by Andrew
In any relationship, there comes a point where the participants must weigh whether the benefits of the relationship outweigh the costs. That time has come in my relationship here at Obsidian Wings. As the commentary in response to my latest post scrolled in, I was, as I frequently am, surprised by how people interpreted my words. As a writer, it is tremendously frustrating to have so few people understand the thrust of a post because my choice of words distracted people from that point rather than highlighting it. And it is quite infuriating to have people claim that I am a liar or that I am dishonest. I have plenty of flaws, I make no pretense about that, but dishonesty is not among them. If I say something, it is well within the realm of the possible that I am in error, but the reader may rest assured that I certainly believe that what I am saying is true.
All groups have their own cant; linguistic phrases and shorthand that allow them to transfer data more effectively. When this cant is used with someone outside the group, confusion will generally result because the listener will interpret the words based on what they mean to him or her, not being privy to what they mean within the speaker’s group, or because they do not share the basic assumptions of the speaker. When discussing politics, this has the unfortunate consequence of making people upset, because a basic axiom for a conservative is frequently considered obviously incorrect to a liberal, and vice versa. This makes communication across the aisle difficult to impossible.
Some commenters here seem to believe that when I use certain words or phrases, I am attempting to frame the argument in my favor or disparage their political party, or I am simply attempting to offend. To respond to the latter first, readers may rest assured that if my intent ever becomes to offend, there will be no question about that intent. When I am writing, I often make statements based on things I believe to be correct, based on my experience. That experience is as someone who has spent his political life on the right side of the spectrum and who since college has had limited exposure to people on the left. My speech is therefore laced with assumptions about the other side that are often incorrect, because I simply don’t have the exposure to people on the left to gather more accurate data. I suspect this will come as a shock to many readers, but my intent when presenting the viewpoint of the left is to do so as accurately and fairly as possible, because misrepresenting those views only undermines my argument, as well as unnecessarily upsetting readers and causing my point to be subordinated to rancor and hurt feelings. I also tend to use shorthand to simplify things, because going into detail often hurts as much as it helps, since any description of such a disparate group as ‘Democrats’ or ‘Republicans’ is certain to be incorrect in the specific case, and that tendency will increase the more specific the description is.
I am going to continue to make these types of errors. I hope to minimize the number of times I make the same error, but given a lifetime of communicating in this way, mistakes are inevitable. I see no way around that, as even were I to suddenly experience a change of heart regarding my political philosophy, I would still be handicapped by the habits of two decades of conversing within certain norms.
I will point out, at the risk of raising hackles again, that many of the assumptions and shorthand utilized by many of the left-leaning commenters have a similiar effect as my own. That is to say, it is not infrequent for me to read a comment that immediately makes me think, ‘Geez, there’s a liberal talking point’ or words to that effect. I have little doubt that they are not intended that way, and that the writer believes what he or she is saying, but that makes such comments no less grating for me than mine do for them. I have endeavored, and will continue to endeavor, to accept such comments without reacting negatively, but it can be quite frustrating to be expected to hold my own fire when others have no hesitation in assuming the worst of me.
I will further note that certain people seem to read my posts strictly in order to find some area to nit-pick. Reading some comments, I find it difficult to believe that anyone could, in good faith, read what I have written and still come to the conclusion they espouse. It seems to me, and I hope I am wrong, that some people read what I write already believing that they know what I think, and therefore see their preconceptions in what I write regardless of the words. This is, to put it mildly, not conducive to debate.
The question to be answered, then, is whether or not my participation here is of value, given that I am going to annoy people by making assumptions and advancing beliefs that are inaccurate (or perceived as inaccurate). I was honored to be asked to join Obsidian Wings, and I believe that writing here has been good for me in terms of helping me to face disparate viewpoints. However, I believe that my purpose as a member of the site is to advance debate, not simply to agitate readers. I am uncertain as to whether I am accomplish the former, and quite sure I am doing the latter. Since I have my own outlet for my views, I could quite easily continue to publish my thoughts without stirring up problems here at Obsidian Wings. People who enjoy reading my writing will, at worst, face the slight inconvenience of clicking over to my site to see what I have to say. On the other hand, I would prefer not to do that; I have far fewer readers than Obsidian Wings boasts, which means I get far less feedback (and certainly not as much feedback from people who see the world through different paradigms) and I learn a lot less.
Before anyone makes a comment, please note the following. I am not looking for people to tell me nice things; my ego is quite healthy and needs no reinforcement. I am instead speaking to the purpose of Obsidian Wings. I suspect that any right-wing voice we bring to Obsidian Wings will raise hackles among the commenters because we will all come here from paradigms very different from the average Obsidian Wings commenter; Sebastian can probably speak to this in detail. What I am asking is simple: does the value of having posters from the right side of the political spectrum outweigh the costs of miscommunication and the anger that results from people who use the same words but that mean very different things, or would the site be improved by a little addition by subtraction, i.e., me taking my comments back home. Rest assured that I will not be overly hurt by people who would prefer to see me go; I’d far rather hear that than endure being the ongoing target for sniping from people who consider me dishonest but didn’t want to actually ask me to leave. As I noted above, regardless of my status at Obsidian Wings, I will continue to blog at my own site, as I have for the past five years.
The floor is open…
Andrew, I haven’t participated much here in the last couple of weeks, and I certainly missed something in the last two days, if this post and Hilzoy’s is any indication, so let me just say pleeeeeeeeEEEEZE stay.
This blog needs thoughful posters and commenters from the left and right, and you are certainly one of those. The last thing I want to see if ObWi turn into an exclusively liberal/left blog.
Yes, please stay. You’re a worthwhile and thoughtful voice.
FWIW, Andrew, I don’t consider you dishonest (and didn’t agree with either of the posters who were characterizing your argument as such).
What I do think is that you have picked up a lot of information from Republican/right-wing distortions of actual events – and, even when the distortions are pointed out to you, you never seem interested in acknowledging/updating the original post. (Never is perhaps too strong. I can’t think of an instance of it.) Your use of Clarence Thomas and Bill Clinton in your previous post, with an exact reversal of the facts, was indeed a useful illustration of tribalism, but not, I think, as you meant it.
You write interesting posts. You write well. I don’t agree with what a lot of what you write, and sometimes I think you’re factually inaccurate because your sources are wrong, but I think you’re making a valuable contribution to Obsidian Wings.
I don’t come here to read things I will agree with. I come here to read things that make me think. Plus, open threads about Terry Pratchett or Babylon 5. 😀
Yeesh, I didn’t want to be first, but here goes.
Stay. I don’t comment much (boring story about living in Europe and missing out on the conversation), but I read every day. And I know you get a lot of flack. Hopefully, with dialogue, we can eliminate some of that.
But this place needs conservatives, especially a conservative as eloquent writing from the right as Hilzoy is from the left (well, maybe not as eloquent, but darn close). You guys are two of the best essayists in the blogosphere and I like that you both write here.
I think the problems with comments can be solved. It certainly is worth trying to keep you here.
Seriously, I know it’s unpleasant, and it particularly stinks being outnumbered (I don’t understand why the commenters here are so predominantly on the left. What makes this place unattractive to right-wing commenters), but it’s useful. At least, even though I’m generally part of the mob with pitchforks and torches, without right(ish)wing people like you willing to engage, I would have a vastly less accurate sense of what it is people like you are actually thinking about.
I don’t know that you get as much out of it as you we do, but your posts and argument really are useful.
yes, stay.
everybody argues with everybody else on the web, and nitpicking is all some people do. but don’t take it personally. you write well, and about interesting things.
Andrew–
As long as you can put up with it, I personally would prefer to have you staying around. I view you as advancing debate more often than less. FWIW.
Andrew, I said it before and I’ll say it again. Wait until after the elections. It’s like the story of the dripping faucet, where you’ve got it going plop plop plop in the background and it really gets on Mom’s nerves, but when she blows up, she is going to blow up over the husband saying he can’t find his keys, or Johnny going vroom vroom with his race car, or anything else, but not the faucet because it is basically not going to make any reaction if she screams at it.
I’ve been here a relatively long time, and it’s my sense that the problems you note would be solved, not exacerbated, by adding a conservative (and ideally a centrist) poster. Back in the day the commentariat was more used to a wide range of posting viewpoints, and a conservative commentator was much more likely to get his or her ideas supported or amplified by others. If the Kitten catches new posters, a broader commentariat will gather.
I’m sorry I didn’t catch the posting rules violations in the thread you refer to – hopefully your grateful readership will be more reactive if there should be recurrences.
Since you ask not to be praised, I’ll speak my encomium to the screen.
I think at this point both you and the regulars are in the midst of a feeling out process. You’re new, so obviously some miscommunication is going to be expected, as people get to know where you are coming from (and vice versa). But really, people are always going to disagree when it comes to politics or social issues.
I don’t necessarily agree with a lot of what you’ve written thus far. That said, I also don’t agree with a number of Hilzoy’s positions, for example (a bit too conservative for my Soviet Canuckistanian blood). But I believe disagreement can be healthy and productive. The disputes that have arisen from some posts of yours have been, IMO, far from tedious, and always thought-provoking.
Your contributions have been a valuable addition to the discourse here. The fact that you can stimulate a vigorous, healthy debate are a testament to their inherent value. Yes, the debate sometimes goes off on a sideways tangent you may not have initially envisioned, but thread drift is unavoidable – especially when comments enter into the triple digits. There will always be folks who, for whatever reason, misinterpret what a writer intends to convey. But I’m of the opinion that a heated debate (within reason, of course) can force both sides of an issue to reconsider their stance, and further promote understanding (or at the very least a mutual agreement to disagree). This can be a painstaking process, but one worthy of undertaking.
In other words, I hope you stay (and continue to [at times] piss people off.)
🙂
Let me put it this way: I read ObWi mostly for hilzoy’s pieces, but if she were to leave, I would continue reading if it were only you. I think a lot of the problems you refer to regarding interpretation of your writing and the subsequent flak fired your way is subject to the 90/10 rule: 90% of the problem is 10% of the regular commenters. Quite frankly, you’re the best conservative writer that ObWi has ever had, and that includes its founding class. And your perspective on matters military is sorely, sorely needed around here.
Now, if we could ever get Edward back . . .
Of course you need to stay, it’s definitely worth it. And certainly you could use some support now and then from the commentariat (or maybe we need more commentoisie; two-and-a-half years ago I would have qualified, but the Bush administration and its congressional enablers have driven me from the stable for the foreseeable future).
Unfortunately the blog, and especially comments, are an imperfect communication medium (not that any other medium is perfect) and a lot gets lost in translation, especially with drive by comments and snark (guilty!).
But really, you haven’t been here that long, and the longer you post here (not that you haven’t been posting elsewhere for a long time) people will get to know you better, and (hopefully) not attribute views, beliefs, intent, etc. to you that you do not have. Taking what you say in good faith, in other words.
I am not looking for people to tell me nice things; my ego is quite healthy and needs no reinforcement.
Okay, then, your mother was a hamster and your father smelt of elderberries! 🙂
Andrew:
Stay, I beg you.
Did John Adams secede from the Union because Thomas Jefferson was an insulting twit? No, he wrote him long letters, without expectation of a reply.
Did Paul McCartney quit the Beatles in 1967 because John Lennon could be an uncooperative twit? No, he patiently nudged some music out of the guy for two more years, and, man, am I glad about that. Yeah, O.K., he reached his limit in 1969.
Did Reggie Jackson punch George Steinbrenner in an elevator because the latter was a bullying twit? Well, yes, but then they got off the elevator and won some games together.
Did Aaron Burr take umbrage at Alexander Hamilton and … never mind that, bad example.
My suggestion (for me and everyone) is to hate Dinesh D’Souza and to respect Andrew, Sebastian, Slart (the independent), Charles, and other conservative commenters here, if they can read my respect through the sarcasm.
Andrew: email if you want for a phone number you can call for a free lunch, if you live where I think you live.
lessee:
If you feel that what I’ve written goes beyond the bounds of acceptable commentary, the e-mail address is accurate. If you don’t want to chastise me in public, you may feel free to do so in private.
I urge you to stay. Politics is best conducted retail even if it is mostly done on a wholesale basis in this country. And echo chambers aren’t all that interesting.
more importantly, i still haven’t convinced you that the appropriate response to the market failure in health care insurance is a single payer plan.
maybe i never will. but the discussion is worth having.
cheers,
What I am asking is simple: does the value of having posters from the right side of the political spectrum
You’ll have to help me here 🙂 I believe I have read every one of your posts here, I even went back and read a lot of your own blog when you were introduced – and I could not in good faith call you anything right of center. Number one – for a military officer you seem decidedly to the left to me.
On court/administration/military matters I would say to the left for sure.
On social issues – not sure I got a feel.
Overall, in your time here, I formed a strong opinion – ‘slightly left’, a good guy, and someone I inherently respect due to your time in the military {salute}. Short version – I would love to buy you a beer and STS at the nearest O Club (actually the NCO club is more fun and usually has a good band).
So – in the end – if folks here consider you a wingnut, then they are too far left to ever consider a point of view this side of Howard Dean.
I would call you a moderate, slightly left. Your writing is clear and concise – I appreciate it, but disagree with much of it. I am not a hard core Rethuglican folks. If you can’t see that Andrew is centrist or even left of center – well, “posters from the right side of the political spectrum” will certainly never make a go of it here.
On a personal note – I enjoy your posts and urge you to continue. Quitting sir, is not the military way.
John Thullen: “you can call for a free lunch”
No such thing as. There’s even a theorem.
I second John Thullen’s motion re: hating Dinesh D’Souza.
I have fought for a long time for more civil discussion here because I thought the commentariate was capable and interested in such. If they somehow manage to run you off, I am going to be severely upset.
Then I will follow you to your sight and start pestering you with more lefty viewpoints there ;-}
JFTR, I haven’t been commenting here much lately, but I remain a very frequent reader, and have found Andrew’s posts quite worthwhile.
It’s all my fault. I am personally responsible for the self-exile of at least a half-dozen posters:partly thru my unrestrained vitriol; my absurdity and silliness; my unwillingness to stay on topic; my interminable 3 AM confessionals cum record reviews.
Which reminds me, I watched David Cronenberg’s A History of Violence for the first time today. Most excellent, but if intended on some level as a metaphor for America, what can it mean that Cronenberg claims to be a hardcore Darwinist natural selection kinda dude? Is, according to the movie, American violence inevitable, but always to be regretted and never denied as an essential part of our character? Can we bear to recognize ourselves? Would Maria Bello marry me?
Leave and I will follow, increasing your hitcounts over there. You can use that as a dire threat, unknown to whom. I suggest a renegotiation of your remuneration with hilzoy and von, based on hazard pay.
there’s no doubt in my mind that you add value to the site.
There’s also no doubt in my mind what single habit on your part has most consistently raised hackles and provoked rancor:
attempts at even-handedness.
That particular trope just doesn’t work for you here. I suspect you’d actually get a better reception taking a different approach. Even being more directly partisan might not catch you the flak that endlessly equating Dems and Reps does.
My over-all feeling: you know a lot of stuff that I don’t know, and your strongest posts come when you write from that knowledge-base.
So cut the false equivalences, teach me stuff I don’t know, and you get my strong vote for staying.
I am an everyday reader and infrequent commenter, who would hate to see you stop posting here. I gather so much info from the whole experience, that at times, the mind boggles.
I want to underline some things previously said.
First, I think Liberal Japonicus is right in suggesting not acting now, but waiting until affter the elections.
Second, I think Rilkefan is right in suggesting that another conservative poster would help in drawing some more conservative commenters.
Finally, I think Jesurgliac is right about the problem of tainted information.
For myself, I’d like to offer a suggestion and observation bundled up like so much yummy baklava. Andrew, you’ve got life experience that differs a lot from many of ours, and easy access to kinds of info that many of us do not. In the past I’ve learned about both history and current events from military posters like James MacDonald and Terry Karney over at Making Light. And more broadly, I learn a lot from anyone articulate writing about the stuff they know and like.
Hoping ot to sound too harsh here, I have to agree with Jesurgliac that I don’t find your basic data on a lot of liberal thought, policy, and action very reliable. But then it’s also true that I don’t exactly need you for a lot of the basics. What I like most, and what others seem to like most, is the stuff that we cannot readily find lying around other places. For instance, have you thought about keeping an intermittent diary about the reupping experience? Or some posts on subjects like all the non-war-making stuff that a military has to keep doing in wartime, and the tensions (and resolutions) that come up in the course of that? I’m willing to admit a lot of ignorance on many of these subjcts, and suspect that knowing more about them would, at a minimum, not make me a worse person.
Also, we’ve kidded about this and used it for light fodder in several threads, but I really do think there’s a place for discussing primarily non-political matters here. I like knowing what others think about regional dialect cuisine, dramatic and comedic entertainment, and so on. The life of the mind does matter, partly because it matters how much we go around consumed by anger and how much we’re able to live life despite sources of anger, and a lot of that is not fundamentally political (even when it has a political dimension).
I do realize the temptation to address others’ blind spots is strong. I am, as I write this, sitting on my hands with regard to some of my stock suggestions about “self-criticism I wish more conservatives would engage in”. You don’t need it from me. 🙂 But I do hope that you’ll stay and illuminate some things that you’re in a unique position to do so, with reference less to the failings of groups far from you and more to the complexities and strengths of groups you’re close to that are often misunderstood or misrepresented elsewhere.
I see Kid Bitzer said a bunch of the same stuff I did, only more compactly.
Bob: Given that Cronenberg is a careful student of William Burroughs and J.G. Ballard, I would guess that you’re reading him accurately. Regrettable necessities are his stock in trade.
Stay stay stay. This blog is better with more conservative posters joining the discussion, especially if they tend towards being thoughtful, not too defensive, not too tribal, and understanding of how political discussion should work and how it does work (qualities that are, of course, also valuable in the liberal posters). And that’s you (too nice? Well, then your favorite sports team sucks!). Sure, a lot of people here are coming from someplace different from you and carrying different assumptions with them, but that’s a big part of why it’s valuable to have you here. There’s going to be some friction and misunderstandings, but I don’t think they’re as big or as bad as you seem to think. The biggest problems (like people impugning your honesty, or failing to listen to you in good faith), I think, are coming from a smallish minority. My suggestion is to not let the few get to you, don’t get into shouting matches with them, and let Hilzoy & the regulars straighten them out. And, when necessary, make an occasional post like this one pointing out how things are falling short of the ideal. But next time, try to leave out the part where you’re thinking about leaving the blog.
If there are ever going to be more centrist and center-right commenters here, it will take someone representing that point of view in main posts. I hope you stay.
I also hope I haven’t been a significant part of making you question the value of engaging in discussion here. I must have missed whatever sparked Hilzoy’s civility post and this of yours.
See, this is just the sort of deceptive post that a Rove acolyte wingnut would try to spew into the. .
no, I’m kidding
From whose perspective do you intend the question to be answered? From my personal perspective, the value of reading a conservative viewpoint without having to visit RedState or Instapundit is enormous. Particularly when that viewpoint is constructive and not combative. You and John Cole are my go-to guys. The costs of miscommunication from my perspective are nil, because it’s easy enough to recommunicate if there’s a misunderstanding, as long as you work from a basic faith in the other guy’s good intentions.
I suspect, however, that the perspective that matters when you’re weighing the benefits vs the costs is yours, not mine. Don’t donate your viewpoint. You need to get something out of it as well.
I am always glad to read posters and comments that move past the expected, or seek to say something fresh. And since I shamelessly look forward to the by-line…
ok, stay.
Andrew, write shorter.
Jake
Dangit, now I feel guilty for not commenting very much lately. I hate work.
For the record, informed debate between liberals and conservatives is what draws me to ObWi. I can (and do) read intelligent commentary on both sides of the aisle in various places in the blogosphere, but this is the only site I have found where the two sides can have a (mostly) civil argument.
I hope you stay, Andrew.
Please stay.
Here’s the thing: ObiWis are a bunch of politics junkies. We feel passionate about our points of view. We like to argue substantive issues, substantively.
The tragedy of politics in the US today is how devoid they are of substance; how often people arguing a particular point of view do so in bad faith; how often the debate is about scoring points rather than finding common ground – or a workable way around a lack of common ground.
I’m very sorry you feel as though you’re under constant attack. I think a lot of that is that you’re unfortunately considered a stand-in for the groups and individuals we’re really enraged at. That’s awful and unfair, and I don’t blame you for being sick of it.
But even when – gods willing, soon – American political debate becomes normative again, it will still be lively, and argumentative, and heated. ObWi certainly will be. I can only hope we’ll be arguing politics rather than personalities, and not using posters or commenters as stand-ins or scapegoats.
All I can suggest is that you ignore the commenters who attack you personally, who nitpick and mindread and rearrange what you said to fit what they want you to have said in order to attack you for it. Just ignore them. Scroll past them. (I do.)
But the ones who disagree with you substantively… I think you should stay and duke it out. Once “conservatism” actually is conservatism again (again: soon, please please) there will be people, like me, who are sincerely interested in discussing how, when, and why a conservative policy would be better than a liberal one.
Once upon a time, I was a fiery doctrinaire liberal. As I got older, some of my opinions ameliorated or even reversed. But the last 6 years (10, if we include the Clinton Wars) have been an assault the likes of which I’ve never seen, and have made me far more combative than I was even 15 years ago. That’s what happens when the political climate becomes a zero-sum game, when political debate is hijacked by people with no interest in good governance or effective policies, when it’s all about power and contempt for the other side.
I really want this toxic, noxious era to be over. I really want to be able to discuss liberal and conservative ideas on their merits. I’m reachable, for pity’s sake: I want good governance and effective policies, and I don’t much care what ideological label they wear.
Please stay. We need you.
Just adding another lurker’s voice to the chorus – The number of places on the web where one can actually come across genuine debate is vanishingly small. I don’t always agree with you, but always for interesting reasons.
Please stay, if you can bear it.
(Besides, you’ve got a good name.)
I was surprised to see this post, and bookmarked your personal site (but for some reason could not access the comments) to get more of your posts (in case you leave us). I also re-read the prior post, and just did not see that much that was troubling about the responses.
Frankly, so what if people miss the drift of what you are writing. It’s either a lesson in mastering better rhetoric so as to avoid weaknesses in one’s own self-expression (a lifelong journey), or recognizing that too many of us can be curmudgeons no matter how you write it. Besides, that is actually sometimes part of the fun.
One more thought. You seem to be equating agitating the readers with somehow not serving a useful function. Frankly, there is not much separation from well-reasoned writing and writing that provokes strong emotional responses — particularly on the subjects discussed here.
To put it another way, rational thinking is another type of emotion and not its antithesis. After all, what is going on when a mathematician refers to an “elegant” proof?
Dear Andrew,
I have been more-or-less absent from Obsidian Wings since you joined, due to the exegencies of work. Hence, I have not been following recent threads closely, or even at all.
A strange twist of fate brings me back just as Hilzoy posts “Civility” and you ask,
My short answer is, yes.
Those who remember me know that I am a congenital Democrat (small and large “d”). I came to ObWi precisely because I value this conversation, conducted (usually) civilly.
I see that Ugh is taking up any slack I left.
Please stay. You have a unique perspective. Obwi would be diminished without you.
Please stay–and bring the BSG blogging too! I’d love to see what the commentariat here makes of that show.
Like many of the others, I have not been around much the last few days. And even tonight when I read, I was twice saddened –once at you feeling any projection of hostility from the commentariat, and then again at reading the comments and seeing nearly everything I was going to be said had already been said before I started reading.
No one wants to push you away. Intelligent and respectful voices are to be treasured. Even moreso when they say things different from what the majority is saying.
My advice: stay only if you feel you’re getting something of value out of the arrangement *with things as they are right now*. If you participate here with the expectation that you’ll be able to bring everyone around to humble and open-minded moderation, you’re just going to be continually aggravated and are probably better off staying away. If you do decide to stay, follow CaseyL’s advice and just engage with the people who seem worth engaging with and ignore the rest. Or if you can’t ignore them, do what I do and use them to test how much progress you’ve been making with your equanimity meditation.
Or if you can’t ignore them, do what I do and use them to test how much progress you’ve been making with your equanimity meditation.
When I read the last line, I thought it said ‘medication’ and I was going to ask kenb where I could score some of that.
I understand why you might be feeling frusterated, Andrew, but I believe the site has been much better since you’ve been here.
What we really need around here is a moderator.
The easy thing would be for me to say I second everything mentioned above.
Yes, stay, but only if kenB’s suggestion makes sense to you.
Why stay?
First of all, You bring your own unique look at things and in time, most people will accept that that is who you are and live with it. Please note I said most.
Second, because when you came aboard you were, at least from the impression I received, the new “Conservative” poster. Unfortunately, this resulted in many things you wrote being automatically suspect in many people’s eyes. I think this is slowly changing.
Third, and this is both a strength and weakness of yours, you do try to engage anyone and everyone who reacts with any degree of hostility to what you have written.
It is a strength because you don’t just drop a thought and leave for long periods of time. A weakness because too much time can be spent arguing about what is in fact a misperception, and then arguing whether or not it is a misperception.
I believe Jes in a previous thread acknowledged that language can be a problem as certain terms in England mean something different then what they do in the US. Imagine someone like dutchmarbel or even Debbie(aussie) dealing with this difference.
But the problem extends even throughout this country. And I do think there is a difference in terminology between the liberal and conservative side, and even with moderates. And I think part of the problem is what you write is given a meaning different from what you mean. And people can be very stubborn in thinking their interpretation is the right one.
A major task when I was doing couples counseling was getting the two people to really try to find out what the other meant rather than just reacting to what they think the other said. The same holds true here and sometimes you are too patient.
Finally, and this is a totally personal reason for wanting you to stay. I like to look at what you say, particularly as it relates to the military, and hold it up against or rather beside what my son tells me. With the two of you, I feel I get a more complete picture, and that means a lot to me.
Oh, and by the way, I tend to agree with OCSteve (amazingly) that I don’t think you a modern day conservative, but then I think modern day “conservatives” have nothing to do with real conservative thinking. And in truth, I think you have pointed out that you don’t consider yourself as much a conservative as a libertarian. Additionally, you have hinted at what might be considered socially moderate viewpoints. So although I don’t think you are left of center, I don’t see you as a right-wing monster.
So yes, please stay.
Andrew,
-“does the value of having posters from the right side of the political spectrum outweigh the costs of miscommunication . . .”
Hell, yes! In the words of Lone Watie: “‘Endeavor to persevere.’ We thought about those words a long time. And when we had thought about them long enough, we declared war on the white man.” Or – this one seems oddly relevant to me – “All I got’s this piece a rock candy. But it ain’t fer eatin’, it’s just fer lookin’ through.”
And a second to Jesurgislac’s last paragraph (6:53), kid bitzer’s last sentence (8:32), and others. Learning is more important than agreeing – how do you get smarterer without friction?
Didn’t know you had a blog. Will be checking it out now. Thanks.
As a short-time lurker: from what I’ve read in the comments section, the main problem I saw that you had was trying to control the course of conversation a bit too much. I, of course, gladly defer to the rest of you and will accept correction, as I am new. But one of the things about conversation (such as in the On Power thread, which I’m still making my way through) is that sometimes it drifts. Sometimes people will bring up points only tangentially related to the points you made in your original post or comment, and sometimes people will discuss viewpoints that can’t be rightly attributed to you. If someone does outright attribute those thoughts to you, correct them civilly (as you do), but that’s really all that’s needed — you seemed to cry foul a little too easily. You want people to talk about the points you made and only those points, it seems. Sometimes, as long as they are not impugning your character, you need to let the conversation go on those tangents. Most people reading are, I think, smart enough not to attribute those tangents to you, especially if you step in to reaffirm your position once in awhile.
You also seem a little anxious and overeager to please, which is a fault I myself can share. Don’t worry about agitating people. The discussion I have seen ’round this site has been excellent and incredibly civil compared to mainstream discourse, and I enjoy it — a little agitation isn’t a bad thing; confrontation is, but lively debate is not. 🙂
Do stay. Again, I’m new, but I have enjoyed what I’ve read so far. And you have a focus I can definitely agree with — learning. I’m doing a lot of that myself. Stay here, keep writing, keep reading, keep seeking that understanding. We need more of that, not less. I appreciate that you do that.
Andrew, it’s quite clear that a substantial number of people — most of the regular audience, I’d guess — believes both (a) having a rightish poster is a good thing and (b) having you as a poster is a good thing. This is utterly unsurprising to me, even ‘knowing’ what little of the regulars that I do. (And I join in both answers).
What is kind of surprising is that you are/were unsure of the answers.
I’m thinking that we need to ask the same of you that you ask of us: do not assume that a comment is intended to convey hostility, dishonesty, derision, or such. Assume rather a failure to communicate.
OK, Andrew: 38 comments so far, and it looks like 37-0-1 for staying: I’ll make it 38 “for”: your commentary, what I have read of it here, has typically (whatever its viewpoint or slant) been a positive addition to the dialogue: your departure would NOT be of benefit to us – please reconsider!
add one more for “stay”. and my advice from 30+ years on the net — just skip over people who seem not to extend you sufficient good will. it’s not worth arguing with them; it takes up energy all parties could better use for other activities.
but. i freely admit i largely come here to read hilzoy. secondary, however, is that i can get some thoughts from the right without fighting my way through stuff that makes me ill at right-wing sites. here and balloonjuice are it for me right now. so, do please stay.
however:
My speech is therefore laced with assumptions about the other side that are often incorrect, because I simply don’t have the exposure to people on the left to gather more accurate data. I suspect this will come as a shock to many readers, but my intent when presenting the viewpoint of the left is to do so as accurately and fairly as possible
these two statements don’t go together. you can’t present an accurate and fair viewpoint of the left if you’re largely not exposed to people on the left! so, don’t. write what you know. there’s bound to be plenty of that.
Stay.
“What I am asking is simple: does the value of having posters from the right side of the political spectrum outweigh the costs of miscommunication and the anger that results from people who use the same words but that mean very different things”
Yes! A major part of why I read this site every day has to do with the chance of reading well-articulated ideas that I may disagree with.
Actually, as others have said, you seem to be more a representative of a moderate-to-libertaran viewpoint than a hard-core rightie. We need to keep you and add another further-right poster who can present his/her case with honest, well-thought-out arguments.
Part of the problem may just be that you, by your own admission, aren’t fluent in liberal. This is not, by any means, a sin. However, it makes things difficult in your position.
Since you are making an honest effort to engage with people here, it creates problems in that it’s hard to split off the replies which don’t make sense because of different metaphors and idioms and those which don’t make sense because the person making them has, perhaps, an imperfect understanding of the basic issues. This leads to natural frustration as the two blend together into what must at times seem like deliberate obtuseness and even rudeness.
Normally, as many have suggested above, one would just ignore the more obnoxious and gently prod the deeply confused in the direction of some references. But, since you are trying to reach out and do not speak the language well enough to tell the difference, you end up engaging in some impossible discussions.
The other side of this is that your own norms are misread by those here. The key element of this is that the examples you choose to illustrate your points are often more controversial than the points themselves. Now, most of these examples would be treated as normal or even veering leftward on most republican or libertarian blogs. But, to the more liberal audience here, these are treated as right-wing apostasy.
So, my advice would be stick around. You’ll get a better feel for replies in time. In the short run, you’ll probably be happier if you avoid controversy in your examples. It will be easier to avoid nit-picking and frustration if you only jar one major assumption of the audience per post :).
Jay C: OK, Andrew: 38 comments so far, and it looks like 37-0-1 for staying
Er… if I’m being counted as the “1” against Andrew staying, it’s been miscounted. I’m for him staying.
Agree with CharleyCarp, though. I don’t presume Andrew’s hostile to me because he makes posts I disagree with: I don’t see why Andrew can’t make the same presumption about comments disagreeing with positions/statements he is presenting. (Aside from the problem that he feels outnumbered.)
Online debate gets suprisingly heated. It’s tough being in the minority, and it takes a lot of work — a lot — to explain yourself to people who don’t share a common frame of reference. It’s tiring, frustrating, and annoying.
Only you can decide if it’s worth it to *you*.
You’re a good writer, and always have thoughtful and interesting things to say. You make a large contribution here. I think the comments on this thread make it clear that you, personally, and your opinions are respected.
It would be a great loss to ObWi if you decided to move on. You’d do us a great favor if you stick around.
Thanks –
It should go without saying that I’m a “stay” vote, but in case it doesn’t: stay, Andrew.
Jesurgislac:
Actually, I meant the count to be 37 “for” Andrew’s staying here (now 42); no “against” votes, and one “neutral”, which is how I read kenB’s comment @ 10:43p (which I may have scored wrong).
OK: a more-careful recount: 45-0-1 in favor of Andrew’s staying at ObWings.
A pretty good indication of sentiments, I think.
Ah. I’m not familiar with that formatting: thanks for explaining.
Andrew- I too hope that you stay. I can’t promise you will always be treated fairly, but I think it should be clear that you are apreciated.
Stay, please?
For the record, I don’t think Andrew has ever really equated them. I could have missed something, but in almost every case where a scandal was compared or something like that, he made clear he was attempting to communicate to liberals how Conservatives felt about or understood an issue. Finding a relatively analagous experience for Liberals — even if the details are a bit off — is a sign of trying hard to communicate effectively. He even went out of his way at times to explain that he wasn’t equating events.
Andrew is an excellent addition to the site. His posts are challenging and enlightening. He also offers the perspective of a member of the military — one that many bloggers are willing to leave to hypothesis and cliche. A big vote for ‘Stay, Andrew!’ And also a big vote for ‘Give Andrew the benefit of the doubt when reading his material!’ for the commentariat.
Andrew, remember how I warned you about showing annoyance?
Try not to do it again.
Speaking of wins and losses, here’s something that will underline how much basic assumptions may vary.
After two straight seasons of watching its top-seeded team get knocked out of the playoffs, the Pacific League will give its regular season leader a guaranteed one-game advantage next autumn.
Well, the playoffs are here, and the first place team, the Nippon Ham Fighters is 2-0 in the best of 5 series for the Pacific League, but have only won one game.
Stick around. I’m a Chomskyite, or pretty close to it, and I’ve never been offended by anything you’ve said or thought you were dishonest. Which is not to say I haven’t disagreed with you sometimes.
And besides, you often strike me as relatively liberal on foreign policy issues, the way Jim Henley does (to a much greater degree), which explains why I can’t recall offhand being offended by anything you’ve written. If you posted on domestic issues more often, I’d probably find myself being annoyed, but don’t think I’d make accusations of dishonesty. (Hopefully not, anyway.)
Stay. You have integrity, which is much more important than political orientation and framing. Political discourse is inherently messy, filled with miscommunication, and often passionate. If we stop talking across the political spectrum our country is well and truly f*cked.
Andrew, please stay. I have greatly enjoyed your posts and realized what a liberal ghetto I live in. ( I am Katherine’s mother 🙂
Andrew,
As one of the targets of your unfair mischaracterization, I was right to call you out on it. I admit that I was too strident about it (I was offended), and I do apologize for my tone.
I do not apologize for calling you out for your remark.
I hope you will keep on posting here (I’m a longtime reader and I appreciate your perspective — if I didn’t care I would ignore you). I also hope you will point out those times when you see a lazy talking point or a straw man argument.
The echo chambers on the left and the right are not healthy for our politics — we should always care about whether the things we say are well-founded. I would be very happy to see all empty talking points smacked down regardless of which side they came from, and I hope we don’t use kid gloves to do it.
Best regards,
Sean
My previous post was based on my own personal political prejudices and why yours don’t set my teeth on edge, but perhaps that’s irrelevant. Striving to be more relevant, I’m surprised you’ve sometimes had a hard time here. Your style just doesn’t seem to be the type that should grate on us leftwing moonbats or anyone else and as others have said, you come across as having a lot of integrity.
Educating the intolerant center-left on how to talk to Republicans is surely a tiresome task, but I hope you’ve got the patience to keep it up.
Andrew:
How can you leave a commentariat that includes Katherine’s mother?
That’s the best conversation ender since Woody Allen tugged Marshall McCluhan by his sleeve out from behind the potted plant in the theatre lobby. 😉
For the record, my grandmother’s last words before she died in 1985 were, “Be civil to guys named Andrew.”
A head-scratcher until now.
This lurker says: please stay.
Stay.
I hope you stay Andrew. I have been lurking awhile and find your posts refreshing. FWIW I don’t view you as a conservative , you definitely aren’t a right winger.
The problem with much political discourse is that often you need only read the author to know the content of their words. That is not the case with you. You really aren’t as peggable as most.
Mr. Eaton earlier nailed it – in your attempt to show both sides you may pick examples that to “the left” don’t seem equivalent but at least you try. It’s unfortunate your overarching point gets missed by some ocassionally.
I believe that having a mix of conservative and liberal officially sanctioned posters is essential to the character of this blog.
It as essential and as defining as are the rules of civility and the generally stratospheric quality of the discourse.
In fact, I might argue that the reason the quality is so consistently high is precisely because of the presence of thoughtful and rational posters on both sides of the aisle.
As an aside, count me in the camp that does not find Andrew to be overly right wing. I would describe him fairly centrist in the grand scheme of things.
Miscommunication in any medium is inevitable and in this case it is worth it. As others have said, there is nothing to be gained in an echo chamber, on the contrary, it is often dangerously self deluding.
Lastly, the reason I can so confidently recommend this blog to everyone is because I know the presence of conservative and liberal posters immediately removes their ability to casually dismiss the whole site as biased.
It wouldn’t matter how informative or civil the discourse was here if people were to automatically dismiss it based on preconceived notions of how blogs function elsewhere.
“What I am asking is simple: does the value of having posters from the right side of the political spectrum outweigh the costs of miscommunication and the anger that results from people who use the same words but that mean very different things….”
Yes.
“…or would the site be improved by a little addition by subtraction, i.e., me taking my comments back home.”
No.
“But one of the things about conversation (such as in the On Power thread, which I’m still making my way through) is that sometimes it drifts. Sometimes people will bring up points only tangentially related to the points you made in your original post or comment, and sometimes people will discuss viewpoints that can’t be rightly attributed to you. If someone does outright attribute those thoughts to you, correct them civilly (as you do), but that’s really all that’s needed — you seemed to cry foul a little too easily. You want people to talk about the points you made and only those points, it seems.”
It seems to me that I ran into this with you a lot, a couple of years ago, on your own blog; I frequently, apparently, got you mad, by talking about a digressive point; this was a primary reason I stopped commenting, after a while, for a long time, since it seemed pointless, since I wasn’t going to stop digressing, and it appeared you weren’t going to stop getting mad at me for it.
So I’d second the point that thread-drift, as anyone with a background on Usenet, or any similar e-discussion enviornment, is inevitable, natural, normal, and harmless. Avoid the Canute thing as regards it.
Hi, piranha!
Conclusion, Andrew: you can’t leave. If you try, we’ll be forced to invoke our stop-loss policy. You should have read your contract more carefully.
Am I the only one who is hearing this song when I read this?
Am I the only one who is hearing this song when I read this?
No.
Funny, I thought the same thing, but didn’t have the guts to include it in my comment.
Am I the only one who is hearing this song when I read this?
*chuckle*. no. hi, gary!
Ah, Andrew, I read via RSS and alphabetically, so I read your blog before I read ObWi 🙂
I hope you stay. I don’t see a ‘condescending’ tone in the comments to your post – in my interpretation people on the whole try to explain carefully because they respect you.
The fact that your posts lead to debate is one of the reasons you SHOULD stay, since there can only be debate if their are different viewpoints. And you obviously provide that 🙂
I’m worried though that you seem to feel hostility towards your posts and I (reading the same things) feel that you’ve on the whole been treated pretty decent. Do I not recognize it? Do you feel it when it’s not there? Are we getting used to hostility and just call it spirited debate because it sounds better?
Yes, I think another conservative poster might make life easier on you – if that person brings more rightleaning commenters. But if you allready feel cast out, not being terribly right-wing, how is any real wingnut [:)] going to survive???
My personal advice (as in infrequent commenter; I’m often out of my league here and mainly try to represent the European continent at times) is that you should feel responsible for the posts, but not for the comments following it. Threadjacks happen, some people thrive on nitpicking and you cannot steer any of that.
Andrew, as someone who’s only a sporadic visitor, a bleeding-heart lefty, a chronic lurker and not even from America, I think it’s not only a good idea to keep conservative voices in amongst the debates on blogs like this, it’s necessary.
Firstly, it keeps the left honest. I’ve become much better at making cogent political arguments and backing things up since having a few run-ins with some conservative acquaintances of mine. Sound, supported, rational debate is something the world needs more of. And people are a lot more willing to listen to the “other side” if they’re not being grossly mischaracterised, which is something I haven’t seen from you (as opposed to a hell of a lot of political posters, both left and right).
Second, the echo chamber effect can be pretty overwhelming in the political blogosphere. In Australian circles, we’ve got a pretty heavy left/right divide going, and usually posters only go into “enemy territory” to take pot-shots. Intelligent and relatively civil blogs like this give us all a chance to examine the issues, find out the points we do happen to agree on, and discover the opinions of people with differing perspectives instead of jumping to conclusions about “what the right/left thinks”.
Lastly, I know it’s difficult to keep your head up when you’re being lambasted, but it can be a good thing if your voice here attracts other conservative voices. I’ve found some of the best debates I’ve seen in the blogosphere have been when people on the “same side” have argued the details of an issue. And just as being examined forced me to refine my debating style, it’s possible you can learn from things that have been misinterpreted. It may not be conscious, but if you find yourself using “dog whistle” phrases on a regular basis (ie any phrase that politicians or commentators use that carries a specific non-literal meaning to people of a particular political stripe) then you may need to think about how you phrase things. A favourite one here in Oz is “Australian Values” – which is our PM’s way of referring to white-centric, neocon, religious beliefs.
Sorry for the essay. In short: you’re valuable here. Please stay.
Andrew,
As a frequent lurker here, there is no doubt that you have already contributed greatly to this site. You are smart, insightful, willing to engage in OBJECTIVE analysis – not just unthinking Clinton-bashing, as an example – willing to look at your own side, as well as criticize the other side.
You’ve made Obsidian Wings better.
Now – as Ken B said above – does it work for YOU?
Because – even though in the previous thread you referred to – the FIRST thing you said, given the Anita Hill-Clarence Thomas example, was something like “let’s not get into the specifics of that example”.
And yet, that was one of the first things that posters jumped on.
And in a site with a lot of commenters, that type of thing will continue to happen. The internet is unruly that way, although perhaps it might get a little better, but in the main, this site is what it is, and can only be coaxed to get a *little* better.
So, if the “unuseful” commentary bothers you too much – and you are outnumbered here, I understand – then you will need to decide for yourself whether you get more out of it than not.
Now for me – PLEASE STAY AND POST!
You could think of it as a patriotic duty – explaining lucidly to the liberal masses what an intelligent reality-based conservative is REALLY about. (‘Cause we don’t see many these days!) Maybe it is a thankless job, but someone has to do it!
Andrew,
I have enjoyed your posts more than most of the conservative posts that have shown up here. They are very thoughtful and help to broaden my view of things, on the whole. By all means, please do stay!
On the question of would I vote for a Republican as raised in the posting that you referenced: I really think that the depths to which the Republicans have stooped are really a response to absolute power, and maybe the Dems would respond in like kind, with the same circumstances. I have more or less decided that, should the Democrats have firm control on congress in 2008, I will likely vote for a Republican president. In my mind, balance has become an over-riding concern….
Again, please stay….and hope you are having a nice weekend at home.
I’m late to the party. But stay, Andrew.