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Sunday, January 16, 2011

What a strange -- and 'liberal' -- set of news items

In his recent The B&R Sunday Edition post, Bob Parks includes the links to a couple of recent news items related to the shooting massacre in Tucson of a week ago --
Shooting victim tries to visit Loughners parents

Tucson shooting victim detained at taping of TV special


Mr Parks observes: "Some still refuse to believe Loughner wasn’t a talk-radio-listening, cable-news-watching, Sarah-Palin-map-reading teabagger"
What a strange -- and “liberal” -- set of news items; what a window into "liberalism" they present us. And mind you, it matters not in the least whether the individual person who is the subject of this post views himself as a political "liberal" -- what I am discussing here is "liberalism" (that is, Leftism-with-a-HappyFace) and its pernicious effects upon society in general and upon the mindsets of the individuals who comprise society.

The first item reports that Eric Fuller, one of the persons wounded in the recent massacre in Tucson, went to the home of Jared Loughner’s parents to “forgive” them … and “possibly” to "forgive" the shooter himself.

My observations:
1) The parents didn’t shoot anyone. Thus, they are not in need of Fuller’s forgiveness for his injury, nor can he forgive them of it. This is a logical and moral impossibility.
2) Fuller can’t forgive Loughnner by proxy via his parents. If he wants to forgive him, he must forgive him.
2a) If he indeed intends and desires to forgive Loughner -- the shooter -- than that "possibly" in his statement is wholly out of place, for it tells us that his willingness to forgive the the actual guilty party is in some way contingent upon a "satisfactory" meeting with innocent persons who happen to be related to the guilty party.
2b) A publicity stunt does not equal forgiveness.
3) This isn’t the 1950s anymore; there is a certain creepiness in showing up, unannounced, at the home of the parents of the man who shot one, and murdered others, so as to "forgive" them -- innocent persons -- for one's injury and/or the murders of those others.
4) The only rational (and moral) thing Fuller can say to the parents is "But, of course, I don't blame you in any way for my injury; and I can't even imagine the horror you must be going through right now."

5) While genuine forgiveness is a Christian virtue, and much to be encouraged, the "liberal" (mis)understanding of the concept is an abomination leading directly to all sorts of the social problems and pathologies presently afflicting America (and other Western nations) ... including such as the events reported in the second item.


The second item reports that this Eric Fuller went to the taping of an ABC-TV "town hall event" and shouted "You're dead!" at a Tea Party spokesman there.

My observations:
1) Ah, "liberalism!" So open-minded! so rational, so forgiving.
2) These two new items together so perfectly exemplify the “liberal” (mis)understanding of the concept of forgiveness:
2a) Fuller imagines that he can “forgive” someone wholly innocent of his injury -- that is, he first attempts invalidly to foist the blame onto them so that he can magnanimously “forgive” them for that of which they are innocent;
2b) Fuller has it in his mind to “forgive,” in the “liberal” manner, the actual guilty individual -- not by, indeed, forgiving him, but by transferring his guilt to an innocent third party;
2c) And that innocent third part would be conservatives, those who are politically and socially opposed to “liberalism” - this is scapegoating, this is a “blood libel” … this is “your mind on liberalism!
3) Leftists ... and the majority of their "liberal" enablers in the public eye ... spent the week after the massacre trying to pin ultimate blame for the shootings on conservatives in general, the Tea Party people in more specifics, and especially upon select individuals, such as Sarah Palin, Glen Beck, and Rush Limbaugh. As Sarah Palin rightly called it, the “liberals” and leftists were dealing in “blood libel” ... until, of couse, it got through to them that this time the American public wasn't buying what they were trying to sell.
3a) The pseudo-argument the "liberals" tried to advance is that by virtue of conservatives’ supposed "violent rhetoric" (and do, let us, ignore that political violence, physical and rhetorical, is the provenance of the left, of the "revolutionaries," of those who want to overthrow and destroy all present social arrangements, who wish to dictate to us what our social arrangements must be), conservatives have "created a climate of violence" which fosters actual violence (by conservatives) against innocent “progressives.”
3b) According to their own “reasoning,” by their actions over the part week -- vilifying and demonizing conservatives in general and Tea Partiers in particular - “liberals” have “created a climate of violence” which fosters the apparent issuing of threats of physical violence against identified conservatives, on virtue only of their conservativism.

4) What are the odds, do you think, that *any* of the “liberals” who spent a week trying to pin the blame for Loughner’s actions on Sarah Palin … and me (and possibly you) … are going to man-up, step up to the plate, and admit their own fault and complicity in Fuller’s actions and seeming threat?

3 comments:

James Nicholas said...

This guy Fuller... he just perfectly embodies what is wrong with the left. He shouts "You're dead" at a Tea Party person. What, he didn't get the take home from the Obama speech? No he actually did, and the fact is that the only change in tone that Obama and the left is looking for is a silence of the opposition from the right.

That's a good post, Ilion.

Ilíon said...

Alleged-President Obama's "plea for civility" was typical leftist and "liberal" moral equivalency BS -- blame “both sides” for the fact the *one* side has (as it consistently does) gone ‘round the bed with fundamentally false and irresponsible and inflammatory accusations, whereas the other side was simply pointing out the flawed conclusions and premises, and then call on *both* sides to tone it down and return to civility -- and it just irks me so many self-identifying conservatives ate it up.

James Nicholas said...

Yep. There was almost a self-congratulatory aspect to it. You're on the money, Ilion.