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Talking politics
Have we lost the art of discussing politics in polite company? According to a poll conducted by VitalSmarts, we have. The survey reveals that 77 percent of people now shy away from political discussion while 10 percent avoid it all costs.
“This is a tragedy for democracy,” says Joseph Grenny, coauthor of Crucial Conversations. “Our founding fathers believed spirited public discourse was the crucible of democratic decision-making. And here we have evidence that dialogue has all but ceased. The result is a public whose opinions are rarely tested and challenged.”
Grenny believes that people are pulling back from talking politics because they don’t feel safe broaching the subject: “These discussions quickly turn from casual conversation into personal attacks on people’s values and interests.”
But Grenny thinks it is possible to have political discussions that are both candid and respectful, and he offers a few tips:
- Look for areas of agreement. Let the other person know you share common goals, even if your preferred tactics for achieving them differ.
- Avoid personal attacks. While you don’t have to agree with the other person’s view, you can still acknowledge their view is valid, rather than “idiotic” or “evil.”
- Focus on facts and be tentative. Consider the source of your facts, and ask the other person to do the same. Ask two questions: Could the facts be biased? Could they be interpreted differently?
- Look for signs of disagreement. If the other person grows quiet or starts to become defensive, reinforce your respect and remind him or her of the broader purpose you both share.
As we head toward Election Day, the political discourse here at WorldMagBlog will no doubt get even more heated than it has been—and it’s been pretty hot. I challenge you all—no matter on which side of the political divide you fall—to take Grenny’s advice to heart and help make WMB an exception to the rule, where people with a wide range of views can feel safe and respected in candidly discussing the issues of the day.
HT: My old friend Professor B.B. Cue, who’d rather argue about how to properly cook a pork shoulder than to pontificate on politics any day.
back to top195 Comments to “Talking politics”
“no matter on which side of the political divide you fall”
There’s something funny about that use of fall.
If you’re tired of falling on one side or the other, take a principled stand and vote for me.
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Mickey, I love your optimism.
Both candidates are promising peace and prosperity. They have two different visions to get us there. That’s what we’re voting on. The rest is details.
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Interestingly, this kind of of forum lends itself to forceful, safe dicussion. I know I have occasionally said things here that I would never say to a friend or a stranger on the street.
I’m not sure that’s a bad thing.
Our truest thoughts sometimes come out when we are emotional and sometimes only then can they be perceived and perhaps even respected or understood by others. On the street such outbursts are dangerous; here they are merely disruptive.
And if one respects the informal rules of the road on a board like this, and responds to the political/philosophical/scientific/religious content of posts instead of engaging in ad hominem or generalized attacks, agreements to disagree peacefully, and even rarely to agree, can emerge.
Politics has always been rough–from what I have seen of political articles and cartoons from our past, it is not really any rougher than before. New media, however, has made the roughness slicker. We are all manipulated more easily by images, music and repetition, than by the pages of a book.
(Of course (can’t resist here) churches, particularly the Catholic church have known this, and been in the forefront of whatever communication technology prevails for 1500 years).
While no consensus on the big issues will emerge from a board like this, I do think that in the long run, the power of words and dialogue, rather than expensive manipulation, and even passion serve a useful purpose.
Am I blithering?
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There is a long list of WoW posters who need to take this advice to heart.
I’m not optimistic that any of them will, or even recognize a need to.
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“Our truest thoughts sometimes come out when we are emotional and sometimes only then can they be perceived and perhaps even respected or understood by others.”
Arcadia, I find that quite true. Not sure about the respect and understanding of others, but the articulation sometimes helps me to see what I myself really think and believe. This brings understanding and many times repentence.
That I don’t usually share because thought because of a couple–not all–of the leftist, unbelieving snipers on here.
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btw, you weren’t blithering at all Arcadia, I appreciated your thoughts.
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If anyone on WoW ever feels “unsafe” because of discussions on the threads, here’s a suggestion from my own experience that some folks might find helpful. Sometimes, when the attacks from Leavitt, Llama, Outkast and Drill get to be too much for me, I curl up in a ball on my bed and just repeat “Find a happy place. Find a a happy place” over and over.
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NT, LOL
I’ll do that when RN, SteveG, Luke and Godlumps get out of control:)
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Why does anyone take Obama seriously? In 2004 he said he wouldn’t run on a national ticket because he wouldn’t have time to gain the experience needed to be President.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4gexyfVpFMU
Does he even remember what he said from one day to the next, or is he just comfortable lying about his beliefs? Does he even have any beliefs that aren’t strictly dependent on poll numbers?
Absolutely nothing in this joker’s “career” merits the amount of hype around him or his celebrity status. He has absolutely no record of bipartisan activity, yet he wants us to think he’ll “cross the aisle” as President. Who really believes that? If Democrats believed he would compromise with Republicans, he wouldn’t have their support. He has no executive experience at all and no legistlative accomplishments in the Senate, where he merely voted “Present” almost 50% of the time.
I am just flabbergasted that this court jester has any credibility at all, never mind the goggle-eyed adoration that this gullible country follows him around with.
And as for the quality of political discourse, this blog has single-handedly helped to bring it down over the years, I think. Which is why my pastor says he never, ever reads it. It’s just a pissing contest.
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Why do people constantly post way off topic? Why is nothing ever done about it?
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Gee, Did David L. break every rule here?
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There are rules here?
I figure if Scroop Moth can all Sarah Palin a bitch and a sow with impunity, the rules are pretty much just for show.
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Night Train, your faux standards amuse me.
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They’re not my standards. They’re generally accepted rules of discourse on most blogs and forums.
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And, I imagine, you are easily amused.
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But the fact that you actually care about following rules–I just find that very cute.
You care about the enforcement of rules when people you disagree with break them.
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Actually, there are very few people I disagree with all the time. And there are no posters that I agree with all the time. If you’re going to comment on my posts, you should really pay as much attention to them as you do to FOX News. Of course, in your book, I’ve just committed blasphemy.
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That’s hilarious. I don’t even own a TV. You might try getting rid of yours. You’re pathetic.
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Rent to own, huh?
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Night Train, you can have the last word. You cheapen my life by your very existence, and reading your weak attempts to insult me are a waste of time.
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Wow, speaking of polite discourse, NT, your post #19 is really mature.
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I want the last word.
Thanks!
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top
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to
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is
This
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Those are all things Obama has just called for,
“We will respond with speed and ferocity to John McCain’s attacks and we will take the fight to him, but we will do it on the big issues that matter to the American people.”
Simultaneously Obama’s campaign released an ad ridiculing McCain for his age. So much for the moral high ground and sticking to the big issues.
The ad spot opens with a shot of the word “1982″–the year McCain was elected to Congress–followed by a montage of images from that prehistoric era: a disco ball, a cinder-block cell phone, a record player, an early PC, a Rubik’s Cube. “Things have changed in the last 26 years, but McCain hasn’t,” the announcer says. “He admits he still doesn’t know how to use a computer. Can’t send an e-mail.” Cue the clip of McCain puttering around in a golf cart with 84-year-old former president George H.W. Bush.
I would be nice to stick to the big issues that matter, rather than personal attacks. But politicians are genetically incapable of doing so.
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Nature of the beast.
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You care about the enforcement of rules when people you disagree with break them.
David L, please point out for all the readers where you took offense at Llama saying I’m possessed of an insane hatred of non-white people that will likely lead me to murder someone because of their race.
Also, please point out for all the readers where you took offense at Llama using the word “f-g” on the At The Salon thread on 9/11.
Thanks in advance.
You’re pathetic.
LMBO
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You cheapen my life by your very existence,
Nice Christian sentiments, David. Thanks for sharing.
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Part of the problem of political discourse for most people is the fact that so few take the time to study the issues and positions of the candidates, instead relying on blogs and TV newscasters to “inform” them. When my fellow carpooler starts talking about the presidential race, he regurgitates Democratic rhetoric and talking points he heard/saw on the news. He rarely comes up with a thought I have not heard elsewhere. Perhaps that is why we all turn to “personal attacks on people’s values and interests.”
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Oh, and David L- to quote the old saying: “Two wrongs don’t make a right.”
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Good points in 28, PeterL. Voters should closely watch speeches and do a little more investigation of candidates on their own. Of course, that’s easy to do here in Iowa, where we get to personally meet the candidates early on in the process, but even then the stump sppeches tend to be general.
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Debate is a contact sport, so we don’t discourage intellectual blocking and tackling within free and open encounters. But obscene, profane, or racist rhetoric—to cite only some obvious examples—shuts down debate.
The above, presumably written or approved by Olasky, sets forth the guiding rule for comments on this blog. It is based on a realistic assessment of the polemical nature of most blogs. As blogs go this is among the rather decent ones.
The reality is that this is a conservative Christian blog-site that has become infested by a passel of radical secularists including not a few unbelievers that for the most part have a corrosive and rather condescending view of evangelical and orthodox Christians. Following Rennie’s maxims with this ilk would be like Canute trying to hold the tide back. I shall continue to heartily block and tackle with an occasional sharp elbow, while strictly avoiding obscene, racist, or profane rhetoric. Note that occasionally a thread gets going sans the secularists in which there is wide, polite, and quite civil discussion.
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I shall continue to heartily block and tackle with an occasional sharp elbow, while strictly avoiding obscene, racist, or profane rhetoric.
I pledge to continue to do the same, even though the leftist spammers and God-haters do get on my nerves from time to time.
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DAVID L: I figure if Scroop Moth can all Sarah Palin a bitch and a sow with impunity, the rules are pretty much just for show.
I’ll apologize to DAVID L, to this blog, and to Palin herself when she apologizes to the president of the Alaska senate for laughing on tape as others called the woman a “bitch” and when the McCain campaign apologizes to Obama for accusing him falsely of calling Palin a pig.
Nobody need apologize for accusing me of introducing derogatory terms from outside the field of Palin’s previous discussions. Palin and her campaign have already associated her with Pit Bull, pig, and lipstick, so the engendered terms “bitch” and “sow” merely follow suit.
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Palin has never been on this blog, Scroop, so she would not have to apologize for violating the terms of this blog. You, however . . .
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Moth, Palin didn’t use the offensive term, she merely laughed when someone on her staff used the term. The lady well might have been one for all we know. As to McCain objecting to Obama’s remark that “You can’t put lipstick on a pig” after Palin’s convention address, he either did it deliberatel, as the audience certainly thought, or he unknowingly blundered into another of his typical gaffes.
At any rate, you are being disingenuous with this jesuitical justification for calling Gov. Palin a sow and a bitch. You are a poster boy for some of the rather crude characters that infest this Christian blog.
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One of the difficulties of writing, is trying to escape the echo-chamber of our own mind. It’s real easy to repeat the talking points and think, wow! that really nailed it. Amazingly, the other side looks on in disbelief.
A starting point might be to keep in mind that all of us are much more interesting than the little bit we reveal here. Along with our passions, we have our loves and cares. We have our histories (and our stories). I suspect we write because we want to be noticed, in only til you scroll down, and say, “whew, enough of that blowhard…next!”
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Scroop Moth: You wrote,
I’ll apologize to DAVID L, to this blog, and to Palin herself when she apologizes to the president of the Alaska senate for laughing on tape as others called the woman a “bitch” and when the McCain campaign apologizes to Obama for accusing him falsely of calling Palin a pig.
Why? What would you be apologizing for and how would you word it?
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Posts 10 -20 sure seem like two sides of a personality (Two-face, Batman 3) arguing between themselves.
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I just hope that what’s going on now will stop — there are kids who come here, and it would be nice if they didn’t have to be exposed to the raunchier aspects of some postings. We’re all intelligent people. We should be able to use a thesaurus and not be crass. In theory, we are adults.
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I shall continue to heartily block and tackle with an occasional sharp elbow, while strictly avoiding obscene, racist, or profane rhetoric.
I pledge to continue to do the same,
My pledge?
You’re not gonna pay a lot for this muffler.
You have my word on it!
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NJL – ADULTS? – you would think so, but in this case it appears we have a few boys who are taking their frustrations out on a blog.
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About Palin’s joke, I got a whole different picture. When a Pit-Bull bites you, it won’t let go. Pit-Bulls are so dangerous because their bite has so much more power to it than a regular dog’s bite.
Pit-Bulls are tenacious and strong, so are Hockey Moms.
Am I the only one who got that meaning?
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I agree with Victoria. Some of the leftist spammers and trolls need to just grow up. Go become a community organizer or something.
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Pit-Bulls are tenacious and strong, so are Hockey Moms.
I agree.
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Palin didn’t use the offensive term, she merely laughed when someone on her staff used the term. The lady well might have been one for all we know.
Fine point, Peter, but it’s already covered by the terms of my offer! I’ll apologize to this blog and to Palin when she apologizes to the president of the Alaska senate for laughing at (read: sharing in) the abusive language used by her staff while on Alaska pay.
Regarding lipstick on a pig, McCain must apologize for falsely claiming that Obama called Palin a pig, because nobody believes he did. Obama called standard Republican policy a pig. He was explicit about characterizing Republican government. By analogy, the mavericky candidates’ pretense to change is the lipstick. The fact that Palin said she only could be distinguished from a Pit Bull by her lipstick does not by any stretch of logic make her the subject of any future use of the political cliche, “lipstick on a pig.” But, even if Obama’s language was an allusion to Palin, if not a direct reference to her, then, by the terms of Obama’s discussion, Palin was the lipstick, not the pig. McCain could accuse Obama of pejorating himself and Palin as lipstick, but not as a pig.
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Bob Buckles, are pit bulls dogs, or not?
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PETER LEAVITT: The lady well might have been one for all we know.
As Palin may be, too, for all you know. My guess is as good as yours — maybe better.
YEAH, see #12.
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Palin may be, Scroop, but for you to call her one is a violation of the rules of this blog.
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Palin may be, Scroop, but for you to call her one is a violation of the rules of this blog.
Well, I remember Lynn Vincent writing on here a while back that calling people trolls is a violation of the rules. In fact, IIRC, she was specifically referring to you, Outkast.
But does that stop Party A & Party B from tossing around the word troll like confetti? Nah, the rules don’t mean anything to Leavitt and Outkast unless someone they disagree with is allegedly breaking them
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Referring to someone as a “troll” is not an obscenity. It’s a well-known fact that several of them have been haunting this blog of late.
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Referring to someone as a “troll” is not an obscenity.
Who said it was, Party A?
You said using a certain word was a violation of the rules. I pointed out that you love calling people trolls, which Lynn Vincent specifically warned YOU about, calling it a violation of the rules.
Who said a thing about obscenity, Party A?
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I think you are mistaken about the rules, Outkast. Making personal attacks against public officials is allowed.
I haven’t delivered a personal attack against any poster on this blog. I’ve never received a warning. But God save me from secret sin. I have been the object of personal attacks, however, and management once asked an attacker to send me an apology. Not being the most popular insect on this blog, I do expect it from time to time.
The fact that people take personally an attack on Palin is their problem.
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The conjoining of the expression “lipstick on a pig” with the “old fish wrapped in newspaper that still stinks” in Obama’s quote, in light of Palin’s recent and memorable joke about lipstick differentiating hockey moms from pit bulls and the frequent disparaging remarks about McCains’s age is unlikely to be the merest of coincidences. If it is, Obama’s speechwriters have a tin ear.
Still, the natural question is, “Why must Sara Palin apologize for the McCain campaign’s remarks or for laughing at the wrong time on a tape before Scroop Moth will do the right thing? The, “They did it first!” defense is just so mature and compelling.
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The issue with Scroop calling Palin those names was not a “personal attack,” but was against the rule of this blog which states that obscenities are not allowed.
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So what? Lynn Vincent also told you specifically that calling people trolls is a violation of the blog rules, and yet you continue to do it.
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I’ll apologize to DAVID L, to this blog, and to Palin herself when she apologizes to the president of the Alaska senate for laughing on tape
******Your behavior is not dependent on others. As a mother, I would NEVER allow your excuse for poor behavior (i.e. “Well, she did it first!)
For shame.
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#26
Night Train,
I agree that Llama goes a bit too far. I find his posts interesting, and I like him, but I don’t support much of what he says when it gets on the nasty side. It’s just that you and others get just as nasty or worse than he does. So, it sort of seems a case of “If you can’t take the heat, get out of the kitchen.”
If you started posting without the rancor then, if Llama or anyone else were to abuse you, I’m sure we’d say something. But, since you’re an abuser yourself, I think we just sit back and listen.
Still, I rarely see a “whoo hoo” to any of Llama’s less kind posts…even when we agree with his overall point.
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The reality is that this is a conservative Christian blog-site that has become infested by a passel of radical secularists including not a few unbelievers that for the most part have a corrosive and rather condescending view of evangelical and orthodox Christians.
That is a false statement. No one has “infested” this site. As the editors have made clear over the years, this site is not a “haven” for conservative Christians. All points of view are welcome as long as they follow the rules. There is no preference given to any group. That means liberals, conservatives, Republicans, Democrats, Christians and non-Christians, and any other type of people are equally welcome on this site.
There have been repeated attempts by certain individuals to “cleanse” this site of all voices except conservative Christians. That is a total violation of the rules and the spirit on which this site was established.
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Calling anyone a b—- is unacceptable. This is not language that that should be used where young people visit. You can say a lot of nasty things, but vulgar language should be, and I think is, unacceptable. You guys can do better than call Palin names like b—– or s–. It certainly doesn’t advance your “argument” and quite frankly, what it really proves is that you believe you’ve lost when you resort that sort of speech.
We have 50 days left. You can hit hard without being crass, scatalogical, or vulgar. TRS is right. And as a mere aunt, even I wouldn’t be conned by “he did it first.”
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Good point Anlir.
The header also calls this a place to discuss “Today’s News,” yet many here don’t want to discuss the news, but post call people trolls if they introduce a current news topic.
__________________________________________________________________
Today for instance we learn FactCheck.org is nailing McCain’s sleazy campaign for its many lies and distortions.
The McCain campaign’s wolf/”Fact Check” ad “drew a measured rebuke from nonpartisan FactCheck.org, which tries evaluating the veracity of campaign ads and called it ‘less than honest.’”
“With its latest ad, released Sept. 10, the McCain-Palin campaign has altered our message in a fashion we consider less than honest,” FactCheck.org writes. “The ad strives to convey the message that FactCheck.org said ‘completely false’ attacks on Gov. Sarah Palin had come from Sen. Barack Obama. We said no such thing. We have yet to dispute any claim from the Obama campaign about Palin.”
“And it was a busy day for FactCheck.org, as it also debunked the McCain campaign’s ad on Obama and “sex ed” for kindergartners. “[T]he claim is simply false, and it dates back to Alan Keyes’ failed race against Obama for an open Senate seat in 2004. Obama, contrary to the ad’s insinuation, does not support explicit sex education for kindergarteners. And the bill, which would have allowed only “age appropriate” material and a no-questions-asked opt-out policy for parents, was not his accomplishment to claim in any case, since he was not even a cosponsor — and the bill never left the state Senate.”
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I agree with Anlir. There is no “infestation.” If the only way you can make your point is by calling someone a dirty name, well, you have’t made your point.
We meet people everyday with whom we don’t agree. I don’t back down in those discussions either, but I don’t call people dirty names. I don’t ask that you like Palin or vote for her, but she’s a human being running for VP. Have some dignity.
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For the record, I have never called Palin anything but a liar.
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KIN: The conjoining of the expression . . .
Obama “conjoined” the expression “lipstick on a pig” with Republican policy, not Palin. The McCain campaign, putting words in Obama’s mouth, associated the expressions with Palin in order to cry foul.
The fact that Palin had invented the image of lipstick on a Pit Bull didn’t give her a copyright on — or change the meaning of — the proverbial saying, “lipstick on a pig.” Obama had no duty to avoid a useful figure of speech simply because listeners could free-associate it with Palin, especially when she explicitly was not the object of it.
Even if Obama’s use of the phrase was misread as an allusion to Palin, Obama would have analogized her to the lipstick not to the pig. Perhaps the McCain campaign rightly could have criticized Obama for pejorating lipstick!
But that’s not what they said. The McCain campaign has to apologize because it flatly accused Obama of calling Palin a pig. The campaign wishes Obama had called Palin a pig, but just about everyone agrees that Obama didn’t. Major Republican surrogates on tv refuse to declare they believe this, yet McCain’s campaign said it.
“They did it first!” isn’t an excuse, it’s the state of political play. The McCain campaign itself has invited this sequence of effects, and they can reverse it by apologizing for what they did to touch it off.
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Godlumps, I could have sworn I saw a post that debunked Obama’s ad and his nastiness towards McCain and the use of the computer, so FactCheck.org doesn’t seem to be catching up. It is rather pathetic of Obama to pick on something like that, and I hope it gets around why McCain can’t type. Obama should be ashamed of himself for picking on someone’s disability. He should know better. And he should apologize.
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Sorry, KEN.
OUTKAST: the rule of this blog which states that obscenities are not allowed.
“Sow” is the name of an animal and a personal attack, but it is not an obscenity.
“Bitch” may or may not be an obscenity, depending on context. The invocation of “Pit Bull” and lipstick certainly is an adequate context for use of the word “bitch.” Further, you can find dozens and dozens of uses of “bitch” by posters on Worldmagblog, often in reference to its use by the people who are the subject on discussion.
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NJL- My attorney jokes that he gets the big bucks because he is a careful reader. He’s good enough at it I pay him almost $400 an hour to read for me. I would expect you, a s lawyer, to be a more careful reader.
FactCheck: “We have yet to dispute any claim from the Obama campaign about Palin.””
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And NJL-
As FactCheck notes above, McCain is not above lying about what FactCheck says……….
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In what land and at what time did “polite company” exist?
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Polite company exists in many areas of the United States, Random.
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Further, you can find dozens and dozens of uses of “bitch” by posters on Worldmagblog, often in reference to its use by the people who are the subject on discussion.
******I’ve been on this blog a long time, and I can’t think of any except the other day.
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Anlir, no one is trying to cleanse this blog of all voices except conservative Christians. WorldMag and its blog, however, clearly is a voice for evangelical and orthodox Christianity. I enjoy the blog mainly to listen to the many serious and varied Christians who come here to express their views. In the rare threads that Christians get to air their view without the often rude distractions of religious skeptics and hard-edged secularists we are able to wide and quite civil discussions.
Your voice is essentially that of a homosexual who is interested in promoting the gay militant agenda. When Christians attempt to state their reasoned and principled objections to homosexual behavior and marriage, you often accuse them of denying people civil rights along with being crude, bigoted homophobes.
Were I a homosexual, or for that matter a dedicated liberal secularist, I would find a compatible web site and enjoy its fellowship. The last thing I would do would be to lodge on an evangelical blog and futilely tilt at windmills. As to why you people masochistically attempt this is a good question, though I suspect it has to do with the old pleasure of epater le bourgeois, especially those straight Christian ones.
I basically agree with Mickey and NJL that we need to tone down the discussion, though if you folk want to continue your habitual insults, I should have no problem battling you within the rules with plenty of blocking, tackling, and an occasional elbow throw.
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Random, “polite society” existed in America before the liberating sixties. Men used to remove their hats inside, but especially when eating. A man offered ladies and handicapped people his seat on the bus. Ladies usually wore hats when going out. Men didn’t curse in front of ladies. And children generally obeyed their parents and respected older adults.
I know most of you belong to the baby boom generation, but generally, it coarsened American culture. “It’s about ME”.
Look at some of the early movies and see the contrast.
I’m not talking about the “Leave It To Beaver” type programs where mom cooked in heels and dress clothes. And dad wore a tie around the house. That never was realistic. But people were polite.
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Random Name,
This is Polite War
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I’ve been involved in international business, social life, and local politics for many years and as a town moderator in a good sized local town in New England for nineteen years; as a rule the discussion has been civil with polite manners. Charles is right that the baby boom generation that was formed in the sixties and seventies had a lot to do with the coarsening of discussion, though there remains, as Outkast suggests, polite behavior in many parts of the country.
Moth’s defense for his patently crude language is pitiful.
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Random – 68
Where I live!
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Anyone who thinks the conversations on WoW are rude has obviously not spent a lot of time playing online poker.
The stories I could tell you…
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Not sure which poker sites you frequent, NT, but on fulltiltpoker.net there is a nice community of hobbyists who enjoy the game without being in the last bit rude. The “slotters,” in fact, don’t last long at the tables because we use intelligent conversations (and ignoring them, or “slowplaying” them when they go all-in before the flop every hand) to rid them of our presence.
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LMBO!
Fulltiltpoker.net, huh?
In other words, you’re playing with play money, not real money. Which means you’re not playing poker, you’re just goofing off. Poker played without money may be called poker, but it’s nothing like playing while risking cold, hard cash. There’s absolutely no comparison. You might as well be playing Old Maid or Go Fish.
Speaking of fish, which is what real poker players call bad players (not “slotters”), I’ll challenge you to a game of real money poker anytime, anywhere. Heads up or a ring game, it’s up to you.
Bring your checkbook.
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#75
Please give us a demonstration of how people in polite company behave.
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LMBO!
That’s absolutely hilarious!
Fulltiltpoker.net, huh?
In other words, you’re playing with play money, not real money. Which means you’re not playing poker, you’re just goofing off. Poker played without money may be called poker, but it’s nothing like playing while risking cold, hard cash. There’s absolutely no comparison. You might as well be playing Old Maid or Go Fish.
Speaking of fish, which is what real poker players call bad players (not “slotters”), I’ll challenge you to a game of real money poker anytime, anywhere. Heads up or a ring game, it’s up to you.
Bring your checkbook.
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Pardon me, my lady, may I lay my jacket down across this mud puddle so you can cross undisturbed in your lily-white dress?
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NT: You obviously don’t know as much as you think. On Fulltiltpoker a person can play with real money or play money. I “play” with both.
But not with you.
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Not on fulltiltpoker.net YOU CAN’T. Fulltiltpoker.net only has free games. To play for real money you have to be on fulltiltpoker.com.
Get your story straight, fish.
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Gambling is a sin, Outkast.
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Chapter and verse, SteveG?
NT: Sorry, I meant fulltiltpoker.com
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Republicans had called McCain a RINO (”Republican In Name Only”) for many years because of his liberal politics and willingness to compromise with Democrats. He agitated both sides and was called a Maverick for it. He even fought Palin’s Bridge.
So who is best qualified to reach across the isle? Well, no one has been more bipartisan than McCain.
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But anyway, NT and SteveG, this thread is about “talking politics,” not talking poker. What do you two think about how different those of political theories view each other these days since, say, 20 years ago?
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McCain has already proven his bipartisanship to both Democrats (who loved him for it) and Republicans (who hated him for it).
B Hussein Obama is still wearing political training pants.
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But not with you.
Of course you won’t. You’ll lose your shirt, and you know it.
Slotters? Yeah, you’re a real poker whiz.
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I enjoy the blog mainly to listen to the many serious and varied Christians who come here to express their views.
Not likely. Peter participates here to argue with liberals.
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Actually, Scroop, I remember when Peter used to post as “Solon” (back in the day, before the anti-Christians implanted themselves here). Peter would post intelligent thoughts that would challenge Christians of all theological stripes before he was distracted by the trolls and others (such as you) who exist here only to ridicule the faith of those who run this blog.
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Who cares about your faith? It’s your infuriating political allegiances that I and others ridicule.
For example, Palin lie #29:
PALIN: I was wearing a T-shirt with the Zip code of the community that was asking for that bridge.
No, Sarah, you were showing your support for the bridge by wearing a T-shirt that said, “NOWHERE,” and provided the zip code, to show the bridge went to somewhere. The photo documents your support, it doesn’t inform people of the island’s zip code.
Palin cannot take responsibility for her own statements and actions, so she tells lies.
This is what infuriates, not your beliefs.
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Since running for president, McCain’s voting record has been extremely loyal to his party. He promises more Republican orthodoxy. He will challenge Republicans on profligate spending, corruption, and issues of process, not governing philosophy.
Like all Republicans, he will finance tax cuts by borrowing disastrously.
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Outkast – 91 – I too remember the day -
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Who cares about your faith?
We do.
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Night Train: Have you ever kissed a girl?
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The taste of her cherry chapstick . . .
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Gambling is a sin, Outkast.
*******Not all Christians believe that, SteveG. In fact, I don’t believe any Catholics believe it. I don’t gamble, but I also don’t have anything against it, UNLESS it gets out of hand and is done to excess (as with many other things.)
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Greenspan did come out on the McCain tax plan, saying “I’m not in favor of financing tax cuts with borrowed money.”
That would be more of the McSame.
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Night Train: Have you ever kissed a girl?
No, I haven’t. Unfortunately, the girls around here are really stuck up. I don’t know how it is where you live, but around here, you just say hi to a girl, and they scream and close the curtains.
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“Since running for president, McCain’s voting record has been extremely loyal to his party. He promises more Republican orthodoxy.”
Good. When I vote for a Republican I expect them to act like one.
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I see that Peter Leavit and others are back on their “conservrative Chrsitain blog” argument.
Of course as stated by Lynn many times. liberals are ex[\plicitly welcomed here (I would love to have coffee with our liberal ..”.
What is interesting is that we can’t even seem to have a civil conversatoion about how to have a civil conversation.
I suggest, however that NJLawyer has a salient point here:
1) if you are reduced to calling your opponent names (rather than commenting on the opponents posted material in a reasonaed manner) then you probably have lost
I will add:
2) if you cannot pprovide independent substantiaion for your asserted facts, you are probably wrong
And in the end this will not matter.
Liberals will post here and conservatives will begrudge them the liberty.
And it becomes an interesting parlor game to see which side reverts to the use of names and invectives first.
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Now I suggest the the tenor of the conversation comes from the top: the editors of WMB set the standards and must actively encourage the following of these expectation.
Now I note that Mickey McLean has apparently specfically suggested during these discussion that evangelical Christian perspectives be granted special consideration on this blog. Mickey backed off when called on it, but his record would seem to be clear.
Is it any wonder then that, since this is apparently inconsistent with previous editors, he has opened up for rediscusion a position which had previously been depreciated.
If we want open and honest discussion, then the editors need to make an honest and and aggressive effort to ensure that their goals of open discussion are understood an encouraged.
Otherwise the blog will take its usual course.
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take it’s usual course.
I think it’s called diss-course.
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Random Name,
I suspect the blogs reflect the greater society as a whole.
It is possible for blogs to hold reasoned discussions on substantive issues with demonstrated factual data.
This requires discipline on the part of the posters, and as some WMB posters appear to have suggested in the past, this is a lot of work which detracts from the discussion.
A simple test is to observe how many posters substantiate their positions with references. Nexct check is how many of these references are factual reporting and how many are references to opinion pieces.
This makes for an interesting study and fun musing.
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What causes conflict? Pride and lies.
We can easily have civil discussion with people who esteem truth above all else, because we have the same goal. People coming from different sides of the same truth will converge as the discussion goes on because they want to move in the same direction, toward the facts.
What kills productive conversation is blind partisanship. It is a team mentality where your team is always right and the other is always wrong.
When someone here points out a fact that contradicts my own position, I have a choice: I can ignore reality and stubbornly fight for my agenda anyway, or I can back down and acknowledge the truth. The latter takes humility, but the discussion benefits and we’ve now moved closer to the truth and to each other’s position.
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I think this article presents serious problems in our society. They are our unwillingness to discuss the political issues of the day for one, but also to discuss them respectfully and cordially with those that disagree with us.
There are three factors to be discussed that have lead to the current situation. They are:
1. Our polarizing sources of information.
2. Our busy lives that help us to avoid studying on our own.
3. Our definition of what is right and what is wrong or lack thereof.
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To break this grip on society that exists, I believe we must do the following:
1. Each individual must take the time to study the candidates and the issues from a variety of sources. That means skipping a ballgame or a movie or favorite tv show to do some digging.
2. They must meet in person the people that they hear and read about or at least the people that work for them whenever possible. Too many candidates and their platforms are villified by a press that seeks to destroy those that disagree with them.
3. Call evil evil and good good and stop being cowards about saying what is right and what is wrong.
4. Stop believing that every action of those we disagree with politically is done for alterior motives to benefit the self interests of each candidate.
5. Unite through the acknowlegement that the enemy lies outside our borders more than inside our borders.
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Liberals and conservatives often have the same goals, but differ on how to accomplish them. The discussion should then be about difference in implementation.
Here are some examples of goals we have in common. I’ve generalized the solutions for brevity, which many of you might disagree with. But at least we’d be discussing the issues. (I realize it is less interesting than discussing lipstick!)
End racism. Liberal position is to impose racial mandates and dole out benefits based on the color of one’s skin. Conservative position: Just end it.
Cleaner Environment Liberal position is government imposed incentives and disincentives against corporations. Conservative position: Clean it up!
Energy Independence Liberal position is more conservation and zero emission technology (as long as you can’t see it, c.f. Kennedy and Hawaiian geothermal). Conservative position: Generate new sources of domestic energy of all kinds.
Help the poor Liberal position: Tax the rich and redistribute the wealth. Conservative position: Remove restrictions to job growth.
Help the economy Liberal position: Increase regulations. Conservative position: Decrease regulations.
National security Liberal position: Focus on America. More inspections at home. Try to make other countries like us. Conservative position: Confront the enemy.
Better Education Liberal position: Shore up the union monopoly with more money. Conservative position: Provide competition and choice.
Reduce wasteful spending Liberal position: No comment. Conservative position: Line item veto.
Reduce abortions Liberal position: Encourage kids to use condoms. Conservative position: Stop abortions.
etc
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He that is slow to anger is better than the mighty; and he that ruleth his spirit than he that taketh a city.Proverbs
The reality is that this is a conservative Christian blog-site that has become infested by a passel of radical secularists… Peter Leavitt
18. Turn not thy cheek in scorn toward folk, nor walk with pertness in the land. Lo! Allah loveth not each braggart boaster.
19. Be modest in thy bearing and subdue thy voice. Lo! the harshest of all voices is the voice of the ass. Luqman 31
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#105, #106, #107
I’m not sure the political discussions here can be straightened out and resolved as easily as a “Dragnet” show: “Just the facts, Ma’am.”
Musing, Xion, and Chalzz, I will attend to your political comments attentively to see your principles in action.
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I wish both presidential candidates would each be given an uninterrupted 30 or 60 minute segment on television to explain why their proposals are better for America than the alternatives in detail. These must not be speeches. I want charts and graphs. I want to see drawings on a white board.
Since nearly every one of Obama’s solutions will be imposed on citizens through the power of government, he should explain why more government is a good thing.
McCain should explain why less government is a good thing. McCain should also explain what he thinks about free speech, since McCain-Feingold is a direct violation of the First Amendment.
There should be full explanations of the costs and benefits of socialized medicine vs. other coverage, socialized education vs. choice, hobnobbing with our enemies vs. killing them, waiting for new forms of energy vs. better utilizing what we have.
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#111 Random. I never agreed to following my own principles! I merely state them. Following them is a whole different matter!!
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Xion
Your post above on “liberal” and “conservative” positions is just the kind of thing you criticize in previous posts. If you can see your way through to posting the actual policies of both groups without a partisan glaze on one side or the other, you might come close to that truth you were writing about earlier.
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Re: #71
Peter still doesn’t have it correct. Again, as the editors of Worldag have repeatedly made clear, this is not a site for conservative Christians only. ALL voices are welcome equally. His (and others) invitation for me and others to leave this site is a direct violation of the Worldmag rules. It’s past time for those calls to stop.
This site is on the internet and is open to the entire world. Literally anyone on the planet can sign in and make comments. People all over the world can read the comments on here. Peter’s idea that this is some kind of “closed” site that can only be accessed by conservative Christians shows a profound ignorance of how the internet operates.
**********
As for Mickey’s call for Worldmag folks to heed Grenny’s advice, I’d say it’s too little, too late. Mickey should have done that six months ago, if not back at the start of 2008. Too much water has gone under the bridge and too many folks have invested their emotional energy, hopes, dreams, and pride in one candidate or the other.
In addition, Mickey needs to look at his own (and his fellow editors) contributions to the lowering of political discourse on Worldmag. There have been repeated threads full of “red meat” for the CCR faithful, with no effort at all made to moderate the dialogue.
So I will be looking in the coming days for moderation on the part of Mickey and his fellow editors. I won’t hold my breath.
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Anlir: No one — NO ONE — here is stating that only Christians should be allowed to post on this blog. What Xion and Peter are saying (and they’re correct) is that this blog comes from an evangelical Christian perspective. Based on that fact, WoW is a Christian site that allows a multitude of other views to be presented by visitors.
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Part of the problem in discussions between Christians and non-Christians, and even some of the Christians on this blog is that when one attemts to use the Bible as a source, it is discounted by those who don’t wish to recognize Biblical authority. Makes it difficult to substantiate one’s beliefs and arguments. Still, there is good reason to be polite nevertheless.
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that should be Attempts
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I don’t question anyone’s right to post on this blog. I do question the good sense of hard-edged liberals, including homosexuals, knowing that as a conservative Christian I would consider it poor sense, judgment, and even manners to lodge on a liberal or gay blog and start harrangueng the natives about the idocy of their ways, which is standard form for most of the liberals on this blog. While Musing is subtle about his views, basically he drips of arrogance and condescension toward conservative Christians. Same with HRW.
Over the years I’ve noted that we have lost quite a few excellent Christian bloggers including Taylor, Perry, Pentamom, and Nanotech, all of whom became exceedingly frustrated with what Perry finallly, after much polite discourse, called the “leftist moonbats.”
I, also, know from some of the rare discussions that we’ve had sans the trolls that most of the Christians on this blog are capable of civil and wide-ranging discussion.
In my view, while this blog is still a fairly decent one, it has become seriously coarsened by a group of trolls whose main purpose is to deprecate and at times insult the Christian folk.
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#114 I realize my generalizations were a bit “charged”, but am I fundamentally wrong? If so, let’s hear it. See how this works?
We don’t have to use fluffy language when dealing with hard issues. Civility doesn’t mean milk-toast. We should speak directly about the subjects, just keep it non-personal.
Are you saying that Affirmative Action is not institutionalized racism? That’s fine, but that is a non-personal discussion topic that can be discussed civilly.
I just finished the book End of Oil, which outlines a position nearly identical to Obama’s for dealing with the oil crisis. It involves a system of government penalties and rewards. Are you saying this is not true?
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#110 Arcadia
“The reality is that this is a conservative Christian blog-site that has become infested by a passel of radical secularists… Peter Leavitt
18. Turn not thy cheek in scorn toward folk, nor walk with pertness in the land. Lo! Allah loveth not each braggart boaster.
19. Be modest in thy bearing and subdue thy voice. Lo! the harshest of all voices is the voice of the ass. Luqman 31″
Now I understand much about you. You are letting us know that you are not a radical secularist. Thank you for the notification.
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Part of the problem is in how we argue. Each side uses different argumentation patterns and as a result we argue past each other. Would it be possible to formalize these argumentation patterns, so that we can recognize them when we see them?
Here is a list of a few argumentation patterns I’ve noticed. Most of these patterns involve deflecting the issues instead of discussing them. We do a lot of this here at WMB. But if we truly want to have meaningful dialog, then should we not begin to recognize these patterns and avoid them?
Can you think of other patterns like these?
• Moral Equivalence: Side A makes a distinction. Side B tries to nullify the distinction by showing how each side is really the same.
• Diffusion: Provide nuanced political answers that avoid answering the question.
• Red Herring: Lead your opponent off the trail by changing the subject to a tangential issue.
• Deflection: Wear out your opponent by providing a myriad of external references (related or not) until they give up.
• Changing Perspectives: Trying to change the argument by changing one’s perspective. For example: If you want to find the enemy, look at yourself.
• Blame Shifting: Reassigning responsibilities. For example: A criminal commits a crime. The victim and society is blamed instead.
• Justification: Side A says something is evil. Side B says yeah, but they deserved it. They had it coming. The chickens came home to roost.
• Straw Man: One side sets up a false argument just to knock it down.
• Rationalization: Giving reasons why an action was taken, even if it was fundamentally wrong.
• Head in the Sand: Believing whatever you want to believe. Sticking fingers in ears and shouting “LalaLaLa”.
• Ad Hominem Attack: Rather than discuss the issue, attack the person.
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My daughter had to read Sun Tzu’s Art of War for school. So I reread it with her.
The strategies and tactics used to win battles are often used to win arguments. This is how the US court system works. It is not about truth or doing what’s right. It is about winning.
I think this is a fundamental flaw in how we argue here and in modern politics. It is not about doing what is right, but about winning. It is not “May the best man win”; it is “May our man win”. It is a team mentality, yet forgetting that we are actually on the same team.
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Xion’s right!
Which, btw, means Xion won.
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Xion, you can talk about good discussion maxims till the cows come home without confronting the real problem of this blog that has to do with serious incompatibility of world views.
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American, and to a certain extent Canadian, political discourse is characterized by a demand for certainty. In a country where the founding document makes allusions to “self-evident truths” and ship full of Puritans blessed with God’s truth, a demand for certainty is firmly rooted from the origins on. Social conservatism with its focus on morality and religion is especially prone but the left has its doctrines which are beyond doubt. Doubt, nuances etc are needed, as politics is the art of the compromise.
When our certainties are threatened by facts, opposing worldviews, and rational arguments we tend to lash back. Some may mourn the loss of several commentators who no longer participate but they made that choice. Although I’m not a mind reader, a credible hypothesis can be forwarded that people ceased to participate as their certainties became exposed or threatened. Doubt for many is a dangerous and unsettling thought crime. For some, like Peter 125, this poses a problem but it shouldn’t. Doubt enables the compromise needed in a political arena where a multitude of views are presented.
Now Peter may view me as arrogant and condescending but this is a matter of style or perception there of and not part of my argument. I believe Xion would call this deflection, red herring or ad hominium. Peter, great argumentation is possible and has occurred here but the argument needs to be attacked not the person. You’ve presented some exceptional demonstrations of argumentation but your argumentation skills suffer when your moral certainties are questioned – doubt is not an enemy but rather a prerequisite for decent discussion. Allow your certainties to be questioned — you will either compromise or through refutation of the argument strengthen your certainties.
I rarely participate in these types of discussions since I find the greatest complainers are inevitably the greatest offenders — moral equivalence becomes a circular argument. Instead of debate, role model the behavior you wish to see and continue onward.
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Well Peter, some of my close friends are my political opposites. Our best discussions have been lengthy even heated arguments over politics and religion sometimes late into the night. We pull no punches, but through it all our friendship is never threatened. We laugh about it. Occasionally we even work our way through to agreement.
Here at WMB, we do have people who only want to disrupt the conversation or make fun of backwoods Christian morons. You’re right that there is nothing we can do about that. Drive-bys are just noise.
But think about it. Even Paul said that Christianity appears as foolishness to the world. So can you blame them? If I weren’t a Christian I’d be on their side. If I did not understand the Bible and esp. the Law, I would call it a pretty bizarre book too. For those who don’t understand it is a stumbling stone. For those who do, it is offensive.
As for politics, I view that as a completely different subject wholly separate from Christianity, a City of Man / City of God kind of thing. As Christians we can debate the theology of such things, but with the unreligious all that is relevant is the politics itself.
When we talk politics I realize I am biased and unashamed, as CoyoteBlue keeps kindly and persistently reminding me. I welcome those on the left who take the time to set me straight.
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#117 touches on one of the issues where we get stuck.
Unlike Klasko, I don’t recognize “Biblical authority.”
If someone says, “Murder is wrong, because the Bible tells us not to murder,” I see no reason not to engage my homicidal impulses.
Although empathy has many flaws as a basis for a moral system, I would not like to be murdered. I can empathize that the person who irritates and offends me probably would not like to be murdered. This understanding restrains me a bit.
As an example of the problem of “facts” is that as soon as we move beyond the most obvious and verifiable cause and effect relationships, assertions are difficult to “prove.”
Capital punishment is an example. My empathy is not the only force restraining me from murdering. I am also aware that I might be caught and punished.
When this discussion arises at wmb, a) most CCRs (thought not all) believe Jesus wants them to punish murderers with death. Some people find this an odd conclusion to draw from Jesus’ teaching, but I have long ago stopped trying to decipher what is “real” Christian belief and practice. b) Many argue that capital punishment deters murder. I am dubious about this assertion (though it’s possible). In any case, just about everybody here will find the “facts” and “evidence” that supports the conclusion they already hold and discount and dismiss the “facts” and “evidence” presented by opponents.
I draw two useless conclusions from this:
1) Just about everybody who reads and posts here has already made up their mind on just about every serious issue and controversy; leaving unanswered the question I ask Why do you post?.
2) Something else is going on than the ostensible reasons many people present for posting and participating. Some have presented sensible reasons for their participation, but most of the most active and frequent posters will not or can not. I come back to the theory that the most common reason may be a feeling of grievance. Again Nick Peters strikes me as the exception that illustrates the rule. He sounds like a racist, but he may not be a racist. If you read his posts carefully, he comes across as a white person who feels discriminated against for being white.
(Nick Peters, when in the presence of black people, may be perfectly polite and civil in his interactions, though I suspect there may be a subtle subtext of resentment in his voice.)
I suspect most people here feel picked on and discriminated against in some fashion or other.
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I should add that I find Klasko to be one of the most reasonable and intelligent posters here. I didn’t want to imply because I used her post as an example, that I regard her as a “bad” example.
We just disagree on basic assumptions, but we do share some “meta-values” such as politeness.
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#128 Random – You bring up a good example.
It may sound amateurish for a Christian to use the Bible when arguing morality with those who reject the Bible. But knowing the long view in a Christian’s mind, namely eternity, what he is really saying is, “Someday you will understand that this is true”. To a non-believer it just sounds like the clanging of a tin cup.
On the other hand, we can also argue truth using reason. Whether the death penalty is a deterrent is a secondary issue.
All civilized societies uphold certain values. Otherwise there would be anarchy. Justice assigns a cost to those values. If a society values property, then a price is exacted for taking it. If a society values life then taking it has a price. Costs are assigned to fit the crimes.
Life becomes cheap in societies who do not value it. Punishing murder sets a value on life. The highest cost anyone can pay is to give his life. Therefore societies who exact the highest cost for taking life, value life the most.
All the hullabaloo about deterrents and vengeance and government sponsored murder or cruel and unusual punishment are ‘Red Herrings’. Dealing swiftly and severely with heinous crimes sets the value of life clearly.
The only difficulty for people who have relativistic value systems is distinguishing between two forms of killing: murder and justice. One is unjust and the other is by definition just.
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I don’t recognize “Biblical authority.” Well then, why have you lodged yourself on an evangelical and orthodox Christian blog, most of whose members revere Biblical authority.
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Part of the answer to “why do you post?” is I’m interested in the perspectives of people different from me who live in different parts of the world and who have had different experiences. As a Christian, I’m coming at facts from that worldview, but that doesn’t mean I don’t take other points of view into account.
Indeed, honest responses from non-Christians are interesting to me, because they help me understand why they believe what they believe. It helps me engage people I actually know in conversation with more thoughtfulness, and respect.
I’ve learned things from posters here who are not Christians, but what drives me away is the annoying trolls who torpedo discussion with inanities or insulting remarks.
I don’t usually engage them, I prefer to ignore. But a note to those who may have something of value to say–I’ll pay more attention if you don’t insult me first.
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Dealing swiftly and severely with heinous crimes sets the value of life clearly.
But does it set the value of justice high enough or is swiftness and severity of a higher?
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that should be higher value
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Thanks for the high compliment, Random.
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Peter L:eavitt post 131,
because perhaps WMB does not require us to subscribe to Bibliocal inerrance to post here?
A number of Christian posters on this blog do not accept Biblical inerrance.
Indeed, based on your own postings regarding Collins and Genesis you do not accept the strong Biblical inerrancy model of say the chicago Statement.
And so indeed many will post here who do not accept Biblical inerrance.
And to argue your position from a Biblical inerrance perspective without also arguing truth from rreason as Xion suggests would seem to imply an inability to make ones argument effectviely toany but ones own similar group of believers.
And as I have noted, Biblical inerrancy is a minority position among Christians.
Bringing us to full loo on why your suggestions about those who do not accept Biblical inerrance positng here is a flawed argument on its face.
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NOw I haveno problem with arguments based on Biblical inerrancy being posed and discussed in WMB.
But if the only argument at ones disposal is a Biblical inerrancy argument, then I suggest that one is woefully unprepared to argue in the U.S. and in the world as a whole: the majority of the U.S. and the majority of the world do not accept Biblical inerrancy.
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But if the only argument at ones disposal is a Biblical inerrancy argument, then I suggest that one is woefully unprepared to argue in the U.S. and in the world as a whole
Your suggestions mean very little to evangelical Christians, Musing, but thanks for offering them anyway!
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And as I have noted, Biblical inerrancy is a minority position among Christians.
You may have noted it, but that doesn’t make it so.
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#138: Reality means very little to evangelical Christians.
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I guess the question is, what is the purpose of the blog section of the site? Outkast, Peter Leavitt and others apparently wish it were for Christians to talk among themselves and not be bothered with challenges to their beliefs.
But if the creators of the blog wanted it to be that way, they could make it so. Clearly, the desire is for debate to take place. Outkast may take some pleasure in labeling us “trolls,” but in fact we have as much right to be here and to argue in favor of our beliefs as you do.
If the owners and moderators of the blog ever want to change that, they can do so. In fact, if I were asked to leave due to the change in the purpose of the blog as envisioned by its owners — that is, if they decided they did want it to be for conservative Christians only — I’d respect that request and go away.
Until that happens, or I do something bannable (not likely), or I lose interest … any of the above … I’m afraid I’m gonna continue to be a thorn in Outkast’s side.
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Xion, I admire your charitable stance on this issue; however, I;m afraid you don’t understand the depth of malice that many of the hard-edged secularists ubiquitously demonstrate on this blog. They are not honestly struggling with what Paul called “the foolishness of Christ;” they mainly are interested in demonstrating the foolishness of the Christians on this site. I learned a long time ago in college, as a Marine officer and as a high-level businessma, that when dealing with malicious opponents one needs to face them squarely and back them off.
The trouble is on this blog is that we have become inured to the not infrequent slurs and malicious remarks made against our persons and, more importantly, our religion. We often hear of “fundies,” believers in “magical” fairy tales, and of homophobe bigots, among other things. Yours and Rennie’s fine maxims of discussion are as straw in the face of this. There is nothing in the Christian religion that requires us to put up with this supinely.
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You’re not at all a thorn in my side. SteveG. I will continue to attempt to show the fallacy of your views, and even if I fail in that regard I will remain sure that the Lord Jesus Christ is still on the throne.
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Peter #142 At the risk of angering you, let me respectfully disagree. A charitable stance is the only stance for a Christian. Funny that ‘charitable’ comes from the word ‘charis’, meaning Grace, which sums up all of Christianity in a single word. Grace means kindness to people who don’t deserve it. It is the stance Christ took. Are we better than him?
SteveG’s comment in #140 was painful and below the belt. It hurts me deeply. But I still genuinely like the guy. SteveG and I have sparred on many occasions and I admire how he didn’t tire but respectfully fielded my many comments. He’s not a drive-by shooter. He has a world view that he defends. I respect that. SteveG reminds me of my colleague at work with whom I am joined at the hip on nearly every project. We spar incessantly, yet we have a genuine lasting friendship.
Semper Fi brother!
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#133 HRW – The swifter, the clearer. On the other hand, making a mistake is a disaster. So taking the time to get it right has value also.
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outkast post 138,
so you are by symmetry argument assertung that evangelical Christians mean very little to the world??
Are you sure you intend to say this?
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Re: #119
I do question the good sense of hard-edged liberals, including homosexuals, knowing that as a conservative Christian I would consider it poor sense, judgment, and even manners to lodge on a liberal or gay blog and start harrangueng the natives about the idocy of their ways, which is standard form for most of the liberals on this blog.</I
First of all, Peter’s entire argument is based on a fallacy that those of us who are not conservative Christians are “invaders” on the Worldmag site. Again, per the Worldmag rules, that is a completely false assumption.
Second, it is no more “poor sense, judgment, and even manners” for those who are non-conservative Christians to participate on here than it is for conservative Christians.
Thirdly, Peter’s use of the words “harangueing”, “idiocy”, “arrogance”, “condescension”, and “trolls” to describe the non-conservative Christians on Worldmag shows he has no respect or interest in observing Mickey’s request for civil dialogue on here.
Fourthly, Peter’s claim that if this website were only inhabited by conservative Christians it would be “heaven on earth” is, again, based on the fallacy that this site is intended to be reserved for conservative Christians only. Second, it’s belied by the bitter exchanges that have occurred many times between conservative Christians on here.
Finally, it would be unfair to decry the loss of those on the conservative Christians side without also decrying the loss of those who aren’t conservative Christians from this site. It is up to each person, as a free agent, to participate or not. Short of those who have been banned by the editors, everyone else stays or leaves of their own free will.
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outkast post 139,
actually outkast you have accerpted this in the past.
However, if you insist, look at the Pew survey. Tell me among the Pew survey which Christian denominations insist on Biblical inerrancy?
Note that aqs I have posted before, Catholics do not insist on strict Biblical inerrancy. Neither do many protestant denominations.
In fact you are really focusing on the evangelical denominations and they are perhaps at best 1/3 of American Christians, and may be as little as 15% of American Christians, depending on one’s defintion.
If you disagree, then what is the statistical evidenciary basis for your disagreement?
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Xion at #142: Thanks for the kind words. The respect is mutual.
For the record, my comment at #140 was directly in response to Outkasts’ proud know-nothingism expressed in #138.
People who appeal to the Bible as a source of moral direction take a respectable and time-honored course. People who apparently have no ability to argue on any basis other than “The Bible says…”, even those parts of it that are demonstrably at odds with reality, at least if the Bible is interpreted literally, show themselves to be not just uninterested in reality but actually proud of their ignorance.
Musing’s comment in #137 is correct. Outkast’s smug dismissal of it prompted my response.
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*****
The strategies and tactics used to win battles are often used to win arguments. This is how the US court system works. It is not about truth or doing what’s right. It is about winning.
I think this is a fundamental flaw in how we argue here and in modern politics. It is not about doing what is right, but about winning. It is not “May the best man win”; it is “May our man win”. It is a team mentality, yet forgetting that we are actually on the same team.
*****
Well said, Xion. I agree completely.
Peter Leavitt:
While some situations certainly warrant a “face them squarely and back them off” approach, rational discussion is not one of them. A show of force may stop a rational discussion when people realize that the guy getting red and in your face apparently doesn’t want to talk about it, but it certainly doesn’t persuade any minds.
You might say that stopping the discussion is all you want — you want to get certain posters to stop mocking your politics or faith. Problem is, the “face them squarely and back them off” approach doesn’t work over the Internet.
So if you’re interested in the discussion, really the only way to proceed is to take a charitable tone and ignore the scoffing (a strategic salvo here and there can sometimes quiet a scoffer, but it’s rare).
And I think an honest reading of the Bible flatly contradicts the idea that “there is nothing in the Christian religion that requires us to put up with [being mocked] supinely.”
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Oops! I will correct post #147 to correct the italics.
*******************************
Re: #119
I do question the good sense of hard-edged liberals, including homosexuals, knowing that as a conservative Christian I would consider it poor sense, judgment, and even manners to lodge on a liberal or gay blog and start harrangueng the natives about the idocy of their ways, which is standard form for most of the liberals on this blog.
First of all, Peter’s entire argument is based on a fallacy that those of us who are not conservative Christians are “invaders” on the Worldmag site. Again, per the Worldmag rules, that is a completely false assumption. The editors of Worldmag welcome the participation of all on an equal basis.
Second, it is no more “poor sense, judgment, and even manners” for those who are non-conservative Christians to participate on here than it is for conservative Christians.
Thirdly, Peter’s use of the words “harangueing”, “idiocy”, “arrogance”, “condescension”, and “trolls” to describe the non-conservative Christians on Worldmag shows he has no respect or interest in observing Mickey’s request for civil dialogue on here.
Fourthly, Peter’s claim that if this website were only inhabited by conservative Christians it would be “heaven on earth” is, again, based on the fallacy that this site is intended to be reserved for conservative Christians only. Second, it’s belied by the bitter exchanges that have occurred many times between conservative Christians on here.
Finally, it would be unfair to decry the loss of those on the conservative Christians side without also decrying the loss of those who aren’t conservative Christians from this site. It is up to each person, as a free agent, to participate or not. Short of those who have been banned by the editors, everyone else stays or leaves of their own free will.
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Musing: I don’t base my theology on surveys.
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#149 Thanks SteveG. You already know this, but it is important to say what we mean. If you don’t think Evangelical Christians care about reality, then by all means say so. But if not, then it doesn’t help your cause.
The reason such a statement is so painful is that I believe truth is more important than any other ideal. It is the ONLY reason I am a Christian. It is more important than religion, because a religion that is not true is meaningless (1 Cor 15:14). To say it means nothing to me cuts very deep.
I also believe that truth is the key to civility. If your worst enemy tells you the truth, well at least you can respect him. If your adversary in a debate honestly wants truth, then you both have something in common. It is something to strive for.
I get political and over the top occasionally, but I’ve got CoyoteBlue to keep me honest! Watch my back too, will ya?
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Outkast: Musing: I don’t base my theology on surveys.
And who said you did?
Musing only noted that your Biblical inerrancy position is a minority view, a statement you challenged. Musing provided statistics in support of the statement. You respond by attacking an entirely different argument that nobody has made.
Classic Outkast.
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“Musing: I don’t base my theology on surveys.”
Holy non sequitur Batman.
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So you do in fact base your theology on what others think, Lumpy? That’s what I thought . . .
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Xion, 130
Your point about capital punishment is coherent and logical. I simply question it.
First, I would not use the word “amateurish” to describe using Biblical authority. Many accept it; many do not. There is no generally accepted “truth” about this disagreement. Not many people are arguing over the “law of gravity” or the “speed of light.”
In morals and ethics, there is a lot of genocide going on, but not many of those committing it openly admit it or brag about it, an indication that they know it is wrong even though they do it.
In terms of capital punishment, I argue that it degrades and confuses a society which generally strives to protect life, to cold-bloodedly take it. In war, we are protecting ourselves against terrible threats. We have a lot of rules to discourage going to war casually. Of late, we have been blurring these lines with pre-emptive wars. The results have been controversial.
In police work, police generally use deadly force without a lot of restraints and rules and procedures. There is a difficult tension between the need to protect society and to protect the law-enforcement officers in their dangerous work, and the recognition that we allow certain representatives to be much better armed and to have greater leeway to use deadly force. This is a very difficult area. At this web site, many react to difficult ethical areas by shouting and sloganeering. (I do not include you in that group.)
When we get to capital punishment, we change from a soldier in battle under fire or a cop dealing with a dangerous and armed criminal where decisions have to be made in a split second to a situation where society coldly and deliberately kills. Doctors take part in designing the best method of killing. There are disparities in who gets killed by society. Rich people are seldom executed. Black people are more frequently executed.
The legal system goes into paroxysms of delay and appeal and questioning whether innocent people are being executed. One reaction to these problems is to proclaim, “We are too weak and sissy; execute them rapidly and decisively.” The other reaction (which I am presenting to make people uneasy) is that the difficulties in our ability to carry out capital punishment swiftly and decisively are a symptom of shaky moral ground.
One could argue that I am much too prissy in my concerns. On my list of moral concerns, capital punishment is very low. My aunt-in-law was murdered many years ago. As far as I know, no one was ever caught. If someone had been, I would have been fairly happy to see the murderer executed. That would have been vengeance. I think it is appropriate for society to take vengeance at that level out of the hands of individuals such as an affected party (in this case, me). I think the Christians here are disingenuous here in how the wrestle an instinct which strikes me as vengeful in a mantle of their religion.
However, I also use what I call the Ted Bundy test. Do I care that Ted Bundy (one of the most disgusting serial killers in our history) was executed? Not much. Even so, if it were up to me, I would not have our society use capital punishment, except I might execute anyone who gave me a hard time in regard to my ruling in this matter.
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Typing error. I meant to say “Police DON’T use deadly force without a lot of rules and procedures…”
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156 is another non sequitur
No one even suggested you base your theology on surveys, except you.
Victoria, can you come rescue him again? Please?
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outkast post 152,
I don’t base my theology on surveys either.
But that it is a minority of Christians who believe in strong Biblical inerrancy is an assertion of fact, not theology.
I provided the notes and have provided the references many times to support this assertion of fact.
I try to base my assertions of fact on data.
It would appear that you do not feel compelled to make your assertions of fact based on data.
And observationally, many time it would appear that there is indeed no data whatsover to support your assertions of fact.
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Xion
Been a few posts between then and now, but let’s just take one of your comparisons. Racism: just end it. Would you like to elaborate on how conservatives plan to do that?
Affirmative action when it started was based on the premise that education was the key. And on that score facets of it seem to have worked as we do see a larger Black middle class now than we had previously. One can argue about it as a method, and I would agree with you if you were to assert we are past needing it in its current form. Though I do agree with Obama that some kind of program like affirmative action for the poor would likely be a good thing.
On energy you hit libs for using government to provide incentives to industry. One could fire back that the conservative approach seems to consist mainly of deregulating, weakening existing environmental law and opening up new land for energy exploration when energy companies have not even developed what they have and that it is hard to see how that strategy is going to work.
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#142 Steve G – “I guess the question is, what is the purpose of the blog section of the site? Outkast, Peter Leavitt and others apparently wish it were for Christians to talk among themselves and not be bothered with challenges to their beliefs.”
Steve, I don’t mind a challenge to my beliefs when it is done with respect and manners.
What bothers me is when there is condescention and name calling and personal attacks.
Whenever you and I have talked, we have had civil discourse without all the baggage. You don’t treat me like an idiot and a simpleton just because my platform and basis for my arguments are based upon a Biblical worldview. You disagree politely. I cannot say the same for some of your fellow bloggers who are atheists, agnostics and secularists. I also cannot say the same for some of my brothers and sisters who call themselves Christains on this blog.
As for Musing’s claim that Biblical inerrancy is a minority view, it is not the minority view on this blog as was discussed some weeks ago. At least on this blog, it cannot be dismissed out of hand.
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#161 CoyoteBlue
Would you deny that Affirmative Action is racist, i.e. discrimination based on the color of someone’s skin? If the goal is to not do that, then how do we achieve that by making it law? If instead, we outlaw discrimination (as we have) and enforce it, then we achieve the goal.
Affirmative Action promotes the unqualified and thereby undermines the legitimate achievement of anyone in that group. It assumes that people in this group are in fact inferior, unable to make the grade without lowering the bar. Well, that is a patently false and destructive mindset. Minority groups are by no means inferior. The belief that they cannot succeed without a handicap is itself racist and this inferiority complex keeps many of them shackled to government handouts for generations.
Regarding energy, government must be involved in supplying the infrastructure. Incentives for alternative energy are fine too. Both candidates support these things.
What I oppose is the knee-jerk reaction on the left that every problem can be solved through taxation and increasing the size of government. Obama’s plan to ween us from foreign oil is to tax the hell out of American oil companies, which will have the side effect of damaging the economy and increasing the cost of living for everyone. Foreign oil will then be much cheaper. Guess where we will get our oil from?
He is offering us a few dollars back in income tax while simultaneously raising the cost of living by leaps and bounds. He also opposes forms of energy available to us now, though he has changed his mind recently on nuclear and even drilling. I’ll believe that when I see it. Under Obama’s plan, American companies and jobs are damaged while terrorists who want to kill us get filthy stinking rich.
As I have said many times before, we agree with liberal goals, but they nearly always accomplish precisely the opposite of the goal.
Want to get rid of racism? OK, let’s make racism law.
Want to get off of foreign oil? OK, let’s tax the hell out of domestic oil.
THIS IS INSANITY!!
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SteveG writes: “Until that happens, or I do something bannable (not likely), or I lose interest … any of the above … I’m afraid I’m gonna continue to be a thorn in Outkast’s side.”
And a source of great amusement for me, I hope!
CB writes: “Racism: just end it. Would you like to elaborate on how conservatives plan to do that?”
Well, you see, CB, racism isn’t really a political problem or issue, it’s an issue of the heart. It’s really all about respect, and we can see the respect or lack thereof in the world right here on this board — we all act both ways! Maybe if you liberals leftys could get your heads out of the sand and not see everything in terms of politics, life would be better all the way around.
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NJL,
Right, we’d all be singing Kumbayah together if it hadn’t been for Brown v. Board and those pesky civil rights laws. It’s all so obvious to me now.
Xion
Affirmative action has been race based — that doesn’t necessarily make it racist. And the perception that folks who got jobs or school because of the hand up affirmative action may have given and they are ergo inferior, really fails to examine the mediocrity of everyone else. But it does make for a great sounding talking point.
Obama’s plan on windfall taxes actually looks a bit like what Palin did. Only he would use the taxes for infrastructure improvements that the country needs. He supports clean coal, natural gas and yes nuclear. You’d probably be alot better served to actually go read the policy papers. And that gets to the nub of why conversation is difficult — no one goes to read what the candidates acutally say for themselves. Dittoheads are particularly bad about that while simultaneously accusing libs of being unthinking. It’s comic.
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Right CoyoteBlue. If discrimination and racial preferences based on the color of one’s skin isn’t racist, what is? That reminds me, I should add the following Argument Patterns to my list:
Redefinition of Terms Rather than address the issue, continually redefine terms to mean something else until your opponent grows weary and gives up.
Condescension Pretend that arguing with the rifraf is so beneath you, but you soldier on out of charity to educate the unwashed masses. Point out a few references that even you have not read and maybe they will go away.
Oh, and thanks for demonstrating the Ad Hominem pattern by calling us ignorant ditto heads. Really adds to the conversation doesn’t it?
I’ll have you know that I have read Obama’s “Blueprint for Change” several times and the only mention of the word nuclear is where he says he is going to rid the world of nuclear weapons. Of course, since he won’t be president of the world, what he really means is he will rid America of nuclear weapons. We are the enemy anyway, right?
Obama’s new position of “considering” nuclear weapons is a new politically expedient position that was not included in his original “blueprint”, nor even in the current one available now. Go read it for yourself.
In case you don’t know where to find it, try here. Glad to help. Don’t mention it.
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Thanks Xion — I’ve observed what works here in WMB land. Nice to know I’ve applied it in ways it can be understood.
If you can’t figure out why affirmative action or as some would call affirmative action and programs like it special measures is not necessarily racist, not sure what to say. But as I am being condescending perhaps you might contemplate connotation and the primary meaning of racist in the first place. Glad to help. Let me know if you need a dictionary. You’ll have to excuse me, I’ve got some latte to go sip in my limo now.
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Tata! Have your people call my people.
I think what you are trying to say is that good racism is not racism, only bad racism is racism. But you hesitate to state it in this raw form because it sounds so silly. That is why nuance is the name of the game.
Several folks here spent quite some time working me over, trying to drum in why minorities can by definition never be racist. Only white males can be racist, since they are the oppressive class.
Unfortunately it never penetrated my Neanderthal skull. So I’m still dragging my knuckles waiting for the Limo crowd and Washington jetsetters to save me. Oh wait, I forgot. No one will save me because I AM the oppressor. Therefore, I REBUKE MYSELF! Cleansing breath! Which office should I send my reparations to?
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Would it be possible to formalize these argumentation patterns, so that we can recognize them when we see them?
I like where Xion is going with his criticism of blog discourse, but he may not like where he ends up. Xion can identify all the typical arguments of rhetoric and point out the logical flaws of each, just as Aristotle did, but 2,600 years later, these tricks of speech are still alive and well. Aristotle called them enthymemes, and described about 39 of them. The reason they are with us still is not because there’s something wrong with us, but because this way of arguing is well suited to the kind of problems we address in politics — policy choices — and the ultimate method we use to solve them — persuasion. People use their habits of emotion (antipathy, sympathy, etc.) as a quick guide for judgement, and smart politicians appeal to these judgments with all the quasi-logical rhetorical strategies that succeed in getting votes but never quite satisfy the minds of people like Xion.
I suspect that Xion hasn’t come to terms with the fact that political questions are inherently non-determinable. Noboldy will ever have the last word. Everyone with an interest comes to the conversation, with or without training in disciplined methods of thought. However illogical, they get to vote their arbitrary choice.
Xion wants the blog to operate as a peer-review community that somehow accepts and rejects posts based on its defined standards of discourse. . . . does that sound a little like a hateful academia?
Rhetoric is here to stay. There are places where people research whether cutting taxes and ending Government action “frees” or handicaps the economy, such discussions are of little interest to people who don’t like government either way.
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Au contraire. I have absolutely no problem observing that there are different forms of discrimination, some of which are not harmful and serve a positive goal (being sighted when driving pops to mind pretty quickly. I think it is absolutely ok to discriminate against blind people by not allowing them to operate moving vehicles). If the issue in the 70’s was equal opportunity, then the question was how to get there. So what if the system opened the door to poor minority kids just as it did to rich legacy kids?
We’ve had the conversation on race, at lease a little bit. Look, all groups are capable of racism toward the other. And just about all groups have a hard time admiting it. Some groups have had more power with which to maintain priviledge. In and of itself that is a human thing and one that is easy to understand.
So let go of the fender and let the limo go on by. But hey, if your’re offering reparations, I’d be a fool to say no.
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#169 is a very good post.
All the techniques of logic and argumentation are of little use unless one is motivated to seek truth no matter where that nasty little creature leads you.
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You know me Scroop. I’m all for rhetoric. An enthymemes is a narrowly defined three-part deductive argument used in logic. What I have been describing are general language patterns used in argumentation.
Patterns have made their way into software architecture and derive these ideas from architectural patterns for buildings. For buildings, patterns indicate common recurring styles for archways, windows, lighting, materials. In software, it refers to common usage styles in coding like facade, strategy, visitor, singleton, etc.
Since software is a language and I do software every day and WMB too often enough, I started noticing common language patterns or styles of argument. Unfortunately, these are all used to try to win arguments, but rarely to advance knowledge. They are more like battle strategies such as feinting, deception, diversion, coercion, avoidance, blocking, confrontation, etc.
So while I absolutely love language and and rhetoric and delight in recognizing such patterns, I am hoping by recognizing these diversionary tactics we might move past them. I realize I am being overly optimistic. However, I do see that CoyoteBlue has begun to recognize these patterns too (I think). So you see, hope springs eternal!
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#170 OK, let me parrot that back. There is good discrimination and bad discrimination. Affirmative Action is good discrimination meant to provide equal opportunity.
If that were the case, then I would almost be for it (except for the racism part, but let’s skip that for now).
If you boil down the differences between liberals and conservatives it comes down to exactly what you are talking about, namely opportunity vs. outcome.
If you are truly for equal opportunity, then welcome. You are now a conservative. I’ll make you a nice little spot over here.
By equal opportunity conservatives mean a level playing field. The rules that apply to a poor kid and a wealthy kid should be identical. That does not mean they will get identical stuff. And therein lies the rub.
Liberals are all about distributing equal stuff. That is not equal opportunity. That is equal outcome. That is a redistribution of benefits based on some agenda, in this case racism. They use the strong arm of government to take stuff from one group and grant it to the other group, not based on merit, but on century old white guilt.
What you really mean by opportunity is that both kids should have the same outcome, i.e. the same job or go to the same Ivy League school. One person earns it. The other person is granted it. How is that fair?
Affirmative Action grants special benefits to people who are not even qualified based solely on the melanin content of their skin. How perverted is that? This is the means whereby we rid ourselves of judging people based on the color of their skin, by granting them stuff based on the color of their skin? Gee, that really works.
My brother is a cop in the south. He has been the most qualified person in his department for years. But he will never advance, he will never get a raise. He will never have the same opportunities as his boss who happens to fit the right demographics. Do you think that community is safer? That is raw racism imposed by the strong arm of government. Good thing we weren’t trying to get rid of racism or anything.
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Why do you consider these language exercises to be diversionary, and where do you want to get when you move beyond them?
No matter how scrupulous your language, I’m pretty sure our discussions here involve topics on which people endlessly disagree. There is no absolute truth in politics and ethics, because topics of goodness, happiness, well-being, and reputation are different for each of us (and for different tribes of us). We state these matters differently. We can and we want to. As political animals we have a duty to persuade — and to allow ourselves in turn to be persuaded. But we should not hope to get beyond rhetoric — I’m afraid that’s armageddon, not millennium.
Enthymemes sound like syllogisms, but they are used in rhetoric, not logic. They don’t rise to the level of proof, and they may be false. Enthymemes serve topics which lack universal truth for all people– topics where the syllogism would be pointless. “Moth is a corrupting insect; a prudent person will not entertain it among his finely-woven opinions.”
I still think your ideal is peer-reviewed academic discussion, not democratic rhetoric. You might be a crypto-aristocrat.
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No Xion
Affirmative action was about giving people who did not have the same opportunity a chance. A chance that’s all. Do please note I say was. I do think affirmative action was useful when it was proposed but is much less so now. I am sorry about brother. If he’s not being promoted on account of his skin color, that’s not a good. On the one hand, I do sometimes observe just how quickly folks yelped when the shoe went to the other foot. It didn’t take long.
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I realize we’re going long on this, but could you please define the word ‘opportunity’ for me. Give some examples.
Here’s what I mean. Two people are up for the same job or school or loan. One is qualified and one is not. The unqualified one gets the (blank). What word would you fill in the blank. If you say ‘opportunity’, then we’ve found where we disagree.
That opportunity is in reality a grant or outcome that is not based on merit. Both candidate did not have the same ‘opportunity’. One candidate had a better ‘opportunity’ based on his ‘classification’. Classification is pure class warfare. It is a caste system based on skin color.
Now, some people will argue that I am using a Straw Man since Affirmative Action should apply only in cases where both candidates are equally qualified. But we know this is rarely the case in practice. Quotas are widely used which are not about equal opportunity, but equal outcome.
An ‘equal opportunity’ lender is defined as non-discrimination based on race, etc. However, as the mortgage crisis shows, that is exactly what happened. People who weren’t qualified got loans. That’s what brought down some big banks today. Are we happy yet?
The ’shoe on the other foot comment’ demonstrates the pattern Justification. In other words, let’s let whites see how it feels for a while. But think about it. How what feels? Racism? Exactly. So then have we eliminated it? Apparently not.
If something is wrong for one person, should it not be wrong for all people? Is that not what we call being equal under the law?
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#174 I’m not sure I follow all that Scroop. All I am after is a mechanism whereby liberals and conservatives can move a conversation forward.
Coyote and I are doing well. You see how we kept moving forward and have narrowed the conversation down to a single word ‘opportunity’. Not bad, eh?
This is a great triumph! What is so fascinating is that I think how we define that word ‘opportunity’ is the root of so many differences between the two sides.
For example, the NH Supreme Court changed the meaning of a 200 year old law based on a new definition of the word opportunity. The law said that all children have an opportunity for good education. Centuries before it meant that children should not be denied an education. Now that Massachusetts liberals have taken over, it means that every school in the state must receive equal state funding.
So you see, we have arrived at the foundation, the root of everything that divides us. To liberals, equal opportunity means equal outcome, whether that be wealth or employment or education. To conservatives it means that the same rules apply to every one: equal under the law.
Eureka! We’ve solved one of the great mysteries of the universe. You heard it first here folks! Thank you. Thank you all very much.
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I find it ironic that Christian bloggers will be the last to call out McCain and Palin for lies that even Republicans like Rove, Romney, and Bennet criticize.
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I like to thing of affirmative action this way:
You have to runners in a race. They’re both at the same starting line, but one of them has a nice, new pair of running shoes. The other has a pair of old blown-out tennis shoes. Is it (or will it be) a fair race? Both will run to the best of their ability, but one of them will have an advantage over the other.
Affirmative action says “Give the guy with the worn-out tennis shoes a pair of running shoes just like the other guy has. Then run the race and let the best man win”.
The fact is, people tend to promote or hire folks just like them, which has historically given an unfair advantage to white people in America. If it were not for affirmative action the situation would never have changed. Many Americans (white and black) think those historical advantages have not been fully erased yet. Hopefully some day they will, and then we won’t need affirmative action any more.
The contention that everyone is on a level playing field in America just isn’t so. The unemployment rate among black people is nearly double what it is in the white community. Health care disparity exists. Education is another area.
Yes, we’ve made a lot of progress on equality, but we’ve still got a ways to go. Conservative white people may say “we’ve arrived at Nirvana” as far as equality goes, but most black folk (and many white folk) think there’s still work to be done.
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I tend to agree that “affirmative action” causes more problems than it solves.
I tend to agree that it is human nature to feel injustice much more strongly when it applies to oneself or members of one’s own group than when it affects others. I have heard white men complaining bitterly about how white men are discriminated against without the least sense of irony. There are a couple of posters at this web site …
Humans are intensely tribal creatures. Whe we were a small scattered group of hunter-gatherers, the harm was fairly limited. We never involved for or intended to be in the large aggregates of diverse groups of today.
For that matter, it was never intended (boy is that bad passive voice) for people who believe in evolution to associate with people who believe in creationism. There is so much discrimination against the latter, we may need to have affirmative action for them in educational institutions.
(Yes, I am a bad person.)
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You are using the Justification pattern Random. You are saying, “Gee look at all the white people squirm now that we are discriminating against them”. What goes around, comes around. The shoe is on the other foot. And so on …
But you see how the use of that pattern sidestepped the elephant in the room, RACIAL DISCRIMINATION!
I am trying to keep a laser focus on the subject here, but you guys are phenomenally good at using argumentation patterns to justify, sidestep, divert, dodge, perry, thrust, anything but admit that my premise is sound.
And so I ask politely, “Would any liberal in the room like to end racial discrimination?” Who is with me? Come on, people! (chirp, chirp, chirp)
If not, then with all the politeness and due respect I can muster, are you not admitting that you are racists? Call yourselves good racists if you’d like. You know, you can put lipstick on a … oh never mind.
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The discussion shows there is no “true definition” of opportunity. Conservatives and liberals can define it variously, just as they may differ about the meaning of happiness or well-being. This isn’t Eureka, it’s Anytown USA. The task citizens face is to persuade each other to accept a different definition of opportunity, or to implement it differently. Usually we resolve these differences by accepting a conservative definition for window dressing and implying a liberal policy to get what we want.
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Anlir #179. I understand. You bring up the classic case. But what is really happening here. You are enforcing a law, correct? So if you are going to enforce a law anyway, then why not enforce a non-discrimination law instead of a discrimination law?
You could just as easily fine an employer for discrimination as for non-discrimination couldn’t you? Then why not do that? What better way to end discrimination than to outlaw discrimination and enforce it?
Instead, what you are doing is looking across the track field and categorizing people based on skin color. Then you hand out new shoes to all the black athletes. It makes no difference that the white guy scraped for years to buy those shoes, the best shoes at the stadium will be the ones with the preferred skin color, the Chosen Race!
Is this not a perverted anthropological experiment gone wrong? Does it not fly in the face of Dr. MLK Jr’s dream speech. Why do you not have the same dream?!!
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#182 In order to understand one another Scroop, we must understand how we define terms. That is the basis of language and communication. This topic is about how we often fail to communicate. Definition of terms is fundamental.
Thank you BTW for bringing up one more argument pattern that is used to avoid resolving the debate: Agreeing to Disagree.
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Xion,
As you know, where the rubber meets the road, people don’t always do the right thing. For instance, my company has a strongly worded non-discrimination policy. It’s in the employee handbook and it’s hung on the “legal notice” section of the HR Dept. and it runs in their ads for new hires. But I’ve actually heard several managers who do the actual hiring say that they will never hire a black person. First they weed them out by their name (if it’s appears to be “black”). Then they weed them out by the phone interview (if they sound “black”). Finally, they weed them out by the personal interview, where they know who is black and who is white. For some strange reason, none of the black applicants are ever “qualified” for the position. As a result, I am the only manager in our company that has hired minorities, and I’ve taken some flack for it.
On the face of it, our company is complying with the law. But the whole thing is really a sham (and a shame).
While conservatives would say “that’s good enough”, we liberal say “we can do better as a nation”.
As long as there are folks in positions of authority who will not hire strictly on the basis of merit, without regard to skin color, then I think affirmative action remains necessary to counteract it.
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Although you said this many, many posts ago,
NJLawyer (#39),
“I just hope that what’s going on now will stop — there are kids who come here, and it would be nice if they didn’t have to be exposed to the raunchier aspects of some postings. We’re all intelligent people. We should be able to use a thesaurus and not be crass. In theory, we are adults.”
Kids come on here? Which ones?
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“In theory.” Good one.
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Anlir,
Did you catch my point that a non-discrimination law would be just as enforceable as a law that promotes discrimination? At your company it would be a violation either way. So why shouldn’t we as a country pursue equal rights under the law for all citizens rather than special preferences based on skin color? Is that so wrong?
That is very interesting about your company. I would really like to know what the root cause is. Is it because they are racist or ignorant or scared to death of frivolous lawsuits.
I have heard that some companies are nervous about hiring women and minorities, especially in Massachusetts where there are so many strong laws against discrimination without any definitive guidelines for proving any of it. Personal opinion or feelings are perfectly admissible.
I had to take a “sensitivity training” class that taught us that basically whatever a woman says goes. My mother used to tell me that too. If you tell a woman she looks nice, it is up to her to decide whether that is sexual harassment. Heaven help us if she’s having a bad day!
If we took that charge as seriously as it was delivered, then we would never look at, smile at or talk to women ever again. Hiring them would be just asking for trouble. Luckily, our company takes the extremely liberal approach and is full of women and minorities. We even hire Muslims from Pakistan who protest at anti-America rallies along with the rest of the kids on Boston campuses. Pretty liberal, eh?
My wife had to testify in a lawsuit defending a major Mass. employer against a sexual harassment lawsuit by a woman whom everyone knew to be lying. But it was her word against the company and she is doing quite well now. The same thing goes for minorities. The Rev. Jesse Jackson earns a very nice living through intimidation and extortion.
So have such draconian laws promoting an ethnic and gender based class system backfired? The ability to damage a corporation based on evidence as flimsy as personal feelings could easily have the opposite effect.
This is just one more piece of evidence for my theory that liberal initiatives usually accomplish precisely the opposite of what they intend. It’s OK though, because we are here to help you actually accomplish your goals.
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If you really want to get rid of affirmative action, then make the process truly blind. Assign each college or work or scholarship or whatever applicant a number and make no reference to race or gender. Don’t even put addresses on the resume, but look at each applicant’s qualifications for the job, scholarship, college entrance, whatever. Base it solely on the merits of the applicant. And then see what you end up with.
If you follow up with the references, you are not allowed to ask anything about gender or race or ethnicity, but character and work performance. The applicant presents letters of recommendation with the application, then the reference can use the person’s number.
If you have to do an interview, then do it from behind a screen and have more than one person doing the interviewing. That has the best chance of making it fair and merit based.
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Conservatives have been at the forefront of opposing laws that made discrimination illegal. It it had been left to them, we would still have signs on hotels and restaurants saying “Whites only”. If it had been left to conservatives we would still have public schools that barred black kids from attending. If it had been left to conservatives we would still have all white police forces, all white fire departments, all white governmental bodies, and all white elections. Conservatives (Democrats and Republicans) were at the forefront of preserving segregation. If it had been left to conservatives it would have been centuries before discrimination and segregation would have been overturned in this country, if at all.
Conservatives have no solution to a company like mine that won’t hire black people. Conservatives would say “Well, that’s just the way it’s always been and there is nothing we can do about it”.
The conservative bleating for a “color blind” America is a farce. They only came to that conclusion when they started losing their privileged status. And they want to ignore all the present day effects that the past racism has wrought on black people, as if segregation and racism never existed. In short, they want to lock-in (”conserve”) the remaining advantages that white people have in this country. Problem is, black people (and more than a few whites) aren’t going to let them get away with it.
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The main topics between XION and ANLIR are “discrimination” and “opportunity”, and Xion mentions them frequently without clear definitions. He suggests “discrimination” is any decision that considers race, emphatically distinguishes “opportunity” from “outcome.” XION’s thinks everyone should agree on a true definition which will govern the discussion. I doubt my post could change XION’s definition of anything, so my purpose really is to show that political disagreements are chosen, not produced by the lack of dictionaries.
DISCRIMINATION:
1.) the unjust or prejudicial treatment of different categories of people or things, esp. on the grounds of race, etc.
2.) recognition and understanding of the difference between one thing and another : the ability to discern : the ability to distinguish between different stimuli
OPPORTUNITY:
1.) a set of circumstances that makes it possible to do something
2.) a chance for admission, employment, or promotion — an occasion
OUTCOME
1.) the way something turns out
2.) a consequence
QUALIFICATION
1.) a quality
2.) an accomplishment
3.) the action which attributes eligibility for something based on qualities or accomplishments.
Regarding each term, XION prefers the second definition over the first, and this causes him to view affirmative action differently than most African Americans and liberals. Also, he doesn’t acknowledge the extent to which “qualification” is in the eye of the beholder, an attribution rather than an inherent or acquired characteristic,
For all his painstaking differentiation between opportunity and outcome, XION arbitrarily categorizes instances of the former as the latter. Admissions, hirings, and promotions are essentially opportunities, not outcomes. The benefits of graduation, pay, and title are the product of performance, not affirmative action. Affirmative action is the foot in the door, not the reward for subsequent accomplishment.
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#190 Anlir, Your argument goes something like this,
We need reverse racism because conservatives are evil and racist and mostly white.
Setting aside that hypothetical reconstructionism, tell me what you want NOW. Is racial discrimination good for America? Is redistribution of wealth based on skin color good for America?
Please answer the question. If you were honest you would simply say YES and stand by it.
Why is it so hard for liberals to just say what they mean? It’s your agenda, your ideology. Why not own up to it? What’s so hard about that?
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Scroop,
Dictionary definitions are helpful. But what is more important in a debate is the ideas we are discussing.
One side defines ‘equal opportunity’ as removing obstacles to competition. The other side defines it as simply handing you the championship trophy.
Affirmative Action is more than a foot in the door. It is the door and the whole house. The housing crisis is partially based on giving out NINJA loans, i.e. free money for people with No Income, Ho Job, No Assets as long as you are classified as a minority. This is a redistribution of wealth based not on merit but on skin color.
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I believe Justice Clarence Thomas (in his memoir) said that Affirmative Action did not help him, as he would have had to try harder to get into college or something.
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Xion, I was trying to make the point that dictionary definitions are not helpful. “Opportunity” for example has alternate meanings which lead you and me in opposite directions. We cannot appeal to a single controlling definition to compel agreement.
Is your discussion of loans an example of deflection or changing perspectives? Loans aren’t the place where affirmative action has inflamed resentments. I think you’ve shifted away from the topics of admission, hiring, and promotion because you can figure out how legitimate, alternate definitions of your favorite words can make affirmative action seem so much more attractive. Unfortunately, I haven’t thought about loans, which probably fit the criterion for a benefit or reward far more closely than an opportunity. A loan is an opportunity to prove yourself, but one that gives you an asset before you perform, and thus is a benefit. On the other hand, admission, hiring, and promotion, are opportunities, not benefits (according to my definition). You can flunk or fail and lose your place to someone else.
Dictionaries don’t settle our disputes, they “cause” our disputes. Look at those definitions again. By selecting different meanings, you can use your change your argument. Discrimination isn’t making decisions regarding race, it’s unjust treatment. Qualifications aren’t attributes that make you more entitled than someone “less” qualified to an opportunity, they are very subjective determinations that may tell more about the person making an evaluation than the person who is subjected to the evaluation. Opportunities aren’t just a place on the starting line, but the coaching, training, nutrition and psychology that make competition real.
I’m smarter than the police chief in my town, I think, and probably would score higher on all sorts of written exams. If not, there are certainly others in my town who would. Does that mean we’re more qualified to be the chief, or that we’re entitled to his job if we want it?
Unfortunately, I didn’t have any Obamas at the selective schools I attended, but my daughter, nieces and nephews, and goddaughter do. Some of them got higher SAT scores than some of the students at Harvard (which said no to them) but they all enjoyed the diversity of the elites school they’ve attended and wouldn’t have stopped affirmative action in order to get into Harvard.
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