The death of debate?
I’m struck by this comment that appeared at Jihad Watch following Robert Spencer’s reply yesterday to my criticism of what I saw as his “carrot and stick” approach to Islam:
Not to worry, Robert. We are with you, still.Now why would the commenter feel that Robert Spencer was under such a damaging attack by me that he would need to be “bucked up” in this fashion? I was simply pointing out a possible contradiction in Spencer’s argument, and calling on him for greater clarity. Isn’t that what debate and discussion are all about? The answer is that in the contemporary West, debate and discussion are not what it’s all about. Liberals and conservatives, especially younger people, have been shaped by a culture and education that tells them to avoid debate, avoid disagreement, avoid judgment. The model of discussion transmitted in our schools today is that everyone has a point of view, and that all points of view are equally valuable and should be given equal respect. This is nothing less than socialism applied to the realm of the mind, and, as with all other types of socialism, must lead to a monstrous double standard. If all points of view are to be treated as equally valid, then correct views must be given undeserved disrespect, and the wrong views must be given undeserved respect; indeed, the more wrong-headed, false, and vicious an opinion may be, the more respect it must be accorded. Instead of the back and forth of discourse leading to greater clarity and understanding, there is the deliberate cultivation of an intellectual miasma in which the worst is given the ascendancy, or, at best, can never be confronted or refuted. Given this educational background, many young conservatives today cannot handle real debate. If their point of view is shown to be wrong, they feel that they have been personally attacked, and they strike back with personal attacks. I have often bewailed the death of debate since 9/11, as the Left’t vicious anti-Americanism has driven much of the establishment right to turn itself itself into a mindless phalanx the sole aim of which is to defend President Bush and his policies from the left. But the death of debate has deeper causes than leftist insanity and conservative reaction; it is driven by the mainstream liberal assumptions of our entire culture, which have shaped the minds and spirits of conservatives no less than those of liberals. However, while the ability of Americans to think and debate has been harmed generally, that does not mean that this educational approach is neutral in its intentions. All points of view may be equal, but some are more equal than others, namely the points of view of favored “oppressed” or minority groups. This is made clear by Carol Iannone in her article, “Diversity and the Abolition of Learning,” Academic Questions, Winter 2002-03. Here Iannone is speaking about a project of the American Association of Colleges and Universities that began in the early 1990s, entitled American Commitments: Diversity, Democracy, and Liberal Learning:
To drive it all home, the authors insist “that students must learn, in every part of their educational experience, to live creatively with the multiplicity, ambiguity, and irreducible differences that are the defining conditions of the contemporary world” (emphasis added). Posted by Lawrence Auster at March 16, 2006 12:59 PM | Send Email entry |