RSS Feed MenuI occasionally write for Andrew Breitbart’s website, and agree with him that the media blasting him for inaccuracy (and the Tea Party for racism) while steadily ignoring the New Black Panther Party or similar organizations is frustrating and silly. However, two wrongs don’t make a right, and “he started it” is a miserable justification for something. Yes, the Left engages in perpetual victim-mongering and yes, they sling charges of “racism” at their opponents while ignoring it on their own side.
But didn’t Breitbart notice how much those practices contributed to their banishment from American politics? Didn’t he notice how Bill Clinton calling out Sister Souljah for being a hypocrite contributed to his success, or how Obama deliberately sold himself as a non-angry, non-paranoid non-Al Sharpton when he was running (whatever he’s become now)? And if Breitbart did notice these things, just what gave him the idea that mimicking this practice was a good, or a conservative, idea, when it was already being marginalized? I recognize the need to go on offense sometimes, but that doesn’t have to mean slinging exactly the same charge at your opponent. Hypocrisy is the live question in areas of Leftist racism, and burying it under the tired former charge is not the best approach.
Besides chilling free discussion of controversial ideas almost to a freezing point on both Right and Left, this practice validates the falsehood that racism/sexism are central to the American experience, and American discourse generally. This would, in turn, lead many Americans to conclude that being openly racist is no big deal, given that there will always be some media establishment somewhere that will defend you, if you only hold the right political affiliation. The net result? Less of an incentive to avoid racism, and voila, racial hypocrisy is legitimized.
Don’t get me wrong – hypocrisy is ugly, no matter who does it, but racism as a charge should be returned to its rightful home in the abyss of Leftist irrelevance and ethnic studies departments. Breitbart may survive, but racism as an ad hominem should not.
busboy33 // Jul 22, 2010 at 7:48 pm
@bamboozer:
Then I guess you don’t watch Fox News. According to them, the NBPP is a bigger story than the oil spill.
Oskar // Jul 22, 2010 at 8:04 pm
busboy33, what would you call it when people are taken to task for having opinions?
Cashmoney // Jul 22, 2010 at 8:27 pm
Oskar,
I don’t know but it wasn’t a bunch of German social theorists.
I promise, Oskar, if you spend an afternoon reading their stuff, you’ll see it has nothing to do with anything that concerns us here.
Cashmoney // Jul 22, 2010 at 8:27 pm
Oskar,
I take people to task all the time for their opinions. Don’t you?
easton // Jul 22, 2010 at 8:33 pm
cashmoney, right, my mouth dropped when I read that. Having opinions, of course, is not the issue, it is the sheer idiocy of the issues that people take Oskar to task for. “thought control” “duopoly”
“tiny martians invading our brains” etc. (Ok, i made the last one up, but I would not be too surprised if he said “see, someone else knows it too”)
busboy33 // Jul 22, 2010 at 8:58 pm
“what would you call it when people are taken to task for having opinions?”
Well, I call it a discussion, but I’m a hippie.
I guess it depends on what you call “taking to task”. Do people beat you into agreeing with them? Or are people pointing out that you’re out-of-your-god-damn-mind? There IS a difference.
Oskar // Jul 22, 2010 at 10:26 pm
busboy22, how does forcing people into sensitivity training a discussion? How are speech codes a discussion? Obviously you are a god-damned hypocrite. As to hippies, George Meany of the AFL-CIO said it best years ago: A hippie is Jack that looks like a Jill and smells like a john.
busboy33 // Jul 23, 2010 at 12:03 am
busboy22?
Really?
I suppose it is a step up from “StinkyFace McStupid”, so kudos to you.
Seriously though, either you’re new at this troll job or you need some medical help. I understand you disagree and that’s fine, but when you finally go postal I want to be able to say “I did warn him”.
Oskar // Jul 23, 2010 at 8:53 am
busboy33, sorry for the typo. Oh and thanks oh so very much for condescending to poor little me and oh so graciously granting that I might be allowed to disagree with you.
busboy33 // Jul 23, 2010 at 2:00 pm
Knock yourself out Oskar. I stopped believing anything you type right after the “I’m for eugenics and Socialism” comment.
Like I said before, you’re either the worst troll I’ve ever seen on the intertubes (worst in talent, not in intensity), or seriously mentally ill. I’m not going to engage with you, because I have a “don’t feed the trolls” policy and I get the impression that you’re not actually as crazy as you act.
I’ll read your next comment, so you can have the last word and feel all special, but no more replies from me. You are a waste of electricity.
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