I have no idea, but I am rather enamoured of the phrase.
Nancarrow, leaving aside whether or not “liberal” and “conservative” have any real meaning (and I think we all know that they do, in at least a general way), the thing that I’ve found so objectionable in this thread is the way many of the posters here were attacking him in ways intended to would him where he might be most psychologically vulnerable. Calling him an asshole, rat-bastard prick is one thing; teasing him and/or saying he deseves to be hated (ala Merryjerk, who for some bizarre reason seems to have acquired a groupie) is quite another…and such behavior flies in the face of many of the assertions one sees around here about how people should behave.
And now I’m afraid I must leave you as other chores beckon. (I know this riles the likes of Merryjerk…and Hector the Contrarian, if he’s around) but I like for people who post reasonable responses to me to know that they’re not being ignored.
Take care, all.
Disability is easy to get for someone like us. All you have to do is file your disability as “Cancerous polyp on the anus of humanity” or “Librul” and they just put it through without further review.
-Joe
**Starving Artist: ** For what it is worth. I am not a leftist, liberal or democrat.
I am a moderate Green Republican with some liberal or libertarian leanings when it comes to saying let people live the life they want to live.
I think I dislike Martin more than most people. I find his views distasteful and nasty. He is mean-spirited and he shows it fairly often.
So it is not just for the left to dislike him. I like almost everyone on this board.
I’ve even partially defended **Clothahump ** a few times. He seems like a nice guy with some views I don’t like. **Martin Hyde ** acts like Mr. Hyde of literary fame. Like he is playing some creepy game.
Jim
I don’t know, but I agree with it… cause the food sure as hell ain’t.
That said, he’s a prig, a prick, and probably a poser. Eh.
Marty? I don’t care about you.
nancarrow --I recognize your location, but you must have changed your name. Who are you? (and hello, again).
Anyway, I agree re the intolerance of intolerance. I also think that this is mistaken by the Right as “do as I say, not as I do”, but that is a mistake on their part (and they tend to harp and beat it to death). Sadly, it works.
And I tend to agree with Starving Artist (I must be febrile) 
in general re the nature of people. Here’s the thing, though–to use just one example, liberals are much more live and let live people. I don’t care who you’re with or who does what in your bedroom (consenting adults, mind); I see no threat to “the institution of marriage” by gays; I see no reason for the government to get between me and my doctor for another. (I don’t want to argue issues here, I’m just trying to make a point). I don’t believe that the free market is the salvation for all societal ills etc.
Somehow, this is so threatening to people like Marty, they tend to demonize those who challenge their mindset. That is my beef in this thread. The irony that he who would denigrate others also claims a higher moral ground does not escape me, either.
Can that be flipped to skewer the more left leaning? I suppose it can be attempted, but it will not stand. The harsh personal remarks may not be needed, but that is up to individual posters to decide just how dirty they want to fight. It is not a representation of the Left as a whole–and this is where SA’s dressing down of us falls flat. He cannot claim that MH’s ravings re the characteristics of liberals is “not casting [MH’s] in the best light” and yet then turn around and sideswipe an entire group of people. I see this as yet another smoke and mirrors defense so popular on the Right.
I am most likely maundering on. I am taking this multi-symptom cold medicine, but I swear it makes me loopy as all get out. I’ll stop now, while I can still make sentences.
This is exactly what I mean when I decry the use of ‘left’ and ‘right’ as meaningless. We could say “left=liberal=fine with gay marriage, fuck off out of the doctor/patient relationship, totally free market isn’t such a great idea”. And we could say “right=conservative=the inverse of those three concepts”, but here’s the pissing-off thing: those three positions have no logical relationship to each other. There is absolutely no logical connection between being say pro-gun and anti-gay, or pro-universal healthcare and pro-environment.
But everyone MUST be either a ‘liberal’ or a ‘conservative’ (whose bright idea was it to make those two words antonyms anyway), and we have positions A, B, C… and their inverses, for you to tick off in precisely one of two ways. As Ford didn’t quite say, “You can have any colour you want as long as it’s one of these two inversely-related polka-dot patterns which are absolutely the only two possible patterns that make any sense”.
This is just nuts. And the dumbest thing is, so many “left” and “right” people don’t see a problem with it.
In short, Americans are just too damn partisan (and we Brits are not too far behind, though with Cameron and now Ming, there’s hope for some nuance yet).
:dubious: Interesting pair of sentences.
Oh, but I can, too! There’s no correlation – and no moral equivalency – between MH’s posts and the liberal response in this thread…unless an eye for an eye is the standard; which, given the anti-death penalty stance of most of the posters here, I doubt. This kind of thing is exactly where the right sees “do as I say, not as I do” coming from the left; and this observation is not a mistake and it’s not smoke and mirrors.
It’s all well and good for you to pick and choose where you want to be tolerant and open-minded and where not, but if you (again, the left in general) want to be taken seriously in your efforts to convince the right of the need to be tolerant, open-minded and pacifistic, you’re going to need to live by that credo across the board and not just when and under whatever circumstances you happen to feel like it.
Well, no there isn’t any logic to it–but these are the platforms that the parties are based on (somewhat). I think we might be mixing up philosophies with actual issues–I don’t know; I’ve never studied political science in my life. (I wish now I had). Do the stances on any one issue flow automatically from the different philosophies? Again, I dunno for certain. I would guess somewhat, but maybe not to the extent that they should?
Sure, there are huge problems with it–looking back, you get Temperance supporters in league with tavern owners for one example. I won’t bother dragging out that hackneyed phrase about politics and strange bedfellows etc.
For that, I blame the 2 party system, which is like a religion here. I want nothing more than for it to be dismantled. But Americans are lazy and spoiled --not many of us even vote. We truly get the government that we deserve.
I was addressing SA’s posts directly there. I admit freely to having taken sideswipes at the Right. I just don’t claim higher moral ground–the Right does and wags its finger at the Left in an attempt to shame the Left for being 'intolerant". IMO, that dog won’t hunt. I thought that was what you were saying as well. No?
Are you seriously saying that the right’s preferred worldview is bigoted, close-minded and war-mongering? That there’s no need for sissy stuff like tolerance and an open mind for you guys?
You need to put away the broad brushes, SA; you’re insulting your friends as well as your foes.
But I have been tolerant–I have stated repeatedly that we need Marty and his kind here. I don’t have to like and approve of his stance to be tolerant of it. It’s not “tolerant” to stand aside and let any amount of smearing occur–that’s being a doormat. Do I think that those who jumped on the possible closeting were in line? NO-and I said as such. But they no more speak for all the Left than you claim that MH’s position doesn’t hold true for all conservatives. (I am using me as an example, but I mean my comments to be general). It was wrong of me to claim one man’s narrowmindedness for a whole section of America, but it is just as wrong for you to decry the Left by some poster’s actions here.
Just what is it that the conservatives want liberals to be tolerant of? Their bigotry? Their lack of compassion and desire to help those more disadvantaged then themselves? What are we intolerant of? I see liberals as intolerant of intolerance. I see conservatives trying desperately to hold onto a way of life that was in its death throes 30 years ago. The genie cannot be put back into the bottle–civil, women’s, gay rights–they are here to stay, one way or another.
I am confused and hopped up on cold medicine.
Yeah, but the thing is, I don’t know anyone who advocates tolerance “across the board,” excepting the odd saint or two. Everyone picks and chooses what they should or shouldn’t tolerate, and (ideally, at least) will have reasons why any individual thing should be tolerated. Personally, I advocate tolerance of homosexuality. I don’t advocate tolerance of child abuse. I have a whole raft of reasons why the former should be tolerated, and why the latter should not be tolerated. Nobody advocates tolerance as a universal good devoid of any context. It’s all about what should be tolerated, and why. And I, for one, do not think Martin Hyde should be tolerated, for the reasons outlined at great length in this and other pit threads.
The thing is, Nancarrow, this country is a two-party country. By and large, the two parties are suppossed to disagree with one another. IMO, the reason everything is so polarized now is because these two parties, which could compete in a relatively civilized manner for most of this country’s history, became almost deadly enemies in the aftermath of the societal upheaval of the late sixties. Suddenly, the left was a bunch of tree-hugging, bra-burning hippie dipsticks living in idealistic denial of the realities of the world, and the right was a bunch of rigid, racist, misogynistic dolts faunching at the bit to keep people from having fun in the bedroom and to force women to have babies they didn’t want.
In other words, each side developed a tremendously strong enmity for the other; and in the battle for the undecideds each demonized the other, and this battle is still going on today.
Still, it’s often been a source of amazement to me how almost everyone seems to fall so strongly into one or the other of these two camps.
I THINK YOU ARE BEING BLIND. There are people right in this thread that don’t fall in either category. Really, I’m one, there are many others. Moderates do exist. WE just seem to have the smallest voice in politics because both parties have been hijacked by their worst parts.
Jim
That is your prerogative, and not one I’d necessarily disagree with. Again, the problem to me was the sadistic, mean-spirited tone to many of the posts here, posts which were meant to deliver specific psychologically-wounding insults to a poster who had made only general insults to the board as a whole. This sort of behavior, coming from posters on a message board supposedly devoted to fighting ignorance and taking the moral high ground, seemed both hypocritical and antithetical to causes the left has always championed to me.
Clearly not. What I’m saying is that there are areas in which [some of] those on the left attempt to convince the right that it is intolerant and close-minded, and that if they want to have credibility in this argument it is necessary to demonstrate tolerance and open-mindedness themselves.
And on preview, of course there are moderates, What Exit?, but they weren’t the focus of Nancarrow’s post, which is what I was addressing.
Conservatives are bigots!?
Now who’s showing their prejudice?
But be that as it may, I don’t think conservatives want liberals to be tolerant of anything in particular; rather, they want liberals, who stress the need for tolerance, to exhibit it themselves.
I express tolerance, but not for hate, ignorance, and general stupidity. Guess I’m not a “true” liberal.
Martin Hyde has been nothing but a jackass from day one. If you think this pitting has anything to do with his political views, you’re sadly, fucking mistaken.
The whole, “they’re just picking on him because he’s a conservative” is so fucking old. Get a new gimmick.
Look, I agree with you that some of the insults here crossed a line, but why do you insist on turning this (like almost every other thread you post to) into a partisan political issue? Why not just call the posters on what they’ve said? Why bring politics, and your own expectations about what liberals believe and how they ought to act, into it?
Incidentally, I’ve never understood why general insults are supposed to be less objectionable than personal insults. If I call someone an asshole, I’ve insulted one person. If I call all Republicans assholes, I’ve insulted millions of people. Surely, insulting millions of people is far more objectionable than insulting one person?
Also, since when has this board been devoted to taking the moral high ground?