2004 Elections: Democratic Party Contenders

Personally, I like the hogs, but if I don't want to be pawed, or am fearful about it getting out of hand.......I stay away. ... I don't need outraged third party observers to protect me from my own bad judgement. That's my opinion and I'm stickin to it.

george wrote:

Quote:

There are many forms of hypocrisy, and all are more or less equally offensive. Lola has gone on at some length about Bill Bennett's
hypocrisy with respect to gambling. There is also an element of hypocrisy in the willingness of the legislators and women's advocacy groups who were so willing to hound and persecute some good friends of mine who attended the infamous Las Vegas 'Tailhook' party, to readily excuse Bill Clinton for equivalent or worse actions done in the government workplace, and with a subordinate worker - in gross violation of laws these same legislators and advocacy groups had promoted.

george,

On this I agree with you. Hypocrisy is hypocrisy, no matter whose it is. I've never been to a Tailhook party. So I can't speak with certainty......so I'll speak in general, leaving, for now, the specific example and getting down to the basic principle. Sometimes, we blame others for our own desires, especially when we don't want to admit we are desiring something. This is a common defense mechanism..... avoiding determinately motivated childhood guilt and anxiety associated with internal conflict due to sexual and aggressive wishes. And I think we see it especially, but by all means not only, in some feminist's claims about rape and molestation. I think we women are often our own worst enemies in this way.

I've always felt............ and I believe some of my friends here disagree with me, so since I anticipate disagreement, I'll just say it as directly as I can. I've always felt that if a person, in this case a woman, doesn't want to be groped or forced to perform certain sexual acts, she should be thoughtful, cautious and wise about where she goes and with whom. This doesn't mean it's ok for the man or molester to molest, but simply that in many of these cases, the men and women share the responsibility. And it's unreasonable to hold a man more responsible than the woman. It's not only unreasonable, it's actually, IMO, disrespectful to women to claim they need some sort of special protection.

And to clarify, I'm speaking only of situations in which the woman places herself in harm's way, voluntarily. Obviously, violent rape and murder don't count here. If a woman finds she's made a mistake and she doesn't want it to happen again, she can learn her lesson and not go there again. Making a big deal out of it is destructive to everyone. If one knows a party will be a drunken brawl, for instance, and there will be aggressive men with therefore reduced inhibitions, then it's a place to be avoided by anyone not wanting to be groped, or more. In the Tailhook situation, from what little I know of it, I believe if anyone was going to be arrested and prosecuted, they should have both or all been arrested for disturbing the peace.

That said, however, I agree with Tartarin in that the Clinton situation and the Tailhook situation are not comparable in an important way. Clinton and Monica were having fun and it was clearly consentual. No one doubts this. So what they did was their business, and none of Ken Starr's or ours for that matter (although it was fun to hear of it.) In situations like Tailhook, there was more a shared responsibility for something that shouldn't have happened. Although, I'll bet there were plenty of women at that party who were there for the express purpose of finding someone to grope with. It's not, IMO, an unreasonable thing to be looking for.

The problem with hypocrisy, or any such symptom, for that matter, is that it allows a us to avoid looking at ourselves. This is not a crime. But it does mitigate against any improvement of a situation. I truly hate to see people chasing their tails.......and we all do it, but does it get us anywhere in the long run, other than the exercise?

And this, to apply all this to the subject of this thread, is why I think we should get rid of George Bush as our president as soon as we can. His methods do not make anything better. His methods are so destructive that he is bringing about tragedy upon tragedy.......ill will and hatred that will take decades to clear up. We should, as responsible citizens, vote him out.

In addition to "the binary trick", now there is the "what about you" trick