Verbal Assault
For those of you who haven't seen it, the increasingly controversial Lee flipped out at our good friend Sipidation yesterday, pretty much without reason. I'd planned to go to bed at eleven, but I'm instead compelled to write a bit of a response.
A few days ago I wrote that Lee's jumped the shark. I'm going to be careful not to write something too incendiary, but for some reason I feel the need to open up a discussion of Lee's recent behavior.
I've been a Christian since I was fourteen. My faith encouraged me toward conservative social values, which in turn influenced me toward conservative political and economic values. My faith made me value the institution of the American family. My faith made me value our freedoms of speech, and our freedom the keep and bear arms. My faith made me value free markets.
One thing I've learned over the last few years, particularly in my studies of philosophy, is just how deep our faith goes. Many people have faith in things without even realizing it. Everyone develops presuppositions that dictate their entire perception of the world. Whether Lee will admit it to himself or not, he's no exception. And yet, for some reason, faith in something beyond what Lee feels he can rationally consider amounts to a blind, uninformed ignorance.
I try never to shy away from a reasonable debate, whether it's theology, economics, or politics. Hell, I'll even get into a debate about why Alexander the Greek was an absolute hack compared to Julius Caesar. Why am I so confident? My rationale is two-fold. Either I'm right, and I have nothing to fear from subjecting my ideas and beliefs to scrutiny; or I'm wrong, and reasonable, critical discourse will refine my understanding of the world. The reciprocal requirement of such confidence is an objective willingness to admit when I'm wrong, or when my understanding is incomplete.
So let's review. I am a man of faith; so is Lee. I enjoy a good debate, and so does Lee. The differences? I can admit that my perception of the world relies on faith, and Lee refuses to; and when engaged in a good debate, I can acknowledge when I'm wrong.
Recently, Lee has addressed two major issues: the clash between creationism/intelligent design theory and evolution, and the issue of Terri Schiavo. The cosmological debate has been treated very simply. The rational, reasonable, factual scientists are under attack by the ignorant, cro-magnon, faith-blinded religious whackos. He's portrayed the Schiavo debate in much the same way: Democrats and libertarian (read: real) conservatives, against the religious nut job conservatives who happen to have control of the Republican party. These are nothing more than hasty, inaccurate generalizations that ignore the larger issues and oversimplify the situation. At no point, in either discussion, has he made the effort to actually listen to what his opposition has to say.
Instead of subjecting his ideas to legitimate critical review, Lee's position is becoming increasingly insulated. Instead of addressing the legitimate and reasonable challenges of others, many of whom have been valuable contributors to his site for years, he calls those who dare to disagree with him "idiots" and "shitheads" and "wilfully ignorant of scientific truth." Aside from the complete lack of tact, Lee's comments have been increasingly arrogant. This is nothing more than intellectual dishonesty, and self-imposed intellectual isolation.
Is the site all about him? Of course it is. That doesn't mean that his baseless denunciation of those who don't bow down and praise every word he says is rational, or mature, or civil.
The only debates I walk away from are those in which I know my opponent is so closed-minded that I have no chance whatsoever of convincing them of the merits of my ideas. My fellow conservatives and I have taken pleasure in the fact that we could win a debate not by yelling louder, or coming up with better insults, but by presenting a better argument. We frequently deride liberals for augmenting weak arguments with personal attacks, name-calling, and evasion of legitimate questions.
So why should we hold Lee to a lower standard?
Lee claims that the Republican party has abandoned him in favor of a far-right agenda led by a bunch of religious fanatics. As far as I'm concerned, "conservatives" like Lee are a minority, and if he's so morally weak, and so paranoid about people with religious beliefs that he'll resort to lumping skeptics of evolution in with suicide bombers, that he would make the statements he's made and behave the way he has lately, then the Republican party can easily do without him.
Does the Republican party need to be careful of becoming too dominated by lunatics like Pat Robertson and Jerry Falwell? Of course; but we haven't come to that point yet, and though the conduct of Congress and the President on the Terri Schiavo case was a disappointment, it is not the final straw in the fundamentalist conquest of American government.
I support Sip's decision to yank Lee's link from his Blog of the Week List. I'm not ready to eliminate it from my blogroll, but I've reached the point where I no longer consider Lee to be reasonable or rational in his approach to posting. If his scholarship is so poor with respect to these issues, why should I trust him on others? If he's so insecure in his ideas and beliefs that he'll cuss out anyone who doesn't handle his arguments with kid gloves, then why should I continue to respect what he has to say?
Lee is going the way of the Democrats: he's using the filibuster to win battles, at least in his own mind; in the process, though, he's losing the war without even realizing it. And that, wankers, is a real shame.
Women are killing their babies every day, and doing it legally. Unelected judges are ignoring both the law and the will of the public by "marrying" homosexuals. The American family has been under attack since the 1960's, and it's damaging our society. A demand for a return to some consistent moral values in a nation founded by devout Christians is not a symptom of religious fundamentalists taking over the Republican party and the American federal government.
If that demand loses us one so-called conservative in California, a state where one more Republican vote would scarcely matter, then it's a loss we can well afford.
A few days ago I wrote that Lee's jumped the shark. I'm going to be careful not to write something too incendiary, but for some reason I feel the need to open up a discussion of Lee's recent behavior.
I've been a Christian since I was fourteen. My faith encouraged me toward conservative social values, which in turn influenced me toward conservative political and economic values. My faith made me value the institution of the American family. My faith made me value our freedoms of speech, and our freedom the keep and bear arms. My faith made me value free markets.
One thing I've learned over the last few years, particularly in my studies of philosophy, is just how deep our faith goes. Many people have faith in things without even realizing it. Everyone develops presuppositions that dictate their entire perception of the world. Whether Lee will admit it to himself or not, he's no exception. And yet, for some reason, faith in something beyond what Lee feels he can rationally consider amounts to a blind, uninformed ignorance.
I try never to shy away from a reasonable debate, whether it's theology, economics, or politics. Hell, I'll even get into a debate about why Alexander the Greek was an absolute hack compared to Julius Caesar. Why am I so confident? My rationale is two-fold. Either I'm right, and I have nothing to fear from subjecting my ideas and beliefs to scrutiny; or I'm wrong, and reasonable, critical discourse will refine my understanding of the world. The reciprocal requirement of such confidence is an objective willingness to admit when I'm wrong, or when my understanding is incomplete.
So let's review. I am a man of faith; so is Lee. I enjoy a good debate, and so does Lee. The differences? I can admit that my perception of the world relies on faith, and Lee refuses to; and when engaged in a good debate, I can acknowledge when I'm wrong.
Recently, Lee has addressed two major issues: the clash between creationism/intelligent design theory and evolution, and the issue of Terri Schiavo. The cosmological debate has been treated very simply. The rational, reasonable, factual scientists are under attack by the ignorant, cro-magnon, faith-blinded religious whackos. He's portrayed the Schiavo debate in much the same way: Democrats and libertarian (read: real) conservatives, against the religious nut job conservatives who happen to have control of the Republican party. These are nothing more than hasty, inaccurate generalizations that ignore the larger issues and oversimplify the situation. At no point, in either discussion, has he made the effort to actually listen to what his opposition has to say.
Instead of subjecting his ideas to legitimate critical review, Lee's position is becoming increasingly insulated. Instead of addressing the legitimate and reasonable challenges of others, many of whom have been valuable contributors to his site for years, he calls those who dare to disagree with him "idiots" and "shitheads" and "wilfully ignorant of scientific truth." Aside from the complete lack of tact, Lee's comments have been increasingly arrogant. This is nothing more than intellectual dishonesty, and self-imposed intellectual isolation.
Is the site all about him? Of course it is. That doesn't mean that his baseless denunciation of those who don't bow down and praise every word he says is rational, or mature, or civil.
The only debates I walk away from are those in which I know my opponent is so closed-minded that I have no chance whatsoever of convincing them of the merits of my ideas. My fellow conservatives and I have taken pleasure in the fact that we could win a debate not by yelling louder, or coming up with better insults, but by presenting a better argument. We frequently deride liberals for augmenting weak arguments with personal attacks, name-calling, and evasion of legitimate questions.
So why should we hold Lee to a lower standard?
Lee claims that the Republican party has abandoned him in favor of a far-right agenda led by a bunch of religious fanatics. As far as I'm concerned, "conservatives" like Lee are a minority, and if he's so morally weak, and so paranoid about people with religious beliefs that he'll resort to lumping skeptics of evolution in with suicide bombers, that he would make the statements he's made and behave the way he has lately, then the Republican party can easily do without him.
Does the Republican party need to be careful of becoming too dominated by lunatics like Pat Robertson and Jerry Falwell? Of course; but we haven't come to that point yet, and though the conduct of Congress and the President on the Terri Schiavo case was a disappointment, it is not the final straw in the fundamentalist conquest of American government.
I support Sip's decision to yank Lee's link from his Blog of the Week List. I'm not ready to eliminate it from my blogroll, but I've reached the point where I no longer consider Lee to be reasonable or rational in his approach to posting. If his scholarship is so poor with respect to these issues, why should I trust him on others? If he's so insecure in his ideas and beliefs that he'll cuss out anyone who doesn't handle his arguments with kid gloves, then why should I continue to respect what he has to say?
Lee is going the way of the Democrats: he's using the filibuster to win battles, at least in his own mind; in the process, though, he's losing the war without even realizing it. And that, wankers, is a real shame.
Women are killing their babies every day, and doing it legally. Unelected judges are ignoring both the law and the will of the public by "marrying" homosexuals. The American family has been under attack since the 1960's, and it's damaging our society. A demand for a return to some consistent moral values in a nation founded by devout Christians is not a symptom of religious fundamentalists taking over the Republican party and the American federal government.
If that demand loses us one so-called conservative in California, a state where one more Republican vote would scarcely matter, then it's a loss we can well afford.
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