From: Jim Whitehead (ejw@cse.ucsc.edu)
Date: Wed Jan 31 2001 - 12:06:32 PST
> >From the article cited...
>
> "It is important to be clear about some things. Not all conservatives
> participate in this cult or speak its jargon, and not all speakers of
> the jargon engage in personal abuse."
>
> Substitute 'conservatives' with 'liberals' in the above sentence and it is
> just as accurate.
I agree -- I do not think this kind of rhetoric is limited to just one end
of the political spectrum. Though Agre makes the assertion that
conservatives first developed the abusive rhetorical tactics, I suspect the
actual development was a co-evolution, involving complex interactions in the
rhetoric of both political sides.
> Agre is obviously arguing from the liberal stance, not a
> 'disinterested' third party. He is just a guilty of the BS
> flinging as he claims his enemies are and if he opened his eyes,
> he would see this sort of shit has been happening from
> the dawn of history. It is the human condition. If he is really concerned
> about this, he will address it in a politically neutral way. If
> he chooses not to address it in a politically neutral way, his
> message is marginalized.
On the other hand, this paragraph seems to be *exactly* what Agre is talking
about.
"Agre is obviously arguing from the liberal stance, not a 'disinterested'
third party."
I could not find anyplace in the article where Agre claims that he is
arguing from a non-political stance. Yet, you're making the connection that
his political bias immediately invalidates the message he is conveying. I
think you'll readily admit that almost all writing involves the biases of
the author; in contrast to much writing, Agre's biases were more readily
apparent in this piece. If anything, the fact the bias is upfront makes it
easier to objectively assess him main arguments (which are about a
particular rhetorical style).
> He is just a guilty of the BS
> flinging as he claims his enemies are and if he opened his eyes,
> he would see this sort of shit has been happening from
> the dawn of history.
Here you go directly for a personal attack. You could have said,
"participates in the spread of politically biased rhetoric", but instead
chose the more emotionally laden "BS flinging". Is this a step towards, or
away from rationality. To me, this looks like a confirming instance of the
"aggressive and antirationalist" jargon Agre was discussing in the entire
article.
You claim "if he opened his eyes ...", directly ignoring contradictory
evidence from the article itself:
> The fact is, of course,
> that neither Clinton nor the cult invented the general technique of
> projection, which is found anywhere and everywhere in human history
> that people engage in aggression despite a culture that claims to
> disapprove of it. So I'm not just talking about doubletalk, or
> unfairness, or false accusations, or bias, or lack of objectivity, or
> propaganda as general matters.
Thus, Agre seems to be quite aware that much politically biased, and
negative rhetoric has been present for thousands of years, and strengthens
the case that he's focused on a specific kind of, more recently appearing,
rhetorical style. But, instead of carefully reading the article for text
that supported your point, you chose to make the unsubstantiated attack, "if
he opened his eyes," cleverly drawing attention away from whether you
yourself had carefully read the article before commenting on it.
> If he is really concerned about this, he will address it in a
> politically neutral way.
With the implication that, even after writing a long, detailed,
well-substantiated essay, Agre must not care about the subject matter.
Perhaps by implication, if President Bush really cared about education (or
any issue X), he would address it in a politically neutral way. This
doesn't follow. If you care about an issue, you'll have biases about it;
the existence of bias does not mean he doesn't care.
> If he chooses not
> to address it in a politically neutral way, his message is marginalized.
As opposed to the mainstream treatment he's been receiving by having his
message appear on RRE, and FoRK ;-)
- Jim
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