Re: Phony Populism -- SPEAK UP

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Date Posted: 16:47:49 03/20/03 Thu
Author: Arkady
Author Host/IP: NoHost / 148.183.241.15
Subject: Re: Phony Populism
In reply to: Richard 's message, "Re: Phony Populism" on 15:24:05 03/20/03 Thu

Sorry to be so verbose -- I type over 80 wpm and I don't bother proofing, so I often find I've churned out a lengthy post without even realizing it.

I agree with you that a better term may simply be pandering, and that pandering is a mild form of demagoguery. However, I reject the distinction that demagoguery has to involve class warfare. I see demagoguery wherever I see an attempt to influence people's baser emotions in order to win irrational support. That may mean class warfare sometimes (which, by the way, goes both ways... remember Reagan's legendary "welfare queen"?). But it can mean a lot of other things, too.

Where I'd draw the line between the relatively innocuous (if deeply annoying) "pandering" level of demagoguery and the more dangerous form is in the severity of the negative by-products of the rhetoric. For example, telling the people how smart and wise they are (pandering) to get votes is a little annoying, but the negative by-product is pretty minor (you end up with a population that's a bit more smug than it started). By comparison, playing up racial resentments to get elected (the kind of demagoguery favored by Hitler) has as negative by-products murderous violence and vicious bigotry, so it's far more harmful.

>Another example that jerks my chain is, 'common sense gun
>legislation'. Again, a carefully crafted title meant to
>defuse any argument against it.

True. That's a form of linguistic gamesmanship, which has become very popular in recent years. If you control the terminology of the debate, you win the debate. Since most voters are only shallowly interested in the substance of what is being argued, they can be swayed by the subconscious effects of hearing the same phrases over and over. There are all sorts of examples, from "tax reform" (read: tax cuts and new loopholes primarily benefiting the rich) to "tough on crime" (read: longer prison sentences even for nonviolent offenders).

Who could be against "common sense gun control"? Who could be for a "death tax" or "partial birth abortion"? Talking about those issues in those terms skews the debate, which is precisely what's supposed to happen. The same debates play out much differently if you refer to "taking away your second amendment rights", "a fair tax on the richest 2% of estates", or "a life-saving medical procedure," respectively.

>I sincerely dislike someone trying to pull that type of
>BS on me. It is insulting.

Same... but, the reason people do it is pretty obvious. For every person who is turned off by the superficial ploy, there are at least two people who don't see through it and are influenced in a favorable direction. The methods are widespread because they work.

The older I get, the more I come to appreciate Orwell's "1984". He was exactly right about how language could be controlled to force certain kinds of thinking. When you think in "Newspeak", "Thoughtcrime" becomes almost impossible.

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Something you might enjoy -- Richard, 17:04:38 03/20/03 Thu