[MD] Ham unlike you I will not crreate false idols

[Arlo Bensinger]

[Platt]
Note the logic. The University is the sole determinant of what is and is 
not a cogent argument. Conservatives do not make cogent arguments. 
Therefore, conservatives do not belong in the University. How laughable is 
that? Ask the Nobel prize winner Milton Friedman.

[Arlo]
I thank you for repeatedly proving my point.

Nowhere did I say "conservatives do not make cogent arguments". I said, and 
I repeat, "young student conservatives attempt to use the rhetorical 
tactics they hear on talk radio as a substitute for cogent arguments". Just 
as you continue to do above. Feel free to keep proving my point all you 
want, Platt. I appreciate it. For even after saying several times I know of 
several "conservative" professors, and others who hold "mixed" views, and 
asserting that ANY viewpoint supported and sustained by cogent argument 
should not be suppressed in the academy, but those who feel that bullying 
ideology through radio-talk show tactics should "be enough" are woefully 
misguided. I have no problem with conservative thinking in the academy. 
But, as in keeping with Limbaughian deception tactics, you repeatedly and 
deliberately misstate my position.

What is laughable, Platt, is your utter reliance on these rhetorical 
tactics, and your willingness to deceive in order to bully your point. If 
that's what you want in the academy in place of cogent argumentation, I 
feel sad for the future of higher education. By the way, I checked. Milton 
Friedman is required reading in six classes this semester. Marx is required 
in only one.

[Arlo]
You mean the way you assign motives to the consumers? I thought you said 
they were all driven by sex? So we can assign motives to the consumer but 
not the producer?

[Platt]
All driven by sex? Another hyperbolic statement. What I said was 
intellectuals have taken biology's side against society, repeating what 
Pirsig said. The major values of biology are sex and violence. You deny this?

[Arlo]
Hmm... how do you know what drives the consumers to purchase Flynt's 
material? And why are "intellectuals" to blame for Larry Flynt's business, 
but not Larry Flynt himself, who is clearly exploiting biology to make a 
profit? So, we applaud (or at least accept) the purveyors of filth because 
they are only "trying to make a buck", but we condemn "intellectuals" who 
say there is nothing wrong with pornography (even though every intellectual 
*I* know condemns pornography as destructive, demeaning and socially immoral).

This amounts to saying, "Hey, the crack DEALER, he's not doing anything 
wrong, he's just trying to make a buck. Nothing wrong with that. But the 
people who BUY the crack, they do so because of intellectuals who side with 
biology over society."

We are on the same side with this, if you could just for one moment let go 
of your conservatistic tunnel vision. In your inability to criticize any 
thing done in the pursuit of profit, you bemoan the value decay that leads 
to the consumption of products, but applaud (or at the very least refuse to 
criticize the profit that drives) the businessman who produces those very 
products.


[Platt]
You have yet to demonstrate any "over-fixation on material profit" or that 
earning money "trumps all other concerns." You have offered no evidence 
other than your own assumptions about why people do what they do. And you 
call that sort of argument one that "will fly in the academy?" Please. That 
won't even fly in the 8th grade.

[Arlo]
Well, aside from the fact that I've used you inability to criticize any 
activity done towards "making a buck", I've also offered as an example the 
success of Walmart, the desire on GM's part to slash employee health care, 
and a while back the deforestation and drilling for oil in public land. 
Just above I mentioned the production of pornographic materials with no 
concern for social outcomes, only a concern to "make profit". In several 
posts, I've talked about the dumping of toxic chemicals across the border 
in Mexico, not to mention the outsourcing of jobs to overseas markets where 
companies can pay two cents per hour for labor. I've also talked about 
Union Carbide and the mine fiasco at Hawk's Nest in West Virginia, where a 
desire for profit led to deliberately placing miners in harms way. I've 
also, a few posts back, referred to the Ford Pinto, where a desire for 
profits led to the company avoiding replacing a defective part because 
replacement costs outweighed potential lawsuits.

So, you can see why your statement above is just continuing evidence of 
deceptive rhetorical tactics.

[Arlo previously]
This coming from the guy who just called everyone who doesn't accept his 
sensibilities "undiscriminating". No egotism there, eh?

[Platt]
And you don't discriminate regarding what will "fly in the academy and what 
won't?"  Talk about ego.

[Arlo]
Well, again, if you think deceptive rhetoric and bullying tactics, 
distortive cries of "ad hominem" and blind allegiance to ideology should be 
accepted into the University is comparable to  bemoaning everyone who 
thinks Jagger is as good a singer as Sinatra as "undiscriminating", then 
you just continue to prove my point.

[Arlo previously]
I've also seen firsthand, and through dialogues with professors, the 
effects of "party loyalty" and the dichotomization of American politics in 
to "conservatives=All Good" and "liberals=All Evil". This makes for good 
talk radio, but it woefully inadequate in the academy.

[Platt]
That sort of evidence is called hearsay which is weak because it is so 
easily made up.

[Arlo]
Everything that does not conform to your party's ideology and propaganda is 
"made up", isn't it Platt? I mean, the ONLY people who tell the truth are 
conservatives. And you accept anecdotal, often third hand "evidence" from 
them, rather than considering "first hand evidence" that challenges the 
ideology. Why don't you spend a few hours a week in your local University? 
Enroll for a class, ask a professor if you can "sit in". Maybe do something 
other than listen to the idiotic propaganda coming out of talk radio.

Of course, what do I know. I just see it everyday. Those talk show guys, 
they're the ones you should believe. I mean, I'm a "liberal", right, so by 
definition I must be lying, or altering, or manipulating the truth.

[Platt]
What was the hypocrisy on the conservative side of the interview? And what 
was not true other than liberal accusations of bigotry? But, glad to see 
you approve of Alito's confirmation. :-)


[Arlo]
The hypocrisy was simply believing that were the confirmation reversed, and 
it was President Kerry appointing a liberal nominee, that the reaction on 
the part of the conservative minority would be any different. Or was any 
different historically. Both parties repeatedly criticize the "other" for 
the very same things they themselves do. It's all good theatre, as I've 
said, but nothing more.

Arlo