Say Anything Blog

It is popular, in partisan arguments, to accuse the other of lacking, mis-using or over-using either emotion or logic in their stance or argument. Often one hears Rush lambasting the left for being emotion driven and lacking the appropriate use of rationale which would lead any sentient being to accept the soundness and supremacy of his stance.
Personally I believe that any stance or opinion on a topic requires both emotion and rationale. I do not necessarily think there is one supreme or objectively correct mix of the two or end result of that mixture; moral position or stance. Humans are almost all sentient beings yet our means of acquiring knowledge, stances, information… is nonsensical. Many are taught, through the manipulation of emotion and rationale, that there is but one objective truth, et al. One can easily see that, with the manipulation of other fears or the exploitation of other lines of rationale, that sentient being may be taught to believe in an entirely different ontology, perceived objective truth, et cetera. Taking these simple things into account can ad a great amount of amusement to observing and partaking in partisan arguments where two or three sides all assert the supremacy of their stance without flinching.
The left is accused of too much emotion which leads them to policies that tax the people in order to take care of the segments of society that suffer more. It is often said, among the right, that those who can manage and even stifle their emotion when considering some questions of politics or policy are able to come up with superior stances. This line becomes very hypocritical when one juxtaposes it with the right’s views on abortion or capital punishment, both of which are extremely emotion-laden stances. The right (who wish to retain the, “we are rational and the left are emotion kooks") my point to religious texts or biological distinctions which ground the rationale behind their stance. Here though, the connection to the text is a predominantly emotional one and any ‘line drawing’ with respect to when something is a person and when something isn’t a person is arbitrary. Even if the ‘line drawing’ wasn’t arbitrary and there was a clear distinction, the left (who here I will assume to be pro-choice) must stifle some emotion about the baby in order to give the mother’s autonomy of choice primacy. Indeed the right often accuses them of being ‘baby killers’ and the like, a blatantly emotional accusation.
In short I am tired of seeing the left and the right accuse each other of being ‘emotional’ or ‘cold’ and ‘rational’ or ‘nuts’. In fact, I think both are true of both party’s policies and stances. Any worthwhile cognition must balance these two, and not necessarily in a certain manner or in certain proportions on various issues. Furthermore, no contentious issue has one correct answer. In an objective world (assuming you believe of such a world (as a result of emotion about perfectness and the rationale that something like this could potentially exist)) they might, but we live in a democracy where the loud din of argument is what we fight to protect. Sadly or not, as a result, each issue is fed to the dogs by the MSM and there are 10 or so incorrect positions, all in disbelief at the others’ stupidity and well… its all kinda funny I think.
Even funnier, to me, is the fact that one can arrive at truth through 100% bullshit. Consider the man traveling to A. He comes to an unmarked fork in the road and asks the farmer nearby which road will take him to A. The farmer informs him to go left, which he does, and he does not arrive at A. Now, through bullshit, the traveler knows the other fork in the road would have lead to A. What becomes really funny is when the traveler continues to travel down the wrong road or returns to the fork and takes the road to the left again. When that type of idiocy occurs, clearly there are emotional-rationale problems occurring. Often times though, there is undue griping and hypocrisy on both sides of the isle from emotional and irrational chauvinists (not in the sex discrimination sense).