Wojtek Sokolowski wrote:
> This crowd is a small part of a much bigger problem of the intellectual
>poverty of the left nowadays that seems incapable of making any political
>argument without having a victim do defend. If they cannot find any, they
>will manufacture one. They seem to have given up on the idea of presenting
>an argumewnt capable of competing with the neo-liberal alternative for the
>"hearts and minds" of themaionstream population, but instead resigned
>themselves to appeals to pity - and for that they need victims.
>
Beg to disagree. Victim rhetoric is pretty much universal by now --
successfully used by the Right, beginning with Bakke and ending with
Iraq war, which had to be entirely cast in victim rather than imperial
rhetoric. We're not there the way the Brits were there at the end of the
nineteenth century -- to sieze what rightfully belonged to the empire.
We're there to protect the U.S. and the world from terrorism and WMD.
Victim rhetoric is the foundation of every right-wing rant and every
"Xtian" reaction.
Though I agree that the Left would win hearts and minds if it gave it up first.
Joanna
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