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June 07, 2006
Understanding rage is a key issue
There are a couple of interesting editorial pieces in today's Inquirer. Reacting to recent medical pronouncements about road rage, Claude Lewis weighs in against medicalization of bad behavior: There was a day when drug addiction, alcoholism and other pathologies were seen for what they were: human failures by individuals who had lost control of their lives. Today, however, is the day of Too Much Medicine.Unless the person is so insane as to be incapable of understanding the difference between right and wrong, the extent to which he's unable to "help it" should not be a defense to to a criminal charge, although I think it's fair for judges to take these things into account at sentencing. Lewis is right that the labeling of bad behavior as "illness" creates confusion that leads inexorably towards allowing people to escape criminal liability. There's a growing chorus of "experts" who can be counted on to maintain that not only crime but virtually any bad behavior is caused by one "disease" or another. Children are medicated for not paying attention in class. Even bigotry has been proposed as a category of mental illness. (Does this mean that the psychiatric profession before 1973 suffered from mental illness?) Which leads to the other editorial by guest columnist Rae Theodore. Her car sports a Rainbow flag, which she displays as a symbol of gay pride. While the car was parked, someone came along and used a key to vandalize her flag -- an act she believes was a hate crime: The use of the rainbow flag as a symbol of gay pride started in 1978, when it first appeared in the San Francisco Gay and Lesbian Freedom Day Parade. Almost 30 years later, the flag still flies around the world as a symbol of gay pride and diversity. You'll see many of them in town this week as Philadelphia hosts its own gay pride parade and festival.While I never especially liked the Rainbow Flag, vandalism is vandalism, and Ms. Theodore has my sympathies. There is no more right to deface someone's rainbow flag sticker than there would be a right to deface a black pride sticker or a Jesus sticker. If a Jesus sticker (say, a fish logo) is similarly defaced, would that mean that the vandal committed a hate crime motivated by religious intolerance? Suppose it was an atheist sticker? Or, suppose it was a Bush sticker. Last year (after Dennis told me about it) I photographed a Bush sign which had been vandalized right on the wall of someone's home. Whether these acts mean that the vandal hated gays, Christians, or Republicans (I suppose these three groups are not mutually exclusive), or whether he hated the message on the sticker is always tough to determine without getting inside the mind of the vandal. But if bigotry is a disease (which words like "homophobia" and "Christophobia" clearly imply), then is it really fair to penalize the mental illness as an additional crime beyond the act of vandalism? If, on the other hand, bigotry is not a disease but a thought process, then should it become a separate thought crime? I don't think hatred is mental illness -- any more than "intermittent explosive disorder." If someone's hatred makes him so unable to control himself that he attacks someone or commits vandalism, he should not be allowed to escape punishment. Whether some hatred is more permissible than others is a much more complicated question. Are road ragers less morally culpable than car keying bigots? What if someone displays road rage against the driver of a car with a bumpersticker that infuriates him and makes him lose control? Has a Kerry driver ever cut off a Bush driver or vice versa? Has an aggressively-jacked-up 4 wheeler pickup with an NRA sticker ever tailgated a gentle Subaru with a Rainbow Flag? (I'd be willing to bet these things have happened, but would that make them hate crimes?) These things are traditionally left up to judges, not psychiatrists. I certainly wouldn't leave any of this up to activists. They have a tendency to take sides, and judge people based on their political preferences. What about my Confederate Rainbow Flag design? I meant it as satire, but if I printed one of these and put it on my car, might people take it the wrong way? Yeah, they might. It might cause confusion -- especially if viewed by the inattentive, or the color blind. Or it might be construed as "hate speech" by angry gay activists, or angry Confederate activists. I guess there aren't too many angry gay Confederate activists. (But if there were, they'd have plenty to be angry about, wouldn't they?) Sigh. Can't we get along? Perhaps I should add a slogan like "THIS IS SATIRE. PLEASE DON'T HURT ME!" MORE: My thanks to Pajamas Media for linking this post! UPDATE (06/09/06): My thanks to Van at Kesher Talk for linking this post and for the very kind words. Van also posed an interesting question: What are the odds that Scheie and a hardy band of Dixie-whistling gay Confederate militants would be embraced and welcomed to the New York Gay Pride march on June 25, in the spirit of tolerance for diverse viewpoints?The registration form is here. I'm tempted, even though the June 2 deadline has passed. As a descendant of a Union veteran, I especially like the diversity idea, and I think these T-shirts would complement the flag. Appropriate accessorizing might present legal problems in New York City. . . posted by Eric on 06.07.06 at 09:02 AM
Comments
I couldn't agree more Eric. The only difference is that I call this trend of scoial absolutionism The Great American Diseasification. Granddaddy Long Legs · June 7, 2006 04:26 PM |
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Satire, I am afraid, is dead.
So is the joy of participating in American political discussion.
It's been killed by folks on both the right and the left.
On one hand, you have right wing pundits (like Ann Coulter) who equate being liberal with Satanic devil worship. Try telling that to my Quaker friends who believe in God and work for social justice.
And folks on the left are just as bad, alleging that financial conservatives are KKK-members or Neo-Nazis in disguise. Try telling that to financiers building a cancer ward at a children’s hospital.
It does seem that folks are not just refusing to get along – but they refuse to accept that other people have different opinions (that could, potentially, be valid). They further believe that difference of opinion is a threat – and that it must be destroyed.
They refuse to consider the ramifications of incessant partisan bickering.
In their zeal to win, their zest for power, both sides have fragmented the collective discourse into such a nasty-assed game of continual one-upmanship.
Maybe this quest for power (and control) is a medical condition, too.
But how can you medicate ambition?
Or the desire to win?
Or the zest for power?
Or the desire to know that one is correct in all matter of issues?
Try medicating that…