Kathy, many of you will know is a member of a select group of some of the best bloggers in Canada who have been subjected to inquisition and excoriation for speaking plainly so she is more than a little sensitive on this point.
I joined immediately and found that the discussion trail at the bottom of the page was full of wandering moonbats and inexplicable bloviators. Sometimes I simply can’t resist the temptation playing whack-a-whack-o but the trail at the bottom of the join the group page was just too target-rich. Embarrassing in a way and I have ADHD- just too much stimulation…
The I happened upon the “discussion board” which was much less populated. I put up a post in support of Wente and we were off to the races. There were a few satisfying encounters. There was a “Poopy-header” http://breathofthebeast.blogspot.com/2007/05/no-poopy-heads-allowed.html named Hollingsworth who tried the old back-door moral equivalency gambit of calling Wente’s article an “atrocity”. Then I got to take a swipe at a poor old left-over anti-colonialist leftie trying to flog the old canards of colonialism and racism. But the one with staying power was someone named Antonia Zebrisias. I didn’t know it at the time but she is a newspaper columnist in Toronto.
In a sly aside she asked, “Mr. Ben Moshe, a question. Are you really concerned with American indigenous people here, or indigenous people in general?” Anyone with a Jewish surname knows what THAT question is about. So I answered (edited to remove typos):
Ms Zerbisias,
I suspect the tone of your question is a geopolitical sneer so I will just say that “Indigenous” is a foolish, guilt-ridden concept and one which allows all manner of "I was there first!" quibbling. I address all of the questions in great detail in my two blog posts on the subject. In case you missed them above here they are again- just in case you, Mr. Hollingsworth or anyone else would like to engage some real information rather than slinging sneers and jibes...
My two basic posts on Indians can be found here:
http://breathofthebeast.blogspot.com/2007/04/indian-guilt-and-american-view-of-islam.html
and here:
http://breathofthebeast.blogspot.com/2007/04/indian-guilt-and-american-view-of-islam_19.html
I could see immediately what she was about. She had less of a position on this than she did a pose. She answered with one of those mind-numbingly indirect and unfocussed replies that you get when someone has no clue what they are talking about, doesn’t care to to do the research or thinking required to turn it into a position but won’t give up on their “pose”. Here she is baffeling us with movement and “stuff”:
“With respect, Mr. Ben Moshe, I have repeatedly tried but I cannot get past your inability to separate your apparent anti-Muslim agenda from any thoughts you might have regarding indigenous peoples.
I also am trouble by your constant blanket referral to ''Indian culture,'' as if the Incas were the Aztecs were the Mayans were the Anazasi were the Cree were the Sioux were the Iroquois were the Haida. Their language, art, architecture, even gods were dissimilar.
Furthermore, referring back to your blog post, many of these were matriarchal societies, a fact that the Christian invaders could not and would not deal with. The breakdown of that structure caused irreparable damage, as it did with the African-Americans whose families the slaveowners had no regard for.
As for definitions of savage, well, if you lived on the plain or in the high desert, you were hardly of the forest now, were you?”
It’s all very light and breezy sounding but quite subversive. Here is the outline of her argument- right out of the liberal check list of anti-western, multiculturalists’ playbook:
Phony respect
Lying about trying to understand
Back door accusation of Islamophobia- Implying that if you are Zionist –or even Jewish you are anti-Muslim
Silly, hair-splitting distinction about “culture(s)”
Name dropping pretense to real knowledge about Indians
New-age twaddle about Matriarchal societies
BAD,BAD Christians, Blame the BAD Westerners
What is even more disturbing though is the style- the tone. It is light and breezy- an attempt to disarm. La-de-da- she says, I just tried and tried but I don’t under stand… I’ll just rattle off names of Indian tribes, that’ll impress ya… Blah blah blah. It reminds me of Strunk and White’s caution in The Elements of Style, “Do not affect a breezy manner. The breezy style is often the work of an egocentric, the person who imagines that everything that pops into his head is of general interest and that uninhibited prose creates high spirits and carries the day.”
I was not going to let it go by:
“With equal respect Ms Zerbisias, I think you are right about some things and mistaken about other things. One thing on which you err is your accusation that I am possessed of an anti-muslim agenda. Nothing could be further from the truth. I am only pointing out that that cohort of Muslims who insist on believing (among other preposterous things) that I and all other westerners- yourself included by the way- are nothing but pigs, dogs or monkeys and that it is their duty to murder us- me and my family and you and yours- for the greater glory of Islam, should be considered a bad influence and resisted.
Even if you were a Muslim yourself, and a nice moderate one, in the prophesied days of the Caliphate (or in many Muslim countries today) that picture of you with a bottle, classy little open necked jacket and ciggy would have the local morality police on your case in a jiffy! Women in Iran and Saudi Arabia have been beaten, beheaded, stoned and hanged for the like. No, I'm not anti-muslim but I'll defend your right not to wear a burkha with my life.
On the other hand, you are quite right in that you seem to lack something (patience, fortitude, reading comprehension?) to get past that thought and get on with some of the more difficult reasoning and evidence that I have laid out in painstaking detail and at exhaustive length both here and in those posts you mention.
Another thing you are correct on is that I wrote of "Indian culture" instead of Indian cultures for although I unintentionally implied by that that there was one culture that was less sophisticated and not as technologically advanced than the western culture, there were,in fact, a whole continent full of them. Some of them were more advanced than others but you are quite correct in reminding me that they were all, every last one of them, less advanced than the West. Thanks for that!
You'll pardon me, I hope, if I point out that all of those tribes you mention practiced bloody warfare on their neighbors. Moreover, the more complex the culture the bloodier were their religions. The Incas sacrificed children to their Gods, The Aztecs took captives from neighboring peoples and cut their still beating hearts out of their chests and held them up as offering to their Gods.
Please, look again and consider your last sentence. It seems, at first to be something of a non-sequitur but underneath that appearance is something more dangerous. You see, what you have just written is that "everything is relative." It all depends on your point of view. No culture is any better than any other. That is simply not so- If you had lived in one of those wonderful matriarchal Indian cultures, the other women would turn you and your multicultural vagueness out into the wilderness. Or- just try going to Iran or Saudi Arabia and try it out.”
I had clearly let her get to me but it made me think. I could have saved myself the trouble of this long response if I had only thought of the Elements of Style criteria first. When someone is bloviating and posing as opposed to taking a reasoned position, it makes sense that it will show in their style. I have always believed that good writing , though not a guarantee, is a good clue that there is a good mind at work. A blithe response is almost a dead giveaway of a blithering idiot at the keyboard. I am going to try to use E.B. White's and Will Strunk’s test first in the future.
96 comments:
Good Luck with the Zerb...
She is a great gal and as doctrinaire as you can be on all matters anti "Zionist", multi-cult and PC.
Having a sense of humour helps.
Actually, I thought you did pretty well, sometimes some transparent bloggers need a formal cannon ball across the bow, and if that don't work a good ole "thwraaaaap" in print for all to see will get their attention.
Personally though, I just can't stand smarmy people who think they need to do my thinking.
Ratt , Mt. Olive, Louisi-Yana
Instead of bloviating about Strunk and White, and the word fits you far better than it does Antonia, why not respond to the points that she made? You shy away from them, and indulge in an extended ad hominem instead.
All Indian cultures, in the plural, were inferior to the European ones at the time? The Mayans, the Aztecs, the Incas? More recently the Cherokee, prosperous farmers with their own writing system? The Iroquois, with a highly complex and successful political and trading system?
The Europeans were burning people alive for witchcraft and imprisoning people who thought the earth revolved around the sun, while the Aztecs had developed an astronomical calendar. The Incas had a complex information storing system (quipu).
And, just to preempt your stupid sneering, I do happen to know a fair bit about these and other Indian cultures that you conflated in your post.
Start with Ron Wright's "Stolen Continents," and if you want some guidance after that, I'll be happy to provide you with a reading list. Frances Widdowson, alas, will not be on it.
Perhaps we might get something more out of you than a sneer yet. I'm not betting the house on it, though.
Dawg owns a house?! Not very Marxist.
You really do believe all this crap, don't you? Wow.
Show me the Indian Michaelangelo, Einstein, Edison, Mozart and Ben Franklin and I'll be impressed. But of course you can't.
Indian cultures didn't invent anything lasting, whereas with all our faults, the West has.
Like this computer you're reading this on. Beats the hell outta smoke signals, eh?
Beast: stick with Plagues of the Mind, Not Out of Africa and the many other books that give the lie to this warmed over Rousseau noble savage crap.
Or better yet, just look around you. If Indian culture is so damn superior, how come they're so ****ed up?
Just curious Kathy, are you primarily stating that Western (as in European) culture is superior, or just that those of the Americas is inferior to that of everyone else?
The Zerb and Dawg are both proof that the modern Lefty needs to be able to believe in 12 impossible things before breakfast.
Yes you betcha, Western culture was at the time and certainly is now FAR superior to that of any/all Indian cultures in North America. Not only in technology, but also in how we get along with each other.
People like Dawg conveniently forget the inter-tribal warfare that happened pretty much without pause until the eeeevile White Man came over here and put a stop to it. Currently there is no inter-tribal warfare going on in Ontario (outside of the Jane/Finch corridor anyway.) The peace and security we take for granted every day and have done for well over 100 years was completely unthinkable back then.
Well, Dawg, that's one way to look at it.
Another way would be to point out that the self-same Aztecs with the super advanced calendar...were ripping the beating hearts out of sacrificial victims to ensure the sun rose (yes, that's a paraphrase, no, I won't cite chapter and verse).
Sorta puts "burning witches" into perspective, no?
And one of the reasons why the Aztec empire was so easy to conqueror was because the Spanish were allied with the tribes the Aztecs had brutally suppressed and colonized, which is ironic.
I'd highly recommend "Guns, Germs and Steel" by Jared Diamond for a good re-telling of why Europe conquered the rest of the world and not the other way around...
How is it possible that an allegedly grown man can go around spouting Marxist inspired tripe in this day and age and still expect to be taken seriously?
Of course Western culture is superior. That means somebody's has to be inferior. Too bad so sad, oh cowardly anonymous one?
Blaze girl: to me, it is very interesting to compare anthropology to climate change science.
Those who believe that the earth is burning will tell us that there is a consensus, the science is settled, and anyone not believing in the science of the consensus is a fool, a liar or on the take.
But when someone finds a scientific nugget that goes against established perceived wisdom of history not matter how small, not matter how OUT THERE, well, then they have to be listened to. Gotta break that racist, Euro-based patriarchal mindset! Celebrate the rebel! Those dead white males are always wrong, doncha know.
We really must hold more of these pow-wows at the Kom-Pew-Tor the white man calls Book With Face. They are more fun than flaying Catholic priests alive! Less messy too.
You are on to something the JAG, it's a bit like arguing with Troofers.
Er, that would be "no matter...", not not matter.
Damn drunk blogging...
And I'd recommend reading some Tom Dillehay as well...
Welcome all to my humble blog- It is ironic for me that this burst of warmth and activity happens as my Sabbath begins- I'll miss the party, I'm afraid but I rest easy knowing that Kathy Shaidle, Blazing Catfur et al are keeping vigil here. I am honored by your presence.
Happy Halloween!
The thing about human sacrifice is that the more primitive tribes are blessedly free of it (for them the animal, not the human is made sacred and "sacrificiable" as we can assume from the focus on animals, not humans, in the oldest cave paintings). That the Aztecs had festivals in which many thousands of captives were sacrificed was indeed a mark of their relative advancement; and the irrational in it was not entirely without some reason: the relative lack of animal protein in Mexico meant that eating humans had some nutritional and demographic logic (there may well have been a Malthusian limit there), however minimally aware of it people may have been.
Similarly, Europe's capacity to sacrifice millions before the machine guns of WWI was a sign of its relative advancement, and not only of what the primitive sacred looks like when realized in a modern context (anticipating Auschwitz and Hiroshima).
Nonetheless, I wouldn't want to live in any but a modern Western society, notwithstanding the big risks when things go wrong. The advantages are many and should be obvious as most of us would dead by our present age in any other kind of society; and there has never been a golden or romantic age of the tribal other, as anyone who thinks seriously about trying to survive with a few stone tools in the woods should realize, or thinks about the sacrificial violence of agrarian civilization. Those who romanticize the tribal past are only working to insure that those not yet satisfactorily incorporated into our now global modernity act in ways that will increase the likelihood of their continuing and unhappy marginalization.
There are a number of paradoxes to unravel. For example, those who would defend the West must also be able to account for the many who are working, with varying degrees of consciousness, to undermine the West and I am talking about quintessentially Western anti-Western figures (we all know the Gnostic and self-hating types). Can we be so sure of Western superiority if it breeds such people? must we not await the judgment of history to see who wins? And then, should the winners not be moderns, to see if they will not in turn eventually evolve into something like today's modernity?
The basic paradox is that the society that is capable of great violence (e.g. WWI) is also capable of the greatest deferal of violence (e.g. modern consumer society and democratic self-ruling nations in a rational inter-national order), and vice versa. There are no guarantees against some ultimate self-destruction, for the seed of the irrational and sacrificial is always with us, even when we are best able to see it.
Comments above remind of me of one of Rene Girard's dictums. Girard, who I believe to be in error when he argues that human sacrifice is original to human society, is I think right when he says: we did not stop burning witches because we invented science; we invented science because we stopped burning witches.
In other words, the key to our modernity is the eventual success of the inherently radical Christian revelation in helping Western society break out of the classical agrarian mold, but this did not happen until about 1500 years after the Christian revelation was first laid down, and in those 1500 years the "Christian" West was not radically different from other classical agrarian civilizations.
It is the last 500 years that are so revolutionary and so difficult for almost every other non-Judeo-Christian culture in the world to come to terms with.
Anyway, when we stopped burning witches and invented science, we unfolded modern possibilities that are not even yet typical of Western man and woman. I don't think a majority of Westerners have ever been at home in the Judeo-Christian revelation that makes possible modern science and free markets and self-ruling nation-states that at their best learn to live with internal and external others with a greater level of peace than any other kind of society; many Westerners have always been tempted by more primitive and more magical forms of religion and ethics. And that's, in good part why we had the horrors of the twentieth century, and we now have a massive White Guilt.
But if we ever give up the ghost of the scientific and kindred ethical revolutions, we will discover just how few people can live under the state of advancement reached by the earlier tribal and agrarian civilizations. There is only one kind of civilization - not that it is any way static or closed to new possibilities - that can support anywhere near the present population of the earth. Those who would condemn this civilization instead of helping us to come to a better understanding of it need to be held to account for the death toll that would be required to go back to earlier times.
Finally, as for Jared Diamond: he may be have a pleasing explanation for why isolated groups could not have advanced as did Westerners. But he has no explanation for why only the Western-most part of the Eurasian land mass was able to break into modernity and create the first global civilization (there is today only one economy, for most intents and purposes). For example, even today when the Chinese clearly want to embrace modern global capitalism, we see the great difficulties they have in developing the kind of political and ethical order many of us think will be necessary to sustaining their foray into global modernity. Diamond has no respect for Christianity which i think is the key to explaining Western success.
Is there anyone more stupid than Zerbisias, how she got where she is is beyond me, she is incapable of thinking for herself , she just spouts the same old PC claptrap over and over again, and loves to play the poor victim.
The net's pre-eminent stealth “poopy head arguer” said:
"The Europeans were burning people alive for witchcraft and imprisoning people who thought the earth revolved around the sun, while the Aztecs had developed an astronomical calendar. The Incas had a complex information storing system (quipu)."
Yaacov I loved your definition of "poopy head argument". These are essentially the Left's genetic reactionary snide ad hominems married to a little disingenuous logical fallicy used to justify the personal attack.
The prime example of “PHA” above comes, admittedly, from one of the most effective “poopy head" argue mongers on the net but his “poopy head” content is artfully camouflaged as supportive rationalization.
Note how this typical example of dawg “stealth PHA” has so many artfully melded elements of fallacious logic. If we dissect it we see; Introductory ad hominem mated to omissive misdirection, ad populum fallacy, false analogy, fallacious dichotomy of extremes, fallacy by inductive generalization, implied polarization fallacy, diversionary irrelevancy (red herring) and of course the implied stigmata of nonconformity to his POV.
However dawg’s anti-colonialist rant is conventional reactionary revisionism which makes standardizd false analogies and leaps of reason… like omitting the fact that similar cultural atrocities and superstitious reasoning also pervaded the pre Columbian cultures and in many cases were definative conventions...particularly where burning/torturing captives and slaves was a common pastime/amusement and sacrificing humans to deities in return for natural “favors” was common. Pre-Columbian culture had a thriving slave trade and enough patriarchal and totalistic injustice to fill any modern tyranny’s mass graves.
Then the false equivalency that idiosyncratic pictographing on rocks and hides or glyphs on monuments or prime number notches in tally sticks approximates the advance of European mathematics (concept of “zero” etc.) and portable wide spread literacy with paper, pen and standardized alphabet and of course the printing press, medical and scientific universities and libraries all established in Pre-Columbian Europe....or that the Columbian discovery itself was a testament to the value of science over superstition when supernatural Church dictum was ignored and old round earth charts and accurate solar/astro-mapping and global positioning instrumentation were used to “discover” and map America. European understanding of science, astronomy and navigation was not exclusively relegated to a priesthood and used for sacrificial and rite purposes…or the false analogy that the Iroquois confederacy "trade system" ( a plunder and slave trade monopoly) was the equivalent of trans-global commodity commerce between Europe- Asia and Africa...omitting these pertinent facts are well...artistic fallacy propagation to be sure.
But between you and me I like "poopy head argument" as a tag better Yaacov. ;-)
As for Zerb...she's been so absurd for so long I'm actually inclined to believe she was around to document the pre Columbian cultures she has dragged into her identity politics dyslexia...she certainly seems old enough....or at least reasons like the pre-Columbian shamans ;-)
I'm first. Just sayin.
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anybody up for a little "six degrees of retardation"?
dr dawg drops by to defend zerb who loves canadian cynic who has a little bit of an obsession... with guess what?
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superstitious reasoning also pervaded the pre Columbian cultures
Funny isn't it, that Stockwell Day's superstitious reasoning is open game for ridicule, but someone who believes in "Turtle Island" is somehow held to a higher esteem...
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"jag says... someone who believes in "Turtle Island" is somehow held to a higher esteem"
ah james... just one of the pitfalls of debating folks who wouldn't know leonardo davinci from leo dicaprio.
do what i do... lower your expectations.
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"Is there anyone more stupid than Zerbisias, how she got where she is is beyond me. She is incapable of thinking for herself, she just spouts the same old PC claptrap over and over again, and loves to play the poor victim..."
Don't think it's beyond you at all; you seem to grasp exactly how she got where she is, i.e., the Red Star. With her qualifications, there's nobody else who would hire her.
Kathy Shaidle is a racist. Simple as that. And proud of it, hoping that her glaringly racist commentary will bring her attention. To quote Shaidle, that is indeed, "Too bad, so sad."
Shane is an idiot and a liar.
Shane, the word racist no longer has any meaning, thanks precisely to people like you.
It has come to mean "anyone who mentions race in public, positively or negatively", and this renders sane, commonsense discourse impossible. There are differences in values and behaviors between people and cultures. This is an observable fact to anyone, even the brainwashed like you. Rendering discussions of these differences, which have huge implications for public policy, off limits is cultural suicide.
But then, the suicide of the West is something you'd probably welcome anyhow, right up to the moment you realize its true implications.
"A racist is anyone winning an argument with a liberal."
So please keep calling me a racist. I wear the badge with reluctant pride, knowing that's what the word has truly come to mean.
Anyway, I'd rather be a "racist" than an old hippie.
Just read the whole post here. Man, if BS were dollars, the mouth breathing beast would be very rich indeed. Talk about playing a hard game of "the same to you with hair on it..."!
Zerb is quoted, and the quoter discounts Zerb's reasonably founded points, accuses of Zerb of...what?
This is how it works for knuckle draggers. Shaidle is one of Canada's leading examples. She makes racist comment so regularly, and suffers no consequence, then goes on to whine about all the horrible consequences she is suffering, writes a "book" that is nothing much more than a poorly organized essay, flogs that, continues with the racist commentary, begging someone/anyone to come and charge her with something, ad nauseum.
Shaidle's racism is blatant. Because it's blatant she argues, in her ridiculous way, that she's not racist. Because the words "racist" and "racism" are oft used, Shaidle and the club swinging narrow-minded right wingers who salivate over her nonsense, argue that there is no such thing.
The words "racism" and "racist" are used around Shaidle for a very simple, very clear reason. She's a racist. She's proud of being a racist. She can be a racist because racism is not against the laws of the land. History shows, thankfully, that the notoriety of idiots like Shaidle is generally short lived.
When we tell Dawg that the Vatican boasts the oldest radio studio AND astronomical observatory in Europe, maybe his head will finally explode and we can have done with him.
I wonder Dawg: if you believe ancient Indian culture is so wonderful, maybe you and I should settle our differences as they would, with weapons, rather than on the web.
Oh wait, that's different, right? You don't mind the white man's rule of law, police forces, lawyers etc as long as it keeps you safe and lets you keep bloviating your nonsense in peace. I forgot.
There are parasitical cultures and non-parasitical cultures, basically. You are a parasite in a non-parasitical one. No wonder you support those who take and give nothing in return.
There we have it. Shaidle at her obviously racist best/worst. Indians offer nothing to the culture, they are parasites. Hitler called the Jews vermin. Hitler suggested the Jews offered nothing to German culture, and were in fact...vermin.
The difference between Hitler and Shaidle? Power and influence and one moustache.
Now perhaps the owner,operator of this blog will hold forth with a treatise on the quantifiable differences between "parasites and vermin..." for all our edification.
Shane makes "poopy head arguments"
Right Yaacov? ;-)
Every one is a Raaay-cist who dissents from the leftoid myth de jour with strong opinion or counter argument.
Racist = not a partisan zombie
Oh, for Jesus Christ's sake! I'm not gonna get sucked in to this rightist masturbation, ok? Look up a word in the dictionary. Accept it's basic meaning. Or deny it. Grow up.
No one on the left is convincing anyone on the right of much. And none of this has anything to do with any of that anyway. This is about pretentious folks with visions of journalistic or literary prowess jacking off in cyberspace.
Like you, Redux, but you would never admit to that, nor would Shaidle. Here is some better news, and context, I think.
Shaidle likes to think of herself as being on the vanguard of some kind of courageous truth speaking, with her usually inane and ridiculously over simplified trade in stereotypes about minorities.
Like the Breathless Beast insists; we "need" to read her blog and buy her book. No, we don't need to do that. I would be willing to submit, to a jury of my peers, this idea:
Folks who don't read Kathy Shaidle have better mental health.
And, happily, we are in the majority. We being the tolerant group of humans who don't reduce everything to sandbox level efforts at bullying.
Shaidle (and you Redux) are part of fringe group. Your points of view are and will be rejected by that "mainstream" you so badly wish to be recognized by. Ironic given your obsessive bashing of other minorities.
Oh pleaaaaasssseee buy my e book!
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"shane o'sanctimonius says...We being the tolerant group of humans who don't reduce everything to sandbox level efforts at bullying."
hmmm... let's go ask la zerb's favourite blogger about that, shall we?
you puffins kill me.
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Canadian Cynic is part of the same fringe group you are, Neo Con. No question there. I'll bet he is also in his pyjamas on a Saturday morning, instead of going outside for some exercise.
So push away the keyboard, Neo Con, because that group I am talking about, most Canadians, are tolerant AND not following any of these blogs.
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"shane o'sanctimonius splutters... Canadian Cynic is part of the same fringe group you are"
ah, my megalomaniacal friend, he nonetheless remains zerb's favourite blogger. and zerb, according to you anyway, is the cat's pyjamas.
and who are you?
shane o'rourke
* Age: 55
* Gender: Male
* Astrological Sign: Cancer
* Zodiac Year: Snake
* Industry: Non-Profit
* Occupation: Being perpetually unstable
* Location: Burnaby : British Columbia : Canada
that explains a few things... maybe time to tweak the ol' meds, huh?
or maybe just another hit on that infamous b.c. bong.
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If perpetual instability is the alternative to proudly racist, or as in your case, bullet-headed, then the bong it is, Neo Con. Better the bong than the bang.
Typical gun toting tactic to take a humourous remark and suggest it's evidence to support your cause, which is intolerance. Anyhow, the winds of change are going to blow some major bong smoke into your face come Tuesday, eh? The bullet-head in chief is going down to defeat and the dreaded very tolerant very liberal voice of change and reason is coming to power. Time to crawl back under a rock Neo Con.
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"shane o'sanctimonious replies... the bong it is"
good choice shane... i guess logic and reason are a little too challenging for unrepentant hippie-dom.
so what's your problem with canadian cynic? your comrade-in-arms, dr dawg, flat-out adores his misogynistic ass.
i've just gotta say... loved the reference to "oiljesus bushhitler"... whatever will the benighted leftosphere do without him?
"uh, dave's not here man."
"come back shane, come back".
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Well Shane,
Maybe you can believe that about Obama because Rev. Wright hasn't set up a church in Burnaby yet. Just before I go to the gym, let me point out that I have actually read Shaidle and Vere's book and can report that it has (notwithstanding the authors' taste for polemics) a sophisticated understanding of the nature of tolerance, especially in its conclusion. It is a short book but it clearly gets at a larger point that the "tolerance" religion of today's postmodern relativists doesn't get.
Being intolerant of those who discuss differences (however well) in the name of tolerance is just to suggest you haven't really done much working through the paradox. Tolerance is a good that cannot stand on its own but has to stand in relation to something more specific, i.e. a confident, coherent, and liveable identity, which includes a viable political identity (i.e., most preferably an incorporation in the kind of culture that can maximize human freedom and self-rule - and tribal culture ain't it). Only with such can we truly embrace uncertainty and humility.
Having said that, obviously Kathy does say things that she knows will be labelled "racist" by your crowd. That point of fact is not in contention though you don't seem to be fully aware of this. It is revealing that all you can do here is insist we agree to shout "racist", to expel the heretic. But you do not provide us any serious way to talk about he fact of human differences. You might embrace "diversity" but only to ban serious discussion of it. There may be limits to Kathy's way of discussing differences but you show no signs of seriously engaging these and taking us further because you need a dogmatic religion that will not broach the question of how to talk about difference. You know, in the manner of postmodern pseudo-sophistication, that any such discussion would entail differentiation and valuation. And that is what you are religiously afraid of doing. Thus you support a man for President who has managed to say next to nothing about what he really believes, beyond hope change and happysad.
My friends and I were discussing the other day if there will be a noticeable blip in youth suicide after the realities of Obama's fallen humanity comes better into view and all the nihilist (i.e. "antiracist") youth who put their last best hopes into the One, have their weakly founded hopes dashed by reality. I'm afraid that is quite possible and we need to start a campaign to show otherwise: kids, there is real Hope and Change after Obama.
Sorry, should have edited that last comment better:
Being intolerant of those who discuss differences (however well) in the name of tolerance is just to suggest you haven't really done much working through the paradox.
-should read: Being intolerant, in the name of tolerance, of those who discuss differences (however well) is just....
Shane O'Buttcrack = that Johny Maudlin burnout? Eeeew! Poster boy for why recreational drug use is a bad thing.
You'll get better sense out of a rock. At least the rock knows to shut up when it has nothing to say.
Kathy Shaidle writes things that she knows will be labelled "racist" by my crowd, Truepeers. Man, for someone who writes pretty clearly, for the most part, you sort of fell off the edge of your own words there.
Shaidle writes that Indians are parasites. Indians=parasites. That is not something that my "crowd" would determine is racist. That's something that any English speaker with access to a dictionary will identify as racist.
Shaidle is a racist truepeers, but worse than that, she's a predictable bore. Her priorities are very plain:
1) attention for Shaidle
2) attention for Shaidle
3) attention for Shaidle
This will no doubt be vehemently denied by the likes of Shaidle but most of the scientific discoveries claimed as their own by Europeans were stolen from Moslem knowledge and learning during the Crusades.
I can't stand it! Here I am trying to prepare a thoughtful post on the last few days of activity here- I was even making headway on trying to get some value out of the exchanges with Dr. Dawg and Shane and now, I get this from debeauxos.
"most of the scientific discoveries claimed as their own by Europeans were stolen from Moslem knowledge and learning during the Crusades."
Debauxos (do you pronounce that like de bozos) dear, please do not make statements like that any more. I hope that you are just saying it to taunt me into being aggressive and insulting and invidious so that I'll be lowered to the same level as Dr Dawg and Shane. The truth is, you make Dr Dawg look like Dr Brainiac!
Look, why don't you just take your tin-foil hat, your quartz crystal lucky charm and your cold fusion power plant and get back to emailing your bank account information to the widows of deceased Nigerian politicians.
If you can actually believe- and hope that I will too- that the crusaders (a rabble of uncultured, mostly illiterate, knights and archers), plundered the great storehouse of science and ideas from the Muslim world and brought them back to Europe to be parceled out over the next few centuries on a schedule that would not arouse any any suspicion until now, then I am forced to assume that you are either so blinded by hatred of western civilization or so dumb that you couldn't empty piss out of a boot if the instructions were written on the bottom of the sole.
Stop it! just Stop!
no all scientific knowledge comes from us
the pyramids
nuclear power
the integrated circuit
gatorade
we also probed whitley strieber
man what a job that was
and no punctuation and no capital letters
Shane,
I haven't a clue what a racist is anymore. It's a term of abuse that gets flung so readily by the terminally self-righteous. Perhaps you could explain to me what you think the word means. Does it mean someone who notices cultural differences? Someone who doesn't like some cultural differences? Someone who notices some cultures are more productive, freer, powerful, than others?
As for aboriginals in Canada, how do we talk about the reality that large numbers of natives today are dependent on the state, something I think we only further encourage when we negotiate land claims to give property not to individuals but to tribal entities? Now if someone were to say that tribal culture and tribal property is incompatible with the needs of individuals in the modern global economy, and incompatible with the exercise of political freedom in a modern nation-state, and that those who promote tribalism in the name of supporting aboriginals are in fact only encouraging the latters' continuing dependence on tribal hierarchies and the state, I would agree. Does that make me a racist?
The problem is rather a difficult one. Clearly we in Canada and around the world are witness to various populations whose members are not yet satisfactorily incorporated into the modern global economy; and there is only one independent economy in the world today. Do you encourage the relative outsiders' incorporation by not saying what might be discouraging: telling them things about their culture, and hence their individual selves, that makes it tough for people to become economically successful modern individuals (something which it should be no shame to admit is not at all natural to our humanity or easy to become)? Or do you attempt some kind of "tough love"?
If there were an easy answer to this pragmatic dilemma, it would be well known by now. But we readily can mitigate against people becoming productive in the modern economy both by discouraging them by telling them that their tribal culture is no longer very viable, that it isn't worth much in most marketplaces, and also by romanticizing their tribal culture and calling it equal or superior to the modern.
Both approaches often fail to do any good; but the latter is almost certain to keep people down, while the "tough love" approach has perhaps a slight chance of success.
At the end of the day, the truth about the condition of poorly incorporated people has to come from within the culture itself; and to this end, having a variety of outside voices for insiders to weigh, even some nasty ones, is for the best. Shutting things up with charges of "racism" probably helps no one.
But frankly I think most Canadians and Westerners today are more or less parasites on the legacy of wealth and knowledge that has been handed down to us, and that few of us, including myself, do enough to renew it and to pay off our debt to past generations. Am I a racist?
Before one gets one's knickers in a twist over anything Antonia Verbiagenishkiswyck or whatever her name is writes/thinks, one should stop and ask oneself: "Can a cucumber think? Do carrots enjoy the same rights as parsley? Is Elvis alive?"
Really now, let's get serious. Any thinking and literate humanoid know that what the Zerb writes isn't even worth a skidmark in one's shorts. She's well known for the shiny, slimy trail she leaves in her wake. Speaking of which, I hope I'm invited to attend the Zerb's wake. I'll bring sparklers and those noisemakers that the kids like so much, but please remember that I really like those little pastry sausage rolls that come with dip, okay? It would be really great if one you you guys brought some of those. And cheese fingers! Somebody bring some of those, okay? Who's gonna volunteer to bring punch?
Dawg:
A few corrections...
1) The Cherokee are in fact a southern Iroquois people, not a completely seperate people.
2) The Cherokee writing system was developed by a man named Sequoyah who took influence from both the current English and Cyrillic alphabets to create an 85 symbol alphabet. You can see the wikipedia article here: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cherokee_syllabary
My thoughts...
Without the western influence, the Cherokee might not have developed a written language in the first place.
Also, the generalization that Europeans were busy persecuting people who believed that the earth revolved around the sun is unfair. Galileo Galilei and Johannes Kepler come to mind for letting their love of astronomy embroil them in political conflict.
Galilei himself was specifically told that defending his circular orbital heliocentrism as one of several possible theories would not get him into trouble. When Galileo ignored the advice, the religious authorities did something liberals today tell us is quite acceptable: they banned his book because what he said was unacceptable in public discourse.
rac·ism
Pronunciation:
\ˈrā-ˌsi-zəm also -ˌshi-\
Function:
noun
Date:
1933
1 : a belief that race is the primary determinant of human traits and capacities and that racial differences produce an inherent superiority of a particular race
2 : racial prejudice or discrimination
— rac·ist \-sist also -shist\ noun or adjective
No, Truepeers, I don't think, given the context of what you're writing, that you're a racist. Given the context within which Shaidle is writing, and what she clearly intends the reader to understand about what she is writing, she is a racist, and a particularly virulent one.
yaacov, I just saw a a new drug for hepatitis C announced on the Bloomberg ticker this morning. Obviously this drug was STOLEN from the Moslem knowledge during the crusades. A fatwa of condemnation declaring jihad shall be issued later today I'm sure.
Which only goes to show that there are people out there who are bigger retards than the Zerb. Hard as that may be to imagine.
Need more evidence? Johnny Maudlin/Shane O'Dickslap calling Kathy Shaidle a racist on your blog, purely for the purpose of driving up his own sad little blog stats. You got a (1) free hit from me, Johny. Isn't that exciting?
You can't debate these people. You can't lampoon them either. All you can really do is allow them to briefly display their hideous ignorance and/or personality disorder(s), and then beat them with the clue bat until they crawl back under their rocks.
Take a cue from Kathy, she put a big frickin' rusty nail in the end of hers. ~:D
Wow. That hit a nerve?
The Crusaders were accompanied by clerics, some of whom recognized the value of the material that was plundered. I'm not talking about a conspiracy here - you are. It has been well documented that learned, scientific manuscripts were taken during the many invasions of the Holy Land.
It is discouraging that you should stand and defend zealots such as Shaidle, whose Catholic ancestors (my ancestors too) started systematically persecuting Jews back then, with the semi-official authorization and encouragement of religious figures.
I am shamed by the pain, the cruelty and the injustice that my European ancestors in France and Germany inflicted upon their Jewish neighbours.
But that doesn't mean that I will refrain from stating historically accurate facts.
debeauxos said: "It has been well documented that learned, scientific manuscripts were taken during the many invasions of the Holy Land."
Wow dude, that's pretty amazing stuff. Especially considering the scientific method wasn't even invented until Francis Bacon made it up. Them Moslem types must have been pretty sharp doing stuff that hadn't even been invented until like 300 years later.
You can see why we mock you, right?
phantom's ignorance of non-western science is breathtaking, not to mention predictable.
Phantom: I note you and Shaidle have an increasing tendency to reference violence as an approach to convincing others of your brilliance. Bats with nails in the end? Clubs?
There is no debate about these two things, Phantom:
1) the meaning of the word racist
2) Shaidle's qualification to wear the label
That is unless you are now deciding on the meaning of words by looking them up in your special neo conservative dictionary. You know, the one with the big pictures?
There is no debate about these two things
-well, at the risk of debating Chairman gawd,
a belief that race is the primary determinant of human traits and capacities and that racial differences produce an inherent superiority of a particular race
-have you ever noticed how the dictionary can be circular and not the key to real thinking? So, racism is a belief in race!! Now, Shane, tell me what is race and tell me how Shaidle thinks it is the primary determinant of human traits.
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"truepeers asks... Does that make me a racist?"
you're kidding right?
this "racist" thing is so far off the chain... the socialists are apparently willing to eat their own young... over this very point.
don't imagine, for even a second, that reason ands logic have anything to do with this... like the b.s. at the chrc, this is all about "hurt feelings".
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deboz...
So if science is Islamic, how come the Islamic world today is so weak in scientific fields, a world that covers a pretty large chunk of the world's territory and population. I know, the crusades, colonialism, yada yada. But there is more science in India, say, and it has been very brutally conquered by the Muslims and then colonized by the Brits... Oh, so is Indian science Islamic too?
Modern science, as it emerged in the 17th century, seems to me clearly an outgrowth of the Christian faith that the Creation is both good, and stable (the will of Allah will not lead to capricious interventions in it, changing its nature) and so we can study and manipulate its great power without fear that we are meddling with something greater than ourselves. It is also in large part an outgrowth of the modern nation-state, something that has only a small purchase in the Islamic world. Much if not most "Islamic" science can be explained as the fruits of the Islamic empire's conquest of earlier, more independent cultures. Imperial cultures themselves are never very creative or productive, and this is not just and Islamic/Arabic thing. Dare I say it, empires are inherently parasitical.
It is very simple really-
No, Shane, I will point this out one more tiresomely obvious time. There is no debate about the dictionary definition of the word racism but allow me to point out that neither KS nor I (nor anybody else who has posted here and is completely exasperated with your unwillingness to engage the truth) meets the definition. That inability on your (and Dawg's and de bozos' parts) is why Truepeers implies that there is no clear definition anymore. We are debating the question of culture here and although culture is often coincident with racial differences, it is in no way identical with them. It is simple empirical fact that the culture of the group can either doom its individuals to compete for life and resources at an inferior level or give them an enormous advantage over other similarly able individuals. If the predominant racial mixture of one group is white (or black or Asian), that is an irrelevancy.
So, you see, your logic is flawed, because you do not understand the difference between race and culture. The main difference is that one is born with race and one is acquires culture.
By equating the two, you actually become the racist because you have, in effect, subscribed to the idea that these differences are in-born and cannot be changed. One cannot change their race but they most certainly can acculturate and learn.
Here's a little airtight logic for you to contemplate: To deny (or ignore) the significance of culture is not tolerance, it is ignorance. Hence tolerant multiculturalists are ignoramuses.
neocon,
kind of kidding, but also curious if Shane can but a coherent argument together, or whether "anti-racism" has gotten to the point where nothing but instant apprehension of heretics is cool, like pointing out bourgeois tendencies in Maoist China. She wears glasses!
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"truepeers says... like pointing out bourgeois tendencies in Maoist China"
or, more to the point, the salem witch trials.
*
heh. I like you nailed her latant antisemitism. She used to rant about Israel all the time util the Red Star made her the baby killer kolimnist.
Again, boys and girls, if bullshit were currency, some of you would be very wealthy indeed...
Truepeers: I take back what I said about your writing. You are just as confused and/or dishonest as Shaidle and the host of this blog. The definition of the word "racism" does not indicate what you suggest it indicates. It's not circular, it's quite clear. But you are not willing to see that so you employ the supposed clever magic of mirrors.
1 : a belief that race is the primary determinant of human traits and capacities and that racial differences produce an inherent superiority of a particular race
Pay attention, Truepeers, if you can manage that, to the word "traits...". Also these two words "primary determinant..." and finally "superiority"
And Yaacov, if you're tired take some freakin' Geritol. You are another smoke blower. I notice neither of you brilliant lads are willing to address Shaidle's Indians=parasites commentary, which is ongoing.
That's not too surprising. When you cannot deal with the simple truth, attempt to baffle with BS.
dude,
what is circular is defining "racism" in terms of "race", without explaining the nature of "race".
What exactly is a race and in what sense does a racist think it "determines" traits? Only when you answer that can I decide if your idea of racism refers to something bad or is applicable to Shaidle.
But you are obviously obfuscating, lest you admit to yourself doubts regarding your last best hope for knowing a sure thing and have to face some kind of existential uncertainty for which you are not prepared.
I'm sorry to hassle you so. I just want you to know that there is hope and redemption after you admit to yourself that you obsessed with persecuting heretics to paint over your own uncertainties.
You give me little choice, at this juncture, old hippy that I am, but to quote Bob Dylan:
"I don't believe you, Truepeers, you're a liiaaarrr!"
Dude, back at you; let's pretend, for the sake of this discussion that there are the following races: the white races, the black races, the yellow races, the red races. Can we do that, or is that a circular situation? Are there Chinese folks, or have I been misled by "left tards and moonbats"?
Are there Indians? If so, when Kathy Shaidle insists that Indians are "parasites" would you be willing to accept that parasite like behaviour would qualify as a "trait"? Or would you prefer to ignore all of that for your own set of definitions?
Shane, correcting you is a job beyond Geritol. I have to say you have taken "thick" to levels only measured before in neutron stars. You say that no one has addressed the Indian=parasite commentary but it is just that you are commenting on things you either haven't read or are not capable of understanding. To wit, Kathy wrote,"There are parasitical cultures and non-parasitical cultures, basically. You are a parasite in a non-parasitical one. No wonder you support those who take and give nothing in return." THERE IS NOTHING IN THERE ABOUT INDIANS BEING PARASITES. It is about culture not race.
There is no dehumanizing characterization of Indians as sub-human parasites at all, merely a reference Indians culture(s) as not being, in any sense that would be recognized here as "productive".
A;hough she HAS called YOU a parasite and I'm sure she means that in the best way possible. I don't know you well enough to agree or disagree for sure, but your argumentative style might well be described as parasitical. After all, this misapprehension on your part is either sheer stupidity, or a mean-spirited wish to brand Ms Shaidle with an undeserved epithet - or both.
Do yourself a favor and try to figure out why you want to rant so badly that you are willing to make a fool of your self by accusing others of your own shortcomings.
Yaacov: Listen, pal, don't give up your day job in pursuit of an avocation of "correcting" anyone. Your intellectual dishonesty is as blatant as Shaidle's racism.
Now you want to default to the position that Shaidle is making comment on Indian "culture" not their ethnicity? You're a liar. And you know it.
But on the off chance you tell the truth, once in awhile, when you look into a mirror, contemplate this (afterward you might need a nap, so don't exert yourself too much...)
If Shaidle is suggesting that an entire culture is parasitical and that culture happens to be the culture of a ethnic group,are you comfortable that this is not racism? What then? Culturism? It's doesn't matter. Both you and Shaidle are preaching to the choir, and it's a very very small choir at that.
It's just such transparent nonsense, and you know it. What you are about, and what Shaidle is about, is that you fancy yourself capable of great argument. But you're not. You have demonstrated a thick skull, a tendency to shift gears when confronted with material you are shamed by, and some ability to be clever with words. But you're not particularly adept at that either.
You belong to a "culture" that is on the eve of being quite thoroughly discredited. I'll spare a thought for you tomorrow evening, lad, when a generation of neo conservatives are tossed from power for their lies and their sins.
Told you, guys. Clue bat, big frickin' rusty nail on the business end.
I mean, what the hell do you say to somebody who argues that Francis Bacon DID NOT invent the scientific method, you racist Moslem hating clod you! But they can't actually cough up the name of the guy who -did- invent it. You have a name for me, de bozo? Probly not, right?
You can't have a rational argument with the Shane/Johnny creature either. He's not a rational person. I tried one time, but he resorted to forgetting what the thread was about.
Case in point: "Phantom: I note you and Shaidle have an increasing tendency to reference violence as an approach to convincing others of your brilliance. Bats with nails in the end? Clubs?"
Cluebat a well known expression, Mr. O'Buttcrack sir. Been in circulation a loooong time. You probably missed it, busy smoking up no doubt.
Here's a picture of Kathy's cluebat.
http://www.llbbl.com/data/RPG-motivational/target164.html You should be so lucky if one of those cartoon spikes penetrates the friggin' four inch bone of your friggin' over-calcified, dope raddled cranium and drives a molecule of sense in there. Be a novel experience for you.
More from the neutron dunce-
Shaneey boy, you say I am shifting and defaulting when the problem really is that you simply can't or won't read. I'll repeat it for you. Here, read her statement again:
"There are parasitical cultures and non-parasitical cultures, basically. You are a parasite in a non-parasitical one. No wonder you support those who take and give nothing in return."
Hellooo, planet of people who can read and think to Shane, that's "parasitic cultures" she wrote. It has been three days and you still haven't mastered that simple passage. Do you really not understand, or are you the liar?
And now that you mention "Cultureism" is a lot closer to the truth than racism is. What it really is, is what works best, advances humanity, and gives people the maximum opportunity to reach their fullest potential in life. That may not matter to cranky, self-loathing, prevaricating pests like you, but consider that you, with your attitude, would have been tied up and left in the nearest snow drift before your fifteenth birthday by most Indian cultures. In our culture you are allowed (even encouraged) to make a nuisance of your self as much as you want. And look at the thanks we get...
Then too, you have, by your reference to the elections tomorrow demonstrated that you have no idea what culture is. We are not denizens of different cultures. We, much as I regret it, share a great culture. True enough, one of us hates it and the other loves it but it is the same culture and we both have to live here. By the way, don't think that this thing is over just yet...
Oh, and listen, about that thought you were planing for me tomorrow? I don't think you should chance it, bucko, you clearly don't have any brain power to spare.
It's over, alright, and you and your ilk are going to be crying on your keyboards come Wednesday at bed time. All the long-winded and windy word tricks won't make any difference now Ben. The last eight years of neo con rule will be remembered as one of the worst managed in history. A war that has cost hundreds of thousands of lives to avenge the loss of three thousand and supposedly protect the USA.
A meltdown of a financial system that leaves old folks on fixed incomes in peril. These are things you are proud of?
And we're the leftards, eh?
Losers is the culture you are part of Benny boy, about to be disgraced.
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"shane o'sanctimonious intones... 'Losers is the culture you are part of, my young jedi, about to be disgraced.'"
oh gawd, we're in trouble now... it's master yoda!
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Wow Shaney, I'm all chastened like.
So when do the Gestapo come to take us all off to the work camps? Just wondering.
The greatest election victory, including by popular vote, since Lyndon Johnson, another Democrat. Oh how the mighty and righteous conservatives have fallen. Americans, with the exception of the deeply racist in the deep south, have acted wisely this evening. This may even humble some of the countless blow hards on the right wing in the blogosphere, but I won't hold my breath.
But what a resounding repudiation for most of everything that's happened, gratis Bush and his band of wizards, this last eight years.
Talk to me in a couple years, burnout. We shall see how your RRSP is doing then.
FYI, the market puked 300+ points today and its only 1pm.
Enjoy the party, 'cause the hangover is going to huuuurt!
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"shane o'sanctimonious crows... what a resounding repudiation for most of everything"
so shane, let's leave the silly playground taunts aside for a moment... what exactly is it... that you "hope"... is gonna "change" ?
and please... be specific.
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Neo-Con: My experience "discussing" these things on with folks like you is that you are generally bullshitters who are interested in argument, to the exclusion of any real exchange of ideas...
And thankfully your ilk are on the sidelines for the next few years, reduced to the fringe where you belong. All that said, on the very remote chance your question was sincere, I will give one example of what I expect President Obama (ah, it sounds great, doesn't it?) to do that will constitute real change:
I expect him to follow through and draw down American troops in Iraq over the 18 months he has given as a time line. When that happens there is going to be terrible bloodshed as the Sunni and Shia populations settle scores and a resurgent al Queda attempt to exacerbate all that carnage and influence all Iraqis to move toward a theocracy.
I expect President Obama to suck up the lousy feelings that will result. Tough shit, eh? This is the outcome of Bush's boneheaded removal of the strongman that kept maintained an Arab style status quo.
I also expect him to exit Afghanistan as soon as he has Bin Laden's head on a stake. If Americans, and neo cons like yourself have still failed to understand your abysmal lack of success at changing the dynamics in the middle east, then time will show Obama is just another misguided American.
See, this is what I like about Shaney/Johnny. He does my work for me.
So Mr. O'Buttcrack sir, the presence of the US military is the only thing preventing "terrible bloodshed as the Sunni and Shia populations settle scores and a resurgent al Queda attempt to exacerbate all that carnage and influence all Iraqis to move toward a theocracy."
And you want Obama to pull out and just blow off all the "bad feelings", right?
This is the same Shaney that professes to be a pacifist and tells The Phantom off for violent talk about smacking people with a cluebat.
Not frickin rational. Just another bitter old pot-head with a hate on, trolling his betters for a few measly hits on his disgusting blog.
Bite me, Shaney. You suck, and you are so DUMB you don't even know why.
Just for the record, folks, you are welcome to check the difference between visitors to my humble blog and the Phantoms. I have happily established a lovely 30 visitor a day readership and have managed to do that on the strength of my writing, the range of the things I write about, and the absence of the kind of nonsense that is spewed compulsively by folks like Phantom, who is clearly reacting badly to the sideline sitting he has been sentenced to.
Man, it feels good to be here at a time when your world view has been so thoroughly discredited Phantom. All ya got is your pjs, your wet dreams about weapons and a world getting ready to move left, eh?
What a crying shame ;-)
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"shane o'sanctimoniuous preens... a lovely 30 visitor a day readership"
30 hits a day... you go girl !!!
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Neo Con: the point is this lad, and it may be difficult for you to fathom. I write about stuff other than who the boogie man of the day is or ought to be. The massive hit counts at pages of haters is nothing to boast about. I've done nothing to advertise my blog, I don't go cap in hand whining about buy-my-e book-and-I-won't-have-to-find-a real job. I don't trade in obnoxious racist hateful speech, doing my best to attract gawkers the way shit attracts flies.
So that 30 folks come by and read my stuff is a good thing. How many folks are reading you Neo Con? Or you Phantom?
You two girls are followers, I think. Essentially groupies. But let's have an example of something you have written.
Shane, you wrote: Americans, with the exception of the deeply racist in the deep south, have acted wisely this evening.
I was unaware that Montana, North and South Dakota, Idaho, Wyoming, Kansas, Utah and Arizona were in the deep south of the USA.
And I'm equally astonished to learn that roughly 45% of the population of the United States lives in the deep south--but they must, according to you, because that's how many people didn't "act wisely" by which I take you mean "vote for Obama".
And are you actually saying that if one didn't vote for Obama, one must be deeply racist? Given what you wrote, that's an inescapable conclusion.
Just one sentence of yours, replete with so many errors and faulty assumptions. I'll certainly be looking to you for accurate knowledge on a whole range of issues.
Just had a quick boo at your blog Neo Con. You have some hits, but your writing is lousy. No range there at all. Just more finger pointing. No colour. Black and white. Bad boogie men on the horizon people, be afraid, be very afraid.
And Phantom, nothing to say about your site at all, is there?
Ron, you have done an interesting bit of context mangling. But I think your comment is fair enough, really. I'm not an political or electoral map expert. I am comfortable with this: there is residual racism, without any doubt, in the USA. In the deep south and in other parts of the country.
Those other voters are likely not so much racist as they are just plain dumb. Kidding. Sort of. I happen to be convinced (which doesn't make me right) that anyone who would have supported John McCain, as a leader, over Barack Obama, is pretty narrow in their understanding of what the world needs at this time.
But certainly lots of folks the world needs more killing, more polarization, more us versus them.
Finally, if it helps, I absolutely understand and accept that racism is not the sole possession of white people. I'm sure plenty of black folks believe they are superior to white folks across the board.
It's overly broad, a human failing.
Black people are, in fact, superior to white people in ways we can discuss. No big deal.
In the end, Ron, at this time, the news has been written, hasn't it? Let's not cling to percentages. Barack Obama and the Democrats defeating the Republicans just as convincingly as they could have.
Conservatives need to be examining themselves, not arguing those results.
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"shane o'sanctimonious says... How many folks are reading you Neo Con?"
well, shane... funny you should ask... i just passed a half million uniques last week. i do about a thousand hits a day.
best day ever... just shy of 4500 hits.
but, of course, i just don't have the star quality that you obviously... (if you do say so yourself)... possess.
don't worry, shane... maybe some day you can get up on the porch with the big dogs.
i mean, there are at least 30 of yer bong-totin' brethren who are rootin' for ya... right?
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Shane wrote"
"Just had a quick boo at your blog Neo Con. You have some hits, but your writing is lousy. No range there at all."
And there you have it! The quintessential socialist answer to market research. Apparently in Shane's World the number of hits a blog gets is in inverse proportion to the quality of the blog. Maybe its just the morbid fascination of the "lousy" writing that attract so many people to other blogs- sort of like what draws people to gawk at train wrecks.
Or maybe you are mistaken, Shane, and its an indication that you have to make sense and write about things that other people identify with and care about. Maybe people have to feel as though they get something of value when they read your posts.
But value is not what being a superannuated hippie is all about, is it? It's about disdaining value, especially the democratic and entrepreneurial values of western culture. Its about wasting time and energy getting all upset when someone else makes a value judgement about culture-especially a pet culture of "ancient wisdom" (read: non productive).
I am surprised that thirty people visit a day. But then, there are probably six or so that are brought in by Google searches that have gone awry and a few close friends and relatives among those thirty. Throw in the odd work related acquaintance and the actual number of people with the requisite residual drug-induced brain damage or free-floating hatred of Western Civilization to be reading for content there makes more sense.
Think about it, what does a socialist do with art, writing or speech with which he disagrees? He starts out calling it lousy then he calls it degrading or hateful. Then (if he has the power) he gets it banned. And from there, well its just a hippie-dippie skip and a jump to concentration camps and Gulags.
Did you ever get a look at Soviet, Nazi or Korean art? My, my, all those stern-faced young people look very determined, Mr. Lenin, but where is the love, the movement, the free will? Ever listen to socialist music? I'll take debased, bourgeois Beethoven over Wagner any day, Adolf, thanks just the same.
God help us, when Canada goes totally socialist, they won't just be taking Kathy, Blazing Cat Fur and Ezra to court anymore they will be forcing the rest of us to read only the likes of Shane!
BTW, if I ever have a day as low as 30 visitors, I expect I will close up shop.
Racists make the mistake of thinking that real people *are* their caricatures.
My only point, really, was that you seem to be making a similar mistake here.
But I know very good, very thoughtful and intelligent people that can muster decent and respectable reasons for voting either side of the ticket offered in this last US election.
And I know folks on both sides whose reasons were shallow, misguided, brutally self-serving and/or plain despicable.
And I very much appreciate the tone of your response to me.
Yaacov and Neo Con: my comment to Neo Con is that his writing is lousy. Has nothing to do with his hit count. Yaacov, would you argue that hundreds of thousands of folks visit porn sites every day? They do. For much the same reason as they will visit a blog like Neo Con's or Shaidle's.
There are countless thousands of folks who don't want to think for themselves. Neo Con is one. He is a member of a scared clique, like kids in school, hanging in a gang, admiring one another's cool lunch boxes.
I'm the maverick here. I would have thought you big strong conservatives would admire that. I am the lamb in the lions den. All alone. Thirty crummy hits on my blog a day. Pathetic.
But here's the funny thing. Coming here is not hard or intimidating. Because, for the most part, I am dealing with followers. Folks hanging with the group.
Have you even read at some of the blogs you associate with Yaacov? Have you read at that sewer that Shaidle calls a web site?
Have you read at Geller's page? The woman is clearly mentally ill. She was absolutely outraged at the venomous emails she received on the eve of Obama's election. Take a look at the youtube of her speech about Obama, when she was stumping to a nearly empty room in Florida.
I don't care how many idiots listen to Rush Limbaugh. One idiot or ten million idiots. An idiot is an idiot, a racist is a racist. Clear enough for you?
Again, Yaacov, you are to thick to get it. 30 visitors to a page that does not participate in the circle jerk of conservative talkism is, in fact, a great success. I earned that very modest success based on my talent as a writer. If I actually thought you are Neo Con, as two examples, could write to save your lives, I would be honest enough to tell you that. Neither of you can think, or write, outside of the tiny box of thought that is re enforced by the other kids in your gang. Sad. But true.
Yaacov:
You guys are so funny. You're so proud of your "logical and rational" prowess. But the most obvious things escape you...
If Hitler had a blog, in Germany, in 1941, how many hits do you think he might have gotten? And this would have proved what, Yaacov? That he was brilliant, worthy of the following? Or that people are freaking sheep? Cannot stand on their own.
This is the story of the hit success for followers like Neo Con and Shaidle. Followers pretending to lead. Neo Con, at a minimum, does not engage in the predictable provocations of Shaidle. That women is the quintessential hit slut. Anything, and I mean anything for a hit. Like a crack whore.
Neo Con is just guilty of being bland as hell. He writes in short sentences, which is decent craft, but he does it because he lacks the imagination or vocabulary to write a longer sentence. Like I said before, no colour. Boring.
You, Yaacov, are maudlin, and hold a narrow religious perspective, but you seem like a nice enough guy. I think you should just review your associations, that's all. You don't need to carry the special Dick Cheney lunch box just because the other kids have one.
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"shane o'sanctimonious whinges... I am the lamb in the lions den. All alone. Thirty crummy hits on my blog a day."
well geez, shane... maybe you just need to dumb down your self-celebrated brilliance... and "write lousy" like me.
yeah... that's the ticket.
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Neo Con: Thanks for the tip, but I don't want to "dumb down..." It's funny, because in trying to be a witty conservative with biting commentary, you managed to squeeze in something revelatory. To whit: your blog is dumb. But not as dumb as Shaidle's. So there is hope.
I cannot get over the notion that you big strong stand alone conservatives are driven into masturbatory bliss at your hit count.
Please tell me, in another of your pithy responses, that you believe hit counts is a measure of:
- the skill of the blogger as writer, commentator, social scientist, or any other neat thing
- the value of the blog and what the blog has to offer.
Again, Neo Con, Entertainment Tonight will run a story on Brittany Spears, and ten zillions hits will result. And the world is better for this?
Man oh man. You smart conservative thinkers are sort of...dull. Anyone here capable of given me a game?
Ron: I am always happy to play it straight with someone who is genuinely interested in an idea swap.
Aaaahhh, I couldn't stand it so I went to his blog. and became his thirty-first victim for today. Shane, listen to me, don't be criticizing other people's writing. You are inviting a comparison you do not want to invite. Simple stories, simply told, simply dreadful.
Now I know why you haunt my blog, yours is a lonely place- and deservedly so.
Go ahead and sooth your vanity with the comforting fiction that the only blogs of any worth are the ones, like yours, that nobody reads, call your self a lamb among lions if that makes you feel brave. But please don't presume to judge the writing of others.
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"shane o'sanctimonious shouts... Anyone here capable of given me a game?"
yes, shane... you do indeed win. you are, as you posit, intimidatingly brilliant.
we all wither and crumble under your penetrating, irrefutable logic and and matchless prose.
i will now go to my room and cry.
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Oh now Neo Con, don't take it so hard. Dry your eyes, FOX news is on at 11PM.
And Yaacov, thanks for stopping by. Did you know I used to call myself Johnny Maudlin? Good I changed, eh? I would have been into your turf.
Of course I will "presume" to judge others writing, yours included. Good writing is good writing. I write well. You don't. Simple enough. But like I said, you seem like a nice guy.
Now, like a nice guy, instead of distracting from the point I have made about hit counts, and Hitler, and sheep, take it on, conservative man.
What, exactly, can you claim a hit count is a measure of? If you are not up for this, perhaps Neo Con is. He doesn't seem to be able to keep himself away from responding to me.
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"shane o'sanctimonious mumbles... hit counts, and Hitler, and sheep... did you know I used to call myself Johnny Maudlin?"
uh, no shit, bro... but... dave's not here anyway, man.
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Shane said:
"I have made about hit counts, and Hitler, and sheep, take it on, conservative man.What, exactly, can you claim a hit count is a measure of?"
Here I am again, explaining the obvious to the oblivious. Shane, this is how it is: The number of hits a blog gets, like the number of votes a politician gets, says nothing about wether the blog or the politician is evil, good or indifferent. It is a measure of how appealing or interesting they are to other people. It is not a question of being right or wrong, it is a question of whether what you have to say is at all appealing, meaningful or interesting to anyone else.
In a marketplace of ideas, Shane, the appeal you hold for other people is somewhere between that of a bad case of rectal fissures and, oh, say, the Ford Edsel.
You can pronounce the rest of the world wrong all you want. You can troll around other blogs that have scores and thousands more hits than yours. You can claim that you are a good writer despite ample evidence to the contrary. That does not change the verdict of the millions of people on the internet that stay away from your blog in great teeming droves- you are uninteresting and unappealing.
As far as Hitler goes, he felt the same way about his paintings that you feel about your hideous blog. Then he became a community organizer and told everybody else what to like. The man was pure evil but he did have at a talent for something. I think we are all fortunate you don't have any talent at all because you think very much the way he did.
Yaacov: Thank you for doing the manly thing and answering my question about Hitler's blog. I think your answer was very reasonable. I've never seen any of his paintings so I can't comment on that. I would like to invite the millions of humans who have been staying away from my blog to come on over, though, 'cause it's a brand new dawn.
On the issue of writing, of course it's all subjective. But if you actually have the conclusive test for what constitutes good writing, I'd love to see it.
In the meanwhile, I am going to stick with my appraisal of your writing Benny, and yours Neo Con. Lacking range and colour and appealing only to wool clad conservatives who only days ago were planning to preempt reason in favour of "patriotism". Dull as dishwater boys.
Yaacov, you notice how the point is wandering and how Mr. O'Buttcrack seems to have a really intense interest in nothing other than blog hit statistics?
Notice that no matter how hard you nail him to the floor, he slithers off in another direction? Like trying to nail jello isn't it?
He's not a rational human being. He's mental. Nuts. Couple fries short of a Happy Meal.
In short, a typical Lefty link whore. I've been trying to get him to comment on my little blog for ages, just so I can BAN the hell out of him. It would be vastly satisfying.
I'm awake right now,suffering from insomnia, so please won't you help me by posting a comment and pushing the count over 100.Anything will do, a word,an insult,an amusing anecdote perhaps.Don't do it just for me,but for the internet.Time grows short.People will grow tired of this post and move on before the magical 100th comment is reached.Also, if you would like to correct my or somebody elses spelling mistkes or grammar,please feel free to do so.Won't you get on your keyboard now and leave a comment ?Thank you for your time.
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