It's not just that the left has no Charlie Kirk. The right has no spaces that compare to the left-leaning universities that he went into. Most universities, for a conservative, are 'ideologically hostile spaces', but the ideology is so widespread that it fades into the background. Everyone is a lefty because everyone is a lefty. By contrast, there are conservative students, but they are rare enough that even a declaration that they are conservative puts them into a space where they have better things to do than argue with the libs.
I've become addicted, this week, to watching Charlie Kirk. Ben Shapiro and Jonathan Sacerdoti debating in places like the Oxford Union and the Cambridge Union. I was extremely impressed by all of them, and I thought they won the majority of their debates largely by just having a better handle on the facts. But I watched many of Kirk's debates with my more-to-the-left daughter, and her opinion was that he had no intention to actually debate anyone; he just wanted to win arguments by intimidating his opponents. Most of his opponents were absolutely useless, and Kirk trounced them because he knew what he was talking about. But every time he encountered a worthy opponent, he switched into 'aggressive mode', where he was not even debating any more. He was just deflecting and mocking and insulting. He had no intention to engage intellectually or to persuade anyone. He just wanted to show that he was better than they were. As I said, I was very impressed by Charlie's and Ben's knowledge and debating skills, but if their intention was to persuade anyone, they failed spectacularly.
Back to your question, though, there is nowhere like the Oxford Union on the right where lefty intellectuals can engage with equals, and there are few right-leaning organisations where a lefty intellectual can just show up and start arguing with young conservatives. There is little need for a Leftish Charlie Kirk.
Lefties are usually welcome in conservative spaces, and the conservatives tend to be far more polite than what you see with Kirk's leftist audiences, though part of that is because these right-wing students are often at religious or military schools, so being on better behavior is not such a shocker. But it sounds as if you didn't see any of the videos of Kirk engaging students intellectually, not trying to dunk, but to persuade. Although even if he was only in it to sharpen his talking points and dunk on college kids in order to create YouTube clips, it's still better than not engaging, not going into ideological hostile spaces, because whatever his purposes, he created a ton of content of himself engaging students on a great variety of topics, and if you're a young Republican, you can pull up any number of his clips and listen to him lay out the Republican position on an issue in an entertaining way. Even if I accept such an interpretation of his political project, which I think is uncharitable, I would still say that we ought to have much more of it in this country.
One quick thought… of all the debates I watched, the opponents who were the best debaters were nearly always polite. It was the losers who were rudest.
Excellent point. I notice this in my personal life too. When people have the power of facts and logic on their side, they are rarely rude. Rudeness, and anger in general, is the result of feeling that your view is not being accepted and so you reach for anger or rudeness (soft anger) as a means of forcing the reaction, or attention, you desire. It’s a kind of Hail Mary. This is a bit of an oversimplification because sometimes you may have the facts and the logic and still get angry, but I would argue this is still, again, out of frustration that the issue is not being taken seriously, and anger/rudeness is used as a kind of emotional highlighter.
I definitely agree that we need more people who will engage with their opponents. It's a good skill to have. I’ll keep watching videos to find a good one. Thanks for engaging.
This is spot on. The "my life isn't up for debate" viewpoint means that people on the left want to lecture rather than converse. A TED talk is a more fitting venue for them than a campus or town square. The "emotional labor" of educating combined with the "words are violence" schtick means that conformity to an ever narrowing set of correct viewpoints is the only acceptable course of action or you are a "literal fascist". I'm glad some people resist being told what to think but I'm not sure where this leaves those of us who support policies like universal healthcare but don't want to be badgered into other absurd viewpoints. As a side note: I'm coming out of 18 years working in academia. If I hadn't put in my notice to retire, there would be no way I would have responded to your post, linking myself publicly to it. Yes, that's how bad it has gotten.
Yes, this makes sense. If you don’t have institutional power, you want to debate items on the merits (like Martin Luther). If you do have institutional power, you want to control who can say what (like the Western Church of 1517). The left has had enough power that opening up issues for honest contention would be a losing bet.
For people on the Left, they ARE their beliefs, they are not people holding certain beliefs they are beliefs incarnated in people, beliefs that construct the whole person as much as a skeleton and nervous system does.
As politics now has become so totalizing, these political positions (that people don't develop through reading or reason but absorb through whichever social cohort they most identify with) are the decisive factor in everything from arts to sports to dating, they are akin to a fundamentalist faith enforced by cult dynamics.
People on the Left can't really publicly debate because their brains are ringed with so many taboos it's impossible to think out loud, there's too big a risk that you may step on an ideological mine and blow up your professional and personal life. It's much safer to do nothing but repeat the same tribal-approved slogans and jargon and hide behind them for safety. Also, as their side controls academia, culture and art, and most of the media, what do they have to gain? Total power doesn't debate, it dictates. Debate is part of open societies, and the Social Justice Left is a completely closed universe. They believe their dogma represents the apex of human wisdom and morality, so what's left to debate?
As David Garrow, King’s biographer, substantiated, King also presided over a rape in a hotel room by his minions. (No #metoo for Saint MLK.) Additionally, King was wrong to support stripping away freedom of association via anti-discrimination law. And he had no problem working with communists.
Love your work ! I just upgraded to paid. I live in a deep blue city in a black and white progressive neighborhood and I am literally in fear for my life every day. As I was waiting for the trolley in broad daylight this morning a man yelling curse words and kicking things walked aimlessly by. Screaming. Nothing happens. I will not politely wait to be stabbed. God bless Iryna’s soul and her memory will not be forgotten.
Progressives have no framework for disagreement, much less debate. Watching my progressive friends and family talk is like watching bats echolocate to find the "acceptable" consensus position about a topic. The consensus is based on not offending anyone's delicate sensibilities. There is no value placed on what is real or true.
The premise to this argument is false. Kirk had no interest in persuasion. He engaged in theatrical debate so Turning Points could post DESTROYS videos online. That is not dialogue.
Yes, universities lean left. But they are still fundamentally liberal spaces who were willing to invite Kirk in. If you could point me to the fundamentalist churches who have invited Medhi Hasan in to debate them then I will stand corrected. Conservatives only believe in debate in liberal spaces, not their own - which must remain safe.
Even if we change the phrasing from open dialogue to civil debate, it doesn't alter the argument. But also, I reject the idea that Kirk had no interest in persuasion. His entire project was getting young people to 1. become Christian and 2. become Republican.
Now if only Žižek took The Judgement to heart, ran across town faster and faster, then threw himself in the river, we'd all be relieved of at least one tedious marxist shit.
Kafka was an artist, Zizek is a con man in love with the sound of his own voice. "Marxists" should be prohibited from discussing art, I thought in their cosmology it's just one big "bourgeois illusion" designed to distract the oppressed from their chains. At least live your beliefs!
The rules of Marxism don't apply to Marxist intellectuals, duh. They get to carry on about the working class while never being a part of it, assign the proletariat to shovel shit, while they supervise the purity of their thoughts.
Amazing benefits come with being a member of the vanguard class blessed with the X-ray Spex they call "critical consciousness". They do it all for the workers and true Marxism has never been tried! lol
1) The Left hates grifters and tends not to support them (cable news excepted)
2) Most folks on the Left don't want to debate Trans rights because debating anyone's human rights is dehumanizing but also, for most on the Left, these are settled issues. There's no need for debate on these topics.
3) It is much easier to argue against something than it is to argue for something. This is why politicians love to be "against" anything. That's the easy position. It's being on the Negative in debate. Being on the Affirmative is much harder because you have the burden of proof. In the US, it is often the Left who is arguing for change on something while the Right, being conservative, doesn't have to promote any of their own views because they represent the status quo. They don't have to argue for anything, they just have to argue against the new ideas coming from the Left. It is much easier for people like Mr. Kirk to go around asking gotcha questions and making a fool out of liberal college students because they are arguing (badly) FOR something. He merely has to stand against it.
4) I enjoy talking with my conservative collegues and I've had some extremely raucous people on my show. But i also know that I am far more willing to compromise on various points (phrased poorly as acknowledging reality) than most people.
5) Speaking of "reality" that is a concept entirely predicated on a defense of normal and status quo. The Left, by its embrace of progress/new ideas is rejecting the status quo. That's the whole point of new ideas, progress and most liberal movements (at least in developed countries). So the right can simply say (as you did) "they deny reality!" Of course they do, because they want to change reality and conservatives (by definition) do not.
And that is why the Right has grifters and the Left does not and probably never will.
“Oh, and in case you were wondering,” added Zarniwoop, “this Universe was created specifically for you to come to. You are therefore the most important person in this Universe. You would never,” he said with an even more brickable smile, “have survived the Total Perspective Vortex in the real one. Shall we go?”
We’ll leave the porch light on, in case you ever feel like entering the real universe
As I mentioned in a previous post of yours (in a different context) the requirement to believe six impossible things before breakfast makes debate a non-starter. You have admitted this here, and yet you persist as a left winger. A triumph of sentiment over reason; what else can explain it?
It's hoping for too much on my part, but I'd rather see more exploratory conversations or even Bohmian-style dialogues where apparent opponents are actually trying to get to the truth together,
It's not just that the left has no Charlie Kirk. The right has no spaces that compare to the left-leaning universities that he went into. Most universities, for a conservative, are 'ideologically hostile spaces', but the ideology is so widespread that it fades into the background. Everyone is a lefty because everyone is a lefty. By contrast, there are conservative students, but they are rare enough that even a declaration that they are conservative puts them into a space where they have better things to do than argue with the libs.
I've become addicted, this week, to watching Charlie Kirk. Ben Shapiro and Jonathan Sacerdoti debating in places like the Oxford Union and the Cambridge Union. I was extremely impressed by all of them, and I thought they won the majority of their debates largely by just having a better handle on the facts. But I watched many of Kirk's debates with my more-to-the-left daughter, and her opinion was that he had no intention to actually debate anyone; he just wanted to win arguments by intimidating his opponents. Most of his opponents were absolutely useless, and Kirk trounced them because he knew what he was talking about. But every time he encountered a worthy opponent, he switched into 'aggressive mode', where he was not even debating any more. He was just deflecting and mocking and insulting. He had no intention to engage intellectually or to persuade anyone. He just wanted to show that he was better than they were. As I said, I was very impressed by Charlie's and Ben's knowledge and debating skills, but if their intention was to persuade anyone, they failed spectacularly.
Back to your question, though, there is nowhere like the Oxford Union on the right where lefty intellectuals can engage with equals, and there are few right-leaning organisations where a lefty intellectual can just show up and start arguing with young conservatives. There is little need for a Leftish Charlie Kirk.
Lefties are usually welcome in conservative spaces, and the conservatives tend to be far more polite than what you see with Kirk's leftist audiences, though part of that is because these right-wing students are often at religious or military schools, so being on better behavior is not such a shocker. But it sounds as if you didn't see any of the videos of Kirk engaging students intellectually, not trying to dunk, but to persuade. Although even if he was only in it to sharpen his talking points and dunk on college kids in order to create YouTube clips, it's still better than not engaging, not going into ideological hostile spaces, because whatever his purposes, he created a ton of content of himself engaging students on a great variety of topics, and if you're a young Republican, you can pull up any number of his clips and listen to him lay out the Republican position on an issue in an entertaining way. Even if I accept such an interpretation of his political project, which I think is uncharitable, I would still say that we ought to have much more of it in this country.
One quick thought… of all the debates I watched, the opponents who were the best debaters were nearly always polite. It was the losers who were rudest.
Excellent point. I notice this in my personal life too. When people have the power of facts and logic on their side, they are rarely rude. Rudeness, and anger in general, is the result of feeling that your view is not being accepted and so you reach for anger or rudeness (soft anger) as a means of forcing the reaction, or attention, you desire. It’s a kind of Hail Mary. This is a bit of an oversimplification because sometimes you may have the facts and the logic and still get angry, but I would argue this is still, again, out of frustration that the issue is not being taken seriously, and anger/rudeness is used as a kind of emotional highlighter.
I definitely agree that we need more people who will engage with their opponents. It's a good skill to have. I’ll keep watching videos to find a good one. Thanks for engaging.
This is spot on. The "my life isn't up for debate" viewpoint means that people on the left want to lecture rather than converse. A TED talk is a more fitting venue for them than a campus or town square. The "emotional labor" of educating combined with the "words are violence" schtick means that conformity to an ever narrowing set of correct viewpoints is the only acceptable course of action or you are a "literal fascist". I'm glad some people resist being told what to think but I'm not sure where this leaves those of us who support policies like universal healthcare but don't want to be badgered into other absurd viewpoints. As a side note: I'm coming out of 18 years working in academia. If I hadn't put in my notice to retire, there would be no way I would have responded to your post, linking myself publicly to it. Yes, that's how bad it has gotten.
Leftism defines disagreement as dehumanization. There is no room for debate in that ideology.
Yes, this makes sense. If you don’t have institutional power, you want to debate items on the merits (like Martin Luther). If you do have institutional power, you want to control who can say what (like the Western Church of 1517). The left has had enough power that opening up issues for honest contention would be a losing bet.
For people on the Left, they ARE their beliefs, they are not people holding certain beliefs they are beliefs incarnated in people, beliefs that construct the whole person as much as a skeleton and nervous system does.
As politics now has become so totalizing, these political positions (that people don't develop through reading or reason but absorb through whichever social cohort they most identify with) are the decisive factor in everything from arts to sports to dating, they are akin to a fundamentalist faith enforced by cult dynamics.
People on the Left can't really publicly debate because their brains are ringed with so many taboos it's impossible to think out loud, there's too big a risk that you may step on an ideological mine and blow up your professional and personal life. It's much safer to do nothing but repeat the same tribal-approved slogans and jargon and hide behind them for safety. Also, as their side controls academia, culture and art, and most of the media, what do they have to gain? Total power doesn't debate, it dictates. Debate is part of open societies, and the Social Justice Left is a completely closed universe. They believe their dogma represents the apex of human wisdom and morality, so what's left to debate?
As David Garrow, King’s biographer, substantiated, King also presided over a rape in a hotel room by his minions. (No #metoo for Saint MLK.) Additionally, King was wrong to support stripping away freedom of association via anti-discrimination law. And he had no problem working with communists.
Thanks, Spencer. I added a line about this and edited the paragraph accordingly.
Love your work ! I just upgraded to paid. I live in a deep blue city in a black and white progressive neighborhood and I am literally in fear for my life every day. As I was waiting for the trolley in broad daylight this morning a man yelling curse words and kicking things walked aimlessly by. Screaming. Nothing happens. I will not politely wait to be stabbed. God bless Iryna’s soul and her memory will not be forgotten.
Thank you! I hope you stay safe. There are a lot of crazies out there. And yes, God bless Iryna.
Fantastic piece. Thanks very much.
Progressives have no framework for disagreement, much less debate. Watching my progressive friends and family talk is like watching bats echolocate to find the "acceptable" consensus position about a topic. The consensus is based on not offending anyone's delicate sensibilities. There is no value placed on what is real or true.
The premise to this argument is false. Kirk had no interest in persuasion. He engaged in theatrical debate so Turning Points could post DESTROYS videos online. That is not dialogue.
Yes, universities lean left. But they are still fundamentally liberal spaces who were willing to invite Kirk in. If you could point me to the fundamentalist churches who have invited Medhi Hasan in to debate them then I will stand corrected. Conservatives only believe in debate in liberal spaces, not their own - which must remain safe.
Even if we change the phrasing from open dialogue to civil debate, it doesn't alter the argument. But also, I reject the idea that Kirk had no interest in persuasion. His entire project was getting young people to 1. become Christian and 2. become Republican.
I think he’s really good at getting the Republican-curious to sign up.
Now if only Žižek took The Judgement to heart, ran across town faster and faster, then threw himself in the river, we'd all be relieved of at least one tedious marxist shit.
Amen!
Kafka was an artist, Zizek is a con man in love with the sound of his own voice. "Marxists" should be prohibited from discussing art, I thought in their cosmology it's just one big "bourgeois illusion" designed to distract the oppressed from their chains. At least live your beliefs!
The rules of Marxism don't apply to Marxist intellectuals, duh. They get to carry on about the working class while never being a part of it, assign the proletariat to shovel shit, while they supervise the purity of their thoughts.
Amazing benefits come with being a member of the vanguard class blessed with the X-ray Spex they call "critical consciousness". They do it all for the workers and true Marxism has never been tried! lol
The left isn't very functional, is it?
A few points:
1) The Left hates grifters and tends not to support them (cable news excepted)
2) Most folks on the Left don't want to debate Trans rights because debating anyone's human rights is dehumanizing but also, for most on the Left, these are settled issues. There's no need for debate on these topics.
3) It is much easier to argue against something than it is to argue for something. This is why politicians love to be "against" anything. That's the easy position. It's being on the Negative in debate. Being on the Affirmative is much harder because you have the burden of proof. In the US, it is often the Left who is arguing for change on something while the Right, being conservative, doesn't have to promote any of their own views because they represent the status quo. They don't have to argue for anything, they just have to argue against the new ideas coming from the Left. It is much easier for people like Mr. Kirk to go around asking gotcha questions and making a fool out of liberal college students because they are arguing (badly) FOR something. He merely has to stand against it.
4) I enjoy talking with my conservative collegues and I've had some extremely raucous people on my show. But i also know that I am far more willing to compromise on various points (phrased poorly as acknowledging reality) than most people.
5) Speaking of "reality" that is a concept entirely predicated on a defense of normal and status quo. The Left, by its embrace of progress/new ideas is rejecting the status quo. That's the whole point of new ideas, progress and most liberal movements (at least in developed countries). So the right can simply say (as you did) "they deny reality!" Of course they do, because they want to change reality and conservatives (by definition) do not.
And that is why the Right has grifters and the Left does not and probably never will.
“Oh, and in case you were wondering,” added Zarniwoop, “this Universe was created specifically for you to come to. You are therefore the most important person in this Universe. You would never,” he said with an even more brickable smile, “have survived the Total Perspective Vortex in the real one. Shall we go?”
We’ll leave the porch light on, in case you ever feel like entering the real universe
As I mentioned in a previous post of yours (in a different context) the requirement to believe six impossible things before breakfast makes debate a non-starter. You have admitted this here, and yet you persist as a left winger. A triumph of sentiment over reason; what else can explain it?
"[2020 summer] wasn't backed by government authority" civil rights laws have been used to prosecut "racist" and "sexist" for a long time
By simple implication of this crime, you kan be sued for creating a hostile work environment. Enforced by the government.
It's hoping for too much on my part, but I'd rather see more exploratory conversations or even Bohmian-style dialogues where apparent opponents are actually trying to get to the truth together,
You make some good points. I have a slightly different take in my last Substack post. https://warnock.substack.com/p/christians-debate-pagans-censor
I am coming round to the pagan framing. It makes a lot of things make sense.