SATURDAY, AUGUST 5, 2023
A pledge to start slitting throats: Many generations have contributed to advances in the American experiment, vastly imperfect as that experiment has been.
Quite famously, Tom Brokaw has called the group which fought and won World War II "the greatest generation." That said, how about the many generations who suffered through enslavement and its frequently brutal aftermath, only to produce one of the greatest moral / ethical systems in human history?
Not every black American agreed with Dr. King's philosophy of non-violence (tied to "the love ethic of Jesus"). In real time, even Rosa Parks, a secular saint, wasn't all in on the non-violent approach—on the refusal to defend oneself with guns.
Still, was there ever a greater generation than the many generations who suffered through the brutal history we've already named, finding their way to a higher affirmation in the process?
Incidentally, their greatness should be viewed as a gift to every person worldwide. Back when we were teaching fifth grade, the story of Frederick Douglass' years in Baltimore, along with his subsequent escape, proved thrilling to a lot of the good, decent black kids we knew.
A letter from a "white" pen pal in Westwood, out in higher-income L.A., showed us that Douglass' astonishing human story can (and should) inspire others too.
Dr. King searched the globe looking for a method. He found his method in Gandhi's non-violence, a new approach on American shores with which not everyone agreed.
We humans are inclined to violence. Experts say that, for better or worse, the impulse is bred in the bone. If we were teaching American history, we'd suggest the possibility that our morally brilliant enslaved generations were clearly among the greatest we, or anyone else, ever had.
They found their way to a moral / ethical affirmation. Today, though, we also have this:
"IF YOU GO AFTER ME, I'M COMING AFTER YOU."
“I have a message tonight for Merrick Garland and Jack Smith and Joe Biden—and the guys back there in the fake news media, you should listen up as well, this one is for you. If you want to get to President Trump, you are going to have go through me, and you are going to have to go through 75 million Americans just like me. And I’m going to tell you, most of us are card-carrying members of the N.R.A.
“That’s not a threat, that’s a public service announcement.”
"We’re going to have all of these deep state people, you know, we are going to start slitting throats on day one."
Our American nation was created through a long act of war—of political violence. There's no perfect way of saying when such violence is justified, but these are dangerous times.
On this morning's Washington Journal, Thomas Zeitzoff discussed his book, Nasty Politics: The Logic of Insults, Threats, and Incitement.
Zeitzoff is a professor at American University. To their credit, a few pro-Trump callers offered examples of violence-tinged rhetoric from a few major Democrats.
We live in a very dangerous time. In yesterday's New York Times, David Brooks offered a major thought experiment.
We may discuss his column next week, along with its many comments.
You've got to be kidding! Today Somerby dares to suggest that slaves benefitted from slavery by becoming noble in their suffering! What kind of huge asshole would make such a suggestion -- that if it hadn't been for the suffering of slaves (who had no choice but to endure what was done to them) MLK wouldn't have had the opportunity to be great! And yes, the Holocaust was terrible but it did give us Anne Frank's diary! And if your house burned down, at least it gave some random firefighter the chance to show his or her bravery. That is the bright side of tragedy after all.
ReplyDeleteNever mind that slavery was deliberately inflicted on black people, could have been ended much sooner, benefitted white Southerners much more than anyone else, but also enabled our country to survive and prosper economically and built many institutions, including the White House, which otherwise might have been unaffordable and was never acknowledged as a black slave contribution to a country they were brought to by force. Never mind that slaves had no choice about making the contributions they did to our nation's survival.
Somerby should take this post down immediately. It is an insult to the intelligence of everyone here, a bigoted offering that shows his ignorance about race in America and how other people feel about this topic, and it should be a total embarrassment to himself, as it may be to his relatives and friends when they read it.
"Incidentally, their greatness should be viewed as a gift to every person worldwide."
Gifts are voluntary, which is central to their meaning to the recipients. Slaves worked by force and did not wish to or intend to give any gift to anyone. And how does the word "worldwide" creep into the sentence? Does Somerby imagine that the tribes benefitted in Africa when their members were abducted and sold to slavers? Does he imagine that perhaps Latin America benefitted because the US focused on African slaves instead of capturing and enslaving those living in the Southern hemisphere. How does Somerby imagine penguins benefitted from American slavery? Did slaves perhaps build some zoos? Or maybe he thinks Hitler benefitted from the invention of race that Americans created to justify their enslavement, letting Hitler's imagination create a vision of Europe in which Germany's master race could enslave the other nations and live off their efforts as the supreme colonizer? Did slavery permit Hitler to be ennobled by their sacrifices perhaps?
Somerby has blown a fuse. Or perhaps his own lingering white supremacism is now being revealed in his splendor. But it definitely doesn't ennoble Somerby to be writing this crap.
Somerby is suggesting that without violence there wouldn’t be non-violence, a huge moral step forward from those nasty violent ancestors, except his chronology is messed up and Ghandi came after the abolitionists not before them. There were violent slave rebellions in America and the war freeing slaves was necessarily violent. So this a jumble. Non-violence is not a gift or moral philosophy, it is humanity’s default condition and violence, like that on the right, is the aberration, a gift Trump gives himself.
Delete11:57,
Delete"Today Somerby dares to suggest that slaves benefitted from slavery by becoming noble in their suffering!"
I'll dare suggest you put the crack pipe down and re-read the article. You'll find Somerby made no such suggestion.
No, I am going to stick with my analysis. I rarely find arguments convinciblng when they start by accusing me of using drugs. But wait, there aren’t any arguments.
DeleteSorry, I couldn't imagine your 'analysis' as the product of a sober mind.
DeleteAnd no, I didn't exactly make an argument. I simply pointed out how badly you mischaracterized what Bob said.
In an intelligent world, you would now try to muster up reasons why your characterization was accurate. Go ahead, give it a try.
You can only miss 11:57’s accurate characterization of Somerby’s post if you combine excessive literalism with willful ignorance.
DeleteHector’s smug righteousness is tragically misplaced. And an embarrassment. However, it’s also a clear indication that Hector is intent on dying on the Somerby fanboy hill.
anon 11:57 and 9:25. No surprise that you are going to stick to your "analysis.". But you conveniently ignore Hector's point - where in TDH's post does he "suggest' that slaves "benefitted" from slavery? Where does he say they benefited from slavery in that they became "noble in their suffering/" Say a group suffers horrible injustice - Couldn't that group become "noble in its suffering?" If one made that observation, or expressed that opinion, one would in no way be claiming that the horrible injustice inflicted on them was beneficial to them. You pile on bogus premise onto another, and claim that this is an analysis.
DeleteDo you really think you come across as high-minded and serious by calling TDH an "asshole," even setting aside your dishonest distortion of what he actually says (which I don't see, in this instance, being all that brilliant). I assume you aren't a crack user, but your vendetta against TDH is bizarre.
It starts here:
Delete"That said, how about the many generations who suffered through enslavement and its frequently brutal aftermath, only to produce one of the greatest moral / ethical systems in human history?"
and continues:
"If we were teaching American history, we'd suggest the possibility that our morally brilliant enslaved generations were clearly among the greatest we, or anyone else, ever had."
Perhaps you do not consider greatness or "moral ethical affirmation" as Somerby puts it, to be a benefit. Somerby has gushed over MLK repeatedly over the years, and his attitude is clear, as are his distortions of what MLK actually said and did, where his beliefs came from, who inspired him. The main connection between past slaves and MLK is his skin color and the current treatment of descendents of slaves, NOT their slave writing or moral philosophy, since there was no such legacy left by people deliberately kept in illiteracy, with no voice other than the abolitionists (who Somerby does not quote). MLK's ideas come from elsewhere, not from the suffering of slaves or contemporaneous black people. Attributing Gandhi and MLK's writings and thoughts to past slaves is an insult to all concerned. Suffering doesn't automatically make anyone insightful or wise, any more than disability makes those in wheelchairs noble and brave (an attribution many disabled people dislike). MLK didn't suffer as the slaves did. He read a lot and was strongly motivated toward achieving justice for his people, fighting against disproportionate power, as Gandhi was. Those parallels created MLK's approach, not the suffering of voiceless prior slaves and freed black people in prior generations.
It is insulting that Somerby ignores MLK's strengths and abilities, giving his accomplishments away to those slaves because he wants to make slavery have some positive outcome.
Somerby is telling a huge lie and his worship of MLK is and has been previously insulting to both MLK himself, to the black civil rights movement, and to current black people who are still trying to achieve an end to bigotry (which Somerby has repeatedly said is over and no long exists among white people). Again, note that Somerby never talks about racism. He doesn't believe in it.
I don't care how I come across. Why should I? TDH is a huge asshole, but he writes under his actual name. His relatives and friends can read what he says and all the world can see how wrong-headed, ugly and racist his essays are.
I have not distorted his words here. I have quoted them. Anyone can read for themselves and see what Somerby has said. Black slaves in the USA were not Gandhis and MLKs. They were regular people who were suffering and died because they were not free. They were not martyrs (because they had no choice) and they were not activists (free men did that), and they did not rise above and become strong because of being enslaved (they died and suffered). Focusing on the very few who found freedom (such as Frederick Douglass) is not inspiring because their luck did not change things for the masses still enslaved, or those who tried to escape and died for their efforts. Just as the Holocaust is not erased because Schindler had a list and managed to save a small number of Jews.
It apparently makes Somerby very relieved and happy to point to how MLK rose from the ashes of slavery to address wrongs that still exist today. This is more feel good white revisionism designed to salve white people's guilt. Why will Somerby not simply acknowledge and live with what white people have done to black people? Making a hero of MLK with smarmy overblown praise and inaccurate portrayal of his thoughts and efforts only insults his memory, and that of the people who were not MLK and had no choice but to tote that barge and lift that bale and hope for rest in heaven.
Of course Somerby is an asshole. And I am not trying to be "brilliant" but aiming for truth.
Somerby's adulation of MLK comes across like Trump's statements:
Delete“I am very proud now that we have a museum on the National Mall where people can learn about Reverend King, so many other things,” Trump said. “Frederick Douglass is an example of somebody who's done an amazing job and is being recognized more and more, I notice.”
“Last month we celebrated the life Reverend Martin Luther King Jr., whose incredible example is unique in American history,” Trump said, employing a favorite meaningless adjective. But this wasn’t really about King. It was about Trump: “You read all about Martin Luther King when somebody said I took a statue out of my office. And it turned out that that was fake news. The statue is cherished. It’s one of the favorite things—and we have some good ones. We have Lincoln, and we have Jefferson, and we have Dr. Martin Luther King.”
https://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2017/02/frederick-douglass-trump/515292/
This is what Somerby sounds like when he talks about MLK being great.
If there has been slavery in so many places and times throughout history, why weren't those great moral philosophy advances expressed a lot sooner? And aren't all those other slaves also great, since they too suffered? Or is there something about being black that makes our slaves better philosophers, greater than in Egypt or Rome? And if so, why are today's black people not expressing similar advances in philosophy, or is it the suffering that enhances thought processes? Is Somerby perhaps suggesting that we put black people back into bondage so their greatness as moral philosophers can emerge once more?
DeleteSee how stupid this idea is?
"Perhaps you do not consider greatness or "moral ethical affirmation" as Somerby puts it, to be a benefit."
DeleteThen if Somerby praised Christ, you'd accuse of him of saying Christ benefitted from his crucifixion.
anon 11:07 (and all your other anon posts here) you are dumb beyond what I thought was possible. a bizarre troll.
DeleteYou have lost the context. It was Somerby saying that slaves were great by virtue of their suffering, not me. AC/MA asked where Somerby said that and I quoted Somerby, suggesting that perhaps AC/MA missed Somerby’s meaning because HE (not I) didn’t consider greatness a benefit.
DeleteAs to Christ, a Christian would say that all of humanity who accept Christ have benefitted because the purpose of his crucifixion was to redeem their sins and save their souls from hell. That is not analogous to what Somerby said, but you can argue it with Somerby.
4:20,
DeleteRight. Christ's moral greatness benefitted not himself, but the rest of us. In the same way the moral greatness Somerby imputes to slaves would benefit others, not themselves.
So Somerby wasn't saying slaves benefitted from slavery. QED.
Except there was no moral greatness involved in suffering as slaves. Neither Gandhi nor MLK got their ideas from slaves.
DeleteSomerby calls the slaves morally brilliant. He is the one saying they benefitted. I think we are agreeing that he was wrong.
DeleteWhile there is no evidence for Christ - a myth, the evidence for Somerby being a racist asshole is offered daily.
Delete12:27’s comment is beautifully written and the sentiment is appreciated.
Moved here from yesterday's comments, because it is still relevant:
ReplyDelete"Times like these tend to produce the kinds of wars which simply can't be won."
It is the right wing that has called for Civil War II and has been using this kind of terminology to talk about divisions in the US. It is not the left that talks about war.
But apparently war metaphors are OK with Somerby. Is he really unaware that the right is taking such talk literally? Does he not know that they are the ones with the guns, asking when they will be allowed to use them? Is he not aware that the bulk of recent political mass shootings have arisen on the right, not the left?
I find it irresponsible to use such language, even figuratively, given the loonies with guns who are itching to start shooting their political enemies -- and these people reside on the right, not the left, so it would be us who are the targets, not Somerby's right wing buddies and pseudo-centrists.
If you don't believe me about this trend, see David Neiwert's new book The Age of Insurrection. It documents the right wing violence arising from Trump's cult.
Somerby tries to both-sides the violence but the stats don’t support him on that.
DeleteSomerby today repeats the right wing view of racism and slavery, as recently expressed by DeSantis and other Republicans, obviously the latest talking point.
ReplyDeleteWere black people not in the armed forces, not part of the greatest generation? Were the black kids in Somerby’s class not also kids?
ReplyDeleteHow is it that the right seems unaware of Gandhi’s wonderful tactics? Did they not receive the gift that was worldwide?
Sophistry is perhaps Somerby’s notion of that gift.
This is damage control over Trump’s threat and Somerby has some nerve using the image of the noble stoic black former slave to excuse Trump’s ugly violent obvious threat.
ReplyDeleteanon 12:32 (the same anon who has posted multiple times above perhaps) - please enlighten me about where TDH's post is damage control for Trump - You seem to be a total troll
DeleteAs has been all over the news, Trump issued a threat against those prosecuting him. Somerby himself quotes the violent threat made by Kari Lake. So, is it a coincidence that Somerby is today pleading for non-violence and extolling the virtues of Gandhi and MLK (who sometimes urged nonviolent opposition to their followers)?
DeleteTrump's surrogates and supporters immediately tried to walk back his statement and reexplain what he actually meant, disavowing the obvious threat he had made. Somerby does the same today, telling us that the left is violent too (as if there were some equivalence when there is not), lecturing the left on avoiding violence as if we had made the threat ourselves, when it came from Trump.
This is an obvious attempt to make Trump appear less violent and the left appear more violent, as if what Trump did is no worse than what the left does. It won't work because the news is also full of descriptions of Trump's vindictive revenge against his political enemies planned for his next term as president.
If you don't see how this works, it is your problem, not mine.
AC, I’m not the poster you asked but if I may throw in: it’s almost impossible to take your question seriously. You ask for something that is way past self evident. It’s hard to remember a situation where Somerby didn’t run damage control for Trump. Can you actually think of one? From excusing his actions on dubious mental health issues, to hyping up some small disclaimer hidden in a sea of vitriol, to fully embracing the notion he is excused because he is supposedly sinsere in his beliefs, to dismissing the Jan 6 committee as weak and dismissible because there are not enough Republicans on it… you really seem to be out of your mind.
Delete",,, David Brooks offered a major thought experiment.
ReplyDeleteWe may discuss his column next week, along with its many comments."
Thanks for the warning.
Brooks asks his readers to consider whether the anti-Trumpers are actually good eyes, using several examples of white privilege, among them:
Delete"It continues in the 1970s, when the authorities imposed busing on working-class areas in Boston but not on the upscale communities like Wellesley where they themselves lived."
Here the assumption is that Wellesley was escaping something unpleasant when in fact busing was expected to be a boon to both white and black students because segregation was bad for both. Notice the implicit way in which Brooks considers busing to be an imposition on those working class neighborhoods, not something to benefit them.
This is what bias looks like -- the attitude that having to go to school with black kids was something bad, that parents were right to oppose.
Brooks is asking whether his group might be the bad guys. He never notices his own racist assumption about whether integration is desirable or not. Then he goes on to say that there is a myth that we are all in this together. The juxtaposition of this remark with the one about busing to working class neighborhoods makes it clear he is clueless about his belief that integration is bad for white students. He clearly thinks that white elites have escaped the badness of having to go to school with black kids.
It will be interesting to hear what Somerby has to say about a guy who is so racist he doesn't know he is saying racist things. Somerby has the same blind spots.
“A letter from a "white" pen pal in Westwood, out in higher-income L.A., showed us that Douglass' astonishing human story can (and should) inspire others too.”
ReplyDeleteIf this is the letter that I think that it is (I may be thinking of a letter that one of Bob’s students received from a British pen pal), I wish Bob had quoted it.
It was a reply to from a young girl to a Baltimore student and the wording was graceful, yet ardent.
The examples from the Trump side are conspicuous in their absence. Are we back to Kathy Griffin? Sorry, no credit for unseen work.
ReplyDeleteIt seems unlikely to be coincidental that the guys engaging in violence are also the ones who are insecure in their masculinity. The rising violence Somerby notes may have nothing to do with anything Somerby considers important or causal. They are the Kens in the Barbie movie.
ReplyDeleteSomerby thinks VP Harris was lying. Why wouldn’t he believe other Democrats say things “tinged with violence”, whatever that means. That is hardly equivalent to the death threats, racial epithets, that are routine on the right, including vandalism, assault and mass shootings. Both sides don’t engage in violence equally.
ReplyDeleteThere probably are examples of Dems flirting with the line, but probably not major players. But since Bob provides no examples (but just says somebody else had examples) he should be utter dismissed on this tat for tat BS. Which of course, you have to do constantly if you read "The Daily Howler" with any critical thinking.
DeleteThe urge to create a hierarchy among generations is moronic and childish.
ReplyDeleteBoth MLK jr and Ghandi were not non violent in their approaches, this is a breathtakingly ignorant and ahistorical claim.
Humans are not “inclined to violence”, yet another remarkably uninformed claim. Humans are inclined towards being communal and egalitarian; the kind of violence Somerby references is not innate and emerged from certain societal pressures originating when humans transitioned to surplus and commodification based societies.
Somerby seems hell bent on rubbing our noses in the fact that he is an unrepentant racist right winger, such is the inclination of wounded and tortured lost souls like Somerby.
Dismantling the myth that ancient slavery wasn't that bad, from The Conversation:
ReplyDeletehttps://theconversation.com/dismantling-the-myth-that-ancient-slavery-wasnt-that-bad-205801
Often you’ll see straw-based scarecrows with birds resting on it, which can, in a roundabout way, represent a familiar fallacy.
DeleteLet’s be clear, slavery is bad.
Catch your breath, sit down if needed.
Here’s how the referenced article sums up its notion:
“The picture of slavery that most Americans are familiar with was deeply shaped by its time, particularly modern racism and capitalism. But other forms of slavery throughout human history were no less “real.”
No shit, Sherlock. To be fair, though, hardly a dismantling.
It concluded there are no good forms of slavery and many people have their facts wrong about ancient slavery — there was racism back then too.
DeleteIt’s conclusion that slavery is bad is obvious and not countered by anyone, it did not make a claim that “there was racism back then too”.
DeleteIt mainly argues that “ancient slavery”, while mostly comprised of indentured servitude, had aspects of chattel slavery, harsh treatment, and geography. It says:
“Because these kinds of slavery took place so long ago and weren’t based on modern racism, some people have the impression that they weren’t as harsh or violent.”
and
“Modern factors like capitalism and racist pseudoscience did shape the transatlantic slave trade in uniquely harrowing and enduring ways.”
and
“Slavery in the ancient Mediterranean wasn’t based on race”
So, yes slavery is bad, and no, there was no dismantling in the manner the comment suggests.
The listing of slave origin on sales documents was offered as evidence that buyers did care about the race of slaves in ancient times.
DeleteWell, Kari, you are going to have to go through 81 million Americans to put Trump back in the White House.
ReplyDelete"Our American nation was created through a long act of war—of political violence."
ReplyDeleteThis is not actually how our revolution happened. It is pretty clear that governing the American colonies became a nuisance and the UK let us go our own way with relatively little fighting because it was preoccupied with other problems and didn't have the will to fight to maintain control.
The Revolutionary: Samuel Adams by Stacy Schiff describes how this happened. I highly recommend it.
Our current political climate bears no resemblance to what happened during our revolution and independence from Great Britain.
America became great through settler colonialism, by conquering indigenous people and plundering their land for its wealth of natural resources via racist chattel slavery which funded imperial ambitions to then conquer and plunder other lands.
DeleteThe US did not just innovate racial slavery and racism, but also Barbie dolls and atomic bombs, and then entertained its masses into a societal slumber of apathy by making obnoxiously silly movies about such innovations.
If Somerby is going to discuss violence in politics, he needs to talk about the justification being used by those on the right who make threats and engage in hate crimes and even mass shootings. These people talk about freedom. There is some irony in that given that they are the ones maintaining racism and unequal treatment in the South and red states, opposing the striving toward freedom of minorities in a multicultural society, dictating the behavior of others via oppressive laws that limit individual freedom.
ReplyDeleteWhat is the right wing conception of freedom? How does the right justify limiting rights given in the constitution by interfering with the right to vote, free speech and recognizing no right except the one about guns and shooting others?
Somerby wants to equate the right and left when it comes to violence, but I see huge differences in how the right and left conceptualize freedom and justify violence. Somerby wants to say violence is bad, but he doesn't want to touch any of the sacred tenets of the right and he won't admit the legitimacy of complaints by the left. He doesn't want to talk specifics at all. And that makes his plea for peace empty and unachievable, because behind the violence are the justifications and until those are dealt with the violence is going to continue. Violence props up a right wing that knows it is losing power and control and desperately wants to resist that in any way it can, including subversion of democracy. The left is resisting the attempts of a minority to impose its wishes on a diverse majority and finds the right's methods abhorrent. Somerby needs to talk about that situation, not quote Gandhi and MLK and plead for us all to get along.
I’m curious to know exactly how Somerby approached Douglass’ story in his classroom. Douglass’ greatness and inspiration lie partly in the knowledge of the brutality that he suffered and improbably overcame. He is problematical for present-day Moms for Liberty types because he criticized America and the hypocritical Christians of his day (‘I have no love for America’ he once said.), and his vivid descriptions of the violence inflicted on slaves.
ReplyDeleteDoes Somerby think about why Douglass might have appealed to his black students in any way that is different from, say, Lincoln, or Jefferson?
Lincoln and Douglass disagreed on some issues, apparently Lincoln was to some degree “in favor of the superior position being assigned to the white man”; however, they both expressed grave concern over the future, warning us about the perniciousness of wage slavery.
ReplyDeleteAs it turns out, they were accurate in their concerns, as today, while few suffer chattel slavery, most of us are wage slaves, which has debased our humanity from it’s beautiful potential to such a degree that misery has gained supreme purchase.
This is due in no small part to the “can’t we all get along” approach of Reconstruction, an utter failure.
As one raised in the South, I can assure you, for the Right, the Civil War never ended. One of Somerby’s main thesis is to continue to let modern right wingers off the hook, those descendants of slavers and holders of the flame.
Seems like this blog is about a lot of things. Media quality is one, and tendency to divide into sides rather than find commonalities or any good in the other "side," or even a non-attack-type argument, is another. The second one is exhibited in comments near daily. It seems a howl how commenters right away can illustrate the point!
ReplyDeleteOh yeah, it’s real deep!
DeleteI think Somerby gets it mostly correct when he talks about how the Right is more open to “find commonalities” with oppressors, even though he mostly ignores the violent vitriol the Right has for the “other side”.
DeleteSomerby is accurate when he describes how the Left refuses to bow down or make peace with those that are obsessed with dominance and that engage in sexism, racism, slavery, and ethnic genocide.
Vitriol like calling them, without a proper or even logical basis, unrepentant, racist, right wing assholes with wounded and tortured lost souls who write racist essays that display their own lingering white supremacism?
Delete7:47, no, the Right’s vitriol is demonstrably different than the Left’s, since the Left is fighting against oppression and the Right is fighting for dominance.
DeleteThe difference is critical to avoid making nonsense claims such as yours.
Oh fighting for oppression by calling fellow party members who' say things you don't like unrepentant, racist, right wing assholes with wounded and tortured lost souls who write racist essays that display their own lingering white supremacism?
DeleteThat kind of fighting for oppression? Asshole cunt.
DeleteWhy can't we all get along with the bigots in the Republican Party?
Delete9:41,
DeleteIf the Klan hood fits...
9:41, 9:42 you’ve got it about correct, yes the Left fights against oppression such as that represented by Somerby’s racist right wing stance, which is likely borne from his unresolved trauma that defines his wounded and tortured lost soul.
DeleteThe Right - and Somerby - would prefer the Left to acquiesce to their supposed dominance and respect their right to oppress, and thus are triggered when the Left doesn’t bow down and instead calls out their bad deeds.
Between oppressors and the oppressed, the burden is on the oppressors to change, not on the oppressed to make peace and make oppressors feel comfortable with their actions and behavior.
It’s good you’re thinking about this and are open to change.
We have come along way since the Right engaged in slavery (ended by the Civil War) and the Holocaust (ended by WWII), let’s keep progressing.
DeleteAfter all, you wouldn’t want to see those levels of violence that were required to defeat the Right, ever happen again, it’s vital to never let up on calling out the Right on their thuggish oppression and violent fascism.