Thursday, January 25, 2007

The decline of civility...

DJ Drummond discusses the collapse of Polipundit. The comments speak much of why I have found myself NOT tuning in to talk radio or on a number of sites. I definitely do not participate - not after I ran into some wanna-be zampolit because I did not go along with them on their pet issue.

Orson Scott Card also discussed this in the afterword to his new novel, Empire. It is a very good, and frightening, read. There is a demand that you conform with them completely, or you are seen as a sellout or worse. The Right does this, and then complains when people view them as scary or extreme. The Left does the same thing, but, as Card notes, they get a pass.

I make no pretensions to perfection in this regard. I have my temper, and I do nto always keep it in check, especially when I see people who pile on others without offering constructive solutions or when they feel they are entitled to their own facts. But as I pointed out at GOPProgress in defending Ann Althouse's comments, there is a difference between someone with deeply-held beliefs occasionally losing their temper and those who imply that their opponents are traitors or have sold their souls.

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