Why do movement ultraconservatives feel entitled to respect?

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Have we really hit such an era of cynical relevatism whereby people whose whole ideology consists of fabrications, distortions, and a brick wall against every fact expect others to treat them as reputable? I mean, seriously, how many times does a liar get to repeat outright falsehoods and be corrected on them before we can call them a pathological liar? How many times can key figures in a movement attack the entire intellectual community and institutions with notions that their gut-instinct is better than anyone else's years of hard cognitive labour before critical thinkers are entitled to distrust the movement?

Why do ultraconservatives think they are entitled to respect? In the words of Sam Harris, we ought to be conversationally intolerant - if people fail to provide evidence for their views, we are entitled to disrespect them.

Every time Glenn Beck opens his yap, a string of refutable nonsense, out and out lies, and bigotry pours out. And yet, his followers take every syllable as Gospel.

-Bill, otherwise known as Kraichgauer

Glenn Beck is a buffoon.

ruveyn.

Don't know where you're going with the first part. 'But I'm sure the "ultraconservatives", whatever that means, would ask you the same question.

Calling people stupid and racist isn't very productive for anything.

Yes. Arrogance and self-righteousness originate from within human beings, not from thus-rationalized ideologies.

Calling people who relied on the Southern Strategy what they are is very effective at drawing attention to their vices. Calling people who say stupid things or are ignorant of the long-use of teleprompters is not only justifiable but something of a duty to tell the truth.

hahaha....

As long as they advocate homosexuality, sexual freedoms, abortions, or other such contrivances, it doesn't matter how much they lie. Advocate against those, and if you lie even once unintentionally, then everyone attempts to smear them. Liars get away with lying so long as their words are pleasing to the itching ears of their audiences. Stop sounding pleasant and then everything you say will be held as false until proven beyond a shadow of a doubt to be otherwise.

It's only effective at cheapening the word racist even more than it is now. Har har on that second part.

I hardly see calling people who use racial stereotypes, pander to rural Southern racial resentment, pass papers-please laws, and come out with "Magic Negro" songs as racists cheapening the phrase at all. A spade is a spade, I don't care if it's conservatively incorrect to call it so.

Seems like you are utilizing such stereotypes as well, would you like to be called a hypocrite?

Yeah, referring to decades of attempts to block desegregation is sure an uber-stereotype!

How dare they appeal to rural white voters............ how dare they ! !! !

(shame this absurd thread didn't just fall to the bottom where it belonged.)

Obviously the far-left shows no intent to respect or even tolerate its political opponents in a representative society.

Well, Master Pedant was actually talking about pandering to people's lowest prejudices - which in this case happens to be ugly racial prejudice and resentment in places where most voters can be swayed. In this case, it happens to be rural white southerners. In the ground zero Islamic center controversy, anger and even hysteria against Muslims is manipulated by rank opportunists like Newt Gingrich in New York.

-Bill, otherwise known as Kraichgauer

I don't care if they are rural green martians. Some subcultures within this country are disproportionately uneducated, ill-informed and bigoted. Notice I didn't say anything about them being UNINTELLIGENT. It's not my problem that large amounts of people in Alabama and South Carolina are mentally trapped in the world that Nathaniel Hawthorne portrayed in his "Young Goodman Brown". Is there some reason we must cater to the lowest common denominator in any society? Did I have something to do with the reason/s these people are so benighted?

"Obviously" you think there's something wrong with not respecting or tolerating the opinions of political opponents in a representative society. Sure I ought to tolerate the opinions of political opponents in the sense that I shouldn't attempt to forcibly disabuse them of their opinions. I think that's just about where said tolerance ends however. Give me one good reason why I need to respect the opinion of people who believe the government should force raped pregnant women to give birth. How about a good reason why I should respect the opinion of people who think the government has the right to interfere in the sexual affairs of consenting adults? Why should I respect the opinion of people who, for all intents and purposes, would like to see a christian theocracy in America?

These are precisely the kind of people republican politicians have been pandering to since the days of Ronald Reagan and the cynical reasons for that are pretty "obvious". Please don't try to tell me that people like Tom Delay and Dick Cheney give a hoot about abortion one way or another. Many conservatives have been quite disillusioned by this as well....including that late conservative icon Barry Goldwater. Furthermore....don't bother telling about who the democrats cynically pander to since that will get you nowhere. Ultimately I hold little more brief for the democrats than I do for the republicans. I vote democrat though and my reasoning here has everything to do with the social/religious conservative wingnuts the other major party has choosen to pander to. If they'd just become "Goldwater Republicans" again i'd probably just vote for third party candidates or sit out the elections altogether.




BTW.....who or what exactly are you defining as "far left" in America???


Obama?.....Keith Olbermann?.....Rachel Maddow?


If so....please explain to me in very technical terms how their opinions/policies on economic issues even remotely resemble those of say.... Noam Chomsky. Or is a more or less Keynesian economic policy and a tiny dash of socialism in a mixed economy now synonymous with "far left" ideology in America?


The social/cultural issues and foreign policy have nothing to do with "left" or "right" as far as i'm concerned.


Ayn Rand was a rabid atheist.

Ron Paul is about as anti-war as Ward Churchill.

Plenty of "right wingers" have no problem with gay marriage....even Glenn Beck CLAIMS to have no problem with it.

Countless hardcore libertarians are pro-choice, against the "war on drugs" and in favor of legalized prostitution.

Would you define any of these individuals as even remote left???

Last edited by Horus on 04 Sep 2010, 12:41 am, edited 1 time in total.

Why not?........ I have no problem with that if the majority goes for it. I did not protest at all against the 53% of the population who decided for Obama.

I'm not even Christian, but I'd rather have the above as opposed to a liberal elite that "knows what's good for everybody." And btw, the liberal elite that wishes to run the country as a big social experiment just because they once sat in a sociology class DOES NOT know any better than those 'bigoted ignorant rednecks."

And anyway, both liberal and conservative politicans can count votes........ They call it the silent majority for a reason.



I do....... Its really the leftists who clearly wish to create a 'rainbow coalition' that completely suppresses and keeps what will be the former majority as helots.