We Have Met The Enemy

[filkertom]

Just amazing:

Thirteen-year-old Lane Dunkley... and his father, Daniel Reddy, who live in Tulsa, went to Broken Arrow on Tuesday night for a hunter safety course normally required to get an Oklahoma hunting license.

...

But when father and son arrived at the lesson, the volunteer instructor, Kell Wolf, asked if any of the students voted for President Barack Obama.

Reddy, a transplanted Californian — and former Marine — raised his hand.

According to Reddy and others in the room, Wolf called Obama "the next thing to the Antichrist" and ordered Reddy and Dunkley from the room. When Reddy refused, Wolf said he would not teach "liberals" and would cancel the course if Reddy didn't leave.

So Reddy and Dunkley left, as did a few others.

I could put a long, long, nasty rant right here. But some people would be offended, and some would chide me, and lecture me about how we, I, have to be more friendly or more tolerant or more something.

It's never their side that has to accommodate mine.

It's never their side that has to perform actions of basic human politeness or the minimum functions of a successful civilization.

It's never their side that has to stop whatever idiocy, or sometimes illegality, they're doing and think about whatever bullshit just came out of their mouths.

No, my long rant commenting on the incredible brain-damaged programming of this lunkhead gun instructor into a Repub talking point mouthpiece would get me shit, because I wouldn't be fucking polite about it.

It's always the side that might actually be willing to compromise that is expected to, if only a common ground could be found.

There isn't one. Not anymore.

Approximately one-fourth of the country thinks our president is a self-proclaimed messiah, the Antichrist, a Muslim, a communist, a socialist, a sleeper agent of al-Qaida, or in the Evil League of Evil or somethin'. And/or they hate him because he's an uppity you-know-what. (Word avoided so I don't get found by the wrong kinds of searches.) There have been enough death threats against Obama in the blogosphere that the founder of Free Republic has told his readers to knock it off, and the FBI is definitely paying attention.

But that's not even what this is really about.

It's about looking at other people in our country as The Enemy, just because of what they think.

Goodness knows there are a bunch of people I have lots of trouble with, starting with George W. Bush and everyone who enabled him during his misbegotten presidency. But my trouble is based on the shit they say and do -- not who they are. And much of my anger is based on my not being able to get inside their heads and figure out how they can possibly do this stuff to their fellow human beings.

If a drowning man begs me to throw him a rope, I'm not gonna stop and ask him his religion, political affiliation, genetic heritage, or whether he thinks Harry should've ended up with Ginny or Hermione. If Dick Cheney himself were in need of aid that I could provide, right in front of me, I would give it, because he is a fellow human being.

In a lot of ways, it reminds me of the "conscience" laws. You know, the ones that let pharmacists refuse to fill prescriptions based on their morals. Exactly the same thing: If you don't want to dispense prescribed legal drugs for a legal medical procedure, or information that you volunteered to teach, because you don't agree with the morals of the person receiving said treatment or instruction... don't effing volunteer. And know in your heart that you just took yourself a little bit out of the human race.

You do what you can to help, because it helps. If you qualify it like this guy did, if you put that kind of sociological condition on it, if you divide your own people into Us and Them, you're not helping anyone.

And this migraine is killing me.

ETA: Tweaked for clarity.

Comments

[thatcrazycajun.livejournal.com]

And madfilkentist wonders why some people call what lunkheads like this are taught to say by Rushbo et al. "hate speech." Very eloquent and right frakking spot-on, as usual, and I thank you.

[dan-ad-nauseam.livejournal.com]

Considering that the course is necessary to obtain a government license, the applicant should complain to the appropriate state office and demand that they either be admitted to the course, or excused from it, and the instructor be disciplined for interference with their constitutional rights. And if the state won't do it, they should sue everyone's glutei maximi.

[louisadkins.livejournal.com]

Filing suit is a wonderful idea on paper, but when you actually get down to it most people do not have the time, money, knowledge, and connections to get a lawsuit going.

A side note on that is that the system has worked hard to convince people that they don't/won't/can't afford to do this unless they have a situation so dire and black/white that they can convince an agency to help them, or they are independently wealthy and willing to put their money down the legal tubes. The costs are not as bad as most people think, a lot of the time, but they can still easily be prohibitively expensive.

[twfarlan.livejournal.com]

While I think refusing to dispense the medication you are PAID to dispense is different than refusing to teach a class you've volunteered to teach, I think there's a simple answer to both: either provide what you've offered to everyone equally or be denied the ability to provide it at all. Don't want to dispense birth control at your job? Lose your license. Simple as that.

[daecabhir]

I have to agree with you... although I'm a little conflicted, because I could understand someone who feels strongly about "life begins at conception" being troubled by filling a "morning after pill" prescription. Unfortunately setting precedents like not filling a prescription with which you have moral or religious issues can quickly spiral out of control. It should be a part of the license process - either you are willing to dispense all prescribed medicines, or you can't get a license. And there will be a subset of the population who will cry religious discrimination at such terms of licensing, but then that would be the same group engaging in their own form of religious discrimination.

[loosecanon.livejournal.com]

I would not trust someone so short sighted to teach a class with such a weighty topic of a responsibility-oriented subject. The "instructor" fails.

[bayushisan.livejournal.com]

The hunter safety course teacher was totally out of line and could very likely be charged with civil liberty violations. He actively discriminated, not just against a freaking former Marine, but against every single person in attendance. He was willing to cost those people the money they paid for the course because of his own prejudices.

Over the years I've had people, both republican and democrat, that have lambasted me for things I've said. I've been the subject of ridicule from so many different types of people that nothing really surprises me anymore. There is common ground though. You and I found some Tom, despite some very different outlooks on certain subjects. :) That's one of the reasons I like talking to you and the others here. You might not agree with everything I have to say but you'll listen and respond and through that we find common ground to see that we're really not all that different.

I hope it helps to know that there are people who can find common ground despite their differences; I know it's helped me more than a few times.

[filkertom.livejournal.com]

I know, ace, but there is one important aspect of this that some people simply will not follow through on: we listened to each other.

It is very damn difficult for me, at least, to listen to something I don't agree with, and that's getting worse as I get older. But I try, because I know how very wrong I can be, and how frequently I can be that wrong. We need the facts, and we need them straight-up.

The big-news item that's made me craziest over the past two weeks can be summed up like this: Obama says the government has been using bad accounting techniques and in some cases (like the Iraq war) just not having huge amounts of debt on the books at all, and he's gonna stop that and actually disclose what's in the budget, and as a result the deficit is going to look a lot worse than it has very suddenly. And he does it, and as a result the deficit is going to look a lot worse than it has very suddenly, and the chattering class of pundits in The Village bludgeon the airwaves with shock! shock! at how Obama has ballooned the deficit.

There are various ways to restate the principle -- "you're entitled to your own opinions, but not your own facts"; the one Lois Bujold gave us, "you can't fool the metal."

I want to believe, and I will continue to believe, that things can and will get better for all of us... and I do want it better for all of us. But it's tough sometimes, to not just yell at people for not seeing what's literally right in front of them.

At some point soon, I might open up a Yell At Tom For Missing The Blatantly Obvious thread. Goodness knows I feel like I could use one sometimes.

[shaharazad.livejournal.com]

It's ridiculous that this happened, but if you read the whole article, the instructor was fired pretty much on the spot, and the department called the family and apologized and even arranged a private class for the kid since there wasn't another one scheduled for several months. It was apparently the first time the guy had pulled something like this (or at least the first time anyone had complained), so I don't see what more could have been done about the situation.

[zibblsnrt.livejournal.com]

The problem's less the whole situation - the education coordinator handled it perfectly - as much as the fact that stuff like this is acceptable enough in enough places that I can be more surprised that the instructor was fired than I am at the stunt he tried to pull.

[zibblsnrt.livejournal.com]

Ugh.

Props to Lance Meek in that whole mess though.

[filkertom.livejournal.com]

I have a number of friends, including a couple of very close ones, with whom I also agree to disagree. In that situation, people have to make a call as to whether the friendship is worth it, and I'd bet in most cases it actually is.

[sourceoftrouble.livejournal.com]

Congrats on the department head (see original article) in removing the instructor immediately upon being reported. Nice that Reddy didn't have to call, someone else did. Nicer that the kid got his class, one on one.

[catsittingstill.livejournal.com]

Yeah, learning about that makes me feel somewhat better about the whole thing.

[jannyblue.livejournal.com]

Here's the follow-up article:

http://www.tulsaworld.com/news/article.aspx?subjectid=11&articleid=20090306_11_0_Thirte948209

tl;dr The instructor was FIRED and the boy got both an apology AND a private lesson so he could get the hunting license.

However, I agree that this should never have happened in the first place.

I'm surprised

[capplor.livejournal.com]

I thought the origin of the phrase was that Pogo & friend (I forget which one) were following tracks around a tree, and discovered they were tracking themselves.

[annearchy.livejournal.com]

One of my sisters lives in that town *sigh* I hope she doesn't know this asshole.

[catlin.livejournal.com]

I hope she does, and she hears about this and can smack him upside the head verbally for his attack of the stupid. :-D

[starcat-jewel.livejournal.com]

Given that the volunteer instructor had apparently been teaching this course satisfactorily for quite a long time, I wonder two things: (1) how old is he, and (2) has he been displaying behavioral changes in other areas of his life as well? The description in the article is pinging my "something besides politics may be wrong here" alarm.

[filkertom.livejournal.com]

I was vaguely wondering about that myself. Problem is, there have been a lot of reports of people freaking out over the Obama presidency, from the earliest days of the campaign. A lot of them may have been much closer to the edge than anyone realized, including themselves. And Obama actually becoming president may have been the one little thing that pushed this guy too far.

I worry that there are more people out there who were that close to the edge, and they just haven't made the news yet.

[alverant.livejournal.com]

I'm not too surprised that this happened in OK. In PZ Myers's blog he mentioned that someone in the OK state government tried to ban Richard Dawkins from speaking because his views would offend people.
http://scienceblogs.com/pharyngula/2009/03/richard_dawkins_banned_in_okla.php
I have to agree with you Tom, conservatives are becoming more ugly after their loss. They're becoming elitist control freaks who see freedom as their exclusive right, specifically the freedom to ignore the standards they set for others, the freedom to be immune to the consequences of their actions, and the freedom to treat everyone else like things to be used, abused, then discarded.

[hitchkitty.livejournal.com]

Dawkins did indeed get to speak at OU. One of my contemporaries got to hear him, in fact.

And may I just say, on behalf of the entire state:
Yes, I know the state went solidly red in the last election. But there are small pockets of sanity here and there. Honest.

[peachtales.livejournal.com]

Ugh. As per usual, you've said many of the things I also would have said, and I didn't have to sputter near as much as if I were reading about it first hand. Thank you.

[mathmuffin.livejournal.com]

Tom said, "I could put a long, long, nasty rant right here. But some people would be offended, and some would chide me, and lecture me about how we, I, have to be more friendly or more tolerant or more something." Thank you for the polite and informative rant, but I lecture. It's one of my vices.

You said, "It's never their side that has to stop whatever idiocy, or sometimes illegality, they're doing and think about whatever bullshit just came out of their mouths." Sorry, but I remember a recent counterexample: a liberal professor who was just as idiotic over a student's anti-gay-marriage views. (http://www.latimes.com/news/local/politics/cal/la-me-speech16-2009feb16,0,6896300.story) You said that one quarter of the country had stupid ideas about President Obama's background and plans and that we have no hope of common ground with such people. Forty-six percent of the popular vote for president went to John McCain. Even if 25% of the voters are too mule-headed to convince, what about the other 21%? Have you given up on common ground with them, too?

President Barack Obama believes in transparency in government, so that the people can make it work. All the people, not just the 53% that voted for him. He has been a strong supporter of common ground over his Senate career. I know Republican congressmen rejected bipartisan compromise on his stimulus bill a month ago, but his work will pick up momentum. Don't give up on common ground now. You quoted Lois McMaster Bujold, "You can't fool the metal." People will see results and results will convince them.

Sure, gripe about sour-grape idiots like Tom Wolf to let off steam. But don't spend too much time looking at the bad examples. Also celebrate the progress we have made already!

Hey, Vice Away :)

[filkertom.livejournal.com]

Like I said, I try to listen, and I try to learn. Sometimes I fail, but I try.

I hadn't heard about that student, or that teacher. Aiee. Obviously I disagree philosophically with the subject of the student's speech, but if the subject matter wasn't specifically ruled outside the scope of the class then it should've been judged and graded like any other. In other words, that professor was a dick.

That said, and I'm sorry if this is gonna sound harsh but it is: One example -- and, yes, I'm very sure you could come up with others, I could myself -- does not get equivalency with the vast reams of evil bullshit that's come out of the mouths of the now-trying-to-convince-us-they're-loyal opposition over the past eight (or, really, thirty) years.

I'm not saying you're trying to do that, but a lot of people, especially in the mainstream media, have. The most blatant example was comparing the crimes committed by George W. Bush with the crimes committed by Bill Clinton, and therefore saying that Clinton's impeachment was justified but any attempt to impeach Bush would be petty and done out of revenge.

That said, no. I am not giving up on anybody, not in the long term. But I am, as you say, not going to spend too much time with the bad examples. At least, not with trying to change their minds. I'll likely dwell on something for a few hours here, a few hours there, same as always. It helps me get past it.

We do differ on a point, though: You say that people will see results and results will convince them. From my point of view, people have been shown results, shown evidence, time and time and time again... and some of them, the real diehards, cannot or do not want to be convinced. And I'm not gonna bang my head against the wall being nice and cooperative and compromising for them. They're the ones who see no compromise, who would rather see their team win than see other people -- and themselves! -- be helped by the opposition. And, bluntly a few of them would stave my head in and call me a fat faggot-loving socialist as my body cooled.

I am not ruling out that something can make them see what I see as reality. But my methods aren't up to it, and I can't see any obvious ones that can. So I won't bang my head against that wall anymore. Still, I do want the country to be better for all of us. Even them. Perhaps especially them. Maybe that will be the thing that makes them see.

And, progress? Yeah. Yeah. I understand we're gonna make some more tomorrow (http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=20601103&sid=ayLc_3N41VkQ&refer=us).

[bryanp.livejournal.com]

Speaking as your resident gun nut, I'd have walked out with them. Also, if it's a requirement for a license then I'd have words with the commissioner of the Oklahoma Wildlife Resources Agency (I'm guessing that's what it's called, since it's TWRA here in TN). The guy teaching the course is probably a volunteer, but I'd make sure his services are no longer needed.

In deference to your migraine I won't even get in to intolerance I've seen from the left. :)

[wizwom.livejournal.com]

I did not vote for Obama. Honestly, his policy on Guns frightens me some, and I suspect is not in line with the Heller vs. District of Cumbia 2008 decision.

But I think that the correct response to anyone wanting to learn to use guns is to teach them how to do it safely. Who knows, perhaps they might gain respect for the weapon and it's power. They might even learn why we have a bit in the constitution about it.

But I know for sure being a dick to them won't help. Instructor has cranial-rectal inversion.

[bryanp.livejournal.com]

Indeed. This story has come up on a couple of firearms related boards I frequent. There have been a couple of schucks saying "Yeah, way to go" etc... They've been drowned out by a sea of "Uh, no. This guy was wrong."

[lemmozine.livejournal.com]

Tom, you're at your best when you're cranky.

Tell you what I'd like to see: when you're GoH at Conflikt next year, maybe if Leslie Fish is going to be there, the two of you facing off in a political debate - simply because you're two well-informed articulate people with strong convictions and many areas (I would imagine) where you disagree.

[acelightning.livejournal.com]

[acelightning.livejournal.com]

[starcat-jewel.livejournal.com]

"Rejecting and excluding"? Try "suppressing and outlawing"... and, in extreme cases, eliminating by any means necessary.

This is why I continue to state, as often and as loudly as I have to, that I am not morally obliged to tolerate any actions, beliefs, or attitudes which will not grant me the same courtesy. Tolerance that isn't a two-way street is only baring one's neck to the knife.

[catlin.livejournal.com]

Friend of mine, good friend, buys into this bs hard core, while still managing to be pro gay rights and pro choice. For her, the talking heads that talk about how the president will make the rich poor is her single thing. OMG we are going to be a socialist government! The welfare state is gonna take all our moneys!

She wasn't really sure what to say when I pointed out that in a true socialist state, everyone Has to work. That there are laws requiring it.

[kayshapero]

Sigh... alas for human folly. At least the problem seems to have been rectified higher up in the chain.

[louisadkins.livejournal.com]

My first response, on reading this, was "What do the dolphins have to do with this?" *Goes in search of his towel*

[shockwave77598.livejournal.com]

My answer would be, "The secret ballot is secret for a reason - so obnoxious partisan boogers cannot use the data for their personal use. In short, none of your d*** business who I or anyone else voted for, you commie!"

:)

[purpleranger.livejournal.com]

I think Obama is all sizzle and no steak, that he is in way over his head, and that January 20, 2013 can't come fast enough, but I would never do anything that stupid.

[fractalwolf.livejournal.com]

On the theory that it may be better to laugh than cry, I point you to this LOLpundit defining liberalism.

[mythdude.livejournal.com]

You know, this sort of thing bothers me. People call Obama the Anti-Christ, because they claim he's the one who will bring Kings together and unite them, and his charisma was granted by the Devil to beguile mankind into worshipping their new master and casting out the old values.

But...wasn't Bush "charismatic" enough to win most of the states in the 2004 election? Didn't Bush pal around with "Pootie"* and the Saudi kings? Lets go back further and look at Regan. Why wasn't the Anti-Christ?

I mean, c'mon. Just cause he's liberal doesn't mean he's the devil.


*I have always wondered if Putin sat in a dark room staring at his Tivo and rewinding every time Bush said "Pootie." I can imagine he'd be thinking "Sooon...I will make you pay for this...."