A sinister trend

[fpb]

We are all, I hope, disgusted, and perhaps grimly amused, at the vile conference convened by Iran's criminal President to "discuss" the Holocaust. Not everyone, however, seems to realize that this is only the last, and not even the worst, of a growing tendency by politicians and rich men to simply refuse the assured conclusions of scholarship and

Comments

I think it is my duty to be brutal here.

[fpb]

When I first read your outburst above, do you know what my reaction was? It was, certainly, astonishment; but above all, it was astonishment underlain by a vague yet present sense of horror. Your way of thinking struck me as having some peculiarly horrible overtones; overtones of madness.

The first thing that struck me - leapt at me - was your complete failure to understand the basics of what I was saying, that is, how I was arranging any possible debate. You did not seem to realize that, in terms of what I had said, of the categories I had set out, of the direction I had taken, your comment would have been the verbal equivalent of a hand grenade. It is not that you presented a re-statement of what I had described, in the plainest possible English, as insanity; so much as that you did not give the least evidence of having noticed that I had done so. If you come into a debate whose basic terms you reject, you have to show that you understand them, and you have to say why you reject them. You did nothing of the sort; you spoke as though what you were saying was a consequential contribution to the whole course of the argument. You brought in notions I had condemned from the word go, without leaving any impression that you even realized I had condemned them, and that in spite of the fact that condemnation of conspiracy theories was pretty much the backbone of my whole entry.

That, after making such an intervention, you should feel hurt and offended because I reacted harshly, only redoubles the impression. If you deny the most basic terms on which another person bases his or her argument, you must at least understand that "them's fighting words". I find it truly frightening that you should expect to be all but patted on the back and welcomed to the party, after making a clear statement that the party does not deserve to exist. You seem to be living at two levels: one in which you can treat with contempt, indeed ignore, the views of others, and another in which you expect to be treated as a friend and a collaborator. This also suggests that your view of what you are allowed to do to others is most unlike your view of what they are allowed to do to you; and that, I hardly have to add, does not suggest sound psychological health.

Your complete inability to understand the terms of others also underlies your bizarre self-display. How long have you been reading this blog, not to realize that I am not impressed by pieces of paper? And on what grounds do you imagine that I should handle you any better only because you happen, for whatever reason, to belong to the Catholic Church? So did Pinochet, for the love of Heaven! We have not mentioned that little matter so long ago that you should have forgotten it.