to identity politics from SWCM w/$ is not more identity politics. You don't combat prejudice being bringing your own to the table. There are now absolute morons in the media and academia who are trying (and failing) to argue that "racism" is exclusive to white people.
Best remark I've ever read about that topic is a joke:
"Identity politics will bring people together. Before labelling them, allotting each demographic privilege points, and finally segregating them again!" How true.
Per privilege, I hear that a lot, but when I ask for what that means, exactly, I'm dismissed as a racist for even asking. When I ask what I can do to upend it, I'm told I should do what they tell me to do, which mainly involves things I don't do in the first place.
I think you should notice something, you, yourself called what Amber Ruffin did a "routine" IT WAS A COMEDY MONOLOGUE ON A COMEDY INTERVIEW SHOW. Do you really think that Seth Meyers is doing a serious news broadcast when he starts with, "Here's the news,"?
DeleteOh, the privilege that straight, white, especially affluent men have had and still have is not a mere slogan, it's very real. It was certainly real at the time of the adoption of the Constitution which allowed local, state and federal governents and courts to privilege white, propertied men, especially when straight and of favored ethnicity, a state that has been in effect in the law right up till arguably NOW and certainly has characterized our society and institutions.
I never claimed that racism was exclusive to white people. I will say that when you mix in the privilege I just talked about with racism that the numbers of people harmed by it and the chance of the targets of such racism finding it impossible to find a remedy to it rises, enormously. For example, compare the lynching statistics and compare the number of Black people murdered by White people and mobs as compared to White People murdered by Black people and mobs. You can compare the numbers of women murdered by men as compared to men murdered by women. I'll give you a clue, the last time I looked the FBI said that an average of 3-4 women were murdered by men on the basis of their gender on an average day.
You have an odd sense of humor. Maybe if you belonged to a group targeted by straight, white men you might have a different one. The problem with the idea of "bringing people together,"or, rather one of the biggest problems is that misogynists, racists, bigots, gay-bashers, etc. don't want to come together, they want to discriminate, they want to enjoy their privilege. Thus Jordan Peterson and his cult of inadequate men and boys who resent the demand for equality, the "incel" losers, etc. etc. etc.