Let's not talk about sex, baby, let's not talk about you or me...

[archanglrobriel]

First of all, sorry I haven't been around more on LJ, but NaNoWriMo is eating my head. You'd think for someone like myself (who tends to fall more on the garrulous side of the spectrum) writing a mere 1,667 words per day would be no big deal...but no matter how you slice it, there's a time commitment involved. And then there's the fact that writing

Comments

[thewronghands]

Wow, he's completely hot in that picture. Pity about my gender. [grin] But good for him! I hope his career thrives.

I'm with you on the politics of outing. Hypocrisy just sucks... it reminds me of an article that I read about how some abortion protestors would go have abortions, and then cover it up and be back out there protesting the next day. Same sort of bizarro-world social pressure to conform driving inconsistent choices that hurt people just like them.

[d2leddy]

That's because abortion and choice are not fundmantally about abortion and choice. In a representative democracy, the only way to gather power is to represent the interests of others. It's best when those others cannot speak, do not speak, or cannot be heard becaue of political weakness.

Regardless of what the anti-abortion and pro-choice activists say, they are respresnting, in a power grab, the interests of those who cannot speak: we do not know what an embryo nor a fetus wants. We cannot. It does not speak. The unborn make a perfect vessel, then, for "support".

Pro-choice rhetoric is not much better. Activists have repeatedly claimed (though not recently I don't think) that they represent those women who cannot speak because they are "oppressed and silenced by their husbands".

Same sort of bizarro-world social pressure to conform I'm not surprised that they appear hypocritical. I propose that the real subject is gathering power through representation: the subject matter is secondary, a means to that end. In that light, the

[centerfire]

Regardless of what the anti-abortion and pro-choice activists say, they are respresnting, in a power grab, the interests of those who cannot speak: we do not know what an embryo nor a fetus wants.

I think this is wrong. To be sure, both pro-choice and anti-abortion activists make the proxy argument -- i.e., "we are speaking on behalf of those who cannot speak for themselves" -- but at bottom I think both sides are trying to represent not so much people as principle: on the one hand, the principle that a fetus is a human life that deserves legal protections and ought not be arbitrarily extinguished; on the other, the principle that a woman should be free to control her reproductive functions, up to and including terminating a pregnancy. I think it demeans both sides of the argument to suggest that they're about a power-grab.

[d2leddy]

I think it demeans both sides of the argument to suggest that they're about a power-grab.

I intend to demean them because I think they are self-deceptively disingenuous, and I object to that.

I mean, honestly, do you really believe that when a modern human being does something publicly on principle, with stated intensions that immediately appear for the common good, that is actually what's happening? Maybe I'm another cynic, or maybe I'm a realist. But cynics have been claiming realism to a clich' extreme, anyway.

I propose that as soon as you see the proxy argument -- i.e., "we are speaking on behalf of those who cannot speak for themselves" the ostensible subject-matter is a means to an end, the end of grabbing power in a representative democracy. This is how we Liberals shot ourselves in the foot: by representing the interests of those who cannot speak or do not speak or cannot be heard for lack of political power--animals, African-Americans, Native Americans, and more. Especially when they did not (whether because

[centerfire]

I intend to demean them because I think they are self-deceptively disingenuous, and I object to that.

"Self-deceptively disingenuous"? That sounds oxymoronic. It seems to me that lying to myself is mutually exclusive of lying to others about the same subject matter. Could you clarify what you mean, here, so that I understand what these people have done to earn opprobrium?

I mean, honestly, do you really believe that when a modern human being does something publicly on principle, with stated intensions that immediately appear for the common good, that is actually what's happening? Maybe I'm another cynic, or maybe I'm a realist.I would certainly not use the term "realist" to describe someone who is arguing that modern human beings do not (or perhaps cannot) act out of principle. I would suggest that such an individual has moved beyond rational cynicism, as well

[d2leddy]

I started drafting replies to your points, beginning with the needed explanation of my oxymoronic "self-deceptively disingenuous", and it occured to me that we've talked before, and we talked about politics. Since Yahoo augmented my email account with an absurd amount of memory and I'm a slob, I seem to have email--including LJ comment notifications from quite a way back. I found a reply you delivered to a comment I made on a now deleted journal

[centerfire]

Respectfully, if you believe that I was trying to insult you or "silence" you (I'm not even sure what that means) in our past exchange, then I doubt I'll be capable of convincing you that it would be fruitful to engage with me now or in the future.

Take care.

[d2leddy]

Case in point.

[centerfire]

Huh? You're telling me that (based on how you've construed our past interactions) you're not sure it's worth trying to have a discussion with me. I'm telling you that (also based on how you've construed our past interactions) I doubt it's possible to convince you otherwise.

Since when does agreeing with someone that discourse is probably not possible constitute a "case in point" of an insult or an attempt to "silence" them? Good Lord.

[archanglrobriel]

Yeah, that picture has been - ahem - on my mind fairly regularly for awhile now. I believe it was taken when he was playing the Master of Ceremonies in "Cabaret".
It's pretty much a point-to reference for "What does Rob find irresistably hot?"