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August 11, 2006

Moral confusion in the MSM - Brian Williams clueless

File this under a "huh?" moment. From Hardball exchange between Chris Matthews and Brian Williams

MATTHEWS: You know, in our first edition of HARDBALL tonight, we had a senator on, former Senator John Edwards on, who said that once these people in the east and the Islamic world get to know us personally, understand our good character, as he said, they wouldn‘t hate us so much, they wouldn‘t want to commit suicide to hurt us. But here we have maybe 25, 24 people who have lived in London and England and the free world for all these years, that become citizens, subjects of the crown, and, yet, after having gotten to know us, they want to kill themselves to hurt us. Isn‘t that an even deeper conundrum here than the chemicals being used in these attacks?

WILLIAMS: And that, Chris, that last aspect, the willingness to take one‘s own life, I always tell people, you know, there are guys on our team like that, too. They‘re called Army Rangers and Navy Seals and the special forces folks and the first responders on 9/11 who went into those buildings knowing, by the way, they weren‘t going to come out. So we have players like that on our team. But to the center of your question, it goes to etiology. Can you reverse the clock here. We now know this is the conflict of our generation. Who would have thought it would take this shape? Who would have thought it would be against an enemy we can‘t always see, and who would have thought the new target would be a stainless steel tube flying, as you put it, at 39,000 feet, full of innocent people.

I realize that Williams was not intending to insult American forces by favorably comparing them with Islamist terrorists. However, this is a huge red flag on how flabby we, as a culture, have gotten from the refusal or tentativeness to actually, publicly discuss morality.

The morality of a terrorist's actions is not predicated on his willingness to die, it is the context in which he DOES die. And killing civilians in order to terrorize, oppress, and pursue a goal of anti-human totalitarianism makes his behavior evil.

Are the Columbine shooters the moral equivalents of Army Rangers because they were willing to die for what they believed in? Is any person one sees on the nightly news committing "suicide by cop" the moral equivalent of the cops who are trying to stop him/her from taking other people with him/her?

Are rape and love making the same just because they both involve sexual intercourse?

I'm aghast.

Posted by Darleen at August 11, 2006 12:35 PM

Comments

Our fighters - police officers, service men and women, firefighters, Navy Seals - are willing to put their lives on the line in order to save others. The terrorists are willing to put their lives on the line to kill others - the more the better. MAJOR difference. Williams is an idiot.

Posted by: Carol at August 11, 2006 01:05 PM

Great post you did on this Darleeen.

Posted by: Wild Thing at August 11, 2006 02:04 PM

What's to be aghast about? Where did Williams assert a moral equivalence? He was simply saying terrorists aren't the only ones willing to die for what they believe in.

However, this is a huge red flag on how flabby we, as a culture, have gotten from the refusal or tentativeness to actually, publicly discuss morality.

Please. Morality is discussed all the time. The Right is always accusing the left of being immoral terrorist appeasers who want to destroy marriage. Conversely, the Left is always accusing the right of being immoral warmongers who want to kill brown people. Paris Hilton is a slut, Mel Gibson a vicious anti-semite, etc. etc. Moral pronouncements are everywhere. Just because the discussion of morality in the culture as a whole is incredibly stupid doesn't mean that it isn't occurring.

Posted by: Josh at August 11, 2006 02:29 PM

Josh

Moral pronouncements is not a discussion of morality.

See, you seem caught up in the flabbiness, too, by waving your hand at morality with a "who needs it" 'tude.

Dude, we need one. And when our code of behavior -- and the rightness or wrongness defined therein -- is unexamined, then we are prey to moral confusion, moral bankruptcy and a failure to clearly define good or bad behavior.

Posted by: Darleen at August 11, 2006 05:41 PM

Moral pronouncements is not a discussion of morality.

This makes no sense. How is one to discuss morality without making moral pronouncements? Moral pronouncements follow from the underlying moral code. One necessarily implicates the other.

See, you seem caught up in the flabbiness, too, by waving your hand at morality with a "who needs it" 'tude.

Please read more carefully. I never said "who needs it?". Rather, I asserted that discussion of moral issues in the media (and blogosphere) is rather childlike and stupid. If one wishes to consider moral issues in a serious way, one would be best served by turning off the TV and the computer and heading the library.

Posted by: Josh at August 13, 2006 10:01 AM