My Shaky Hand, Immortalized | Main | Falling water

January 10, 2004

Pretty Is As Pretty Does

There's a distressed squawk from Jim Henley re: Hesiod's comments calling Colin Powell a "Stepin Fetchit" who "dances for his massah."

"Will some liberal bloggers please try to get through to Hesiod," he asks, suggesting "maybe he'll take the objections of a true ideological confrere more seriously."

Hesiod isn't interested:

"[...] maybe I could say the same thing without using racially charged phrases like 'massah,' and 'stepin' fetchit.' But would they have the same impact? I doubt it."

In other words, he's out of grownup words.

"I hope it makes people angry. That's the point. Then they'll understand how I feel about the man right now."

Paraphrasing yet again, he's throwing a tantrum, spelling out how he feels by smearing poo on the walls.

So we're confronted with someone who, when words fail him, decides that rather than practicing the wisdom of occasional silence will instead resort to the most hateful language he can think of. And when called on his tantrum will stubbornly insist that he'd use the same language for Robert Bork while trying to cloak his fit in some sort of legitimacy by noting that "sme[sic] prominent African American leaders" have said the same thing.

I'd submit that Hesiod's true confreres could be just as easily located on FreeRepublic.com, IndyMedia, Democratic Underground, or wherever else rageaholics congregate to vent at the expense of the credibility of those in service of an ideal. Sometimes ideology is less an expression than a vehicle. And pretty is as pretty does.