Auguste wrote:

Atrios says (extreme paraphrase) that, rather than worrying that snark and vulgarity will allow the right to shut down discourse, we should recognize that the right has already shut down the discourse and snark and vulgarity are a useful tool to shine a light on that fact.

Really?  I’m just imagining that Pandagon exists, that some of y’all are at the Nutroots Nation panel? 

Has anyone there been arrested for speaking his mind?  Is Amenda in a concentration camp?

I guess that I have a difficult time with the concept that on a very popular liberal blog you are complaining that the right has shut down discourse.  About the only thing I san see in this particular post is a claim that, as a “righty blogger,” I don’t actually have an ideology.

Hey Auguste, I was slack this AM and just walked into the panel. Look at how civil our blog leaders are on the panel! Where in god’s name is the profanity?

To defeat your opponent, become like him.  Just remember that an eye for an eye makes the whole world blind.

Dana, please do not act like an ass in public. It is embarrassing.

The drivers of the discourse that you see on television are right-wingers promoting talking points and supporters of the Iraq war whose biggest complaint about anyone who disagreed with them was, “they use profanity!” It’s a catchall attack on anyone who disagrees with them which obscures the fact that such opinions didn’t even get any attention in public until pearl-clutchers acted horrified that naughty words were used.

Seriously, Dana, you sound extraordinarily foolish.

Dana, since when does Amanda have her own show on CNN?

The existence of bloggers, some of whom are (Gasp!) Leftists, does not refute the idea that the Reichwing has effectively shut down many normal discussions which would have already occurred under different circumstances.

Your (Rightists’) games with controlling language and using “appropriate” words and “tone” and “being polite” just add insult to injury.

Blogging is one of the only ways progressives can circumvent the stranglehold the Right has on normal media.  But its penetration in the media “market” is almost insignificant compared to the MSM, where the Left is almost non-existent…

Hey Dana, an anti-semite like you who believes the Jews killed Jesus is in no fucking position to give lessons on vulgarity.

Sirkowski, Dana is a lot of things, but I don’t remember any antisemitic stuff from him.  Can you give a link or something?…

Comment #1: Proving your point, Auguste.

Snark? What does the mascot from the Thundercats have to do with anything?

The LiberalAvenger blog is down right now, but I retreived the comments from Google cache. Shorter Dana: Jews killed Jesus.

Atrios is a smart guy and I think he’s right again.  At the same time, use of profanity (snarkily or not) is off-putting to older generations brought up with stricter rules on what could be said in public.  There is also a difference between using profanity for shock value and just being offensive.  If you don’t give a shit about what people think of you and you want to say whatever the fuck you want however the fuck you want to say it, go right ahead.  But don’t be all surprised and shit when you discover that a lot of people don’t get your message because they’re turned off by all the fucking cursing.

Has anyone there been arrested for speaking his mind?  Is Amenda in a concentration camp?

There are those on the Right who would like the answers to those questions to be “yes.” That’s who we’re fighting against.  If I can say “we.”

Well, really, Amanda being young and presumably fecund, they’d probably like her sent off to a forced reproduction camp.  But, you know, I guess “concentration camp” is good enough…

Snark? What does the mascot from the Thundercats have to do with anything?

Fail

I think swearing also shows we’re not all flower children on the left-- not that there’s anything wrong with that, but the stereotype of the flighty, wimpy, touchy-feely hippy/New Ager has been a stereotype for a long time, and not th at many people relate to it.
The irony and swearing and pulling out of facts are all part of Progressives saying “We’re reality-based. Our ideals are grounded in practical solutions to practical problems.”

Dan: 0:31 through 0:38.

Thanks for the link Sirkowski.  I figured you were correct but I wanted to see it before re-evaluating my opinion of Dana.

I’m already aware that MAJeff has pointed out some nasty ant-LGBT comments from Dana, and I’ve seen other marginal stuff from him over the years.

I tend to cut him a little slack because he really doesn’t seem evil so much as deluded.  (Sad to say, he reminds me of some of my relatives, including my own father.) But that was over the line.

Dana, that blood libel stuff has been around way too long and harmed way too many people to be taken lightly.  I’m surprised you didn’t make a stronger effort to apologize and ask forgiveness.  Isn’t that what a good Catholic boy would be expected to do?…

Sirkowski is quite wrong.  Jesus was Jewish, and the people who were demanding his crucifixion were Jewish, doing so for religious reasons, true enough, but any guilt they bore died with them; it doesn’t somehow pass down through the generations.  You’d have a difficult time finding a greater admirer of Jews in America today or stronger supporter of Israel than me.

You’d have a difficult time finding a greater admirer of Jews in America today or stronger supporter of Israel than me.

I dunno. I suspect you’re outclassed by plenty of Jewish people as well as a lot of evangelicals (though your “admirer of Jews” and “supporter of Israel” credibility might be a little bit more honest and well-informed than that of a lot of evangelicals). Still, I might add that such phrases sound kind of silly.

That said, I think Sikowski is wrong on his take on Dana.

Mr Ess wrote:

Dana, since when does Amanda have her own show on CNN?

Perhaps one day she will.  But is it your contention that a woman who has attracted national attention, who has a book out and a very populat website has somehow been silenced?

The existence of bloggers, some of whom are (Gasp!) Leftists, does not refute the idea that the Reichwing has effectively shut down many normal discussions which would have already occurred under different circumstances.

Your (Rightists’) games with controlling language and using “appropriate” words and “tone” and “being polite” just add insult to injury.

Mr Ess, I have to admit: I have a difficult time seeing those who have commend of but one adjective as capable of making a reasoned argument.  If some people choose to express themselves in terms which turn off part of the audience, that’s their problem.  In persuasive speaking and writing, you are attempting to persuade an audience; if you lead them to think that you are a foul-mouthed boor, it shouldn’t be surprising that they don’t pay attention to your arguments. 

Blogging is one of the only ways progressives can circumvent the stranglehold the Right has on normal media.  But its penetration in the media “market” is almost insignificant compared to the MSM, where the Left is almost non-existent…

The stranglehold the right has?  Oh, good grief!  The New York Times, The Boston Globe, The Washington Post, The Los Angeles Times, The Philadelphia Inquirer, you can go through the list of all the major newspapers, and virtually all of them supported Al Gore in 2000 and John Kerry in 2004.  CBS News, which is supposed to be non-partisan, used forged documents—meaning: documents that were so obviously faked that bloggers were able to spot them as forgeries not in the paper copies but in video screen-caps—to try to help John Kerry in 2004, and then tried to withhold damaging news until the Sunday before the election, for the same purpose.  CNN was practically the Clinton News Network for eight years.  About the only medium in which you could reasonably hold that conservatives have dominance is talk radio.

Why does Fox News exist?  Because conservatives saw CNN as so biased toward the left that there was a market niche for Fox!

Dana, your comment illustrates Atrios’s point to a T.  Like I’m beginning to wonder if he paid you.

“Why does Fox News exist?  Because conservatives saw CNN as so biased toward the left that there was a market niche for Fox!”

Dana, there are a whole lot of things conservatives believe that are not true.  We don’t have to respect your illusions just because they make you feel all warm and fuzzy.  Faux News is entertainment first and last.  Any useful information conveyed is purely accidental.

We’ve seen enough over the last 8+ years to know there’s Reality, and there’s What Wingnuts Believe — and it frequently seems those things have very little in common with each other…

- the strong ideological defense they’ve built up is vital, since whenever it drops we see clearly that they don’t actually have an ideology.

‘Less plain ol’ thuggery does be a stand-in?

Tyro wrote:

I suspect you’re outclassed by plenty of Jewish people as well as a lot of evangelicals

Outclassed?  What does that mean, to you?

My admiration for Jews stems from their internal cultural norms.  A discriminated against minority everywhere, they developed a culture which pushes their children to study and work hard in school, to try to get the best college admissions they can, and then study and work hard in university, to get the best positions they can after they are graduated.  They really are the embodiment of the American dream in that regard.

The Left inhabits an alternate universe from the rest of us. It’s the only explanation for the beliefs expressed here and at Nutroots Nation.