Political Theatre category archive

The writer of a letter to the editor of The Roanoke Times muses on the difference between a political party and a cult.

Via Juanita Jean.

Words can indeed have consquences.

As it turns out, getting your license to practice law suspended for spreading election disinformation through the courts doesn’t exactly sit well with law schools that have awarded you honorary degrees. Imagine that! Who’d have thought?

On Friday, Drexel University revoked the honorary Doctor of Laws degree it bestowed upon Giuliani in 2009, long before he became America’s deposed mayor.

Warning: Language

Via C&L.

One more time, “social” media isn’t.

David addresses the question of why Republicans emphasize “culture war” issues over policy issues.

Aside:

I would also suggest that, if Republicans clearly expressed their policy positions (such as “make the rich richer and the poor poorer” and, to put it bluntly, “let’s return to the days of de facto, if not de jure segregation”) they would lose many of their supporters–not the hard core ones, natch, but enough to reduce their power to a pittance.

One more time, “social” media isn’t.

Image via Job’s Anger.

Writing at Psychology Today Blogs, Patricia Prijatel explores why those who rely on “social” media for news and information are among the most misinformed and offers some suggestions for remedying this. Here’s a bit:

Consider a few facts:

• Most Americans (80 percent) get their news on digital devices. About half get it from social media. We’re inhaling only snatches of information, not nearly what we need to become the kind of well-informed citizenry our Constitution assumes.

• Most of those—70 percent—read only the headline of an article. You’ve seen this—people arguing with an article that is clearly satire, or concluding that the piece said what they wanted it to say, rather than what it actually said. They clearly read no farther than the headline.

• Those who rely on social media are the most ill-informed Americans. (See 1 and 2 above.) But, boy, they may feel strongly about their misinformation.

One more time, “social” media isn’t.

At the St. Louis Post-Dispatch, Professor of Political Philosophy Solomon D. Stevens argues that those who claim that taking simple measures to protect the public health, arguing that such measures somehow violate their “rights,” clearly do not understand the concept of “rights” in civil society. An excerpt (emphasis added):

The doctrine of natural rights was developed in English philosophy by Thomas Hobbes and then revised and expanded by John Locke as part of what has become known as social-contract theory. When Thomas Jefferson wrote the Declaration of Independence, he drew heavily on Locke’s theory. What the anti-mask and anti-vaccination people do not understand (or refuse to admit) is that, while social contract theory celebrates rights that are absolute and unlimited in the state of nature, it also mandates that rights be modified and limited once we agree to live together in civil society. There is no such thing as an absolute right once we choose to live together in a community.