Sunday, August 14, 2005
Momento Moronus
The one thing I find that most liberals can agree upon is that hypocrisy is a universal evil.
Get into a debate with a liberal on the subject of absolutes, and inevitably you will find that when you raise the question of whether hypocrisy is universally wrong, you will hear the stammer and stutter of an opponent who will run to the nearest lampshade by which he (or she) may cover his head.
And so today we have diatribe in the Providence Journal on the subject of (tada!) the hypocrisy of the Republican right wing with a top ten list egregious hypocritical positions held by people like me.
One wonders aloud just what possesses the people at the Projo editorial board to invite such nonsense onto their pages. The piece was written by a Dr. Saleh R. Shahid whom I’ve not heard of before. It’s difficult to get an option editorial into the Journal, but it could be that everyone’s away on vacation so Dr. Shahid was able to slip through a crack.
We won’t address all 10 of his rants, but we will hit on this one (below). Other RI conservative bloggers (Anchor Rising, AntiProtester Journal, Dust in the Light, Kellipundit, Ocean State Blogger, RightRI and others will likely address this and others of Dr. Shahid's points:
Sayeth Dr. Shahid:
2. The basis of [the Republican right wing] religion is the existence of absolute truth, the constancy of God's will, and of right and wrong. Yet when faced with a very constant religion such as Islam, many RW people quickly become the moral relativists they've long opposed -- speaking of Islam's need to "modernize," as you would a household appliance, and espousing the "evolution" of their own religion.
Here’s my response:
As a Republican right winger, I’ve never believed that Islam needs to modernize or evolve into something else. I do believe all religions are subject to radical fringe groups, but that, as an absolutist, most religions are just plain, well, wrong. Therefore radical fringe versions or wrong religions are very dangerous. What I’d like to see for Islam and other similar so called religions that are out of sync with the Truth is for them to wise up and basically reform themelves to "the Truth." Not "evolve" or "modernize." And this is the type of error Dr. Shahid makes all the way through his piece. He's just enough off the mark that what he says seems palatable, but in reality the way he twists his observations make him way off base.
The ONLY thing I’m relativistic about really is…hypocrisy (ahem). This is the issue upon which I most think about when it comes to left wing nincompoops (momento moronus: think upon the morons). The absolute truth that hypocrisy is evil just makes them boil.
Get into a debate with a liberal on the subject of absolutes, and inevitably you will find that when you raise the question of whether hypocrisy is universally wrong, you will hear the stammer and stutter of an opponent who will run to the nearest lampshade by which he (or she) may cover his head.
And so today we have diatribe in the Providence Journal on the subject of (tada!) the hypocrisy of the Republican right wing with a top ten list egregious hypocritical positions held by people like me.
One wonders aloud just what possesses the people at the Projo editorial board to invite such nonsense onto their pages. The piece was written by a Dr. Saleh R. Shahid whom I’ve not heard of before. It’s difficult to get an option editorial into the Journal, but it could be that everyone’s away on vacation so Dr. Shahid was able to slip through a crack.
We won’t address all 10 of his rants, but we will hit on this one (below). Other RI conservative bloggers (Anchor Rising, AntiProtester Journal, Dust in the Light, Kellipundit, Ocean State Blogger, RightRI and others will likely address this and others of Dr. Shahid's points:
Sayeth Dr. Shahid:
2. The basis of [the Republican right wing] religion is the existence of absolute truth, the constancy of God's will, and of right and wrong. Yet when faced with a very constant religion such as Islam, many RW people quickly become the moral relativists they've long opposed -- speaking of Islam's need to "modernize," as you would a household appliance, and espousing the "evolution" of their own religion.
Here’s my response:
As a Republican right winger, I’ve never believed that Islam needs to modernize or evolve into something else. I do believe all religions are subject to radical fringe groups, but that, as an absolutist, most religions are just plain, well, wrong. Therefore radical fringe versions or wrong religions are very dangerous. What I’d like to see for Islam and other similar so called religions that are out of sync with the Truth is for them to wise up and basically reform themelves to "the Truth." Not "evolve" or "modernize." And this is the type of error Dr. Shahid makes all the way through his piece. He's just enough off the mark that what he says seems palatable, but in reality the way he twists his observations make him way off base.
The ONLY thing I’m relativistic about really is…hypocrisy (ahem). This is the issue upon which I most think about when it comes to left wing nincompoops (momento moronus: think upon the morons). The absolute truth that hypocrisy is evil just makes them boil.
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