Pretty Darn Stupid
As OB suggested below, it’s been a pretty awful time lately. And it goes without saying that Russia today is just appalling.
Admittedly I should have known better, but I decided to check out what the folk (with apologies to Dubya) at Crooked Timber made of all the horror this week.
Guess what, as far as I can tell – and despite their combined IQ of 213 – they have absolutely nothing to say on these matters. Not a squeak.
So what are they talking about?
Something about ITunes – though I’m too limited to understand a word of it.
Ah, Rousseau. Cool.
Some blindingly obvious stuff about Durkheim. Oh no, it’s really about George Bush.
More about George Bush, but with a staggeringly pretentious title.
Ah, Kerry this time. If only, it actually turns out to be about… Dick Cheney. Variation on a theme. Very good.
Gay republicans. (I tried to think of a way that this was about George Bush, but failed. Damn!)
This one’s about copyright. But somehow it starts off by saying that Republicans are dismayingly insane!
Something about the Enlightenment. By the Rousseau fella. Obviously, he hasn’t caught whatever obsessional illness his colleagues are suffering from.
Speaker of the House. (Is that George Bush?)
I’m bored now. Okay, this is very childish. But there’s a serious point here. I can’t find a single mention of the murder of the Nepalese hostages, exploding Russian jets, hundreds taken hostage in Russian schools. Of course, people are entitled to their own interests. But not one mention… that I can find. (I did get bored looking!)
I’d like to finish this by quoting someone from Panda’s Thumb (well from their comments section). They’re talking about mass murder.
I was a professor for 12 years. You are fighting a losing battle. Stalin
killed millions. Mao killed millions. Pol Pot killed a million or so. But the
majority of academics will apologize for them. Why? Because most academics and
most professors are pretty darn stupid. It’s that simple.But thank you for helping me remember why I hate academia—for there are times when I am tempted to go back.
Pretty darn stupid. He’s got that right.
I knew something seemed very strange when I logged onto Crooked Timber this morning, but I couldn’t quite put my finger on it. It was like stepping into another world. A world where Tariq Ramadan’s refused visa gets three separate posts (for the record, he should not have been refused) but hostage-takings, decapitations, busses and planes blowing up and various massacres across three continents are entirely off the intellectual radar. There is never any forest in CT’s trees.
I know. If I were being charitable, I’d make allowances for the whole Republican convention thing.
But this week isn’t wholly peculiar. Try typing Islam into their search engine; then compare the number of returns to something like “White House” or “Bush”.
My view is that they are guilty of a certain kind of moral blindness. That’s why I attack them (not that they give a bugger; or even notice).
Is this the pot calling the kettle black?
Fryslan
Whatever you say, darling.
Love and kisses,
Jerry
Maybe it’s a different blog from the one you would like it to be? Compared to most popular political blogs, they’re not particularly obsessed with Bush. Maybe you don’t want them to be a political blog.
Now, now. B&W doesn’t seem to have much on the Russian news either, but I don’t hold that against you.
As for that quoted comment: it was pretty darn stupid. I don’t know any professors who apologize for Stalin or Pol Pot or other mass murderers (although I’m sure such creatures exist, just as they do among plumbers and airline pilots), so it’s ridiculous to tar the whole profession with a peculiar and inaccurate perception.
Does Crooked Timber actually have a mission statement? I’ve never noticed one.
Has it ever claimed to cover all the important issues of the day, in a timely manner?
Wouldn’t that be a mammoth undertaking, even if it had, which it hasn’t?
And finally: is this the new Princess-Diana-ism, but squared? Are we political bloggers to be morally obligated to talk about an appalling terrorist crime, even when we don’t particularly feel we have anything to add that hasn’t already been said, or perhaps we don’t want to talk about it any more just now because it’s too distressing.
And what is the threshold? At what point does a terrorist act become so awful that it simply has to be talked about on political blogs, according to JS?
Ah, I see dsquared has now posted on Crooked Timber about Beslan: “Al Quaeda in Beslan?”
He starts off by saying:
“As Chris notes below, the hideous events in Beslan are the property of the people who lived there; I don’t feel comfortable commenting on them, or in getting involved in the blame exercise of what happened and whether things could have been handled better. All we can do here is offer the profoundest sympathy, and weblogs are a particularly poor medium for doing that.”
After declaring that “all we can do here is offer the profoundest sympathy”, Daniel proceeds to demonstrate that there is a lot more that can be intelligently discussed. But he has a notoriously thin skin and is quick to call any critic a “troll”, often with a dash of obscenity. No one is expecting every blog to weigh in on the day’s atrocities, but for a blog so heavily political, Crooked Timber’s avoidance of subjects that don’t fit its template is becoming a bit of a sour joke.
Maybe we should criticize all those teenage diaries on livejournal.com for not covering this topic either.
Alex T:
“Maybe we should criticize all those teenage diaries on livejournal.com for not covering this topic either.”
I really hope you’re not a defence lawyer! CT are not teenagers. One might hope that would make a difference.
Robin Green:
You’re missing the point. It’s not simply that they hadn’t mentioned the Russian school horror. It’s that there was not one mention – not one, not even in passing, as far as I can see – of the horrors of the past week. That is odd (see Jimbo above)…
PZ
“I don’t know any professors who apologize for Stalin or Pol Pot or other mass murderers”
Well, you’re mixing in the wrong circles then. I think we’ve posted stuff on B&W previously dealing with leftist apologetics and Stalin.
I’ve sat in lectures where it has been explained that one shouldn’t judge Stalin too harshly; that, for example, one must take account of how quickly Russia industrialised before jumping to condemn the loss of life; after all, didn’t millions lose their lives because of slavery, etc.
Here’s a quote for you all. I don’t think I’m using it out of context:
“I’ve just done a tour of the various British blogs that supported the war from of liberal/lefty pov, and I find, amazingly, that they haven’t been discussing Najaf at all. Not a mention! (I’m sure commenters will dig up exceptions.) Perhaps events have deviated too far from the script? Data does not compute!”
And who is it by? Why it’s Chris. From Crooked Timber. Just a week ago…
You can read the rest of it here (you’ll notice, for example, that John Guiggin, fellow CTite, finds it “significant” that the pro-war left aren’t discussing Najaf):
http://www.crookedtimber.org/archives/002402.html
I’ll let you draw your own conclusions as to whether there’s a difference between CT not discussing the kinds of things I’m talking about and pro-war blogs not discussing Najaf.
Jerry – I haven’t mentioned any of those horrors on my blog either – is that “odd” as well? Why / why not?
I want to know what the criteria for it being “odd” are, please.
Is it “odd” because you secretly think that they are apologists for terrorism? If you think that, why don’t you just come out and say it?
Robin
I don’t think they are apologists for terrorism.
I think:
1. That their loathing for George Bush (legitimate though it might be) skews their perspective.
2. That likely they don’t want to think too closely about the horrors of the last week because it raises uncomfortable questions about Islam; about the moral virtue – or lack of it – of the oppressed; etc.
Basically, I think CT’s Chris is right to be suspicious of those of us on the pro-war side who don’t want to think too carefully about Najaf. But I think it cuts both ways.
Jerry, I made it perfectly clear in comments to that Najaf post (as John also did) that I attached no significance at all to the fact that this blog or that blog hadn’t covered Najaf. It was the fact that a range of blogs which usually write a great deal about Iraq had all become silent.
As it happens I made several attempts at writing a post on Beslan yesterday, before finally posting a few words just to register my horror at what had happened. I found it tremendously difficult to write anything that was both appropriate to the awfulness of what was happening and which wouldn’t come across as exculpatory or over-contextualizing.
I find it odd that last week’s complaint was that we think of ourselves as having “a monopoly of virtue and omniscience” and this week’s is that we haven’t posted on various subjects. Perhaps a reason we haven’t posted is precisely because we are unsure, fallible, know that we don’t know enough about some subjects? Certainly that was one of the factors behind my own reticence.
Robin
I see I missed your major point (sorry it was the middle of the night).
The answer, of course, is that there is no general moral requirement to talk about the horrors of the last week. Indeed, there are plenty of blogs where it would be a strange thing to do (and, actually, I think I’d include B&W in that list).
But:
1. where you’ve a blog which comprises some fifteen different people;
2. where they are constantly exercised by the failings of George Bush’s war on terror;
3. where the majority of their posts are explicitly political in tone;
4. where they are apparently concerned with issues to do with international relations, national sovereignty, etc;
5. where they are quite happy to talk at length about Najaf, the torture of Iraqi prisoners of war, etc;
6. where one of them is happy to cite – approvingly it seemed – a post which claimed that liberal Islamophobia is the biggest threat to the world today;
7. and so on (I could carry on at great length in this fashion!);
then yes, I expect at least one of them to allude to “hostage-takings, decapitations, busses and planes blowing up and various massacres across three continents” (to quote Jimbo).
The key here is selective silence, not silence per se.
[Edited here: because of a cross-post – I deleted something]
Chris
FWIW (and I realise that you won’t care), I’d largely exclude you from these criticisms. You’re the best of CT.
But CT is a range of blogs. There are fifteen of you. My criticism isn’t directed at any one of you. It’s the collective you.
” I found it tremendously difficult to write anything that was both appropriate to the awfulness of what was happening and which wouldn’t come across as exculpatory or over-contextualizing.”
I believe you. But I’m sorry, I just don’t believe that’s the reason your colleagues have been silent.
“Certainly that was one of the factors behind my own reticence.”
Again, I believe you. But this isn’t about you. You have demonstrated a willingness to confront stuff which it might perhaps have been easier for you to stay silent about. Today’s posting about Yusuf al-Qaradawi, for example.
PZ
Because I’m a kind-hearted sort of guy, I tracked down some Chomsky for you. He’s talking about Pol Pot:
“The deaths in Cambodia were not the result of systematic slaughter and starvation organised by the state but rather attributable in large measure to peasant revenge, undisciplined military units out of government control, starvation and disease that are direct consequences of US war, or other such factors… The positive side of the picture has been virtually edited out. The negative side has been presented to a mass audience in a barrage with few historical parallels, apart from wartime propaganda.”
Not a bad bit of apologetics!
Jerry, there may be fifteen of us, but some of those fifteen post regularly and others much less frequently. Of those fifteen a majority are based in the US where the coverage in the news and consequently on blogs (blogging being a rather reactive medium) is at present overwhelmingly slanted towards the coming Presidential election. The focus on Bush, which you deplore, is therefore understandable, and all the more so during the Republican convention.
I also think you have a rather odd view of the group dynamic on a blog like CT. We don’t have a party line, and we don’t co-ordinate postings. You may think it significant that fifteen people stay silent on an issue but I’ve often hung back from writing on something because I rather hope that one of the others will mention it. Sometimes they do, sometimes they don’t.
Finally, flattered as I am that you “largely exclude” me from your criticisms, you and I both know of course that I am the person you are referring to in your point 6 above. I didn’t think then and I don’t now “that liberal Islamophobia is the biggest threat to the world today”. But I still think that Marc Mulholland had some useful things to say, things that I’m afraid you couldn’t hear him saying.
Chris
Well I consider the Marc Mulholland thing to be a mistake on your part, but we’re not going to agree about it, so let’s leave it.
“is at present overwhelmingly slanted towards the coming Presidential election.”
You’re being somewhat disingenuous here. CT has always been Bush obsessed. Try the Search thing I suggest at the beginning of these comments.
Of course, it’s true that the Republican convention, etc., is going to count this week, but we’re talking here about not one mention of any of the things I’m talking about. This is what is so striking here. It’s the complete silence.
Honestly Chris, don’t you get tired of the endless stuff about the minutiae of George Bush’s life which appears on CT? Okay, the guy is a menace, but he isn’t responsible for all the ills of the world (whatever Chomsky and his ilk might think).
You should have stuck with Junius. I was never irritated by it. Even though you once wrote not entirely kindly about a book I was involved in putting together! :-)
“You should have stuck with Junius. I was never irritated by it.”
I don’t mean to imply any relation between these two things!
“I was a professor for 12 years. You are fighting a losing battle. Stalin killed millions. Mao killed millions. Pol Pot killed a million or so. But the majority of academics will apologize for them. Why? Because most academics and most professors are pretty darn stupid. It’s that simple.”
JS, you’re onto a loser with this one and you know it. Quoting Chomsky isn’t going to establish that the -majority- of academics are apologists for Stalin, Mao and Pol Pot. I doubt you’d even find -many- academics, even in the sorts of departments that might be more inclined to be apologists (oh, I don’t know, sociology maybe).
Actually, that crazy communism is evil, libertarianism is good stuff on Panda’s Thumb is very incongruous but I won’t moan about it here cos I didn’t there.
PM
“I doubt you’d even find -many- academics, even in the sorts of departments that might be more inclined to be apologists (oh, I don’t know, sociology maybe).”
Well, you’re probably right. But it perhaps might not be quite as clear-cut as one would think.
It depends what you mean by apologist. As you probably know, I’m a sociologist. Certainly, you wouldn’t find many sociologists who would try to justify the behaviour of people like Stalin, Pol Pot, etc.
But you would find plenty, probably the majority, who would engage in a processes of explaining away; and relativisation (Stalin bad, but the US equally bad for its treatment of the slaves, third world, etc).
Sociologists aren’t typical of the academy as a whole – obviously – but they’re probably no more “radical” than many people who occupy positions in humanities and social science departments (especially if you include professors at smaller colleges, etc., amongst the people we’re counting as academics).
“that crazy communism is evil, libertarianism is good stuff on Panda’s Thumb is very incongruous”
Yeah. I must admit that I’d not be on the side of the person I’m quoting here. But hey, I’m interested in the perlocutionary dimensions of the stuff I post, so I’m not troubled by the facts of the matter! :-)
So if I say that Stalin was bad but the US was also bad, although not equally so – does that make me an apologist for Stalin? Do I have to pick sides?
PM
The serious answer to your question is that it would depend whether your response was designed to deflect attention from the depravity of Stalin’s regime.
To talk in sweeping generalisations, one of the problems of the Left is that they’re too slow to condemn atrocities which are perpetrated in the name of Leftist politics, or which are perpetrated by groups with which they would normally have sympathy.
If every time somebody wants to talk about the abhorrence of Stalinism, you respond, ah yes, but America were also bad, then I reckon you’re at least some kind of apologist.
It’s preposterous for you to criticize CT for not covering an issue, especially one which is breaking and for which no moralizing tut-tutting is required.
I could constructively criticize — and I have to OB, privately — this blog’s total blissful blindness to the condition of our built environment and (more germane to your interests) of the language used to discuss it.
But while that would be true, and sad, such criticism would also be a bit silly because that’s just not what you cover: you are not a newspaper and I do not turn to you for comment on every aspect of life. So to, with CT.
This post of yours is wrong-headed.
So the last few posts on CT have been about Bush. Whereas the last few posts on B and W have been about… Anyone? anyone? Bueller?
Well, five of them have been about Harding, who is far less important than George W. CT bloggers are not journalists; they can post about whatever they want whenever they want, and you don’t have to read them if you don’t want to. I seem to detect that you’re just envious of their popularity.
Furthermore you seem to be pulling a Wieseltier and using CT as an excuse to riff on an entirely different hobby horse, namely the leftist response to Stalinism, which by the way was a topic on a CT post not too long ago.
Chris. Don’t be silly.
You definitely have a point there, Chris! Really it’s quite unfair to his colleague for my colleague to go accusing other people of talking about X to the neglect of Y, considering my tendencies in that direction. That’s probably why he did it. It was probably a devious way of getting readers to tell us how tedious and long-winded I am.
He’s not jealous of their popularity though. I am, of course, but he’s not. He prefers obloquy and loathing. That’s probably the other reason for the CT-tease.
Oops, cross. That really was not intentional!
“He’s not jealous of their popularity though.”
Come on now, surely you realise that my indifference to matters of popularity, recognition, esteem, and so on, disguises a deep-rooted egotism rooted in self-loathing and insecurity. :-)
No actually what I think it disguises is a deeply-rooted need to torture me for being so vain and greedy and egomaniacal, that’s what I think it disguises.
snicker!
Nah, that’s just a secondary gain. :-)
See? I’m such an egomaniac, I think everything’s about me.
cackle!