Dave Winer’s declaration that no one has the right to judge Rev. Wright provoked this exchange in his comments with a blogger named Marco:
Marco 18 hours agoIt will be hard to believe but this is not meant to be a shrill attack.
Posts like these are jarring in their inconsistency. I fully understand your point on Rev Wright and even sympathize with your position.
What I don’t understand is why you can’t see the hypocrisy in wanting to extend individuals like Rev Wright every possible explanation for their words or actions (“He was alienated”, “He was caught in a position non of us have ever been in”) but when someone you disagree with politically is automatically an evil person and each misstatement is borne of the most nefarious motives.
Its insulting to see you constantly deride others for sweeping generalizations and oversimplification of issues only to have you follow up with a string of posts casting sweeping dispersions and attacks based on 3 seconds sound bites addressing unbelievably complex topics.
I appreciate the perspective you bring which is why I haven’t yet unplugged from your feed but it would be great to see just a little of the balance you want to see in our political process displayed in your posts.
It’s pretty simple, I say what I have to say and it’s a function of what happens in the world. So when things change, my point of view may change too. If you disagree, go ahead and disagree. But all these charged words, hypocrisy, insulting, deride, attacks, etc — sorry, that’s your mind playing tricks on you. I’m none of those things. Usually I don’t let comments that require defensive responses (or else I admit to all the BS you accuse me of) through, but this time I wanted to restate this, that I’ve said many times before. My blog is my space to say what I think. You don’t have to agree, and if you want to, start your own blog to say what you have to say. That’s where comments like yours (above) belong, not here.
See how much space it takes to clear up your mess. But now that it’s clear I can answer your question.
BECAUSE MY MIND WORKS DIFFERENTLY FROM YOURS.
Which is so obvious it doesn’t even need to be said. All our minds work differently, we were all raised in different environments with different values. To say basically that I should see everything the same way you do is a waste of bandwidth. It’s ridiculous. It’ll never happen nor should it ever happen.
That’s not even remotely my point.
Do you really think I would be interested in engaging you or anyone else who did not agree with my world view if that was what I believed? Of course not.
Your response is a wonderful defense of your desire to remain ideologically isolated. “I see things the way I see things and I have no need to try and understand your position” is a great way to stifle true debate and a horrible way to effectively change the way we approach issues in this country. As I said before – it wouldn’t matter to me if you wouldn’t insist on standing on your soapbox and donning sackcloth and ashes to mourn the death of honest debate.
Okay you get the last word, the rest of it, if there is more — in your space.
Marco, like every well-intentioned person who responds to Winer, hasn’t learned yet that he can’t handle criticism. Winer’s statement, “Usually I don’t let comments that require defensive responses (or else I admit to all the BS you accuse me of),” is one of the clearest explanations he’s ever given that explains why: He thinks that if he doesn’t delete critical comments, it means they are true.
Open and honest dialogue is not possible on any forum that Winer controls.
Appreciate the thoughts.
I wrote Dave fully aware of his propensity to use his bully pulpit to broadcast his positions and balk at any subsequent as to their validity.
However, given his sizable influence within thus niche community I thought it was important to at least try to provide a counterbalance. It has become extremely obvious that, like the public at large, members of the communities that orbit individuals like Dave do not understand the complexities of our political process and, as a result, are vulnerable to arguments that sound great on face but do not stand up to stricter scrutiny.
My comments were aimed more at his readers than Dave himself. It may ultimately be a fool’s errand but I strongly believe that if our political discourse is ever going to benefit from the power of social media applications those of us with divergent opinions must respectfully engage.
Starting a project to improve the political discourse by challenging Dave Winer to change is like starting an abstinence campaign by converting Paris Hilton. Good luck, Marco. You’re going to need it.
I don’t see what the big problem is. I told him if he wanted to make it personal do it in his own space. Looks like he found the right place for people who are offended and aren’t gettin heard. The system works. Rant on.
“I don’t see what the problem is.”
Is ANYONE surprised by this? Douchebaggery at its finest.
“I don’t see what the big problem is.”
Of course not. Denial is a wonderful little tool that helps us to avoid facing things about ourselves that we’d find unpalatable.
“I told him if he wanted to make it personal do it in his own space.”
As we’ve covered here before, at length, any disagreement with Dave is “personal”, unless it’s tempered with enough praise. Looks like Marco didn’t lay it on thick enough.
Okay, I’ll probably regret this — but I’ll play along.
What was he disagreeing with me about? I got that he was insulted and was calling me a hypocrite and some other names (very illuminating!), I didn’t see much else other than a disclaimer it might be hard to believe it wasn’t a shrill attack.
Reminds me of the Dale Bumpers line where he said “If they say this is not about sex — it’s about sex.”
http://mp3.morningcoffeenotes.com/itsAboutSex.mp3
One of the greatest. Quotes. Ever!
Well, a quick read of his comment suggests that he disagrees with the way you regularly look to make excuses for those whose political ideologies you agree with while you’re so strikingly quick to condemn those whose political philosophies differ. He also seems to believe (and I agree) that you don’t adhere to the same standards that you expect from others.
It may be a meta disagreement, but it’s certainly not a personal attack.
Further, I’ll add, he didn’t call you a hypocrite. He said that one pair of behaviors was hypocritical. Remarkable difference there… the only “name” he called you in his comment was “Dave”, and I’m pretty sure that’s acceptable.
Again, to clarify, while it is not hard to ascertain that I disagree with Dave on issues of ideology my decision to engage had nothing to do with the exact content of his statements on Wright and everything to do with the drastic departure they represented from past statements about McCain and others.
The fact is that I agree passionately with him about the need for a change in the way we discuss issues as a society and I strongly believe that the innovations of social media apps will continue to provide us a way to do that.
Had he never made any statements indicating a desire to see changes in the way we debate ideas I never would have bothered.
I can disagree with the ideological underpinnings of the Democratic Party or candidates like Obama while still granting that they are ideas presented by good people who ultimately desire what is best for the nation at large. While it is easy to identify that approach as one that is central to our ability to change the reality is that we will continue to propagate the status quo unless individuals like Dave who are looked to as thought leaders within their social networks take the first step.
See this is so boring it puts me to sleep. You can have this shit on your site, I don’t want it on mine. Look at the thread we have today about Comcast. Tons of data there. If you didn’t know much about Comcast and read that all of a suden you’d know a lot more. If you read Marco’s comment you’d know that some person with no last name whose first name most likely isn’t even Marco is not happy about something I wrote. Your mother may care, even Bullshit Mancuso might care but trust me, no one else does.
Believe it or not I was able to post this comment AND read your posts on Comcast yesterday (which for what it is worth I thought were very informative).
I am a little stymied by the fact that he keeps using phrases like “you can have this kind of thing on your site not mine” – my follow up comment was not meant to draw Dave into further conversation and nothing I have said thus far has demanded that Dave must allow every comment on his own blog.
I appreciate that he must receive several anonymous detractors – I am not one of them – Marco is indeed my real name http://www.linkedin.com/in/marconunez
“some person with no last name whose first name most likely isn’t even Marco is not happy about something I wrote”
What is the point of this comment, if not to declare that you are an important person while Marco is a nobody beneath your notice? What an asshole.
Hilarious. Winer spouts off about Marco being anonymous and then he’s called on it.
It won’t change winer’s opinion. You’re either with winer or against him. He’s a man-child.
“See this is so boring it puts me to sleep.”
Why am I not shocked? The most intelligent people I know are always fascinated to be called out, proven wrong, intellectually bested, or otherwise challenged on their thoughts, opinions, or consistency.
For Dave, it’s “boring” to have someone come in and lay bare the fact that, despite claiming to be an “independent”, he’s really just a liberal shill.