The Smoothest ‘Conservatives Are Nazis’ Reference Yet
Megan McArdle responds to her Atlantic stablemate, far left blogger Andrew Sullivan (and/or his ghost bloggers), but ends an otherwise estimable post on a growing conservative tolerance towards homosexuality by violating Godwin’s Law:
Andrew Sullivan has been doing a lot of blogging about Ryan Sorba, the [expletive deleted] who got up on stage at CPAC to condemn them for inviting GOProud. Andrew’s mostly given a lot of space to illustrating what a [censored] [redacted] Ryan Sorba is, and I fully agree. One can only cherish the hope that thirty years from now he will writhe in shame at this performance, and given the vagaries of youth, there is a good chance that eventually, he will.
But [expletive deleted]s getting up at political conferences and saying asinine things are not exactly a surprising happening. To me, the news story was this: Sorba got booed off the stage. At CPAC. This seems like great news. So why focus on the sad truth that yes, there are still homophobes out there? Maybe this is just heterosexual privilege, but this seems like a genuinely great moment in gay rights–and the gay conservatives and libertarians who sent met that clip seemed to take it as such. The culture war may not be over, but the allied forces are advancing on Berlin at an astonishing pace.
Ironically, Sullivan, who in 2007 described George Bush as “The Weimar President” and recently equated Sarah Palin with the Hitler Youth in Bob Fosse’s Cabaret, would certainly approve of that last analogy.
What if certain people, moving at a less “astonishing pace” on such matters than certain others would like, mind you, were okay with civil unions but not necessarily with gay marriage? Are they part-time goose-steppers? Are their “no” votes, which outnumber the “yes” votes on proposals in state after state more often than not, merely monuments to their own bigotry and intolerance – or might they be opinions to which free thinking people are so entitled in America?
Social change can occur very quickly or at a glacial pace; sometimes for good, sometimes not so much. Nevertheless it can be debated without playing the wink-wink-you-know-what-I’m-talkin’-’bout-Berlin card.
I generally like McCardle’s writing and I’ve seen worse examples of this phenomenon, but when you’re on your high horse — and I’ve been known to get up there myself — and all you see is black hats, sometimes you need to hold your fire and take a deep breath. It’s a wonderful/horrible world (or something) and not everyone is going to agree with everyone else no matter how much Rush Limbaugh wants to retire.
Put shorter in the Atlantic comments by Michael B:
If I get a note from my older lesbian neighbors thanking me for shoveling their walks during the last three Minnesota winters, can I avoid being shipped off to the Gulag by the Atlantic bloggers after they take over “Berlin”?