Philosophy
So, I'm wondering why Rush Limbaugh is getting so much flack for his comments about Georgetown law student Sandra Fluke. Don't get me wrong, I think he deserves it, but I'm baffled as to why he is actually getting what he deserves. He's been doing the same thing for decades and getting away with it. Indeed, the entire point of his schtick is to intentionally step over the line of decency, civility, and rationality in order to bait people to denounce him.
It's a brilliant trap. On the one hand, if you do denounce him, then it just goes to show how liberals control the media and how they will do anything to silence conservative voices. Liberals may say they believe in tolerance, but deeming unacceptable speech to be unacceptable brings howls of hypocrisy. On the other hand, if you do not denounce him, then the silence shows assent, that there is no way to argue against it and therefore it must be true. If you try to neither ignore nor denounce, but rather to rationally argue against him, then what you've done is introduce his infected invective into the public discourse, you've elevated the nonsense to the status of sense, of a legitimate point of view in the marketplace of ideas.
And it has worked for SO long. Why are we seeing the push back now? His advertisers have heard him say things just as disgusting for many years, why now are they suddenly shocked, shocked to find he is uncouth? Is it that he attacked someone who is not a public figure? Is it because Sandra Fluke is a well-educated white woman and resembles "us" rather than "them"? Is it just that she's a woman and it makes him look more like a bully? Michele Malkin stalked and publicly attacked a child and his family for advocating for public children's health insurance and she wasn't subjected to this. Yes, she should have been, but she wasn't.
Is it a function of the times? Has the larger discourse changed suddenly? Have the tea party and the anti-woman policy provisions of the Texas, Virginia,... legislatures brought us to a point where the entire movement is being eyed suspiciously for a change and Rush happened to be the lightning rod?
I guess the straw that breaks the camels back is no different from the multitude of other straws. Or is it? Why now?
- Modern Mencken
Tomorrow is Mencken day at the Enoch Pratt Library, honoring one of the great intellects of Baltimore. Who would be the modern day version of H.L. Mencken? Is there a writer who is smart, ascerbic, conservative, and wry? P.J. O'Rourke? ...
- Can You Really Own A Position?
I've been thinking about the use of the verb to own with respect to an intellectual view. When a student is being wishy-washy about a proposition he or she is arguing for and clearly believes, I'll tell the student to "own the position." ...
- Mitt Romney And Richard Grennell: Is There An Obligation To Stand Up For Your People?
The Richard Grennell flap has me thinking. Mitt Romney hired a gay conservative who worked under John Bolton in the George W. Bush administration to be his spokesperson for foreign policy matters. Grennell is open about his sexual orientation. ...
- Historians, Archaeologists, And Scientists
Are historians scientists? They frame hypotheses about the causes and effects of real events and use empirical evidence to support their accounts. But they don't do not look for regularities to make into laws; to the contrary, they account...
- Justifying Fashion
This is fashion week in New York. To be honest, I've always had an antipathy for fashion. Growing up as a nerd in an upper-middle class suburb, fashion always seemed to me to be a two-pronged evil. On the one hand, it was something...
Philosophy
Rush Limbaugh, Straw Meets Camel
So, I'm wondering why Rush Limbaugh is getting so much flack for his comments about Georgetown law student Sandra Fluke. Don't get me wrong, I think he deserves it, but I'm baffled as to why he is actually getting what he deserves. He's been doing the same thing for decades and getting away with it. Indeed, the entire point of his schtick is to intentionally step over the line of decency, civility, and rationality in order to bait people to denounce him.
It's a brilliant trap. On the one hand, if you do denounce him, then it just goes to show how liberals control the media and how they will do anything to silence conservative voices. Liberals may say they believe in tolerance, but deeming unacceptable speech to be unacceptable brings howls of hypocrisy. On the other hand, if you do not denounce him, then the silence shows assent, that there is no way to argue against it and therefore it must be true. If you try to neither ignore nor denounce, but rather to rationally argue against him, then what you've done is introduce his infected invective into the public discourse, you've elevated the nonsense to the status of sense, of a legitimate point of view in the marketplace of ideas.
And it has worked for SO long. Why are we seeing the push back now? His advertisers have heard him say things just as disgusting for many years, why now are they suddenly shocked, shocked to find he is uncouth? Is it that he attacked someone who is not a public figure? Is it because Sandra Fluke is a well-educated white woman and resembles "us" rather than "them"? Is it just that she's a woman and it makes him look more like a bully? Michele Malkin stalked and publicly attacked a child and his family for advocating for public children's health insurance and she wasn't subjected to this. Yes, she should have been, but she wasn't.
Is it a function of the times? Has the larger discourse changed suddenly? Have the tea party and the anti-woman policy provisions of the Texas, Virginia,... legislatures brought us to a point where the entire movement is being eyed suspiciously for a change and Rush happened to be the lightning rod?
I guess the straw that breaks the camels back is no different from the multitude of other straws. Or is it? Why now?
- Modern Mencken
Tomorrow is Mencken day at the Enoch Pratt Library, honoring one of the great intellects of Baltimore. Who would be the modern day version of H.L. Mencken? Is there a writer who is smart, ascerbic, conservative, and wry? P.J. O'Rourke? ...
- Can You Really Own A Position?
I've been thinking about the use of the verb to own with respect to an intellectual view. When a student is being wishy-washy about a proposition he or she is arguing for and clearly believes, I'll tell the student to "own the position." ...
- Mitt Romney And Richard Grennell: Is There An Obligation To Stand Up For Your People?
The Richard Grennell flap has me thinking. Mitt Romney hired a gay conservative who worked under John Bolton in the George W. Bush administration to be his spokesperson for foreign policy matters. Grennell is open about his sexual orientation. ...
- Historians, Archaeologists, And Scientists
Are historians scientists? They frame hypotheses about the causes and effects of real events and use empirical evidence to support their accounts. But they don't do not look for regularities to make into laws; to the contrary, they account...
- Justifying Fashion
This is fashion week in New York. To be honest, I've always had an antipathy for fashion. Growing up as a nerd in an upper-middle class suburb, fashion always seemed to me to be a two-pronged evil. On the one hand, it was something...