Yes, let’s assign motive and a whole new raft of views to everyone that might disagree with us. That’s the way to have a reasoned discussion.
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That’s not an exact comparison.
It would be more like the Koch brothers making a large donation to a Republican running for president in return for a powerful position in government. When the republican wins the election they find out that not only they can’t put the Kochs in that position but the current most popular issue is to get taxes from people using the same tax avoidance scheme as then Kochs use. The Kochs then write a book about the president and go to Fox news with claims of beastiality. Fox give the Kochs a week of one hour shows because Rupert Murdoch also benefits from the tax avoidance scheme.
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This. People in every sector of the society do things that can reasonably considered distasteful or obnoxious. Why does it need be attached to class warfare? It saddens me when the likes of Cory (whose views I respect hugely in many areas) persists in what are effectively ad hominem attacks on people he disagrees with simply because they did something stupid during their youth. I dare say there are many people he agrees with that have also done something stupid during their youth, but that’s never discussed.
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High quality intellectual discussion on BoingBoing has sadly fallen by the wayside in favour of back-slapping rhetorical populism.
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Noted.
By my reading of your response to my comment, you ignored the context that I cited in order to cite your own oversimplified context (while also saying, oddly, that we should ignore context). And you did so in order to move on to a claim that what motivates interest in Hameron’s pig-fucking is not such things as justifiable class-based anger over his kind’s hypocritical, smug sense of entitlement and superiority, but rather “puritanism,” which could supposedly return to bite the currently interested in the arse in just the same way that they’re currently biting Hameron’s. It’s a ridiculously circuitous way to not only warn about a dark possibility that simply isn’t going to happen, but also to divert attention from actual, serious reasons to care about Ham’s pig-fucking antics within their actual sociopolitical context.
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Straw Man, followed by Slippery Slope. This is what you consider, eloquent, convincing, and logical?
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Thanks for those links, hadn’t seen them. They’re both excellent work.
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Now we’re talking to each other.
Actually, I meant to accept the context you cited as an independently verified fact.
Cameron’s (and his kind’s) hypocritical, smug sense of entitlement and superiority is ample reason to express justifiable class-based anger whenever you hear his name. Even when he hasn’t fucked any dead pigs.
But I fail to see how fucking a dead pig in the face during a hazing ritual can a priori be assumed to be linked to Cameron’s asshole-ness. Despicably elitist college societies have strange hazing rituals, but so do other groups which are not elitist at all.
If, while disregarding your context, I don’t see why fucking dead pigs is evil, I don’t see how adding the context can change anything.
By “puritanism” I am, of course, not referring to the religious denomination, but to the tendency to apply extremely strict rules of “decency” to anything remotely sexual. Which is not a dark possibility that simply isn’t going to happen, but a constant problem that exists in society.
Which is, you are right in pointing out, context that I added. I never said that context is a bad thing. I just said that it interferes with answering the question “is fucking a dead pig evil?”.
Now I still don’t see a reason to care about Cameron’s pig-fucking antics. The only thing I can think of is “here’s our chance to bring the man down”. And that just doesn’t fit with my particular ideas of honesty, and with my rejection of what I labeled “puritanism” earlier.
When he proposes another porn filter, or any other law that I’d consider “puritanical” - those are the acts that show his hypocrisy. Not the pig-fucking itself.
Argument from fallacy, followed by ad personam. (Two people can play that game. Let’s stop?)
I don’t see the straw man. Complaining about where other people used to stick their parts without hurting any one is something I label “puritanism”, and which I reject. Complaining about Cameron is something I like. Unfortunately, I also don’t like hating the right people for the wrong reasons.
As for the Slippery Slope, yes. It’s a fallacy if I added “and therefore, exactly that will happen.” It was just meant to illustrate how labeling “pick fucking” as evil does not serve to fix our problems. With some obvious exaggeration built into the story.
I want to hate on the ruling class and their secret clubs because they are a ruling class with secret clubs, not because their secret rituals involve fucking pigs.
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Are you British? If not, or even if so, please read AnonyMouse’s first link above. It says so much better than I could what you don’t seem to have understood yet about the relevance of this particular pig-fucking in its particular national context.
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For me it isn’t the act, but the hypocrisy. If he attempts to repeal the puritan laws that his government have introduced then I will leave him alone about this.
He will still have to answer for the continued destruction of the NHS, vicious treatment of disabled people who are unable to work, authoritarian anti-union bills that even other Tories have objected to… I could be here all day with that list so I will leave it at that.
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I enjoyed it [the pilot for the new Muppet show] quite a lot, actually. Folks should give it a shot.
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On this thread, you really need to provide some context.
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Point taken! Edited to do so.
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I’ve read the link (and no, I’m not British). You’re way to quick to attribute ignorance.
I quote: “Outsiders to the British cultural landscape are focusing on the central detail that a leader of a G8 country screwed a dead pig […]”… and I say that detail is nothing to be outraged about.
The text goes on to describe the system that provides the “ideological training” for Britain’s elite. I quote again: “Its structural function is as an agreement of mutually assured destruction between the rulers of tomorrow”. And I refuse to help enforce that agreement by viewing the pig-fucking as a big deal.
“Ashcroft had expected that he would be given high office in exchange for this, and Cameron didn’t pay up when the time came.” This is the least of Cameron’s crimes, and Ashcroft is punishing him by publishing details about the pig-fucking. And the pig-fucking isn’t a crime either. Some people are piling on because they hate Cameron (what’s there not to hate?), others (“puritans”) because OMG he fucked a pig. But it looks to me that the outrage machine is part of the system.
Incidentally, the article goes on to talk about Thatcher turning a blind eye to pedophiles. Apparently, both the child rapists and large parts of the outraged public seem to think of the two very different acts of “putting a penis into a dead pig’s mouth” and “raping a child” as similar. Which allows the child-raping elite to feel less bad about what they are doing, and gives the pig-fucking elite more leverage over each other.
Now, if Cameron, as a member of that secret society, had pressured others into fucking a pig, that would be a crime worth getting upset about. Someone please investigate.
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In the first instance I’ve made no comment on your conclusion, merely the quality of your argument itself. In the second, I have not attacked your person or your character - just noted that the use of logical fallacy - intentionally or not - is not generally compatible with the kind of debate you say you wish to encourage.
So, no, it appears that two cannot play at that game.
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You seem to think that Zathras is trying to defend Cameron as a person and a politician.
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So it appears you have avoided the “argument from fallacy” fallacy the same way I avoided the “slippery slope” fallacy, i.e. by just observing something without drawing the implied fallacious conclusion.
Probably just a misunderstanding, then. For the record, I (mis)took your comments “This is what you consider, eloquent, convincing, and logical?” and “So, no, it appears that two cannot play at that game.” as general, unfriendly attacks on my intelligence and my ability to engage in a discussion with you. (Compare how “you’re incompetent” is usually understood as an insult, while “I think you made a serious mistake here” and “this is wrong” is usually not).
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Yes, but the entire point is that Cameron belongs to the political party that believes in repression of obscenity and deviance, wants to censor the Internet and won’t listen to scientific evidence on drugs, and what he stands accused of is hypocrisy in the third degree.
The entire schtick of the Bullingdon wing of the Conservative Party is we can do what we like because we are rich, and you cannot do the same things because you are poor. Not all Conservatives are like that (our MP isn’t) but they have allowed this shower to run things.
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