So good on them.
Of course...
If you watch the news, you probably wouldn't even know it was happening! (Sad though it may be, THAT article was the first I'd heard about it! And I listen to National Public Radio!)
And when they HAVE reported on this GENUINE, grass-roots, political phenomenon, what have they had to say?
Fox's Watters Degrades Wall Street Protests As "The Sludge" Of "Every Single Left-Wing Cause"
Fox's Guilfoyle: Wall Street Protesters Are "People With Absolutely No Purpose Or Focus In Life" There To Just "Dirty The Streets"
Limbaugh Calls Occupy Wall Street Protesters "Stupid," Says They're Being "Us[ed]"
Ann Coulter And Sean Hannity Lash Out At "Destructive" "Mob Mentality" Of Occupy Wall Street Protests
Kuhner: "Obama Has Unleashed Class Hatred And Racial Hostility"
Fox's Stephen Hayes On Occupy Wall Street: "This Is Not Going To Amount Of Any Kind Of A Serious Movement"
Limbaugh Derides Occupy Wall Street Protesters As "Pure, Genuine Parasites," Says Many Are "Bored Trust Fund Kids" ***do you know how many lawyers and political insiders this shit-stain's family has?! And he has the NERVE to call someone ELSE "trust fund parasite?!"
Fox's Trotta On Occupy Wall Street Website: "Ravings Of What Sounds Like The Unabomber"
Fox's Bolling: Occupy Wall Street Protesters "Do Seem Like Petulant Little Children"
Fox's Crowley: Wall Street Protestors Are "Useful Idiots Who Probably Haven't Paid Much In Taxes Their Whole Life"
Now, to be fair, that's mostly Fox, but basically no one else has even made a STORY of it! In response to Alan Colmes calling out Fox's double standard here, one poster though it was relevant to say that this was all being backed by GEORGE SOROS! (And old trick, to be sure, but a new one relative to THIS story!)
(And, of course, If George Soros WERE leading a Left-Wing Revolution in American politics? Shouldn't that at least qualify as a STORY?! Shouldn't MORE PEOPLE be talking about that?! So... Even were it TRUE, Colmes still has a point!)
My favorite was this one:
Fox's Doocy Quotes NY Post To Claim The "Number One Reason People Are Going" To Wall St. Protests Is "Free Food"
Now, I'm not posting all of these items, merely to pick on Fox. We've all know, for a looooong time, that they are kind of a "special needs" news channel, and so we can't expect them to get it right all the time. (Or ever.) But there is an interesting patter here. Do you notice what every single one of these headlines (and moronic Internet comments) have in common?
They're all nothing but ad hominen attacks!
Under that Free-Food item, poster donzostevens1082 (finally) pointed out:
Even if this "free food" nonsense were true, how does it invalidate a protest against vast and growing income disparity?
And the answer? Is ABSO-FUCKING-LUTELY NOTHING!
Because that's what an ad hominen attack IS!
When you can't "win" on facts, evidence, logic, reason, principle...
When all else (including you're own intellect) FAILS...
ATTACK THE SPEAKER RELENTLESSLY!
Look at the above comments: "Idiots," "Sludge," "Parasites," "Mob mentality," (which sure is rich, coming from the Reich-wing!) "People with no Purpose," "Petulant Little Children..." Do ANY of these things address the POINTS that are being made? Oh, HELL no! Why would Fox News want to make anyone aware of the MESSAGE and the POINTS that these people are making?
Well, they might...
IF they had ANYTHING of substance to counter with.
I mean... MMFA pretty muich puts up ALL KNOIDS of things trhey Right says, EVERY SINGLE DAY. And they do this because they KNOW they can prove them wrong! You see, it's like I always say:
WHEN YOU ARGUE WITH A LIBERAL, S/HE'LL TRY TO PROVE THAT YOU'RE WRONG. WHEN YOU ARGUE WITH A CONSERVATIVE, S/HE'LL TRY TO PROVE THAT YOU'RE LIBERAL.
And try they have - to paint these protesters as "commies" and "hippies" and any number of things OTHER than American's who have had ENOUGH of this crap!
And don't forget: This was the same network that described the Tea Party as "grass roots" - every chance they got, in their 24/7 coverage of them, on their national news service, from whence they organized protests and coordinated rallies... Yeah.. "grass roots." No corporate sponsors there, huh? The trouble with the Right isn't WHAT they think, or even (as I once believed) HOW they think. The problem with the Right is that they're not even living in the SAME WORLD as the rest of us! They're not actually living in the same REALITY any more.
Think about "OBAMACARE." Can anyone explain to me what that actually IS?! I mean... they spand an awful lot of time harping on it, and yet NO ONE can explain to me how it is any different for mwhat we've had forever. What IS this thing? It is nothing more than a figment of the Rigth's imagination that the have convinced their followers EXISTS...
...The same way Obama is going to take all of our guns...
...or impliement Sharia law...
...of wants to tank the economy...
...or start a race war.
In what fucking plane of exsistance can any of this crap be taken seriously?!
Bottom line?
The ad hominen attack is the last refuge of the guy who's got nothin'.
Fox has got NOTHING. So? Attack the speaker. Sling mud. Make people suspect him. Make people HATE him...
...because you're basically BONED if anyone actually LISTENS to him!
Thank you, Fox. I accept your concession on all points.
Now... CAN WE PLEASE VOTE OUT ALL OF THE CORPORATE WHORES?!
Fox news is just a bunch of asshats. I am sick of them. I am sick of the right. I am sick of the religious nut jobs. I am sick of John Boehner-technically the first "colored" speaker of the house. I am sick of Herman "stepin Fetchit" Cain. I am sick of wall street and the Cock brothers and Sean Hannity and Palin and all the other sanctimonious finger pointing asshats. This religious woman gives y'all the finger. Bite my ass. Hooray for the protestors. Keep up the good fight. The left can protest without wearing wool suits in the middle of summer or three corner hats or wrapping themselves in the flag. We are democracy you bunch of jerks.
ReplyDelete"The problem with the Right is that they're not even living in the SAME WORLD as the rest of us! They're not actually living in the same REALITY any more."
ReplyDeleteBe careful about that wording--that makes it sound as if a "reality" is optional; that everyone can have their own little version. Belief in that is, of course, the source of the very problem you're outlining.
And it's a serious problem. I've called it our most serious problem, in fact, and I've been writing about it since at least the mid-'90s.
The American conservative elite has waged a relentless war on the notion that there is any such thing as an objective fact, and they've effectively instilled this notion in the minds of far too many of their followers. Not long ago, I wrote this long series of posts about the work of the Media Research Center, and, throughout it, I once again tackled the psychology at work in this--it's the psychology behind every article the MRC publishes. Your "when you argue with a liberal" thing is spot-on. Conservatives try to prove those who disagree are "liberals" because that, to them, means the argument with which they're being confronted is totally unfounded. A "liberal," to them, is, by definition, one who lies, cheats, is deceitful, and everything he says is inherently without merit.
I've been writing about Occupy Wall Street in various venues lately, and I've been confronted with a new meme from the right, that OWS is just a made-up, top-down creation of various powerful liberal interests--that it is what, in reality, the teabaggers were. I haven't tracked down the source of it, but the frequency with which I've encountered it means it probably comes straight from Fox or Limbaugh. The righties may find this a comforting notion, but it isn't based on anything. I challenged one fellow to name names. Who are the powerful liberal interests who have created this OWS thing? He named Van Jones and George Soros (the Evil Jew Who Secretly Controls Everything). So how did they bring this about? Jones, he said, once predicted there would be this sort of citizen uprising. And Soros, he said, was a fellow who funds everything liberal.
And that was it.
I asked him how these fellows created OWS. Where's the funding? Where are they doing the organization? Who are their lieutenants? That sort of thing. He had no answer. His Masters, whom he had parroted, hadn't given him any answers to those kind of questions, you see, and he'd never even thought to ask them himself before so entirely swallowing that narrative that he was going around to message boards and very passionately parroting it.
In the most powerful nation in a world in which we've either invented or discovered 10,000 ways to obliterate ourselves, this is a mortal threat. Not just to the U.S., but to all mortals, period.
I find it interesting that the right is pushing back hard against the Occupy movement. I believe that to be evidence that they pose a real threat to the conservative machine - it is amazing that they have convinced all the original occupiers - the first tea partiers - that this is somehow different.
ReplyDeleteI was looking through Erickson's 53% knock-off and the little testimonials these counter-Occupiers make are filled with so many holes!
You can't reason with these people. I was trying to enlightened some but they kept calling me a "lemming" and that I was just trying to find every excuse to protect my liberal brothers!
Tucker Carlson (am I the only guy who thinks his looks would be improved by an elbow to the nose?) gave the clearest example of the ad hominem I've ever seen. It was years ago, and I've forgotten the issue and who he was talking to, but I distinctly remember him saying, "Why should I listen to a word you say? You're a liberal." The problem with that, of course, is not only the estrangement of the two strands of political thought, but the death of thought itself. If I dismiss your arguments without even hearing them, I don't have to subject my own positions to rigorous thought, and mindless dogmatism becomes the order of the day. That's where the right is, in my opinion.
ReplyDelete