House of Eratosthenes

This late in the game, it’s abundantly clear to anyone paying attention that the people we call “conservatives” understand more about the thought process of those we call “liberals” than the other way around. There is a marginal possibility, a HUGE logical leap, that a sincere effort exists on the left to understand opposing viewpoints, and it’s only the achievement that is lacking. If that’s the case, I guess my viewpoints really are stupid, because every time a liberal has insisted on an explanation from me about “why do you think x” the conversation always arrives at some variant of that tried-and-true intellectual riposte from six-year-olds, “YOU’RE STOOOPIDDD!!1!”

Well, that’s the trouble with calling people stupid isn’t it. Not only is it unlikely to persuade the target of your assault, and not only does it make you feel good about your own viewpoint even if you’ve proven absolutely nothing, but it places you in a position of knowing less about how your opposition thinks. Today, we have a major political party that is built on a half-century or more of calling the other side stupid. The ideology behind this party understands so little about the thought process of anyone who doesn’t drink the kool-aid, that in spite of the white-hot angry fidelity it enjoys among the True Believers, its continuing ability to lose elections is all but assured.

I’ve decided to help the Democrats and liberals out; 2006 is coming fast, after all.

Now that the war in Iraq is enjoying probably the lowest approval rating now that it ever has, we perceive a “bedrock” of people who remain convinced that it’s a good idea. That would be okay with the liberals, except the bedrock is close to 50% or so. What the liberals would like to do, although they are loathe to admit it, is find a way to dig into that bedrock. Calling us “stupid” doesn’t seem to be doing much, but anyone caught going out of their way trying to actually understand how we think, is likely to lose their Good Lefty Club membership card. So I’ll take the first step.

It all comes down to this, liberals. Terrorists, to me, resemble — actually, to me they are exactly like — toxic goo.

Deadly, carcinogenic, toxic goo.

Deadly carcinogenic toxic goo, capable of killing on contact with humans and cuddly pets, discharged by an irresponsible, megalithic, greedy capitalist corporation, with malice.

Toxic goo discharged by a corporation that makes obscene profits and cheats on its taxes.

That should explain everything done & said by people like me, in ways people like you can understand it. The September Eleven attacks, to me, compared to a disastrous event involving the deaths of three thousand innocent men, women and children, who were exposed to toxic goo. That event was not a wake-up call about “Al Qaeda” or “Osama bin Laden”; it was a wake-up call that we had been ignoring the Weird Beards, and in so doing, we and our government had been negligent. It was time to get “eco-friendly” and get that sludge cleaned up wherever we possibly could. We all became, in that sense, a bunch of tree-hugging liberals ready to bash an industry without mercy…a certain kind of industry.

So you see, your problem with convincing us isn’t in the lack of veracity to your arguments, quite so much as a lack of relevance.

To build an argument that my President is telling me lies about the war, is about as relevant as saying “sure that guy is cleaning up toxic goo, but he’s a liar who is cleaning up the toxic goo and he’s cleaning up the toxic goo under false pretenses.” See how irrelevant that becomes?

To tell me Iraq doesn’t have anything to do with Al Qaeda or doesn’t have anything to do with September 11, 2001 — by the way, you’ve done an abysmal job of organizing and disseminating that particular Talking Point, I mean, which is it? — is like saying “this puddle of toxic goo is not connected to the puddle of toxic goo that killed that three thousand people and there’s no evidence they were ever connected”. See how irrelevant that becomes?

To tell me Saddam Hussein has never murdered any Americans is like saying “that particular puddle of toxic goo you are cleaning up never killed anyone”. See how irrelevant that becomes?

To tell me there are no Weapons of Mass Destruction in Iraq (which is a problematic claim in & of itself) is akin to saying “no carcinogens have actually been detected in that puddle of toxic goo”. See how irrelevant that becomes?

Nor do I care whether “it’s about oil”. That’s like telling me as the toxic goo is being cleaned up, it’s being converted to petroleum and someone’s making a profit from it. See how irrelevant that becomes?

I don’t care if the goo is mad, and by extension, I don’t care what makes it so. Angry, vengeful, screaming goo is no more deadly than happy goo. Make it dopey, grumpy, bashful, sneezy, sleepy goo. It all goes.

To tell me terrorists have rights we are denying them, is like telling me the toxic goo has rights being denied it. No, really. I have absolute respect for the natural rights of others, particularly the rights of others to have the individual opinions they want to have — but to state that my respect is absolute is diffferent from saying it’s unlimited. It’s not that; it exists within a boundary. People who want to kill folks like me, with impunity and apathy, exist outside of that boundary. Actually, anyone who fails to recognize the sanctity of human life exists outside that boundary. On this point, you’ve got the bedrock figured out. We don’t think people like that have rights. You have to adhere to the obligations of a social contract before you enjoy the benefits of it, and that’s one obligation.

If you don’t subscribe to that, what could your vision possibly be? That we live in a state of nirvana with people who don’t want to kill us because we are behaving in a way they find palatable; who, otherwise, would want to kill us, but because we adhering to the unwritten rules, don’t worry about it? C’mon, guys, take a couple steps backward and look at this again. That’s not gonna work.

We don’t think the terrorists, or their sympathizers, are sentient beings, in the sense they enjoy these basic rights. And we think they’re interconnected by default; they are connected virtually, even if & when you prove they are separate physically. A danger posed by one, is a danger posed by them all. Just like provably isolated, but equally lethal, puddles of toxic goo. You wouldn’t quibble about which corporation dumped it or where it was dumped, would you?

As an aside, I guaran-damn-tee this analogy won’t penetrate the thick skull of a single True Believing anti-war liberal.

But it all fits.

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Toxic GooThursday, August 4th, 2005

Toxic Goo
Thursday, August 4th, 2005