Inspection- The Great Rhetorical Train Wreck Called America
The great rhetorical train wreck called America.
You hear it in the "I am willing to say anything" nasal tone of Ann Coulter, the Left Wing pundits who claim Obama is George Bush in Black.. or that George Bush gets off on torture... the sniffles of Glen Beck moaning and over the top histrionics about "his" America and invisible plans to steal guns.
While my own political skew is obvious to most readers, I won't type that it's all the fault of the Right, the Left, the Fundies, the Secular, bloggers or even my own generation. I won't even claim that my personal pedestal is higher than all the aforementioned.
It's not.
We have a problem America. We can't talk to each other.
I know the past is filled with parents and sons fighting over Nam, yellow journalism at the start of the nation, split families killing each other over North-South issues, and when the first President Adams heard a pub patron call him old and querulous he had him locked away until Jefferson set him free. Why? Simply because Adams found him disagreeable.
All of this has happened before.
But it seems as of late the punditry; both armchair and more "official," has for little reason gathered the worst of these attributes and added both fertilizer and accelerant in a way that would make Timothy McVeigh jealous. It's a little different when compared with an understandable, passionate, violent, disagreement citizens might have during a Civil War. Or Nam where there was a likelihood you might be forced to kill; drafted into a position where there was a good chance you would be killed... or spat upon for doing what a nation asked of you.
If one's rhetoric those days was a little over the top, well so were the circumstances. Compared to now? Not so much.
These days it's both "over the top" with the mere intent just to be more "over the top" than the last guy; Glen Beck angst driven, baby-babble and, honestly... plain phony. Because many on either side really don't care who their targets really are. Disagreeing alone justifies saying anything; doing anything.
Think of North Korea and how they act as if everything is an offense and a threat. Currently they are getting ready for the impending invasion and yelling at us that, "We'd better not..." Yup. That's the North. We all know how "loony" and over the top" they are, right? Notice how for years they have laced every conversation with accusations and threats of their own. Yet... are we really far behind them rhetorically speaking as a nation when we argue with each other?
Recently I heard Thom Hartmann on his show discussing the murder of Dr. George Tiller with Randall Terry. Like a corpse dangling from his own rhetorical rope, Terry refused to admit that the over the top rhetoric of some of those in the anti-abortion/pro-life camp may drive people to murder others. After many decades of clinic bombings, murders of abortion providers, nurses, clinic workers... in your face clinic tactics and assassination lists, there can be little doubt that the way the debate has been framed by those who wish to make abortion illegal again has fueled passions.
As far as I'm concerned, Mr. Tiller, more than anything else, is a victim of the warped nature of the national discourse on most issues. He was run over by our metaphorical train.
And what must be said about a movement dedicated to saving life so frequently stained by the taking of it? Left, Right or "other," one cannot escape the blood stain left on any movement when many individuals over a long period of time are driven by rhetoric to such extremes.
But Pro-Lifers aren't alone in this out of control train wreck created by over the top rhetoric. We have become a society which argues by extreme; absurd, hyperbole... and that has become the standard for "rationale" discussion. Those who disagree with us are cast in absurd stage lights while we toss rotten tomatoes: personal insults and mischaracterizations, at them. Many of these comments are no more than mere smears that would make Boris Badenov seem more human: more real. They're certainly not true debate or discussion.
Of course another factor here is the tendency to portray whatever those who disagree with us believe in as always resulting in worst case scenarios, while whatever you believe in will always result in best case scenarios.
Worst and best case scenarios almost never come true. Intent is rarely as evil as we might claim.
We have a not so funny, funny, way of discussing issues these days. We paint anyone who dares to disagree with broad brushes then continue on as if our painting is "fact." We must ask ourselves when we discuss; when we debate, what exactly does strong sarcasm, name calling, and conveniently proclaiming you know the "true motives" of those who you disagree with achieve?
Will it make anything better?
Will those you disagree with just go away, no matter how clever your insults are? Or will they be more determined to oppose you?
Will it all escalate?
If you think the actions, opinions or words of those you disagree with might be very wrong headed, just how much good will handling such conversations in a very confrontational way achieve?
The answer here is almost always...
"It will make it all worse."
To bring up another specific example, I heard a master of exploiting this art a while ago on NPR. Michael Savage was being interviewed by Neal Conan on Talk of the Nation via the telephone after the unwelcome mat was tossed down for him in England. He blathered on and on about "free speech," "toleration" and "name calling..." I only use "blathered" because of what happened next. Neal Conan took some calls: as he often does when he has guests. The first caller questioned the choice of Savage as a guest, getting about eleven words out. (I believe it was, "I don't think Michael Savage was the wisest choice for a guest...") Savage immediately interrupted the caller with some version of "commie pinko liar jackass" and then pounced on Neal, claiming if he was going to let %$#@!*&^%$#@!s on to his program he would go elsewhere. To Neal's credit he politely: and I do mean politely, told Savage that if that's what he wanted to do... well go ahead. Savage slammed the phone down. I give Conan even more credit because he went on with the topic and mentioned what had been said by those who defend Mr. Savage without an ounce of sarcasm or nastiness.
Now that's a professional interviewer.
While I don't defend his tactics, I do defend Mr. Savage's right to say what he says, I just think he is the prime example of how we shouldn't be debating and discussing topics. I also think his style of "debate" is like an angry mugger with severe mental issues than a debater. Whether Mr. Savage actually has mental issues is a matter of how much of an act his act is.
May society learn to resist, or at least ignore, such: no matter what end of the spectrum it comes from.
Emotion isn't "discourse."
It's just emotion.
And how do we explain someone who claims Obama is nothing more than a Communist out to grab every gun, or Rush Limbaugh is nothing more than "a big fat idiot?" I have loathed Limbaugh since he first went national and quickly learned his idea of humor was promoting his own ego while using this very type of discourse, but I'm sure, as a human, he's more than just "a big fat idiot." And he is "human," despite smartass remarks even this author may have made occasionally.
See? I told you. I claim no purity.
Sonia Sotomayor... a racist? You would think that Newt Gingrich would be a little sensitive about such bomb throwing in the form of casting such aspersions, considering how he has been portrayed as a baby having a tantrum in the past, for example.
Why is it those who cast such aspersions never notice it simply ricochets back at them?
What is the result of running the national discourse as if it were mere framing of individuals and groups using potty bowl-based materials? Think of past shootings, bombings, even 9/11... and we're talking pure rhetoric driven mass murder here. You can draw a straight line between over the top, hate-filled, bleak; yet cartoonish, rhetoric pumping over our airwaves and the Knoxville UU church shooting, the assassinations of many Dr. George Tillers, 9/11 and Timothy McVeigh. When did we get into the realm of Joe Sixpacks walking into churches and blowing strangers away to get back at "liberals," or those who perform abortions?
When as a society did we decide that stoking the fires of mass murder via slander, lies and screaming fire in a formerly more placid theater, is OK?
When did we decide that to rhetorically mimic the Roman's delightful tendency to feed large portions of humanity to the wild beasts is still "entertainment?"
And just who are these "wild beasts?" To modify Pogo...
"We have claimed we have met the enemy, while we go out of our way to make him us."
Inspection is a column that has been written by Ken Carman for over 30 years. Inspection is dedicated to looking at odd angles, under all the rocks and into the unseen cracks and crevasses that constitute the issues and philosophical constructs of our day: places few think, or even dare, to venture.
© Copyright 2009
Ken Carman and Cartenual Productions
All Rights Reserved
This is a well argued and written essay. If I correctly understood its thesis, the cause of much of our national political dysfunction is our inability to have civil public discourse. I wonder, however, whether uncivil public discourse is the cause of our dysfunction, or rather, merely an EFFECT of some other causal dynamic?
The multi-cultural, multi-ethnic nature of American society, while a source of tension producing positive constructive change, also is an inherent source of social fault-lines which are exploitable to promote destructive change or the status quo. While we cannot always accurately determine the motivations of those we might debate that doesn't mean the motivations of such opponents are not destructive, even malevolently so.
Voices calling for division, and hate, and fear, and violence are too often, IMO, possessed of such destructive motivations - whatever the reasons. There is no civil debate to be had with those kinds of voices and mentalities. They seem to rarely show themselves open to the possibility that they may actually be in error on an issue (I may be in error about that ;). They seem rarely to engage in discourse in hopes of mutual enlightenment, they seem to engage to FORCE others to adopt their thinking and perspective.
None of us is perfectly intellectual, perfectly rational we are all creatures of emotion as well. It seems to me, however, that the likes of Nixon, Lee Atwater, Karl Rove, and Rush Limbaugh (I know, I've left out Democrats) did and are exploiting those cultural and ethnic fault lines I'd mentioned. These have now widened to crevasses of political radicalization. This is, IMHO, the CAUSE of our present day uncivil public discourse.
June 9, 2009 11:33 AM | Reply | Permalink
(I know, I've left out Democrats)...
So did this essay. Despite the claim that it's a Left - Right problem, as far as I can tell only the rhetoric from the right is quoted?
June 9, 2009 12:56 PM | Reply | Permalink
Then you've got Jon Voight just recently, using Fundamentalist Christian rhetoric against Obama in particularly creepy ways.
June 9, 2009 1:20 PM | Reply | Permalink
" places few think, or even dare, to venture."
could this be any more inflated of a gasbag?
June 9, 2009 3:19 PM | Reply | Permalink
I blame movement conservatism.
June 9, 2009 7:43 PM | Reply | Permalink
"First seek to understand then to be understood."
On of the problems is that Americans don't listen to other viewpoints. Good negotiators listen and empathize with the other party. They put themselves in the other's place to understand them. Our culture doesn't advocate listening, we advocate spouting off.
Listening takes a lot of work and patience too. So you could say that the problem's listening. Or you can call it cultural. One thing I noticed about Obama's speech in Cairo last week is that he tried to empathize with the Muslim world's viewpoint. He tried to show that he understands what they think. But can one role model, even a president, change how we relate to one another?
June 9, 2009 4:00 PM | Reply | Permalink
The examples of historical rhetoric certainly embarrass all of us today, but remember that the mendacity and oversimplification of issues are time-honored. We glorify the past and then find we fall far short of glory.
I don't disagree that public discord has become discordant; it is a product of TV culture, advertising theory, propaganda concepts, and the power of the least of us to cast a vote. You raise the interesting point that the medium has indeed come to drive the message, as when Republicans made clear they were perfecting their opposition to whomever Obama nominated to the Court.
A little historical context-
In 1833, Tennessee Congressman David Crockett, before he became Texas martyr John Wayne, said
"Get up on all occasions, and sometimes on no occasion at all, and make long-winded speeches, though composed of nothing else than wind. Talk of your devotion to your country, your modesty and disinterestedness, or on any such fanciful subject. Rail against taxes of all kinds, officeholders, and bad harvest weather; and wind up with a flourish abut the heroes who fought and bled for our liberties in the times that tried men's souls. To be sure, you run the risk of being considered a bladder of wind, or an empty barrel. But never mind that; you will find enough of the same fraternity to keep you in countenance."
A "bladder of wind"- anyone we know?
June 9, 2009 9:11 PM | Reply | Permalink
The radio orators are attempting to make money. I mean all media folks are.
But the right wing found a way to do it and get to stay protected by the First Amendment.
June 10, 2009 12:03 AM | Reply | Permalink
"We have a problem America. We can't talk to each other."
You almost have it there. We are becoming a nation of people who simply WON'T talk WITH each other. Civil political discourse in the USA is becoming as endangered as the polar bear. Nary a day goes by that I don't hear or read someone vilifying another person with whom they disagree about one topic or many, and it comes from every end of every spectrum.
Radio, television, the blogosphere, and the local church or tavern are all equally likely locations for the spewing of vitriol and downright hatred.
How has this come to pass? Do we have to put another man on the moon or beat the Russians in another hockey game to all be americans again, proud of our shared heritage?
I don't know the answer. I guilty of it myself.
June 10, 2009 3:14 AM | Reply | Permalink
I'm guilty, actually.
June 10, 2009 3:15 AM | Reply | Permalink
It's a proven fact:Rush Limbaugh is a big fat idiot!
You're making the same mistake establishment journalists do by putting both sides on equal footing regardless of the facts of whatever particular issue is at question. It's a mistake to lump all vocal critics together even if some who are making otherwise sound critiques come off as "shrill."
There are no liberal mirrors of Coulter, Savage, Gingrich, O'Reilly or Limbaugh. They exist as part of a movement intended to distort and distract discourse. The media allow the idiotic venom they spew legitimate consideration (and of course there are sometimes "over-the-top" reactions).
Not that "sides" are always so easily delineated, but proclaiming all vociferous pundits to be on the same base level, in effect, elevates the truly bigoted blow-hards that play on prejudice and fear. It either discredits legitimate if loud critics or gives credibility to the 'Limbaughs" posing as political pundits .
June 10, 2009 4:43 PM | Reply | Permalink
I respectfully disagree. there are plenty of nutjob equivalents right here on TPM. Even though I agree with many of them does not change their stripes.
June 11, 2009 2:20 AM | Reply | Permalink
"' places few think, or even dare, to venture.'"
could this be any more inflated of a gasbag?"
Why, yes, it could!
June 27, 2009 11:17 AM | Reply | Permalink