Asymmetrical Information

Eat your heart out, Godwin!

Only a greedy, self-absorbed, right-wing neocon could suggest such a thing. ;)

pshaw....

Only a regulation loving, law-passing, elitist democrat would suggest such a thing. ;

Only Hitler would propose such a thing! Hitler, I say!

It seems almost like a deductive derivation of Jane's Law, but it's sufficiently unique. Dreck's Law it is then!

Polarization? Whut you mean, polar? Hell, this is summer in the northern hemisphere!!

I suspect there's some sort of meta-law lurking behind both Dreck's Law and Zrimsek's Law-- which states that the normal and inevitable reaction of any heterosexual man or woman to a briefing or training course on sexual harassment is to make risque jokes about it to any member of the opposite sex who shares the same office.

I've observed this phenomenon in a more general sense pretty much anywhere a conversation takes place that might -- however remotely -- be related to politics. :)

Fark.com, for example, typically devolves into a flamewar of the "Bush lied/Michael Moore sucks" variety even if the starting topic is boobies.

I'd might consider changing it to "any thread" or even "any conversation" - covers more territory that way - but yeah, good one.

Thanks for your post about Elitists.

I used to live in Framingham, MA and at night you could hear a train come through and some folks hated it, I loved it because it meant STUFF was being moved, stuff someone made or grew was going somewhere where people wanted to buy it. I thought that was a form of beauty.

There was a sticker factory in town too and the air sometimes smelled like glue...I loved that too, it meant people were working and making stuff....just my two cents.

I used to live in Framingham, MA and at night you could hear a train come through and some folks hated it, I loved it because it meant STUFF was being moved, stuff someone made or grew was going somewhere where people wanted to buy it. I thought that was a form of beauty.

Today's poetry corner:

"I raise a voice for far superber themes for poets and for art,
To exalt the present and the real,
To teach the average man the glory of his daily walk and trade,
To sing in songs how exercise and chemical life are never to be baffled,
To manual work for each and all, to plough, hoe, dig,
To plant and tend the tree, the berry, vegetables, flowers,
For every man to see to it that he really do something, for every woman too;
To use the hammer and the saw, (rip, or cross-cut,)
To cultivate a turn for carpentering, plastering, painting,
To work as tailor, tailoress, nurse, hostler, porter,
To invent a little, something ingenious, to aid the washing, cooking, cleaning,
And hold it no disgrace to take a hand at them themselves."

A little Whitman for ya.

Read the whole thing, now THAT'S a rant! Thanks, Brian.

Mindles, it is even worse than your post portrays. The post on "Political Xenophobia" has now degenerated into a dull flame war about gay marriage. Twice I tried to get the thread back on topic and for this effort I was rudely insulted. I have had the same experience, many more times, at other sites. An off-topic flame war starts and anyone who tries to bring the thread back to some vicinity of the post is insulted.

Perhaps off-topic flame wars could be the subject of some corollary to Dreck's Law. I have noticed that some people just seem vested in demonstrating their moral superiority by flaming others in comment threads, usually concerning one of a small set of favorite topics. The topic of the original post does not matter for these people. I suppose that my complaining here has particular poignancy because Asymmetrical Information has far fewer off-topic flames, and therefore more interesting comments, than the vast majority of blogs.

By the way, I think that the way that you and Jane interject yourself in the comments section has a hugely beneficial effect on comment quality. Please keep it up. Your efforts are noticed and appreciated.

Roger that, and I'm glumly thinking I helped start the flame war (and boy, that is a flame war) on the other thread.

Wow. Proof that the universe is, indeed, circular. There's a whole genre out there extolling the beauty of noble work and production. Socialist Realism. Titles like 'Cement', subjects like plowing the collective farm. And don't even get me started on the art !

(Sorry, don't mean to flame on, nor mock Walt Whitman. Everyone was quipping so civilly, I thought I'd try to be clever, too.)

Cheers,

I happen to adore Commie propaganda, Rofe. All those heroic bulldozers, steam hammers, power plants...it's like an Ayn Rand novel! Liberals would be appalled! (Heh.)

But we're getting away from Dreck's Law, methinks. (Largely my fault too, methinks.) So to recap:

"The comment section of any post criticizing destructive political rhetoric ultimately provides more vivid examples thereof."

Discuss.

Yes, you are right about Socialist art. It is beautiful and ennobling...too bad it is hyprocritical and propagandist in its lies. If a society has to create art like that, then the society doesn't "get it". Kind of like putting "people's republic" in front of the name of country that is neither.

What about a corollary to Dreck's Law, characterizing the tendency of destructive political rhetoric to reproduce itself and drive out reasonable discussion? (Actually, I'm pretty sure there's an appropriate quote in the Federalist Papers or a similar source.)

I forget where I read this, I work in a library so I read a lot of different things, but I read a study recently that implied that it is almost impossible to change the mind of someone who is angry. So at the first instance of something that might make anyone vaguely angry the discussion is likely to polarize. I find that making a point is a lot easier if you agree with the other person first. For instance, I agree with you politicalobscura that socialist art is propaganda and lies in the context of the socialism it was used in. But looking at it today, in a democratic society, it has a certain aesthetic which is pleasing.

Actually, I'm the one who inadvertently started us down the slide to a crazy discussion of gay marriage, although that is not what I intended to discuss.

I identified myself as living all of my adult life within the most leftist communities in the U.S. I didn't say this, but I'll offer the corollary. I have had virtually no contact with the following groups since I was a child: Republicans, evangelicals, military personnel, suburban married folks, or southern rednecks.

And then I offered what is kind of an economic critique of the left's outlook on sex and love. I offered this critique as somebody who lives every day in the midst of the most committed leftists. I did this because I know that this economic critique really does address why my leftist friends and colleagues have become so angry and vengeful.

I am 54 years old. For my entire life, the left has presented us with one crisis of sexual freedom after another. Each purported crisis was represented as a crucial battle over whether the purported victim's sexual life and identify were diminished. And, always, the enemy to be defeated in this battle was the "bigots." This has led, within the left, to a view of sex and love that is remarkably consonant with the leftist view of economic matters. Happiness in sex and love are something for the government to deliver through an ever expanding set of rights. In other words, on the far left, people are blaming Republicans, evangelicals, etc. for the failings of their love lives. This tends to make people extraordinarily angry. Think of it. The very foundation of their happiness is under attack.

This is a critique delivered from within the left, not from the right. And, amazingly, as soon as I deliver it I become a partisan of the right. In truth, I am completely inactive in politics and I don't even know whether I will vote. I have a slight preference in the presidential election, but I really don't care who occupies any office. You see, I don't think that my happiness in life is to be determined by governmental policy.

Now, in the forthcoming discussion, I expect what I actually said to be completely ignored. Have at it.

Hey look, everyone, Stephen's trying to turn this thread into a debate about homosexuality and gay marriage, too.

I think some big mean old lesbian must have beat him up as a kid and he's never gotten over it.

Prediction fulfilled!!

Reponse has absolutely no relevance to anything I actually said.

Beautiful!

Dreck's Second Law: the comment section of any post on Dreck's Law will eventually become an example of Dreck's Law.

Folks:

From my obseravation (admittedly limited), Don P seems to be a perpetual agent provocateur in these fora.

I recommend we ALL just ignore him. (Banning him has a certain visceral appeal, but technological problems and my respect for free speech - even when abused - makes it impossible for me to advocate that.)

I recommend that everyone ignore Honda, including himself.

Note that Dreck's law applies primarily (only?) when the criticism of partisanship is used as a partisan tactic. i.e. the hypocrical use of criticism of destructive political rhetoric will generally cause vivid examples thereof.

There's an old economist joke - "well it works in practice, but how about in theory?"

I will readily concede that this law doesn't apply in non-existent circumstances.

More of the interesting "proportional representation" theory of political criticism - that it isn't valid if not applied equally across whatever ideological boundaries the critic's critic defines.

What? You haven't criticized anyone whose name starts with B? Invalid! Hypocritical!

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