Is it hate?
Bookworm on Feb 16 2011 at 10:59 am | Filed under: Gay marriage
The Indiana legislature is working on a bill to ban gay marriage. On my “real me” facebook, several of my friends characterized this as an act motivated by hate: “Stop the hate!” “Boy, they really hate us.” “Could they be more hateful?” I found this formulation interesting, perhaps because semantics has been such a big issue lately, what with the liberals trying to redefine Reagan so that they can redefine Obama. (For two excellent articles on the politics of semantics, check out this and this.)
Saying that people are motivated by hate is a very powerful and demeaning argument. Most everyone at whom such an argument is aimed reacts instinctively to deny that he or she is hate-filled. Often, to prove that there is no hate, the person will back of from the allegedly hate-filled position.
I’m wondering, though, if there is any merit to the “hate” argument when it comes to gay marriage. I don’t like gay marriage because I’ve increasingly come to believe (here come the semantics again) that it would be better if “marriage” was kept to religious institutions, with civil unions belonging to the state. The state can then decide how best to advance the goal of stable two parent families, which are the backbone of every growing, healthy society.
To allow state gay marriages as a civil right raises the horrible specter looms of a gay couple being denied a Catholic marriage, only to sue, alleging that the couple is being discriminated against under the Constitution. The Church, of course, reasonably responds that, under the same Constitution, the government has to stay out of its doctrinal practices, and where are you then? In other words, I don’t hate gays; I just hate the idea of gay marriage.
Those who oppose gay marriage for other reasons also don’t seem motivated by “hatred” for gays. They may believe that marriage should be between a man and a woman; they may believe gay marriage is a slippery slope to polygamy; they may believe these matters should be put to the popular vote, not the courts or even the legislatures; they may believe that their religion prohibits gay marriage; or they may believe something else entirely. But what one hasn’t heard from the majority in the gay marriage debate is personal animus towards gays. Ignoring the fringes, one hasn’t heard “hate.”
Or am I misdefining hate? Is it hatred if you place obstacles in the path of a specific group, without explicitly demeaning, deriding, insulting or attacking that group? What if you justify those obstacles on grounds unrelated, or reasonably unrelated to the group?
I actually don’t have answers, just questions. Nor am I seeking to open a debate about gay marriage. I’m simply wondering about politics, semantics, and identity groups.
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It’s the Alinsky thing…
Hatred is recognized as “bad”. Racism is recognized as “bad”. If you oppose it, then you tag the “offender” as a “hater” or as “racist” – which is just the Alinsky thing about identifying the opponent, isolating it, targeting it and then attempting to destroy it. Their attempt to destroy someone is by smearing them with the “bad” identifiers.
Check this out as an example:
http://www.rollcall.com/issues/56_84/-203455-1.html
If _they_ do it, it’s just clarification, stating the facts, etc. If “we” do it, it’s hatred, racism etc.
Have we discussed Herman Cain…yes…we have. I remember now. Anyway…he apparently said that when he opposed Obama Care – or maybe other of Obama’s policies – they called _him_ racist! It isn’t the facts that matter, it’s the smear. You’ve covered the same thing in your article about smearing conservatives who are black or female.
I think people are beginning to catch on, but it’s still a nasty thing that can devastate someone or someone’s career. I don’t think I’m particularly for Santorum for President, but the smear is totally unjustified.
Bookworm: I don’t like gay marriage because I’ve increasingly come to believe (here come the semantics again) that it would be better if “marriage” was kept to religious institutions, with civil unions belonging to the state. The state can then decide how best to advance the goal of stable two parent families, which are the backbone of every growing, healthy society.
We strongly agree. Separating the religious from the secular resolves many of the conflicts concerning the various viewpoints people have about marriage.
Bookworm: To allow state gay marriages as a civil right raises the horrible specter looms of a gay couple being denied a Catholic marriage, only to sue, alleging that the couple is being discriminated against under the Constitution.
No, that’s not an issue. The Catholic Church can deny marriage on religious grounds, such as for people who are divorced.
Bookworm: Those who oppose gay marriage for other reasons also don’t seem motivated by “hatred” for gays.
Consider that just a few years ago, sodomy was a felony in parts of the United States — and still would be if the courts hadn’t struck down these laws on Constitutional grounds. Those who advocate against gay marriage and other “special” rights, are concentrated in the same communities that would have imprisoned people for being gay. Perhaps they have evolved in their beliefs, but there is a history of persecution.
You know, I was just musing over the question, “when was the last time that the U.S. (any state) imprisoned someone for being “gay”.
I don’t have a clue why that question just happened to pop into my head?
Does anyone know?
Danny, keep in mind that Zach is a master of the red herring. (I think he may be Danish.)
It has to have been decades since anything like that happened. The sexual revolution, which was well under way by 1965, pretty much overthrew social conventions against sodomy, hetero or homo. So the idea that some states would have continued imprisoning homosexuals (in what numbers?) if SCOTUS had not intervened is farfetched.
Why do you think Zach is Danish?
Is it the flakey puff-pastry exterior or the gooey, sweet high-calorie filling?
Yes, the pastries, definitely, but also the herrings.
I like herrings…it’s a taste I acquired on the other side of the pond. They are pretty slimy and fishy, though.
I understand that they make easy prey for bigger fish.
I’ve also found that they’re best when pickled.
Chuckles
Danny: “when was the last time that the U.S. (any state) imprisoned someone for being “gay”.”
Assuming that your question isn’t just rhetorical; not sure if it was the last time, but it was certainly the last major news report: Bowers vs. Hardwick in 1986. Even then the two involved were not arrested for “being gay” – they were arrested for sodomy (despite being in the privacy of their own home). Since then many states have changed their laws. There is something unfair about applying the same law to some but not to others – and that was the core of the issue.
Book, the word “hate” (like so many others, i.e. Nazi, Fascist) are used by so many today for exactly the reason that you state – to silence the opposition. Trying to define the argument is a common tactic.
But I do see hope, more and more people are refusing to be smeared by such tactics and are “fighting back.” (scare quotes because I don’t want to be accused of inciting violence against anyone – another tactic used by some)
I remember the case. However, didn’t the [State, Community] decline to prosecute and wasn’t the law taken off the books?
I really hate all this hate stuff. It’s BS. Just a rhetorical device to derail a real conversation with name calling. As suek mentioned. Like “racist” or “Islamophobe.” Hatred is a natural and necessary part of the human emotional repertoire. It’s funny that so many people who say they are anti-Zionist but do not hate Jews find it impossible to conceive that you can be anti-gay marriage but not hate gays.
Now I will confess that I do not favor gay marriage AND I have a dim view of gay culture AND I am gay.
There used to be a loud anti-assimilationist voice in the “LGBT” world. It stated that we queers were different from the rest of the bourgeois breeder world and so we should not seek acceptance or try to adapt to mainstream values and institutions. Granted, it was an adolescent sort of oppositional-defiant attitude, but it seems to have disappeared. Now, all of a sudden, along with same-sex attraction should come a thirst for a wedding. Not buyin’ it.
I am not a fan of gay marriage for a couple of reasons, but one of them echoes the anti-assimilationist stream, now apparently dormant or silenced. Speaking in Jungian terms, I suspect that the archetypal energies of two males who want to become partners is not honored by forcing it into the “drag” of what is an essentially male-female institution. The demand for gay marriage is about social acceptance and legal advantage, but seems to me to be at odds with the kinds of psychological and emotional bonding that men do with men. (Same for women with women, I assume.)
So, am I a self-hating gay? Not as far as I can tell. I greatly dislike the group victimism, the feminist-inspired hatred of actual men and masculinity, and the kneejerk leftism of gay culture and the people who buy into it.
But the powerful erotic, emotional, soulful bonding of two men together? For me, there’s nothing better.
But I don’t want a wedding. To be honest, weddings are for girls.
It’s hatred if a liberal says it’s hate. It’s incivility if a liberal says it is. It’s “hate speech” (love that locution!) if a liberal says it is. That’s all – very simple.
“To be honest, weddings are for girls.”
I get your drift when it comes to how two men want to have a long-term erotic relationship, and it has me thinking about something I saw recently on TV. My wife and I are fans of a show called “The World’s Worst Cooks.” Its gimmick is to take 20 absolutely clueless, terrible cooks, divide them into two teams and have a master chef lead each team on to cooking prowess through a generous application of drill instructor tactics. Each week, you can see the participants improving, although the two worst at the end of each episode are sent home.
The goal is for the two worst cooks left standing—by this time they have turned into pretty handy people in the kitchen—to compete for a final prize of $25,000 by cooking a three-course meal for a group of arrogant food critics.
My favorite contestant has been a woman named Georg (pronounced “George”), a speech therapist from Chicago who has a “wife.” At one point in the show her “wife” came on to sample some of Georg’s cooking, which has come a long, long way from the first episode. She was a nice woman who obviously loved Georg, but I couldn’t help but notice how butch she was. She reminded me of the football coach in “Glee.”
What is it with not wanting to marry a man but ending up marrying a woman who looks so much like a man? Inquiring minds want to know.
Gays have been hijacked by the Left. Now they do as they are told to do. Not very complicated.
What is it with not wanting to marry a man but ending up marrying a woman who looks so much like a man? Inquiring minds want to know.
Perhaps she had bad experiences with other men before. You really have to get down to their personal details on this matter if you want the question answered.
Mmmmm, herring.
Take two English muffins and toast them with butter. Then squish most of the oil out of a tin of kippered herring. I usually dump the fish on paper towels on a plate then put more paper towels on top and then another plate and smoosh the plates together – works like a charm. Anyway, divvy up the herring on the muffins. Top the herring with either chopped chives or chopped green onions. Then put a nice slice of cheddar cheese on top of each muffin and put the whole thing under the broiler for a couple of minutes to melt the cheese. Alternately, you can grate the cheese, but it doesn’t really make much difference. Serves 2 to 4 depending on how hungry you are.
Mmmmmm, herring for breakfast tomorrow.
I was semi-listening to the Mike Gallagher show last evening on the way home. His topic was the CPAC, and whether the GOP should welcome the gay “group” who supported fiscal conservativism or adhere to social coservativism, and reject them. The discussion then migrated slightly to whether the gays who were demanding acceptance of their lifestyle were “activist” or just a “group”. If they are truly _not_ activists (as they say), then why do we know and identify them as a gay group? Why are they not _just_ GOP members? It’s a bit like DADT – if you don’t want to be discriminated against, then why do you advertise? If no one knows you’re gay, then how can there be discrimination _because_ you’re gay? (Personally, I think that’s the rationale behind the elimination of DADT. I give it one year -max- from the end of that policy before the first lawsuit claiming discrimination)
My first instinct is to say “welcome”…. But then I began thinking about it, and wondered about the infiltration of such groups as the feminists (originally “equal pay for equal work” women’s rights groups, and now?), the Democrat party itself, AARP, and various other “rights” groups. I wonder if acceptance of these gays isn’t accepting the camel’s nose under the tent.
Maybe I’m being too much of a conspiracist – but that’s how they work. I don’t trust them. It isn’t that the whole group has the intention of infiltration – but there seems to be a directed movement to join, then change the goals by moving up though entering management of the group and finally, redirecting the group. We have too many accommodating RINOs already. So I’m ready to cut them no slack. Let them take the party or leave it. Join us as we are with no special considerations (I don’t know if they’ve asked for any other than recognition) or go form your own party. Or join the Dems.
I don’t know. What do you think?
A lot of people at the time thought that Bowers V. Hardwick was a bit of a set-up. Two guys get in flagrante, while a confederate calls the cops, who burst in on a private moment and have to arrest the guys, setting up the case.
Michael Adams, shades of the Scopes trial in 1925. Scopes volunteered to violate state law by teaching evolution in his classroom, was “caught red-handed” and taken to trial as a test case.
I wonder if acceptance of these gays isn’t accepting the camel’s nose under the tent.
This is what I think, this is what I see, this is what I hear …(CPAC and the GOP) It’s impossible not to be a conspiracist. suek, it’s more than nose! It’s simply impossible not to think conspiracy. The left, already saturated with ‘social justice’ groups up the kazoo has moved on to squat on the remnants of the GOP. You know you can wash your hands, stay out of crowded places and do all the right things to mitigate catching the flu during the winter – but it’s no guarantee. There are simply some people, who are carriers who show no outward signs of being infected and worse, they don’t know or recognize that they are the carriers.
http://pajamasmedia.com/tatler/2011/02/12/video-acus-suhail-khan-declares-that-there-is-no-muslim-brotherhood-in-the-united-states/
Danny Lemieux #3:
> You know, I was just musing over the question, “when was the last time that the U.S. (any state) imprisoned someone for being “gay”.
Strictly interpreted, I doubt anyone has ever been imprisoned for “being gay”.
But I would examine in a different issue: If a man is imprisoned for performing a sex act on another man, and a woman who performs that same sex act on a man is *not* imprisoned, then I do believe you have injustice.
There are only two potentially legitimate arguments against my statement: That homosexual activity violates the natural order; or that homosexual activity violates the religious order.
As to the first of those, that’s hardly a Constitutional or legal argument. Your “natural order of things” is not my “natural order of things”.
As to the second, well, it’s entirely appropriate to drum anyone out of a religious community for a violation of religious decree. It’s another to throw them in jail. Last I checked, the U.S.A. is not a church.
Justice Scalia was right in that Lawrence decision: This should not have been a Constitutional question, and communities *should* be free to make such laws. But it is still bigotry. I must say, were it not for the Lawrence decision, we *would* be having arguments on precisely this issue, still. They’d be real arguments concerning real issues and real events.
“The demand for gay marriage is about social acceptance and legal advantage.”
That seems about right.
Brian does a good job with that short comment on gay marriage. That’s what this blog entry is really about.
The problem with the gay activist approach to gay marriage is that they are cheapening marriage. Most of them don’t give a damn about marriage itself. For them it is merely an ephemeral right that they wish to have – but that they have NO intention of exercising. For most of them, marriage is not sacred.
For too many Americans in general, marriage is already cheapened, and no one who cares wants to see it cheapened further. I also suspect that for many activists, winning the battle for gay marriage *is* in fact merely a stepping stone for further agitation for further rights. For far too many of them, that does include polygamy.
There isn’t a valid comparison (to me) between gay marriage and women’s right to vote, blacks’ right to vote, or other black civil rights battles, because of this. In those earlier battles, those engaged in the fight desperately, and I mean desperately, wanted to exercise their right should they win. It was a fundamental desire to be able to vote, to be able to be free. This time, with gay marriage, it’s just an amorphous “right” that they want to “win”. It’s a notch in the belt. And that is entirely unacceptable. Also, they are using judicial activism in ways that override the way the battle of public opinion is supposed to be fought. They want the cheap and easy solution, and that’s never been the case before. Consider miscegenation laws. The Supreme Court finally struck them down, but only after the public opinion battle had long been over, *except* for isolated pockets. That’s a big difference: Over half the people in the vast majority of the states are against gay marriage. The attempt to rely on judicial activism instead is laziness defined.
I’ve always been opposed to gay marriage as the battle is currently defined (though there;s no real reason to remember all those posts…) but I have been. A valuable civilization is founded on a man and a woman raising their children within a valued and sacred marriage. Until the focus remains reliable right there, on THAT, I can’t support anything they’re trying to do.
My conversion to conservatism did not include this issue; I’m a firm supporter of gay marriage. I am close to several people — a relative, a professional colleague, an old friend — who would all be married to their same-sex partners if they could, and who frankly long to be. (In fact, one of them is married now, under the laws of another state where she and her partner traveled for that purpose — but she couldn’t have done it here at home, even though, by her profession, she is qualified to administer the marriage ceremony to others!) I had to laugh at excathedra’s line, “To be honest, weddings are for girls,” because, in point of fact, my friends who wish for marriage ARE all girls — I know some gay men too, but I’ve never heard any of them express a personal interest in getting hitched. Maybe all we need is lesbian marriage??
Anyway, these are good people, not wild promiscuous activists, not shoving their lifestyles in other people’s faces, but just ordinary citizens with ordinary jobs, mortgages, steady relationships with their partners that they keep up through hard work, commitment, and old-fashioned love – and, in every case, they have children. They want to be married for a lot of reasons but, primarily, because of their children; they want that strengthened framework, that societal support, for their families and their kids just as I have it for mine. And I honestly cannot come up with a single reason why they should not have it. How would letting these good people join and contribute to the institution of marriage weaken it, as some think gay marriage would? Try as I may, I can’t see it — I only see that letting people like these lend their lives to what is otherwise, let’s face it, a dying institution might help the rest of us keep it alive.
Book’s concern about discrimination makes no sense to me. Obviously the Catholic church can’t be sued for offering its sacraments only according to its doctrines. But I think her idea about uncoupling religious marriage from civil unions makes perfect sense, except for one problem. This would take away the concept of “marriage” — a freighted word indeed – from all the heterosexual but nonreligious folks who marry in civil rather than religious ceremonies, and they would scream, with perfect reason, that this weakens the institution — just as conservatives have warned. A self-fulfilling prophecy.
Ordinarily, I fully agree that the word “hate” is used by liberals as a silencer and a substitute for thought, but in this case, I have to tell you: my lesbian friends do genuinely believe that those who oppose gay marriage hate gay people, or at least are bigoted against them. They believe this because they never hear any good, clear, sensible other reasons why gay marriage opponents want so passionately to shut their families out. Hate is the only explanation they can think of — and since, in fact, some people DO hate them and plenty of people are bigoted against them, it strikes them as all too painfully, fearfully probable.
I just want to add to my post above that there’s a simple solution to the problem I mentioned in uncoupling marriages administered by churches from those administered by the state: just call them both “marriage” and use adjectives to distinguish them: religious marriage and civil marriage. (It’s the word that’s the problem; to some extent, it’s the word — a magic word indeed, with the weight and the baggage that it carries — that is causing all the strife. ) Both forms would be entitled to all the same legal protections and requirements, but only the religious ones would be subject to whatever additional restrictions or protections are part of the churches’ doctrines. I agree with Zachriel (pigs are flying!) that separating the legal institution from the religious one would solve a host of problems besides the one we’re discussing here.
>>My conversion to conservatism did not include this issue>>
So…what _does_ your conversion to conservatism include?
Um, it’s hard to make a comprehensive list of what I think now along conservative lines that I didn’t think before — especially since conservatism seems to me to be genuinely diverse in ways that liberalism only pretends to be, so that almost any value or idea I might think of as “conservative” might be disputed by some other conservative as “not exactly” or “not quite” or “not at all!” It’s easier to do it the other way around: the only idea that I can think of right now that liberalism is supposed to stand for, that I used to agree with when I thought of myself as a liberal, and that I still do agree with is support for gay marriage. I suppose there might be something else out there, but that’s all that comes to mind right now. Does that help?
Wait, let me be more precise. I want to rewrite the following line a little, as follows: the only idea that I can think of right now that differentiates liberalism from conservatism, that I used to agree with when I thought of myself as a liberal, and that I still do agree with is support for gay marriage.
That’s because, obviously, liberalism is “supposed to stand for” principles that all of us would agree with, such as racial equality or freedom of speech, so my initial formulation was wrong Whether it actually DOES stand for those things is an entirely separate question!
My own conversion from liberal to conservative –with a few transitional years as a libertarian— was complex and piecemeal, but I note a few contributing factors: while working in the AIDS movment, I found that people from religious backgrounds were actually kinder and more able to see individuals as individuals than the political zealots, who were often shrill, dogmatic, intransigent, unkind and self-righteous…everything they accused “religion” of being. I wondered how such high political principles could so often produce such wretched (and blind) human beings.
I have a characterological resentment against being told what not to say, what not to think and what not to feel. Liberalism was a thriving environment of restrictive speech, groupthink and moral hectoring. I made me react by reading and listening to people I was supposed to loathe. To my shock, they often made a lot of sense.
Contemporary liberalism, to me, is cultural Marxism, a war of certain classes of people. If your group has been successful –male, white, capitalist, American, Christian or Jewish, etc– then you must be an oppressor. Because if you were not oppressing women, people of color, the poor, other countries, atheists, etc.. then they would be as successful as you are. This is, of course, complete fantasy. It makes the doctrine of the Trinity seem plain by comparison. All utopianisms, I discovered, created nothing but hells on earth.
A major reason I became conservative is, ironically, because I am gay. Because. Simple reason: only in the Western world can a man like me lead a free and decent life. And America is the lynchpin and backbone of the West. Anything that weakens America and the West is ultimately my enemy. And who stands for the West? Conservatives. We can argue all day about gay marriage, etc. but to my mind, we share a set of values that is larger and for me, an important matter of survival. Gay I am, at least in my character if not in my cultural style, but before that I am, as my 9/11 tattoo says, a “Man of the West.”
While I’m at it. A powerful conservative concern is the principle of the unintended outcome. And one outcome, unintended I am sure by most (not all) advocates of gay marriage is that it would inevitably lead to polygamy being legalized.
Polygamy has a far longer and more widely established history than same-sex marriage (which as about a scintilla, maybe.) If you render irrelevant the genders of the spouses, –a universal constant– then by what possible serious reasoning can you demand that the number remain at two? It’s just cultural and historical prejudice.
Defenders say that there is no logical connection. Maybe. But this is politics, not logic 101. If we all get weepy over two handsome fellas in tuxes declaring that “love has no boundaries”, then how do we say no to four weepy Muslim women –who have the added cachet of likely being people of color– who plead for their family to be recognized and honored and to give their children the security of a home, just like everybody else?
And one of my attitudes, precisely as a gay conservative, is that anything that makes our society more Muslim friendly, I oppose. Cause Muslims ain’t no friend to guys like me. “Queers for Palestine” notwithstanding.
>>the only idea that I can think of right now that differentiates liberalism from conservatism, that I used to agree with when I thought of myself as a liberal, and that I still do agree with is support for gay marriage. >>
You also support abortion. So that makes two.
>>They want to be married for a lot of reasons but, primarily, because of their children; they want that strengthened framework, that societal support, for their families and their kids just as I have it for mine.>>
“Their children”… Where are the biological other parents of these children? what exactly comprises the “strengthened framework and societal support” that marriage provides? Is it somehow different than when a single parent raises children?
Do they understand by weakening that “strengthened framework”, they will soon eliminate that support which they crave?
>>They believe this because they never hear any good, clear, sensible other reasons why gay marriage opponents want so passionately to shut their families out.>>
The basic reason is that the primary purpose of marriage is the procreation of children. Gay marriage by definition does not support that purpose. Yes, gay people can adopt children, gay people can have children from a previous heterosexual relationship, and gay women can have themselves impregnated by various fertility clinics, but a gay “marriage” cannot produce children. It is in a society’s interest to protect the “incubation” of it’s future citizens, therefore, it’s in society’s interest to protect the institution of marriage as it has been traditionally understood. What is the reason to change that understanding? “Because some people want to” is _not_ a reason.
I’m also reminded of another blog I read, in which the author stands passionately for the exceptionalism of the human. He points out that there are those who would raise the level of “rights” of animals to that of humans, and that there goal is not so much to raise the status of animals to that of humans, but rather to lower the status of humans to that of animals – but that there method doesn’t raise the defense mechanism that the reverse would. I would posit that Gays are effectively doing the same thing. They cannot meet the standards required to be married, so they wish to simply change the standards so that they can claim them for themselves. It is the ultimate expression of self-centeredness.
Excathedra: While I’m at it. A powerful conservative concern is the principle of the unintended outcome. And one outcome, unintended I am sure by most (not all) advocates of gay marriage is that it would inevitably lead to polygamy being legalized.
Funny that you should say this, Ex. I have a standing bet with my (pro-gay marriage Episcopal priest) that polygamy would be the next taboo to come under fire. I told him that he will have no standing upon which to oppose polygamy if gay marriage is ever approved. He, of course, pooh-poohs this.
Suek, I would weigh in on your comments except that you have so concisely and effectively articulated my points that I am at a loss for words. I would add, though…
the Western concept of “Marriage” (as well as in other religions and cultures) has evolved over thousands of years through trial and error. It has gotten better (we no longer sell our daughters into marriage, for example, and marriage has become more a partnership of equals than before) but it is nonetheless a severely threatened institution. I am not opposed to providing a legal structure for “partner benefits” between gays or non-married straight people, but I am really opposed to screwing around with an institution that is so critical to the continuation of society as is marriage.
Looking around at the damage that I see done to kids from failed or otherwise stressed marriages and their inability to make marriage commitments in their own lives, I would say that marriage is a highly threatened institution and that its demise implies horrendous consequences. Look at the demographic disaster that is evolving in Europe, where marriage is becoming the exception rather than the rule. I don’t think we want to go there.
Not all slippery slope arguments are fallacious. The argument that homosexual marriage would lead to demands for legalized polygamy makes great sense to me. When the definition of marriage excludes its traditional core definition of the union of two sexes and is reduced solely to a contractual expression of “love” that the state is compelled to recognize no matter who wants in on the contract, it then becomes anything that some fool on a courtroom bench decides it is.
There is no coherent stance against polygamy that does not involve making some of the very same arguments that opponents of same-sex marriage make. It will be interesting to see how militant pro-same sex marriage people handle the polygamy question: Will they oppose it, and if so, why? Or will they reveal themselves as the hypocrites they are by supporting it, a contradiction to their pooh poohs that a push for same-sex and polygamous marriages can be linked in any way in the judicial mind?
suek, I have never supported abortion in my life, which was, or should have been, the first big clue that I wasn’t the liberal I thought I was. I have no idea why you would make such a baseless claim when I said no such thing and you know nothing about me – nor do I understand why you seem to be taking such a hostile, confrontational attitude toward me. As far as I know, I said nothing hostile or confrontational to you or anybody else. (Well, maybe to Zachriel, with the comment about pigs, but we’ve locked horns often enough in the past that I suspect he feels the same way about the likelihood of agreeing with me.)
You asked about the biological other parents of my friends’ children. In one case, the children came from a previous heterosexual marriage, which broke up when my friend’s husband left her for another woman — he remains involved in their children’s lives, for better or worse — he’s a bit of a jerk, as you might guess. In another, the child is adopted from another country and the biological parents who surrendered her are unknown; in the third, I don’t know and wouldn’t presume to ask. As for the rest of your questions and comments, I don’t understand some of what you said, agree with some things and disagree with others — but I did notice after my first post that Book specifically said that she wanted to focus this thread on the question of hate and didn’t want it to devolve into a debate about whether or not gay marriage is a good thing, so I’m not going to get drawn into discussing that question — especially since you seem to be so angry at me, for reasons I can’t fathom.
To Bookworm, I apologize for leading the topic somewhat astray and will try to do so no more. My original comment should have been confined to just this point: my gay friends who wish they could marry truly do believe that opposition to their right to do so is grounded in hatred and/or bigotry. They are not just using the words as weapons in the dishonest way that liberals so often do; they believe it. Nothing that I, at least, have been able to say to them so far about what I understand to be the reasons for the opposition — which I don’t personally believe to be hatred or bigotry, in case that wasn’t clear — has dissuaded them.
Mrs. Whatsit: As a conservative convert myself, I totally understand that there are certain issues that didn’t make the political transition. My lingering liberalism is the emotional reaction I have to abortion. Intellectually, I agree totally with the pro-Life people. Viscerally, I can’t let go of the feeling that women should have a say in the matter. I’m perpetually wishy-washy. And like you, I also discovered that many of the beliefs I held in my “liberal” days simply didn’t mesh with what the Democratic party was standing for. Reagan had something good to say about those of us who are conflicted: “The person who agrees with you 80 percent of the time is a friend and an ally — not a 20 percent traitor.” The beauty of life in a free land, and at a polite blog, is that we can debate that 20%.
Excathedra: Yes. Yes. And Yes.
Ex cathedra, please add my Yes, yes and yes to Bookworm’s, as to everything you said. Your second paragraph, in particular, sums up succinctly, with ideas that would have taken me several pages to describe half so well, pretty much exactly how I got from there to here.
Bookworm, thanks.
Mrs.Whatsit…
My apologies…I mixed up your identity with someone else, who _was_ in favor of abortion.
>> nor do I understand why you seem to be taking such a hostile, confrontational attitude toward me.>>
I don’t believe my comments were hostile or confrontational towards you. Please be specific as to which comments in particular you find offensive. If it’s possible, I’ll restate.
I don’t consider holding a different opinion to be hostile or confrontational. Do you?
>>but I did notice after my first post that Book specifically said that she wanted to focus this thread on the question of hate and didn’t want it to devolve into a debate about whether or not gay marriage is a good thing, so I’m not going to get drawn into discussing that question — especially since you seem to be so angry at me, for reasons I can’t fathom. >>
I’m not angry with you. We may simply have differing opinions on the topic – so actually, I think we’re still on topic. The problem may be something of the same problem – those who consider people who are against gay marriage to be expressing hate, and you, considering that I’m expressing anger when I have no such feeling. Somehow, a communication barrier exists. Statements of fact or opinion are considered to be expressions of an emotion – which they are not. I think that’s the issue that needs to be addressed.
It’s like a child saying a parent “hates” them when the parent says “no” to something the child wants.
No, Suek, it was the abortion remark that I perceived as hostile and confrontational, especially after the initial post demanding that I explain the details of my conversion. I had no way of knowing, of course, that you thought I was someone else – I haven’t posted here very often before and I am pretty sure you and I haven’t exchanged any discussion in the past — so it really did seem like an unprovoked attack. Also, I feel strongly enough on the subject of abortion that it’s hard for me to read the suggestion that I support it without getting hurt and upset (made my heart pound, felt my face turn red . . . ) That must have affected how I read the rest of your post.
Of course I don’t think holding a different opinion is hostile and confrontational. I’m sure you can see that, believing that you were confronting me, I wondered if the reason for what seemed like your hostility (and maybe it was, but directed toward that other person?) might be that my opinion about gay marriage differs from yours. I see now that’s not the case. I’m sorry that I overreacted, and thanks for the apology.
The slipper slope is only called a fallacy because people try to use it as the only justification for why something is bad. If something is bad other than that it could slip slide down the slope, then it’s no longer a fallacy of logic.
The identity confusion that Suek and Mrs. Whatsit had is an interesting thing because I think it’s a subset of a lot of the hostility that marks debate today: people aren’t face to face. Had Suek and Mrs. Whatsit known each other’s faces, it’s unlikely any confusion would have arisen. (I say unlikely, because I still manage to get confused, but not as often as when I’m dealing with names alone.)
Further, because neither of these gals is at all mean (witness how politely and kindly they resolved the problem), each would have realized within a word or two that something was going awry with the communication, and would immediately have remedied it. Writing a long post, though, fixes emotions in place.
I don’t have any solutions or really anything of depth to add. I just find it interesting when these communication mix-ups happen and truly heartening that here, at the Bookworm Room, kindness triumphs.
To return to the issue of hate.
Leftism never deals with individuals, only with groups. And leftism has a very select and limited list of groups that are worthy of support, understanding, amelioration, defense, etc. And for a single reason: they are, in the leftist grand narrative, victims. Innocent victims.
And to have a victim, you must have a perpetrator, a criminal, an evildoer, an oppressor.
That’s how the whole thing works. It takes two to do this tango.
Consequently, when gay people, like the lesbian friends you mentioned, Mrs Whatsit, are unable to see disagreement with their political agenda as anything other than hatred, namely, a desire to do damage, it is because they are locked inside the leftist narrative. To allow that people in the oppressor group (heterosexuals) might not be evildoers would undo the whole structure. This is, for many gays –or blacks or women– literally un-thinkable.
The leftist narrative requires that what we might think of as principled opposition be read as nasty oppression.
So if you disagree, you must be filled with hatred. There is no alternative.
IMHO. And thanks for your kind words.
“Hatred” is only proscribed when it is directed at incorrect groups. When directed at correct groups it is actually prescribed.
It is wrong, in the leftist narrative, to hate gays, that is, to do anything but celebrate and accommodate them. But there is nothing wrong, indeed it is high virtue, to hate George Bush and Dick Cheyney and Republicans and the Christian Right. Because they themselves are “haters!” (And that fact that they are mostly white makes it even better.)
jj said as much yesterday.
>>I haven’t posted here very often before and I am pretty sure you and I haven’t exchanged any discussion in the past>>
I remember things visually…
I worked for a bank for a period. Had to check driver’s licenses for ID. Then I went to work for H&R Block. A couple came in to work on their taxes, and although I didn’t really recognize them, a driver’s license jumped into my little brain and I knew their name. It was a bit weird. Anyway…I think you were involved in a discussion with a person who _was_ in favor of abortion, and my mind has remembered your name in connection with that thread. Unfortunately, I remembered it in the wrong frame of reference. I’m sorry for that – especially if that’s a particularly sore issue for you. I can understand why you considered it a challenge – it was only intended as a recognition of a second issue when you said there was only one issue. But obviously incorrectly intended.
Both issues are pretty incendiary. Both are both legal and moral issues in the minds of most conservatives.
Suek, I suspect you were thinking of the Duchess of Austin.
I agree with Zachriel (pigs are flying!) that separating the legal institution from the religious one would solve a host of problems besides the one we’re discussing here.
I believe you will find that in reality, what people like Zach will actually do, as opposed to say they will do, will have little relation to the words quoted above.
Please be specific as to which comments in particular you find offensive.
Addressing suek, I believe it was the general tone and context in which your statements were framed earlier. This set things up so that the mentioning of abortion became a trigger. Meaning,
So…what _does_ your conversion to conservatism include?
This statement of yours reminds me, textually, of some things you have said before when you were in strong disagreement and are in the process of grilling as a prelude to some lengthier comment.
Meaning, from that statement alone I could derive two suppositions of at least average confidence.
1. That you disagreed with something.
2. That you were looking for something else in order to talk more about it.
If you had in fact believed Mrs. What to have said the same things as Duchess of Austin did in the past, then this would be consistent with that scenario, would it not. This is also constructed such that observers without any knowledge of your previous writings, might have the same suspicions as me, although much much weaker in confidence.
<B> (I say unlikely, because I still manage to get confused, but not as often as when I’m dealing with names alone.)</b>
Why not take a few classes on textual analysis ; P then you could do what I do.
In both Book’s case and Suek’s case, there were instances of something they had written which reminded me of something they did in the past.
Danny, probably the case.
When it comes to the internet and writing, the time delay on the response means that you essentially occupy a strategic position similar to a medieval general. They give an order and they only know what happens after the action on the front line is over. Thus the problems of not having enough information entails that they give either too many orders, too many confusing orders, or they mistime what they are saying with what is actually going on.
This is something email doesn’t quite have as an issue, because the time delay there is too long. This format we have here is not as fast as speaking or a chat room, but nor is it as long as an email in terms of delay response. It truly does occupy the time delay a general of the medieval times would have faced when fighting on the field of battle.
Y…
I could never do what you do. Can’t type fast enough!
Danny is right – I was thinking of Duchess of Austin. She too said she had been a liberal, but was now a Conservative – except for one thing… abortion. I combined the two – unfortunately. Having done so, however, when Mrs Whatsit said she had only one difference with conservatives, I was basically accusing her of having said the same thing with regard to abortion. In the context of _this_ thread, I have some concern about gay activist infiltration, so if someone claims to have only this one difference with conservatives, and then comes up with a second “except for” item, it does make me suspicious.
Or approaching from another angle, gay marriage and abortion are liberal issues. If someone says “I’m a Conservative – except for these two issues”, I have to wonder what basis they’re using when they claim to be a Conservative. Hence…”what _does_ your conversion to Conservatism include?”.
suek, I was going to say I couldn’t remember participating in an abortion discussion here — though my remembory is faulty enough that I can never be sure. (In your place, with the driver’s license situation, I might have remembered the faces but never, ever could have possibly recalled the names.) When Danny came up with the “Duchess of Austin” name, it rang a bell — I did a search and found the January thread that he was thinking of. Sure enough, there was a Duchess who said pro-abortion things in what strikes me as a highly provocative, spoiling-for-a-fight sort of way. I can see why you might have been ready to challenge her on the question. I was on that thread too, though not talking about abortion. The thread had started off with Sarah Palin and had then gone wandering off in several fascinating directions. The one I was following had to do with whether people are basically good, or evil, or some of both, and what those terms mean, and what philosophy has to say on the question. Meanwhile, the abortion conversation was running parallel and I was staying out of it on purpose. I have tried talking about this subject on the Internet before and I don’t do it any more — I care too much about it and it never ends well.
(which is not to say, Book, that I don’t share some of the ambivalence you described — I do — it just plays out a little differently for me. The questions you described as intellectual feel visceral for me, and vice versa.)
So — I see how it happened and I’m glad we got it straightened out.
Now, back to gay marriage and hate:
Ymarkasar, about pigs flying, I’m sure you’re right.
excathedra, about leftists locked within the narrative of hate: you’ve said it so well, I don’t have a lot left to add except Yeah! when it comes to my lesbian friends, there certainly is some of that in operation — all of them are located somewhere along the leftist spectrum, one a bit closer to the center than the others but nonetheless Over There, and while none of them are hateful people in the other ways they live their lives, they do seem to be vulnerable to that easy way to understand their opposition.
But when it comes to gay people dealing with opposition to gay marriage — as I don’t need to tell you — there is also another element that I think plays into my friends’ readiness to believe that their opponents hate them. This is that sadly, some people DO hate gay people. I said this before and I wish it weren’t still true, but people here seem to be smart, honest, realistic folk and of course, it is. When you know that there are people out there who hate you, for something that is a fundamental part of who you are — it must be necessary to live with a constant level of defensive caution that must make it awfully hard not to perceive that hatred everywhere, even where it’s not.
I think a good part of my friends’ readiness to believe that opposition to gay marriage is grounded in bigotry does come from the simplistic leftist narrative you described (if you’re going to have cartoon good guys, after all, you’ve got to have cartoon bad guys). But in all fairness to my friends, who are, as I know you know, real people with more than one dimension, some of it is also that other, harder, realer thing — the awful knowledge that you’re not just paranoid, some people out there ARE out to get you — that adds so many layers of fear and hurt that it ends up very hard to think.
When you know that there are people out there who hate you, for something that is a fundamental part of who you are — it must be necessary to live with a constant level of defensive caution that must make it awfully hard not to perceive that hatred everywhere, even where it’s not.
That’s how totalitarian regimes control the populace. They say, for example, that there are internal enemies to the Revolution, which requires emergency decree and martial law. Then they say that there are foreigners, like Americans and Jews, who are spying here and attempting to create havoc.
You can name any internal or external enemy you wish, real or imagined. A regime designed to perpetuate problems rather than fix them, can use any number of them.
The black community here in the US suffer under the same handicap. Except their enemies aren’t so much Jews and capitalists, as it is white people or institutional racism. To get a glimpse of the squirrel cage and hamster wheel they are caught on, just remember Helen Losse’s comments here. And she isn’t even black. Check out the blacks grown and raised under the poison of always being told that their problems are due to the “White Man’s” neglect or some such. And guess what. It is has become a very convenient tool for black activists like Sharpton to con people, including black people, into going along politically with the Left, even though the Left is not doing anything to increase the economic prosperity or security of blacks.
The Left picks on weak people. People who have something to fear. They use a seed of a legitimate fear or economic destitution, as a leverage to control. But in order to sustain this control, the Left, like any totalitarian organization, must keep their people afraid. If they ever “solved” the fundamental problems gays, minorities, immigrants, blacks, or poor people faced… guess what, they won’t have control over them any more. Since independent, strong, individuals don’t need the ‘help” of a totalitarian organization.
Ymarsakar: Check out the blacks grown and raised under the poison of always being told that their problems are due to the “White Man’s” neglect or some such.
A large number of African Americans lived under Jim Crow, and were denied equal opportunities in education and jobs, and felt first-hand the sting of bigotry and discrimination. These are not historical slights, but living memory. Some people are still bigots. Others are just incredibly insensitive (such as considering Nathan Bedford Forrest for a license plate in Mississippi). The new generation is more able to rise above these divisions, but they still remain.
>>A large number of African Americans lived under Jim Crow>>
Not any more. Perhaps if you defined the end of what you define as “Jim Crow”?
>>Some people are still bigots>>
Bigotry is not illegal. You may not like it, but it is not illegal. Many types of discrimination _are_, but bigotry is not. Insensitivity is also not illegal.
>>The new generation is more able to rise above these divisions, but they still remain.>>
Actually, the problem seems to be that the new generation is _not_ more able to rise above these divisions, and instead of rising in a society that does not permit discrimination, they require instead, an affirmative action which is in reality a form of discrimination against non-blacks. In other words, without special treatment, they seem incapable of rising on their own.
Suek, I don’t think you realize that Zach and their fellow travelers believe that American blacks are inferior, as they obviously are incapable of succeeding on their own except as wards of the State.
They are like the special needs students in our public schools, who must forever be accompanied and ministered to by government social workers funded by taxpayer monies.
Unlike black immigrants from Africa and the Caribbean, that is.
Zachriel: A large number of African Americans lived under Jim Crow.
suek: Not any more.
Of course there are. Here’s a typical example.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Lewis_(U.S._politician)
And more that lived and live under other forms of non-official discrimination.
suek: Perhaps if you defined the end of what you define as “Jim Crow”?
Jim Crow was the legal system of segregation in America’s South, from 1876 to 1965.
suek: Bigotry is not illegal. You may not like it, but it is not illegal. Many types of discrimination _are_, but bigotry is not. Insensitivity is also not illegal.
That’s right. But this thread concerns hate. It is reasonable for people who have suffered under discrimination to be suspicious of people who minimize or ignore that history. It’s also reasonable for them to teach their children that history. It is reasonable for people who suffer under bigotry today to be suspicous of people who ignore bigotry. It takes time to win people’s trust, once lost.
We live in a liberal culture that promotes and rewards victimhood.
http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2011/02/110216132042.htm
Once a group, Blacks are a great example but not the only ones, achieves Official Victim status, there is so much to be gained from it –especially the pleasure of blaming others for your own flaws– that people hang on to it long after its sell-by date has expired.
Shelby Steele in The Content of our Character has a great analysis of how blacks and whites play the race game with each other. Whites want to be proved innocent and do that by giving blacks “license and deference” in all matters racial. A dead end.
And speaking of hate. I hate it when people screw up their own lives and then want to blame someone else for it. I’m a psychotherapist, and big part of my work is helping people move from the victim position to a place where they can take responsibility for their adult choices.
Zach…
Do you know who Bill Cosby is?
If you do, do you know his background?
Do you know his political beliefs today, and his attitude concerning race?
Also..
Do you equate bigotry and hate?
These are not historical slights, but living memory.
You’re going to have to write something more descriptive concerning this living memory of yours.
If any of you guys have issues with GOProud being at CPAC, maybe you should focus on the bizarreness of Suhail Khan and his fellow panelists there…http://pajamasmedia.com/tatler/2011/02/16/video-cpac-panel-recommends-outreach-to-nation-of-islam-la-raza/
People like Jesse Jackson and Al Sharpton have reaped $-millions by keeping black people crushed under a cloud of perceived discrimination while painting themselves as the gateways to redemption – for a price, of course.
They are the vilest of the vile for the lives they have diminished or destroyed. As far as I am concerned, John Lewis destroyed his civil rights credentials and put himself in the same class as Jackson and Sharpton when he pulled that stunt at the Tea Party protest on the Capitol steps.
As far as the “legacy of Jim Crow”, sorry: that was then, this is now. They need to get over it.
That’s right. But this thread concerns hate. It is reasonable for people who have suffered under discrimination to be suspicious of people who minimize or ignore that history.
So Z here thinks that it’s natural for blacks to be suspicious of the Democrat party, who enslaved them in the past, and have now enslaved them in the modern times. Is that basically how it is, or did Z contradict himself. Jim Crow is a Democrat manufactured product. Is it then “reasonable” for those who lived under Jim Crow to support the Democrat party, line by line, star by star?
Nathan Bedford Forrest
People could have learned from him. Far more than they would have learned from Khomeini, Castro, Obama, or Sharpton. As usual, the data Zach is using to inform his prejudices on this matter, are based upon shifting sand, rather than what is true.
The Democrat party basically blames Forrest in order to avoid bringing attention to the Democrat Klu Klux Wizards and Kleagles they currently support and have. Or had, given certain deaths. The history, is a bit different than the narrative the Left crafted. But I think many here already knew that one way or another.
http://www.rootsweb.ancestry.com/~mscivilw/wizards.htm
The link won’t help out Zach, cause he refuses to learn anything that might contradict his assumptions, but for those of Southern born or Northern inclinations, read some of the material in the link about cavalry tactics to better understand why Nathan Bedford Forrest is known as one of the greatest military leaders of the US Civil War.
Then read the wiki pedia article, easily found online, concerning NBF.
It is no mystery why the South respects him. And there is no question that the Left hates him. Then again, the Left hates many people that got in their way, including Bush, Palin, the last Shah of Iran, Diem of South Vietnam, Batista, the white rulers of Rhodesia, and of course… the Chilean benevolent dictator that is called by the name “Pinochet”.
Never, ever, believe at face value the lies the Left says about historical figures. They are never telling you the whole truth. They aren’t interested in telling you the whole truth. That is not what they are paid for.
For a short summary of what NBF was:
Forrest started from uneducated origins and got rich by taking risks. He became a major planter of the South, owning and selling slaves, given that the Southern economy was based upon cotton, mostly. And cotton required slaves. He enlisted in the war to fight the Union as a private, when at the time major planters were “given exemptions” on being drafted into the army. Yea, you guessed it right. The huge plantation owners, the slave masters de jure, those who benefited most from winning the war, were in fact the ones ordering everybody else to suffer and die, while they sat safely. Until the Union came for them, at least. Forrest is a killer. He’s brave. He’s undaunted. He is very charismatic. He had a pure, unrefined, quality that allowed him to ignore social status and get right to what’s importance. This quality is part of his charisma. And it’s why he didn’t even think of himself as somebody exempt from war or someone entitled to a commission just because he had money and status.
In terms of personal qualities. Forrest had 90% of Democrats (here and now) already beat. For his time, Forrest was better than 90% of his fellows (of his time). In military courage and skill, better than 95%. And in certain reckless valor, better than 99%.
At the time the war was lost, this was what he said.
Civil war, such as you have just passed through naturally engenders feelings of animosity, hatred, and revenge. It is our duty to divest ourselves of all such feelings; and as far as it is in our power to do so, to cultivate friendly feelings towards those with whom we have so long contended, and heretofore so widely, but honestly, differed. Neighborhood feuds, personal animosities, and private differences should be blotted out; and, when you return home, a manly, straightforward course of conduct will secure the respect of your enemies. Whatever your responsibilities may be to Government, to society, or to individuals meet them like men. The attempt made to establish a separate and independent Confederation has failed; but the consciousness of having done your duty faithfully, and to the end, will, in some measure, repay for the hardships you have undergone. In bidding you farewell, rest assured that you carry with you my best wishes for your future welfare and happiness. Without, in any way, referring to the merits of the Cause in which we have been engaged, your courage and determination, as exhibited on many hard-fought fields, has elicited the respect and admiration of friend and foe. And I now cheerfully and gratefully acknowledge my indebtedness to the officers and men of my command whose zeal, fidelity and unflinching bravery have been the great source of my past success in arms. I have never, on the field of battle, sent you where I was unwilling to go myself; nor would I now advise you to a course which I felt myself unwilling to pursue. You have been good soldiers, you can be good citizens. Obey the laws, preserve your honor, and the Government to which you have surrendered can afford to be, and will be, magnanimous. N.B. Forrest, Lieut.-General
Headquarters, Forrest’s Cavalry Corps
Gainesville, Alabama
May 9, 1865
After the war, he convinced the first Klu Klux Klan organization of self defense militias to disband, something the Democrat party never even tried since it would have required the principle of obedience to the law. Afterwards, the Democrats took over the KKK unofficially and used them to kill white Republicans and black slaves to prevent them from voting in Republican reps in the South. This caused the Republican regimes to fall, ushering in Jim Crow and “no blacks allowed” policies.
It mattered little what Nathan Bedford Forrest thought of negroes, blacks, or Union whites in the beginning of the war. Many Southerners thought poorly of Northerners. Believing that the North lacked any spine for real fighting. After 4 years of Civil War, neither side could say of the other that they lacked the guts to kill and die for their beliefs.
In line with a post written before about the Left’s need to sow weakness, this is the same issue.
Why does the NAACP attempt to stop license plates honoring Nathan Bedford Forrest? Does the NAACP lobby Congress to deny Robert Byrd official recognition because Byrd filibustered the Civil Rights Act and was actually part of the violent, mob death squad KKK as their Kleagle? If the NAACP is fine with Robert Byrd, for much of the time Byrd was alive, what makes them so hot and bothered about Nathan Bedford Forrest. Is it so hard to honor a dead enemy that fought with valor and skill?
It is impossible, I say, for weaklings like the NAACP or Leftist cult members to act anything other than as insecure children. Creating a better future requires personal confidence and strength. The NAACP has none of that. The New Black Panthers has none of that. The Left has none of that. If they ever got it, they would eject that person from their group for fear that the taint will spread.
Strong leaders, alphas of their pack, do not become hot and bothered over the honoring of dead enemies. They don’t begrudge people’s need to believe in a strong and glorious past. especially not when it is also part of the past of the country they are supposed to be leading. They don’t try to control how people feel by making them worship only “approved symbols”. They don’t sit around thinking up ways to make people worship the state religion’s god. They don’t use violence to win arguments. And they sure as hell don’t make up lies believing they are real.
Yet, all of these weak as hell acts are present amongst the Left. Why is that do you think?
Ymar asks, “Why does the NAACP attempt to stop license plates honoring Nathan Bedford Forrest? Does the NAACP lobby Congress to deny Robert Byrd official recognition because Byrd filibustered the Civil Rights Act and was actually part of the violent, mob death squad KKK as their Kleagle?”
Whoops! Game, set, match!
What about all the (Democrat) monuments to LBJ, who did more than any other modern U.S. political figure to condemn black people to family dissolution and economic misery?
>>But this thread concerns hate. It is reasonable for people who have suffered under discrimination to be suspicious of people who minimize or ignore that history>>
“To be suspicious ” justifies the necessity for affirmative action?
>>people who minimize or ignore that history>>
Minimizing or ignoring = hate???
>>Whoops! Game, set, match!>>
>>“Hatred” is only proscribed when it is directed at incorrect groups. When directed at correct groups it is actually prescribed.>>
I think we’ve come full circle!
suek: Do you know who Bill Cosby is? If you do, do you know his background?
Yes, he’s an American entertainer, who also earned a PhD in education.
suek: Do you know his political beliefs today, and his attitude concerning race?
Cosby knows that institutional inequility and injustice exist, but that it doesn’t excuse not doing one’s best to overcome. He stresses the need for parents to take more responsibility for rearing their children, and the importance of providing good role models.
Cosby: “I agree with President Carter that racism is playing a role in recent outbursts against President Obama.”
suek: Do you equate bigotry and hate?
They are related concepts, bigotry referring to intolerance of a group rather than an individual. Bigot, ”a person who is obstinately or intolerantly devoted to his or her own opinions and prejudices; especially : one who regards or treats the members of a group (as a racial or ethnic group) with hatred and intolerance.”
excathedra #59
I linked the very same video post #20
Danny, I think one of the fundamental mistakes people have made in response to the Al Sharptons is that their immediate response is to say “but things are better now, so we don’t need any affirmative action”. The reason why it is a fundamental mistake is because it leaves the victims, the blacks, to a single recourse: the Sharptons and Jacksons. The black people know something is wrong. They don’t know what, who, or why. But they know something is wrong. And the reason why it is wrong, is because of the Sharptons. Thus you cannot respond to their claims of institutional racism by saying “it doesn’t exist” or “it no longer applies”. This kind of response actually reinforces the fears and insecurities of blacks, by catering to their delusions and mass manufactured hallucinations. Of course they will believe even more fervently that their position is righteous the more of us attempt to deny it is true. It gives their conspiracy an “enemy”.
So my ideal strategy is to steal a march on the Sharptons. If they say there is institutional racism, then I won’t deny it. I will simply plant it at the feet of the Democrats. If black people want to end institutional racism, they need to vote Republican, like they did once long ago in the South before the KKK got into full steam. If black people want their condition to worsen, then keep supporting unions and Democrats. Framed in that manner, I believe it would make for more effective and powerful propaganda in defeating the Left’s lies about racism.
It’s not enough to say “that is wrong” if we don’t have a better solution. The question is, how do we present our “better solution” in a way that they will believe. Well, for blacks, that’s easy. Just make it very clear who the real source of racism and institutional slavery are. And we don’t even have to lie to do it, Danny. It would be the complete and utter truth.
suek: Do you know who George Washington was. If you do, do you know his background?
Zach: Yes, he was an American politician. He was also a surveyer and held a military rank.
suek: Do you know what a dictionary is?
Zach: Yes. I have an online dictionary that I have open every time I visit this room. It is next to the Wiki and IPSS windows that I have open all the time, as well as my direct link to Watson, the IBM computer who is my lord.
suek: How come you never reveal your own thoughts on things like Marxism, or abortion, or homosexual marriage or Obama’s lack of credentials? Why is all your stuff boilerplate that has obviously been copied from some other source?
Zach: Yes. I have an online dictionary that I have open every time I visit this room. It is next to the Wiki and IPSS windows that I have open all the time, as well as my direct link to Watson, the IBM computer who is my lord.
lol@ Martel
Ymarsakar: Jim Crow is a Democrat manufactured product.
That’s correct. But the Democratic Party changed. That’s why nearly all African Americans vote Democratic. When Johnson signed the Civil Rights Act, he is said to have remarked, “We have lost the South for a generation.”
Zachriel: Others are just incredibly insensitive (such as considering Nathan Bedford Forrest for a license plate in Mississippi).
Ymarsakar: People could have learned from him.
Forrest is a part of history, including the history of the Civil War and the history of the KKK. No one wants to erase history, but that wasn’t the issue.
Danny Lemieux: What about all the (Democrat) monuments to LBJ, who did more than any other modern U.S. political figure to condemn black people to family dissolution and economic misery?
Johnson was instrumental in passing the Civil Rights Act. He did so knowing that it would fracture the Democratic Party.
suek: “To be suspicious ” justifies the necessity for affirmative action?
We weren’t discussing affirmative action.
“Whenever this issue of compensatory or preferential treatment for the Negro is raised, some of our friends recoil in horror. The Negro should be granted equality, they agree; but he should ask for nothing more. On the surface, this appears reasonable, but it is not realistic. For it is obvious that if a man is entering the starting line in a race 300 years after another man, the first would have to perform some impossible feat in order to catch up with his fellow runner.
http://bighollywood.breitbart.com/bighollywood/2009/09/17/bill-cosby-racism-is-playing-a-role-in-recent-outbursts-against-president-obama/
No need to banter back and forth – not when a poster defines the loving leftists so well.
http://directorblue.blogspot.com/2011/02/top-15-photos-from-wisconsin-hate.html
s: Do you know who George Washington was. If you do, do you know his background?
Z: Yes, he was an American politician. He was also a surveyer and held a military rank.
Charles Martel, you have not been paying close attention. Zachriel would answer quite differently. George Washington was the “greatest man in the world.”
s: How come you never reveal your own thoughts on things like Marxism, or abortion, or homosexual marriage or Obama’s lack of credentials?
Charles Martel, you have not been paying close attention. Zachriel rejects Marxism as left wing pie-in-the-sky thinking, sees abortion as a grievous loss for most, agrees with others on this forum that the cultural and religious aspects of marriage should be separated from its legal aspects, and understands that Obama has a certificate of birth in Hawaii.
Zach, Zach, I love it when your adult overlord steps in and shows brief flashes of wit! First riposte, well done.(However, you do commit your typical fallacy of the false extreme—Washington Cosby is either your bland Wiki-derived non-description or else he is what you imagine your strawman right-winger would say.)
Second point: a birth certificate is not a credential. A college transcript is. What is the Zachster’s official boilerplate take on Obama’s complete refusal to reveal the college grades of the smartest man ever to be president?
Third point: “sees abortion as a grievous loss for most” is one your best evasions yet. The question is what all of you Zachs think about it, not how other people view it.
Interesting that you use the footrace analogy, Zach. It appears that white, as a group, are slower afoot than blacks. Maybe all whites should get a 5% headstart in the Olympics just to make it more fair.
Any program that advantages and disadvantages individuals because of their membership in certain groups is prejudice and reprehensible. I have no problem at all with evaluating the circumstances of individuals and taking those into account in hiring, admissions, etc., even if that results in more individuals from certain groups being helped than others (as it undoubtedly would, given the history that you now use as an excuse for discriminating against whites as a group). Still, each individual must be evaluated on his/her own merits and efforts, not on membership in a group.
CM, Washington Cosby?
Quixote, the damned strikethrough on Washington didn’t take. However, in Zach’s universe I’m sure both are equally accessible and equally important in Wiki.
Charles Martel: However, you do commit your typical fallacy of the false extreme—Washington Cosby is either your bland Wiki-derived non-description or else he is what you imagine your strawman right-winger would say.
“When King George III heard Washington would resign his commission to a powerless Congress, he told the painter Benjamin West: ‘If he does that, he will be the greatest man in the world.’ ”
http://www.gvsu.edu/hauenstein/george-washington-the-greatest-man-377.htm
Charles Martel: Second point: a birth certificate is not a credential.
These are the requirements for being President of the U.S. (that and winning in the Electoral College):
U.S. Constitution, Article V, Section 1: No Person except a natural born Citizen, or a Citizen of the United States, at the time of the Adoption of this Constitution, shall be eligible to the Office of President; neither shall any Person be eligible to that Office who shall not have attained to the Age of thirty five Years, and been fourteen Years a Resident within the United States.
“Whenever this issue of compensatory or preferential treatment for the Negro is raised, some of our friends recoil in horror. The Negro should be granted equality, they agree; but he should ask for nothing more. On the surface, this appears reasonable, but it is not realistic. For it is obvious that if a man is entering the starting line in a race 300 years after another man, the first would have to perform some impossible feat in order to catch up with his fellow runner.”
Don Quixote: Interesting that you use the footrace analogy
Yes, Martin Luther King used analogies to great effect.
Don Quixote: Any program that advantages and disadvantages individuals because of their membership in certain groups is prejudice and reprehensible.
“When Johnson signed the Civil Rights Act, he is said to have remarked, “We have lost the South for a generation.”
Uh, no. I think that is what Bill Moyers is reported to have said. I believe LBJ actually said something very different.
Incidentally, which party’s overwhelming votes of support made it possible for the Civil Rights Act to pass?
DQ – I am firmly in your court regarding Affirmative Action. I would also point out that it demeans the accomplishments of the recipients thereof on the basis of their skin color. This was one of the most trenchant arguments made against Affirmative Action by leading black conservatives such as Thomas Sowell and Ward Connerly.
Consider how this charge was used against black conservatives, such as Clarence Thomas and Condoleeza Rice, by the Left.
If a man is indeed entering the starting line in a footrace 300 years after the event took place, the analogy is pretty rickety. A better analogy is starting in a 1965 footrace with improper equipment, no training and a piss-poor set of starting blocks against a white opponent.
The best analogy is one that fast-forwards to 2011, after almost 46 years’ worth of pouring trillions of dollars into welfare, public schools, remedial programs, scholarships and subsidized housing. The racer is this case still reaches the starting line poorly trained and equipped, but at his own volition, and demands to be given a 15-yard head start and a separate starting gun.
Danny Lemieux: Uh, no. I think that is what Bill Moyers is reported to have said. I believe LBJ actually said something very different.
It’s normally attributed to Johnson.
http://www.google.com/search?&q=%22We+have+lost+the+South+for+a+generation%22
He purportedly said it to Bill Moyers, and it fits Johnson’s political character.
Danny Lemieux: Incidentally, which party’s overwhelming votes of support made it possible for the Civil Rights Act to pass?
Both parties supported the bill.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Civil_Rights_Act_of_1964#By_party
Southerners of both parties voted against the bill. But there were far more Democrats in the South at that time. Which was the whole point of the Johnson quote. They are the ones who took the political risk.
Charles Martel: The best analogy is one that fast-forwards to 2011, after almost 46 years’ worth of pouring trillions of dollars into welfare, public schools, remedial programs, scholarships and subsidized housing.
That’s a different argument than King raised.
“That’s a different argument than King used.”
King wasn’t making an argument, he was making an analogy. Quick, go look up “analogy” on Wiki!
Both parties supported the bill. Depends upon where you begin the history.
The Civil Rights Act of 1960 was a United States federal law that established federal inspection of local voter registration polls and introduced penalties for anyone who obstructed someone’s attempt to register to vote or actually vote.
The Senate’s debate over the passage of this bill actually started on February 29, 1960. However, a group of 18 Southern Democrats divided into three teams of six in order to be able to create a continuous filibuster wherein each member would only have to speak for four hours every three days. This system resulted in the longest filibuster in history, lasting over 43 hours from February 29 to March 2. On the morning of March 2nd, only a fifteen-minute break was allowed before the Senate sat for another 82 hours. By the time the 24-hour sessions were called off by majority leader Lyndon Johnson, the Senate had sat for 125 hours and 31 minutes minus a fifteen-minute break.
The act was signed into law by on May 6, 1960. Ike was president.
Charles Martel: King wasn’t making an argument
King was certainly making an argument.
Let’s try to return to the original questions.
Bookworm: Is it hatred if you place obstacles in the path of a specific group, without explicitly demeaning, deriding, insulting or attacking that group? What if you justify those obstacles on grounds unrelated, or reasonably unrelated to the group?
It’s not necessarily hatred, but when there is a history of bigotry, and the same groups place obstacles, then it is reasonable to be suspicious of their motives. Trust has to be earned, especially after a long period of discriminatory behavior.
SADIE: Depends upon where you begin the history.
Sorry, it wasn’t clear. With reference to the bill Johnson signed, we were discussing the Civil Rights Act of 1964. But you’re absolutely correct. A minority of Southern Democrats kept civil rights legislation bottled up for years.
NO, Zach – not a minority, a majority.
In the 26 major civil rights votes after 1933, a majority of Democrats opposed civil rights legislation in over 80 percent of the votes. By contrast, the Republican majority favored civil rights in over 96 percent of the votes.
http://archive.newsmax.com/archives/articles/2002/12/13/194350.shtml
Zach, quit being so craven and answer the question I posed above: What’s your take on Obama’s refusal to release his college transcripts?
Also, what’s your personal take on abortion (other than boilerplate that says “many people are perturbed by it”)?
C’mon, kid, jump in with a real opinion, not one you’ve lifted from Huffpo, Wiki or SimCity.
Martel, he has to wait for a government permit. You need to be understanding in this scenario.
Ymar – you made a funny
That requires a license too ; )
_This_ is the part of Bill Cosby’s life that you seem to have overlooked. He certainly didn’t start out with advantages – but he overcame the handicaps “placed” in his way, and succeeded. On his own. No affirmative action needed.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bill_Cosby#Early_life
By the way…I think that in the interest of affirmative action all sports teams should be proportionally racially distributed. So that if a college is 10% black, it can only have 10% blacks on their sports teams. If a professional team is based in a state that is 25% black, then only 25% of its team may be black.
I think affirmative action should apply to crime and punishment, too. For example, if whites are 60 percent of a city’s population, 60 percent of the arrests for burglary, assault, drug dealing, robbery, rape and homicide must be of white men or women.
So Charles….
How would you go about that? Given that 60% of crimes are not actually committed by whites, what should we do to rectify the situation? Have a jail time pool like the jury pool? If your number gets pulled, you get arrested in lieu of a minority who walks?
How about when – as it seems inevitable – caucasians become the minority…do we then get special consideration? or is it somehow perpetual majority status no matter what the numbers are??
suek, to paraphrase Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., “If a man approaches the starting line for a life of crime and finds that his opponent took off years ago, there’s nothing he can do to catch up.” Obviously we need a sort of affirmative action for whites. Each white boy should automatically be assigned five felonies and 10 misdemeanors when he reaches the age of 18, and right away become eligible for Three Strikes and Your Out.
To answer your question about Oppressorhood, I refer you to wymyn. As you know, wymyn are a slight majority in the U.S. population, and an overwhelming majority in colleges. Yet, miraculously, they remain a minority. The answer grasshopper, is that even as whites go from majority to minority, they will remain a majority.
Glad I could be of help.
suek and Martel
Have either of you considered the concept of selling carbon offsets and apply it to the majority-minority conundrum.
Each white boy should automatically be assigned five felonies and 10 misdemeanors when he reaches the age of 18, and right away become eligible for Three Strikes and Your Out.
I haven’t worked out all the pesky details yet, but the white boy could sell off a few felonies and half the misdemeanors for a king’s ransom.
The possibilities are just endless. LOL
SADIE, after the U.S. and western civilization collapse, how about you and I get together and found a duchy, or satrapy or something?
Danny Lemieux: Incidentally, which party’s overwhelming votes of support made it possible for the Civil Rights Act to pass?
Zachriel: Both parties supported the bill.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Civil_Rights_Act_of_1964#By_party
SADIE: NO, Zach – not a minority, a majority.
Civil Rights Act of 1964
The original House version:
Democratic Party: 152-96 (61%-39%)
Republican Party: 138-34 (80%-20%)
Cloture in the Senate:
Democratic Party: 44-23 (66%–34%)
Republican Party: 27-6 (82%–18%)
The Senate version:
Democratic Party: 46-21 (69%–31%)
Republican Party: 27-6 (82%–18%)
The Senate version, voted on by the House:
Democratic Party: 153-91 (63%–37%)
Republican Party: 136-35 (80%–20%)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Civil_Rights_Act_of_1964#By_party
Danny, as you know, Zach has a problem with language (the definition of “overwhelming,” for instance) and the ability to actually answer a question without misdirection (offering “both parties supported the bill” as a refutation of the overwhelming percentages posted by the GOP legislators).
Charles, you sly dog – you hit the 100th post and I forgot to award a prize.
A duchy sounds ducky and we shall make it a z-free zone, too
Charles Martel #102
When one is on auto pilot, they should also visually look down to check if they’ve already landed – otherwise they just drone on and on and on and on.
Charles Martel: offering “both parties supported the bill” as a refutation of the overwhelming percentages posted by the GOP legislators).
We answered this more completely above, but will repeat it here. The difference was regional. If you notice, Southerners of both parties voted overwhelmingly against the bill, while Northerners of both parties voted overwhelmingly for the bill. It is not in dispute that Southern Democrats, especially in the Senate, bottled up civil rights legislation for generations.
The original House version:
Southern Democrats: 7–87 (7%–93%)
Southern Republicans: 0–10 (0%–100%)
Northern Democrats: 145-9 (94%–6%)
Northern Republicans: 138-24 (85%–15%)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Civil_Rights_Act_of_1964#By_party_and_region
The passage of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 solidified African American support for the Democratic Party and began the transition of white Southerners to the Republican Party.
Danny, as you know, Zach has a problem with language (the definition of “overwhelming,” for instance) and the ability to actually answer a question without misdirection (offering “both parties supported the bill” as a refutation of the overwhelming percentages posted by the GOP legislators).
Charles Martel: Zach{riel} has a problem with language …
It’s quite alright that you pretend not to notice the point raised, and try to divert with personal attacks. Our readers can read for themselves the distinction that was drawn, and check the facts for themselves.
Zach, I just had a nice, simple dinner of beans and franks, something my wife and I eat every so often to remind us of simpler days when we were in our 20s.
May I recommend the Hebrew National quarter-pound franks? Those bad boys are great on a fresh bun, slathered with mustard, onions and relish. Yum! Hebrew National used to sell some great knockwurst, but we’ve been having trouble finding them at the store lately, so the quarter pounders are a fine substitute.
I’m going to go watch “Smallville” now. Used to be a great show, but now I’m just putting in the hours until the sorry thing drags itself across the finish line.
Ouch! the finger on my mouse’s scroll wheel just cramped up.
Charles, wise man say…”when lose point of argument, submit more mosquitos to circumcision.”
Charles M…a satrapy ruled by the Duke of Hammer and the Duchess of Awesome?
Martel, I’m sure I can find something that would cater to your particular individual tastes.
Even if one accepts Z’s point concerning the politicians ruling over the South, how does that nullify the issue of Democrat complicity?
When the Democrat party elects Jimmy Carter, a Southern Democrat, when Ted Kennedy of the Kennedy clan goes into “women’s rights”, and when Robert Byrd of the KKK is respected and feared as a powerful member of the Senate (for Life crowd), we’re supposed to believe Zach that it was just a “regional issue”?
If it was a regional issue, California must be being destroyed due to a space-time warp to the South then.
Ymarsakar: Even if one accepts Z’s point concerning the politicians ruling over the South, how does that nullify the issue of Democrat complicity?
It doesn’t. But the Democratic Party went through a period of change that left it fractured. Southern whites moved to the Republican Party, and African Americans moved to the Democratic Party.
Charles Martel: I just had a nice, simple dinner of beans and franks
Mark Twain had dinner with U.S. Grant, saying it was like eating beans with Caesar.
Southern whites moved to the Republican Party, and African Americans moved to the Democratic Party
Obviously, Southerners Robert Byrd, LBJ, Orval Faubus, Sam Ervin and Jimmy Carter didn’t. The Democrat Party didn’t really lose the South until after Ronald Reagan’s ascent and the descent of the Democrat Party into hard-left socialism. Blue-Dog Democrats today are a rare breed indeed.
Danny Lemieux: Obviously, Southerners Robert Byrd, LBJ, Orval Faubus, Sam Ervin and Jimmy Carter didn’t.
Not the best examples, but as you suggest, and as we mentioned above, it was a transitional process.
Danny Lemieux: The Democrat Party didn’t really lose the South until after Ronald Reagan’s ascent and the descent of the Democrat Party into hard-left socialism.
That’s just silly. There are virtually no socialists in positions of political power in the U.S.
If it looks like a socialist, walks like a socialist, quacks like a socialist…it’s a socialist.
Danny Lemieux: If it looks like a socialist, walks like a socialist, quacks like a socialist…it’s a socialist.
There is no support for such a statement. Are you using some odd definition of “socialist”?
Do socialists = progressives?
Do progressives = socialists?
If not, what are the differences?
Maybe better, how do you define a socialist? What would be their goal, if they were in a position to set the goals?
suek: Do socialists = progressives?
No.
suek: Do progressives = socialists?
No.
suek: If not, what are the differences?
Progressives believe in reform through government action, such as outlawing of child labor or limiting pollution. Socialists believe government should directly control the means of production.
suek: Maybe better, how do you define a socialist?
Conventionally. That way people know the meaning of the words.
Let’s see…Google…Democratic Socialists (members of the Socialist International).
find “Young Democratic Socialist” website here: http://www.ydsusa.org/Home
click on “what is Democratic Socialism”.
scroll to bottom and what do we see?
“Through the socialist movement and the Democratic Socialists of America you can help build a progressive majority and become part of the solution to social and economic injustice here and abroad.”
Then cross-link with Vermont Progressive Party statement of principles, found here:http://www.progressiveparty.org/issues/principles
Hmmm….not much difference between the two, is there? They both think they have a right to what I earn.
There, that was easy enough!
Here’s a screen shot of a Democratic Socialist of America (DSA) web page listing of Democrat members of the DSA in Congress. There’s quite a few.
http://www.scribd.com/doc/35733956/DSA-Members-American-Socialist-Voter-Democratic-Socialists-of-America-10-1-09
Of course, the page was scrubbed before the last elections.
>>Progressives believe in reform through government action>>
To achieve what goals?
You mention two specifics, but if those specifics were their end goal, then there would be no further need for their political action. Yet they still exist. That assumes that they have other goals – what are they?
Danny Lemieux: Here’s a screen shot of a Democratic Socialist of America (DSA) web page listing of Democrat members of the DSA in Congress.
We could make a website and list you as a member of the Smokey the Bear Club.
The images indicate this url: http://americansocialistvoter.com/demsocofamerica.htm. The domain is registered to CRYSTAL COAL INC., possibly a nonsense organization to hide the actual identity, and doesn’t appear to be active. The Democratic Socialists of America is at http://www.dsausa.org and is registered to Democratic Socialists of America. They’re not hiding.
Anther clue, the top of the page says “How the Democratic Socialist of America self-describes its organization.” The third-person is a tell.
In other words, it doesn’t appear to be screenshots from the DSA. But if you Google for “How many members of the U.S. Congress are also members of the DSA?”, you’ll find it echoing all through the right-wing blogosphere.
suek: You mention two specifics, but if those specifics were their end goal, then there would be no further need for their political action. Yet they still exist. That assumes that they have other goals – what are they?
Progressives are not a single political entity, and have a variety of views. Most support laws to provide universal healthcare, fair trade, living wage, right to unionize, openess in government, protecting the environment, ending the war in Iraq, ending violations of due process in the war on terror, ending corporate welfare and limiting corporate influence on government, more help for the poor.