The problem with republicans isn't that they're stupid...

[Kurt_and_Hunter]

it is that they are AGGRESSIVELY stupid. They think things are valid simply because THEY think them, and will stand on a chair and bellow stupid things at you until you leave the room, and then think they won an argument.

The repetitious, "I am a clod!" threads from folks who think the New Yorker has an obligation to address them on their own level is the quintessence of the Republican intellectual style.

Private views do not constitute censorship. Only the government can censor.

Private views do not constitute school segregation, either. Only the government can segregate public schools.

But there are views that are in line with school segregation. There are personal modes of segregationist thought. If your neighbor says, "I don't like my child going to school with blacks," you might call her a segregationist. She could counter with, "Only the government can segregate the public schools. I am merely voicing my opinion, and I am entitled to do so."

All very true. But so what? The distinction doesn't make your neighbor any more admirable.

If you spout right-wing hog-wash, like thinking that publications *should* conform to your own set of attitudes and anxieties, then you are thinking like a censor. You can say, "but I am not proposing censorship," and that's all well and good, but it doesn't make your mode of thought much prettier.

It is pathological spending much time fretting about what other people *should* publish. The fact that one stops short of proposing formal censorship doesn't sanctify the obsession with what other people *should* publish, read, watch, etc.. It's like spending a lot of time fretting about what sexual practices your neighbors *should* and *shouldn't* enjoy.

(An aside... I am, of course, writing about how you *should* think about the implications of the first amendment. You caught me red-handed! Any resolution of that contradiction will have to wait for another time. The point for today is that censorial modes of thought are hostile to free thought, though are themselves free thoughts. The standard mode in America is to tolerate the First Amendment, rather than embrace it, and it cannot long survive on that basis. All of us express desired governmental virtues through our personal behavior. During Jim Crow some white southerners treated black people more fairly than others, and those same folks tended to be likelier to favor integration... they were living the ideals they hoped their government to someday have. I am encouraging people to try to incorporate the ideals of the First Amendment into their personal ideas about human expression, not treat it as a necessary evil.)

In matters of thought, expression and publication there is never a shortage of people summed up by Marge Simpson's immortal line: "I must have thought it was some of my business."

James Dobson is one of the top proponents of censorship in America, though he holds no government position. (At least I don't think he does... who knows anymore?) Dobson is more than entitled to think like a censor and talk like a censor. It's a mode of thought... disgusting, but obviously (and necessarily) permitted.

And DUers are free to think like James Dobson and talk like James Dobson. But don't expect to do so without reproach.

A key formative experience of mine was living near the one theater in Richmond that showed THE LAST TEMPTATION OF CHRIST. There were pickets there for a month, hassling people who just happen to like Martin Scorsese.

The protesters were outraged that the film was not aimed at THEM, and did not comport to THEIR views and salve THEIR anxieties. They were full of suggestions as to what Scorsese *should* have done... like they are supposed to be consulted every time someone makes a movie.

Those protesters were well within their rights. But that doesn't make them admirable.

If you don't like a movie, don't watch it.
If you don't like a magazine, don't read it.
If you don't like abortion, don't have one.
If you don't like same sex marriage, don't marry someone of the same sex.

[EstimatedProphet]

1. Agreed.

[pwb]

2. they are a bunch of drunks.

Mean drunks.

[blondeatlast]

3. This ex-librarian is jumping up out of her chair and shouting BRAVO!

A nice summation of what free speech is all about.

:patriot:

k/enthusiastically r.

[Kurt_and_Hunter]

15. Funny how librarians are considered both mousy and fanatical libertines

Still waters, and all that...

"Chaucer... Rabelais... Balzac!"

Thanks!

[Lord Helmet]

4. they wallow in stupid

[mrreowwr_kittty]

5. Criticism is not censorship. Nor is it indicative of a desire to censor.

And equating people who don't like the NYer cartoon with proponents of racial segregation and religious nuts picketing a movie is dishonest and hyperbolic.

If you don't like what people are saying on DU, don't read DU.

[Bluerthanblue]

8. ah the Irony eh?

if we aren't gonna see things their way- we are the ones who want to silence and censor.
And 'we' must be like "repubs".

:shrug:


Well said Catburgler

:hi:

[SidneyCarton]

6. Exactly, K&R

[sufrommich]

7. Great post,great Democrat. k & r

[Egnever]

9. Are people here calling for censorship of the publication?

Or just deriding their choice of covers as a poor attempt at humor?

[Bluerthanblue]

11. you are either silently with them - or you are

a republican.
:evilgrin:

You are guilty of making sense.

:shrug:

beam me up this planet is uninhabitable.

[Kurt_and_Hunter]

13. No, not a Republican. Someone adopting the Republican mode of thought.

There are some hard-core authoritarian types here-about who nonetheless favor most of the planks of the Democratic platform.

They are Democrats, but *think* like Republicans.

There are national goals, and then there's political philosophy.

Different philosophies can seek the same goals, and the same philosophy can seek different goals.

People who are comfortable with having a "Daily Hate" about a magazine cartoon are philosophically or psychologically more aligned with the modern Republican party than with the modern Democratic party, though their policy goals might be quite left-leaning.

[Egnever]

14. isnt that sort of what your thread is attempting here?

to censor the censors?

[JoFerret]

20. Sir, madam

be careful not to engage in a general attack on a forum or a forum of thinking cos you is either forum or against them.

[Bluerthanblue]

10. so those who were outraged at Donnie McClurken's presence at

Obama's concert were people you'd say the same to as you do to those who are speaking out against the decision to put this on the cover of the NYer?


Hmmmm....... interesting ????

[Kurt_and_Hunter]

12. That's some pretty turned-around thinking there

Equating a political candidate and a literary magazine is pretty weird. It's like equating worrying about the ten commandments being posted in a courthouse and worrying about your meighbors owning a Bible.

The problem with McClurkin was that he was being used by A POLITICAL CANDIDATE to raise money and to legitimize a wicked message.

I do not remember calls to harass McLurkin's record label for selling his music. Had I seen any such calls I would have condemned them, but they were not there to be seen. The outrage was directed against the POLTICAL CANDIDATE.

The POLITICAL CANDIDATE was seeking to represent peoples' views in a Representative Democracy. He was seeking the nomination of a party to which I belong. He was seeking to represent my views, in the manner our government is set up to have my views represented.

Any Democrat saying what someone seeking the Democratic nomination *should* do is equivalent to any citizen saying what the president *should* do.

(Speaking for myself, I have never much cared what any Republican does in a Republican primary. They are not seeking to represent me, God knows, so it's really not my worry.)

What the government does, and what aspirants to governmental power ostensibly representing us do, are all of our business, pretty much by definition.

If The New Yorker is seeking the presidency then it would make more sense for everybody to consider what the New Yorker does "some of their business."

[JVS]

16. hmmmm

:popcorn:

[Kurt_and_Hunter]

19. Shorter Version:

Shorter Version:

Participating in a Daily Hate over a magazine cartoon = what Republicans and other religious psychos (of all religions) do

Criticizing what positions a politician embraces = the heart of representative democracy

[JoFerret]

21. Short and long

Both good.

[Bluerthanblue]

23. pretty creative posturing there K&H

"Participating in a Daily Hate over a magazine cartoon*" is also "Criticizing a poorly thought out magazine cover"

*= it wasn't the 'cartoon' that most people are so disturbed about, though- it was the editorial decision to put this in the very PROMINENT PLACE of the front cover of the mag- 4mos before the election!

"What Republicans and other religious psychos (of all religions) do- wow. that's such a bigoted ugly statement I'll just let it stand on its own demerits.

"Criticizing what positions a politician embraces" can also be seen quite reasonably as Obama's allowing a performer to perform at a fund raiser DESPITE the fact that the musician holds positions about sexuality that Obama does not share.- in other words, allowing the performer to participate in society even if that performer has ideas that are personally offensive to others.
You want censorship? What would un-inviting him have been other than that??? It actually is WORSE than censorship, because it doesn't only seek to silence the man, it seeks to not allow him to practice his 'craft'- (which was all he was supposed to do before the up-roar anyhow)

Obama's allowing McClurken to go ahead and perform, WITH his statement that he does NOT share McClurkens views on Homosexuality IS the "heart of a representative democracy" IMO- So is the New Yorker printing whatever the hell they wanted to print on their cover, and being called to task for doing so by those who disagreed with the wisdom of having done so.

You only serve to destroy any rational argument you have for your perspective when you fall into the comfortable pit of labeling/libeling anyone who doesn't agree with you as "republican" or "religious psycho's"


But I believe you are smart enough to know that- you're just counting on people not to think- simply react to your words.

thanks for sharing
:hi:

[Abacus]

17. I'm glad that

you noted the contradiction in this missive as opposed to yesterday's.

[mrreowwr_kittty]

18. Kurt_and_Hunter, please keep us apprised of what opinions are appropriate to have.

I would so hate to think that I was not incorporating the ideals of the First Amendment into my personal ideas of human expression to a degree that you deem satisfactory. :sarcasm:

[CreekDog]

22. Oh, the problem with some of them IS that they are stupid

:think:

[Colobo]

24. A huge number of Republicans are voluntarily obtuse.

[olkaz]

25. I know plenty of aggressively stupid progressives as well. Lots of them on my ignore list.

Depends on who you're talking to.

I know plenty of intelligent conservatives. It's fun to argue.

[Imagevision]

26. Republicans would be happy to see mccain in the WH. then later bitch about the consequences

it's like speaking before you think?