Oct 20 2009
I Stand With Charles Johnson, And In Total Opposition To Robert Stacy McCain
Addendum: Sadly I have lost one reader I respect a lot. So I want to put some perspective on this decision to make a stand. I grew up amongst a lot of racists during the 60’s and 70’s. They are family members whom I care deeply for, despite their serious short comings. But I can never abide their hate or hold them up as exemplary Americans. Â They are seriously flawed people, to their own detriment.
They are good people – to a point, a tragically limiting point that doesn’t allow their goodness to shine through to all human beings. McCain has friends and family, but he too clearly has tragic limitations as to where any positive side of him will travel. This flaw is his to bear, not mine. And no amount of goodness can offset even one act of racism. He cannot be a standard bearer for conservatism. He has not earned the right.
It is important that we as a people deal with irrational hate front on, and not let it become a cancer in our society. McCain’s own words indicate he is not worthy of respect or following. Those who side with him make their own choices, but first decide if McCain is even worth the commitment. – end addendum
I have seen the blog wars ongoing between Charles Johnson over at LGF and too many top conservative blogs who seem to be backing one Robert Stacy McCain. I am a centrist conservative who tries to be tolerant of differing views. But I have to say I must make a stand here between two camps. One camp promises hope for the conservative movement, the other is a cancer leading to its inevitable death.
I disagree with Johnson on many subjects (e.g, he and I are on opposite sides of the Global Warming debate – but I swear I could demonstrate to him how the science and math are clearly against the alarmists). But we also agree on many other areas (e.g., the mythology of Creationism in its opposition to Evolution and Biology – personally I don’t see why Evolution is anything other than the handwriting of God).
But when I look at what The Other McCain has written over time, I find myself repulsed well beyond my moral limits of tolerance. Anyone who thinks “race” verses “human beings” is off track. Way off track. And anyone who defends slavery is plain insane. LGF noted a detailed analysis of McCain blathering which has pushed me to the point I must make a public stand. Some disturbing excerpts of the thinking of a sick mind:
The problem, you see, is that slavery as an institution rubs roughly against some basic premises of republican government, contrasting the right of liberty to the right of property. It is only to egalitarian or collectivist social theory, really, that we may turn to find a critique of slavery. It was not subject to criticism by the Constitution of 1860, which recognized it. Nor is slavery condemned, per se, in Judeo-Christian scripture. So by the basic political and religious tenets of Americans in 1860, the existence of slavery should have been no evil, had it not been for the egalitarian phraseology of the Declaration of Independence. The Declaration, thus, is in direct conflict with the Constitution and Judeo-Christian scripture.
Studying the rise of abolitionism after the Missouri Compromise, I think we should be able to see that it was in mimickry of the British abolition of colonial slavery that the American fanatics came to their position.
Anyone who cannot distinguish between ‘property’ and a ‘human being’ is sick. There is no rub at all. And note those who see humans verses races are simply “American fanatics”.
Certainly, chattel slavery was no ideal economic or social system. [You think?! ~SR] Even many slaveholders such as Thomas Jefferson recognized that by stigmatizing labor, slavery encouraged sloth in both master and slave. Though most 19th-century white Americans, North and South, subscribed to racial theories that consigned blacks to an inferior status as “hewers of wood and drawers of water,” it is incorrect to say that slavery was a system based upon racial hatred. Indeed, both white and black Southerners of the era have left us testimony to the cordial and affectionate relations which generally existed between the races in the Old South.
Warped and sick logic. Slavery is not an “economic system’ it oppression. McCain seems to be saying that love of one’s ‘property’ negates the interest of basic human rights. He continues this madness into other streams of ‘logic’:
Do I expect Pitcavage or Brooks or Epperson to suddenly repent, join their local SCV chapter and start reading Dabney and Calhoun and Davis? No, I fully expect them to continue in their current opposition to Western civilization and the Judeo-Christian tradition, feeding the wolf and hoping to be eaten last.
You need to read the analysis to see that McCain equates “Western Civilization” and the “Judeo-Christian tradition” with these white supremacists. Davis is Jefferson Davis, and there is quote from Davis I can only assume McCain wishes to be a cornerstone of “Western Civilization” and the “Judeo-Christian tradition”:
In the meantime, the African slaves had augmented in number from about 600,000, at the date of the adoption of the constitutional compact, to upward of 4,000,000. In moral and social condition they had been elevated from brutal savages into docile, intelligent, and civilized agricultural laborers, and supplied not only with bodily comforts but with careful religious instruction. Under the supervision of a superior race their labor had been so directed as not only to allow a gradual and marked amelioration of their own condition, but to convert hundreds of thousands of square miles of the wilderness into cultivated lands covered with a prosperous people; towns and cities had sprung into existence, and had rapidly increased in wealth and population under the social system of the South
This is not Western Civilization. This is not America. McCain even seems nostalgic to the dark days of slavery in America:
Whipping and branding, Axel? How common were whippings? How common was branding? Did the slave who had proven his dilligence, honesty and trustworthiness — and I think it would be racist to say that slaves were not generally so — really have to face such treatments? I doubt it.
Read the whole thing. And realize the GOP and conservatives cannot be a force of good in today’s America with such Neanderthals holding any place of respect or leadership in the movement. He should go the way of David Duke. One last sick statement from a sick mind:
[T]he media now force interracial images into the public mind and a number of perfectly rational people react to these images with an altogether natural revulsion. The white person who does not mind transacting business with a black bank clerk may yet be averse to accepting the clerk as his sister-in-law, and THIS IS NOT RACISM, no matter what Madison Avenue, Hollywood and Washington tell us.
I see two human beings sharing their lives. McCain sees races and is repulsed. I have made my decision. I stand with Charles Johnson, and I will stay away from any party or group that this person is connected to.
[…] AJ Strata, standing with LGF on the RSM issue Possibly related posts: (automatically generated)Right And Left […]
I’ve posted here a fair amount, and I think I’ve made some good contributions. I have thought about how to respond to this, and sadly, this is now a matter of conscience.
I can no longer support this blog or the stand you have taken. It is a shame, as I have enjoyed most of your posts, but this is too much. The fact that you would openly ally yourself with the locus of some of the most vicious hatred and insanity on the web today is something I cannot accept, and I will not have my name associated with it.
I will not insult you or engage in some flame war, I will simply say – good bye.
So WWS, You stand with the man who made these comments? You want to defend this creep?
Well, glad to see you leave then.
BTW, go to McCain’s site and search ‘whore’, and let me know if you feel like you need a shower.
Congrats AJ and welcome to the fight. I was wondering when you were going to join it. At The Pink Flamingo I’ve been writing about Robert Stacey McCain, his colleagues like Peter Brimelow, and the rank racism that once was rampant at the WTimes under McCain and Francis Coombs.
Funny thing, but these are some of the leading lights of the anti-immigration fight.
Makes a person wonder, doesn’t it.
Welcome to the fight. You are not alone.
SJR
The Pink Flamingo
sjreidhead,
I have been there for a while. Finally I saw enough evidence to push me to go public. I wonder how long RSM will be coddled by the right blogosphere?
I deleted LGF some time ago. I also hate racism, will not tolerate it, in any form. Both men deal in unacceptable discourse in my humble opinion.
AJ;
I’ve been asking the same question for about 3 years. No matter how well I know the players and can predict exactly what they are going to do and say, it always shocks me. You would think people who claim to be “moral” and the “party of Reagan” would know the difference between what is “right” and what is “wrong”. But, alas, they do not.
The real problem is RSM is not the only one out there. I think one of the things we must do is not be afraid to name names and start exposing these people, no matter who they are an how “important” they are.
It is going to be a long and dirty war. I think you will be shocked to see how many people will continue to be seduced by the dark side, and will not hesitate to denounce you. We’re dealing with some very powerful people who make a heck of a lot of money promoting their “values”. They are not going to want to surrender their $$$$$.
I’ve learned the only way to approach this is like the movie, Tombstone. In the movie, during Wyatt’s Vendetta Posse, he went after anyone who wore a red sash. That’s the way I feel about these people. I keep going after them until they are either taken out or renounce their affiliations.
SJR
The Pink Flamingo
Lighten up, AJ.
You aren’t the only person on this planet who lived amongst bigots and racists.
McCain is only sating historical facts. You may be unaware that nearly 1 million Irish were sold into slavery during the English opening of the Ulster plantation. You may also be unaware that Irish slaves wre deemed of less value, by thier english christian slavers, than negro slaves. It seems the pale-skinned Irish did not do well in the West Indies.
Many early immigrants to America got here in servitude (slavery of a fixed period). Some, including me, would argue that bringing an IT worked into America from India, as H1b, is a different form of slavery – they have no self-determination and are wholly dependent upon their H1b sponsor….only to be discarded at a moments’ notice.
McCain is historically correct – Slavery is not a crime in Christian theosophy. Nor is slavery a crime in Islam or Judaism. Perhaps you are blind to the child slavery of China, Saudi Arabia, Africa and elsewhere?
I suspect your emotions have gotten the best of you on this one AJ. McCain may be provocative and controversial…but McCain is not the kind of KKK racist you paint.
In the history of time, just about every race has been enslaved as far as I can tell.
As to LGF and McCain, who cares?? Why stand with either one of them?
They are two I don’t even read and don’t care to read. Are they leaders? Not as far as I am concerned. I’ve never even heard of McCain. But If I were to go LOOKING for nastiness on the right I am sure I could find it but it doesn’t make it the norm.
I think some perspective is needed here. There may be some enmeshment going on. LGF’s fight is his own, not the Right’s, not the Middle’s, not the GOP’s etc. His, period.
Personally, I am sick of this destruction and division from within. I say, *ignore* those who are trying to divide conservatives. Side with those who are trying to bring us together.
And WWS, I wish you would reconsider….
I don’t like either one of them all that much. But Johnson hates just about everyone anymore, including the Tea Party people AJ, he hates them.
So, I think that this is one fight, you might have been better off staying out of.
As for slavery, that is the history of man all over the world. Slavery dates back thousands of years. It is not uniquely a part of American history. And in this hemisphere it was part of our settlement.
Believe it or not the original inhabitants of Haiti were not French speaking black people, no more than the original inhabitants of Brazil were from Portugal and of mixed race.
And Johnson has lost his mind I think. He hates people who do not support the belief in global warming ideology. He hates people who believe in Creationism. He hates the Tea Party people and thinks they all represent some sort of back ward racist movement, etc.
The truth is I had to stop looking at LGF some time ago. As for the other guy, I don’t know him nor do I much care to.
“McCain is historically correct – Slavery is not a crime in Christian theosophy. Nor is slavery a crime in Islam or Judaism. Perhaps you are blind to the child slavery of China, Saudi Arabia, Africa and elsewhere?”
Remember that until very recently there was no such concept as freemen or rights, etc. The Magna Carta helped get the ball rolling. We take it for granted the rights that we do have these days. Slavery was a fact of life for the entire history of the world.
For the whack jobs that say the Bible justifies slavery, I ask them can they live by “do unto others” and still own a slave? Can they enslave someone of another race and not fall into racism (which is hate or murder in thought)? The reason England made slavery illegal was *because* of the Bible. The wonderful movie about William Wilberforce called “Amazing Grace” was named after the song his friend wrote after being so convicted of the sin of slavery.
[…] this is a shame I have seen the blog wars ongoing between Charles Johnson over at LGF and too many top conservative […]
AJ, the problem with the LGF/Robert Stacy McCain brawl is that both can’t lose. LGF has gone off the deep end in some areas – and I can’t stand The Other McCain, either.
Charles Johnson has been very quick to slam people in recent weeks – and he’s been far too willing to buy into some of the left-wing spin about Limbaugh and others.
Harold and others,
Until you are the victim of the right wing rage you cannot appreciate how jarring it is, and how easy it is to respond with anger and condemnation. It is truly ugly.
Johnson is maybe coming on too strong, but I don’t think he is against normal conservatives (or the tea party types). If he was he wouldn’t be talking to me.
It is a question of respect. And if you or anyone gets in his blowback incidentally (and I mean without cause, not that you ‘may not have meant’ to hit a nerve) I think he would be more than gracious to pull back.
It is impossible to explain the anger you can generate when you hit a zealot’s true beliefs. Trust me.
AJ, I have NOT been on the receiving end of right-wing rage per se, but I *HAVE*, within the last year, seen members of my faith targeted over Prop 8 – and it reached the point where white powder was sent to LDS temples in Los Angeles and Salt Lake City, and church buildings in California and elsewhere were vandalized. Irrational rage is irrational rage, and I don’t care who is dishing it out.
Charles has fired shots at Glenn Beck (who was among those promoting the tea parties), and he’s been focusing a LOT on the outliers of the tea parties.
I’m on your side with this – I have a few beefs, myself with the hard right on issues like immigration. But at the same time, I cannot help but note that Charles Johnson is lashing out with the same sort of irrational rage that he is quick to condemn from those who he doesn’t seem to like.
jimharlowon 20 Oct 2009 at 3:43 pm wrote:
McCain is historically correct – Slavery is not a crime in Christian theosophy. Nor is slavery a crime in Islam or Judaism.
How anyone who actually read the Bible and practices their religion could state such blasphemy is beyond the pale. The Bible consists of both the Old Testament and the New Testament. Judaism is based upon the first 5 books of the Bible called the Torah while Christianity is based upon both the Old and the New Testament.
The second book of the Bible following the Book of Genesis, is the Book of Exodus. The entire Book of Exodus is about the freeing the Hebrews from Egyptian slavery. God heard the cries of his people and appeared to Moses. God instructed Moses that he was to lead his people out of Egypt to the “Promised Land”.
From the The Book of Exodus
Exodus 3:6 Moreover he said, I am the God of thy father, the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob. And Moses hid his face; for he was afraid to look upon God.
Exodus 3:7 And the LORD said, I have surely seen the affliction of my people which are in Egypt, and have heard their cry by reason of their taskmasters; for I know their sorrows;
Exodus 3:8 And I am come down to deliver them out of the hand of the Egyptians, and to bring them up out of that land unto a good land and a large, unto a land flowing with milk and honey; unto the place of the Canaanites, and the Hittites, and the Amorites, and the Perizzites, and the Hivites, and the Jebusites.
Exodus 3:9 Now therefore, behold, the cry of the children of Israel is come unto me: and I have also seen the oppression wherewith the Egyptians oppress them.
Exodus 3:10 Come now therefore, and I will send thee unto Pharaoh, that thou mayest bring forth my people the children of Israel out of Egypt.
I say to those who believe that Judaism and Christianity in some way support or accepts slavery that they read the Bible and educate themselves.
SBD
Aj I have no knowledge or interest in this feud. You are giving these people WAY WAY too much credit. Nobody influential listens to either LGF or this McCain guy–trust me. But I do know this: to publicly align with someone as crazy and extreme as LGF and Charles Johnson is a grave, grave error in judgement. It would be like aligning with Mussolini against Stalin. Don’t go there.
Take care, AJ, Charles Johnson is some weapons-grade crazy. Try not to get any on you.
The man sees racism everywhere, and requires everyone to think as pure on the subject as he does. See his assault on http://gatesofvienna.blogspot.com/ as an example of his extremism in the matter.