In light of the Todd Akin/Dave Catanese controversy, many people are calling for Todd Akins's resignation, and some are hoping Dave Catanese, Politico reporter, be fired in light of some contemplative tweets about Akins last night, which resulted in him being essentially called a rape apologist by many. I think this is part of an alarming trend that we should temper.
Preface: On Todd Akin and the organic social consequences of freedom of speech
Personally, I think Akin is an idiot; has unambiguously said something hurtful to women and to men who, like our own President, agree that "
rape is rape"; and should quit the Senatorial race if for no other reason than that he would likely try to legislate into existence some aggressively regressive social policies that would further weaken the bridge to gender equality. So this is not a defense of Akin's point—freedom of speech is legally protected by our constitution but it does
carry with it social consequences, the most fitting in this case being a call for his resignation given how damaging his views are to both his own party and to a socially progressive view of the world. My central point, though, made further down below, is that he ought to resign for reasons that extend far beyond my mere disagreement with his point of view—reasons that I do not believe extend to Dave Catanese's 'thought experiment' on
the bearing of the biology of rape on Akin's word choice—and that we are on the verge of losing something valuable as a society if we don't apply our social consequences more critically.
Setup: Our Culture of "Fire Them!"/"Boycott Them!" Bloodlust
Because we are now freer, more connected, and more empowered than at any other time in history, it has become far easier to align ourselves to causes and ideas, and to organize ourselves in the pursuit of any given goal. Not surprisingly, one of the things that has picked up tremendously in my lifetime is the frequency of calls for firing individuals with whom we disagree or who disseminate ideas we find disrespectful, idiotic, or reprehensible. This is a byproduct of technology and of the social layer, and has created a sort of "social free market" that has closed the gap between cause and effect. You could even call it an equalizer of sorts: corporations, now more influential than ever, can at last be mass-boycotted enough to hurt their bottom lines or draw significant attention to them (the recent Chik-Fil-A controversy comes to mind), which sometimes leads to enough unwanted or bad press to negatively impact their advertising revenues, further yielding significant and positive changes. This is, in a word, great.
However, all of this has also led to a trend in which any time a critical mass of people want someone fired, that person usually is. Sometimes it's because of something quite egregious and clearly wrong (Rush Limbaugh calling Sandra Fluke a "slut", for which he wasn't fired but at least lost huge sums of advertising revenue and is sinking into eventual irrelevance); at other times, it's merely because the noise is sufficiently distracting to warrant stepping down so that larger objectives can be met (Anthony Weiner sexting a Twitter follower, which resulted in the resignation of one of the Democrats' most stalwart and vociferous champions, sadly replaced with a Republican).
There is another danger, even in instances in which someone is not fired: sometimes, controversial but sorely needed discussions are reigned in well before they can yield any social benefit. When MSNBC's Toure claimed a few days ago that Romney was engaging in the "Niggerization" of Obama, Toure was forced to apologize a day later. Now the precedent has been set: media figures cannot bring up "niggerization" (a charged yet useful term that Princeton's Cornel West coined years ago) even when it might actually apply or be worth discussing. (It's bad enough that, despite our not having properly addressed issues of race as an American society, almost no one in the media or public eye can say "nigger" even when quoting its use: they must say "N-word". But that's a whole other topic.)
On the one hand, this is democracy at work and "comes with the territory" (though it is bipartisanly double-edged); on the other hand, it is symptomatic of a larger problem that Bill Maher famously pointed out when he defended Rush Limbaugh by espousing that "People Need To Stop Throwing ‘Conniption Fits’ Over Things They Find Offensive".
My Point: Freedom of Expression Is Being Punished in an Uncritical, Undifferentiated Way
Even when the issues at hand are highly charged, we would do well to give due attention to the nuances of, and differences between, various types of remarks, opinions, word usages, perspectives, and thought experiments. Not everyone should be fired every time they say something we disagree with.
From a fellow Kossack's recent Front Page diary:
So is Politico going to suspend Catanese as well? Do his tweets meet their "standards for fairness and judgment"? Why should Politico keep on its payroll a reporter who defends the indefensible, doesn't understand what rape is, isn't clear on the science of where babies come from (and is too lazy to look it up), and blames "the left" for pointing out how wrong he is about everything?
If Politico doesn't get rid of Catanese double quick does that mean Politico stands by Catanese's Twitter meltdown?
This seems like a nuanced conversation we should definitely be having.
There again, a call for firing someone. We have got to be intellectually vigilant and rigorous enough to distinguish between, say, the following:
a) Rush Limbaugh, a radio personality, calling Sandra Fluke a "slut"
b) Daniel Tosh, a professional comedian, making a joke about rape in a comedy club
c) Louis CK, a fellow professional comedian, joking about the Daniel Tosh rape controversy on Jon Stewart's show
d) Todd Akin, a politician, calling some forms of rape "legitimate" and (wrongly) saying that few pregnancies result from rape
e) Dave Catanese, a civilian political writer, considering the possibility that perhaps Akin really did misspeak based on an inaccurate or incomplete understanding of the biology of rape
These are all separate examples of opinions being expressed, with varying degrees of appropriateness, credulity, and social impact, and should be treated as such. If each is treated as similarly reprehensible enough to fire that person from his or her job, then is there not a long-term danger to critical thought and to freedom of thought? Perhaps there is, if "the indefensible" can never be defended, even for argument's sake, without professional punishment.