Kudos to Matt Drudge!
It is a sad fact that, on average, about 80 Americans are killed each day in the Unites States by means of guns. It is sadder still that, on average, about 135 people are killed each day in automobile accidents. It is an altogether abominable fact that, on average, about 3,500 Americans are killed each day by trained technicians under government protection in tax-funded abortuaries -- and nobody even blinks.
There has been a lot of fevered hype about guns. I have heard no discussion of Uterine Currettes, Syringes with Spinal Needles, Forceps, Vacuum Aspirators, or Dubois' Embryotomy Decapitating Scissors -- the deadly instruments of abortion (reader advisory: graphic video).
And then, of course, there's this:
In memory of the countless victims of the holocaust . . .
Whoever saves one life ... saves the world entire.
62 comments:
I hope that you are not suggesting that denying demented human beings like the Newtown mass murderer access to firearms is tantamount to creating a police state. Isn't it just common sense that those not in possession of their faculties should not be in possession of guns either? Isn't the government obliged to protect the rest of us from would be mass murderers? Surely those who wrote the 2nd Amendment wouldn't have had a problem with the confiscation of the weapons of a known madman. Why, then, shouldn't we conduct background checks not only on gun purchasers, but their families?
I don't think PP's post suggests anything of the sort.
Think about it: What existing gun laws at the time of the massacre (or, for that matter, what executive orders concerning guns just issued by the President) would have protected those school children?
None. The shooter didn't legally own the guns. He killed the owner: his mother.
Further, I do not know if he was mentally ill or not, but that may be well beside the point: a specialist on the psychology of killers who go on a killing rampage, whom Bill Bennett had on his show recently, insisted that they are rarely if ever mentally ill. They don't simply "flip out." Rather, they deliberate and visualize their massacres long in advance, planning and plotting how they will carry it out. Their problem, the psychologist said, is not mental illness, but evil.
That individuals are capable of malice and evil intent, though widely denied by the liberal media who see everything concerning crime in terms of relative mental stability, rationality, and education, is nevertheless readily recognized in the language of our courts, which distinguish between pre-meditated murder (with intent to kill) and manslaughter, for instance.
But my primary point here is simply this: no law regulating external behavior of people is capable of preventing evil from being done at some time or other. This is nothing more than a fact of our fallen condition.
Therefore, no background checks, not licensing, not laws about gun-free zones, etc. would have protected those children inside their school.
The shooter was a criminal. He stole the guns and ammo, he was not licensed, he broke into a gun-free zone by breaking into the school.
Further, in the other recent shooting in the Colorado theater, the shooter deliberately chose the only theater in the area which specifically posted signs that it was a gun free zone in order to carry out his massacre without fear of resistance. This also tells us something.
This post is clearly about the value of life. I am impressed that Matt Drudge, of all people, should call the nation's attention to the hypocrisy of those who wring their hands over the NRA (which they implicitly and ridiculously blame for the gun massacre in Newtown), but ignore the ongoing holocaust of abortion.
They lament the killing of deer during open season for hunters, but never dream of lamenting the continual open season on unborn Americans. Sheer idiocy. Sheer evil. (I suppose they go together.)
AB:
His negligent mother had no business storing firearms in her house, given her son's instability. Either the guns or the boy had to go. The boy was most certainly unstable and had been evincing mental illness for years. The "mother" herself was talking about institutionalizing him. (And where was the "father" in all of this?)
The President is not just talking not about enforcing existing gun restrictions, but tightening background checks so that firearms do no wind up in proximity to deranged individuals. You would agree with me that the 2nd Amendment is consistent with the common sense notion that madmen shouldn't be able to easily access weapons?
"No law regulating external behavior of people is capable of preventing evil from being done at some time or other. This is nothing more than a fact of our fallen condition." AB
That is simply a ludicrous statement, AB. It means that we should not enact ANY laws designed to deter crime. Sure we are fallen; nonetheless we are obliged to do WHAT WE CAN to prevent evil. One such measure is the criminal code and its enforcement mechanisms. Does it guarantee our safety? No. Does it tamp down crime? Of course it does. Are you suggesting that anarchy would be an upgrade?
Look, I know you guys dislike BO. I don't care for him either. But when he's talking common sense, we would be foolish to disagree.
Dear Mr. Allen. What is it about the govt that makes you so trusting of it?
Do you think we are not living under a tyranny in which The POTUS maintains his own kill list and has complete liberty to kill whoever he wants whenever and wherever he wants just by identifying the individual as a terrorist?
You have very very very few rights left and yet you seem anxious to lose the few you do have.
There is not one blessed thing the govt can do to keep guns away from either the insane (such as a member of the Judiciary or a Hollywood Actor) or the evil (such as a Senator Boxer or a female astronaut who drives 1000s of miles wearing diapers).
Stay away from the inner cities and high-density black and minority centers and you'll be fine for the fact is that American whites in gun suffused America have the same murder rates as whites in the gun-controlled countries of Europe.
It ain't the guns - its the people; look as Switzerland - they are required to own guns and they murder others about as often as Pee Wee Herman slays an audience.
Robert Allen says:
"That is simply a ludicrous statement, AB. It means that we should not enact ANY laws designed to deter crime."
How so? My original statement said, in essence, that no law can prevent all evil, or some sort of evil being done at one time or another.
How is that not true? Isn't the point that when criminals steal, vandalize, and kill, they do so by BREAKING LAWS? So how do more laws help? How do laws against crime prevent crime? They may prevent good people from committing crimes, or people afraid of the consequences of breaking laws. But if a criminal doesn't give a rip, what difference do laws make?
No, I'm not against background checks. I'm just saying that background checks aren't going to prevent every possible crime. They may help just a bit, yes. But that's my point: just a bit.
Take away guns from citizens willing to give them up, and then only the criminals will have guns. Even if you could take away all guns, hypothetically, the criminals would simply resort to other means: strangling, stabbing, hatcheting, poisoning, clubbing. More murders are committed in these alternative ways than with rifles or shotguns of any kind anyway.
Maybe you've read about the school where Obama's children go to school: it has 11 armed guards: http://youtu.be/a-phl2d_n60
IANS,
I trust the govt. enough to allow it to enact common sense laws designed to reduce the likelihood that madmen will gain easy access to firearms. BO is not so benighted that he can't see the need to keep would be mass murderers from stockpiling weaponry. You are simply being ridiculous comparing corrupt judges and depraved actors to the individual who perpetrated the Newtown massacre. It is, of course, the people, which is why certain people should not be allowed to own firearms, the present concern being with those caring for the mentally ill in their homes. We don't allow firearms in insane asylums do we?
But look, my neighborhood is racially integrated; my children go to school and play with children of other so-called races (race being a biological fiction), which warms my heart. I have fought racism my entire adult life. You have crossed the verbal line with me blaming African-Americans for the problem of violence in our society. Expect no further correspondence.
Robert Allen,
I just inadvertently deleted a second comment you posted. My apologies. Google Blogger's arrangement for moderating comments has a "delete" button in exactly the same position as the "post" button in different windows (one for the original posting, the other for further moderating). Sorry.
What you were saying, in response to Anonymous Bosch was that you had claimed that laws deterred enough crime to make them worthwhile, not that they would eliminate all crime. Hence, you said, you felt you were talking past each other. I think that was the gist of it.
[PP -- Site Moderator]
Robert Allen,
I doubt anyone here has a quarrel with the notion that racism is bad or that lethal weapons ought to be kept out of the hands of the mentally insane.
My family used to live in the inner city where white people were so uncommon that they would point to them and say to their mother, "Mommy, look a white man." And their embarrassed mom would shush them up.
Still, I don't think IANS's remark needs be though racist when he implies that it is not primarily whites that account for the high murder rate among murders committed with guns. You're right: it's the people, not the guns, that commit violence, and the inner cities are full of impoverished mostly black people who are as much the victims of gun violence as they are involved in the drug trafficking, etc., that leads to violence. It goes without saying that one can find good and bad among every ethnic group.
Beyond the debate about the mentally insane and gun use, I would agree with Anonymous Bosch regarding the irony of a President against gun violence, but with a record of being THE leading American supporter of the holocaust of abortion:
1) He voted against the Born Alive Infant Protection Act FOUR times, confirming his embrace of infanticide.
2) On his third day in office, he repealed the "Mexico City Policy," making foreign abortionists eligible for U.S. foreign aid funds.
3) He boosted federal funding for Planned Parenthood from 33% to nearly 50% – over $487 million in taxpayer funding for the abortion business.
4) He refused to sign an emergency budget until Planned Parenthood funding was included in it, leveraging his abortionist client by putting national defence funding on the block (and this was after Live Action exposed Planned Parenthood aiding and abetting sex-traffickers in underage girls.
5) His Affordable Care Act further funds "community health centers" (i.e., primarily Planned Parenthood clinics), and requires all Americans to fund abortion and contraception.
[Source]
I'm not suggesting you disagree with this, but only that it's an irony (and a hypocrisy on BO's part) worth acknowledging.
Correction: "where our kids would point to other white people ..."
'I doubt anyone here has a quarrel with the notion that racism is bad or that lethal weapons ought to be kept out of the hands of the mentally insane.'
I am not so sure that all my correspondents DO accept these notions. Witness the knee jerk reactions here to ANY initiative on the part of the Obama administration to keep the ALs of the world from getting their hands on firearms. It's as if the slightest criticism of NL's arsenal is construed as an assualt upon the 2nd Ammendment, a slippery slope towards confiscation of all firearms. Then we have IANS' admonition to avoid minorities. I wouldn't have expected such nonsense from him given his learning and understanding of Catholicism, but there you have it.
As for BO, I will take a back seat to no one when it comes to holding him in contempt. Those who point out the incongruity between his reaction to the Newtown massacre and his stance on abortion are spot on and to be applauded (even if they are typically gossip mongers).
But look, my neighborhood is racially integrated; my children go to school and play with children of other so-called races (race being a biological fiction), which warms my heart. I have fought racism my entire adult life. You have crossed the verbal line with me blaming African-Americans for the problem of violence in our society. Expect no further correspondence.
Dear Mr. Allen Reading that you will not dialogue with me approaches the disappointment I experienced when I was learnt there are no nude photos of Ruth Bader Ginsburg.
Look; race exists and if it did not the Catholic Church has wildly erred by teaching that racism is a sin.
On this Feast day of Saint Martin we would all do well to take a look at the crime stats compiled by the govt you trust:
http://www.colorofcrime.com/colorofcrime2005.html
Robert Allen,
Did you vote for Obama in the last election? Just curious.
You seem a bit paranoid. Hope you don't have a gun.
Sorry, didn't mean that. Really.
Dear Mr. Allen, It is with deep anxiety and growing surprise that I find myself reading more and more claims by my brethren that race does not exist.
And yet, and yet, here is a well-known Pope teaching not only that race does exist but teaching that it is sinful to make of race an idol (you know, like The POTUS does; Dreams of my Father a story of race and inheritance)
..This God, this Sovereign Master, has issued commandments whose value is independent of time and space, country and race. As God's sun shines on every human face so His law knows neither privilege nor exception. Rulers and subjects, crowned and uncrowned, rich and poor are equally subject to His word. From the fullness of the Creators' right there naturally arises the fullness of His right to be obeyed by individuals and communities, whoever they are. This obedience permeates all branches of activity in which moral values claim harmony with the law of God, and pervades all integration of the ever-changing laws of man into the immutable laws of God.
11 None but superficial minds could stumble into concepts of a national God, of a national religion; or attempt to lock within the frontiers of a single people, within the narrow limits of a single race, God, the Creator of the universe, King and Legislator of all nations before whose immensity they are "as a drop of a bucket"
http://www.vatican.va/holy_father/pius_xi/encyclicals/documents/hf_p-xi_enc_14031937_mit-brennender-sorge_en.html
Dear Mr. Allen Don't subscribe to the smelly orthodoxies of this crummy culture and, just for the record, my wise-ass rhetoric is in no way intended to indicate I have any animus against you; it is just the way I think and write due to the two races of my heritage - Irish and Injun.
Even the insane need weapons when the govt refuses to
protect them:
http://www.vdare.com/articles/gun-control-like-immigration-law-enforced-only-against-those-who-obey-it
Dear Mr. Allen. You want the puissant Fed Govt to prevent the weak/defenseless insane from getting weapons so that could be seen as succoring the strong and shunning the weak (if I were to be argumentative; which I seldom am).
What then do you do when the puissant Govt decides your political ideas are nettlesome and so it declares the weak defenseless you insane and sends you to the slammer - where is your civil rights then?
http://www.washingtonsblog.com/2012/08/governments-indefinitely-detaining-citizens-in-psychiatric-wards-without-due-process-of-law.html
Please note, fair-minded readers, that my erstwhile interlocutor has gone from one form of hate-mongering to another, now stooping to denigrate a lady's appearance.
It should also be pointed out that it's possible to be a racist even though races are non-existent. One need only lump together a large group of individuals on the basis of some shared superficial traits and proceed to treat them as inferiors.
Anyone who still thinks that there are races should check out the findings of the Human Genome Project.
Genome Schneenome. That don't prove nuthin!
"hate-mongering"? That Ginsburg coment was ROFLOL-hilarious!! Get a life! Liten up!
The analysis of crime suggested by the statistics IANS cites is as superficial as the notion of race itself: poverty has always bred criminals, who, down through the years, have belonged to many different so-called ethnic/racial groups. Skin color is incidental here, only bigots would pay it any mind. Nor does it become efficacious simply because the federal government lists it as a category in a report. Is the suggestion that there is some genetic defect shared by all and only African-Americans? Then why aren't they all criminals? Mentioning St. Martin's feast day does not undo the damage done by this gentleman's broad brush.
Dear Mr. Allen
I am following this thread with interest. If you would indulge me, would you define "race"?
Dear Mr. IAN Spartacus,
I know an Injun lady who is quite high up in the medical field. She sometimes signs her name "Susan, NDN" I think that's cute. She is also part Irish (my heritage)
Donna
DH,
Educated men respect both science and women. They don't dismiss the former's findings out of hand and they refrain from making crude remarks about the latter. Would you like your wife spoken of in that manner?
It should also be pointed out that it's possible to be a racist even though races are non-existent. One need only lump together a large group of individuals on the basis of some shared superficial traits and proceed to treat them as inferiors.
Dear Mr. Allen. I have to assume that your assessment of me is based upon some non-existant Mantai Diagnostic and Statistical Manual that describes an imaginary illness which is. essentially, a delusion about non-existent categories.
Oh, and for those keeping score, it is you who is, without one bit of evidence, charging me as one who treats other races as inferior.
I hope your Unicorn has been broken to the saddle.
...now stooping to denigrate a lady's appearance.
Stooping? I think I rose to the challenge presented by her appearance; that aside, I will write something positive about the fetid follower of Moloch's Minister, Mengele, - I am positive she'd win, at minimum, a Silver Medal were she to enter a Gurning Contest in Chernobyl.
R. Allen,
Education hasn't got nuthin to do with bigotry. Ejumucated people are some of the worst bigots I've seen. Try using the word "man" around them. Idiots.
And there's science, and there's "science." Maybe your sience ain't real science. Take the science of earth warming. Who says? No conclusive proof. Science schmiscnce. Everyone knows what race means. Your a cocasian, or an asian or a semite or whatever. Those are races. If you can't see that, where has yur educaton gotten you?
There is NO scientific evidence for the existence of races- period. Homo sapiens has not existed long enough to divide, plus the human genome has been thoroughly examined for race genes: none have been found. (They were amongst the first things sought.) Ask any biologist if he/she believes in races- the way, say that she believes in sexes- and you will receive a negative answer. Only scientifically illiterate folks continue to treat these artificial constructs as having explanatory power.
When someone says "stay away from minorities" if you desire safety that is racism, pure and simple.
A race, Donna, would be what is called in biology a "sub-species": that is, a large group within the species homo sapiens that is genetically in the process of forming a new species. This process has, of course, occurred throughout history in other species. Ours has not been around long enough. This point is not hotly contested amongst actual biologists. Only folks who are dismissive of their work make a fuss over it.
I continue to think that it is unmanly, not to mention unbecoming a Catholic, to ridicule a women's appearance.
Skin color is incidental here, only bigots would pay it any mind. Nor does it become efficacious simply because the federal government lists it as a category in a report.
Dear Mr. Allen. You deny the existence of race as a category even though a very popular book references it
http://www.drbo.org/cgi-bin/s?t=0&q=race&b=drb
and even though the Catholic Church treats of it as a true and valid category and the Fed Govt treats it like a real category so why'n'hell you think those of us, like my own self, would think your peculiar and personal prejudices normative is beyond me.
Oh, I almost forgot this gem of yours- poverty has always bred criminals - then I leave it to you to explain away the fact that one of the Evangelical Counsels did not breed criminals for if your silly assertion is correct, then Saint Francis would have been Don Francis.
Now, I found this exchange to be both revealing and fun but you are an ideologue and as it is the case that ideology is not correctable by reason and facts, then there is no longer a reason to carry on the exchange.
The main reason I engaged is to drop a few one-liners but I don't want to waste any more of them on you.
Dear Donna. I am delighted that the Irish race is in your blood but as to why God did not arrange for you to also have some race of injun in you must be due to the fact that you are a woman.
As a man, I am able to enjoy,say, Saint Patrick's Day by getting drunk and scalping protestants but that'd be a very unladylike thing to do.
Dear Donna. Asking Mr. Allen for his definition of race is like asking an atheist for his definition of God.
You'd do well to ask for that definition from a forensic scientist, the man called in by the cops to determine the sex and race of the skeleton they discovered.
Dear Donna. While you are at it not asking such a question of Mr. Allen, consider Tay Sachs + Sickle Cell and try to understand the bigoted hatred in the targeting of innocent minorities by those obviously racist diseases.
As for me, I am going to go buy some cabernet...
"It should also be pointed out that it's possible to be a racist even though races are non-existent. One need only lump together a large group of individuals on the basis of some shared superficial traits and proceed to treat them as inferiors."
Offering up bon mots like the above in a tone of typically academic superciliousness is proof enough of the proposition being ennunciated, and of its irrelevance.
It is also the reason for the ennunciation of descriptive phrases such as "pointy-headed perfessers what can't park a bicycle straight."
"There is NO scientific evidence for the existence of races -- period."
This is like G.A. Wells, in his book Did Jesus Exist?, claiming that there is no scientific evidence for the actual existence of Jesus as a historical person.
Or like Bertrand Russell claiming that there is no incontrovertible evidence that the world is more than five minutes old and did not pop into existence five minutes ago with all the appearance it then have of antiquity.
Or like Joe Biden and NRA opponents claiming that there is not a shed of evidence that schools protected by armed guards makes school children any safer than schools without them.
Or scientists claiming that there is no evidence that the global warming hype is based on an unscientific hoax.
Whenever I hear the words "we now know," "science has found," etc., a red flag goes up. I want to know: says who and whose scientists?
None of you people are biologists; more importantly, you have offered no empirical evidence against my claim about the non-existence of races. My definition of race, which comes straight out of the biology textbooks, you attempt to refute by argumentum ad hominen. So score one for me. But let's put those scientific points aside, which you have turned into a giant red herring. (In other words, if you want to remain scientifically illiterate, be my guests.) My chief contention, not to be obscured by that fallacy and the accompanying willful display of scientific ignorance, is that telling someone to "avoid minorities" is a dirty rotten racist thing to say. Decency requires the concession of that normative point. But IANS NEVER admits he's wrong.
This shouldn't turn personal. Let's try to keep to the issues.
Robert, the closest I can find to a definition of 'race' in your comments is something like a sub-species that is in the process of turning into a new species.
I think such a notion of race, as well as the assumptions you make as to what counts as evidence (for ex., that the human genome project has found no 'race gene'), is a fairly specialized contemporary notion found within a thin slice of the scientific community.
Before the advent of the fevered hypotheses of Darwin, for ex., nobody would have dreamt of defining race as a sub-species of homo sapiens in the process of turning into ANOTHER SPECIES. Humans were understood as a stable species, even though the human family could be sub-classified according to various physical, anatomical, genetic, geographical and cultural characteristics.
I see no problem with such a notion of 'race' as long as it is not used in a 'racist' or abusive way. We classify ourselves as Cocasians, Asians, Blacks, Native Americans, etc. Beneath those divisions, we classify ourselves as Italians, Poles, Mexicans, Germans, Irish, Moroccan, Jewish, Leganese, Japanese, Arab, Thai, etc. No problem there.
What started this whole exchange over race in the first place, I believe, is your response to IANS's claim that crime rates are higher in inner city slum-type areas largely inhabited by blacks. Is that a 'racist' remark? I don't think it needs to be seen thus. It's a sociological fact. It should not be seen as reflecting negatively on blacks as blacks. If Germans had emerged from generations of ancestors who were enslaved and discriminated against, I suppose our slummy inner cities could be inhabited by poor Germans, and I doubt the crime rates would be any better.
There. If this doesn't settle the issue for you, I don't know what will. Smile, God loves you and every minority too! And, by the way, by the inflection of your writing, I know you must be an Outer Mongolian!
Dear I am not S.
Thanks for the laugh. Me thinks I'll hide me Protestant family and friend on St. Paddy's day.
Donna
Charles,
Here is the full offending statement:
"Stay away from the inner cities and high-density black and minority centers and you'll be fine for the fact is that American whites in gun suffused America have the same murder rates as whites in the gun-controlled countries of Europe."
The suggestion here is clearly that African-Americans and other minorities, and not just those in "inner-city slums," are prone to violence. So-called whites, he is saying, can own firearms responsibly; they are peaceable people. Other putative racial groups are full of uncivilized, trigger happy, criminals- murder is in their blood, culture or both. Now I am done with the biology lesson; but I will continue to take great offense at this heinous notion. Telling me to smile is to trivialize my concern. If he had just said stay away from slums I would not have objected, because the sad historical truth is that crime is prevalent there. But, no, he had to turn it into a racial matter, as if blacks in this country are the only people amongst whom have been found violent criminals. Do I have to point the finger at other groups in this country and others who once inhabited slums and produced their share of violence and crime before someone around here is willing to acknowledge that it would be best to leave "race" out of explanations of our society's ills?
The New York Times...
http://tinyurl.com/b34w799
agrees with the Catholic Church that race exists
http://www.newadvent.org/cathen/12620b.htm
and the academic ideologues who insist otherwise must first prove, using the scientific method, that science is the superior and more reliable form of knowledge, before I'd give them two seconds of my time for I can see for my own self that race does exist - Who are you going to believe, me or your lying eyes says the "scientist."
And as it is true that science successfully sued for divorce from Sacred Theology we now find ourselves surrounded by its bastid children who I am supposed to love.
PFFFFFFT!!!!
The whole modern race-does-not-exist movement is not scientific, it is ideological (and it is tied to the crimes of the nazis) and it denies all history that came before it and in that way it mimics the memory hole ideology of the Mahometans who completely deny all non-mahometan history before Mahomet ((a combination David Koresh and John Gotti as Mr Trifkovic describes him) as bigotry and superstition.
Sure science has an attiutude but so does Andrew Dice Clay.
http://www.cabrillo.edu/~crsmith/gill.html
Roughly 50% of these scientists confess that race exists - and all manner of evidence supporting the sensible idea that race exists can be found by any human willing to google for ten seconds - but that will not deter the ideological smart set from calling others ignorant, bigots, or racists by those adepts of "science" in their haste to identify others who disagree with them of being possessed by malign intent and they do all of that without the slightest bit of evidence that they possess any afflatus but such is their arrogance that they think their ideas/views are normative when they are as far from normative as the planet Pluto is from Earth.
Stay away from the inner cities and high-density black and minority centers and you'll be fine... is what I wrote and such a common sense statement- based on statistical crime reports - is a hate fact for some humans; ...is a dirty rotten racist thing to say...and I imagine such a person, all alone, having his car break down on some Martin Luther King Boulevard in some major metropolitan area around midnight and I imagine him dying of an aneurysm caused by cognitive dissonance because the fear he feels declares war against his non-discrimatory ideology and I imagine, years later, a forensic scientist examining his skeleton and thinking This is a foolish white male who for-whoever-knows-what-reason was walking on Martin Luther King Boulevard.; he was around 50 years old and he was prolly a civil servant or a high school teacher or a member of some other indolent class.
Classification in biology is not done according to superficial traits such as skin color. What the untrained eye sees surely in not necessarily what the scientist intends to study. He wants to know underlying structures, found, as we now know, in genomes. There is supposed to be a "genetic marker" for those groups the members of which are naturally connected. No such traits exist in the human genome. Thus there are no races in Nature.
Only racists like IANS freak out when they find themselves in the vicinity of blacks. I myself would be no more scared breaking down in the middle of Detroit than anywhere else. I have lived all of my life in the sort place of which he is deathly afraid. Yes there is a crime problem there, but it has NOTHING to do with race, as ALL (so-called) races produce criminals. It has, on the contrary, EVERYTHING to do with socio-economic conditions. Again, had he identified the areas in question without referencing the skin color of those living there, his warning would not have been offensive. But he chooses instead to see the world in racial terms, denigrating with a broad brush an entire group of people the vast majority of whom are law abiding citizens.
The analysis of crime suggested by the statistics IANS cites is as superficial as the notion of race itself: poverty has always bred criminals...
Nope.
http://scottystarnes.wordpress.com/2010/01/10/does-poverty-cause-crime-a-crime-theory-demolished/
Look, do cloistered nuns eventually surrender to the temptation to counterfeit money or engage in some other criminal enterprise?
Mr. Allen's response to facts that do not fit into his ideological weltanschauung is to reflexively gainsay those facts and which action automatically triggers the labeling - racist, bigot (what, no homophobe?) - of the man citing the facts.
The modern repudiation of the traditional category of race is insisted upon dogmatically whereas the academy is quite content to live in peace with those who are actual marxists; and such is the cultural marxism that far too many in this crummy country have made their peace with.
If I could weigh in on this conversation about 'race', I would like to share some observations in the form of a question.
Mr. Allen, in your latest comment, you responded to an earlier one by Charles, who noted that 'race' has traditionally been identified in terms of various kinds of anatomical and other characteristics -- which might include the high or low-bridged noses, breadth of nose, thick or thin lips, color and texture of hair, skin color, size and shape of torso, shape of eyes, etc. These are highly variant. E.g. Ethiopians are dark-skinned but have thin lips, unlike many other dark-skinned people.
You write, however:
"Classification in biology is not done according to superficial traits such as skin color. What the untrained eye sees surely in not necessarily what the scientist intends to study...." (etc.)
In classes I teach on philosophy of nature (& philosophy of science), we have observed that one of the premises underlying modern science is a form of empiricism. Alongside this came the jettisoning of Aristotelian formal and final causality. What was real was what you could empirically observe (material and efficient causality).
But as these scientists kept pushing, naturally, for the "underlying reality" of things, the proceeded to move increasingly away from the concrete world of empirical characteristics. "Matter" was no longer wood or metal or salt, but the elements of which these compounds were formed. Salt was Sodium + Chlorine, a toxic metal and toxic gas. Water was two gasses: Oxygen and Hydrogen. These elements were further broken down into their atomic components -- electrons, protons, neutrons, and these into sub-atomic particles such as the six types of quarks that have been labels as part of a mathematical physical theory but no ontological status, because they are incapable of being identified as having any sort of 'nature.'
My question, then, is this: Does science get us closer to the essential nature of things or does it sometimes take us farther away from their nature, so as to even deny that things have natures at all? Is the ultimate reality of the universe according to contemporary science ("mass" + "engergy") any less refractory to intelligibility than Aristotle's notion of proto-matter, which is actually nothing but potentially anything?
I am an old-fashioned Aristotelian myself, PP, so I would be loath to deny the existence of formal and final causes. The jettisoning of the notion of a teleos, moreover, has had a disastrous effect upon Western thought. (Though I must concede, Aquinas notwithstanding, that it causes a serious problem for the belief in free will. There I much prefer Anselm.) So, no, I don't subscribe to the empiricist's notion that all reality is observable. But that metaphysical stance is consistent with the desire to carve Nature at her joints, that is, where genetic differences exist, not along the lines suggested by superficial traits. My opponent's scientific methodology, it should be noted, is also empirical. However, the observations upon which I would rely are not be be made by the untrained, unaided eye. Thank you for your thoughtful question.
Oh, and please try to get my correspondents to cease throwing mendicants at me as counterexamples to my claim, made by plenty of leading sociologists, that poverty breeds crime. It does not entail that ALL slum dwellers will become involved in criminal activities, only that there are more reasons to develop a criminal mindset and more of an incentive to act upon it in a setting where necessities, niceties, and jobs are scarce.
Only racists like IANS freak out when they find themselves in the vicinity of blacks.
IANS exercises prudence based upon science and experience and common sense and being aware of his surroundings.
Oncet, he was in Oakland watching his beloved Raiders and he freaked out when their Quarterback had a crummy game and the team lost but IANS was quite comfortable with all of the blacks surrounding him due to the venue, the nature of the event, and the presence of many cops.
However, he would never go to Detroit at night because he is not an idiot. He has science to back-up his prudent choice:
http://www.lagriffedulion.f2s.com/hood.htm
I myself would be no more scared breaking down in the middle of Detroit than anywhere else.
That just shows how absolutely out of touch with reality ideologues are.
I have lived all of my life in the sort place of which he is deathly afraid. Yes there is a crime problem there, but it has NOTHING to do with race, as ALL (so-called) races produce criminals. It has, on the contrary, EVERYTHING to do with socio-economic conditions.
I have already posted the refutation of this erroneous claim.
Again, had he identified the areas in question without referencing the skin color of those living there, his warning would not have been offensive.
You are the only one taking offense. Now I will assume you think that is because you are enlightened and the rest of us are benighted bigoted bohunks rather than the case that it is you who are out of step with the sensible realistic majority of men.
But he chooses instead to see the world in racial terms, denigrating with a broad brush an entire group of people the vast majority of whom are law abiding citizens.
Pffft. That is an observation that would need a dozen weather balloons attached to it just so it could rise to the level of mendacity.
In an earlier post complimented me on my knowledge of Catholicism which makes me think you have read what I have written in here, and maybe even elsewhere, and if that is the case, then you have no basis for falsely claiming my world view is race based.
Such a tactic suggests to me that you are frustrated that I do not acknowledge your presumed authority and putative superior knowledge and that is why you are jumping nasty.
In any event, you ought to know that such tactics are wasted on me; my emotional skin is thicker than Hilary's ass.
Act of Consecration of the Human Race
Most sweet Jesus, Redeemer of the human race, look down upon us humbly prostrate before Thy altar. We are Thine, and Thine we wish to be; but to be more surely united with Thee, behold each one of us freely consecrates himself today to Thy most Sacred Heart. Many indeed have never known Thee; many too, despising Thy precepts, have rejected Thee. Have mercy on them all, most merciful Jesus, and draw them to Thy Sacred Heart. Be Thou King, O Lord, not only of the faithful who have never forsaken Thee, but also of the prodigal children who have abandoned Thee; grant that they may quickly return to their Father’s house lest they die of wretchedness and hunger. Be Thou King of those who are deceived by erroneous opinions, or whom discord keeps aloof, and call them back to the harbor of truth and unity of faith, so that soon there may be but one flock and one Shepherd. Be Thou King of all those who are still involved in the darkness of idolatry or of Islamism, and refuse not to to draw them all into the light and kingdom of God. Turn Thine eyes of mercy towards the children of that race, once Thy chosen people: of old they called down upon themselves the Blood of the Savior; may It now descend upon them, a laver of redemption and of life. Grant, O Lord, to Thy Church assurance of freedom and immunity from harm; give peace and order to all nations, and make the earth resound from pole to pole with one cry: "Praise be to the Divine Heart that wrought our salvation; to It be glory and honor for ever." Amen.
Try as you might, you can not cleave from reality a real Catholic for a real Catholic cleaves to Catholic Tradition.
As to combox etiquette, I refer my readers to Da Rulz, linked in the right-hand column down a ways under "Index."
As long as we refrain from gratuitous ad hominems and name calling, it doesn't concern my what facts are marshaled as evidence or on what side of a debate.
[Site Manager -- PP]
Mr. Allen,
If I could follow up on your reply to my previous question, perhaps I could put the matter differently.
In a book I use in one of my classes, one writer refers to reductionism as "nothing-buttery," the idea being, for example, that morality is nothing but psychology (Hume's emotivism), or religion is nothing but economic self-interest (Marx), that knowledge is nothing but self-serving power (Foucault), and so on.
My question would run more along these lines, such that I might ask whether in your opinion, e.g., "water" is nothing but hydrogen and oxygen, or whether "salt" nothing but sodium and chlorine, and so forth.
The reason being that I wonder whether this has anything to do with what side of the 'race' issue different individuals will come down on. Is a human being biologically nothing but his DNA?
Or, to put it differently still, is the primordial REALITY (what is metaphysically perhaps the only reality) underlying "water" and "salt" their chemical/atomic components, and what is ultimately the only reality underlying humans biologically, their DNA?
It's an interesting question, at least to me, and perhaps with some bearing?
Human beings are formally and teleologically the same. Thus, if races exist it would be on the basis of material differences: racial differences would have what Aristotle called a "material" cause or explanation. These, in turn, would be genetic, not superficial. So, no, I abhor all forms of Reductionism. (I teach my students that one good reason for believing in Platonic/Aristotelian Forms, despite their immateriality, is that they afford a solution to problems concerning change that are simply unavailable to the materialist: you either believe in such entities or end up as Heraclitus, staring at his series of imperceptibly different rivers.) But, I still hold that Nature can be carved at her joints, which is an empirical matter. Modern science looks to genomes to reveal these distinctions, such as those between various species of canines. It has not found genetic differences within the human genome rising to the level of racial (sub-species) markers. Those writing prior to the discovery of DNA can be forgiven for using what turned out to be empty terms to express themselves; intelligent people nowadays should know better. Keeping up with the developments in science, moreover, does not make one a modernist. I hope this brief reply clarifies things.
Oh, and please try to get my correspondents to cease throwing mendicants at me as counterexamples to my claim, made by plenty of leading sociologists, that poverty breeds crime
I also linked to an article dealing with The Great Depression and crime as a way to dynamite your dogmatic assertion that poverty breeds crime - and there also other examples.
Here:
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052748703580904574638024055735590.html
And as to textbooks written by this, that, or the other "authority" - such texts are not free from bias.
Just pick up any text treating of American history and read about how the Emancipation Proclamation freed the slaves when it did no such thing; or, even worse, read about the putative Andalusian Paradise in our textbooks.
And, it ought be noted that one becomes a leading sociologist by toeing a political line and avoiding certain truths; like the existence of race.
There is Whig history and Catholic history and Marxist history and Feminist history and Mahometan history and Queer history etc etc and so appealing to the presumed authority of Biology texts (as though they were not written by those who have had intellectual intercourse with enlightenment principles) is not convincing to me and so many others who see the academy as irretrievably corrupted by cultural marxism ( in ten minutes I can identify many statements of professors who publicly confess they can not speak the truth about particular subjects - but that is so well known that such facts have become a tautology).
The authority for me is Our Triune God and especially His Son, Our Lord and Saviour, Jesus Christ, who established His Church and sent the Holy Ghost upon it to teach it all truth and it was under the inspiration and guidance of the Holy Ghost that such teachings as racism being condemned means that race does exist as a category and the idea that some sociologists deny such obvious truths is as immaterial to me as race is immaterial to them.
I know that some think biologists and sociologists have more authority than Holy Mother Church but that is but a confession of their weak faith.
So, Mr. Allen, if you are Catholic, tell us why you think the the Catholic Church is wrong about race existing as a category and the biologists are right that race does not exist as a category and please tell us of another example where the Catholic Church wrongly taught in the area of faith and morals for the Catholic Church teaches that racism is a sin.
See Catechism entry 2113.
See Mit Brennender Sorge...etc etc
Robert Allen,
I don't think you respond adequately to PP's excellent points about reductionism.
You repeatedly refer to the significance of being able to "carve Nature at her joints," but then seem intent on reducing biological Nature to material causality as "biological matter" would be understood by contemporary materialists. If there were anything like 'race' exists, it would have to be discoverable on the GENETIC level, and couldn't be "superficial."
In the first place, how is this NOT reductionistic? How is this not to suggest, using PP's example, that "water" is REALLY hydrogen and oxygen atoms, or that "salt" is REALLY sodium (a soft metal) and chlorine (a toxic gas)?
In the second place, this seems to buy uncritically into a currently popular but by no means unquestionable view of "science" as necessarily having only one legitimate method (as proposed by the "unity of science thesis") and that it alone delivers the whole truth and ultimate truth about reality (the "scientistic thesis" of positivist legacy).
In the third place, this is exemplified in the condescending assumptions of the statement:
"Those writing prior to the discovery of DNA can be forgiven for using what turned out to be empty terms to express themselves; intelligent people nowadays should know better.
"Empty terms"??? "Intelligent people"??? Please.
I know what the true nature of "water" or "salt" is, not by understanding the atomic numbers of its chemical constituents (however much that may enrich our theoretical views), but via my experience of drinking and swimming in water and salting my eggs for breakfast, and through knowledge by analogy fostered by such Biblical expressions as "the waters of life" or "salt of the earth." These are hardly "empty terms" (and I'm not assuming you would think they are: just that this is what your words suggest).
Perhaps the problem is that you may be assuming that "race" must be understood on the Neo-Darwinian Evolutionary model of biological understanding in terms of an incipient neo-species, which nobody believes who finds difference between human and non-human a difference in kind, rather than one of degree.
But why should we assume that 'race' requires that we believe that caucasians, asians and negroes represent something like DIFFERENT SPECIES or PROTO-SPECIES? I see absolutely no reason for assuming that.
Peace.
My view is not reductionistic because I posit a formal principle in my analysis of material substances. But if you are analyzing material principles themselves, then DNA is 'where it's at'. Formally human beings are the same. Thus, unless Blessed Scotus is right about the body having its own form (and various organs as well), homo sapiens would not have divided itself into races unless it had developed different material principles, which would lie at the level of DNA if they were substantive. If you want to talk about cultures, somatotypes, physiognomic resemblances, languages, fine- then I'll grant you that there are plenty of distinct groups within the family of man. But, again if you want to discuss fundamental differences, such as the one between canis lupus familiaris and other gray wolves, you need to look to genetics.
My other antagonist here has now stooped to questioning my faith because I have the temerity to read biology textbooks, so I think I'll pass on a response.
Forgive me for finding this exchange of ideas interesting, even if it has departed from the original subject of my post.
The last exchange between Messers Charles and R. Allen raises several questions in my mind.
1) If the material principle of human beings is DNA, then what is the formal principle?
2) If DNA is responsible not merely for the common nature shared by all human beings, but also for eye & skin color, etc., as it surely is, then how should commonalities below the shared level of 'humanness' yet above the level of particular (and unique) individuals be understood.
3) Why could 'race' not simply be understood, as in the common lexical definitions and traditional understanding, common predictable traits of different human genetic pools?
Mr. IANS mentioned Tay Sachs and Sickle Cell diseases as particular susceptibilities of African-Americans. I would agree that this has nothing to do with their instantiating a different species. But the information making these predispositions a common trait are also in DNA, are they not; and I shouldn't think anything objectionable about noting such differences alongside the specific human commonality.
Whether or not there is something objectionable about referring to such non-specific variances as 'racial' is perhaps another matter; but I don't personally see any problem with the term, as long as it isn't used pejoratively or offensively.
My other antagonist here has now stooped to questioning my faith because I have the temerity to read biology textbooks, so I think I'll pass on a response.
Well, that was quite craven.
Everyone can read that I did not accuse you of having the temerity to read biology books but such a mendacious reframe of my simple straightforward question suggests you do think the Catholic Church has erred.
If you refuse to answer the question. I'l take that as a tacit admission that you do think the Catholic Church has erred in its teachings.
Ah, IANS is again playing the Catholic card. He needs to be reminded that a faithful servant of the HMC needn't consult Church documents written prior to advances in modern genetics, such as the discovery of DNA, to answer questions regarding human biology. Those documents were written with an imprecise and superficial definition of 'race' in mind. I have already conceded to the interlocutor who doesn't question my faith that races exist in that sense. I'd be willing to bet lots of $ that the biologists working at the Vatican and in seminaries would wholeheartedly concur with my framing of this issue. Not that their agreement would move him, since they are in his eyes just a bunch of corrupt modernists like me. But you should ask yourself, who is IANS to go around deciding who gets to be a Catholic?
No need to apologize PP, nothing like a good philosophical discussion, even if it is a tangent. The formal principle/cause is the form of the substance, its "quiddity"- what makes it what it is, a member of a certain natural kind ("secondary" substance). Every material substance is a "hylomorphic" compound, that is, a composite being: the unification of some matter and a form. The latter is shared by all the members of the kind in question. In our case that would be a rational soul. DNA is NOT responsible for this shared nature, but may instead be viewed as serving the same conceptual purpose as the form Scotus posited, contra Aquinas, for the human body: it is the unifying principle for the matter that makes up a human body. The rational soul would then be that which animates and renders conscious the composite of which that body is the material principle.
If you prefer describing the world in terms of nominal essences, I believe that you are failing to come to grips with what is really out there. Let's leave such superficial analyses to the untutored. It should instead appear gratifying to the Catholic thinker that biology now teaches us that we are indeed one.
The reason for my first question, "If the material principle of human beings is DNA, then what is the formal principle?" is this: Fr. William Wallace, in his The Modeling of Nature, applies Aristotle's causal model to various levels of nature, beginning with the inorganic. This requires him to move away from the artifact models of causality, in which agent and end are clearly distinct from the object in question, to what he calls the "inner dimension," where agency and end sometimes become conflated with the form or matter, as I'm sure you are familiar.
In analyzing inorganic nature, he moves from the concrete downward into the increasingly abstract, submolecular, subatomic level, showing the mystery involved in ultimate material causality; but he also states that, e.g., on the atomic level, it is the particular arrangement of electrons, protons and neutrons that accounts for the nature of the substance in question, showing how intimately formal causality is related to material causality. [He also draws on modern science in developing a complementary "powers model" (here: electromagnetism, gravity, strong and weak forces) in tandem with Aristotle's causal model, which is another matter.]
This is the reason for my second question, about the relation of "DNA to the common nature shared by all human beings." You reply that DNA is NOT responsible for this shared nature, but rather more like Scotus' notion of 'form' for the human body, as the unifying principle for bodily matter.
I don't know Scotus well, but this doesn't sound extremely different from Fr. Wallace's notion of form as that which is the unifying principle of inorganic substances.
But if DNA is not responsible for the specific form of rational animals, it must be the ABSENCE of any distinguishing 'racial' characteristics that leads you do deny a biological basis for 'race,' no? (since the rational form would subsist in the animating soul as form of the body).
If something like this is the case, and if you have no problem with the term 'race' as used in what you call the "superficial" and "imprecise" sense, then there seems no apparent reason for the quarrel between you and IANS, other than whatever gratuitious personal ad hominems ,ay have passed between you.
For then DNA does not undermine the common notion of 'race' in what you call its "imprecise" sense, which nevertheless allows for certain distinguishable traits as discussed above by a number of commentators, and you are perhaps secure in your claim that no genetic basis can be found for 'racial' distinctions (beyond "superficial" characteristic) in the human genome (DNA).
He needs to be reminded that a faithful servant of the HMC needn't consult Church documents written prior to advances in modern genetics, such as the discovery of DNA, to answer questions regarding human biology
The subtext of your argument is that biology is authoritative in this exchange so if you'd be kind enough to indicate where the Catholic Church has taught that it would be most helpful.
Failing that, it is clear that your odd claim is an ideological eisegesis read back into the teachings of the Magisterium and not a reasonable or rational or faithful acceptance of Catholic Teaching.
The Catechism of the Catholic Church was promulgated on October 11, 1992 by Pope Blessed John Paul II, a man some consider fairly well read and educated; and many think 1992 is not so ancient.
I have already posted the entry number for race in the Catechism and noting the date of its promulgation it is clear your immaterial claim about modern biology carries no water for what the entry on race shows is continuity in Catholic Doctrine which you, ineffectively, have tried to sever by your references to some biologists who reject race as a category.
Now, I could post many references to Pope Blessed John Paul II denouncing the racism you claim doesn't exist but I will just post this one from the late 1980s.
http://www.shc.edu/theolibrary/resources/jpracism.htm
I would also note Fides et Ratio and ask you to explain how the incredibly intelligent Blessed Pope who wrote that and promulgated the Catechism could be so blind that he could not see that he erred by teaching about racism - a racism you insist does not exist - when it is clearly is, you claim, opposed to science.
It seems to me that Pope Blessed John Paul II had a pretty good grasp of the truth that true faith and true science were not opposed to one another, but you, objectively, seem to think otherwise
And now, I am done with this matter and I thank Dr. Blossser for his patience
Vatican Two;
DECLARATION ON CHRISTIAN EDUCATION
GRAVISSIMUM EDUCATIONIS
PROCLAIMED BY
HIS HOLINESS
POPE PAUL VI
ON OCTOBER 28, 1965
1. The Meaning of the Universal Right to an Education
All men of every race,
All poor untutored IANS has been able to produce is quotes from the Bible, an Ecumenical Council, a Blessed Pope, a Universal Catechism and Catholic Tradition proving that race exists whereas Mr. Allen has cited some (and they are a decreasing number) biologists who are ideological race-deniers.
In anticipation of foreswearing violence this Lent, I will stop factually beating-up on Mr. Allen today.
He just doesn't get it. How many times do I have to say that in a loose and popular sense there are groups of people within the one human race the members of which superficially resemble each other more than they superficially resemble the members of other groups? But biologists do not consider these sub-groups races, since they do not classify human beings according to features appearing to the naked and untrained eye. They rely instead on genetics. When the Holy Father decries racism it is race in the former sense with which he is concerned; JP2 was not making a scientific claim. It was stupid, unkind remarks like 'Stay away from minorities' that he meant to proscribe- which was my main point.
I swear to you, PP, that I was going to go along with your suggestion to try to find common ground with this guy, but he just doesn't play that way.
Mr. Allen has posted a "May I have another, Sir" response and who am I to deny such a request?
He just doesn't get it. How many times do I have to say that in a loose and popular sense there are groups of people within the one human race the members of which superficially resemble each other more than they superficially resemble the members of other groups?
Say it until a Crew from Jamaica wins an Olympic Bobsled Gold Medal for all that I care. The fact is that within the human race there are a diversity of races and you can rhetorically out-stomp Rumpelstiltskin and it still will not convince me for I agree with the Catholic Church not some supercilious biologists whom disagree with each other about whether or not race exists as a category.
But biologists do not consider these sub-groups races, since they do not classify human beings according to features appearing to the naked and untrained eye. They rely instead on genetics. When the Holy Father decries racism it is race in the former sense with which he is concerned;
So, Pope Blessed John Paul II knowingly employed the faux category of race to denounce racism?
I am glad he did not identify sins against Unicorns as a way to denounce mistreatment of animals because that would have been real confusing - you know, not like the example of him using a fake category to appeal to charity amongst all men.
Still, it must be admitted by you that he missed a teaching moment when he failed to correct the modern error of thinking that race exists - nope, worse than that, he actually strengthened the laity's belief in that false category (maybe that is why his Canonisation is being held-up).
Once again, you are engaged in eisegesis reading back into the Catholic Magisterium the modern ideological dogmatic errors of biology and insisting that is what the Magisterium teaches when what I have previously posted simply blows-up that false, political, ideology.
....I swear to you, PP, that I was going to go along with your suggestion to try to find common ground with this guy, but he just doesn't play that way.
Hey, cut me some slack. All you have had to do is read several score of words that I write whereas I have to live as IANS 24/7/365.
I will close with a quote from Monty Python's Holy Grail;
FRENCH GUARD: No, now go away or I shall taunt you a second time-a! [sniff]
and I will leave Mr. Allen with the final word...
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