Please spare us.
With all of the vile policies and existential threats to our democracy that here are to respond to during these nightmare times, our damn lightweight media and politicos are tizzying out about "incivility" that somehow has suddenly crept into our national dialogue with "The Red Hen Incident." Certain ossified Democrats have started to form their civility circular firing squads (please STFU and get out of the way), and the pearl clutchers at the WaPo have hit the fainting couch with a particularly noxious call to let Stormtrumpers eat in peace. Notably, there was this tidbit of Fred Hiatt- generated ahistorical nitwitticism:
... How hard is it to imagine, for example, people who strongly believe that abortion is murder deciding that judges or other officials who protect abortion rights should not be able to live peaceably with their families?Does he mean like the family of Dr. George Tiller or the families of the dozens of doctors and other family clinic personnel killed or wounded over the past 25 years by "pro- life" fanatics? Or the bombings, arsons, etc., that have terrorized family clinic personnel for decades? Or, hey, how about the separated families on the border who're not "able to live peaceably with their families"? Wow, turns out it wasn't hard to imagine at all! And please go fuck yourself, Fred. (Is that uncivil?)
A few tweets to sum it up:
One thing the Red Hen situation has made abundantly clear is that the vast majority of people in the national media identify more closely with the White House press secretary than with anyone who might be in a position to cook or serve food to her in a restaurant.— Nick Baumann (@NickBaumann) June 25, 2018
When we go low, we get blamed. When they go low, we get blamed for not trying to understand them.— Steve M. (@nomoremister) June 25, 2018
If you seriously don't understand how calls for "civility" were historically used by the powers-that-be to shut down protests, you should really read Bill Chafe's excellent study of the civil rights movement in Greensboro. https://t.co/CwH6Vvcj0F— Kevin M. Kruse (@KevinMKruse) June 25, 2018
BONUS: Green Eagle delves into the media concern trolling past and present (h/t One Fly in the comments).
BONUS II: Hunter takes the bark off the WaPo editorial.
Oh my - the f bomb was used. Ya mon! If you don't know about this guy Green Eagle give this a read. This is exactly the situation as you point out as well.
ReplyDeletehttps://largegreenbird.blogspot.com/2018/06/media-concern-trolling-at-its-finest.html
One Fly -- I check him out now and then and will check out that piece. Thanks!
ReplyDeleteNon-civility is okay if you're a Republican because reasons. They always claim the higher moral ground because mumble mumble. The Democrats are scum and therefore act like scum, so why be civil towards scum? Round and round we go, and we're always at the bottom.
ReplyDeleteThis is a never-ending cycle of behavior in which Republicans always get to say and do whatever they want to and expect to be perceived as the Better Party. They can be racist, they can hate women, they can cut away programs to help those who need it most, but just don't call them on it. They outnumber Democrats ten to one on Sunday political talk shows regardless of who holds the majorities. It is always this way and that's why our overt rebellion is making them nervous. We're telling them to their faces that we don't like what they represent.
The national news outlets are taking a scold's tone, reprimanding us for challenging the rhetoric. Gee, where were they during Huckabee's scathing news conferences when she insults every reporter who asks her directly about any number of subjects. I'm sick to death of the double standard. Our “president” speaks about other human beings as killers and thugs and treats immigrants, women, and minorities like second-class citizens. And we're supposed to smile and accept that?
Speak up. speak out. We can vote these people out in November, but we can fight back every day. We've been polite and yielding and compromising with people who repeatedly step on us. Violence? No. But standing up to this attack on our beliefs and our people, yes.
donnah - well said again. Violence is not an option, but shunning and shaming are. Don't let the spineless who have let things get so out of hand tell us what is "civil" when the foundations of democracy are being undermined every day.
ReplyDeleteAs someone said recently, we don't have a crisis of civility, we have a crisis of democracy.
the vast majority of people in the national media identify more closely with the White House press secretary
ReplyDeleteThe media are always afraid of antagonizing people like Suckabee-Handers because they might lose their precious "access". It's one of the things that has neutered much of the MSM.
Defenders of a guy who mocked a disabled reporter, dissed McCain for being a prisoner of war, makes up insulting (and unimaginative) nicknames for everybody he doesn't like, talked about "blood coming from her whatever" and "grab 'em by the pussy", and generally displays toddler-level vulgarity in everything he does, have given up the right to complain about lack of civility.
Infidel - we need to ignore the admonishments of the MSM "civility police" because, as with so much today, their need to seem even- handed and reasonable is killing our democracy when has been progressives that have been upholding civic values and norms in the face of decades of right- wing rage and hysteria. As far as the perpetually outraged Stormtrumpers and their media lapdogs, as you say, they've long ago given up the right to complain.
ReplyDelete