EVAN SAYET: I call myself a 9/13 Republican. I grew up a liberal New York Jew; you don't get much more liberal than that--although it was lower-case "l," not what's considered Liberal today. I graduated from high school knowing only one thing about politics: that Democrats are good and Republicans are evil.I tell a story. It's not a true story, but it helps crystallize my thinking that brought me to become a conservative. I say: Imagine being in a restaurant with an old friend, and you're catching up, and suddenly he blurts out, "I hate my wife." You chuckle to yourself because he says it every time you're together, and you know he doesn't hate his wife; they've been together for 35 years. He loves his daughters, and they're just like her. No, he doesn't hate his wife.
So you're having dinner, and you look out the window and spot his wife, and she's being beaten up right outside the restaurant. You grab your friend and say, "Come on, let's help her. Let's help your wife," and he says, "Nah, I'm sure she deserves it." At that moment, it dawns on you: He really does hate his wife.
Good metaphor, and I saw it too after 9/11. CBC had one of their "Town Hall" broadcasts, full of the usual university types, journalists, and professional Marxists (but I repeat myself), all happily babbling along about how much America "deserved it."
Unfortunately the screeners made the fatal error of letting some ordinary Canadians into the studio. One of them, clearly exasperated, said something like: "You people are exactly like the types who blame a raped woman for the way she was dressed."
Well! Woman = Good; Rape = Bad; America . . . Victim???
Cognitive dissonance writ large. Does not compute! Danger! Danger! Danger!
It was a rhetorical masterstroke, the equivalent of a baseball bat (or hockey stick, if you prefer) across the chicklets.
After much stammering and harumphing they got back on track, but it took awhile to get those hamsters up to speed again.
Via Blazing Cat Fur