From: Case (Case@iSpots.com)
Date: Sat Nov 05 2005 - 15:39:40 GMT
Arlo,
Sorry, I get my arguments confused sometimes. I thought you were making a
case against subjectivity not a political argument. Ham should be delighted
to know I embrace subjectivity but since this is about politics you have
probably noticed I lean more in your direction than Platt's. I was not
identifying your position with totalitarianism I was saying that is the
extreme. Of course Platt throws it up at you. You should be throwing the
anarchist extreme back at him.
As far as our existing political system goes, advocating for either extreme
is not likely to accomplish much more than raising blood pressure. (Although
having said that I remember this guy Raygun...) But then the secret to
Raygun's success was his talent for over simplification.
I went to a seminar last week about Sexuality in the Bible and one of the
speakers was an Old Testament scholar, James Crenshaw. Several years back he
was working with Robert Funk, the founder of the Jesus Seminar. This was
about the time the 'Five Gospels' was published. Funk told Crenshaw that
Jerry Falwell had offered to debate him about the Jesus Seminar's work.
Crenshaw advised him not to do this. He said, "I told him that every time a
question was asked, he would have to answer that he didn't know, and Falwell
would say, 'Well I know the answer without a doubt.'" He said Funk's
intellectual integrity would kill him in a debate like that.
When I asked Crenshaw where we could find some theologians will a little
less integrity, some of the other panel members chimed in. John Carey
chaired the Presbyterian National Committee on Human Sexuality. He got
interviewed a lot when the committee's work was published. He said he found
that he was being questioned mostly from a right wing perspective. He said
his strategy became to stay focused on the message and not the specific
questions being asked.
The point is that in order for a message of any kind to actually permeate
into the society at large it has to be understandable. It needs a set of
buzz words that call to mind a clear set of ideas.
For example take the term "activist judges". The right is throwing that
around like it is a bad thing. They don't mention that fact that 'activist
judges' interpreted the US constitution in favor of individual and civil
rights, as opposed to the several states' right to restrict those individual
rights. Whereas a "strict constructionist" would have to support slavery or
having abolished slavery, would have no reason to extend full civil rights
to former slaves.
This is rambling on I know but the overall point is that neither side of
these political arguments will find comfort in the extremes. And that in the
marketplace of ideas subtlety is a formula for failure to persuade.
Case
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