a caveat and/or a confession
I may be breaking a promise here, but . . .
I grew up in a working-class neighborhood of Birmingham, Alabama. My mother worked in a bank; my father worked in the trucking business when he wasn’t in prison; my grandmother took care of me most of the time. No one in my extended family, on both sides, had ever attended college. My parents seemed to think that my inclination to continue beyond my high school graduation was slightly peculiar, and while they didn’t actually object they made it clear that they weren’t going to do anything to help me out — if indeed they could have done anything, which I doubt. We didn’t have much spare cash.
They did let me live in their house, though, which I needed to do, since all the money I made working in a local bookstore went to pay tuition at the University of Alabama-Birmingham, the nearest and cheapest place for me to go to school. I worked twenty-four hours a week during term, while taking a full load of classes, and full-time during all the vacations. Even at this less-than-elite school I wasn’t a very good student, partly because of my schedule, partly because I didn’t really know why I was in college in the first place.
Eventually I met a young woman whom I fell in love with; thanks to her influence I became a Christian, of the evangelical variety. And one of the most dramatic changes my conversion brought about in my life was this: I began to think of my mind as a gift, and a gift that required cultivation — what Christians call “stewardship.” For the first time in my life I began to take intellectual life seriously, I began to work at getting smarter and gaining knowledge. And as a result I found a direction for my life; I found a calling.
All this to make one point: when people who write from a position of privilege and cultural authority make fun of an accent from the hinterlands, or mock the mediocrity of someone’s education, or describe Christianity as a kind of death of the mind — well, I tend to have another perspective on all of those matters. It is that perspective that shapes many of my reactions to what I read in newspapers and magazines. I have sympathy for public figures who are treated that way, even if they are, for example, politicians whom I’m not going to vote for.
One could call my sympathy a function of prejudice in the conventional, pejorative sense of that word; one could also call it prejudice in the Burkean sense, that is, actual knowledge derived from the experience of belonging to some “little platoons.” I could say that it all depends on how you look at it, but of course I don’t believe that, so I won’t say it.
After less than a year working in DC, I’ve come to the realization that those Ivy League degrees (I’m a graduate from one of the bottom ranked institutions in Canada) aren’t always really proof of higher intelligence.
— mark · Sep 9, 04:38 PM · #
Alan, of course you’re right, it’s wrong to look down on people that way. You’re right to say so. And, believe it or not, I condemn it, too. It’s wrong.
You know what else is wrong? For one party to unapologetically deride and insult millions of people, to make their entire convention a Two Minutes Hate against “elites”, “snobs”, liberals and Democrats. It’s wrong for it to be okay— for it to be encouraged, preferred— for the members of one ideology to endlessly attack the other side, while recoiling at every perceived slight from their opponents. Again, Alan, I have to ask you, who is attacking whom? Go back, watch Obama’s convention speech, then watch Palins. Just count the attacks, Alan. Count the moments of contempt, of derision, of insult. See if you can tell me with a straight face that Barack Obama is engaging in cultural war, and Sarah Palin is not. Her entire speech was delivered with a sneer, a sneer at a culture she doesn’t belong to, that she doesn’t understand, a culture that, yes, she’s out of touch with. The difference is, the Democrats at least outwardly condemns that sort of thing, while the Republicans revel in it.
That’s cultural war, Alan, and it deserves your condemnation as much as the attitudes that you’ve described here.
— Freddie · Sep 9, 04:55 PM · #
Right on Freddie! I would add, on the Republican side, the culture war is waged at every level, including the McCain campaign and McCain and Palin themselves. But who among actual real-life high profile Democrats mocked Palin’s accent? Who mocked her education? Now, it is perfectly legitimate to raise questions about education of a candidate to a job that is the second-in-line to probably the most important and difficult job in the world. Just as it is legitimate to raise questions of qualification and experience, for both Palin and Obama. But who is mocking, derisive, condescending, insulting to a majority of the American people that live in cities? Why is it OK for an entire city of San Francisco to be smeared as some sort of a Sodom on the Bay?
— phasearth · Sep 9, 05:23 PM · #
Freddie:
We all have our own peeves and sensitivities, and there’s no reason Alan should apologize for what happens to piss you off. He’s not blaming you for what Slate prints, is he? Or is this a case of the proverbial shoe fitting?
Insisting over and over again that there’s some moral symmetry between Alan’s complaints and the sneering, opportunistic speeches of the Republicans doesn’t make it so. He does not, in fact, have to atone for the sins of Rudy Giuliani before he’s allowed to point out the snobbery of the commentariat against evangelical Christians.
— Matt Frost · Sep 9, 05:31 PM · #
Matt, if Alan is attacking the principle of cultural war, then yes, I would say he should condemn Republicans too in order to create the kind of argumentative culture I think he wants. But, you’re right, Alan doesn’t have to criticize anything in particularly, and clearly, we all have our own individual sensitivities. I expect much of all of you. But you’re right, I guess.
Also, I didn’t, actually, say that Alan was being like the Republicans. I said that the Republicans are the ones who unapologetically mock their opponents, not the Democrats; and I think I’m right, in that. That’s not the same as saying that Alan is engaging in the same thing here. I think Alan here is as much a model of temperance and fairness as he always is.
— Freddie · Sep 9, 05:40 PM · #
Freddie, haven’t you written me off as a lost cause yet? Are you still harboring the illusion that I’m going to end up writing the kind of posts that you want me to write? I love you, man — seriously, I think you’re a great contributor to the conversation, except when the initials S. P. are involved — but give it up already.
Look, this is a freakin’ blog. It’s an inherently casual enterprise. My view is that when you’re blogging you’re free to write about what crosses your mind. If you want to praise a book or record, you have no obligation to run through all the books and records you know to see if something there is, according to some putatively objective criterion, more worthy of praise. And when something annoys you, it’s not necessary to run it through some kind of moral filter to see if there are other things that should annoy you equally or more. If you can’t say what comes to your mind on a blog then where can you do so? Especially if you don’t have a dog in the fight du jour, which I don’t — remember, I’m not voting for either of the major parties, as I have said repeatedly.
You’re just too damned moralistic for me, Freddie.
Besides, you’re still not paying attention before you comment. See if you can tell me with a straight face that Barack Obama is engaging in cultural war, and Sarah Palin is not. I didn’t say anything about Obama at all, did I? If you actually read my post you’d see that I was writing about “many of my reactions to what I read in newspapers and magazines.” Newspaper and magazines, not speeches by candidates.
But for the record, Obama himself has been uniformly gracious, and wisely so, I think. He has been perfectly consistent with his own admirable principles of political discourse. I didn’t say so in the post because the behavior of the candidates isn’t what the post is about. I’m going to keep posting on what interests me, Freddie, so you can stop the hectoring. Or you can keep on hectoring, but I won’t be listening.
— Alan Jacobs · Sep 9, 05:42 PM · #
Seeing the exchange between Matt and Freddie I realize that I could have just kept quiet for a few more minutes and all would have been (reasonably) well.
How many times in my life do I have to receive that lesson before I get it, I wonder?
— Alan Jacobs · Sep 9, 05:44 PM · #
I think Alan pointed out something important, but it cuts both ways.
Alan didn’t blame the Obama campaign. He blamed the “liberal media” – and justifiably so.
And, arguably, that liberal media shot first, because the shots started flying seconds after the nomination. So arguably Palin was just defending herself with her pugnacious speech.
But here’s the thing: that speech was a political speech, one that explicitly drew a contrast with the other party.
Alan didn’t attack the Democrats for hating “real” Americans. But Palin did – in response to attacks on her not from the Obama campaign but from the media.
In other words, here’s (arguably) the sequence:
1. McCain nominates Palin.
2. Media fires first shots in culture war against Palin.
3. Palin fires back at the Democrats.
Palin’s job – not just what I think was wise politically, but what I think was the right thing for a potential VP to do – was to rise above the attacks and show that she was ready to be VP of the United States of America, not just of Red State America. She didn’t do that. Instead she said: those folks out there who are mocking me? They aren’t the real America. We’re the real America.
Now, if you believe that the media is an extension of the Obama campaign, then maybe this doesn’t look like an escalation. But I don’t believe that, and so to me it does look like one.
— Noah Millman · Sep 9, 05:58 PM · #
Tell you what Alan, from now until election day I’ll just assume that my objections are understood and leave your posts in peace. Sorry.
— Freddie · Sep 9, 06:05 PM · #
I still think it’s weird to talk about opening salvos in the culture wars this election season and not talk about bittergate and it’s attendant controversies.
— Blar · Sep 9, 06:13 PM · #
Try this on for size, Alan.
I’m not arguing in a vaccuum but in the context of this political campaign and its day to day life. Check out this blog post, for example.
http://culture11.com/blogs/theconfabulum/2008/09/09/disrespecting-sarah-palin/
This is a perfect example of the fact that the right-wing thinks it’s perfectly responsible to attribute any and all criticism of one of their sacred cows to the Obama campaign. I can’t find a single attack in that post that genuinely originated from the Obama campaign. It seems to be a standard conservative political weapon now to act as though you can attribute the opinions of any particular asshole to Obama, liberalism or the Democratic party in general.
Now can you understand why I might be tempted to perform the reverse with you? It’s tempting, when every other random posting from blogger X shows the deep anti-Americanism of Barack Obama and the liberal movement, to act like a blogger attacking certain members of the liberal movement is in fact attack liberalism or the liberal candidate.
— Freddie · Sep 9, 06:31 PM · #
That’s a great story. My reading is that your conversion made you acutely aware you had a soul. I’m generally down on Christianity in general and evangelicals specifically. However, you illustrated that evangelicalism can be a path to grace. Nonetheless, grace is not often encouraged in a meaningful way. Smugness, self-righteousness and intolerance find a much bigger audience and are peddled more heavily.
I grew up in a similar milieu, small-town Texas. Our differences are big, though. My mother is from Korea and most of my days were filled with racial taunts and snickering. I attended an evangelical church, but started losing my faith at about the age of eleven. My memory was just too good and the religion I was being taught too inconsistent and theologically shallow. No one available to me had the theological depth necessary to resolve those contradictions. I declared myself an atheist at the age of fourteen. My mind was always my refuge — the fact that I could run circles around my classmates was my most consistent source of self esteem. As an adult I marvel at how emotionally unbalanced I was and take time to remember the people who embraced me. Grace is hard, though. I describe this to show that an encounter with evangelicalism can have just the opposite effect you described. I would say that both of our experiences have driven us to “live more deeply.” The labels that now apply to both of us are dramatically different, though.
I live on the West Coast now and strive to not participate in the condescension expressed to those in the middle of the country. I also try hard to ignore the condescension thrown my way. I’m sick and tired of hearing about “San Francisco” values. It’s like one expects to see gay men fornicating on the sidewalks. Why is it this way? Maybe grace is not that advantageous of an adaptation when applied at a whole species-level.
— galen · Sep 9, 06:34 PM · #
After you guys figure out whether rural Christians or urban college-graduates bear the biggest burden of unfair bigoted sneers and stereotypes, maybe you could settle for me the question of whether blacks or women are more oppressed in America?
— Michael Straight · Sep 9, 06:36 PM · #
Michael: I thought we settled that one, and the answer is Nell Carter.
— Noah Millman · Sep 9, 06:41 PM · #
Alan, Can you write again about trees. I liked that. I like trees too (Catalpas, Weeping Willows, and Ponderosa Pines especially).
— Zak · Sep 9, 06:45 PM · #
Alan seems to have internalized republican spin. Who specifically is attacking you?
The big difference between you and I, Alan, is my father fully expected all five of his middle class, small town kids to go to college. He is more like you – he had to put himself through college and noted the better life he was able to live with the better employment opportunities provided by that education. Thus, he wanted his children to be educated also. But, we were never encouraged to look down on those less educated or those with accents. That would be looking down on my grandfather.
That’s one of the reasons why I am voting for Obama – he will do more to make education available to more people than McCain. Not because I am an elitist who looks down those with less education.
We educated elites do not appreciate being told we look down on less educated people. Freddie, in the second comment, says it much better than I can. Do you think for a minute McCain and Palin really believe that garbage they’re peddling? They are using it to get your vote. I hope you are smarter than that. Not just educated, but smarter.
— mike · Sep 9, 07:13 PM · #
No doubt everyone knows this, but there has always been a gross asymmetry in public mockery, with the elite holding the short end of the stick. This is true for tribes, where chiefs often mock themselves in front of their people to make their superiority more palatable to those they rule. And it’s true for civilization in general, where it’s far more acceptable for the vulgar to ridicule the cultivated opinions, manners and affectations of the elite, than for the ridicule to flow the other way.
I’m not sure why, but it seems to be a price you pay for being on a higher rung in the social hierarchy.
As a weak-ass proof, when’s the last time you saw an elite politician mock the commonfolk? I’m not talking about condescending explanations, opposition or contempt, I’m talking about actually mockery.
Maybe it’s happened, but if it has I can’t think of it. And yet, as Sarah Palin proves, mockery flowing the other way is alive and well as a strategy to obtain public office.
— JA · Sep 9, 07:18 PM · #
Bear in mind that I’m not saying that the above is a justification of my continuing to be a pain in the ass, and I genuinely am sorry, Alan. It’s just an explanation, I guess, of my mindset.
— Freddie · Sep 9, 07:33 PM · #
JA, maybe that’s because there is only so much naked condescension one can take before the response is “You know what, fuck you,” and rejecting the trickling abundance of spite back at the oppressors. It seems to have been very cathartic.
— Blar · Sep 9, 08:23 PM · #
Freddie, you write: “Now can you understand why I might be tempted to perform the reverse with you?” No. No, I don’t. I’m not and never have been a Republican, and (for about the tenth time) I’m not voting for McCain/Palin, and I haven’t done any of the things you’re complaining about. As far as I can tell there is no meaningful connection between my posts and your response to them. I’m not being a smartass, I really seriously don’t understand.
galen: “I describe this to show that an encounter with evangelicalism can have just the opposite effect you described.” I hear you, and I understand. I know a lot of people whose evangelical upbringing did something similar to them, and I am often paradoxically thankful that I didn’t have such an upbringing myself. I didn’t encounter evangelical Christianity until I was ready to hear it, and the variety I encountered was relatively healthy. If I had had your experiences I might well be in the same boat you’re in. I still think Christianity is true, though.
mike: “Who specifically is attacking you?” Why, nobody, of course. “Do you think for a minute McCain and Palin really believe that garbage they’re peddling?” Don’t know. Don’t care, either. Do you read posts before commenting on them, mike?
— Alan Jacobs · Sep 9, 08:45 PM · #
“I said that the Republicans are the ones who unapologetically mock their opponents, not the Democrats; and I think I’m right, in that.”
Somebody needs to get out more, broaden his horizons, get to meet more people etc. Then he wouldn’t say things like this.
— The Spokesrider · Sep 9, 09:00 PM · #
“As a weak-ass proof, when’s the last time you saw an elite politician mock the commonfolk? I’m not talking about condescending explanations, opposition or contempt, I’m talking about actually mockery.”
Dunno if it’s exactly what you’re talking about, but Vladimir Vladimirovich Putin and the Nashi types like to mock people who don’t matter.
— The Spokesrider · Sep 9, 09:09 PM · #
Somebody needs to get out more, broaden his horizons, get to meet more people etc. Then he wouldn’t say things like this.
Boy, the “you don’t know how the world works” line of argumentation is a real hit around here, huh.
Read this post, then casually go through the comments.
http://meganmcardle.theatlantic.com/archives/2008/09/coastal_privilege.php
Who has more derision for who? I count over a hundred comments that are explicitly contemptuous of blue state America. I count maybe a half dozen that are explicitly contemptuous of red state America. And it’s like this all over.
Message sent, Alan.
— Freddie · Sep 9, 09:11 PM · #
“I count over a hundred comments that are explicitly contemptuous of blue state America. I count maybe a half dozen that are explicitly contemptuous of red state America.”
In other words, both sides do it. Which is not what you originally claimed.
— The Spokesrider · Sep 9, 09:33 PM · #
Ah. So unless what I’m saying is literally without exception, then both sides are exactly the same. Got it.
— Freddie · Sep 9, 09:41 PM · #
Just want to point out that Jefferson County, Alabama (over which Alan’s hometown presides) is on a collision course with bankruptcy.
Don’t know if this is an example of the evil coastal elites taking advantage of the innocent and well-intentioned, if perhaps a little naive, folks with accents from the hinterlands? Or if it shows that folks with accents from the hinterlands shouldn’t be in charge of stuff because they are all rubes? Or if it’s just another example of identity politics trumping competency to the detriment of citizens (in this case it happens to be Republicans, but I think Detroit/Baltimore would work as the Democrat example)? Or maybe it’s simply the EPA’s fault?
— keatssycamore · Sep 9, 10:02 PM · #
You guys are killing me. I pour my heart out in this post, and Michael S is comparing the oppression of blacks and women, Freddie thinks one comment thread on one blog proves a nationwide phenomenon, keatssycamore is discussing the impending bankruptcy of Jefferson County. The inmates have totally taken over the asylum. Zak is right: from now on, it’s trees or nothing for me. . . .
— Alan Jacobs · Sep 9, 10:14 PM · #
Dr Jacobs,
Take heart. I am a former student of yours. I discovered quite by accident that you were a contributor and one of my professors. I humbly regret that in the second semester of my senior year I wasn’t a better student. I have been enriched by your thoughtful commentary. You are the prime example of why I believe so much in the mission of Wheaton College and the impact it has on its students. I only wish I had the opportunity to dialog with you as a student, but I am grateful for your participation on this site.— Bfinlay · Sep 9, 10:34 PM · #
1968 was about as troubled and violent a year as 20th century America saw (obviously some years in the 19th century were worse). In the course of that year’s presidential campaign Richard Nixon spied a girl holding up a sign reading “Bring us together!”. Nixon was a street fighter of a politician, far from a saint, but the sign moved him and he adopted it as a late theme of his campaign.
Can anyone imagine McCain and Palin adopting a campaign of bringing America together? the McCain of 2000, maybe, but not the McCain of 2008. Our cultural conflicts are an order of magnitude less (at least) than what we knew in 1968, but the GOP cannot hold off pouring gasoline on those flames— and then wondering why their elected office holders are so hated and cannot accomplish much of anything.
— Jonfraz · Sep 9, 10:50 PM · #
Soon after 9/11, I heard several people blame the plane crashes on a spectacular “failure of imagination.”
When I first heard the charge, I thought it meant the terrorists hadn’t been able to put themselves in the place of the people they killed and injured. If they’d been able to empathize, they wouldn’t have had the mental will to do the deed.
When I read and hear personal attacks on the candidates,I sense a troubling lack of empathy in the speakers and writers, a failure of the imagination. People either don’t have much experience with those on the other side of the fence, or they’ve remained emotionally closed when they did.
— Julana · Sep 9, 10:51 PM · #
Don’t give up, Alan. And while I like trees – please keep broadening our horizons, I learn something almost everytime I read your writing.
— Intellectual stalker · Sep 9, 11:22 PM · #
OK.
I was thinking ‘Alan’s a little prickly’; and then I saw again your protest over the reception of your proffered heart.
Yes, of course.
But, the emotional temperature may be expected to continue its rise, and hold its peak through mid-November.
Every little thing will be taken as either support or insult depending on bias. It may be nothing more than blind optimism driving your hope for a thread divorced from political charge-and-countercharge.
I wish you well in your pursuit of blithe blogging grace; only remember that impediments are a gift, and Grace is always sufficient.
— felix culpa · Sep 10, 02:55 AM · #
Thanks to all for the kind words. You’re right, felix, that I naïvely thought I could speak of personal sympathies and cultural affinities in a way that would deflect the wrathfulness that appears to be intrinsic to partisan politics. I hope I won’t make that mistake again. I certainly won’t make it for a while, because I’m going on hiatus. I don’t think this medium is a good fit for me, but we’ll see how things look further down the line.
— Alan Jacobs · Sep 10, 03:11 AM · #
Aargh and alas.
It will be wonderful to see you back, whenever that may be.
You will, I’m sure, return stronger and yet more lucid, and we will be glad.
I’ve donated some footage of Schaeffer to the archives there; if it turns out to be a worthwhile contribution, I’ll hope to be in the neighborhood and come metaphorically knocking on your office door.
— felix culpa · Sep 10, 04:14 AM · #
My God, man. Lighten up and grow some thicker skin. Dr. Jacobs, how on earth did you defend a dissertation, reach your professional level , and teach for so many years at a very prestigious (and expensive) school? A few random stupid “comments” are enough to drive you from the medium? What percentage of readers ever even read these comments, let alone participate?
You’re going to throw away your gift (your “baby”) with the bathwater? Just ignore the stupid comments! Engage when and if appropriate. You don’t have to answer to every idiot who wanders in with two cents; learn to filter them out. There is huge value to some of the engagement, but you expect far too much of the blog masses.
Your initial post may have touched and affected dozens, hundreds or thousands who have no idea who “Freddie” or “Mike” are. Your personilization of this silly comments thread is pathetic.
If First Things were to turn on a comments thread with and attract a huge audience, would you stop writing there? Sure, your books have a limited and invested audience, and don’t invite every reader’s every idiotic thought into the “conversation.” If they do in the future, will you stop writing altogether?
I can’t imagine C. S. Lewis would have made it as a writer beyond 1944 if he were this thin-skinned. He would have dropped the whole idea of Narnia upon the first strong criticism.
You have an opportunity to reach a growing, significant audience here that you’ll never reach through the occasional First Things article or review, or your short print run books. Sure, you have greater control of your Wheaton classroom, and I’m sure you do some good there, but what does that prove?
If you lighten up and do this right, you can actually impact the world through this “medium.” But it’s not as safe as what you’re apparently used to.
— Mobile Reader · Sep 10, 04:50 AM · #
Finally:
I’m ashamed I didn’t stop to reflect and remark upon your extraordinary story.
You’ve leapt some daunting divides. It suggests a potentially wonderful post, or rather series of posts, evoking the atmosphere of your childhood and adolescence. And I find decidedly delightful your discovery of intellectual self-respect as of a piece with discovering Christ’s Lordship.
Blessings,
ed fielding
— felix culpa · Sep 10, 04:56 AM · #
Geez, Mo;
I wuz there cheering until ya dropped the ball, man.
Ya shouldn’a done it.
He’ll never listen to ya now.
Ya should’n use impact as a verb, man.
You were goin’ real good there.
Why you do that?
— felix culpa · Sep 10, 05:06 AM · #
I have just one question for you, Alan.
Do you believe in Creationism aka Intelligent Design as posed contra Theory of Evolution?
I argue that you are not in Sarah Palin’s tribe at all.
You guyz persist in posing this as a culture war…..it simply isnt.
It is the War of the Bellcurve.
Thomas Jefferson understood the neccessity for the left side of the bellcurve to have self-esteem and value. That is what his praise of the “Yeoman Farmer” is all about.
And also what the electoral college is all about.
Even Reihan’s sensei, intellectual l33t David Brooks, says “the republican right is not INTELLECTUALLY ready to govern”.
The children of the yeomanfarmers that do go college, often give up their tribal affiliation and become atheists or agnostics.
Creationismbelief is more a tribal marker than anything else. There are religious l33ts, like Dr. Ken Miller and Dr. Francis Collins, but they are not in Sarah Palin’s tribe either.
Religion is selfesteem and a sense of personal worth for the leftsiders. To them, being “godsmart” becomes the peer of “booksmart” or “sciencesmart”.
After all, godsmart is what is really matters, lol.
Scientific progress is inimical to this world view. And eventually will doom the kind of blinkered religious belief endemic in Sarah Palin’s tribe. And what will they have then?
The 100 million people that will never get quantum physics or nanotechnology or evolutionary biology?
The 40percenters that just simply aren’t college material?
How do they not feel inferior and resentful?
— matoko_chan · Sep 10, 12:45 PM · #
Alan:
I hope you don’t stop blogging here.
And your mind is a gift.
All the best,
Jim
— Jim Manzi · Sep 10, 03:24 PM · #
After I wrote my tree request, I realized it might have been taken to be dismissive of the actual content of the post, relating to your background. It was not intended as such. I thought it made its point well and gave a good insight into your background and your thinking. As with all that you write, the prose was superb. I’ve enjoyed and valued your contributions to First Things and Books & Culture, along with your musings and reflections here. I hope you reconsider putting an end to your blogging.
— Zak · Sep 10, 06:44 PM · #
If it’s any consolation, which it probably isn’t, I understood what you were saying. I have an analogous “prejudice”: during the immigration “debate,” my own background as a first-generation American of Hispanic/Latino/whatever background made my sympathize with the people that, in my estimation at least, were being demonized. It didn’t matter that I thought that some of the concerns were valid — I didn’t like the tone with which people spoke about these folks.
— Roberto · Sep 10, 07:11 PM · #
On the initial post: Great post; I had no idea and wish to know more. How so many have missed, evaded or simply used the point made in your penultimate paragraph as a jumping off point to mount their own hobby horse is beyond me.
On your decision to take a hiatus from blogging: Damn. That sucks; hope you’ll reconsider.
— Karl · Sep 10, 08:11 PM · #
Alan, I have to second Karl’s post. This was a beautiful piece of heartfelt writing.
Now, I don’t usually cotton to compliments; I’m way more comfortable holding a red pen than a white flag (for reasons I can’t entirely articulate, compliments evoke within me images of the latter — must be my stolid, old-school Southern upbringing).
On a more selfish note, don’t stop blogging.
— JA · Sep 10, 09:32 PM · #
Sheesh, Alan. I thought it was obvious my “who’s more oppressed, blacks or women?” joke was making fun of the people who, on reading about your frustration with the stereotypes aimed at rural people, would respond with, “Oh yeah?!? Well MY people get sneered at SO MUCH MORE than your people.”
— Michael Straight · Sep 10, 09:36 PM · #
Alan – don’t let the bastards grind you down. Even though I don’t share your views on a lot of things, that’s no need to stop writing. Shake it off and move on.
— Mark in Houston · Sep 11, 05:07 AM · #
Alan, I’m surprised you are still interacting with the commentators. Would you consider the wisdom of simply ignoring the comments section?
I’d hate to lose your thoughts over the inability for commentators to be thoughtful and careful in their commenting (partly because of the nature of the blog comment).
Or would ignoring comments conflict with your purposes for this blog? I just think it’s too emotionally and physically exhausting to sit there and respond all the time, and most of the profit for everyone comes from your writing and not everyone’s writings.
— Albert · Sep 11, 03:48 PM · #
Alan wrote:
“You guys are killing me. I pour my heart out in this post, and Michael S is comparing the oppression of blacks and women, Freddie thinks one comment thread on one blog proves a nationwide phenomenon, keatssycamore is discussing the impending bankruptcy of Jefferson County. The inmates have totally taken over the asylum. Zak is right: from now on, it’s trees or nothing for me. . . .”
Alan,
I grew up on a pig farm in central Kentucky. No matter how many showers I would take after feeding the hogs in the early morning, I still smelled of hog shit when I arrived at school. I got sneered at by all, even the real rednecks, at my high school and the fact that I was smart made me that much more of a target. Who’s ever heard of an elitist pig farmer? So I know about being sneered at.
The sneering continued through higher education. In fact, my country accent was often the joke of the night at college and law school parties, “Hey, ask Keats if he knows where there’s a ‘warsh-cloth’ you can use, see if he’ll take a walk up the holler to the crick and fetch us some water for the outhouse.”
And, yeah, all that sucked and was elitist and stupid and at times made me stupidly ashamed of my roots for no reason, but instead of ultimately feeling sorry for myself and out of anger choosing one group or another to identify with, I realized that the people who sneer are just idiots. All of them. I mean I well-understand the urges a hick like myself has to disparage ‘elites’, but I usually save that derision for particular ‘elites’ like, for instance, Fannie Mae’s former CEO, rather than simply doling out the hate towards anyone who lives in NYC ala the Party of Palin.
Did I pour my heart out enough here? I’m not sure if it’s good enough to join the (self) pity party that’s going down in this thread. But I’m trying to say to you, Alan, that I share your pain and yet think your response to it is all out of balance.
Which was my point about Jefferson County’s bankruptcy. That, at least in politics, cultural affinity plus a nickel can get you a municipal bankruptcy. Which is why I vote for the person who I think can best lead the government in the policy directions I want to see the government go, not the person who simply shares my accent. To that end, I have not voted for the Democratic nominee for President ever even though, for instance, I think Bubba grew up a whole lot like you and me and certainly sounds a whole lot like you and me. I think maybe you are too deep in the halls of academe to see the forest for the elitist trees (tree analogy being my way of reaching out for common ground with you). Because the elitist trees aren’t the only idiots in the forest, they are just the ones you most often have to deal with professionally.
Sorry to ramble, but I don’t think you’ve taken those comments which you apparently construe as demeaning your life-experiences and heart-pouring in the light they were intended. See Michael Straight’s comment above where he explains (and confirms my initial reading of his comment) that the “blacks and women” comment was sarcastic and intended to support you and get a little laugh.
— keatssycamore · Sep 11, 03:54 PM · #
I think that people are taking Alan’s “pouring my heart out” comment a little too seriously in return…
— Matt Frost · Sep 11, 04:20 PM · #
Matt’s right. That “pouring my heart out” was a semi-playful response; I thought that my comment about writing only about trees from now on was a dead giveaway. Evidently not. You don’t know from pouring my heart out.
It is true, however, that I think this is an especially unfortunate thread, and also that we’ve had a number of unfortunate threads on the Scene recently, and, consequently, that it wouldn’t hurt anyone if I were to be quiet for a while. I told a story about myself that strove to make the simple point that it’s possible to have human responses that have nothing to do with partisan politics. What I learned, reading the comments, is that right now a hell of a lot of people aren’t interested in anything but partisan politics, and others have axes they’re going to grind and hobbyhorses they’re going to ride regardless of what the topic of the post is, and still others are going to complain about the axe-grinding and hobby-horse riding. So what exactly was the point of my writing the post in the first place . . . ?
Of course, as Albert says, I could just ignore comments, but (a) I don’t think that’s right — I think that when you enable comments on a blog you have an obligation to listen to what people say and respond if there’s something to respond to; and (b) I’ve observed that when bloggers ignore their comments those comments turn poisonous after a while. Plus we used to have some helpful exchanges in the comments here.
So the best answer I can come up with at the moment is just to say, for now, See y’all in the funny papers. You may now resume your analyses of my psychological and moral deficiencies, and sometime in mid-November I might check in to find out what they are. Until then, posting will be light and reading of comments lighter.
— Alan Jacobs · Sep 11, 05:18 PM · #
“I think that when you enable comments on a blog you have an obligation to listen to what people say and respond if there’s something to respond to.”
Can does not imply ought.
— Phil · Sep 11, 05:52 PM · #