Better Than Sticks and Stones: Stigmitization of Voices from the Right......

The Iconoclast ^ | October 9, 2002 | Unknown

[clintonbaiter]

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The Iconoclast (www.iconoclast.ca)

Better Than Sticks and Stones......



October 9, 2002: How does that little children's ditty go? Sticks and stones may break my bones, but names will never hurt me!

Well, that might be an appropriate maxim for the playground, but it certainly doesn't apply to modern-day North American politics. Name calling has turned into one of the most sophisticated weapons of the political left -- and probably its most effective stratagem in the cut and thrust of everyday political combat.

And what name calling would we be referring to? Why the use of such pleasant labels of disapprobation as right wing, right winger, right of center, far right, rightist , reactionary, extremist, fanatic, racist, homophobic, misogynist, anti-female, etc., etc., etc. Of late, even the term "conservative" has increasingly been tainted in everyday discourse.

Use of such adjectives in a derogatory and detractory manner has increasingly been employed by the liberal left for such varied purposes as marginalizing Republican candidates for office, justifying the denial of judicial appointments to strict constitutionalist judges in the U.S. Senate, and stifling debate on liberal college campuses.

Of course, what it all comes down to is reverse McCarthyism. Plain and simple, liberals have made it a risky business to espouse conservative opinions in legal contexts, in the mainstream media or on college campuses. And that's for fear of being politically lynched -- tarred with one of the many nasty labels employed by the liberal-left to marginalize and disarm any opponents it can't otherwise deal with.

As already indicated, we're of course taking about such typical ever-so-polite liberal-leftist adjectives as "extremist," "fanatic," "racist," or "homophobic" -- as in "right-wing extremist," "conservative fanatic," "hateful racist" and "homophobic right winger." Having one of these labels applied to you in mainstream North American society these days is a unique kind of status degradation ceremony -- almost the equivalent of experiencing a secular excommunication or modern-day shunning. For these days, such loosely-applied labels as "right winger," "reactionary," "extremist," "racist," "misogynist," and "homophobic" prescriptively imply that the stigmatized person is so irrational, unfair, selfish, ignorant and cruel as to be beyond the moral pale. Built into such judgmental labels is the ideologically-charged assumption that anyone espousing such "hateful" views must be so twisted and pathological as to be some kind of subhuman monster -- the left's ingenious method for Hitlerfying (and thus stigmatizing) any dissent against their prevailing orthodoxies.

As many a victim of such political labelling has discovered -- especially in legal circles or on college campuses -- the unspoken intention of such prescriptive labels is to de-legitimize in the eyes of their peers (or potential employers) these selected "deviants," and to strip away any and all credibility from the ideas or opinions expressed by such individuals -- somehow identifying them with cataclysmic outpourings of hate, extremism and wrongdoing in the past. In otherwords, this Orwellian corruption of language is used to stigmatize any vocal dissenters from the liberal orthodoxy as dangerous social reprobates so morally bankrupt they're not worthy of even being given a hearing.

And according to the unspoken strictures of this status degradation process, what should happen if a politically-incorrect dissident should still find a venue for his or her ideas? Then the individual should be literally shouted down because of the sheer "horribleness" of his or her extremist viewpoints -- a not uncommon practise on today's college campuses or in U.S. Senate hearings.....................

[clintonbaiter]

Perfidy of the left.

[longtermmemmory]

How many freepers admit their participation to co-workers?

How may lawyers who post here tell fellow lawyers? (doctors, office workers)

How safe is it to admit conservative beliefs at a party?
(try it this thanksgiving or christmas)

Do college admissions committees passively exclude students who are conservative?

When was the last time you saw a madison avenue produced commercial where the man was the smart consumer? not a clutz?

[bluester]

It's a two way street.

[Apolitical]

Exactly. By today's standards, conservatism in any guise is not fit for public expression in politics, the workplace, halls of higher learning, or the legal community.

A real intimidation factor in politics, many careers and social settings.

[MHGinTN]

That's why I risk aprobrium with my characterization of abortion on demand as sanctioned serial killing and pro-abortion folks as enablers for serial killing, and the despotic democrat party as the serial killer support program.

[William McKinley]

Yassir Arafat's Double Would Never Donate. Will You?
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[longtermmemmory]

To paraphrase ann coulter, For a leftist (liberal, democrate party, socialist) when logic fails, stand up indignantly, point your finger at the conservative and scream at the top of your lungs, "NAZI!!!".

[LiteKeeper]

AMEN! mega-dittoes

[7thson]

Dell. Not the Dude guy. But the Dave guy. He's the guy in charge of IT in a company. Best commercial is when the boss, faced with people telling him of all the budgets cuts, flatly states, "IT has an solution. Dave?" Good commercials.

[wideawake]

When was the last time you saw a madison avenue produced commercial where the man was the smart consumer? not a clutz?

When was the last time you saw a commercial with a multiracial cast where the white person was the one who was knowledgable about the product and was the "smart" consumer?

My wife laughs, because whenever we watch TV, one of these commercials come on and I say something like: "Wow! We whites are so stupid . . . good think black people are around to describe the workings of PineSol to us!"

[lodwick]

The Freeper Tagline Challenge!
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[mhking]

"IT has an solution. Dave?" Good commercials.

CDW. Not Dell. (I worked there about 10 years or so ago.)

Great company. Michael Krasny (founder & CEO) has a great thing going there.

[JohnGalt]

Have you also noticed that the neo-cons use the same tactics against anyone to the Right of them?

If you are against support for Israel, you are an anti-Semite.

If you are for allowing citizens to carry firearms onto an airplane, you are a guns rights extremist.

etc...

[wideawake]

No it isn't.

Conservatives are routinely called "Nazis" or "fascists" when they have absolutely no sympathy for either of those political movements and actively detest them.

Leftists bridle at being called "socialists" or "Communists" even when they espouse Marxist doctrines, invoke class warfare and wear Che Guevara T-shirts.

An opponent of affirmative action is in no way a "Nazi sympathizer". But someone who supports Castro is quite explicitly a Communist sympathizer.

[wideawake]

Ha! I live in NYC, the belly of the abortionist beast, and whenever the legal murder of children is mentioned in conversation, I call it what it is.

I've had more people storm out of the room than I can count - usually with them screaming at the top of their lungs while I maintain a conversational tone.

All you have to say is: "It's OK. Just admit that you think it's all right to murder a child for personal convenience. If that's your viewpoint - fine. Just don't use fancy words to pretend it's not a child and that you're not killing it."

[Yardstick]

So true. The online Democratic bulletin boards have a very visible communist and communist-sympathizing fringe. Their presence is accepted. They're just part of that culture.

It's really kind of disconcerting the way Democrats comingle with the ideological enemies of this nation, shamelessly and with virtual impunity. I saw a girl prancing around the library in a Che Guavera t-shirt just the other day. It's almost surreal.

[bluester]

I saw a girl prancing around the library in a Che Guavera t-shirt just the other day. It's almost surreal.

Hmm, I have also saw quite a few people (mostly young ones) wearing Che Guevara t-shirts and I know they were not communists. It's more about fashion then politics or ideology, believe me! :)

[nanny]

"Hmm, I have also saw quite a few people (mostly young ones) wearing Che Guevara t-shirts and I know they were not communists. It's more about fashion then politics or ideology, believe me! :)"

I would think it is more about ignorance and stupidity-------

[NapaCA]

I live in NYC, the belly of the abortionist beast, and whenever the legal murder of children is mentioned in conversation, I call it what it is.

Simply stated: Abortion - The Human Sacrifice To The God Of Convenience.

[mlmr]

I work in a radically liberal setting. Health care. Whenever conservative bashing or Bush bashing happens, I smile and quietly state my persepctive...and then I smile again and say isnt it wonderful that we are so diverse?

It is fun to watch the urge to attack me fight with the urge to be diversely PC play out on their faces. It stops the conversation cold.