"Here we go again: As Trump administration policies become ever more intemperate and inhumane, critics of those policies are being counseled to become more “civil” in their criticisms.
This is an old pattern and a discreditable (and discredited) one. The idea seems to be that if the critics would just air their views politely and tactfully, their targets would suddenly awaken to the error of their ways. All Americans would then march hand-in-hand toward a nirvana of permanent comity.
The truth is that, as urged upon critics by their targets, pleas for “civility” are a fraud. As aired by members of the critical camp themselves, the pleas are a trap. More often than not, the result is to blunt the impact of the critique and enfeeble the opposition. That is, of course, what the targets hope for.
As we observed a few years ago during a free-speech controversy on the UC Berkeley campus, the targets of free speech always try to counteract it by the use of weasel words. Calling for "constructive criticism" is weaseling. So is "You can express your views as long as they're respectful." In those examples, "constructive" and "respectful" are modifiers concealing that the speaker really doesn't wish to be challenged at all." LA Times
http://www.latimes.com/business/hilt...625-story.html
Ol' Mike Hiltzik from my hometown paper has the long and the short of it. In effect, we're being provoked and then gaslighted by these crooks and liars in the White House, aided and abetted by their willing sycophants in congress. Interesting times we're living in, that's for sure.
