QOD

Filed in National by on July 28, 2008

Does not giving a crap if someone is dying and having nothing good to say about “said” dying person make you a bad person?

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  1. Joe M says:
    July 28, 2008 at 4:19 pm

    No, misusing “quotes” makes you a bad person.

  2. Al Mascitti says:
    July 28, 2008 at 4:21 pm

    Well “played.”

  3. Dorian Gray says:
    July 28, 2008 at 4:21 pm

    No. My recent fave was Hitch’s quote regarding Falwell’s death.

    “If you gave Falwell an enema, he could be buried in a matchbox.”

    If the person is a dirt bag, as Falwell certainly was… then good riddance! Unfortunately there isn’t a hell for him to be banished to.

  4. Dorian Gray says:
    July 28, 2008 at 4:23 pm

    I hadn’t even seen Pandora’s Falwell caveat on the Novak post. Why should I care that some scum bag dies again?

  5. RickJ19958 says:
    July 28, 2008 at 4:24 pm

    When you make the statement “I have nothing good to say about that guy,” it is inferred that you have plenty bad to say. If you want to be discreet, just say nothing. By letting the world know there’s nothing good to say, you speak volumes.

  6. Al Mascitti says:
    July 28, 2008 at 4:26 pm

    Is that a roundabout way of trying to put me out of business?

  7. Joe M says:
    July 28, 2008 at 4:28 pm

    It makes you a bastard, but not a bad person.

    I’m sure you have few problems with that, DV!

  8. cassandra m says:
    July 28, 2008 at 4:30 pm

    Saying nothing is certainly the polite company way to approach the matter.

    But pointing out that an individual is not (was not) a saint — especially when that individual made his living at NOT being a saint — should not be so controversial. It does not make sense to criticize the person when they are well and whole and than have that criticism be completely off limits when they are not.

  9. mike w. says:
    July 28, 2008 at 4:31 pm

    Not necessarily, but one should at least be respectful. DTB – you seem to have trouble grasping that concept.

  10. Dorian Gray says:
    July 28, 2008 at 4:31 pm

    Why does it make you a bastard to tell the truth? I think lying about someone who has died and cannot defend themselves isn’t exactly civil, but a douche bag is a douche bag.

  11. Dorian Gray says:
    July 28, 2008 at 4:33 pm

    So everyone deserves our respect because they just so happen to have been born…like a blind compassion… now I understand why there are so many people who still believe this quaint religious shit.

  12. Joanne Christian says:
    July 28, 2008 at 4:34 pm

    No…just ill-mannered, harsh, incompassionate, unempathetic,juvenile, mean- spirited, smug, base, and sinister—but bad…no…you didn’t DO anything bad. Death and dying are a HUMAN experience that we will all pass through–can’t a small pause for an extension of some humanity be extended to the afflicted or someone who’s life may be a bit sad from the news. Some COMMON decency…no eulogy. Believe it or not. some people won’t speak ill of the dead, and some believe you bury their faults with them (I don’t)….but hey..a little slack on a new diagnosis…geez…he’s only a pundit!!!!!

  13. mike w. says:
    July 28, 2008 at 4:36 pm

    Liberals have little if any respect & compassion for dead / dying conservatives, yet they’ll make excuses for violent criminals and say that conservatives are the “heartless’ ones.

  14. Joe M says:
    July 28, 2008 at 4:37 pm

    Remember, I speak from the bastard side of the line. However, I do recognize that badmouthing someone, or kicking them when they are down so to speak, is a bastard thing to do whether they are the Dalai Lama or the Pope.

    I’m not saying don’t do it, I’m saying recognize that you’re being a bastard, that’s all.

    There’s always something sad about someone dying, even if it’s thinking of all the good that they could have done with their lives.

  15. jason330 says:
    July 28, 2008 at 4:38 pm

    Joanne,

    I have a confession to make. Back when I apologized for calling the gun nuts morons and idiots and they complained that it was a bogus apology they were right. I wasn’t apologizing to them. I was apologizing to you.

    Your moral barometer makes this blog better, and I worried that I might have crossed a line.

    Thanks for reading and commenting.

  16. Joe M says:
    July 28, 2008 at 4:44 pm

    “Liberals have little if any respect & compassion for dead / dying conservatives, yet they’ll make excuses for violent criminals and say that conservatives are the “heartless’ ones.”

    Make broad generalizations; that’ll help.

    The point that DV is making is that compassion has to, to some extent, be earned. LG made the point a little more clear in the other thread.

    I think that’s a little bit true, as well. I think it’s sad that a guy like Falwell died. Not because I thought he held any value as a human being, but for the pain of loss his loved ones will feel.

    DV is restricting the question to compassion for the person who is dead/dying and I’m led to agree with him.

    Sometimes the world is made better through the loss of someone. I’m not saying Novak is one of those cases, but it is true.

  17. Dorian Gray says:
    July 28, 2008 at 4:44 pm

    For the record… you can bash the shit out me when I’m dead… piss on face… what will I care…

  18. Delaware's Toughest Blogger says:
    July 28, 2008 at 4:48 pm

    SWEET! I’M so in! Man your funeral is going to be awesome! assuming I outlive you…based on what I know, the odds are in my favor (barely)

  19. RickJ19958 says:
    July 28, 2008 at 4:50 pm

    “For the record… you can bash the shit out me when I’m dead… piss on face… what will I care…”

    Not a whit. Mrs. Gray, the little Graylings, and everyone who knows you as something other than an internet poster, they would care greatly.

    We don’t have funerals for the dead, we have them for the living.

  20. Delaware's Toughest Blogger says:
    July 28, 2008 at 4:53 pm

    I think I said it best in the other post. I’m not going to project my own fear of an illness or death onto some putz just because.

  21. Dorian Gray says:
    July 28, 2008 at 4:59 pm

    Actually Mrs. Gray holds the same position on death as I do. She’ll miss me I guess – because I am so fucking cool… but she knows I’m good with it whenever it comes. I was lucky enough to live at all… considering the to number of people who could have been born and weren’t.

  22. Delaware's Toughest Blogger says:
    July 28, 2008 at 4:59 pm

    RJ,

    you don’t know DG at all my friend…I think people would pee on him b/c it would be what he wanted

    🙂

  23. delawaredem says:
    July 28, 2008 at 5:00 pm

    Mike W, it is hard to accept your comment when conservatives literally celebrated Kennedy’s cancer. Indeed, often do you see comments on Free Republic and Little Green Footballs where conservatives wish death and disease upon liberals and Democrats.

    To be fair, some liberals do the same thing.

    The point is I can make the exact same statement you made about liberals, but have it be about conservatives.

    We all need to try to be more human and understanding for we all are human in the end.

  24. Al Mascitti says:
    July 28, 2008 at 5:30 pm

    In a tangentially related matter, the motive of the Tennessee church gunman is now known: He hated liberals and targeted the Unitarian church because of its liberal social attitude.

    “It appears that what brought him to this horrible event was his lack of being able to obtain a job, his frustration over that, and his stated hatred for the liberal movement,” Chief Owen said of the suspect, Jim D. Adkisson, 58.

    http://www.nytimes.com/2008/07/28/us/28shooting.html?em&ex=1217390400&en=5a4d84737691055f&ei=5087

  25. Al Mascitti says:
    July 28, 2008 at 5:31 pm

    Or, alternate hedline:

    “Look What Stoking Conservative Rage Hath Wrought”

  26. El Somnambulo says:
    July 28, 2008 at 5:45 pm

    El Somnambulo will express sympathy for Robert Novak when Robert Novak expresses remorse about outing Valerie Plame.

  27. Delaware's Toughest Blogger says:
    July 28, 2008 at 5:58 pm

    guns

  28. Sharon says:
    July 28, 2008 at 9:10 pm

    To answer the question, yes, I think it makes you a bad person. Or maybe I do agree with Joanne that you aren’t bad but just not a particularly nice person if that’s your attitude.

    The internet allows an awful lot of anonymity so people say nasty things about others they don’t even know. The “but conservatives did it, too!” meme doesn’t work here anymore than “everybody’s doing it” did IRL with your mother. I don’t like Ted Kennedy, but I was sad to hear he had a brain tumor. And I don’t know that I feel one way or the other about Robert Novak, but I was sad to hear he had a tumor. Some things should be about the human condition, not what political hay you can make of it.

    The point that DV is making is that compassion has to, to some extent, be earned.

    The very essence of compassion is that it is unearned. But I guess if someone can’t understand that, then maybe it explains a lot of the comments.

  29. Joe M says:
    July 28, 2008 at 9:17 pm

    Sharon, you are very much oversimplifying the idea. Consider LGs question: Do you have compassion for the death of Charles Manson (when it happens)? Jeffrey Dahmer?

    I don’t mean compassion for whatever made them what they were, but simple compassion that they were humans dying?

    How about Pol Pot? Would you weep for Stalin? Mao Tse Tung?

    If not, then where’s your unconditional compassion?

  30. pandora says:
    July 28, 2008 at 9:28 pm

    Unconditional compassion doesn’t exist. It’s just tossed out there when people criticize someone you like.

  31. Delaware's Toughest Blogger says:
    July 28, 2008 at 9:33 pm

    oh ok Sharon,

    so I get it, you get to be “sort of” a dick while you are alive and IF inflicted with some painful life threatening illness I can’t speak ill of you? got it, great. cool, it’s lifes equalizer.

    being a dick + debilitating possibly life ending diagnosis = all forgiven

    got it. Sweet. I’m hoping i get pancreatic cancer so you can say I was a nice guy.

  32. Sharon says:
    July 29, 2008 at 9:19 am

    Wait a minute, Joe. You’re comparing Robert Novak to Pol Pot? That’s a nice slippery slope you fell down.

    Pandora, no, unconditional compassion does exist. Witness the behavior of the Amish community when a gunman killed their daughters. You don’t want to believe it because it allows you to dislike people without guilt or shame.

    Well, if you want to be a dick, that’s your choice. I didn’t say you had to like everyone. But arguing that “you don’t give a crap” and being a dick yourself says more about you than the person you are discussing.

  33. mike w. says:
    July 29, 2008 at 9:27 am

    “Well, if you want to be a dick, that’s your choice. I didn’t say you had to like everyone. But arguing that “you don’t give a crap” and being a dick yourself says more about you than the person you are discussing.”

    Exactly! That applies to DTB and his bashing of the late PFC Dwyer as well.

  34. Joe M says:
    July 29, 2008 at 9:36 am

    “Wait a minute, Joe. You’re comparing Robert Novak to Pol Pot? That’s a nice slippery slope you fell down.”

    See, I knew someone was going to intentionally misinterpret that in order to change the argument when they couldn’t answer the real point.

    If anyone actually thought I was comparing Novak to Pol Pot, rest assured that I was merely using an argument of hyperbole to present the fact that it is possible and moral to have no compassion or varying shades of compassion for someone whom you think has done ill.

    If compassion can vary based on behavior, then compassion is not unconditional.

  35. Dana says:
    July 29, 2008 at 1:40 pm

    One of the few sensible commenters on the Think Progress thread concerning Robert Novak’s brain tumor said, “Karma works both ways.”

  36. Joanne Christian says:
    July 29, 2008 at 3:19 pm

    Jason–Back to you–that’s the whole point on being a liberal—an overdeveloped conscience!!! Good for you…your stock is rising in the DHB race!!!!

  37. Sharon says:
    July 29, 2008 at 9:12 pm

    Joe M,

    I didn’t “oversimplify” the question. You are trying to nuance your way out of something that was obvious from the get-go. This post was created just after the news of Robert Novak’s brain tumor was released. It’s not a big leap to associate the “not giving a crap if someone is dying and having nothing good to say about “said” dying person make you a bad person” was referring to Robert Novak or someone similar, not to Stalin, Mao or Pol Pot.

    But, for the sake of argument, if you actually are a compassionate person, you probably would feel bad about the deaths of those people, while not endorsing their lives. After all, the Pope showed compassion for the man who tried to kill him. Compassion isn’t about earning; the very definition of compassion is that it is not earned.

  38. Joe M says:
    July 29, 2008 at 10:22 pm

    Sharon,

    This is a nuanced discussion, which is completely out of my ability to change or yours to show depth of thought.

    My example was given as a direct argument against your black and white moral views, not as a response to the original post. It’s not my fault if you failed to see that.

    I also notice that you didn’t answer my question of if you feel compassion for the depths of those men, instead you fell back to the limp and pale “you would, if”.

    Your argument holds no weight with myself as an example. I feel compassion for good people who die, or animals in pain, or the suffering of the innocent. However, since I feel no compassion that Stalin died, I’m not a compassionate person?

    Talk about weak and shallow morality!

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