The Problem with a call for "Civility"
Hey Folks -
In the preceding post I said I would share my response to the editor's column. It's directly below.
Unsurprisingly, I have not heard back from him. People in a relatively superior power-position (or those who make a comfortable living working for them) seldom see (or admit) that they are perceived as oppressive by the "inferiors" whom they cause suffering (e.g. Europeans invented "the White Man's Burden" which almost demanded colonialism and the slave trade - all for the good of the "savages"- and a slave had better keep a "civil" tongue in his mouth when addressing his benefactors).
In any case here is what I said (you can review his column in the posting directly below this one).
- Uke Man
Dear Mr. Marrison,
On April 27, 2008 you wrote a column titled “Civility War” about e-mails the paper receives that show little civility. Since that day I have been considering responding and finally have decided to make the effort.
On the one hand I sympathize with you; I have received anonymous diatribes myself and have experienced their hurtful and frustrating effects. Likewise, I share your prejudice for civil, thoughtful, fact-based debate.
On the other hand, however, I don’t believe your situation is as simple as you describe it.
The Dispatch receives irrational e-mails, in part, because it prints irrational letters. On the editorial page the paper regularly prints letters from unhinged readers who, while expressing their opinions, fall far short of “civil, thoughtful, fact-based debate.” They don’t have their facts straight; they call others derogatory names; they make gross generalizations; indeed, they sound very much like the very ones who could go even further via e-mail. The Dispatch, by printing these folks, gives its benediction to their irrational, uncivil ranting and, as a result, encourages more of the same.
Having read the paper for over fifty years, it has been my experience that the majority of these letters come from angry right-wingers, hard-core Republicans, and religious zealots. That may be the result of having so many of these good folks living in your distribution area, but I can’t help suspecting that more of them get printed because they play into the paper’s editorial agenda (are you going to argue that the Dispatch doesn’t have a Republican/business/ conservative/status-quo agenda?? I’ve already heard Dispatch folks on talk shows claim that the opinion columns selected are equally distributed among lefties and righties, but an honest appraisal shows the center of this “balance” framed to the right of center – you do not regularly publish columnist on the left ideologically comparable to Goldberg, Sowell, Will, Krauthammer, and Novak. And the argument that zealous right-wingers call you “Liberal” is equally misleading; those folks call Voinovich a Liberal ).
So, in part, the nasty e-mail you get from angry right-wingers is the paper’s own doing. It may not be YOUR doing, but aren’t you responsible for projecting the editorial board’s agenda?
Left-wing zealots have even more reason to pull their hair and shoot off an insulting message. They don’t get equal time for their irrational, uncivil, rants. They are as unhinged as their right-wing counterparts, but are stung doubly: the paper not only prints their opinions parsimoniously but also overwhelmingly presents editorials, letters, and articles inveighing against their view.
I agree that life would be more pleasant for you were this not the case, but you certainly can’t be surprised by the reality you endure or your partial responsibility for it.
Echoing your displeasure with anonymity, for some years I have wondered about the faceless, nameless folks on the Dispatch editorial board who decide so many things that affect me and other central Ohioans, and do so without any checks or balances – save from the wealthy owners of the paper. They have no need of shouting, incivility, venom, or vitriol; they have power and can make decisions in cold blood that reflect little moral concern for the harm they might be doing to large numbers of people.
It seems to me that the weak who react angrily to mistreatment by the powerful are less culpable than their calm, thoughtful tormentors. The insults you receive via e-mail are conventional insults; everyone recognizes them as such. The editorial board, however, is blind to the insults they hurl.
The insults you receive are empty angry words. The insults that the Dispatch agenda generates are not conventional insults but, nevertheless, do insult people’s standard of living, their ability to provide for their families, and their self-respect far more concretely than the angry words e-mailed to the paper harm the owner, the board, or its employees. But that’s “just business”; that’s “just the way it is”; it’s “nothing personal.” At least that’s what the privileged, seeking to maintain their advantage, like to say.
And I don’t think that people write nasty personal attacks to the paper because they don’t take time to think about what they are doing. Nor do I think that the editorial board takes the positions it does because it has taken time to think about it. The editorial board is not directed by rationality but by the interests of the paper’s owners, and they are civil because they are powerful. If an e-mail had power, its author would be civil too.
Which brings me to my closing comment and perhaps the best argument for my position.
I think you will agree that this e-mail has been civil and thoughtful, the rational antithesis of the e-mails about which you wrote; and I’ve included my name below as well. Nevertheless, it won’t make any difference. It won’t change a thing. The Dispatch doesn’t do what it does on the basis of civility, rationality, or thoughtfulness. As I’ve said, the Dispatch acts in the interests of its owners.
The only difference between my civil letter and an e-mail filled with expletives is that my letter can be more easily forgotten.
Yours - Tom Harker
In the preceding post I said I would share my response to the editor's column. It's directly below.
Unsurprisingly, I have not heard back from him. People in a relatively superior power-position (or those who make a comfortable living working for them) seldom see (or admit) that they are perceived as oppressive by the "inferiors" whom they cause suffering (e.g. Europeans invented "the White Man's Burden" which almost demanded colonialism and the slave trade - all for the good of the "savages"- and a slave had better keep a "civil" tongue in his mouth when addressing his benefactors).
In any case here is what I said (you can review his column in the posting directly below this one).
- Uke Man
Dear Mr. Marrison,
On April 27, 2008 you wrote a column titled “Civility War” about e-mails the paper receives that show little civility. Since that day I have been considering responding and finally have decided to make the effort.
On the one hand I sympathize with you; I have received anonymous diatribes myself and have experienced their hurtful and frustrating effects. Likewise, I share your prejudice for civil, thoughtful, fact-based debate.
On the other hand, however, I don’t believe your situation is as simple as you describe it.
The Dispatch receives irrational e-mails, in part, because it prints irrational letters. On the editorial page the paper regularly prints letters from unhinged readers who, while expressing their opinions, fall far short of “civil, thoughtful, fact-based debate.” They don’t have their facts straight; they call others derogatory names; they make gross generalizations; indeed, they sound very much like the very ones who could go even further via e-mail. The Dispatch, by printing these folks, gives its benediction to their irrational, uncivil ranting and, as a result, encourages more of the same.
Having read the paper for over fifty years, it has been my experience that the majority of these letters come from angry right-wingers, hard-core Republicans, and religious zealots. That may be the result of having so many of these good folks living in your distribution area, but I can’t help suspecting that more of them get printed because they play into the paper’s editorial agenda (are you going to argue that the Dispatch doesn’t have a Republican/business/ conservative/status-quo agenda?? I’ve already heard Dispatch folks on talk shows claim that the opinion columns selected are equally distributed among lefties and righties, but an honest appraisal shows the center of this “balance” framed to the right of center – you do not regularly publish columnist on the left ideologically comparable to Goldberg, Sowell, Will, Krauthammer, and Novak. And the argument that zealous right-wingers call you “Liberal” is equally misleading; those folks call Voinovich a Liberal ).
So, in part, the nasty e-mail you get from angry right-wingers is the paper’s own doing. It may not be YOUR doing, but aren’t you responsible for projecting the editorial board’s agenda?
Left-wing zealots have even more reason to pull their hair and shoot off an insulting message. They don’t get equal time for their irrational, uncivil, rants. They are as unhinged as their right-wing counterparts, but are stung doubly: the paper not only prints their opinions parsimoniously but also overwhelmingly presents editorials, letters, and articles inveighing against their view.
I agree that life would be more pleasant for you were this not the case, but you certainly can’t be surprised by the reality you endure or your partial responsibility for it.
Echoing your displeasure with anonymity, for some years I have wondered about the faceless, nameless folks on the Dispatch editorial board who decide so many things that affect me and other central Ohioans, and do so without any checks or balances – save from the wealthy owners of the paper. They have no need of shouting, incivility, venom, or vitriol; they have power and can make decisions in cold blood that reflect little moral concern for the harm they might be doing to large numbers of people.
It seems to me that the weak who react angrily to mistreatment by the powerful are less culpable than their calm, thoughtful tormentors. The insults you receive via e-mail are conventional insults; everyone recognizes them as such. The editorial board, however, is blind to the insults they hurl.
The insults you receive are empty angry words. The insults that the Dispatch agenda generates are not conventional insults but, nevertheless, do insult people’s standard of living, their ability to provide for their families, and their self-respect far more concretely than the angry words e-mailed to the paper harm the owner, the board, or its employees. But that’s “just business”; that’s “just the way it is”; it’s “nothing personal.” At least that’s what the privileged, seeking to maintain their advantage, like to say.
And I don’t think that people write nasty personal attacks to the paper because they don’t take time to think about what they are doing. Nor do I think that the editorial board takes the positions it does because it has taken time to think about it. The editorial board is not directed by rationality but by the interests of the paper’s owners, and they are civil because they are powerful. If an e-mail had power, its author would be civil too.
Which brings me to my closing comment and perhaps the best argument for my position.
I think you will agree that this e-mail has been civil and thoughtful, the rational antithesis of the e-mails about which you wrote; and I’ve included my name below as well. Nevertheless, it won’t make any difference. It won’t change a thing. The Dispatch doesn’t do what it does on the basis of civility, rationality, or thoughtfulness. As I’ve said, the Dispatch acts in the interests of its owners.
The only difference between my civil letter and an e-mail filled with expletives is that my letter can be more easily forgotten.
Yours - Tom Harker
posted by Ukulele Man at 5:42 PM
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