Over at Newsbuckit they came up with a way of counting how often the “seven words you can’t say on television” appear in the blogosphere. They then determined that, comparing left-wing and right-wing sites, that…
Oh, I won’t spoil it for you. You’ll probably guess anyway. What you might not guess is the ratio.
An obsession with polite or correct public language is a sign that communication is in decline. It means that the process and exercise of power have replaced debate as a public value. The citizen’s job is to be rude — to pierce the comfort of professional intercourse by boorish expressions of doubt. Politics, philosophy, writing, the arts — none of these, and certainly not science and economics, can serve the common weal if they are swathed in politeness. In everything which affects public affairs, breeding is for fools.
—John Ralston Saul, Canadian essayist, novelist, and critic, The Doubter’s Companion, 1994
Comment by Phoenician in a time of Romans — 1 March, 2007 @ 18:57
Note that Ralston was able to communicate that without sounding like a foul-mouthed moonbat.
I don’t necessarily object to the vocabulary, but it does seem funny that crutches like that show up more frequently in people unwilling to devote much thought to forming their opinions.
Comment by buttle — 1 March, 2007 @ 21:15
Another interesting attack mode, seemingly from left leaning commenters is to imply a lack of genetic diversity in one’s family. If a commenter provides profile data that includes their geographical location another meaningless attack discounts comments because of the poster’s location. Where I have indicated that I live in NC I am accused of being a stupid inbred red-neck know nothing. Anything to discount the messenger but not he message.
Comment by John L — 2 March, 2007 @ 4:49