He really sounds like he's getting a kick out of the whole radio gig. I'm not being mean, I'm actually kind of amused.
But he's being extremely vague on who the Leftaliban are. They're religious extremists who want to impose their views on everyone else, and though he claims he's actually not talking about the Religious Right, I don't get it. He's talking about liberals in academia, I've heard him talk about it before. He doesn't like it when they oust people from jobs (I think he's specifically only talking about evolution and global warming), which is why he calls global warming a hoax becuase too many people get money from it (a dubious claim I think). But who are they? What are their names? Where are they? It's all too vague. It looks to me like he wanted to come up with an incredibly provacative way to insult liberals, and uses it as often as possible to insult them, but when pinned down for a definition offers up something vague enough so that it actually seems to describe almost no one specifically.
And he's being extremely loose with the word "religion," and I know why he's doing it, and I think anyone paying attention would know why too. It's retaliatory for the sorts of attacks the Religious Right recieve. It's also cheap and not the right word to use. If someone went on a mission to ban trans fat as a national law, no transfat ANYWHERE, because they felt it was their duty to end obesity in America, I have a feeling he'd call them a religious fanatic. He's overusing the term to describe anyone that believes something, regardless of facts, regardless of pretty much anything, and it's an incorrect use of the word.
But I don't buy his narrow interpretation of this term he's created, because he's slapping that damned label on any liberal he has a bone to pick with, and when you describe the problem without the title Leftaliban, frankly he was right in the beginning, I do think he's talking about the Right. I think he has possibly a valid complaint, but he doesn't seem interested at all in debating it on the merits, and that's my problem with him.
To his credit, he never sounds verbally as hostile as he does on paper. I've read him, and I've heard him, hell I've even talked to him, on THIS very subject, and I never got the impression when I heard him that he was being hateful or offensive, he sounds like a perfectly nice guy. I'm even amazed that he can explain his articles without coming off smug.
Maybe he just needs to switch the World Watch articles over to a podcast. I wonder if that would really make a substantive difference. I suspect it would.
Posts: 21898 | Registered: Nov 2004
| IP: Logged |
posted
Those who questioned my Moore vs. Limbaugh take, a couple of comments: 1. I disliked Moore because his Sicko film misrepresents health care. There is no good answer, but socialized medicine is one of the worst of bad answers. (I am in heath care.)A bit of googling finds all kinds of lies and misrepresentations: http://www.newsbusters.org/node/12914 (a funny story about left wing Cannuks being PO'd about Moore praising Canadian health care.) http://www.davekopel.com/Terror/Fiftysix-Deceits-in-Fahrenheit-911.htm about his previous film, Farenheit 911. I didn't see it so I didn't have an opinion.
2. So I tried to compare Rush's accuracy rate. Tough to do, because AIM - apparently a right wing media watchdog - has no problem, but the wikipedia entry on Limbaugh has some somewhat vague info about people who accuse him of inaccuracy. FAIR - left wing media watch - of course does attack Limbaugh, which is should do. http://www.fair.org/index.php?page=1895 It is a somewhat tiresome attack, focusing only on chlorine and whether the ozone is destroyed by Mt. Pinatubo. Reading between the lines, I conclude: 1. Moore consciously lies. 2. Limbaugh is sincere but somewhat lazy in his research.
Limbaugh is more entertaining and I am generally comfortable with his biases. The writer who said "You are wrong" is obviously silly. There is no right or wrong. Moore does lie, evade, and threaten with lawsuits when someone criticizes him. Limbaugh makes provocative claims that may not be supportable, but I see him as more sincere.
Too bad the left has no radio personality with whom I could compare Limbaugh. It is a mistake for me to link those two very large white men in a compare-and-contrast.
Posts: 121 | Registered: Jul 2006
| IP: Logged |
quote:Originally posted by Lyrhawn: To his credit, he never sounds verbally as hostile as he does on paper. I've read him, and I've heard him, hell I've even talked to him, on THIS very subject, and I never got the impression when I heard him that he was being hateful or offensive, he sounds like a perfectly nice guy. I'm even amazed that he can explain his articles without coming off smug.
Maybe he just needs to switch the World Watch articles over to a podcast. I wonder if that would really make a substantive difference. I suspect it would.
I've noticed that same phenomenon in the past couple of years with several right- and left-wing journalists who write columns and appear on TV. Almost without exception, their print mode came across as more extreme, hostile and/or intolerant than their video mode. I guess being on camera forces you to moderate your tone somewhat.
Coulter might be the exception that proves the rule, but she is the equivalent of a shock jock.
Posts: 6316 | Registered: Jun 2003
| IP: Logged |
posted
Regarding the radio show: interesting, but terribly vague. Not for the first time, here's anecdotal, third-party hearsay in support of a very broad assumption and condemnation.
Now, are there left-wing academics who have kept people whose opinions they dislike from getting tenure? I don't doubt it. I've met people in academia who were capable of as much.
Likewise, I've known of right-wing people who might pass someone up for promotion or decide not to renew a contract for a liberal opinion expressed in a lunchroom.
"Leftaliban" still seems to me a word that will be, like the argument, as vague as the arguer needs it to be. For someone who makes such protestations of the importance of an open mind, how strange to create a word-tool that seems to divest one of the need for an open mind.
That some people, given power, will misuse that power is not remotely unique to the left, nor would it seem to be such a news flash as to require endless repetition.
Posts: 3826 | Registered: May 2005
| IP: Logged |
posted
lynn, Are you planning on addressing the whole you saying people here are equivalent to the Taliban thing?
Posts: 10177 | Registered: Apr 2001
| IP: Logged |
posted
Waitaminute, lynn -- both the sites you have on Moore and the sites you have on Limbaugh essentially say the same thing about both their targets, so where 'between the lines' do we hypothesize baldly that moore's is conscious lying and limbaugh's is sincere misinformation?
It sounds like a product of pre-emptive bias, there.
Posts: 15421 | Registered: Aug 2005
| IP: Logged |
posted
It seems Mr. Card MAY have listened to a few complaints, because in the recent WW he's moved to saying "insane left" instead--which I appreciate, even if I don't particularly think any of the views on the left are in fact "insane".
Posts: 1314 | Registered: Jan 2006
| IP: Logged |
posted
I prefer "insane Left" mainly because the use of the adjective makes it possible that there are members of the Left to whom the adjective does not apply.
Posts: 37449 | Registered: May 1999
| IP: Logged |
quote:I prefer "insane Left" mainly because the use of the adjective makes it possible that there are members of the Left to whom the adjective does not apply.
Although making a point without childish name-calling at all would be even better.
Posts: 10177 | Registered: Apr 2001
| IP: Logged |
Thanks for the interest in my meger contributions.
I teach a class at a local university, and one day was having lunch with a full time prof. We got talking and I said something vaguely positive about the war in Iraq, to the effect that if they have a democracy there, it could be preventing a much worse war later. I kind of referred to Germany and Churchill. My lunch friend was outraged, deeply offended. He then made me admit I tend to vote Republican, that I don't believe the New Deal did any real good, and that I didn't think the Great Society was great or even good.(I actually think it was evil.) I don't think there should be a Department of Education in the Federal Government and I take the tenth amendment very seriously.*
He was so upset that he later said he didn't know if he could be a friend to me - someone I have known for over twenty years, jogged with, and had many lunches with. We talked about our academic discipline. Politics never came up, so we were good friends. Now we cannot be?
I replied that I always knew he was a flaming atheist liberal and didn't find him intolerable. Why was I intolerable if I am religious libertarian (e.g., Republicans are too far left for me)? He didn't have a good answer. But he was still really angry.
I've had less violent versions of that experience several other times. So when the term "Leftalaban" comes up, it resonates with me. It shocks me to see the kind of emotionality and invictive that follows. After all, I am ridiculously over-educated, teach some college classes, drive a foreign car, and bike to work. I am personally quite "green" and live in a solar home I helped design and build. I recycle. Shouldn't I be a liberal democrat? I shock people if I speak from the heart about the kind of society I would consider good. Then I get the "we cannot be friends" reaction.
I cannot say that anyone here is a member of the leftalaban, but I know they are out there. I have tried to be friendly to them. It disturbs me to have these conversations because of the rigid quality of thinking on the left. When I read Radical Son by David Horowitz, it resonated because it explained so many of my own experiences through the years.
Now how do I know that Limbaugh is sincere? I think it is just my bias, as Sanprimary says, although how Moore could not know that the Cuban hospitals are not available to the common Cubano, I cannot imagine. How could he be so naive? Also, he threatens to sue people who say bad things about him. That defensiveness usually goes with conscious deception. So I conclude that he was consciously trying to hide the full truth. Like a liberal writer friend says(well, I like him, I don't think he likes me), he is justified in lying in order to achieve a good goal. But generally conservatives believe that lying is not acceptable. They/we tend to be deontologists, I suppose. So I project that onto Limbaugh, who doesn't seem to threaten people with lawsuits when they attack him. (To be fair, he's been married three times which disturbs me a good deal, so I am cautious about him.)
LJ
*I also have an altar set up to the Second Amendment, but don't tell anyone.
Posts: 121 | Registered: Jul 2006
| IP: Logged |
posted
The right isn't rigid? Both sides need to listen to the other side and not name call or judge, that would probably be a lot better.
Posts: 9942 | Registered: Mar 2003
| IP: Logged |
posted
lynn, do you honestly not see the difference between, "I disagree with your politics, so we can't be friends" (as childish as that is) and "I disagree with your politics so I am going to blow up your buildings and shoot your family"?
Because I think that's why people are objecting to the "Leftaliban" term. It's equating political snobbery to murder and terrorism. Which is a bit of a stretch.
Posts: 9866 | Registered: Apr 2002
| IP: Logged |
posted
dkw, you make an excellent point. I didn't think about that. Perhaps I can rationalize my blindness:
Did you ever read "The Hiding Place" by Corrie Ten Boom? She talks there about her brother who studied in Germany in the late 1920s and found a kind of hardness and negativity setting in. I don't remember the exact description but rather recall the moral deterioration he described. The idea that manners and courteous discussion were weaknesses . . . well, you get the idea.
So perhaps you could view this term as a blessing in disguise. If thoughtful people are using that term, perhaps it is an early warning about a moral bankruptcy setting in. Rather than attacking the messenger, could you look thoughtfully at the message.
How did the Taliban become as they did? Didn't it start with intolerant talk? After all, the Buddha said, "thoughts become feelings, feelings become acts, acts become character. Take care of your thoughts." Or words to that effect.
Syn: I have some pretty good evidence that the right is actually not rigid, but the psych research showing it so is done by lefties who want to make it look that way. Read Radical Son and see how Horowitz was greeted by people on the right.
quote:Originally posted by lynn johnson: Limbaugh is more entertaining and I am generally comfortable with his biases. The writer who said "You are wrong" is obviously silly. There is no right or wrong. Moore does lie, evade, and threaten with lawsuits when someone criticizes him. Limbaugh makes provocative claims that may not be supportable, but I see him as more sincere.
There is nothing silly about me. What is silly about you is that you ascribe my statement to what was said about Moore, not to what was said about liberals. It is far from silly for me to say that when you say that liberals take Moore at face value, you are wrong. It is a false statement. Aside from being far too general to argue (the point about no right or wrong is correct only because the comment is too half baked to deal with) the point is pretty moot. It doesn't stand well to counter the argument that "leftaliban" is in poor taste, by simply pointing out all of the other stuff that is in poor taste in politics and punditry. We are trying to deal with one specific incidence that is offensive, representative of what we don't like. It should follow that if we are making this argument in favor of taste, we can also see that Moore has very little of his own. Getting us to agree to that point should not be hard, and it should not be taken as a counter argument of any effect.
Posts: 9912 | Registered: Nov 2005
| IP: Logged |
So perhaps you could view this term as a blessing in disguise. If thoughtful people are using that term, perhaps it is an early warning about a moral bankruptcy setting in. Rather than attacking the messenger, could you look thoughtfully at the message.
I look thoughtfully at thoughtful messages. I do not believe that reprehensible statements and hate speech are things we can learn from very easily. We learn much more about the person using this kind of speech than about ourselves. This type of speech directs attention to the user consciously, and creates a barrier against understanding by alienating people. It is a statement about Card, it is not a very good statement regarding anyone else. It is unreasonable, and therefore you should hopefully see that the majority of posters here are seeking not to justify its meaning for themselves, but to understand how it is that Card came to use it, and for what reason he could possibly justify it. I think we are finding that some things are very difficult to comprehend, and that those things may not be justified.
You invoke Buddha, but I have a hard time seeing why. The harshness of the rhetoric that Card uses contradicts that missive in its aggressiveness. I have said before that I never understood why Card treats his own audience as if we haven't read his books and remembered the falseness and maliciousness of his pundit characters, and their manipulative speech.
I know he's read Emerson, (Card's thought is quite Emersonian) and Emerson echoes the buddha quite nicely : “Do not set the least value on what I do, or the least discredit on what I do not, as if I pretended to settle anything as true or false. I unsettle all things. No facts are to me sacred; none are profane; I simply experiment, an endless seeker, with no Past at my back.”
I often think Card is just playing us, and refusing to admit that we realize it or that he does. Maybe he agrees with you, for some reason, that his rhetoric actually does someone some good. Personally I would prefer sincerity and directness.
Posts: 9912 | Registered: Nov 2005
| IP: Logged |
posted
Tom, a psychologist at U Va, Jon Haidt, has published research suggesting that conservatives have what he has called "thick" morality, and liberals have "thin." He, a left-winger, now says that conservatives have moral intuitions that liberals are blind to. http://cbdr.cmu.edu/seminar/Haidt.pdf
Note that liberals strongly endorse two of the five moral bases, and conservatives evenly endorse all five.
What would be better is if conservatives respected liberals' contributions in caring & justice (two of the five) and liberals acknowledged the value of the other three (loyalty, respect for hierarchy, and purity).
Lying is a "purity" issue, which Haidt's research clearly shows liberals discount in moral decision making.
But you are partly right, Tom. I came to believe that before I read Haidt's work, and his work simply reinforced my biases.
You could make a case that the reason I focus on truth telling is because I am personally troubled by the temptation to lie, and therefore notice it more in others. A totally truthful person wouldn't notice the lying or be bothered by it as I am.
posted
Personally I have found both parties to be pretty near equally low on intellectual veracity. I think in politics, "truth" is what you can prove on paper, which you can se to convince others. It isn't anything more.
Posts: 9912 | Registered: Nov 2005
| IP: Logged |
quote:Lying is a "purity" issue, which Haidt's research clearly shows liberals discount in moral decision making.
Can you show me the research in question? The paper to which you've linked is an advocacy piece and contains no actual data. I'm deeply suspicious of "lying" as a "purity" issue as it's presented here, since "purity" seems to represent instead one's level of atavistic disgust at unnatural or antisocial behavior and/or appearance. While I can see how, with very careful questions and controls, one might be able to isolate the issue of "purity" out of this, I don't think that makes a great deal of sense.
To a liberal, something like "I could not be friends with someone who lied about having an affair" is a very, very different issue than "I could not be friends with someone with a deformity;" as described, these would both be "purity" issues for the purposes of the study. I actually suspect that certain forms of lying provoke a "loyalty" response from liberals where they might provoke a "purity" response from conservatives; a Baptist preacher who was a closet homosexual, for example, would be regarded with disgust by liberals for betraying his "own kind" and lying to people who looked to him for advice -- while conservatives, recognizing the latter, would also be disgusted by the nature of the sin.
In other words, at the very least, I would like to see how the questions were worded to control for this. If I were to conduct a similar study, I'd actually consider breaking "lying" out into an axis all of its own. There are too many complicated issues tied into each lie to say "yeah, conservatives are atavistically disgusted by lying and liberals aren't." The success of Ann Coulter alone would seem to disprove this.
Posts: 37449 | Registered: May 1999
| IP: Logged |
posted
Tom, the paper does have data, work your way all the way through it. At least my earlier version has data from his research. I haven't seen the PDF, just a .doc version.
Posts: 121 | Registered: Jul 2006
| IP: Logged |
posted
The paper has graphs, but no data. I have no idea what questions were asked, or how those questions were answered. They do specifically identify things classified as "purity" as "whether or not someone did something disgusting," but don't address dishonesty specifically anywhere in that classification.
--------
BTW, the idea that the Buddha recommended "compassionate anger" is pretty specific to Vajrayana. In fact, most people I know who use the phrase are using it to compare it to the "compassionate anger" of Jesus.
Posts: 37449 | Registered: May 1999
| IP: Logged |
posted
Tom, I am greatly appreciative of your knowledge of Buddhism, it provokes me to try to study more.
You are correct - I am extrapolating from slim evidence. But Haidt clearly shows that there is a significant difference between liberals and conservatives about how we construe morality.
In other news: Why believing in God helps society.
Find this Article at: <http://tinyurl.com/34aflo>
December 9, 2007 God Effect, The By MARINA KRAKOVSKY
Some anthropologists argue that the idea of God first arose in larger societies, for the purpose of curbing selfishness and promoting cooperation. Outside a tightly knit group, the reasoning goes, nobody can keep an eye on everyone’s behavior, so these cultures invented a supernatural agent who could. But does thinking of an omniscient God actually promote altruism? The University of British Columbia psychologist Ara Norenzayan wanted to find out.
In a pair of studies published in Psychological Science, Norenzayan and his student Azim F. Shariff had participants play the so-called “dictator game,” a common way of measuring generosity toward strangers. The game is simple: you’re offered 10 $1 coins and told to take as many as you want and leave the rest for the player in the other room (who is, unbeknown to you, a research confederate). The fair split, of course, is 50-50, but most anonymous “dictators” play selfishly, leaving little or nothing for the other player.
In the control group of Norenzayan’s study, the vast majority of participants kept everything or nearly everything — whether or not they said they were religious. “Religious leaders always complain that people don’t internalize religion, and they’re right,” Norenzayan observes.
But is there a way to induce generosity? In the experimental condition, the researchers prompted thoughts of God using a well-established “priming” technique: participants, who again included both theists and atheists, first had to unscramble sentences containing words such as God, divine and sacred. That way, going into the dictator game, players had God on their minds without being consciously aware of it. Sure enough, the “God prime” worked like a charm, leading to fairer splits. Without the God prime, only 12 percent of the participants split the money evenly, but when primed with the religious words, 52 percent did.
When news of these findings made headlines, some atheists were appalled by the implication that altruism depends heavily on religion. Apparently, they hadn’t heard the whole story. In a second study, the researchers had participants unscramble sentences containing words like civic, contract and police — meant to evoke secular moral institutions. This prime also increased generosity. And unlike the religious prime, it did so consistently for both believers and nonbelievers. Until he conducts further research, Norenzayan can only speculate about the significance: “We need that common denominator that works for everyone.
Copyright 2007 The New York Times Company
Posts: 121 | Registered: Jul 2006
| IP: Logged |
quote:But Haidt clearly shows that there is a significant difference between liberals and conservatives about how we construe morality.
Oh, no argument there. But there's a huge difference between that statement and "liberals aren't as honest as conservatives."
Posts: 37449 | Registered: May 1999
| IP: Logged |
posted
Tom: What I said was that I think Moore is dishonest and Limbaugh is more sincere but possibly wrong. I also mentioned I know of one media-person, admittedly quite liberal, who believes it is acceptable to lie in service of achieving his social goals. I wonder if it is because the purity area isn't as strong. I didn't intend to make a general statement. I did imply -- but didn't say -- that when people on the left do lie, I am not as shocked as if I find that Limbaugh abuses drugs or divorces a perfectly good wife. I have higher standards for people on my side. That is just silly bias, but I cannot deny it is there.
But Horowitz found that many on the far left consciously lie and are proud of it. Morality was what drove him out of the far left to where he admitted that in 1984 he voted for Reagan!
Liberals would likely not lie because their intuition tells them it is wrong, and their justification would probably focus more on issues of justice, if Haidt is right. Conservatives feel dirty when they lie (to oversimplify) and liberals feel unfair and unjust. The far left would look at such qualms as signs of weakness.
So the leftaliban word is a perfectly good description of the radical left, people who in my very younger days would chant, "Up against the wall, melon flipper." I realized that if the revolution they kept jabbering about came through, I would be one of the melon flippers who would be up against the wall. I am probably scarred for life.
Posts: 121 | Registered: Jul 2006
| IP: Logged |
posted
Lynn, the study doesn't show that God is good for society, it shows that societal conventions connect a number of words related to religion with doing the right thing. That's hardly surprising, and it of course provides no evidence that religious belief enhances generosity. It is yet another proof of good old classical conditioning.
Edit: And I'll add my own hypothesis, pretty much unsupported, but it's what I always thought: No one believes in God. Yep. I believe that there is no one in the world who believes in God. I do think that tribal superstitions and stories evolved over countless eons into a spiritual religious system, many of them, but I do not believe that anyone believes in them. As far as I am concerned, vast numbers of people are effected by classical conditioning to begin viewing their world as if it were the one described in their given religious system. I do not believe that is belief. Just me. Call me crazy, but that's what I call religion.
Posts: 9912 | Registered: Nov 2005
| IP: Logged |
posted
Lynn, you said, specifically, "But generally conservatives believe that lying is not acceptable. They/we tend to be deontologists, I suppose." I have no idea how "conservatives tend to be deontologists" isn't meant to be taken as a generalization.
You also said "lying is a 'purity' issue." What I'm saying in response is that I can find nothing in the article to which you linked that suggests honesty was lumped in with "purity" by the researchers. Their definition of the "purity" category actually seems quite different.
quote: But Horowitz found that many on the far left consciously lie and are proud of it. Morality was what drove him out of the far left to where he admitted that in 1984 he voted for Reagan!
We don't want to play the anecdote game, do we? I mean, sure, I have no doubt that extremists in either camp lie regularly; there's a whole book by David Brock (who's basically the Mirror Universe version of Horowitz) called Blinded By the Right that does nothing but discuss the dishonesty of his conservative colleagues.
quote:Liberals would likely not lie because their intuition tells them it is wrong, and their justification would probably focus more on issues of justice, if Haidt is right.
I think this represents a fundamental misunderstanding of the study, Lynn. The results aren't meant to have predictive power.
quote: So the leftaliban word is a perfectly good description of the radical left, people who in my very younger days would chant, "Up against the wall...."
I'm not sure how that follows. Can you explain how, even if we grant the thesis that liberals are far more concerned with social justice than conservatives are, comparing them to an oppressive, murderous theocracy amounts to a "perfectly good description?"
--------
(BTW, read the last paragraph of your NYT article, Lynn. It sounds like we need "police" more than we need "God." *grin*)
Posts: 37449 | Registered: May 1999
| IP: Logged |
posted
Tom, couldn't there be some kind of phase shift between liberals and the far left that leftaliban describes? I am more worried about the left than the right; you may be the opposite. Something has to worry everyone, I suppose. I extrapolate from Haidt's ideas, you are going far too far to imagine I am deriving my ideas from that data. I said earlier it is just my own biases. I find his ideas useful.
If you didn't hang with radicals when young as I did, perhaps you didn't have a personal experience that affected you. Yes, I think there are some genuinely dangerous people on the left. So I think the term is a good wake-up call. Recall Corrie Ten Boom's discussion about the moral degeneracy of Germany in the late 1920s. We ignore wake up calls at our risk.
The purity thing - I think I can speak with definite personal authority. If I lie, I do feel impure. How do you experience yourself when you lie? If you use the five modules, that is.
NYT: congrats on reading the whole study. An appeal to justice works well too, even with the evil, immoral atheists. <Now don't go off on me, Tom, I am having some fun.>
Orinoco: You seem offended when I said your previous "you are wrong" comment was silly. Here you say you know the inner experience of the believing part of the world. Now how can that not be silly? I can speak with personal authority there also. I and people I know well usually believe in God when we experience Him in some unexpected way in our lives. It is usually a surprise of some kind that makes us aware of a large reality. If that happens, it is a remarkable event that changes one's life. I recall several. There weren't always comfortable or pleasant or wished for.
Haven't you read C.S. Lewis's account of his conversion and how unhappy it made him? Some conversions shock and hurt us terribly.
To be fair, Orin, that is clearly not true with all people. There is some truth to what you suppose, you have just over-generalized it. Some people are as they are because of tradition, not because of the numinous encounter. But a surprising number will tell of some phenomenal encounter. Rumi's poetry is about this encounter, meeting The Beloved.
Example: Look at www.nderf.org and track back through; maybe you can get an experience of what I mean. These may seem unusual cases, but a Gallup poll puts NDEs as occurring in about 1 / 20 people.
That's just one example. There are many more which I could detail.
My own opinion on atheists is that they experience a crisis of conscience around 13 when they experience puberty and impure sexual impulses, and reject their intuitive connection with God so as to resolve their guilt. I did some surveys on a list once and most of the atheists did "realize" (scare quotes used intentionally) they were atheists around puberty.
That is a silly idea too, but one I am quite fond of. So when I point out your idea is silly, I am also saying we are siblings.
All thanks for the stimulating dialog. Good night, all.
Posts: 121 | Registered: Jul 2006
| IP: Logged |
quote:Yes, I think there are some genuinely dangerous people on the left.
And yet all the bombings and politically motivated domestic shootings I can think of in the last twenty years have been conservative ones. Don't get me wrong; I think there are dangerous people on the left, but that's mainly because I think there are dangerous people and these people occasionally have political opinions. I think they'd be dangerous regardless of the philosophy they settled on for an excuse.
quote:How do you experience yourself when you lie?
Impurity never crosses my mind. There's a strong sense of shame (that, in my experience, generally suffices to prevent dishonesty), but it's not tied to a "purity" impulse. I'd say it's closer to a "disloyalty" impulse, but that's at best a part of it; in general, I feel like a lie is a betrayal of the fabric of reality. It's like a kind of madness.
Posts: 37449 | Registered: May 1999
| IP: Logged |
Those who don't feel this Love pulling them like a river, those who don't drink dawn like a cup of spring water or take in sunset like supper, those who don't want to change,
let them sleep.
This Love is beyond the study of theology, that old trickery and hypocrisy. I you want to improve your mind that way,
sleep on.
I've given up on my brain. I've torn the cloth to shreds and thrown it away.
If you're not completely naked, wrap your beautiful robe of words around you,
quote:Originally posted by lynn johnson: A poem by Rumi
Ode 314
Those who don't feel this Love pulling them like a river, those who don't drink dawn like a cup of spring water or take in sunset like supper, those who don't want to change,
let them sleep.
This Love is beyond the study of theology, that old trickery and hypocrisy. I you want to improve your mind that way,
sleep on.
I've given up on my brain. I've torn the cloth to shreds and thrown it away.
If you're not completely naked, wrap your beautiful robe of words around you,
and sleep.
I adore Rumi, but do you have any idea how UNRIGHTWING he is? I mean the donkey poem alone... Rumi was a total mystic, as unorthodox as you can get. His ilk wrote poems about God as if God and his worshiper were lover and the beloved. Which meaned that many of these poems were quite steamy. They totally appeal to me as I like the concept of God as not being a separate inentity. But, perhaps he was more Right than I think, who knows?
Posts: 9942 | Registered: Mar 2003
| IP: Logged |
quote:Liberals would likely not lie because their intuition tells them it is wrong, and their justification would probably focus more on issues of justice, if Haidt is right. Conservatives feel dirty when they lie (to oversimplify) and liberals feel unfair and unjust. The far left would look at such qualms as signs of weakness.
It seems to me, now, that what you are doing is starting from a position of presuppositional bias, one that is colored by an image of the left as 'less honest' and 'more prone to lying,' this based on criteria that judge and categorize people's mental states based on what side of an American ideological line they fall on. You find some ideas with no explanatory power and read into them to justify the concept that you started with, then you use it to make sweeping demarcations. You look at two hyperbolic pundits and determine that one is a liar and one is sincere and in the end this conclusion from 'reading between the lines' is strongly originated only from your own baldly hypothesized ideas. Everything beyond this point is an attempt to pick out anything which you can use to self-justify this bias.
At which point it becomes self-reinforcing. Moore becomes a way of circularly 'evidencing' himself as am example of 'how the left lie.'
I mean, hopefully you see why this is all such a big problem.
Posts: 15421 | Registered: Aug 2005
| IP: Logged |
posted
I think that Rumi's experience with God was valid, just as mine is for me. Being orthodox is over-rated. I don't know who actually came up with the blind men and the elephant metaphor, but it certainly is consistent with my experience.
Orinoco said belief is socially conditioned. My point was that the experience of God is what promotes belief. It is beyond words, beyond doctrine, beyond comprehension. Yet it is the most real experience one can imagine. Rumi spoke with appreciation about Jews and Christians and says their experience is valid as his is. I think that Buddhists are tremendously spiritually powerful, and have some personal reasons for thinking that.
Every society I have studied has a rich history of encountering spirits, ghosts, prophecy, soul travel, demons and spiritual antagonists. We try to make sense of that through our doctrine.
My path is the Christian, his was Islam, and the Dalai Lama's path is Buddhism. All lead to an awareness of the spiritual reality. Conservatives want to preserve and enhance what makes society work. Rumi loved people and wanted them to awaken. Those who were awake in 80 did vote for Reagan. So maybe Rumi would have voted for Reagan in 1980-84!
Posts: 121 | Registered: Jul 2006
| IP: Logged |
There was no reason to use force on a bunch of college students even if they were trespassing. What's to say that LIBERALS don't also love society and want to improve it? I want the foster care system to be reformed. I want the education system here to improve and the prison system and I don't identify as conservative. I doubt Rumi would have voted for Reagan. He probably would have been too busy meditating and dancing in circles or at least writing beautiful intense poems. Too many of Reagan's ilk would be too scandalized to notice the beauty of Rumi poems even when it's the really racy ones... I feel like conservatives don't always see the whole picture anymore than a lot of liberals do. Folks need to see the whole picture, what needs to be fixed, where things are wounded and how to make them whole.
Posts: 9942 | Registered: Mar 2003
| IP: Logged |
quote:What's to say that LIBERALS don't also love society and want to improve it?
I don't see how anyone could argue that Liberals DON'T want to improve society. I think the argument comes from how they want to do it. Liberals want to help everybody, and they always have big grandiose ideas on how to do it. Conservatives want to help, well, let's say for argument's sake they want to help everybody, but they want to do it at the state or local level, or the community level.
Posts: 21898 | Registered: Nov 2004
| IP: Logged |
posted
I think it's bit deceitful to provide a report/research as evidence in your favor, but seemingly also admit that its actual veracity would would be irrelevant as far modifying your opinion in any way, as it appears to me you are saying, lynn. Or am I wrong (I could definitely be wrong)?
-- I grew up around all sorts of liberals, and married into a family of people who are even more liberal, generally, than I am. While I often think they are wrong, I also am fairly certain that they are sincere. I am also friends with more than a few conservatives, people I likewise disagree with, but I have no doubts of their sincerity either. Of course I don't hold grudges, and so wouldn't extrapolate a particularly unpleasant personal encounter into a character trait shared by people who are otherwise completely different.
quote:Conservatives want to preserve and enhance what makes society work. Rumi loved people and wanted them to awaken. Those who were awake in 80 did vote for Reagan. So maybe Rumi would have voted for Reagan in 1980-84!
That's your summary tie-in to politics?
Conservatives are the ones who are 'awake?'
The wholesale generalizations and implications aside. Do you doubt the sincerity of liberals because you think that in contrast to conservatives they actively or stupidly do not want to 'preserve and enhance what makes society work?'
Posts: 15421 | Registered: Aug 2005
| IP: Logged |
posted
My experience with liberals has not been good the past few years.
I was wondering if I do think that the Leftaliban is dishonest, and if so, why? I think it is for a couple of reasons that I can identify.
First the "Bush lied" business suggested to me the psychological process called projection. In the words of PeeWee Herman, what you say is what you are. I judged that accusation as a lie in itself, repeated ad nauseum.
Second, my judgement of the Clintons was that they were terribly untrustworthy. Example: Hillary saying that the accusations were part of a vast right-wing conspiracy was, in my judgement, a conscious lie.
Third, the reading of Radical Son. I lived the tail end of that era and judge Horowitz as deeply truthful.
These reasons weren't really clear to me until I was reflecting on this as the dialog progressed. The more I reflect on it, the more likely I think it is. There are some other incidents I could mention. So I find myself moving towards less and less trust of the left. Perhaps this group of criticizers is an exception. I would hope so.
Bok's reply isn't helpful because it misrepresents my position. Bok is at a disadvantage since he hasn't read all of Haidt's work. Specifically look for the paper on the emotional dog and the rational tail. Values are not rationally derived, they are intuitive. Rationality is post-hoc. I haven't said that Haidt proves anything to me, I simply use it to illustrate a useful set of concepts.
As to conservatives being awake, yes, I think so. That has nothing to do with sincerity. Sincerity doesn't excuse poor performance. Government based programs are a waste at best and damaging at worst. The New Deal was a waste (e.g., The Forgotten Man by Shales). I recall how disappointed I was when in a college history class I tried to track the results of the New Deal through the depression. It was a moment of wakefulness, one might say.
The Great Society was positively damaging to people who were helped (read, victimized) by it. My experience is that liberals are reckless at discarding what makes society work. They are sincere.
Have you read Master of the Senate by Caro? LBJ was clearly reckless in what he did in the Senate and subsequently in his presidency. I am not sure he was sincere. I am sure he was a damaging factor in our country's history. I am sure he was quite dishonest.
You see, most conservatives view liberals as people who haven't read history. There is a quote misattributed to Churchill that if one is not a liberal in youth, one has no heart. But if one is not a conservative in maturity, one has no head.
But all of this evades the core question: Does the term Leftaliban convey a useful meaning? I argue that it does because of the narrowness and unwillness to consider the legitimacy of other points of view, precisely because of the self-righteous indignation that the term raises. The reaction proves the foundation of the word. JFK planned to tour the country in 1964 and debate Goldwater. That type of liberalism seems to be dead, replaced by a dangerous singlemindedness and narrowness. The politics of personal destruction.
Exception: McCain picked up an endorsement today from Joe Liberman. That is the kind of principled liberalism that conservatives could work with. But the politics of personal destruction has corrupted our society, and the new term, Leftaliban simply is a wakeup call for liberals to use as a soul-searching tool.
There is a need for a national project of soul searching. Politicans who call for such cannot be elected. I am not optimistic.
Posts: 121 | Registered: Jul 2006
| IP: Logged |
quote:In the words of PeeWee Herman, what you say is what you are.
So OSC's a member of the Taliban? *blink* I'm not sure that's a rational argument.
quote:Second, my judgement of the Clintons was that they were terribly untrustworthy.
And the Bush Administration isn't? Oh, c'mon. Seriously, these are softballs you're throwing, here.
quote:You see, most conservatives view liberals as people who haven't read history.
That conservatives are condescending is not in and of itself a justification of that attitude.
quote:The reaction proves the foundation of the word.
Again, I think you're stretching, here. If I were to call you an "angry b**ch," and you were to become upset, would your reaction prove that I was right?
quote:That is the kind of principled liberalism that conservatives could work with.
Since your definition of "principled liberalism" seems to include "voting for Republicans with conservative agendas," I'm not sure what room is left for principled liberals in your world.
quote:But the politics of personal destruction has corrupted our society, and the new term, Leftaliban simply is a wakeup call for liberals...
Please tell me that the irony in that sentence tasted at least slightly rancid in your throat. I'd hate to think that you weren't at least that self-aware.
Posts: 37449 | Registered: May 1999
| IP: Logged |
posted
Lynn, have you read the book mentioned before: Blinded by the Right? If you read both Horowitz and Brock, and still decide that the right is cleaner than the left, I'll be interested in hearing why.
Otherwise, it appears you have a serious case of confirmation-bias in your selection of literature. If I read only what you've read, and had a nasty run in with a liberal jerk or two, I'd probably be in your boat.
BTW, Lieberman is a conservative Democrat, not a liberal, in the sense that we're using it in this thread.
quote:You see, most conservatives view liberals as people who haven't read history. There is a quote misattributed to Churchill that if one is not a liberal in youth, one has no heart. But if one is not a conservative in maturity, one has no head.
But all of this evades the core question: Does the term Leftaliban convey a useful meaning? I argue that it does because of the narrowness and unwillness to consider the legitimacy of other points of view, precisely because of the self-righteous indignation that the term raises. The reaction proves the foundation of the word. JFK planned to tour the country in 1964 and debate Goldwater. That type of liberalism seems to be dead, replaced by a dangerous singlemindedness and narrowness. The politics of personal destruction.
Exception: McCain picked up an endorsement today from Joe Liberman. That is the kind of principled liberalism that conservatives could work with. But the politics of personal destruction has corrupted our society, and the new term, Leftaliban simply is a wakeup call for liberals to use as a soul-searching tool.
Well that's ironic considering conservatives talk so often about liberals living in ivory towers and being intellectual elites. Doesn't that suggest we're at least somewhat educated? Considering the moves made recently by the Bush Administration, I'm convinced most of our government and the people who think they are doing a good job haven't read a history book lately.
I don't think the term is useful because anything useful that you try to convey with it gets buried beneath the untruth. You're calling them narrow minded? Well that's alright (I sometimes agree, though I'm surprised you really see a difference in narrowmindedness between the right and left), but useful as I MIGHT find that, I immediately ignore it when the comparison ALSO includes murderers and despots. Someone who uses a term like that doesn't care about making that subtle a point, they are either stupid for thinking you'll actually follow that NARROW an interpretation, or they know you'll make the broader association to the full meaning of the Taliban. It's utterly ignorant at best, and disingenous at worst.
Honestly I think the most insultingly appropriate thing he could have said was to call them the Evangelical Left. If his goal was to call them narrowminded and NOT murderers, anyway.
Posts: 21898 | Registered: Nov 2004
| IP: Logged |
posted
Lynn, Peewee, the Clintons and Horowitz are very slender reeds indeed to base your argument on.
Horowitz just lately made a fool of himself when he claimed to have 100 colleges participating in his "Islamo-fascism Awareness Week". Yet many of the colleges had no connection to it or any events. This is your "deeply truthful" icon of Rightitude?
Posts: 6316 | Registered: Jun 2003
| IP: Logged |
posted
What a hornet's nest! I will try to dialog with you but I am not sure it will do any good. No, in fact, I am sure that no good will come of it.
Last will be first: Morbo, it did happen on my campus, and others. I don't know that Horowitz made a fool of himself except in your own imagination and that of a writer in Minneapolis. E.g.: The Berkeley effort: http://www.frontpagemag.com/Articles/Read.aspx?GUID=17069DA6-6C04-4E06-81C7-010C9F29AD55 I found that article moving and having integrity. Is she not from Egypt? Can she not speak with authority? I read several of Aynte's articles, and he seems to be trying to be a good reporter, although the Ann Coulter piece was clearly misrepresenting what she did say. I had to wonder what influence his personal religious views would have on trying to debunk something that clearly did happen on many campuses. I know it came off at Columbia, for example. But I do not know if there were a full 100 campuses represented.
Picking such an example from an unknown blog to disprove Horowitz seems irresponsible to the spirit of dialog. Can you find repeated factual errors in Radical Son, which I referenced? (Any book has some errors, the question is whether they are simple errors or manipulation of the facts.) Did he lie about how his affair broke up his marriage? Did he lie about how his own behavior was irresponsible? Did he lie about his role in Ramparts?
Lyr: My argument has been that words lead to action. When hatefilled words are used then that will lead to actions. Your term is excellent, his is a good one too. Google <fundamaterialist> for a similar bon mot. The idea that Lieberman is conservative seems bizarre. I would never vote for him. http://www.acuratings.org/2005Senate.htm Discussion, see David Frum: http://frum.nationalreview.com/post/?q=MjBkYjU5Njk5ZjY2OWZiMGIyNTk1MmUwNThiMDA0YTI= If Lieberman is not liberal, what on earth is he, with that voting record?
Bok: I should read it. My education about the left comes from Daily Kos. Moveon, and similar web sites. Thanks for the reminder. I predict I will find it distorted, but knowing I have a bias I will do my best to counter that. Do you counter your bias when you read Caro (Master of the Senate) or Horowitz or someone similar? The Slate review of the book showed that Brock had a lifelong habit of lying and I didn't have such a burning desire to read it. His conversion to the left was about sexual politics (I guess the Logcabin republicans were unacceptable) so I don't know how seriously to take the book. Cf: http://www.nybooks.com/articles/15746
Tom, you seem to confuse illustration with proof. I am not interested in proving anything, I was offering dialog. I have enjoyed some of your past contributions; this one not so much.
The incessant "Bush Lied" chant was, I repeat, a lie. Those who forget history . . . Forbes magazine ran an informal contest among its readers to find one promise that Bill Clinton had not broken. I recall someone finally came up with one. No one has / can do that with Bush. I do disagree with many of his actions, perhaps most, but the man is not a liar. If you need proof of that, you aren't paying attention.
Yes, you may call me whatever name you wish and I am not offended. I may be amused by that particular label, thanks for brightening my day. (Could that name calling be projection? I don't know, wouldn't presume to judge, he says slyly.) Have you never read Epictetus, a man (do I assume too much?) of your obvious education?
To all: I don't see value in taking this further. I liked the term and found it amusing. The angry reaction seems to me to validate it. The Taliban started with rhetoric (see the Frontpage mag reference above) and it became behavior. Hitler's rhetoric became behavior. So also Mao who killed many more than Hitler ever dreamed of. Hutu rhetoric led directly to the Rwandan genocide. Language is rehearsal. I see the same happening here. I remain not at all hopeful about the future of this wonderful country. I am not angry, I am saddened and discouraged.
Posts: 121 | Registered: Jul 2006
| IP: Logged |
posted
I'm not calling people any names, I just don't trust most politicians even if they are on my "side". It's like totally trusting commercials. But I really don't think the left can be compared to Mao or Hitler. It seems like both sides like to sling mud, which isn't helpful for the country at all... We should not sling mud. We should compromise. Fighting is just useless and doesn't help the country one bit.
Posts: 9942 | Registered: Mar 2003
| IP: Logged |
Printer-friendly view of this topic
![[Smile]](smile.gif)
![[Wink]](wink.gif)
