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Tuesday, May 31, 2005

Self-Defeating Message

Human Events Online has a list of the "Ten Most Harmful Books" ever published. While I agree that the books on the list espouse some rather silly and/or hateful rhetoric, one has to wonder why Human Events Online would link to the Amazon purchase page of each and every book on their list?

Heck, their link even contains an Amazon Associate ID to ensure that the Human Events Online website gets a cut of the proceeds.

If these books are so "hurtful," why encourage people to buy them? Personally, talk of discouraging people from reading certain books gives me the chills (I don't want anybody deciding which books are and are not appropriate for the general public to read, even if they are suggestions), but whatever Human Events is trying to accomplish they're certainly sending a mixed message.

I guess you just can't keep good capitalists down.

Comments

Avatar for Don Myers

Why the hell isn’t The Bible on this list? Way, WAY more blood has been spilled in God’s name than Marx---although the Bible does have a pretty big head start, so it’s probably a not a fair comparison.

But Betty Friedian? And Rachel Carson? I know you conservatives hate America and equal rights and shit, but what have you got against clean air and water?

Don Myers on May 31, 2005 at 03:05 pm
Avatar for Kadnine

Giving Human Events Mag the benefit of a kind interpretation, I’d say that they don’t mean to imply the act of reading a book on their list will cause the reader harm (though maybe they do) but rather, the collective influence of these works has greatly harmed our society and the world over the last two hundred world. Then the list becomes a more of a sigh of dismay rather than a dire warning. They seem to be saying that the damage has already been done.

And with few exceptions, I’d agree.

Though, like you, I’m a bit perplexed they’d link each one to Amazon.

Kadnine on June 1, 2005 at 07:06 pm
Avatar for Carrick

Don Myers says:

Why the hell isn’t The Bible on this list? Way, WAY more blood has been spilled in God’s name than Marx—although the Bible does have a pretty big head start, so it’s probably a not a fair comparison.

My God!  I missed this gem of a post.  Don, you really are a total loon.

Since Marx, all estimates, since these communist regimes didn’t go around bragging about how many of their people they murdered: 

Stalin: 60,000,000, Mao Tse Tung: 40,000,000, Khmer Rouge: 2,000,000.  Bible:  roughly zero.  Sources for Marx-inspired deaths on request.

Historically, you may get the total deaths made in the name of the Bible as high as 1,000,000 (mostly from the Inquisition and the Crusades).  I’m not even sure it’s that high.

Can you point me to one example since the Communist Manifesto where Christian mass extermination camps even existed, let alone killed a single person.

Had you been intellectual honest instead of trying to score a cheap point, you could have pointed out the number killed by Mein Kampf and other instruments of nationalism, which is probably higher than even communism.

Carrick on June 18, 2005 at 12:06 pm
Avatar for likwidshoe

Don Myers spit out, But Betty Friedian? And Rachel Carson? I know you conservatives hate America and equal rights and shit, but what have you got against clean air and water?

Since when is Betty Friedian and Rachel Carson about “equal rights and shit”?  Betty Friedian hated women, heaping scorn upon those who decide to stay at home and raise the kids (which is the most important job a woman can ever have in life because it is the world’s most important job).

Rachel Carson’s “Silent Spring” hyped up and flat out made up the dangers of DDT.  Result of Carson’s rhetoric: millions of people, primarily in Africa, now die of malaria borne by mosquitoes that was once wiped out by the use of DDT. It wasn’t ever about “clean air and water”.

I know that you moonbats hate the truth, but what have you got against common sense and reality Don?  Remove your fat head from your ass and breath some fresh air Don.  It would do you a world of good.

likwidshoe on June 18, 2005 at 01:07 pm
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