Dissent depends on point of view

Steve Smith took some shots at my column about William Bennett some

weeks ago that rather cleanly missed the point I was trying to make.

I’ve been hoping Lolita Harper would pick up on it, but since she

didn’t, I’ll leave it there except for one reference that seems to me

worth further exploration.

He called my piece one of “the predictable responses of the left

... to Bill Bennett’s out-of-control video poker gambling habit.” It

was the “predictable responses of the left” that caught my attention

because it offers such a clear example of the labeling that infects

social and political rhetoric these days.

We’re going to be seeing and hearing a lot of it in the months

ahead, so it occurred to me that I could provide a service by

offering a brief dictionary of terms that need to be redefined to

understand their political implications. Here are some of the more

frequent examples of labeling being used in political and social

criticism:

* A “liberal” is a bleeding heart whose primary mission in life is

to take hard-earned money from other people and give it to indigents,

bums, welfare cheats and similar undeserving malcontents who didn’t

grow up in middle-class suburbs. Liberals look to more government to

address social inequities as long as the rich pay for it.

* A “conservative” is someone who is certain that the poor --

including children -- got that way because they were lazy. Providing

them with more help would be counter-productive because it would only

reward laziness. Conservatives look to less government so they can

better protect what they have.

* The “left” is anyone more liberal, and the “right” anyone more

conservative than the current critic.

* “Whining” means expressing views contrary to those of the

critic, whose opinions are always honest, straightforward, earnest

and backed up by formidable research. Contrary opinions are

“whining,” and are offered up only by whiners.

* “Facts” are bits and pieces of information assembled to support

a particular point of view. There are good facts and bad facts. Good

facts are those assembled by the critic. Bad facts are those cited by

the person whose views are being criticized. Facts may or may not be

true. There is a limitless supply of “facts” from which to choose for

the critic and the person being criticized to support conclusions

they mostly reached before they started looking for facts.

* “Dissent” means expressing views that don’t conform absolutely

to the pro forma policies of authority. Perhaps the most prominent

dissenters in our history were the men who signed the Declaration of

Independence. When the same group wrote the Constitution, they felt

it important to protect dissent in the nation they created, and

nowhere did they suggest it might be unpatriotic. Dissenters are

accepted as a necessary evil by the prevailing establishment as long

as they don’t express themselves, at which point they become either

whiners or traitors.

* “Colorful” refers to lies expressed in literate language that

covers up a paucity of research.

* “Ill-informed” means that the person under attack has selected a

set of facts on which to support his premise that is different from

the set of facts that appeal to his critics.

* “Irrational” and “irresponsible” mean that the conclusions being

criticized do not logically follow the critic’s “facts.”

* A “cheap shot” is irony that draws blood and is either not

perceived as irony by the critic or is regarded as a tactic that only

the critic can legitimately use.

* “Thinly disguised propaganda” refers to arguments that the

critic can’t logically refute.

* “Learned professor” is a catchall for academics whom everyone

knows to be impractical -- and sometimes dangerous -- liberals,

leftists, dissenters and fuzzy thinkers who never met a payroll.

* A “straw man” is an argument or position that can only be

assailed by ridiculing it as irrelevant.

* A “larger problem” is one the critic would rather debate than

the problem on the table.

These examples -- limited by space -- only scratch the surface of

political rhetoric.

There are dozens of other examples, which I’ll be happy to take a

shot at defining if you want to send or phone them in to the Pilot.

Meanwhile, to save the readers’ time looking for examples, I’ll be

happy to admit that I’m as guilty of labeling as Steve Smith or even

William J. Bennett, and I should properly be judged hypocritical if I

don’t follow my own advice.

I would never, however, suggest that attacking Bennett’s critics

is a predictable response of the right. I checked with the members of

my poker group and found that some suspect leftists have been known

to expose their children to Bennett’s “Book of Virtues” and some

suspect rightists think he got what was coming to him. This is

admittedly a small sampling, but I consider it as accurate as most

polls.

From a deep sense of serving the public, I’ll keep you posted from

time to time on new examples of political rhetoric. Let me know if

you would like to add some of your own.

* JOSEPH N. BELL is a resident of Santa Ana Heights. His column

appears Thursdays.