Some of you may have noticed (ok, so probably nobody noticed, but you’ve noticed now that I have said something about it) that I have deleted Little Green Footballs from my blogroll. I’ve been considering doing it for some time, and finally decided that it had to be done. I posted my reasoning in the comments on his post on “Why I Parted Ways With The Right.” The post has capably been disassembled by Rusty and his furry minions, but I felt that I wanted to make my own objections clear. I will repost it here, as I believe that it is something that should be said, and Charles seems to have been deleting the posts of those who similarly indicated their displeasure with (and their intention to disassociate themselves from) him, referring to the idea that it “is a form of mental illness” for people to think he will leave their posts up. Admittedly, he refers to them as “hate-filled,” but as they have been deleted, I am unable to judge whether they were indeed hate-filled, or simply opposition-fille (or jelly-filled, perhaps?). I suppose time will tell if my post is hate-filled enough to get it deleted, but here it is in its entirety:
Well, it has been an interesting few years during which I regularly read LGF. One of the things that I liked initially about this site, Charles, was that you were a moderate who was willing to focus on issues rather than parroting a party line. Unfortunately, we have come to a parting of the ways.
I have become more and more concerned recently, Charles, with your willingness to paint everyone on ‘the right’ with a disturbingly broad brush. Does the Republican party deserve criticism? Yes. Is it productive to accuse virtually anyone that you disagree with of secretly being racist / homophobic / religious fanatics / bigots / insert-derogatory-term-here? No, it is not.
Perhaps the most important thing that I learned while doing my undergraduate degree in political science was that in really good debate, you have to be able to focus on the ideas rather than on your thoughts about the people who you perceive as holding those ideas. It’s possible to have a productive political debate with people you find morally reprehensible, just as it’s possible to strenuously disagree with people you really like.
Political discourse is cheapened — often to the point of worthlessness — when it simply becomes an ad hominem slug-fest. By all means, disagree with others, make moral evaluations of their actions and words, and share your opinions. However, when you start attacking the characters of those you disagree with instead of engaging on the topic at hand, expect productive political debate to expire quickly.
If you want to declare this post to be a “goodbye, cruel world” post and delete it so that others will not be able to see it, go right ahead. You may delete my user account as well — I would save you the trouble, but after a cursory examination of the account settings page, I could not find a way to delete my own account.
I wish you the best, Charles, and I hope that one day I will be able to return to regularly reading and enjoying your commentary. For now, however, I will be deleting my bookmarks.
UPDATE 12/3/09 15:29: My suspicions were correct. My post apparently was ‘hate filled’, as it has also been deleted. Charles’ comment — apparently on deleting the post — was “And another one. Amazing.”
Another what? Another “hate-filled” comment? Apparently. It would be interesting to know exactly which of the comment guidelines I broke — “Obscene, abusive, silly, or annoying remarks”? Containing personal information or claiming “First!”? Advocation of violence? It certainly brings some light to bear on his statement that “Disagreement and debate are welcome”. If a post like mine is considered “insult[ing] or abus[ive]” and thus not acceptable disagreement, one wonders just what kind of disagreement is allowed.
By the looks of it, only cheerleading posts are allowed. Surprise, surprise.