I may have to watch more John Schneider:
Choice quote:
If you are currently being accepted by people you disagree with, then you're obviously not speaking out.
This hits me personally because, however much I may blog a certain way, I do have friends who don't agree with my position, and I prize their friendship as I hope they prize mine. Schneider's point of view seems harsher: you ought to be actively pissing off the people whose principles you disagree with, to the point where they reject you. Flak means you're over the target, right? Superficially, I see what Schneider is saying, and I sort of agree. More deeply, though, I have to wonder how practical his point of view is. If I go out of my way, on a face-to-face level, to piss off people I disagree with, I wonder whether I'll have any friends left. That said, I also don't want to be the squishy peacemaker who's so in love with compromise that I end up with no principles of my own. Meanwhile, as I squish along, the people I disagree with freely pursue their agenda, and I do nothing to stop them. How is that right?
All of this is to say that, if nothing else, Schneider is forcing me to think about where I stand on certain issues, and how hard I ought to be fighting for my own position regarding those issues. Ultimately, it's something we all need to think about. And honestly, I'm still thinking.
1 comment:
Argue all you want, minds are rarely changed. But yeah, you do have to take a stand to defend your principles. I've been "unfriended" by many of the folks on the left I know, but I've only blocked the ones who attacked me in a personal offensive manner.
It's sad that most of the time things never move past the exchange of talking points. On the rare occasions that I've had a meaningful dialog with a political opponent, it was surprising just how much middle ground existed.
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