The Power Of Silence

The Fascists cannot argue, so they kill. -- Victor Marguerite

A little tactical musing today, I think.

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One of the most striking things I've noticed, in studying the tactics of the Left, is how averse they are to actual argument. Anything but a bald proclamation of their positions is anathema to them. Reasoning? None. Response to objections, counter-contentions, and criticism? Slander, vilification, assaults on motives...whatever the leftist believes will end the exchange then and there.

I've come to believe that leftists generally are aware that:

• They have no arguments consistent with logic or the evidence of history;
• We're on to them in any case.

The typical leftist mouthpiece might enjoy slinging epithets at conservatives, but from a tactical point of view, that's a secondary consideration at most. What he wants is for his claims to go unchallenged. When he replies to a conservative in foul-mouthed and calumnious fashion, he's mainly concerned with preemptively silencing further argument. As the Left's claims cannot withstand either reason or evidence, this is his paramount concern.

The tactic has served the Left well. Deploying a counter-tactic has become vital.

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In recent years, we have seen an explosion of violent and intimidating public action from leftists; "street politics," if you will, designed to make others fear that opposing them would be deleterious to one's well-being. Surely smashing store windows, menacing the homes of private figures they want to demonize, and issuing death threats and implications thereof constitute no valid argument of the sort Socrates would approve. But this is merely an illustration of the Victor Marguerite quote at the top of this article.

One way or another, the Left is determined to have the political field entirely to itself. We ought to have known that from the phenomenon of the "one-party State" that appears near to inevitable for a nation that's allowed itself to be taken over by the Left. Exceptions to the pattern are quite rare.

When it comes to Leftist violence and intimidation, the only possible response is in kind: fearlessly and aware of the potential consequences for life and limb. As it turns out, when confronted by equal, equally resolute force, the Left tends to strike its tents and slink away, in the time-honored fashion of bullies throughout history. So the response in kind is less risky than it first appears...if it's deployed early enough to forestall the Left's attainment of a dominant position.

As for opposing the Left rhetorically, in somber awareness of its proclivity for slander and vilification, it's time for an entirely new approach.

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The only possible responses to personal slanders, demonizations, imputations of low motives, and so forth are denial and reciprocation. Neither of these has proved useful to the Right. We need an alternative that averts that path: an approach that "takes the bat out of their hands."

To achieve that end, we must deny ourselves our traditional response to Leftists' claims and demands. We must refrain from arguing with them.

Why argue with one who's unable to argue? Why dignify his representations by answering them seriously, if all that would do is give him the opportunity to call you a racist, a sexist, a homophobe, an oppressor, a tool of the moneyed interests, or any other insult his shriveled brain can produce? You may be quite sure of his inclination to do so; honest leftists willing to confront evidence and logic are as rare as blizzards at the Equator. So why identify yourself to him as a target for abuse?

If the leftist's contentions are ridiculous, why not allow them to stand unanswered, exposed to the scrutiny of whoever might attend to him? In other words, why not trust your fellow citizens' intelligence and hard sense?

After all, if your fellow citizens are unintelligent and hard-sense-deprived, your arguments, no matter how well-turned or eloquent, will have no positive effect on them. But if they possess the capacity to see through the Left's obfuscations and appeals to envy, they can and will do so. They'll go looking for a sensible alternative...and they'll find you.

Atop that, Americans tend to be respectful of those who respect them. Leftism is a single, centuries-long confidence game that uses the appeal of envy and devil theories to attract allegiants. Once an American realizes he's being conned, he develops a resistance to it against which further attempts to deceive him will shatter.

In that view, the Right's weapon of choice, already at hand, is silence.

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Barack Hussein Obama and his lieutenants have made many claims about "obstructionism" and "attempts to return to the failed policies of the past." An unfortunate number of persons have attempted to answer those charges, to approximately no avail. Why answer them, when the sole reply would be more of the same, with additional slanders and imputations of evil motives?

In the aftermath of the Zimmerman trial, race-hustlers such as Al Sharpton, Ben Jealous, and Julian Bond have made extravagant claims about "open season on young black men." Once again, to reply merely invites more vilification. Why answer them, when their statements are so plainly nonsense, both as matters of law and as assessments of the state of American race relations?

In the most laughable of the easily identified cases, various gender-war feminists have accused the Right of a "war on women," because of our desire to limit their "reproductive rights" -- i.e., their "rights" to kill viable-but-unborn children and to have their slutteries financed from the public till. Any response other than a derisive chuckle and a shake of the head imbues such charges with a dignity they don't deserve. Why answer them, when anyone with three functioning brain cells would dismiss them without a second thought?

We have feared to allow the Left's accusations and representations to go unanswered. That fear was based on the assumption that our fellow citizens would infer that an unanswered attack must be true. It's time to jettison that assumption, especially as it implies a lack of respect for the very persons we hope to win to our way of thinking.

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I once asked the brilliant cartoonist Chris Muir, who delights us daily at Day By Day, how he deals with attacks from the Left. He answered at once that he ignores them and continues on. "A response is what they want," he said in amplification. "Why give it to them?"

Why, indeed?