Coverage by the local paper has been painfully sanctimonious. Now SMN is a good paper in spite of its clear liberal editorial bias; they produce well-researched journalism on the drug trafficking situation in the region, on local politics, on internal Cherokee Nation affairs, and also on arts and literature in the area (the latter being why I read it; I often find out about good bands and live shows through them). I've been genuinely impressed by their straight journalism work. Even here, they went to some trouble to get the facts straight and to file appropriate public records requests, etc. That's not the issue.
I'm also willing to give an argument against interest in opposing the sanctimony. The coverage demonstrates that people were passing rumors that are not supported by the video of the incident. That's dangerous, as they say; and we can reasonably agree that a hundred years ago a similar kind of rumor about possible sexual predation by a hated minority might have led to a lynching. The absence of lynchings marks real progress, and I am prepared to acknowledge that these sort of irritating liberal responses are presumably partly to be credited for that progress. (Certainly not wholly to be credited for it, but I can see the argument that they are assisting in providing a helpful social immunity to such mob violence).
All the same, I have a problem with the preaching. I do mean preaching literally: two of the section headers in their first piece are unelaborated Biblical references, whose clear intention is to suggest that their social opponents are bad Christians as well as bad people (as well as wrong on the facts).
This is not necessary, and in fact is very risky, for their preferred arrangement. Their basic argument is captured in their headline: "The mere existence of trans people is not a crime." (Again, whether or not the wholly anonymous dude in the bikini is in fact trans, or just a David Lee Roth impersonator, is not clear from the facts.) Now that's true as a matter of fact, but it's accidentally true: and if you put it to a clean vote, democratically speaking, I don't know that it would continue to be true. Still, the best argument is that there is official toleration of this violation of local mores that the population is legally bound to accept regardless of whatever they or their church think about it.
Shifting it to a religious ground opens the question of whether this kind of behavior is in fact something that ought to be tolerated as a matter of ethics and morals, and it turns out religion has a lot to say about that. St. Augustine and Aquinas have a lot to say, as does the official doctrine of many churches, as do many preachers and priests who might rise of a Sunday morning to speak to the matter if asked to do so.
The liberal project to a large degree depends on disallowing that entire line of argument. The liberal project no longer attempts -- as it did in the era of Immanuel Kant** -- to universalize religious philosophy as an exercise of practical reason. It has long since simply declared that religion belongs in the private sphere. Because freedom of religion is a basic right, anyone may accept or refuse to accept any religious doctrine. Thus, positive laws cannot enshrine religious doctrines without violating the right of people to reject the doctrines those rules are based upon.
If you want to argue religion, you have to admit religion to the debate. If you want to exclude religion from public life, you don't get to preach either.
As for country music, I haven't ever heard the song and thus don't know if I consider it actual country, which is a more vicious debate even than these already described. The tradition of vigilante fantasies in music is very old and broad, though; it's not just Merle Haggard and Charlie Daniels but traditional Irish and Scottish music, and English, and, well, all such music. You're just going to have to learn to live with that one, SMN. Freedom of artistic expression is a basic right on the liberal model too.
* Dude is a gender-neutral term, they say.
** Kant's universalized philosophy of practical reason was hotly against alternative sexualities, by the way.
7 comments:
I note that what is upsetting them is comments people are leaving that vaguely threaten violence. "Boy, if I was ther..." "It's a good thing that none of the fathers of those children..."
I don't think such things should be held as meaningless, but neither are they actual violence. I have long said (though I admit it is less true on both sides these last ten years) that conservatives are more defensive but not reluctant to include human beings, while leftists go on offense with actual violence far more often, though they usually confine themselves to cars, windows and buildings, and other nonhuman targets.
Conservatives can do a lot of woofing, and it doesn't mean much until you are actually on their property or at their kid's school, at which point they will activate. Before that, they are making declarative warnings - and are often stupid and obnoxious about it, but still, it's a warning.
When leftists start talking like that, actual violence does result - a lot. There is a lot less distance between warning and action for them. Both groups project their own statement vs action patterns on the other and jump to conclusions.
So in the case of SMN, they shouldn't put much stock in it until it looks like actual people are going to get hurt. Admittedly, my theory is eroding over time.
Only in a pretend world can 'cult' be excised from 'culture,' which is to say that only in a pretend world can religion be removed from day-to-day life.
AVI's remarks serve to re-inforce that; Lefties are inclined to violence to maintain their pretend world--it's the world of their cult, after all, and their cult includes the use of violence (see, e.g., abortion.) To them, it's existential.
The Right is usually more circumspect about use of violence due to Christian principles, but it is certainly allowed.
The question is 'when'?
"(Again, whether or not the wholly anonymous dude in the bikini is in fact trans, or just a David Lee Roth impersonator, is not clear from the facts.)"
Grim, I'm not sure you're being fair to David Lee Roth here- he's a pretty interesting guy, and once said, after becoming a certified EMT and working for the NYPD EMT corps, “I wasn’t someone until I put on that 5.11 uniform and went on my first call, I’m not gonna kid you – I knew I was in for the humbling experience. A white-boy rock star thinks, ‘What, this is an easy gig?’”
He also spent two years learning Sumi-e art in Tokyo.
" The coverage demonstrates that people were passing rumors that are not supported by the video of the incident."
Not having experience to trust this outlet, as you do, I am suspicious. I assume there is no video within the locker rooms, and they don't say *how* they know he/she/dude did not enter, they simply proclaim it. Raises my BS antennae.
Hey, nothing against Diamond Dave! He just used to wear some interesting outfits.
What the video apparently shows is that dude never went into the women’s locker rooms, but used a ‘family’ room that allows both sexes.
Okay, if so that's clear. I'd suspect then that the man who reported this on behalf of his daughter probably heard her say something like she was concerned about going in the locker room because this person might be in there, and heard it as he was in there. Something like that anyway. I thought it was crass of them to shame him- which as far as I can see is the only reason for naming him.
Yes, I feel as if there’s a chance that they are not being equally empathetic to all sides. Their coverage reads to me as if they are just exhausted of patience with these people, and wanted to do the journalistic equivalent of reading them out from the altar.
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