Liberals justifiably mock the right’s ignorance of basic civics, the country’s history and the Constitution; after all, part of being a responsible citizen is in knowing these things. Signs with misspelled words advocating “English Only” are met with derision; posters with the swastika are met with outrage. The right’s lies, distortions and hypocrisy are greeted with a mixture of ridicule and outrage and held under the microscope by non-partisan fact-checking organizations – along with those from the left.
Harsh criticism is leveled at the racism implicit in signs at Tea Party rallies and on billboards, on edited photographs, in emails and snail mail, and on social networks. Nowhere is this more exemplified than in their tasteless personal attacks on the current President and First Family; even the children are subjected to racist insults. These character defects should and do attract scorn from most decent Americans, regardless of political persuasion.
But do I detect an echo? Can it be said that the far-left is sounding like the extremists on the right and adopting some of those very same character flaws we so vigorously reject and condemn?
The Bloggerhood: Free Speech and Hypocrisy
Very early on in my blogging career I read about how Pam, a conservative over at The Oracular Opinion, stepped in to help her friend Shaw at Progressive Eruptions who had to have surgery and needed help to keep her blog running. Liberal bloggers applauded her acts of kindness; right wingers all but tarred, feathered and ran Pam out of Blogger Town on a rail. Her crime? Aiding and abetting the enemy.
A liberal who used the name Blackwaterdog was hounded off Daily Kos by a loud, noisy chorus of ugly rhetoric. She started her own blog appropriately named The Only Adult in the Room. But the “purists” weren’t satisfied; they wanted to annihilate her. This dehumanizing effort was led by none other than Salon’s Glenn Greenwald, a good buddy of Jane Hamsher’s at FireDogLake. Her crime? Posting positive picture diaries of the President and First Family’s activities.
Not everyone may be drawn to the content on The Only Adult but does this give her critics the right to compare her to Nazi propagandist, Leni Riefenstahl? Sound familiar?
The blatant hypocrisy and the total disregard for a person’s right to free expression because their speech is not agreeable with another’s is deplorable and unacceptable. But sadly, I see many comment zones turning into war zones with the far-left resorting to personal insults when disagreeing with more pragmatic liberals who in most cases share the same ideals but not the approach.
Sentamental History
I would have been surprised had the main street media not started attacking President Obama the moment he opened his eyes on the morning after the inauguration. But I was dumbfounded at the attacks from the so-called professional progressive blogs. They began mildly enough but very quickly their rhetoric turned into a cacophony of ugly vitriol not unlike that heard from the far-right. Even worse, professional and non-professional far-left bloggers resort to the same kinds of tasteless personally degrading labels that they criticize the right for using.
“Obama should be like LBJ was” or “Obama needs to do what FDR did” is not too far removed from “I want my country back.” The glaring but simple reality is that we can’t go back in time; our country is facing a different set of problems with a different cast of characters. More obviously, Obama is not like LBJ, just as LBJ wasn’t like JFK, and JFK wasn’t like HST, and HST wasn’t like FDR, and so on.
We get our kicks out of mocking the extreme right for its ignorance of history but the far-left can be just as ignorant of and blind to documented historical facts.
FACT: When legislation for Social Security was introduced, Franklin D. Roosevelt dropped the national health care provision that was originally included. Why did he – gasp! – compromise/sell-out/cave? Because at that time and place in our history, he wisely understood that the Republicans would say NO to health care reform and in the process kill Social Security as well.
I wonder if anyone on the far-left during those gloomy dark days of the Great Depression accused FDR of being corrupt, a puppet, inept or a snake oil salesman.
FACT: The Social Security Act, signed by FDR in 1935, only covered workers in commerce and industry. In 1937 the Federal Insurance Contribution Act (FICA) was passed; it required workers to pay taxes to support the Social Security system. In 1939 Social Security was expanded to include dependents and survivors. Not until nearly 25 years later in 1950 was it expanded to cover dependents and survivors. In 1956 Disability Insurance was created and has been expanded over the years.
FACT: LBJ never would have succeeded in getting civil rights legislation passed had it not been for Republican support. The Dixiecrats, led by Strom Thurmond, did everything in and out of the book to block it. Obama is not only burdened with the yellow Blue Dogs, he is faced with an unprecedented concrete wall of well-organized obstruction from the opposition – and now he has the far-left participating in the drive to bring his presidency – and thus the country – to its knees.
The lessons here should be obvious. Not every president can get everything he may have promised during a campaign; a foolish attempt to win no doubt but no more foolish than voters who take such promises at face value. Politics has never been a “take all or nothing” kind of game. Passing legislation is in fact the “art of compromise.” The “all or nothing” school of thought is not only unrealistic, the end result is nothing.
Bloggers Get Down and Dirty
The extremes on both sides of the political spectrum have a penchant for chanting infantile slogans: “I have a right to free speech” from the right translates into “I have a right to disagree with the president” or “I have a right to criticize the president” from the left. Yes and yes, but that is not the issue.The issue is not in the message but in the way it is delivered, the language.
Vicious epithets directed at the President of our United States are limited only by their crude imaginations. One side is just as repugnant, tasteless and vile as the other. Epithets from the right include: Spoiled Brat, Obama Bin Lyin, Half-breed Muslim, Barack Hussein Obama, No Clue Balls Obama, Robbing Hood, Nazi, Terrorist, Barack the Magic Negro.
What’s the difference between that kind of toilet tank talk and this used by far-left bloggers? Barack Bush, Nel, HomophObama, Pootie Tang, the Black Mr. Rogers, House Negro.
I can’t help but wonder if there is a connection between the use of such invectives and the fact that Obama is the first black president.
Headlines such as “Barack Obama the Anatomical Wonder. We’re Looking for Organ and Skeletal Donors for Barack Obama” (from one of my favorite blogs no less) and crude – as in content and production videos such as this one.
Other Mirror Images
Who cares what the majority thinks?
It’s all about “me”, not about “we”.
My preferences are more important than yours.
The president is ignoring our side.
I only listen to Glenn Beck or Keith Olbermann.
What party of NO? What obstructionism?
Our country is on the verge of collapse. It’s the eve of destruction.
If I can’t have it all and NOW, I’m staying home.
I’m not paranoid. What denial?
Who? Me Whine?
. . . I know we liberals like to say that we don't march lock-step with our leaders as do the GOPers, but where does it say we have to destroy them with the same sort of dehumanizing invective and emasculating and emotional strafing that the far right uses on Obama? I have seen over my lifetime a radicalization of our politics and the extremes in both parties by true believers will keep us in a constant state of combat instead of making some sort of arrangement to get done the very important work that this country needs to get done.
I wish I had said this but I didn’t. It was included in an email from Shaw at Progressive Eruptions. I owe her a debt of gratitude for her insight and willingness to guide me and keep me on track.
There are several reasons I don’t visit right-wing sights: the epithets, the hysterics, the distortion of facts, the sniping, and the doomsday mentality. Maybe I’m just uncomfortable with extremes because I find myself visiting fewer and fewer far-left sites these days. I truly feel both extremes have a humanitarian problem and that if they don’t become more realistic and less pugnacious - more willing to give and take – it will not be because of Obama that this country collapses.
Oh, you know, I always say that 90% of what happens on the internet is nonsense. You can't take this stuff too seriously or as indicative of anything other than people now have a forum in which to vent. There is always a bunch of hand-wringing over the "lack of civility" and whatnot but really, that's always been there in public discourse. This is nothing new, it's just out there for all the world to see.
ReplyDeleteWith that in mind, perhaps you won't be interested in seeing this “Hello! Welcome to the Progressive Internet Forum!” video but I thought it made a very good point. Guess that's the DFH in me.
Cheers!
Boy, I am glad that I don't read any of those progressive blogs that you do....reading them is kind of like watching Fox News...or MSNBC (of which I only watch Dylan Ratigan)...
ReplyDeletePersonally, and I speak only for myself, as I always do and always will; ITS OVER!
The reality is that regardless of if we elect a "compassionate conservative" or we elect our first "black progressive" our foreign policy does not change, our wars continue as they always continue, our economic policies do not change, and basically the government our hole political structure keeps on going in the direction it always goes and it continues to do as it always does. We have gone from the Patriot Act to now finding out that the FBI is building a database on people of interest....
None of this is a knock of Barack Obama but rather a horrific reality check...
We go through the process of pretending to change government when we go to vote but the reality is nothing changes...
As President he can only attempt to stay on the beast not control it....
Honestly, what you are seeing is a split between those who support that status quo and those who do not.
Gridlock has become the status quo and this benefits somebody...I know that most of you find Sarah Palin and the masses that support her so appalling....Look at it this way, when you reach a point where 25 or 30% of the citizens of a nation believe BOZO THE CLOWN could do just as good a job of running the country and improving their lives then whew!
Because that is exactly how you need to look at Sarah Palin...
We all spent 8 years lambasting Bush for being the absolutely worst President this country has ever seen and then when you turn around and realize that one of the most intelligent Presidents we have ever had cannot do much better...then its time to call a spade a spade...THE GAME IS RIGGED...
The only way to change a rigged game is from the outside not the inside...
As I said, this is my opinion and my opinion only...and I do not read any of the blogs that you read because the only nasty comments I have seen about Barack Obama have been from the right....
Obama is a decent person...but the system is broke....
tnlib,
ReplyDeleteI'm in general agreement that bloggers of any political view can be pretty strident in their tone and should mind their manners, to say the least. Thanks to the Internets and their anonymity, there's always a great quantity of what T.S. Eliot called "the arrogance of the mild-mannered man behind his typewriter."
But what is meant here by "Far Left"? There is no such thing in the U.S.A. The people you mention may be as strident as you say, but I don't hear them calling for the expropriation of all expropriators or the abolition of private property. That's what a true member of the "far Left" would do. So I think that "what we have here" (I say, sounding a bit like that sheriff played by Jackie Gleason on Smokey and the Bandit) is some well-mannered and some ill-mannered liberals, the latter of whom may have unreasonable expectations that then cause them to take their disappointment out on others. But "far Left"? I wouldn't characterize them that way, and I don't think we should be invoking such a category because it renders the righties' case easier to make -- they, of course, tend to consider anyone slightly to the "left" of Joseph McCarthy an outright Marxist.
tnlib, you must have been following my comments on various blogs around the net lately. I've been blasted for trying to defend Obama by the same people who were singing his praises on the day after his election, all because not everyone is getting everything they had written on their wish list on any given legislative solution. Given the fact that he's had to swim upstream since day one against a backlash of (yes, here it comes...) racist reactionism on the part of some Americans and a strident attitude of obstructionism on the part of the GOP, combined with the shittiest economic hand ever dealt to an incoming President in U.S. history, I don't think the guy's doing too badly.
ReplyDeleteThe support we on the left have offered to the President stopped upon his election. It's as if we worked for his election, maybe made some calls or knocked on some doors or offered up modest donations, but once the voting stopped and the confetti hit the ground we've sat back and expected miracles.
Meanwhile, those on the right, stung by defeat and eager to extract vengeance on the victor, have rallied their troops in an unprecedented display of unity, using Obama and his family as the all-encompassing symbol of "what's wrong" with this country. Their hate knows no bounds, and their vitriolic venom knows no shame.
We on the left may have despised Bush, but there was no lack of ammunition or fact-based reasoning for that sentiment. The right, on the other hand, has simply made up things about Obama to inspire the hatred and disrespect of millions of disciples... from the Kenyan usurper lie, to the "death panel" lie, to the lies about Socialism or his Muslim heritage or whatever Beck and Limbaugh are raving about on any given day.
I've taken a stand on a lot of good people's blogs to point out the obstacles Obama's overcome thus far in his presidency, despite the forces arrayed against him, and am amazed at how vicious some have been because the results they've hoped for haven't been realized within the first two years of his term in office.
I greatly appreciate your post today, and hope you get a few positive responses from some of the usual suspects who HAVE to know your words apply to them. We have much to be proud of in this man, much to fear from his enemies, and the all-too frightening prospect of potential violence directed at him by those who are driven to act by the words they hear so casually spoken against him.
I fear for his life every time I see him in a crowd, and think the hew and cry of some of his detractors might be hard to justify if something horrible occurs.
Thanks for this one, I mean it!
SoBeal: What Grenwald did to that gal was witch-hunting and character assination at its worst. He is no minor blogger. He's a prominant figure who is often interviewed and quoted by the MSM and by lesser known bloggers, including me.
ReplyDeleteTAO: This country has faced many ugly and tough times. We seem to be able to survive in spite of ourselves. I don't subscribe to the doom and gloom theory. Well, one of the major "far-far-left" bloggers leaves comments on your blog all the time and was the first to comment on mine. The "house nigger" epithet came from a guest post on his blog.
Dino: I'm sticking with far-left. They are not, imo, Democrats, liberals or progressives - and they very often admit it. They are way out there on the extreme edges of the far left. One of the extreme far-left blogs is FireDogLake. The language can be pretty crude and personally insulting to Obama. People would be wise to double check their facts before quoting anything. Jane Hamsher is a pretty big gun. Also, read this post by our own Matt Osborne:
ReplyDeletehttp://www.osborneink.com/2010/12/when-commitment-to-jane-hamsher-supersedes-critical-thinking.html#more-7149
And thank you very much for your thoughts. The only thing an old retired woman has to do is blog, so maybe I see too much. Sadly, I have several on my blog roll.
Tnlib, our economic system has some structural problems...The tax cuts won't change that. In 2011 we will continue to bleed banks, in fact we will lose more than we did in 2010. The mortgage crisis is still with us and will continue. Then we will also begin to witness cities default on their bonds and debt...
ReplyDeleteThe blogger you refer to has already lost his business and is losing his home....
I am on the verge of losing 1.5 million of my own money because I cannot, in any way shape or form come up with another million from any source...the money just isn't there. I have even offered to relocate operations and create 50 jobs to either Wisconsin or Illinois and I can get tax credits but I cannot get funding...
We have some serious structural problems....over 75% of the jobs we have lost are in higher paying manufacturing and all the jobs we are creating are in lower paying service sectors...
All we are attempting to do is a "soft landing" rather than a crash....that is the part that makes me mad...and not at Obama but at the system...but don't fool yourselves things are not getting better. We may end up with unemployment at 8% in two years but that does not tell us how many people are earning substantially less than they were before the crash, it does not tell us how many people settled for two part time jobs and no benefits, nor does it tell us how many people have just given up....
I think all of have to also agree that Obama picked his staff, he may have inherited the mess, he may have been stuck with a disaster in congress, but he picked his staff and he had the support of a vast majority of Americans...more than any other President and at this point he still has very positive ratings in comparsion to other Presidents but he seems to have lost the motivation to inspire...again that is his fault.
He also might be in a different situation now had he not thrown people like Howard Dean under the bus after the election...
...as far as the right goes...hey, they were mouthy and crazy before the election and they haven't changed much....it might help if we all quit paying them so much attention...
squatlo: I no longer think that the R-word is limited to the right which this line subtly implies: "I can’t help but wonder if there is a connection between the use of such invectives and the fact that Obama is the first black president."
ReplyDeleteI see this kind of thing on the blogs I have listed on my roll. Many of us visit the same ones, so I don't see how anyone can miss it. I see a lot of these epithets in the comment sections on very respectable blogs. Maybe people don't read the comments?
Anyway, thanks for your understanding. I'm scared shitless about Obama getting shot. If it happens, God forbid, it won't be by a conservative or a liberal. It will be by an extremist.
tnlib,
ReplyDeleteI'm coming from the direction of studying the European Left. To me, the American "Left" doesn't even come close in terms of history or intensity. Our Left, such as it is, doesn't exactly seem to have a copy of the Commie Manifesto in its hip pocket. And there's no excuse for that, you know, because the big publisher for said Manifesto publishes some nice little copies of it. Probably fits right in one's commie-pinko pocket.
I think what you're calling out -- correctly -- is bad manners and maybe a bit of personality-cult stuff. Can't speak to the particulars (thanks for the links -- I'll visit them), but what I mean in general is people perhaps getting used to everyone else agreeing with them in their neck of the blogosphere and then becoming angry when someone doesn't agree. To me, that sure seems like an attitude problem, not really a politics per se, that we're looking at.
But I agree with and share your annoyance at the Barack-Bashers. I think the man's done a pretty good job given the implacability of those aligned against him.
Tnlib...
ReplyDeleteFire Dog Lake? You read that? Shame on you! As far as Jane Hamsher goes she is an idiot...
I guess in a linear world you could call them far left if you want....anti social anarchists would be a better fit... At some point if you go far enough to the right and or the left you end up falling off the scale....that's call la la land...
TAO: "The blogger you refer to has already lost his business and is losing his home....
ReplyDeleteI am on the verge of losing 1.5 million of my own money because I cannot, in any way shape or form come up with another million from any source...the money just isn't there"
I have nothing but genuine affection and enormous respect for both of you and I'm truly sympathetic to your rotten luck. But you know something, it's all relative. By the time I get my check I'm already overdrawn about $300-500 dollars. I eat a lot of beans and pasta salad - day in and day out. I have to borrow a few bucks every now and then just to buy toilet paper. I can't even afford all the meds I need, so I have to priortize them. Diabetes care beats out bipolar. I need to move to a cheaper apt. but I can't afford to even drive my car, which needs all kinds of work, to the grocery and back. As I say, it's all relative and things look a lot better when they're not coated in anger.
Dino: I doubt if most Americans know enough to know the distinction beween the European left and the far-left in this country. : ) I was trying to avoid party labels.
ReplyDeleteI meant to add a "sources and reading list at the end" but forgot. Will do it tonight or tomorrow. Thanks, Dino.
TAO: Oh, I so totally agree re FDL - and with this: "At some point if you go far enough to the right and or the left you end up falling off the scale....that's call la la land..."
ReplyDeleteTnlib...
ReplyDeleteI am not angry...just fed up with all the stupidity! I think Paul Krugman pretty much hit it on the head in his article today...its all zombie economics...
Inregards to the other comment...
What you fail to realize is that I am actually trying to help Barack Obama by creating jobs...I was actually attempting to be part of the solution not part of the problem.
I could have very easily taken that money and moved to Ireland like Octy was talking about...or sailing around like Capt. Fogg....
But no, we got Summers and Geitner who know alot about finance and nothing about economic systems telling the President what to do....considering how intergral they were in creating our current problem...
That is a true and fair criticism of Obama...he picked those two...they are his boys....that is nothing but a fair and honest criticism...
tnlib, I agree with everything that you've said. Dino, I don't think that the European far left is an appropriate measure for the American far left. Socialism has never been a major component of American political culture and the natural evolution of the far left in the U.S. is not likely to parallel the ideology of the European far left. The anti-communist of the 1950s fed by McCarthy wasn't based on any significant socialist movement in the U.S. but rather a paranoia fed by those who equated all socialist ideology with the Soviet communism model. Different societies, different standards, but we do have our own far left and I agree with tnlib's characterization of it. Extremism on the right or the left equally blocks meaningful change. Extremism inevitably leads to violence.
ReplyDeleteLabels are just labels and as tnlib so ably points out they shift and change with time. Democrat, Republican, Liberal, Conservative, right, left, they are all labels that have meant different things at different stages in our history.
TAO, just because you aren't personally familiar with the material that tnlib references doesn't mean that it doesn't exist. I don't think that any of us have time to cover in entirety the huge volume of information out there.
tnlib, I'm also a comment reader I've read the same types of comments that you reference. Recently on Swash Zone I was surprised at a comment from TAO that accused me of voting for and continuing to support the president because we're both black. TAO, I'm not attacking you, just stating the facts. It's up to you to ask yourself why you went there.
I also keep reading that we're doomed and it's all over. I'm not certain what "it" is. What catastrophe has occurred that it is beyond our ability to recover from? Certainly a lot of people are dealing with some serious financial problems but as tnlib point out, it's all relative. Making the choice between paying the utility bill or buying insulin is a no win situation.
I can't recall where I heard this but we can choose to sit in the dark cursing the darkness or we can turn on a light. My addition to that is that we may have to first invent the light bulb. The most destructive force in our lives is despair and what saves us from despair is hope. When Pandora opened that mythical box and released all the ills of the wold, the last force to exit from that box was a shining light named hope.
Luckily the antidote for those on the 'far-left' is ramping up to save us all from partisan bickering.
ReplyDeletehttp://nolabels.org/
Looking at nolabels I catch a glimpse of the future.
Not red. Not blue.
Beige.
Tnlib, thank you for this post, which mirrors many of my concerns too. As one who participated in the discussion at Matt Osborn’s place, I have some first-hand experience with the vituperation described here.
ReplyDeleteThere is hardly a liberal of any stripe who is happy with the tax cut compromise, or the ongoing wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, or the intractable nature of the recovery; but, as one who has borne witness to wars and dissent, to social movements and backlash, to conflict and compromise between stakeholders, I know change takes time.
Meanwhile, I refuse to join the chorus of impatient liberals who dismiss Obama as “Bush Lite” and would undermine his reelection chances. Although frustrated with the pace of change, I worked hard to get Obama elected because I trust his judgment, not because I harbored illusions.
What do extremists, whether they are far left fire baggers or far right tea baggers, have in common? Let me offer these thoughts: Defense mechanisms such as denial, devaluation, projection, rationalization, and all-or-nothing-thinking are hardwired into the emotional life of all human beings; and some of us rely on defense mechanisms more than others. IOW, we bring the same emotional baggage into every discussion … regardless of ideology.
tnlib :
ReplyDeleteYes Glenn Greenwald is a significant lefty opinion writer and there was HUGE pushback from others on the left about that Leni Riefenstahl comment when he made it in early December. You don't see anything like that on the right. When a righty says something horrible they circle the wagons and march in lockstep.
But no we on the left upset at this Administration are NOT the same as the far right. And I'm sorry but since when are we the "far left"? We used to be the mainstream Democratic Party. Since when is ending the last president's war of choice a "far left" position? Stopping torture? Extraordinary rendition? Eavesdropping on American citizens without a warrant? Regulating Wall Street? These are "far left" positions? Since when? These are MAINSTREAM, middle-of-the-road positions.
To me the "far left" are those anarchists who break windows at the G8 summits.
A lot of us on the left are angry at Obama for a lot of things and unlike when the Tea Party gets angry and the Republicans welcome them into a nice warm snuggly hug, liberals are told we're "fucking retards" and other insults. If the president would invite progressive leaders to a meeting or even a fucking conference call and let us speak out on why we are upset but no, we're thrown under the bus. So Glenn Greenwald gets mad at the "clap louder" set and gets immediately slapped down. NOT the same as what you are talking about AT ALL.
Sheria, You made a general claim that to be speaking the truth when you posted the article of Reed's claiming that white progressives who criticized Barack Obama were being racists....and you even used the tired old "black man in a white world" analogy. You claim that you have more insight into Barack Obama because you both carry the label "black."
ReplyDeleteIn your post you did not specificially name anyone nor did you provide any links. It was just "white progressives" and or those who criticize Barack Obama are racist because they have not walked in his shoes.
Common political criticism, nothing that has not been said about Presidents past, present, and most likely future...but because its Barack Obama its racist. So, that is the truth as you see it...well, thats as logical as my truth being that you only voted for Barack Obama because he was black.
You claim now that numbers are just relative but if I had said that about your numbers of children in poverty you would have blown a gasket...
Why did I go "there?" I went there because you went "there." But the reality is that you believe you are the only one who can go "there:" You claim that whites and blacks cannot have a meaningful conversation about race because whites will always claim "...some of my best friends are black..." But then again you are claiming a special relationship with Barack Obama because of race...a black woman who grew up in the south wants to believe that she shares a culture with a man who's father was from Kenya who was raised in Hawaii by his white grandparents...oh, and lets not forget the stint in Indonesia.
I am sorry, I don't see the sharedness that you do...
So, call me a racist if you want to, call me ignorant if you want to...
You yourself have stated that you were proud to vote for Obama...for a black man...and yet you want to point out that I claimed your vote for him was racist.
I also acknowledged that I took shed tears when I voted for Barack Obama partially because of his race but also because we were finally getting a president who could complete an understandable sentence.
But our ideology blinds us doesn't it.
Sharron Angle can tell Harry Reid to "Man Up" and no one comments on the sexism of that stupidity...but if Harry Reid had told Sharron Angle to "get her butt back in the kitchen..." or to "Woman Up" or whatever then all of the sudden there would have been screams of sexism...
James Carville says that Hillary could give her balls to Obama and then he would have a pair and he is NOT by any definition a progressive but no one quotes him and his audience is a hell of a lot larger than Firedoglake....nope...but let some stupid blond chick say something and all of the sudden its "The Left" or "Progressives" who are being racist.
Excuse me if I don't buy into the argument that believing that blacks know more about whites because "blacks took care of the the white mans kids and worked in their kitchen" is all that much different than the governor of Mississippi claiming that things 'weren't that bad'
From YOUR perspective you are correct, and from HIS perspective he is correct but your perspective does not warrant an understanding of Barack Obama anymore than the governor's perspective explains the totality of the south after the civil war.
Sheria,
ReplyDeleteThis dino, who is a bit grumpy because he's still working on his morning cup of coffee, is going to have to challenge all you humans out there to define this American "far Left" that you keep insisting exists. SoBe is probably right that the G8 window-breakers are a pretty good approximation of a Left these days, but most of them aren't Americans, no?
So, as your time permits, what does the American "far Left" believe? What policies does it advocate? I don't believe you will be able to provide a convincing description that goes beyond mentioning some impatient progressive bloggers with bad attitudes because, in simple, there is no American far Left. There is no organized political/ideological "Left" in this country. My point is that it is a figment of the American Right's imagination, and every time you agree that it exists, you are helping them perpetuate it even though that is not what you mean to do. The fact that there's a Far Right does not mean there has to be a Far Left to balance it out: I call false equivalence.
It is not "relative" at all -- the Left wing is very specifically a term that derives from modern Euro-history, and it's associated with very specific ideological and policy-based formulations. Back in the 1930's, we had a real socialist movement headed up by Eugene V. Debs, but that was only for a time, as a response to a brutal economic situation.
Eugene V. Debs....a socialist in Indiana...
ReplyDeleteThose were the days! In Terre Haute...and now you can't find a democrat there!
Thanks Dino...
Emil Seidel...mayor of Milwaukee, Wi in 1910 and our nations first socialist mayor. In fact the whole city council was socialist at the time.
ReplyDeleteVictor Berger, first socialist elected to the House of Representatives in 1910 but was not seated in the house in 1918 because of violations to the federal espionage act....
Want to know more: http://www.wisconsinhistory.org/turningpoints/tp-043/?action=more_essay
Then of course you have the Progressives in Wisconsin under Robert La Follette
TAO,
ReplyDeleteThanks in turn -- yes, I recall La Follette. Once upon a time, we had some real Euro-style lefties. Not anymore.
I think SoBe makes the key point:
"since when are we the 'far left'? We used to be the mainstream Democratic Party. Since when is ending the last president's war of choice a 'far left' position? Stopping torture?"
Right on. The mythical American Far Left is nothing more than a chimerical effect of the hard right turn this country has taken in recent times: simply being sane is now taken as an indication that one is "a member of the communist party." My plea: don't use such terms as "Left" casually. This is not a trivial point; it is vital because it involves a fundamental mischaracterization and dehistoricization of the American political scene, and in the aggregate, it's greatly helpful to conservative blatherers and extremists.
Dino...
ReplyDeleteI relate to what you and SoBe say....
We acknowledge that the republicans have turned right but yet do not want to acknowledge that the democrats have followed too...
Today RFK or George McGovern, or any mainstream democrat from the 60's would be "far left"
Good Lord, Richard Nixon would be a liberal today to a democrat!
Then we want to bemoan why we cannot get support from the "masses" and why the "masses" vote against their own self interests...
I am not sure how being nothing more than republicans with flowers in our hair is going to build brand loyalty...
10 years ago Truth could count on 50 to 75 local democratic supporters and now there are none. I was visiting with the county democratic chairman and she was angry at the lack of support for the democratic party in a county that is, very liberal with a strong union presence....her exact comment was, "...don't they see? We represent them...."
Obviously not sweetheart, obviously not!
A buddy resigned last year from the board of the local county Democratic party - he said he could not deal with the "extremes" in the party who were driving for immediate withdrawal from the middle east, pushing gay marriage, wanting to impeach Bush.
ReplyDeleteHe tried to tell them that governance comes from the middle. Rather than push a platform that alienates people and scares off votes, better to appeal to them, win the election, THEN have the power to enact what you want. But they wouldn't hear of it. He liked to say that the extremes of both parties end up becoming indistinguishable.
TAO, you seem to believe that the only relevant ideology is yours. I never called you a racist but I do think that you have a high level of ignorance when it comes to understanding anyone who doesn't fit into your predetermined dynamics of how we should perceive the world. You're rude and insensitive. You whine about your financial problems as if no one else has such problems. When I said it was all relative I was specifically reaffirming tnlib's comments about her financial issues. Loss is equally significant to people whose financial troubles involve losses of lesser amounts of money than yours.
ReplyDeleteThe black experience in America is different. We were not immigrants; the majority of our ancestors did not choose to come to this land. I'm willing to buy that slavery could have been an institution primarily motivated by economics except for the aftermath of the Emancipation Proclamation. That's when it became clear that white attitudes towards blacks were rooted in something far deeper than the economic benefits of slavery. Jim Crow laws had no other purpose except to demean and ensure that black people lived as second class citizens without the most basic of civil rights. Jim Crow lasted well into my lifetime. I don't accept that we've reached some post racial utopia because I don't see any signs of that, not yet.
My post of Reed's article and my own comments said nothing about progressives or anyone being racists. My point and Reed’s was that in constantly harping on Obama's manhood that progressives failed to recognize the realities of what it is to be a black person, particularly a black male, in a society that has emasculated black men both figuratively and literally (lynching generally also involved castration) for generations. No racism but insensitivity to the unique issues faced by the first black president.
I find that any group that has been a victim of systematic oppression tends to share some common bonds, we call that culture. I see it among Jewish people, among Haitian refugees, among the Cuban immigrant population in Florida, in the Mexican population that has grown rapidly in numbers in the south. Every culture has value. The problem in this society is that there is still a widespread assumption that the white majority culture is somehow superior and something to which the people of color should aspire. That attitude isn't limited to the right.
In addition, neither Reed nor I said that every single progressive lacked sensitivity or understanding, but you responded as if I had personally accused you of being a racist. I've known racists and I don't use the term lightly. The only person focused on the progressives being called racists was you.
The following statement is just bullshit. Common political criticism, nothing that has not been said about Presidents past, present, and most likely future. There has been nothing common about some of the criticism directed at the president. I don't consider calling the president "Bush lite" or declaring that he is a wimp or without balls is just common criticism. Declaring that he's a sellout and has betrayed progressives isn't criticism, that's an attack. Criticism of his policies, his decisions is more than valid but accusing him of being less than a man is hitting below the belt because as a black man, his experience has been different in this country. It's an affront to all black men in America. It's an affront to the black men who fought and died for this country and came home from WWI, WWII, the Korean War, and the Vietnam War facing segregation in all aspects of life from housing to education.
I'm not angry but I am tired of you TAO. I don't care for bullies. I think that you are a sad, angry man who is particularly defensive when it comes to a woman challenging what you hold to be true. I've played nice and you haven't. I'm not playing nice any more. Maybe you've never met a real black woman before, but I do bite.
dino, very briefly, I agree that the far left isn't organized like the far right, although I would argue that the far right is more smoke and mirrors than anything else. The Tea Party isn't the far right, t's just a group of confused and angry folks who fear that their place in the social hierarchy is being usurped.
ReplyDeleteI think that the far left is an extremist ideology manifested by a fringe group of bloggers and their followers who call for no efforts at compromise and want the president to make the Republicans toe the line using some as yet unidentified mythical powers. They represent insanity to me. There can be no government, no country if we truly insist on drawing lines in the sand and daring the other side to step over those lines. Like it or not, secession is not a reality and we cannot fight another civil war, that means that we have to find common ground. I consider the voices that do not want compromise, who call for the annihilation of the right are just as extremist and dangerous as their counterparts on the right. I think that it is a self serving myth that the left is all reasonable and the right is crazed.
There are some right wing blogs that spout nothing but hate; I don't hang out there. It makes about as much sense as my attending a KKK meeting. What can you expect except to be attacked. But there also some far left sites out there were there are some pretty vicious things said to anyone who doesn't walk in lockstep. My main point is that the left is not morally superior to the right. We all have issues.
The European Left doesn't play a role in contemporary american politics. It's a new century and our infatuation with socialism has faded from the days of Debs et. al.
I use the term far left to refer to a rigidity of ideology so extreme that there is no room for compromise. The people who seriously believe that there is no such thing as a good conservative. Are they organized? Not yet.
Love all these comments and will be back to respond after a little break. I just now got through responding at my own place. Anyway, here's a copy of a general comment I made this morning - or at least part of it but it might clarify a couple of things:
ReplyDelete"The only reason I brought up FDR and LBJ legislation was to illustrate to all the people comparing Obama to them and other presidents, that they 1) have a romanticized notion of history based on illusion - or delusion; 2) no president gets everything they want and they do have to "compromise" - or as the far-left refers to it, go whoring. 3) that Social Security when it first passed was nowhere near as comprehensive as it is today. I was concerned - and for good reason - that we would get into the pros and cons of every bill that has been passed. Specific pieces of legislation is/are? not the point here - only the context in which they were passed.
Frankly, I prefer a president who tries to govern for ALL the people and not for just one small group, even if that means I don't get everything I want NOW.
I wasn't happy with the term "far-left" but I wanted to separate them from Liberals, Progressives, Democrats. The far-left, imo, are extremists and have all the same characteristics as any other extremist group: denial, paranoia, rigidity, "it's all about me and what I want," projection, intolerance, etc.
This is a very good "psychological profile" of the far-left:
http://www.opednews.com/articles/The-Left-s-Unconscious-Sel-by-Peter-Michaelson-101215-951.html
. . .
I will get back asap.
Robert,
ReplyDeleteI think your friend's comment was a legitimate expression of how frustrated dealing with political neophytes can be, but I wouldn't draw it out as a philosophy. Why not? Well, because in any kind of thinking that we want to have some philosophical and critical precision, it is vital to maintain distinctions. Claiming the "the Left" and "the Right" somehow meet at an edge of the earth extreme and are "the same" wouldn't be accurate even if we were talking about the European Left and Right, which we aren't. It's surely true that if you run with Stalin's or Hitler's (or Pol Pot's, for that matter) ideology and enact it, what you get is a horrible, deadly nightmare – even so, nightmares take on different shapes, and it's important to thinking to maintain its distinctions because they are all that enables further thinking.
Sheria,
ReplyDeleteSure, understood. I'd say never mind the Tea Party -- many of the so-called mainstream Republican leaders these days seem pretty far to the right. Just look at the kinds of things they do, and what they explicitly support: they're blatantly self-contradictory irrationalists and authoritarians whose words and actions underscore their disdain for what's best about America. Just about anything you or I might label a genuine advance in civilized life, they oppose with an intensity that is at times astonishing.
As for your "ideological extremists" on the alleged Left, I still think what you're describing is a steep intensification of attitude, not a big difference in goals from mainstream liberalism. For even the rudest blogosaurus out there to be an "extremist," the qualifying factor would have to be in what said blogosaurus wants to achieve, not the obstreperousness and intolerance with which he or she advocates it.
We've probably all read a few strident individual critiques of the President on prominent liberal websites, critiques that acerbically accuse him of being a craven semi-fascist sellout for doing this, that, and the other – or for not doing this, that, and the other. Yet what even those impatient, insensitive people seem to be calling for fits rather neatly within the mainstream liberal paradigm -- stuff like "give us the public option" or "get out of Iraq" or "we ought to look into possible malfeasance committed during the Bush Administration."
None of that amounts to radicalism or political extremism -- in fact, I'd say it's only an intensification of what the majority of Democrats think, policy-wise. Our "radicals" aren't calling for the doing-away-with of capitalism or handing out drab Maoist uniforms for us all to wear.
The trouble is just that the people saying this stuff so stridently tend to be neophytes or fools who can't think five minutes in advance, so all they can do is spout angrily and shoot themselves (and every Democrat around them) in the foot. That does not amount to "an American Left." My objection to the term is that it's extremely useful for the Right to get everyone to believe there's some frightening spectral fiend called "Left-Wing Radicalism" in America waiting to gobble us all up. There isn't, so I won't say anything tending towards validation of that belief.
A General Dino-Statement: most American liberals are simply capitalists who are informed enough to know that capitalism, like all other systems devised by human beings, is not a perpetual happiness-making motion machine; it needs tending, and so does the social order allied with it. We have a little something in common with the British Laborites historically, in that regard. Many so-called conservatives, evidently, are not similarly well informed. Either that, or they just don't give a rat's bottom about the well-being of their fellow citizens. Or both -- could it be that they think any suffering that doesn't touch them personally makes them stronger, so the more of it there is, the better? Are there no workhouses? Are there no global-warming-rebutting snowbanks into which we may cast the widow and the orphan? Argggghh!
TAO: "That is a true and fair criticism of Obama...he picked those two...they are his boys....that is nothing but a fair and honest criticism..."
ReplyDeleteI'm not talking about "fair and honest criticism."
Sheria: People who fail to see the kind of vitriol from the far-left that I and most others see can only have their heads in the sand. Lordy. Maybe I just need to purge some of the blogs on my roll.
A-stone: Looks interesting. Will check it out.
Octo: Bravo. I might add paranoia, rigidity, self-absorption ("it's all about me and what I want"), projection, intolerance - to name just a few. ; )
SoBe: Greenwald has never apologized. I've caught FDL in too many lies - the same kind of thing the right wing does. Beyond that I just don't think you understand what the thesis of this article is. I don't know whether it's because you can't see the forest for the trees or because I've struck a raw nerve.
dino: I repeat:
ReplyDelete"I wasn't happy with the term "far-left" but I wanted to separate them from Liberals, Progressives, Democrats. The far-left, imo, are extremists and have all the same characteristics as any other extremist group: denial, paranoia, rigidity, "it's all about me and what I want," projection, intolerance, etc."
If someone can come up with a better term, I'll be happy to consider it - maybe. For now, I'll let it stand and if you folks want to engage in an academic exercise in semanics, go for it.
Glenn Greenwald Twittered:
ReplyDeleteI affirm my distaste for photographic leader-glorification, but I'll rescind my invocation of Leni Riefenstahl as too inflammatory & extreme
Turns out Glenn saw the error of his ways after all.
It really isn't a matter of 'semantics' at all.
Your thesis that the 'far left' is in any way shape or form remotely equal to the right in terms of online vitriol, distortion and outright lying is not illustrated very well by dragging up a single post by Glenn Greenwood (which he repudiated) and the mention of one Jane Hamsher by name only along with a handful of unattributed remarks dissing President Obama.
Not quite enough to make me hear any echo.
“See, as a black person I'm so sick and tired of white liberals who have still enjoyed the privilege of being white trying to tell a black man how to navigate in a white world.”
ReplyDeleteSheria, that is your quote. From that perspective you cannot help but interject race into everything. It is your overriding ideology and one that you demand that everyone bow to. Or as you say, “…but I do think that you have a high level of ignorance when it comes to understanding anyone who doesn't fit into your predetermined dynamics of how we should perceive the world. You're rude and insensitive...”
Like, “Can You Handle The Truth?” is polite and considerate.
Nothing like the kettle calling the pot black is it?
We have a man, who’s father was from Kenya, and who was raised by his white grandparents in Hawaii for the most part and yet you are attempting to project upon him your own history and just like you project onto whites your experiences with southern whites.
I am far from a bully, but I am not going to bow down to a way of looking at the world that I believe is holding us back. John Kerry was a decorated war veteran, a hero, and yet he was considered a wimp. Al Gore looked absolutely spineless next to George Bush, and I am sure if I surfed the web I could find all sorts of comments questioning their manhood…
The reality is that they just like Barack Obama exhibit the temperament of senators and that is why senators do not traditionally make good Presidents. Oh, but when someone questions Obama’s manhood Sheria jumps right in and plays the race card.
You will never see anything post racial, because you do not nor are you willing to see it. You want to see race in everything, and you are unwilling to acknowledge that Germans, Italians, Irish, and a host of other immigrants had to “aspire to the white majority culture” upon first arriving in this country. Which is what the new wave of immigrants, the Haitians, the Cubans, and the Mexicans are doing…that is not race but economics. Its funny that you did not mention the Asians or Indians considering they also represent a very sizeable amount of the immigration in the south; is it because they don’t prove your preconceived notions?
Of course you are tired of me…you want your white men to roll over and nod their heads in approval when you start with your tired old’ race talk. Oh, and I never ask for sympathy from anyone. I made my business decisions and I will pay the consequences of the decisions that I make. Don’t assume that I was whining just because you believe that that is all white people do….I was just stating that there are structural problems in our economic system that limit our ability to create jobs.
I can’t help but feel, after listening to you the same way about you as I do when I hear those fools in South Carolina attempt to claim that succession was about states rights not slavery. Its never going to be post racial because Sheria needs race to matter; the real issue is why Sheria needs to see race in everything to be relevant? I actually try to surround myself with people who force me to rethink my ideas but apparently Sheria loves to surround herself with people who agree with her.
Hey, it’s a big world, and us liberals love to include everybody don’t we? I do apologize for not seeing a black man when I think about Barack Obama…
tnlib,
ReplyDeletetnlib,
Yes, I saw your "I wasn't happy" remark and appreciated it. My post was not written by way of opposing you. Usually, I try to make pretty general remarks.
However, dismissing points as "semantics" and "academic" is often an unfortunate gesture. I grew up appreciating the value of accuracy in language, and while people may think what they wish, nobody is going to get any agreement from me when they start bandying about phrases like "the American Far Left" because I know we liberals have been shooting ourselves in our own hindquarters with that kind of talk for a good long while -- ever since the so-called Reagan Revolution, I'd say. As certified "damn liberals," we should know better than to suppose terminology -- especially self-descriptors -- doesn't matter. How else did Reagan's pals turn "liberal" into a dirty word? Lord a'Mighty!
A good question would be, why on earth should we try to create a whole new category for something as nebulous as (my phrasing) "strident, unreasonable bloggers who get mad at their more temperate liberal counterparts for disagreeing with them about stuff like the public option"? I don't think that deserves the honor (however dubious) of being labeled the Far Left (or any other allied term) and thereby lumped in with V.I. Lenin.
Sorry if any of this sounds mean. I think we're all in a bad mood today. Kindly don't take it personally, as there's use even in somewhat unpleasant hashings-out (otherwise known as squawking and bickering), at least amongst friends and colleagues. I'll go back to being a friendly dino now....
Arthurstone: I have been recording these labels for some time - on both sides. I deliberately chose not to provide links; in many cases I had just jotted them down as I came across them and in a few cases I didn't want to publicly embarrass blog publishers who I actually like. I just don't agree with some of their methods.
ReplyDeleteWith all due respect, nit-picking on my choice of "far-left" is just that - nit-picking. The term is only a minuscule part of the whole picture - just like all the focus on the Greenwald tid-bit. Interestingly, this is a diversionary tactic the far-right often uses to focus attention away from the subject at hand. Funny, none of you has offered up another suggestion.
Now, I'm not one to toot my own horn but I feel you have impugned my character and professionalism. I spent 40 years in academic and news libraries as a researcher and had my own research business for ten years (with clients from all over the country). I belonged to several professional organizations, wrote for one paper,and contributed to several white papers, was a columnist and have an excellent rep as a "super searcher." People have commented that if I can't find it, it probably doesn't exist - and, maybe more importantly, that I'm totally ethical. But you'll just have to take my word for it and I'm sure you wouldn't be comfortable with that.
I've been playing with this idea for some time. In the end I spent over four days doing in-depth research and trying to the best of my ability to update everything. I don't know when Greenwald apologized - it may be after I published. In any case, imo, he was was being self-serving because of the people who protested - not because what he did was wrong. btw, I have a lot of respect for Greenwald and was more than a little surprised when I read this.
Anyway, back to research, not one person has criticized me for what you perceive to be sloppy work. Quite the opposite in fact - in emails and on my own blog where I have a reputation for being fair even to those I don't necessarily agree with. You might want to visit.
Anyway, I think I hit a raw nerve with you as well.
PS: RE FDL - I had to delete an article by Jane once because it wasn't true. And that's all it takes for me.
ReplyDeleteTAO --
ReplyDeleteYou know, all I myself saw in Sheria's original post, as I recall, was a suggestion not that one should avoid criticizing Pres. Obama or anything like that, but rather that it's important for supporters not to trash the fellow rhetorically. It's true that the Righties usually go for the "crown jewels" with male politicians of whatever race (we remember harsh talk about John Kerry's windsurfing, about Michael Dukakis being, well, not very tall, about Bill Clinton supposedly "walking funny," and lots of other mean-spirited, bogus claptrap). Trouble is, while when people say all that about Kerry or Dukakis or Clinton, it doesn't fuel some crazy racist out there who has sugar-plum visions of black men hanging from trees -- "strange fruit," as the Billie Holiday song says, right? But with Obama, that's another matter. You may not see a "black man" when you look at him but you can bet your bottom dollar that racists do. This point seems straightforward to me.
There's a ready-made "put the uppity black man in his place" narrative just waiting to be exploited by the most vicious elements in modern American society. A little care in one's choice of words (and metaphors) when criticizing is therefore in order.
Remarkable! Who would have thunk a lame duck Congress would have ended with this many accomplishments: An extension of unemployment benefits, the repeal of DADT, passage of the food safety bill, and the likely passage of the START treaty. If Jane Hamsher had her way, Congressional Democrats and Republicans would be locked in mortal combat, and none of this would have happened.
ReplyDeleteThere is much to be admired in the patient and pragmatic approach – in contrast to being dogmatic and self-sabotaging. I will say this of folks who allow themselves to get angry in any debate: If you feel you must trade on anger to win an argument, then you have defaulted on any claim to win by persuasion.
Speaking of raw nerves...
ReplyDeleteCriticizing your piece is hardly 'impugning your character'. It's diagreeing with your argument. That said the reason the Greenwald quote and subsequent apology for same carry such weight for me in how I perceive your piece is that it is virtually only the direct quote you make supporting your argument. And if you choose not to provide examples of egregious far-left posts from blogs you enjoy so as not to 'embarass' one wonders why not?
Dino,
ReplyDeleteI agree wholeheartedly with your comments...but the reality is that the really crazy comments HAVE been said and they have come from the right...I mean when a LT. Colonel, a doctor in the military refuses to deploy because he is a birther...
That is an idiot.
Then to hear the crazies in South Carolina attempt to explain succession as a "states right" issue and not tied to slavery...well, to follow that stupidity you have to actually cut out whole paragraphs of the original documents. Or then you got "Dumbo" the governor of Mississippi...I go to Mississippi at least once a month and that place scares me today!
I find that a couple of comments by some left wing nutcase really isn't going to make it to those who could act upon their stupidity....my money is on Fox News stirring up a nutcase.
We have to find a way to talk about race and to talk about it differently than how we currently do, or as Sheria wants to talk about it...at some point there has to be an honest two sided conversation not a conversation that is owned by the black experience.
We have to find points of shared reference, which Sheria continuously, if maybe subconsiously, continously denies. I have spent the last 25 years talking about race and forcing people to work with each other and I have learned that quite a few times I have had to knock some heads together...
Its like when I hired a black woman to be payroll manager...I offered her the job and she accepted and then I told her, "You are black...." to which she responded, "...you can't talk about that..." and I replied, "...if you can sue me over race then by God, I can talk about it..."
I have actually found, amongst the folks that work for me that they are pretty tired of all the race baiting by Fox News....in fact, I am surprised at the number of right wing nutcases that I deal with on a daily basis who are getting tired of all the negativism on Fox News....
Ah, but what do I know....
Octy,
ReplyDeleteFunny what Congress can do when you got it packed with a bunch of folks that have just lost an election and you tell them they won't get to go home until the work is done...
Too bad we can't have lame duck sessions on an annual basis.
But with that said, if those of us on the left do not speak up, and I am not talking about lambasting Obama personally, but if we do not threaten, demand, then the shift to the right will continue...
Its politics and the squeaky wheel gets the grease....
TAO - "forcing people to work with each other ... I have learned that quite a few times I have had to knock some heads together..."
ReplyDeleteIf I were that payroll manger, knowing my boss had the power to fire me if I refused to converse on a subject and in a manner that caused me discomfort, I would regard such behavior as coercive and oppressive. It is the thing as saying, "The beatings will continue until morale improves."
Didn't catch the name of the pundit commenting earlier on NPR regarding the successes for the President in the lameduck session bit the guy opined as how it was all well and good for Obama for the time being come January & a Republican House the President 'will have a difficult time reclaiming the center after his success wirh his radical health care initiative'.
ReplyDeleteIt seems the other part of the story (beyond leftists behaving badly) is Democrats need to assume positions on many social issues to the right of Dick Nixon.
It's never, ever the right needing to wake up amd join the 21st century but far too often the Democrats feel compelled to join the Republicans/Conservatives in the 'center'.
Make that a 'center' as existed in the 19th century. The American golden age of manifest destiny and robber barons.
The good old days.
dino: tried to post a response but it died somewhere in transmition. You mistake my exhaustion and some frustration with being angry. And please do not take my comment personally - but I am going to make it short and to the point. imo, criticism of the use of the term "far-left" as it was used for the purposes of this article is petty. It has nothing to do with the point of the article. Only recently has there been any attention paid to this issue so, as I've said, I grabbed it out of thin air to distinguish this group of people from what we conceive of us liberals or progressives. Frankly, I don't really care what the far-left is called in the rest of the world and I dislike getting diverted from the issue at hand.
ReplyDeleteThe same applies to Arthurstone. With all due respect, even if I had kept a record of the links for the epithets, I would not have used them. I do remember a couple of them but they're staying with me and it really is none of your business or anyone else's as to why not. I will just say that they were found on liberal blogs in the posts or in the comments. I couldn't make up stuff like this, btw.
tnlib,
ReplyDeleteDidn't think you were angry; neither am I. Still, here's how I respond. My observations aren't "petty" unless you think expecting some precision of thought is petty. The very TITLE of your entry includes the term about which we disagree. It isn't peripheral, or you wouldn't have put it right in your title and then used it or variants thereof repeatedly, no?
As for your not caring how things are termed elsewhere, all I can do is offer up a phrase you may not like but which is accurate: "American intellectual exceptionalism."
Yes, as the phrase implies, because we're Americans, what others in the world have said or experienced regarding this or that doesn't much matter. Words mean what we say they mean. That's Humpty Dumpty talk, and it's not the sort of thing I expect to hear on this site.
Consider the Right's use of the word "socialist." The word has a long history, but they don't care; many just use it as a pejorative for anything they don't like. How is your usage of "Far Left" more defensible? Are you calling people this because you don't like them, or because it's what they actually ARE? If the former, you shouldn't do it.
The flawed nature of your usage is perhaps best revealed in this quotation: "I see many comment zones turning into war zones with the far-left resorting to personal insults when disagreeing with more pragmatic liberals who in most cases share the same ideals but not the approach." So our "far lefties" agree with our ideals and goals? Logically, doesn't that make us far-lefties, too? Welcome to the Soviet Socialist Republic of SWASHistan, comrades! I hope commie red goes well with my khaki hide. The term you've used implies strong and even radical alterity in goals, not a minor disagreement about timing or strategy. American liberals are certainly not "leftists," far or near or anywhere in between.
Here's my general point, and then I want to have done with all this: we cannot just make words mean anything we want them to mean, or wield a well-defined, historically significant descriptor and promptly declare that our use of it is immaterial to our argument. Precision in language is not a petty concern; beyond language, humanity has little in its bag of tricks aside from brute violence, so we have to at least try to get it right, even if it's frustrating at times.
Now what is the proper term for the sort of nasty blogger whom, 2-4-6-8 we never will appreciate, professional or otherwise? (I'm not aiming this at any nameable person out there because I honestly don't like calling people names.) The technically precise term is, of course, JERK. Peace out.
When Obama announced his candidacy for president, not a single headline read, "Kenyan American Announces Candidacy for President." Instead, the announcement was some variation of "black man" announces his candidacy. There were stories about the first black president when he won. In this country, Obama is black, period. Black people don't play the race card, we play the hand that we've been dealt. With the exception of Clarence Thomas and Ward Connerlly, we tend to have shared commonalities of experience, yes, Tao, I, a black southern woman, feel a connection to President Obama as a fellow black person.
ReplyDeleteA report released by Harvard this month addresses the persistence of the "one drop rule" in America, finding that, "... we still tend to see biracials not as equal members of both parent groups, but as belonging more to their minority parent group. The research appears in the Journal of Personality and Social Psychology." (http://news.harvard.edu/gazette/story/2010/12/%E2%80%98one-drop-rule%E2%80%99-persists/)
I don't know how race looks like to you, but I do know what it looks like to the less educated, lower class, marginal members of our society.
ReplyDeleteI know since NAFTA, and the great liberal promise of higher paying jobs, the individuals that lost their jobs with employers who moved off shore have had to settle for jobs that paid considerably less.
I know a plastics company in town that has slowly but surely replaced all of their white, black, and asian employees with hispanics and I know that the employees who lost their jobs really are anti immigrant now! The company replaced employees earning 15 to 20 dollars an hour with hispanics earning 8 to 9....and guess who the employees blame?
Oh, but Octy would claim that those employees are stupid and racist...and they need to be more tolerant and better educated...
Sorry, if I see liberalism as a broken promise...but when I realize, from owning a daycare that had 150 kids in it that the incidences of child abuse dramatically increase when parents suffer a job loss during a recession...well, when I see a baby with cigarette burns on their body I really don't give a shit what color the babies ass is or the statistical causes of child abuse....I want to figure out a way to improve the jobs situation and pay situation in the United States...
Hey, I am rude crude, insensitive, ignorant, brutish and whatever else you want to call me....
I want to make a difference and I am too much in a hurry to be nice....and if pissing off a bunch of liberals is what it takes to enact change then by God, I will do that too...
I found that if your existing paradigm is not creating improvement then it might be time to question your paradigm....
I do not know what race looks like to Sheria, I have no idea what race or poverty looks like to you sitting behind a desk in some governmental agency.
ReplyDeleteCan't find the comment that contains this statement but I received it in my email inbox.
TAO, I wasn't born behind a government desk. I was born in 1955. I lived in a segregated neighborhood and attended segregated schools until 1971. My father's mother supported her family by running a liquor house. My mother's parents were farmers. Like many poor farmers, particularly black southern farmers, they lost the farm in the late 1960s. The white landowner that purchased their land paid them far less than the value of the land.
Both of my parents were resourceful. Unable to find work, my dad joined the military. He rode across country to a marine base in California at the back of the bus. When my mother took us shopping there were some stores that we weren't allowed to enter at all and others whee there was a separate colored only entrance. We couldn't try on clothes; we had to buy them and there was a no return policy. No restaurants served us in the dining room but there were some that would allow us to come to the rear and place a to-go-order at the back door.
My father left the military in 1964. The emphasis was on integration. So the local police department decided to hire four black police officers; my father was one of them. They weren't allowed to drive patrol cars and their beats were all on the black side of town. They were also paid less than the white officers.
My mother took a job as a sales clerk at a local bakery that was on the black side of town; however, the new owner, a Yankee, had fired a white woman prior to hiring my mother. The phone calls started the day after mama took the job. Threats of bodily harm to my mother. She worked for a week, until one morning a white man wearing a roman collar offered my sister,, brother and me a ride to school and candy. We were Catholics and attended the Catholic school; we thought that he was a priest. We accepted the ride and the candy. The call that night described what we wore to school and warned that if my mother didn't quit the job that the next time we wouldn't be coming home. She quit. My dad didn't report the threats to the police department which he was a member of because there was pretty credible rumor that members of the police department were also members of the KKK.
My parents believed that education was the way out of poverty. My mother went to college when my brother , the youngest of us, was 14. She graduated when he was 18. All three of us went to college on scholarship. We were exemplary students. We had a good role model in Mama, the first person in her entire family to attend college. I was the first in my generation to attend a professional school.
I wouldn't change a step of my journey to this desk. I've only been here for 4 years. My first legal job was as a Legal Aid attorney; I wanted to give back to the people with whom I identified. My second job was working for a nonprofit organization on behalf of low-wealth children and access to a public education. Some folks think that I'm a pretty good lawyer and I've been offered positions that pay triple what I earn but I keep being called to be a part of the change for those who lack resources and any real voice in the system. I took my desk job because I needed steady income and benefits to support me because I wanted to be able to do more pro bono work for low wealth folks who can't afford the services of a lawyer. I'm not special. I'm just paying my debt.
Race and poverty look like me. That's where I come from and where I do my best work.