The Bunny Pulpit

Morality vs. Privilege--Part I

2007-05-10T23:48:00.000-04:00

There's a reason conservatives can't get through to black America, and it's the same reason black America can't catch up to the rest of us. In the name of leftist groupthink, we have seen morality replaced with priviledge, supplanting individual accountability and initiative with standards that depend entirely either on what other people have done to you or how much you identify yourself with the oppressed. Both those who are "saved" by leftist policies and those who do the "saving" by implementing them receive a fundamental satisfaction from this altered ethic. It's about far more than how much we should tax the rich.

The left often criticizes the right for policies they themselves implement selectively. This demonstrates that they don't fundamentally disagree with the effectiveness of the policies in question, they just want them applied differently.

For example, the left often complains that traditional law enforcement methods, namely putting criminals behind bars for a very long time, are simplistic. We need to focus our efforts on addressing the root causes of crime, eliminating poverty and racism, and rehabilitating criminals. Long jail terms don't work as a deterrent.

But, if you attack somebody because of their race or sexual orientation, we need to lock you up indefinitely, because although longer jail terms won't deter the average mugger or gangland murderer, they will somehow prevent hate crimes. Either they believe that harsher sentences actually deter criminals, or they don't and have decided to grandstand. (Perhaps they just care about feelings.)

They often criticize American society for being too judgemental, but when Don Imus or Michael Richards make an ass of themselves it's perfectly appropriate to shame them mercilessly. I could live with this as a societal standard, if they could.

But yesterday, a regular on guest of Opie and Anthony joked about raping Condoleezza Rice, having rough sex with Laura Bush, and the supposed ugliness of Queen Elizabeth II (h/t Captain Ed). If Al Sharpton is asked about this, he will undoubtedly say that he thinks they went over the top, but I doubt he'll launch a crusade to silence them.

I can't read into the minds of our Civil Rights leaders, but I can't help but notice a double standard of sorts. Don Imus is white. Charlie, the guest who joked about "that George Bush bitch," is black (or at the very least he certainly speaks fluent ebonics--I admit I haven't seen a picture). Castigating Imus is of the utmost importance to maintain societal decorum. Castigating Charlie makes sense only if a talk show host calls you on it.

When a genuine hate crime receives publicity, the left spends comparatively little time analyzing the mindset of the perpetrator but instead demonstrates no hesitancy whatsoever to throwing the bastard in jail where he belongs. They quite appropriately subject the Ku Klux Klan and other like-minded groups to ostracism and ridicule. When they truly want something stopped, they become quite conservative in their approach.

This leads me to believe that deep down many of them know we're right about what works, they just want things to work differently. Implementing "an array of taxes" would be a great way to discourage fossil fuel usage, but taxing capital gains has a negligible effect on investment (h/t Jeff Goldstein in an incredible post--in the same article we see the author decry the need for proof before we act against global warming--I wonder if he felt the same way about Iraq's WMD's).

Although much of the left-right debate is over tactics, i.e. how to reduce poverty, maintain security, etc., the real debate is over our fundamental societal vision, for when the left wants something done, it will adopt the policies it decried several minutes ago in a heartbeat. Calling Iran, Iraq, and North Korea the "Axis of Evil" was counterproductive, but calling Bush a Nazi fosters dialogue (or something like that).

This leads me to believe that as much as they want to save us all from themselves, something else is more important. Indeed, the prioritization of motivation is near the heart of the left-right divide, but something else matters more.

I suspect that much of this is a twisted mix of self-congratulation and nihilsim. Whichever it is, it depends entirely on the morality of hierarchy.

UPDATE: Here's the full text of the Opie and Anthony conversation in question. If you found "nappy-headed hos" offensive, you might not want to listen.

On Throwing Bombs

2007-05-07T18:22:00.000-04:00

No, I'm not yet at the point of advocating any sort of armed domestic upraising--I'm metaphorically referring to harsh language.

Before I return to topics of substance, I'd like to respond to commenter myofacial release who recently stated, "Good blog though, rare for a conservative to reach out to people instead of creatively insult people." Not to deflect one of the only compliments I've received here on this blog, but I'm not alone. Neo-neocon and Ed Morrissey are two others who spring to mind off the top of my head.

However, the only reason I've refrained thus far from launching verbal assaults is that I've not yet had the need. "[C]reatively insult[ing] people" is a necessary rhetorical tool, although it's one most pundits of all persuasions use too often.

The purpose of this blog is to examine how to reach out to people, most especially those who've either not put much thought into politics but pull the lever for the Democrats out of habit, or those who vote that way because they sincerely believe that Democratic policies will benefit the country. I believe that those who are sincerely mistaken can be persuaded, unlike those who have made leftism an intrinsic part of their identity, most of whom will always disagree no matter what we say or do.

I've spent a great deal of time trolling around websites like The Daily Kos, and I've come to the conclusion that the most effective ways that the left has refuted our points by is distorting or ignoring them. I've also engaged in many debates on comment-boards, in chatrooms, via email, and in person, and rarely have I encountered a proud leftist who deals directly with the actual points I'm making. I've observed the mainstream media simply not report on much of what we have to say.

This has led me to the conclusion that the most effective way for us to persuade the apathetic and sincere lefties is to spread our actual message--if there were effective refutations to what we have to say I would have heard them by now.

This entails several types of persuasion, all of which require that we not allow the opposition to either evade or distort out message.

Those who sincerely disagree ought to be engaged in honest discussion. I consider leftism to be a Lie, but like all effective lies, it's based on certain truths (the poor have an unfair shake at things, healthcare is too expensive, peace is preferable to war, etc.). We need to discover the truths behind their erroneous beliefs, emphasize our agreement with the truths in question, and then elaborate on how leftism will make the problems they (correctly) identify worsen. Yes, minimum wage fails to support a family of four, but no, raising it won't help the poor but will instead increase unemployment.

But we don't always get the chance to do that. If we're up against a representative of the AFL-CIO on Hannity & Colmes, we will likely face an opponent who has no interest whatsoever in exploring Truth but instead has every reason to beat you. In such a case, you can't let him, and that may very well mean "creatively insult[ing]" him. (Understanding why he has supporters can be a great way to make yourself more effective at this, which is why I advocate trolling around on the leftward side of the blogoshpere.) I never engage in a discussion hoping to make somebody look like an ass, but if my opponent insists that one of us looks like a moron, it sure as hell won't be me--any third parties watching are unlikely to find themselves convinced by someone who's just been humiliated.

That said, there's another use for harsh language--the confident affirmation of one's own views. Exposure to the left, which can be quite hard to avoid, can get rather exasperating. After a while, it all starts to sound like this, and it feels good to make fun of it. Even though I'm no great fan of Ann Coulter, it's hilarious watching her castrate Colmes--it feels great to see one of them get what's coming to him. I'm not particularly proud of this, but I am part human.

The danger comes when we replace what feels good for what works. By and large, the conservative movement is full of bomb-throwing pundits (Coulter, Hannity, O'Reiley) and mealy-mouthed politicians and political parties that allow themselves to be routinely mocked while trying to "build bridges" with opponents who have no intention of letting them.

Both groups are one-trick ponies. I have no reason to suspect that Ann Coulter could engage a sincerely mistaken lefty in honest discourse (I've seen O'Reiley try but he's awful at it). No matter what Harry Reid says about Bush, Bush replies rather meekly.

We need to get softer and to toughen up. I've already begun describing how I think this should be done, and I will continue to elaborate as this blog progresses. In the meantime, I can lead by example. Thus far my only critic has been in sincere disagreement, and I've responded in kind. Someday, I'll have an earnest troll, at which point you can see how I think he/she should be disposed of.

And as far as an opponent who's actually right about something...Frankly, I doubt this will ever happen, but if it does, I must keep my future reaction secret so as to keep y'all coming back.

Me me me me me me me And You you you you you you you you

2007-05-06T00:44:00.000-04:00

Earlier, I elaborated on some of the root causes of the us-versus-them mentality (which I will now refer to as UVTM) of black America and described why it needs to be overcome. However, I failed to distinguish between the destructive UVTM that haunts the black community and healthier forms needed to replace it.

I suppose it would be nice if we all consistently saw everybody else are part of One Human Family, and in certain respects we both should and do, but I find it entirely unrealistic to expect people not to do so ever. A commenter cited examples of how we do it on the right (O'Reiley's hits on the "secular progressives"), and he's aboslutely correct--we do it all the time. However, there's a fundamental difference between how the left and right categorize, and it's one that must be recognized, for it's a substantial stumbling block keeping the "oppressed" from getting out of life what they should.

Black UVTM stems from the white UVTM of the old South. Whites largely stood by each other and allowed race and class to trump justice far more often than they should have. Blacks therefore came to view institutions like the legal system and business as tools of oppression instead of institutions of achievement, economic development, and justice.

However, as understandable as the causes may be, we're left with people seemingly categorizing themselves according to race. When confronted with this accusation, the left cites the shared experiences of minorities and tells us that there are things that all of them have endured that the rest of us have not, that it's not ultimately about race, it's simply more comfortable to spend one's time with those who've suffered what you have. Again, this is understandable.

Nevertheless, I would argue that this is a reactive form of self-categorization, for that which leads us to wish to sit together in the cafeteria is not what we've accomplished, what we stand for, or what we wish to become, but instead what was done to us. Even if it's not based on skin-color like the right alledges, it's still ultimately letting them categorize you. After all, aren't you excluding yourself because they excluded you first?

The ultimate danger of such groupthink is that it trains us to think reactively. Even if the upper classes view the son of a plumber as little more than the son of a plumber, to become class-conscious, the plumber's son must agree with the upper-classman's fundamental assessment of him. He would undoubtedly disagree with a rich snot's belief that being a plumber's son indicates any inherent inferiority, but he still bases his fundamental self-image on things over which he has no contol, namely, that his background is what really matters. (Likewise, a spoiled rich kid who thinks of himself as superior because of his powerful dad plays the same game and limits himself accordingly--albeit with different consequences. Modern white supremacists merge the groupthink of race-superiority with class-consciousness to allow themselves the status of perpetural "victim-superiors"--but they and the rich snot are for another post)

However, in a free-market society such as ours, social class is fluid, for we can always transcend our socioeconomic backgrounds. The son of a plumber may become president of a bank (yes, I know it's an uphill struggle, but it happens a lot), the daughter of a coal miner can sell millions of records. In regards to whites, the left's categorization of us is transient (if we don't buy into Lennon/Lenin's view of things).

But you can't make yourself un-black, not even if you're Michael Jackson. You can break through nearly every chain set before you, you can straighten your hair and listen to heavy metal, but your skin will still be darker than that of most of your countrymen. If you've bought into leftist groupthink based on class, you can change external circumstances enough to unbox yourself. If you've bought into leftist groupthink based on race, you're stuck, forever, no matter what you do.

Such emphasis on the external has had a devastatingly powerful effect on the black community. "You will always be one of us, for the white man sees you differently than he sees himself."

How white people, rich people, the cool kids, or whoever they may be matters; it would be foolish to assert otherwise. However, one of the fundamental differences between the right and the left is that we believe that under most circumstances, what they do to you matters less than what you do about it.

Again, I don't deny that injustice exists, I just believe that after we've established relative equality under the law that we need to shift our focus to individual initiative. The quest for cosmic justice emphasizes the external, conflating that which should be with what is. Individual initiative emphasizes the need for individual accomplishment within the actual parameters of the here and now, not necessarily waiting for them to get it right before one makes something of oneself.

I know that civil rights leaders sometimes discuss the latter, but they held Don Imus (the establishment, the underlying environment of hostility, the white man, etc.) to a far higher standard than they hold Snoop Dogg, an individual member of the black community with a considerable amount of influence over young people. They may complain about rap lyrics, but I've yet to see any prominent boycotts. I know that in one of my college linguistic books (Chaika's Language: The Social Mirror), black misogyny was explained away and blamed on the oppressors.

The UVTM of black American initially mirrored an UVTM of justice, for blacks were universally and unquestionably oppressed. Even if a black stole something, it could very plausibly be argued that he had so many strikes against him that he deserved shielding from the police. Since then, much progress has been made, but UVTM still defends the likes of OJ Simpson and gang members who terrorisze their own communities.

I remember seeing a Chris Rock stand-up routine in which he lamented that black people were too happy about the OJ Simpson verdict (this may or may not be true, but I was out of the country at the time so I'll have to take his word for it). However, he later said that if Jerry Seinfeld or another white celebrity suffered the same fate that white America would have acted the same way.

Pace Mr. Rock, he was dead wrong about this. I believe that Mr. Rock, like many blacks, thinks we're more race-conscious than we are. Very few of us (fortunately) retain a race-based UVTM. For the most part we have adopted an UVTM based on values. (Yes, lefties, I recognize that we whites don't have to look at the world through the prism of race because we've created the prism and all, but keep in mind that it was whites around the country who saw other whites treating blacks like crap on their televisions and decided to help the blacks they saw as heroes do something about it, thus "turning against our own" for the sake of "social justice.")

I think Rosa Parks was a hero and Ted Bundy was a thug--any me-versus-you going through my mind has much more to do with what somebody stands for and does about it than menalin content or the need to protect "my people." I think both Joshua Lawrence Chamberain and the Tuskegee Airmen were greater men that I will ever be (in large part because I'm a rabbits [sic]). I consider "my people" to be those I respect and admire, and "they" are those I don't.

Not to place myself on a pedastal here, but when most of us of all races look at things this way we'll be much better off. Yes, I know that most black people hate the thugs that make their lives hell, but (and I've seen this happen firsthand) if a white person criticizes the same lowlifes, many blacks start defending the lowlifes. I've watched public access cable shows that white people never watch and seen the black hosts and black callers rip "urban values" to shreds. I've seen those same hosts later tell whites that they have no right to criticize anybody, that we have no right to judge. Race groupthink trumps values groupthink, meaning values groupthink can't ever win, for there's always a white person around somewhere to inspire the need to circle the wagons.

From here I could go into how leftist UVTM ultimately rejects values, the way leftist UVTM inspires a class of annointed who feel like they're doing the right thing and don't notice the harm they do, or perhaps the two groups of semi-heroes who are inches away from being the very types of people who could inspire "oppressed" America to accept and live the American dream, but I haven't decided. Feel free to make a request.

The Eggman Cracks

2007-05-03T01:31:00.000-04:00

Although I told you all that I was about to explain how we could get through to black heroes in my next post, I realized that I don't know how to do that yet. There's obviously more to it than going up to a black guy who's made a great life out of nothing and saying, "You epitomize Republican values and should therefore join us!" I'm not saying this approach won't ever work, but I doubt it will very often.

Not only do I think we need to explore the left's view of heroism in a bit more depth before we can proceed, I also know that I failed to cite specific examples of the leftist take on heroism. In order to help me rectify this, Green Day has just released their own version of John Lennon's "Working-Class Hero." I have had the fortune of hearing the new rendition of this "classic" on the radio twice today and found it disturbingly illuminating.

I realize that neither John Lennon nor Green Day are in heavy rotation on many urban radio stations, but what I see in this song is an attempt to get working-class white America to look at the world like most blacks do already. It also does so within the context of heroism, a concept I've already described as essential to the recovery of black America (and frankly, the rest of America, too). I'm sure that many lefties perceive this song as an homage to the poor guy who's never had much of a shot at life. I see it as an ugly attempt to degrade humanity far worse than anything by Nine Inch Nails or AC/DC (and I'm holding neither Lennon nor Green Day responsible for the typos).

As soon as your [sic] born they make you feel small,
By giving you no time instead of it all,
Till [sic] the pain is so big you feel nothing at all,
A working class [sic] hero is something to be,
A working class [sic] hero is something to be.

The first lines of the song refer to an unnamed, amorphous, villainous "they" out to get you. Immediately, the victim in the song is described in terms of us-vs.-them, and the motives of whoever "they" might be are nothing short of pure malice. The setting of the song is one of futile struggle against an undefinable enemy, not unlike the pointless lives of poor black kids hopelessly struggling against a system thoroughly poisoned by the racism of the White Power Structure.

Not only that, they potty-train you and teach you how to speak when they should be letting you have all your time to yourself.

This comes right before a call to be a "hero."

They hurt you at home and they hit you at school,
They hate you if you're clever and they despise a fool,
Till [sic] you're so fucking crazy you can't follow their rules,
A working class [sic] hero is something to be,
A working class [sic] hero is something to be.

Yet more exemplification of a can-do attitude! Not only are working-class kids the only ones who suffer such injustices, studies show that anyone who has ever been "hurt...at home" has no chance whatsoever to make anything of themselves, ever. And even if they don't actually hit you at school in the literal sense (I have no idea of the state of corporal punishment in British schools when Lennon wrote this song, but I know for damn sure it's not allowed in America around the time of the Green Day version), you're undoubtedly a victim of metaphoric violence, which smarts even more considering what you're going through with Mum and/or Dad. "They" are probably driving you "crazy" intentionally so they can keep you out of the way. You have everything stacked against you, even more than India's untouchables. If you're smart you'll just present a threat to "their" power, and if you're dumb it will only prove that they're right to look down on you. So be a hero.

When they've tortured and scared [sic-it's sung "scarred"] you for twenty odd years,
Then they expect you to pick a career,
When you can't really function you're so full of fear,
A working class [sic] hero is something to be,
A working class [sic] hero is something to be.

If the childhood of a typical working-class kid is replete with "torture," no wonder these folks go ballistic over Guantanamo. Not only that, you're supposed to get a job?! Anyone looking for the "root causes" of the mentality that causes endemic poverty in Harlem or Soho need look no further. Those tough-looking dudes you see who obviously spend a lot of time at the gym aren't academically disinclined, violent, or sexually irresponsible, they're just "full of fear." Emphasize with the deep insecurities that manifest themselves as the overwhelming need to violently impress the neighbors. Perhaps you should enhance their deflated self-esteem by prostrating your wallet before them as well.

By the way, you're supposed to be a hero, even though John's making it seem damn near impossible to even fill out an application at Burger King, much less make it through the interview with all that "hurt" and "fear" floating around in the back of your mind.

Keep you doped with religion and sex and TV,
And you think you're so clever and classless and free,
But you're still fucking peasants as far as I can see,
A working class [sic] hero is something to be,
A working class [sic] hero is something to be.

Here the powerful description of lament segues into Marxist terminology, telling the poor "fucking peasants" that they can't be "free" because they still consider themselves "classless." Some might even argue that this passage reflects condescension towards the poor, but we know that John Lennon and Green Day care way too much to ever consider such a thing--John must have been showing the "peasants" what other rich people think of them.

By the way, be a hero! But how? It's all so hopeless!

There's room at the top they are telling you still,
But first you must learn how to smile as you kill,
If you want to be like the folks on the hill,
A working class [sic] hero is something to be,
A working class [sic] hero is something to be.

Unfortunately, some of the "peasants" listening to this song might still think it's possible to succeed--they might have heard of, or maybe even actually know a fellow "peasant" who is has become one of those "folks on the hill." Not to worry, just assure them that getting a good job is to "learn how to smile as you kill." If despair can't get them, maybe guilt will. Furthermore, for those who've already bought into the bit about how impossible it all is, this gives them even more reason to hate those who have exploited them by creating their televisions.

So where do we go from here? We've been made "to feel small" by being given "no time," felt "pain so big" we've become numb, "hurt," "hit," either "hate[d]" or "despise[d]," driven "so fucking crazy" we can't make sense of it anymore, "tortured," "scarred," been expected to find a job even though we're "so full of fear," and "doped with religion and sex on TV." You may already be enlightened, but as for me, I feel overwhelmed. What should I do, John?

If you want to be a hero well just follow me,
If you want to be a hero well just follow me.

Ahh, so that's it--if I want to get by in this scary world, I need to let you tell me what to do, to follow your example. I'm not really sure if you're encouraging me to lie in bed all day in the front window of an apartment store with my ugly wife, waltz around the room to "I, Me, Mine" with my ugly wife, do a lot of drugs, write cryptic lyrics, neglect my firstborn child, pose naked in a fetal position for the cover of a magazine (also with my ugly wife), or just wear round glasses, but you're obviously much more enlightened than a "fucking peasant" like me so I suppose you know far more about how I should run my life than I ever could.

I know that Mr. Lennon doesn't speak for everyone on the left, but this does epitomize the attitudes that they utilize to score political points, and he does happen to be one of their icons.. If you don't believe me, simply observe how much feeling they put into "Imagine" as they sing along "living for todaaaaaaay" while intoxicated. Green Day is one of today's most popular cultural opponents of the "redneck agenda" of the average "American Idiot."

Therefore, Green Day deserves our gratitude for resurrecting this song and ensuring that kids across the globe will be hearing these wise words repeatedly on the radio day after day!

But false class consciousness remains. Despite the unrepresentative distribution of ethnic minorities in the National Basketball Association, several prominent black basketball players have resisted the attempts of a pair of academics to portray them as victims.

If only our oppressed masses could transfer the ethic they bring to math class to the basketball court our society would be much healthier.

Everyday's Hero

2007-05-01T03:06:00.000-04:00

Not much has happened in the racial cultural wars since my last post--the Duke rape case is fading down the leftist memory hole and Hillary was unable to score political points against Imus. However, you can rest assured that we'll be back here again with the next slip of a prominent tongue (unless it's Robert Byrd's).

Still, I want to address my first commenter who stated that perhaps conservatives "should phrase it this way: don't ignore the past, rather honor it. Honor their sacrifices by using that freedom to live the kind of life they hoped their descendants would have."

I agree that this is essential, but to do this successfully, we need to address a fundamental aspect of leftism that would undermine this strategy.

The left often has trouble differentiating between what is and what ought to be (we do as well, but less pervasively). It is perfectly normal and acceptable to hope for the best, if one recognizes it as hope and not a description of what will invariably occur.

The Iraq study group claimed that Iran and Syria should want stability in Iraq. Employers should hire just as many people after we make it more expensive to hire them by raising the minimum wage. Workers should work just as hard even if they know it's almost impossible to get fired. The rich should spend just as much money investing in new businesses even if we tax away all their profits. Criminals shold stop stealing and raping once the harm they're doing others is adequately explained to them, we give them greater economic opportunity, and after somebody shows them how much they care. If I had all day, I could make this paragraph into an absurdly long one.

This clouds their view of all injustices, both past and present. For example, most of us agree that Jackie Robinson was a hero (and if you don't think he was a hero, this isn't the blog for you). Mr. Robinson endured some horrible injustices, but he also overcame them. The left's preoccupation with "should" emphasizes the former part of that statement, the right accentuates the latter.

Jackie Robinson should not have had to endured death threats, catcalls from the Phillies, and segregated hotel rooms. He should not have had to know in the back of his mind that every time he struck out or made an error that it would serve as an excuse for bigots to continue believing that his people were inferior. Mr. Robinson should not have even had to be a pioneer in the first place, for baseball should have already been integrated.

Unfortunately, Mr. Robinson had to endure hell to make what should be into what is. He could have decided to stay in the Negro Leagues where he could play baseball in peace. After he went 0-for-3 his first day with the Dodgers, he could have blamed the pressure and given up. He could have told the bigots exactly what they deserved to hear his first year and frightened reluctant whites into feeling even more threatened by him. He could have lobbied Congress for more legislation or sued Major League Baseball for creating a hostile environment (well, in 1947, maybe not). He probably wanted to rip off certain people's heads, and I don't think any of us could blame him.

Instead, Jackie Robinson decided to become a hero. Despite injustices that probably rattled him to his core, he did everything he could do (play baseball really well), didn't try to do what he couldn't (change bigots minds by yelling back at them), and transformed society.

Although it would be unfair to accuse the left of belittling Mr. Robinson's character, I find that they too often emphasize that which he should not have had to endure over that which he did about it. This is an important yet very fine distinction--after all, it was the filth around him that let us see his greatness.

We should not have needed a hero like Jackie Robinson, but we did. Today, poor blacks should not have to fight so many aspects of American culture to succeed, but they do.

Unfortunately, there will always be things that shouldn't be--terrorists, cars flying into lakes, screaming kids and bills we can't afford. We should rectify this as much as possible (kill terrorist, pay attention on the road, etc.), but no matter what we do, some degree of injustice will remain.

But the left seems to perpetually overestimate what's possible in the realm of eliminating injustice while underestimating the ability of individuals to overcome it. They seem to have unlimited faith in the ability of government to eliminate poverty while simultaneously thinking that an individual born into poverty is doomed to get pregnant at fourteen and sell crack.

Obivously, kids born into poverty are more inclined to act certain ways, largely because certain people will always tend to succumb to injustice rather than overcome it. However, without heroes willing to take responsibility for the harshness that confronts them, humanity would probably stll be living in caves. We are able to live in relative peace and harmony because farmers, philosophers, scientists, soldiers, and parents decided to ignore what was understandable and chose heroism instead.

This will always be the case, but will always be the case for some more than others. However, it is through accepting what is with the desire to make it what it should be that transforms lives: the role of circumstance is secondary. I believe that few of us want to have to be Jackie Robinson, but that a part of each of us would like to be him if we had to. Unfortunately, many of us do have to, but answering that call is what makes us alive.

Instead, the left continually tells us that things should just be better and that the government can make it that way. The government can do certain things (maintain equal justice under the law, enforce individual rights, etc.), but it can't make you approach your life productively. It can, and should, guarantee aspects of your right to the pursuit of happiness, but happiness is up to you.

The left implicitly denies this. For example, although I agree with the left's assertion that today's drug laws are unfair to minorities and believe that we have a duty to rectify this, I also believe that crack users would be unlikely to succeed even if crack were legal and free. The external injustice is real but secondary to the internally flawed behavior pattern. Perhaps we shouldn't be putting black crack users in jail, but people shoulnd't be doing crack, either.

Despite instinctually understanding most of this, black America has produced heroes who support the Democratic Party, a party that undermines the very mindset that makes heroism more difficult. I will explore this phenomenon in my next post, for these are the folks we need to reach first. We need to "[H]onor the sacrifices of the past" through honoring the sacrifices of the present. and reaching black American heroes is the ideal, but exceptionally difficult, way to do this.

Not Gone Yet

2007-04-25T23:03:00.000-04:00

I apologize to my burgeoning fan base for my recent dearth of posts. This will cease tomorrow. Things have come up that bode very well for me, but they've taken time from this blog.

However, I am happy to report that my first prediction looks like it was rather off base. We're not responding quite like I hoped we would, but the response has been far from impotent.

I hope I get such egg on my face more frequently.

This Is Why I'm Not Hot

2007-04-24T00:36:00.000-04:00

All of us fall into the trap of me vs. the world. On a day when your boss unjustly yells at you, your suit comes back from the cleaners with a hole in your pants that you notice right after your wife takes the car, and your puppy gets diarrhea, you might find yourself tempted to think that the world is ganging up on you. Despite the painfully obvious fact that your puppy has never met your boss (and neither know what cleaners you frequent), both might become part of an amorphous "they" that's oppressing you. However, eventually the day ends, and you realize how ridiculous your thoughts were, or at least forget about them.

But you don't have a political movement continually reminding you to keep thinking that your puppy is in league with that rude Chinese lady. Blacks do. When the world is viewed through the lens of Power Narratives, slights by every "oppressor" and nearly every injustice one encounters that can't be directly attributed to a fellow victim are all connected by the Racist Power Structure. It matters not if you have never personally encountered a single specific instance of the racism that your forbears encountered daily--you know that they're just hiding it, and the proof is in your rotting neighborhood.

As I've discussed before, as difficult as it may be to believe, many injustices against blacks were rectified in the 1960's. Things weren't perfect, but a lot changed, and it became a crossroads for the black community.

I would compare this to the moment when a formerly abused child recognizes that it isn't his fault that his father abused him. After being victimized by forces beyond his control and taking the first steps to rectify that which he can, he can either heal the pain and take responsibility for his life, or he can remain bitter and make his father the permanent reason he can't succeed.

Freedom is both wonderful and horrifying, and as the War on Poverty failed to eliminate ghettos, it succeeded in altering the definitions of "freedom" and "justice." Things didn't seem to be getting better fast enough, and if you finally get the freedom you always wanted and still find yourself going nowhere, if you're not especially courageous it's perfectly natural to claim you're not really free yet.

At this juncture the Civil Rights establishment could have attempted to inspire its followers to appreciate their new found freedoms (which by definition contained some pitfalls and was always going to be far from perfect) but instead chose to make itself more indispensable through enumerating new needs. Gradually, the new grievances became more amorphous, and therefore more insurmountable.(for an in-depth discussion of this see Shelby Steele's White Guilt

As "racist" became a label almost nobody wants ascribed to them its definition changed. Since white people wrote the dictionary, simply viewing somebody as inferior because of their race no longer suffices. Racism is now either prejudice mixed with power or a system that keeps racial hierarchies in place. As blacks became less likely to point to specific incidents of racism, to keep the nightmare alive racism had to become something even more insidious, and something that can never be wiped out.

It's much easier to confront Don Imus is he's just an arrogant windbag. If you see him as landlord/cop/corporation/low-paycheck/expensive-groceries/doctor-bills he's a bit more formidable, and almost as bad as a slave driver.

Hence the new Power Narrative, only one more similar to the Vanguard of the Proletariat. People fail, and other people tell them that there's so much stacked up against them that failure is all but inevitable. Even those that succeed are reminded that they should not have had to have been so exceptional.

In one sense, this is true, but in another sense, it's most definitely not. In my next post I hope to contrast the liberal inability to distinguish between "should be" and "is" with the more productive conservative perspective.

Heroism, the only remedy to our predicament, can grow under either set of assumptions. However, only through conservative values can it spread.

Swing and a Miss, Again

2007-04-20T22:37:00.000-04:00

Before I get back to my regularly scheduled diatribe, something has to be addressed. I haven't been able to watch the news in the last couple of days (and what I've seen has been Cho, Cho, Cho), but I have the sinking feeling that we haven't been addressing this enough. I know that a couple of representatives have criticized the Honorable Senator Reid, but if your'e not a Montana hermit you should have repeatedly, over and over, and redundantly heard an actual barrage of criticism like:

"I know the Senator means well, but after he said that Zarqawi must be doing backflips in his grave."

"If Reid were alive during WWII, he would have declared that the start of the Battle of the Bulge meant D-Day was a failure."

"Yes, what happened in Iraq was awful, and I share the Senator's sense of mourning, But the Honoralbe Mr. Reid needs to recognize that he's saying exactly what the bombers hoped he would."

And after Reid responds, we should repeat it again, making sure the debate is about American defeatism helping the enemy instead of "Bush's failed policies."

I've gone over this before, but I'm sure our experts in Washington have a better plan in mind.

After all, considering the current sky-high support for the war, who could possibly quesiton Republican political strategy? Just because people like Harry Reid say exactly what terrorists want them to say without any sense that there might be a political consequence, why should anyone be concerned?

Yeah, after they make egregious comments like this, let's just have three or four of us say we disagree, find ourselves accused of heaving forth a "barrage of criticism," and then let it drop. Why should Harry Reid suffer any political blowback for inspiring our enemy? After all, his intentions are noble, and we're sure he really supports our troops, so it's much nicer to be gentle with Senator Reid than to actually support our troops by sticking up for them.

Most Democrats are dumb enough to think that playing nice will work with terrorists. Most Republicans are dumb enough th think that playing nice will work with Democrats.

Wrong on both counts.

Us us us us us us us And Them them them them...

2007-04-19T23:51:00.000-04:00

He hath disgraced me, and hindered me half a million; laughed at my losses, mocked at my gains, scorned my nation, thwarted my bargains, cooled my friends, heated mine enemies; and what's his reason? I am a Jew. Hath not a Jew eyes? hath not a Jew hands, organs, dimensions, senses, affections, passions? fed with the same food, hurt with the same weapons, subject to the same diseases, healed by the same means, warmed and cooled by the same winter and summer, as a Christian is? If you prick us, do we not bleed? if you tickle us, do we not laugh? if you poison us, do we not die? and if you wrong us, shall we not revenge? If we are like you in the rest, we will resemble you in that. If a Jew wrong a Christian, what is his humility? Revenge. If a Christian wrong a Jew, what should his sufferance be by Christian example? Why, revenge. The villany you teach me, I will execute, and it shall go hard but I will better the instruction.

The Merchant of Venice, Act 3, Scene 1
(emphasis mine)

To avert accusations that I was simply making stuff up in my last post about the us-versus-them mentality prevalent in the black community, rapper Cam'ron came to my defense in an interview with Anderson Cooper (link probably won't last long enough for anyone to read it).

Rap star Cam'ron says there's no situation -- including a serial killer living next door -- that would cause him to help police in any way, because to do so would hurt his music sales and violate his "code of ethics." Cam'ron, whose real name is Cameron Giles, talks to Anderson Cooper for a report on how the hip-hop culture's message to shun the police has undermined efforts to solve murders across the country. Cooper's report will be broadcast on 60 MINUTES Sunday, April 22 (7:00-8:00 PM, ET/PT) on the CBS Television Network.

(emphasis mine)

I understand that I previously linked this behavior to slavery and Jim Crow, and I stand by my statement. However, it's a little more nuanced than that.

For a very long time in this country, if a cop came looking for a black guy because of a rape accusation, there was every reason to believe that the cop was actually looking for some white guy's scapegoat. There was little way to ascertain the truth of the matter, for frequently before making it to his unfair trial, the black guy could very well find himself hanging from a tree. On the other hand, if a white raped a black, the odds he would get lynched, or even face rude stares in the street, were minimal at best.

It therefore makes perfect sense that blacks would develop a "code of ethics" favoring hunkering down and keeping as much information as possible from the white man. Police, lawyers, judges, and most of the institutions in the Old South thrived on an us-versus-them mentality, only the "us" was white people. "They" learned it from "us." Hence, the root causes.

Yet there's more. Anti-violence advocate from Harlem Geoffrey Canada says:

in the poor New York City neighborhood he grew up in, only the criminals didn't talk to the police, but within today's hip-hop culture, that's changed. "It is now a cultural norm that is being preached in poor communities....It's like you can't be a black person if you have a set of values that say 'I will not watch a crime happen in my community without getting involved to stop it,'" Canada tells Cooper.

(emphasis mine)

I have no idea how old Mr. Canada is, but whatever his age, during his youth not as much time had progressed between then and slavery as has passed today. However, according to Canada, Cam-ron's anti-authority ethos is stronger now. Were slavery indeed the root cause, shouldn't it be waning instead of increasing with the passage of time and Civil Rights legislation?

We see the same phenomenon with illegitimate births and crime rates, all of which peaked several years after the Civil Rights movemment alleviated much (but admittedly not all) of the institutional unfairness prevalent in our country. (Thomas Sowell discusses this in great detail.)

We therefore have the following sequence of events:

1. Unjust historical circumstances create understandable thought and behavioral patterns, some defensive (us-versus-them), some destructive (crime).
2. As the unfair circumstances gradually alleviate, the patterns remain but lessen.
3. A movement drastically reduces the number of injustices.
4. The initial thought and behavioral patterns increase in scope.

Huh? Acoording to Dr. Sowell, for a period earlier this century, blacks who knew actual former slaves had lower illegitimacy rates than whites, but now we're supposed to blame the effects of racist institutions for the number of blacks without a father at home. Our society is far from perfect, but it no longer sanctions auctioning off somebody's kids, and the days when it did sanction such awfulness are fading farther into the past every second. Time is linear, after all.

(I know that Vyan, among others, blames black incarceration rates. Although I wholeheartedly agree with him that our drug policies are patently unfair, I also know that when I was fifteen I had a job with about twenty Detroit high schoolers, none of whom were in jail or married but nearly all of whom already had kids.)

Pardon my knee-jerk reactionary impulses, but I suspect that something other than the meanness of white society is at work here, for white meanness has decreased substantially since 1957, but in 1957 more black kids interacted with their fathers on a daily basis.

So what is at work here, and what can conservatives do about it?

In my next post, I will expand on the problem (the leftist manipulation of understandable defense mechanisms through the overprioritization of motivation--it's a mouthful but very effective), and hopefully get to the solution--heroism.

Keeping It Real

2007-04-17T23:34:00.000-04:00

Before I explore the possibility (or lack thereof) of expanding our appeal while remaining principled, I think it's important to point out how we're already not living up to our principles. To illustrate my point, I'll be using this diary entry at The Daily Kos.

Near the beginning of his diatribe, Vyan says that he's "skeptical that she could acually name specific song or lyric by these artists that matches the comments made by Imus." When we seen the interview in question (first one on the page, h/t Protein Wisdom), Michelle gives us no reason whatsoever to doubt Vyan's assertion. Furthermore, Vyan points out the incontrovertible fact that the Reverends Sharpton and Jackson have quite recently criticized violent and mysogynist rap lyrics.

Malkin has fallen into the "fake but accurate" trap for which we so rightly condemn Michael Moore. Indeed, her overall point that Imus is receiving a disproportionate amount of their outrage is valid, but if she can't get her facts straight, her opponents have every right and every incentive to call her on it, thus clouding issues that should remain clear.

Those already inclined to agree with her will probably unquestioningly accept the "accuracy" of her assertions (not unlike those who stand by the Dan Rather memos), but anyone who does't already see things her way will get caught up in her ignorance instead and never digest her overall point.

Besides, getting your facts wrong to prove a truth is unethical, even if it's accidental (as I susupect it probably was in Michelle's case).

This is one of the reasons I so strongly advocate understanding the other side. If Ms. Malkin cited specific lyrics or compared Al Sharpton's mild chiding of rap artists with his fervent attacks on Imus, she would have been far more persuasive. Frequently, blacks see conservatives as painfully ignorant of their culture and way of life. Just a small amount of research can deny our opponents this ammunition.

That's not to say that those like Vyan won't immediately switch the subject from what it's okay to say to how many blacks are in jail. The left will always do this, for to them, every oppression issue, from high incarceration rates, to Jimmy the Greek, to affirmative action is the same issue. They have a point, from a certain point of view, but it's a point of view that simultaneously uplifts leftist victim culture and degrades blacks.

Black America has been trained to see every specific incident of unfairness as evidence of an underlying racist culture infecting our entire society. Imus is more harmful to kids who've never heard of him than Snoop Dogg because Imus isn't Imus, he's the manifestation of an oppressive power structure. It's ridiculous to think that a great basketball player with a bright future ahead of her should be scarred for life by the comments of a dumb old white guy, but he's not just a dumb old white guy, he's them, and he slipped up to show her what they really think of her.

Likewise, this "us versus them" mentality keeps blacks from criticizing their own too harshly if others are likely to hear. I've encountered numerous blacks who agree with me on the importance of black America getting its own act together, regardless of what the rest of the country does. However, I've only heard such comments after I've really gained some trust over a long period of time--they've got to "keep it in the family."

What began as a healthy way to protect their community has morphed into an excuse-ridden culture of protecting the predators in their midst.

This is undeniably a direct result of the atrocities of slavery and Jim Crow. But, not unlike denial or any other defense mechanism, if not grown through, it can take on a life of its own, and it can kill you.

They've Warped the Playing Field--So Do We Play?

2007-04-16T23:13:00.000-04:00

The final comment in my last post was somewhat ironic (I made the number up), but I do think that conservatives have been awful at getting their message out to the black community. The black community has by and large followed the likes of Jesse Jackson, so I'm not absolving it of responsibility, but conservatives have let certain problems go unaddressed. The left has addressed these problems, poorly, but when somebody feels beaten down, he'll pay attention to the guy who seems to sympathize and ignore the one who doesn't seem to understand anything other than that he needs to get his act together.

To the right, sympathy and understanding are beside the point. To the left, sympathy and understanding are the point.

I would argue that assessing all the stumbling blocks in one's way are perfectly healthy if it's done for the purpose of transcending the blocks. I'm sure that psychologists disagree as to the necessity of confronting such issues, but whether or not it's useful to do so, it certainly feels good, or at least pretty comfortable.

However, analyzing the difficulties on one's path can all too easily become its own point, as we see with the numerous African-American studies departments that exist only to list grievances, claiming that no progress can be made until damn near every single historical injustic has been addressed and rectified. Although there are movements within the black community that focus on taking responsibility for one's own actions, there is a perfectly human tendency to want to shift blame for despair. We don't want to blame ourselves, and the left continuously tells us we shouldn't have to.

Yet most of us on the right know that this blame shifting makes progress more difficult, if not impossible. But as it stands now, the black community sees the right as the voice of get over it. Of course, getting over it is the best way to get past it, but they'll never listen to us as long as they think we have no idea what it is.

The left obviously understands the plight of the black community; the right does not. Regardless of whether or not there's an objective connection between understanding societal ills and being able to do anything about them, an apparent connection is firmly embedded in most of our minds.

Perhaps this connection should not be there, but if vasts swaths of our people think it's there, we have to recognize that reality to have any hopes of changing it.

It's usually the left that brings up descriptions of the evils of slavery or Jim Crow, followed by an excuse for ineffective behavior on the part of poor blacks or a call for more economic redistribution. This has helped to cement a connection in most people's minds between the acknowledgement of some very ugly realities with leftist/socialist victim culture.

On the right, we don't bring up that stuff very often for two basic reasons. First, we believe that regardless of how badly somebody's great-great-grandfater was beaten (or even father, for that matter), the point is what one does with his or her life today. Second, we too have heard the citing of past grievances so frequently followed by more leftist claptrap that we sometimes inadvertently also assume that the very connection the left wants us to believe in is much stronger than may actually be.

There is a case to be made that the very fact that we're still ennumerating racial grievances means that some of us would rather shift blame than improve our lives. To this I reply only that I agree.

Nevertheless, the left has been so successful at getting folks to believe that we need to "heal the past" in order to create a decent future that when we talk about individual initiative, it seems like we're skipping a step. As artificial as that step may be, it's there and has taken on a life of its own.

So, by not overtly referencing the injustices felt by blacks, are we taking a principled stance against victim culture, or are we giving the left free rein in the black community? If black America continues to suffer from victim culture, obviously black America bears ultimate responsibility. However, are those of us who understand the greatness of America adequately presenting our case to our own people?

Is there a conservative, principled, healthy, way to address racial injustice, and if so, how do we proceed?

When They Harness Their Power

2007-04-12T23:04:00.000-04:00

This interesting article in Time ends with a quote from Kia Vaughn of the Rutgers basketball team with which we can (I hope) all agree:

I'm a woman, and I'm someone's child...I achieve a lot. And unless they've given this name, a 'ho,' a new definition, then that is not what I am.

I refuse to defend Imus, and I don't want to make the same "rappers say it all the time" argument we've been reading so much of on the conservative blogosphere. However, rappers do say that all the time, and this does raise certain questions in my mind.

According to some, our society has experienced the "death of outrage," but the Imus and Michael Richards fallouts clearly demonstrate this isn't so. Outrage is alive and well in this country. It's incredibly effective, but also selective.

The aforementioned Time article agonizes over where the "line" is in regards to controversial statements. Well, for one thing, we know where it's not:

All women should be respectfully addressed in public discourse unless their actions indicate they deserve otherwise.

I would wholeheartedly approve of such a line (through societal condemnation and voluntary broadcasting decisions, not governmental censorship), and I think most conservatives would agree. According to the Drudge Report, the Rev. Al Sharpton feels "that this is only the beginning. We must have a broad discussion on what is permitted and not permitted in terms of the airwaves..." Does he plan to launch a concerted effort to purge Snoop Dogg from radio? I doubt it.

I know that many in the civil rights establishment have criticized rap lyrics (as well as members of the Rutgers basketball team themselves). But what has been missing from their attacks is the outrage they reserve for the likes of Imus.

This is further evidence that the left cares much more about motivation than results. Were the concrete prevention of the denigration of black women the goal, would not gangsta rap receive as much indignation as Imus? After all, who affects the lives of these women more directly, someone whose music they and the males in their lives hear every day, or an old radio host they've never heard of?

I would love to see black women treated more respectfully, and I humbly argue as an member of another ethnic group (but fellow human being) that the most effective way to encourage respect for black women is to discourage anyone from labeling them "hoes." Old white guys do it occasionally and loose their jobs. Young black guys do it repeatedly and meet with senators.

But for obvious reasons, we can't accuse Ludacris of hating black people like we can Don Imus. Racism is a motivation, and an ugly one at that, and that's what's at stake in the eyes of the left. Concrete results are secondary.

I agree with them that racism is awful, abhorrent, disgusting, and primitive, but I also believe that warping the values of young blacks is worse than being a racist. Jimbob Redneck may hate blacks, but rich celebrities inspiring a generation of kids to slap bitches upside the head does America far more harm than Jimbob ever could.

So, lefties, you wanna fight racism? As long as you stick to the actual definition of the word "racism," I'm with you all the way.

But if you really want to improve young black lives, perhaps you should consider at least seeming like you're a little bit disappointed in certain aspects of urban culture, too.

I know you do, but you're "keeping it in the family." I'll deal with this and a couple more of the 48,262 reasons why we need to be gentle with black folks in my next post.

Ulterior Motives

2007-04-11T22:45:00.000-04:00

We help them because we let them frame the debate in terms of our heartless motives versus their noble ones, and if we ever happen to succeed at shifting it, it's only for an instant and we don't press our advantage.

To the casual observer, motivation seems much more pertinent than it actually is. In the first place, it's inherently unknowable. Although we'll theorize about each other until doomsday, we can't ever actually see into the heart of another. I seriously doubt Bush invaded Iraq just to enrich his oil buddies, but I can't ever know that for certain, and neither can his opponents.

Likewise, I can't see into the hearts of the left. I suppose it would be interesting to discover whether or not Ted Kennedy is just an old cynic or if his heart bleeds for the less fortunate, but either way, the policies he advocates are a disaster, so I don't particularly care.

Unfortunately, a substantial portion of the American public is more likely to vote for the candidate who "understands" them the most, even if that candidate is an utter fool.

This "all-you-need-is-love" manner of evaluating policy favors the left considerably for several reasons. First, that's how they wish the country to evaluate them, because that's how they evaluate themselves. Socialistic policies may always result in ruin (yes, even in Europe), but Mao had his people's best interests at heart, so he wasn't all that bad. Hippies can't be blamed for the Vietnamese boat people and the massacres in Cambodia because they only wanted peace. Bilingual education may damn hispanic kids to the fringes of society, but we don't want them to feel left out in school.

Secondly, the right's conception of human nature takes realities into consideration that make people uncomfortable. Sympathizing with a murderer and giving him a second chance won't necessarily keep him from taking another life. However, we know that forgiveness can be a virtue, and we like to think that such behavior will produce favorable results. We're good people and we like to believe we can love away our violent tendencies instead of defeating them. Beating something ugly means having to look at it.

Some might argue that we should turn the motivation game back on them, to question their patriotism, out them as race-hustlers, and expose environmental hypochrisy. I agree that this can be useful as a secondary approach, but it brings me to the third reason we should sever the caring=effective association in the minds of the American public--when we're talking about motive, we're extremely unlikely to win.

Because their entire collective self image depends on wanting peace, harmony, etc., they've developed a much keener defensive instinct in this regard than we ever will. As Dr. Sowell points out in his latest column, Democrats have mastered the art of indignation, the "how dare you question my patriotism/racial bonifides/environmental awareness?!" I'm not particularly interested in hearing about how much Barbara Boxer "supports our troops," and you shouldn't be either, unless you want her to look good.

Instead, I recommend we overtly grant them their pure hearts and then attack their effectiveness. Vice President Cheney almost actually executed what could be an immeasurably effective talking point for Republicans everywhere.

I would argue that his initial claim that the Democratic plan would "'validate the al-Qaeda strategy'" was correct but too easily allowed for a counter-attack, which inevitably came in Pelosi's strident defense of her patriotism.

In response, however, Cheney did not allow the debate to shift to the purity of her motives. "'I didn't question her patriotism. I questioned her judgement.'"

This is what needs to be done, with two caveats.

First, he should have made clear, as all Republicans should make clear before launching an attack, that we're not calling their sincerity into question. For example:

I know that Senator Moonbat cares for this country every bit as much as I do, but the simple fact of the matter is that every time he gets in front of a camera, al-Qaeda's morale goes through the roof.

This keeps Sen. Moonbat away from his "how dare you question my...!?" comfort zone, saves us a news cycle, and allows us to get straight to the point--they're helping the enemy.

You may want only peace, but you're inspiring murderers. You love America, but they're using your soundbites in recruiting videos. You support our troops, but you give terrorists reason to believe killing them will get them what they want. Your heart's in the right place, but let's talk about the harm you're doing instead.

The GOP has not done this, nor does it give us any indication that it will. Cheney allowed his master stroke to remain buried in old newspapers and the memories of the few who heard about it. I'm sure it was repeated, but it wasn't REPEATED.

Nice motives don't necessarily mean nice results, and the association between the two must be forever severed in the minds of the American public.

The Weapon

2007-04-10T22:21:00.000-04:00

Some might argue that I overprioritize understanding the other side, believing I'm not unlike the multiculturalists who wish us to deepen our understanding of the root causes of terrorism so that we become less apt to kill terrorists. On the contrary, I advocate understanding their vision because I see it as our potentially greatest weapon, for its one they'll never be able to possess.

I reiterate that the hardcore lefties like Chomsky, Jesse Jackson, and the trolls who make rude comments on conservative blogs have almost no hope of seeing the light. Fortunately, they don't make up a very sizeable portion of the electorate.

The "war for hearts and minds" instead lies among those who only peripherally pay attention to politics, those who may or may not consistently vote for either party (or even at all) and who don't necessarily equate their sense of self with a political viewpoint. (This is supposedly conventional wisdom, but I see the GOP spending much more time identifying Republicans than creating new ones.)

It's therefore we who care about this stuff on the right and they who care about this stuff on the left competing for the hearts of the relatively apathetic, and as I argued in my last post, they control most of our educational system and popular culture, hence their long-term advantage.

But the left's inherent disadvantage we fail to exploit is their total lack of understanding of our point of view. They either blithely dismiss what we really have to say, distort it in their own minds before allowing themselves to consider it, shout over us when we come to speak on their campuses, or simply let the matter remain unconsidered. "The debate is closed on global warming."

Were they able to challenge our views on their own merits, I highly doubt they would spend so much time and effort to keep us from expressing them (speech codes on campuses, speakers getting shouted down, cyber-attacks on blogs, crimes prevented by private citizens with guns not mentioned in the newspaper, etc.)

Therefore, if we can get our perspective heard within favorable parameters, they will loose their advantage, and they seem to know this better than we do.

However, the very nature of their vision gives them some exceptionally effective tools to prevent this. We need to understand their vision because we must to know why certain conditions favor them so heavily.

If we can shift the debate to one of facts within the correct context, we can and will persuade Joe Sixpack. Instead, on almost every issue, we allow ourselves to debate within the parameter upon which the entirety of leftism is based.

This can change, if, and only if, we recognize how we've been helping them.

Introduction

2007-04-09T23:52:00.000-04:00

At least initially, I’d like this blog to be more about political discourse than an example of political discourse. We have plenty of sites out there from the entire political spectrum that promote their views well.

I have my biases, and although I intend for my audience to be largely conservative, when those of other persuasions come my way, I promise to do my best to be fair. Nevertheless, if you’re here looking for a debate, even though you may get one, this isn’t the blog for you.

I’m here to analyze how the right and left present their arguments, why I believe that in the long term the left is winning, and how the right can regain its advantage. Each side appeals to certain aspects of human nature, and the left is gradually training society to value those aspects of human nature that serve its political ends best--we should do likewise.

Our current conflict is A Conflict of Visions, as Dr. Sowell so adequately puts it. In this book, Dr. Sowell discusses how one’s political views reflect one’s fundamental approach to the world. Perhaps political views should be thought through and logically analyzed, but they are largely felt instead.

Each side of the debate thinks the other illogical and blames the other for emphasizing emotion. To an extent, each side is correct, for the logic of each is based on premises the other rejects, and each emphasizes emotions the other believes to be inappropriate. Both sides claim to oppose using fear to promote one’s agenda, but few of us are bothered by neocon “alarmism” in regards to terrorism and Gore’s Inconvenient Truth. We pick the fear we approve of and accuse the other guy of appealing to our lower instincts.

Furthermore, our definitions of such fundamental terms as “security,” “fairness,” “justice,” “equality,” and “freedom” differ according to our respective visions. Hence, our perpetual talking at instead of to one another.

I would argue that despite the remarkable abilities of Sean Hannity and Ann Coulter at talking at their opponents, debaters such as they have become a disproportionate face of the conservative movement, great at humiliating but not to great at reaching out. Debaters will always have their role (and in some ways their role should be expanded), but we also need more and better persuaders.

There are at least three prerequisites to effective direct persuasion (as opposed to indirect persuasion through humiliation which I‘ll go into later). First, one must be comprehend the underlying vision of one’s opponent, as ridiculous as it may seem. For a lie to be effective, it must subtly distort of a truth. Blacks do have it rough in this country (although they have it rougher everywhere else). Corporate CEO’s often do make amounts of money that seem absurd (but they also create wealth for the rest of us in ways most of us can never comprehend). The Iraqi people do want to be left alone (although I‘m not so sure they‘d like us to abandon them to Al Queda or Al Sadr). Nevertheless, after one discovers that the moderate liberal in one’s midst feels this way, after being exposed to a wider and more realistic vision, they can be persuaded.

The third prerequisite is an “opponent” with whom one can discuss issues in good faith (which requires that you do the same). Some on the left, for a myriad of reasons, have adopted their views with a fervor that will not be overcome short of a Damascus moment (if even that would work). These folks are so thoroughly convinced that they are right that they will not even consider what you have to say. Their entire goal is to “beat” you. They will change the subject, use ad hominem attacks, and evade or lie or do whatever it takes to either prove that they are right or shut you up.

I in no way assert that only leftists can be this way. However, I have encountered hundreds of trolls on other sites that have developed the remarkable ability to argue against a person while never actually addressing any of the points that person makes. I’ve also seen conservative speakers get shouted off college campuses with regularity and haven't seen this happen to many leftists.

Third, one must have access, and this is the left’s greatest advantage. Most Americans go through the public school system, and most teachers aren’t Republican or libertarian. Our universities are even more slanted. Most reporters may have no intention of indoctrinating the American public with their own worldview, but I doubt many of them are even aware of how blithely they overlook perspectives that oppose their own. And despite the occasional episode of South Park, the entertainment industry is leftist, pure and simple. Can anyone name an album as popular as Green Day’s American Idiot with conservative views?

Unfortunately, I don’t see us addressing any of these three points to the necessary extent. How we should proceed shall be the topic of my future posts.