Mort and me
It's phone tag in cyberspace. I occasionally drop by the blog, Octogenarian, written by a retired journalist living the good life as a snowbird in Florida. Mort is a secular Jew who had a fascinating career and is enjoying sharing his memories while upgrading his technical skills. Like me, he does get political. And he's a liberal. Earlier this spring his blogging was a story in the Palm Beach Post which he posted at his blog. I was a bit surprised, knowing all the problems in the world and his vast experience and talent, that what irked him most was "mean-spiritedness and lack of compassion of people, especially those from the religious right." I tried to comment, but the comments had been turned off for that one, so I went to an older entry and commented that compared to some really big problems (and I cited the ones exacerbated by the liberals) this seemed like an odd complaint.When Mort found my comment he e-mailed me to clarify, which of course I had to answer with even more documentation. However, his e-mail server bounced my message, saying it was for spam abuse. So I had to go back to his blog, leave another message that in addition to facing closed comments, I was now blocked from replying to his e-mail. He has e-mailed me saying he doesn't know why, but of course, I can't respond. Nor can I leave my other e-mail address at his blog, because if I wanted that spread all over the internet, I wouldn't be using Medscape. Here's my comments in response to "mean spirited religious right" (code words for conservative Christians, not conservative Jews or Muslims or Hindus).
- I was disappointed to see you set up the strawman "religious right" as what irks you most in life. I'm an evangelical Christian and a Republican, who was a Democrat until age 60. I can't imagine that you search the dial for conservative talk shows, and you certainly can't find conservatives on the network or cable news, unless you are watching the very timid Fox News. I, on the other hand, have almost no access to fairness unless I choose Fox, which sometimes is a bit too entertaining and giggly for my tastes. I read all the major papers, but am subjected to terribly biased opinion posing as news in the NYT, Wapo and WSJ. I don't mind it at all on the OpEd page where it belongs--just don't throw it into the news reporting. Because you are a liberal, I think you see this as "normal" or the way it ought to be because people can't be trusted to judge for themselves.
I believe I saw a survey that journalists were about 12:1 liberal to conservative; but you have nothing on librarians, who are 224:1 liberal to conservative. These are the folks who buy all the anti-Bush and anti-Christian books they can get their hands on, while insisting that another view must make it through the accepted review channels of Publishers Weekly and Library Journal, both owned by the same publisher.
What irks me most isn't left wing harangues, blogs or reporting. That is so much hot air. It's the result of leftist and socialist ideas that make it through congress or into the business world that result in real damage. What irks me is millions of Africans dying of malaria because do-gooders got DDT taken off the market; what irks me is the 60% poverty rate for single women and children when it is only 3% for married women, an almost direct result of militant feminism; what irks me is the head long rush into silly, expensive regulations and crushing business decisions that global warming fundamentalists are trying to impose--it's just a new age religion in different robes; what irks me is journalists who buried on the back pages the Christians who were tortured, mutilated (disemboweled, castrated, throats cut while alive) and murdered by Turkish Muslims, when Muslim terrorists who were "subjected" to wearing women's undergarments made the front pages for weeks and months.
Republicans are weak and disorganized and religious conservatives have all the same problems as anyone else--divorce, obesity, ill health, mortgages, etc. You need to find a bigger, stronger enemy to face down, and unfortunately, I think it is going to be the anti-semitic left wing of your party.
And I read the web sites like Media Matters, that slices and dices and dispenses the raw meat to the liberals, what they think the talk show hosts are saying. Maybe 2 lines from a 3 hour show. But this I do know. If Rush Limbaugh is a Christian, he never mentions it. Glenn Beck is open about being a Mormon. Michael Medved and Dr. Laura are very open about being observant Jews. Laura Ingraham is very open about being a Catholic. Bill Bennett is some sort of conservative Christan (Southern Baptist?), but I don't know which brand, same with Hugh Hewitt.
Parody and poking fun is not "hate speech," Mort. Pointing out inconsistencies in Michael Fox's ads for political candidates is not "hate"; just because he has a disease doesn't mean he gets a pass to lie. Although I'm sure our Democratic Congress will try to make it so. What Rosie O'Donnell says IS hate speech because you get her words combined with her hate-filled expressions on TV, but if she can find a sponsor for it, let the public decide with their consumer dollars whether to support her hatefulness. Even so, she wasn't removed for her words, but for her demands for more money.
Rush Limbaugh (the non-religious talker) is first of all an entertainer, former disc-jockey, and sportscaster. He uses phrases and voice clips from the people he parodies--like "Barack the magic Negro," a phrase from the left coast LA Times, or the Justice Brothers, sound bites of Jesse Jackson and Al Sharpton singing duets about victimhoodness. His term "Feminazis" is close--but still no cigar, because it was a term applied many years ago to just a couple of shrill women in the media, who in fact, do support programs and ideas that would probably result in the demise of the male gender if taken seriously. Rush will often just read the words of a liberal columnist or journalist--that's all--just read it aloud. With pauses. Giggles. Sighs. Laughter. Now is that hate speech? One of his favorite phrases is the "drive-by media" (journalists who don't actually listen to him but take pot shots) who use the phrase "mean-spiritedness."
And "lack of compassion?" Mort, there have been so many studies on the generosity of conservative Christians--they far exceed the liberals and humanists, and liberal Christians. Protestant denominations and Catholic orders take Matthew 25 very, very seriously. That is our marching orders, not the belief that we will change the world. That's why humanistic-academic social plans so often fail or make things worse in the long run--they have no roots, no deep source and just enlarge the problems they try to solve. So, here I, the librarian, just have to tell a journalist to go back and review your sources.
A WSJ story about a new test for Down Syndrome ran yesterday. Although it mentioned the number of false positives, it did not say that 90% of women whose babies tested positive for Down Syndrome chose abortion. Now that, Mort, is a liberal slant to a news story. It was what was left out.
But sometimes it is the word choice. White intermarriage. Black miscegenation. Two phrases in the same story about intermarriage of races.
Or how about these.
- Global warming. Climate change.
Pro-choice. Anti-choice. Pro-abortion. Anti-life.
Iraq debacle. Iraq conflict.
Right wing conservatives. Democrats.
Posts
10 comments:
Norma, given ONE MILLION YEARS, I could not have crafted a post as articulate and hard hitting and TRUTHFUL as this one.
Thank you for saying all of this.
Ah, Norma. Brilliant. I am printing this!! You did such an excellent job, and isn't curious how Mort so casually mentions his irk, but does not accept a rebuttal? Sounds just about right considering the source.
Impressive information here.
These are things I've sensed, but not had the data to put into words and cohesive thoughts. Thank you.
Reader "em" (above), like many on the right, is quick to see sinister motives in matters that disturb her (or him). As Norma knows, I did not deliberately refuse her rebuttal, nor have I blocked out her e-mail messages. My blog has been having unexplainable tech problems. I have corrected one of them, and Norma's critical comment has been published on my blog. However, Norma has not published my response to her critique.
So, in brief, let me explain. By "religious right," I meant no disrespect for Evangelical Christians. My label refers to all religious fundamentalists, including the Orthodox Jewish community in which I was raised, who do not tolerate different beliefs. By hypocrisy, intolerance and lack of compassion, I refer to: so-called pro-family advocates who commit adultery; abortion-banners unconcerned about the welfare of the newborn babies of poor, single mothers; those who bully and call people with opposing political opinion traitors (Limbough & co.); people who see sinister conspiracies in an allegedly biased media because the reported facts conflict with their ideology. That's the short list.
Yes, I did not mean to imply Mort had blocked me. His ISP is blocking mine, not me personally, probably because someone using Medscape has sent spam. Neither Mort nor I, being just a couple of old folks trying to use the web, can figure our way out of the cyberbag so we can send e-mail.
But this is truly the first time I've ever heard "religious right" mean people outside the Christian groups. Mort is an honorable man, and if he says he's heard other religious groups, then he has.
Also, the religious right, Mort, is willing to adopt the unwanted babies or support organizations that help mothers keep their babies, not abort them. Hardly sounds vicious to me.
BTW, I don't publish full text of e-mail comments without permission, they being private communication covered by copyright. I didn't ask Mort to do that.
You have my permission to publish my initial response to you.
And by religious right, I refer to fundamentalist camps in all religions: Orthodox Jewish, Roman Catholic, Protestant, Hindu, Buddhist and most of all, Islam. I see similarities in belief or at least tone.
I think I've solved the comment blocking problem. For the first time, I notice there is a box that has to be checked at the bottom of a Blogspot posting to enable comments. Apparently, it has to be checked with each post and the box is cleared before a new post is written. This has not been the case during the past 2 years, and I do not understand why it crops up now. Are you still experiencing the e-mail "abuse" blockages? No one else has complained about that and I know you are not abusing me. Must be a conspiracy--I don't know whether from the right or the left, however.
Bill Bennett is a Roman Catholic. He spoke at my Catholic High School many years ago shortly before he became Secretary of Education. I think some student was a nephew or something like that.
Hmmm. Starting to look like talk radio is heavily Catholic. I'm finding out all sorts of things.
This has been very interesting reading, Norma. You certainly express yourself clearly and effectively. It is so good to read something of substance and thought in a blog from time to time.
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