Mar
31
A bunch of Hot Air
March 31, 2009 | 14 Comments
Over the past few weeks Sydney Carton has been documenting the anti-Catholic bigotry that has been displayed by a few commenters over at the otherwise excellent Hot Air blog. Today, Donald McClarey at The American Catholic posted on this problem, and I will just add my voice to their chorus. I also agree with Donald’s assessment of Ed Morrissey. I subscribe to Hot Air’s syndication feed through my Google Reader, and I always click on the links to the posts put up by Captain Ed. As for the posts put up by that other fella – not so much.
The only argument against deleting comments and banning certain commenters is that their own idiocy can later be used against them. But I do think that truly bigoted and distasteful comments ought to be eradicated.
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14 Comments so far
The anti-Catholic bigotry comes from the top.
I think some of you Othodox Catholics are jumping on the “bigot” bandwagon and hoping to ban commenters because you don’t believe you can win in a fair debate.
Yeah Jim, that’s it. We’re just not smart enough to deal with people who have the outstanding ability to write so magnificently by the light of their burning crosses. We are just so scared of their superior intellect, and we just don’t have the ability to deal with arguments as intelligent as:
Often the day-laborers leave a urine stain on a wall and the local priests show up to declare it a vision of their “Queen of Heaven” as proof AMNESTY should be granted to these criminals. What a failed people, culture, religion, and country!!!!!
How can we possibly muster up logical arguments to counter this modern day Socrates?
Here’s an example of what I’m talking about. The urine-stained is over the top, but one of you two complained that this was bigoted and should have been deleted. I think this does correctly describe what happened in the past.
Sure, it’s not like popes throughout history have called non-catholics and their churches heretical.
TTheoLogan on February 18, 2009 at 12:30 PM
CrankyCon,
Don’t bother with Jim, he’s an anti-Catholic bigot himself. He’s just baiting you and the others on this blog to distract from the core of this posting.
And that is that AllahPundit is an anti-Catholic bigot and thus he allows for all the hate to perpetuate.
Tito, then explain how something that I wrote was “bigoted” and explain how this isn’t: “Liars and slanderers of Catholicism are almost always pro-choice.”
You apparently are unwilling to defend your positions in a fair fight.
Tito:
I don’t think that AP is necessarily an anti-Catholic bigot himself. He is not exactly warm to social conservatives, and most of his posts seems geared more to garnering hits than arguing points in a substantive fashion (and, heck, based on HA’s traffic, he does his job well). I just appreciate Ed’s writing much more than AP’s.
That said, they should do a better job monitoring the comments. Again, I don’t think AP encourages the vile stuff. I just disagree with the policy of leaving all of the worst comments up.
Again, I don’t think AP encourages the vile stuff
Perhaps I should amend that to say that he doesn’t embrace it. His provocative style could be an encouragement for certain commenters.
CC,
Well said.
Jim, other churches are heretical. Sydney’s citation of that quote wasn’t necessarily taking issue with the correct information contained therein, but in the followup: “Right, but catholics tend to burn and torture who they consider heretics.”
The qualification of “almost always” in the statement “Liars and slanderers of Catholicism are almost always pro-choice.” That’s an opinion, an evaluation made based on personal experience, and one with which I agree. The most vocal opponents of the Catholic Church, especially in the political realm, tend to be pro-abortion and pro-contraception. And they also frequently (usually?) misrepresent Church teaching and history. Is this done through malice (a necessary ingredient to slander)? Perhaps, since the true information is available and people choose not to hear it.
Isn’t “tend to” in the first quote the same qualification as “almost always” in the second.
The Catholic Church did burn and torture heretics in the distant past.
“The Catholic Church did burn and torture heretics in the distant past.”
And so did Protestants. The key phrase here is “distant past.”
It’s utterly ridiculous to dwell on the religious wars of the Reformation, when we are facing the dual threats of secular leftism and Islamic terrorism. Jim, are your Catholic neighbors (assuming you have any) threatening you? Do we riot and say we’re going to kill people when some “artist” displays a statue of the Virgin Mary covered in dung? Are we the ones pushing for partial birth abortions and explicit sex education in schools? If you’re a conservative, I would suggest that you get your priorities straight.
Like a secular leftist, you find it easier to pick on Catholics and the Church, because you know we’re not going to bomb you.
Donna, I didn’t write the sentence. TTheoLogan did.
I just said that, if “Liars and slanderers of Catholicism are almost always pro-choice” isn’t bigoted and inaccurate because it reflects someone’s opinion or is true in some way and has some qualifications, then “Right, but catholics tend to burn and torture who they consider heretics” also isn’t bigoted for the same reasons.
Sorry, Jim not going to a Know Nothing get the last word. You will have to answer for your bigotry.