Benj,
I have very little interest in meta-discussions, let alone meta-meta-discussions. I confess that I am a philistine, count me among the plumbers.
Your earnest soul with the Zinn and your woman with the Iliad are indeed, er, *discussants.* Perhaps there IS some utility in brushing up on social criticism or revisiting deep cultural precedents, but there is certainly no substitute for informing oneself of the facts at contention.
“Who to believe?” Indeed, that is the question for the incurious, or lazy, soul that wants to be taken by the hand. The more difficult road is to plow through the information available, deal with the the contradictions and inconsistencies, and form a working hypothesis of one’s own. (Methinks that Didion et al. were less concerned about insuring an objective discussion as they were anxious to preserve their own critical analysis framework. Ditto Said and his compadres.)
The literary intellectual tradition is great good fun, but its reliance on analogous reasoning – similes and metaphors – makes it a lousy tool to extrapolate meaning into the phenomenal world. It provides insights of exquisite, heartbreaking beauty, but it is useless in deciding which crop to sow this year or in deciphering the unsentimental calculus of power.
Witness the dialectic that occurs on this very forum. We see a video of children singing for Obama. It looks LIKE totalitarian propaganda. The impression then becomes that it IS totalitarian propaganda. The more excitable among us begin muttering darkly about armed resistance. Confusion of metaphor for fact is a hallmark of literary intellectualism.
Consider the “McSame” Democratic talking point. It is short and snappy, but it is merely a metaphorical placeholder for a real fact. It is a discussion-stopper of the highest order. Bush resembles Hitler because he, uh, conducts a war with the informed consent of the elected legislature? Only metaphorical, impressionistic reasoning can make that a viable argument, but it is fondly embraced by an awfully lot of highly educated people.
There are social constructs, but, facts exist and facts matter.
