First, I’m with Max Boot. Let’s turn away from the seamy Stormy Daniels saga and look at the real Trump scandals — the ones that, at least in some cases, we can discuss in front of our children.
But before we do…
A couple of days back, I read in The Washington Post the view that “the most radical” — and apparently most wonderful — part of Anderson Cooper’s interview with Stormy Daniels was that he opted to “refuse to treat Clifford as if she was irresponsible or immoral, or as if she were less than credible simply because of what she does for a living.” The piece elaborated that despite the mainstreaming of porn by the Internet, “working in adult films is not exactly regarded in the same neutral way as waiting tables or working at a law firm.”
It continued:
But, refreshingly, that’s exactly how Cooper and “60 Minutes” treated Clifford’s work. The narration in the segment noted that Clifford “has been acting in, directing and writing adult films for nearly 20 years” and that “she was one of the most popular actresses in the adult industry.”…
I harrumphed and moved on. It was hardly worth engaging, because my views are not substantively different. That is, I don’t consider this woman to be necessarily more or less credible because of what she does for a living. Also, I think Anderson Cooper or any other journalist, or any other person, should always interact with fellow humans respectfully.
My objection was to the suggestion that being a porn star should be regarded in the same “neutral way as waiting tables or working at a law firm.”
No. There is a moral hierarchy in human activity. Waiting tables, for instance, is better than being a bank robber. And working at a law firm, generally speaking, is at least a more tasteful, even nobler choice than performing in pornography. (I don’t care what Juan says.)
Or, to bring it back to the subject at hand, it is better for Anderson Cooper to speak respectfully to this woman than to call her a harlot and dismiss her.
So yeah, I’m with you on the treating people decently and respectfully. I’m just not with you on pretending there’s nothing morally objectionable in being engaged professionally — as “actor,” director, producer, distributor or whatever — in the business of pornography. Just because it’s the oldest profession doesn’t make it the most honorable.
Anyway, I had decided not to address this issue until I saw Kathleen Parker’s column today. As usual (she tends to approach issues as a parent, as do I), she’s of my way of thinking.
For her part, after bemoaning the mainstreaming of the phrase “the porn star and the president,” which she no more sees as a sign of social progress than I do, she rightly focuses her opprobrium on the sleazier of the two — and it’s not “Stormy Daniels:”
This president’s behavior is not up to the standards we have a right to expect from the man or woman we elect to lead the nation. This is the shame and the travesty Trump has perpetrated upon the office he holds. Who cares about Stephanie Clifford, really?…
Not I, except to say two things: Working in porn is not the moral equivalent of waiting tables. But this porn professional is not as morally objectionable as this man who uses other human beings — from Playboy bunnies to national security advisers — and throws them away according to what he sees as benefiting his own momentary, scatterbrained gratification.
Because there is a moral hierarchy to human activity…
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And all I can say is… YAWN.
Speak for yourself. Bud and Doug are ALL stirred up…
“And working at a law firm, generally speaking, is at least a more tasteful, even nobler choice than performing in pornography.”
Waiting for Bryan’s response…
Could it be as colorful as, “Regardless, someone there is getting “screwed”? There’s a better word than “screwed” but Brad won’t allow it.
I was actually thinking more of Juan.
Yeah, Juan’s not gonna like that…
I left myself wiggle-room with the “generally speaking…”
Yeah, sorry. I was out of pocket all day yesterday on a case in Charleston. I was helping a client settle a very contentious case in mediation in what was a 12 hour work day for me.
I’m pretty comfortable with my place in the moral hierarchy. Law is a pretty good profession. It’s one of the original three along with military service and the clergy.
“It’s one of the original three along with military service and the clergy.”
Hmm.. you seem to have left out one… the oldest profession.
Working in porn is not the moral equivalent of waiting tables.
-Brad
Explain. I see nothing morally objectionable to working in porn.
Agreed, bud.
Assuming they are engaging in consensual activity with no pressure to perform, porn actresses ARE morally the equivalent of waitresses from a professional standpoint – they perform a service and get paid for it. I can think of several professions that are lower on the morality scale generally: most car salesmen (certainly 95% of the ones I have dealt with in my life), certain categories of lawyers, a large percentage of politicians, telemarketers who scam the elderly…
Brad believes the world should conform to his views of morality. Probably will just get grumpier as he gets older because it ain’t happening. In fact, it is more likely to go in the opposite direction from his (antiquated) views. Why judge people who make choices that are different from yours, Brad?
It is somewhat ironic that a newspaper like The State will gladly distribute ads for auto dealers — where the ads nearly always contain either total lies about vehicle prices — or minuscule fine print that make any offers impossible to attain — but probably would balk at advertising a strip club or adult book store (am I wrong on that?)
I suppose it’s okay to get screwed by a car dealer but not by an adult film star.
Well, there’d be a somewhat lowered chance of getting a wasting disease, so there’s that…
So it’s dangerous. Lots of jobs are dangerous. That would make swordfish fisherman the most immoral of all jobs.
I don’t know. I know that was true in the past. But I see a lot of adds we wouldn’t have seen in the past.
And of course you’re being facetious when you say you find it ironic. I’m sure you don’t find it ironic at all. It’s precisely what you expect to find, after which you will condemn it for “narrow-mindedness” or whatever.
As Kathleen said at the outset of her column:
So our house libertarians, who are oh-so-proud of their modern sensibilities, begin the process of shaming Brad for holding to standards that most people in Western culture have held to for most of the last couple of millennia. Which makes these notions — what’s your word again? — “outdated.”
Yeah, whatever. I could answer your postmodernist cliches with other cliches. I could ask whether you’d prefer your daughter to be a porn actress or a waitress. But personally, that would offend my oh-so-offendable sensibilities. I believe it’s about caring about everyone’s daughters. And sons, too, of course, although with rare exception, they have little chance of becoming stars in the genre.
Yep, there I go again, looking upon society as a father does. That’s what I do, and I’m not a bit ashamed of it. I’ve had that outlook on life since I was 23 years old…
So our house libertarians, who are oh-so-proud of their modern sensibilities, begin the process of shaming Brad for holding to standards that most people in Western culture have held to for most of the last couple of millennia.
-Brad
That statement is completely useless as a debating point. What MOST people do or do not believe in really isn’t important. Come on Brad, try to at least make some attempt at explaining why a porn star is somehow morally beneath other occupations. You really can’t do it because it will always circle back to this notion that MOST people regard it as such. Morality is not decided by a democratic vote. I think you’ve made that exact point before.
“What MOST people do or do not believe in really isn’t important.”
Actually it is, when you act like there’s something remarkable in my pointing these things out. There’s nothing remarkable about it at all…
But you’re right that having a majority on your side doesn’t make it right. If I’m right, and everyone on the planet disagrees with me, I’m still right….
It’s ok.
Who believes anyone here would cheer their children if they became porn actors?
No one. But as I said earlier, I wouldn’t make up my mind about the issue based on that…
Speaking of that word: “actors.” Or more relevantly here, “actresses” — who are more the focus of pornography.
I’ve tried to step around that word, as you may have noticed. It doesn’t seem to be the right one.
Is this acting? Not to a critic, I wouldn’t think.
Which brings me to a wider question, which I almost made into a separate post (but decided I’d had enough of the topic): Has anyone here ever seen (or, not to put you on the spot, heard of) an excellent porn film?
I haven’t. Oh, I remember that back in the ’70s, that’s what “Emmanuelle” was supposed to be about — “the first film of its kind that lets you feel good without feeling bad,” as the trailer said. It was supposed to be (soft-core) porn that was also high-quality filmmaking. But you could tell even from the trailer that this was no “Citizen Kane.” It was cheesy…
And you’d think, 50 years after the sexual revolution, in a world in which millions of upstanding citizens such as Doug say “acting” in a skin flick is “just a job” like any other, that by now somebody would have made a “Citizen Kane” of porn.
It seems that the taboo that keeps serious actors, directors and writers away from straight-up porn would have evaporated enough by now that there would be some porn films that caused serious critics to say they were just fine films, period.
But that hasn’t happened. Or if it has, I haven’t heard of them. So why not?…
Of course, Stanley Kubrick did make “Eyes Wide Shut,” which I’ve heard is all about sex — but I haven’t seen it, and don’t know that anyone would call it actual pornography. Nor does it seem to be among his most revered films.
I mean, “Carnal Knowledge” wasn’t pornography, despite the title…
Define porn. Is simulating sex on camera for millions of dollars higher on the morality scale than porn? Have you watched films that include depictions of sexual activity – real or otherwise? Did you regret it?
I’m assuming you watch only G or PG movies and cover your eyes whenever there are any “naughty” parts.
That’s a quick-thinking kid. The first part is what he’s drawing for the entertainment of his classmates, then he draws the rest when the teacher starts to come down the aisle near his desk…
Oh, I expect that you and I both, like Justice Stewart, know it when we see it. And a definition would just spoil it. I like the way the justice put it:
I’ll not presume to be cleverer than Mr. Stewart.
But speaking of knowing it when you see it…
Whatever happened to all the porn spam we used to get in the ’90s? There was LOTS of it, and a lot of it extremely graphic — which was one reason we kept the one computer in the house back then in a public area, where we could monitor what the kids were seeing. You’d just be sitting there doing something entirely unrelated and BAM!, you’d get an extremely graphic popup. It happened a lot, both at work and at home. (On one occasion, my wife was shocked by images that popped up on the screen while our then 8- or 9-year-old daughter was using it.)
Is it just that spam filters got that much better? Because for awhile there, they were cropping up constantly, and now I don’t think I’ve seen one in 15 years, maybe 20.
Although I do occasionally get new followers on Twitter that are just invitations from young girls saying things like “come look at my hot pictures.” But those aren’t nearly as intrusive as the old pop-ups, and if you just ignore them, they disappear from your followers list…
By the way, the film Justice Stewart was saying was not obscene according to his “I know it when I see it” test was “Les Amants” (“The Lovers”), a French drama directed by Louis Malle.
I can’t guarantee whether I’d agree with him or not, but since it came out in 1958, I’m kind of thinking I’d agree with him…
Weak dodge.
I find that the local newspaper that does advertise strip clubs and adult book stores typically has more interesting and better researched articles than the one that doesn’t.
Assuming they are engaging in consensual activity with no pressure to perform, safe crackers ARE morally the equivalent of waitresses from a professional standpoint – they perform a service and get paid for it.
See how that works?
Only if the safe they are cracking is owned by someone who needs it opened. Otherwise the activity is illegal. See the difference!
No, I think maybe you need to explain. Nothing? Nothing at all? I mean, I could come up with problems with waiting tables if I made an effort. I think you can probably think of one or two problems that exist in the universe of pornography, maybe something that even you find objectionable, as magnificently broad-minded as you are.
Methinks thou dost engage in hyperbole to make thy point…
It’s interesting to see how open minded these folks are now that once screamed at Bill Clinton for sleeping around. Remember when morality was all that mattered to some of these hypocrites?
Even the soon to be 4 times divorced Rush Limbaugh is ok with adultery and now since trump is president acknowledged that the federal debt isn’t that big a deal.
Times are changing.
Fast forward to Trump’s previous favorite for VA Secretary, Pete Hegseth of Fox News fame. The only problem is Pete has been busy impregnating a Fox Coworker behind his 2nd wife’s back. The former “family values” Hegseth disappointed even the ever cheating Donald Trump.
Y’all do get the larger point here, right? I mean, Bud and Doug are going to refuse to acknowledge it even if they see it, but the rest of you get it, right?
The point is, to say it for the fourth time, that there is a moral hierarchy in human behavior. All of us subscribe to that. All of us.
If there weren’t, then Bud and Doug would have absolutely no right to criticize me for my supposed narrowmindedness. Because there would be nothing I could say that would be better or worse than any other statement by any other person.
And ultimately, the most morally objectionable person in all of this is the current POTUS.
But for me to say that, or for one of Trump’s fans to say that about Hillary Clinton (which they will; they love to bring up that irrelevant has-been who is on no one’s minds but theirs), there have to be certain human actions that are better than other human actions.
And I’ll take it another step: Our society is currently so conflicted, so polarized, because starting about 50 years ago the consensus that once existed in our country about what did and did not constitute moral behavior started falling apart. Of course, the fact that a consensus once existed is extremely offensive to bud and Doug, but even their judgment of that is based in their own moral hierarchies — they find community standards (as opposed to standards spontaneously adopted by the almighty, autonomous individual) to be deeply evil. Which is them being just judgmental as all get-out.
Moral judgments are inherent in any assertion of opinion, no matter where you’re coming from…
ultimately, the most morally objectionable person in all of this is the current POTUS.
-Brad
Does that mean the job of POTUS is morally objectionable? Of course not. What is objectionable about Trump is his behavior. So don’t conflate any specific job with morally objectionable UNLESS the job duties (safe cracker) is morally objectionable.
Our society is currently so conflicted, so polarized, because starting about 50 years ago the consensus that once existed in our country about what did and did not constitute moral behavior started falling apart.
-Brad
And that so-called “consensus” included Jim Crow laws, laws against inter-racial marriage, laws against gay marriage, laws prohibiting the sale of can openers on Sunday, aversion to public breast feeding, acceptance of public smoking, acceptance of drinking and driving, long sentences for pot smoking. Consensus is a funny thing. It doesn’t necessarily conform to morality.
Yeah, got it. Jim Crow existed in The Past, so The Past is 100 percent evil. We know you will say that, every single time.
What you always ignore is that THAT was the time when we had the moral consensus, the confidence in ourselves as a nation, a people with shared values, that we did away with Jim Crow. It’s also the last time we made any significant moves in other areas of social justice, such as providing health care to the poor.
The ’50s and ’60s were when we had Brown vs. Board of education, federally enforced integration of schools in Arkansas and Alabama, the Civil Rights Act, the Voting Rights Act, Medicare, Medicaid. We did those things because a consensus arose in the country that Jim Crow was evil, and that letting people die because they couldn’t afford health care was wrong.
NOTHING significant on the race relations front has happened in recent decades, these modern days that you think are so wonderful. Why? Because we are too divided; we lack moral consensus. As for health care — the ACA was a pathetic thing compared to the boldness, the moral clarity, of the 60s — and yet half the country has been trying like crazy to undo it ever since, because they’re so deeply offended by the idea that it might help somebody.
All of this should be fairly obvious to anyone with a solid grasp of history. I have no idea why you are so blind to it…
NOTHING significant on the race relations front has happened in recent decades.
Uh, didn’t we just have an African American POTUS? Not even a remote possibility in the 60s, 70s or 80s.
Yeah, but I don’t include that in what I’m saying for two reasons:
1. He wasn’t elected because of any great new laws we as a society had agreed upon, the way we did in the 60s. He was a product of those times, though. Because of the ways our society changed for the better in the 50s and 60s, people who grew up with those laws were ready to accept it when the strongest candidate happened to be a “black guy.”
2. I don’t think of Obama personally as being part of the whole American race thing. His election may not have made us a post-racial nation (in fact, it definitely did not), but he was pretty much a post-racial candidate. Or maybe even a never-was-racial candidate. As I’ve said many times, Barack Obama was simply outside the whole national thing about race. He didn’t have a single ancestor who was brought to this country as a slave. He wasn’t so much “African-American,” in the sense that we usually mean, as he was the child of a white American and an African. Or, to put it another way, of an American and a foreign student. He, and his family, were not shaped by the usual racial dynamics that shape our race relations. Add to that the fact that he grew up in places that simply don’t have the same kinds of racial constructs that we have here on the mainland. But of course I went into all that in this lengthy column before he was elected…
Of course, most people did think of him as the “first black president (sorry, Bill!),” and plenty despised him for it. But those aren’t the kinds of people likely to appreciate the nuances I’m invoking…
Yes, we get it, not for the fourth time but maybe the four thousandth. You think Trump is the worst person ever… And yet nothing you have said or will say will change the fact that he is President. Who else are you trying to convince to join you in your misery?
Doug, it is beyond reproach to say that Donald Trump is the worst President in our nation’s history. He has proved that already in only 14 months in office. It is fact now. Black and white as you like.
Trump is immoral. Not amoral, immoral. He is a cancer on our civilization. He is mentally unfit for office. More importantly, he is even more emotionally unfit for his position. It shows every single day.
Sure Trump is a reprehensible human being. I detest the man. Having said that his ranking among the presidents will depend entirely on what happens. If North Korea gives up its nukes we must consider that in the final ranking. I can point to a number of very bad developments on his watch but the jury is still out on where he ranks.
If North Korea “gives up its nukes” (unlikely), zeitgeist, rather than POTUS, will be the reason.
So who’s fault is it that we have who we have in office? We had a Republican candidate who half of American hated… and we had a Democratic candidate who half of America hated? Why do you think things would be any different today had Hillary won the election?
If anything is apparent, it’s that you run for the office for personal reasons and not for the betterment of the country. Who in their right mind would want the job? From what I’m seeing the parties have to dig deep to find someone to run, and it seems that it’s more of an ego thing than a “civil service” for the candidate. Trump ran to prove that he could win, Hillary ran because in her mind she deserved the position. Correct me if I’m wrong.
You’re not wrong at all. We need better candidates.
And since you ask this question… “Why do you think things would be any different today had Hillary won the election?” I’ll answer it yet again, because I obviously haven’t yet gotten the point across to some readers…
It would have been awful. I said that before the election; I’ve said it after the election. I’m not fond of Hillary Clinton, but Republicans have a completely irrational, virulent HATRED of her that would have led to… here I go typing these words again… would have led to a poisonous partisan atmosphere that would have made the Bush and Obama years look like a picnic.
But we’d have a sane, qualified person — just like the sane, qualified Republicans who got rejected in the primaries — running the country, even though her ability to do so would be greatly hampered by the constant partisan warfare with the Congress. That would still be better than having an unbalanced ignoramus running things, equally under fire…
Sorry, Mark. But in my view, Bush was worse compared to Trump so far. Trump is a blowhard attention seeking narcissist. But he still hasn’t matched Bush’s utter contempt for human life with a phony war that we still can’t extricate ourselves from and pretending the economy wasn’t crashing while he stood there pretending to be President.
Trump is what we get after years of the Clintons, Bush’s, and oh-so-cool packaged Obama.
Yes, Trump is what we got when the voters lost faith in America.
Trump has no functioning executive branch. And every one who is replaced is with someone less qualified and more personally pandering to Trump.
It’s really scary, Doug, and you ought to wake up to that fact.
Whether Bush was right on everything or wrong on everything, he lead a functioning government. That’s the first requirement, no? The voters can always choose ideology; but they should never be duped by executive incompetency.
“Yes, Trump is what we got when the voters lost faith in America. ”
What was the alternative, and would anything be changed had the other candidate won or would we just have different problems?
There wasn’t just one alternative in 2016; there was a small army of them. But all through the primaries, people like you kept voting for the worst contender in American history, rejecting all the alternatives…
Brad already expressed this, but to reiterate Mark’s point, yes it would have been different had Clinton won. Though she would be constantly hated and maligned and not as productive as possible in another environment, she would never the less be competent to run a functioning government.
Which we don’t have today.
“It’s really scary, Doug, and you ought to wake up to that fact.”
I refuse to allow others to try and scare me. I’m not scared about Donald Trump any more than I have been “scared” about people like Nancy Pelosi or Mitch McConnell.
What we are seeing is that despite all the chaos within the White House, the country as a whole just keeps moving along as usual. I’m not in the least bit interested in which bureaucrat occupies some office in the White House… the guy that just got booted from the VA was just another in a long line of incompetent, self-serving paper pushing, political appointees with little accountability or accomplishment. Different people, same results.
… because, you know, anyone who serves in the public sector is automatically a bad person.
I’ve never understood how it is that Doug think all the self-serving, venal people in the world are attracted to the public sector. It makes zero sense in the abstract, and doesn’t fit reality, either.
If I were that sort of grabby, selfish person, I would definitely choose to go into the private sector, where the opportunities are greater and the chances of getting caught are so much smaller.
Doug likes to point to bad folks in the public sector who PROVE his way of looking at things. He never acknowledges that the reason he KNOWS about those people is that they get caught. And they get caught because the glare of scrutiny is greater in the public sector.
It’s not as great as it once was, of course, with the disappearance of healthy news media on the state and local levels. But you’re still more likely to get caught than in the private sector.
The truth is that NEITHER the public nor private has a monopoly on good or evil people. But for whatever reason, Doug reserves his contempt for those in the public…
Not all.. just many in the higher positions of government… especially those appointed rather than selected. They get those jobs not through skills but through politics. Pretty much all cabinet positions are filled by people based less of ability than connections.
When I complain about people at lower levels of government it is because they work for managers who don’t have any accountability. It flows down from there… when you have a monopoly (DMV, IRS, etc.) the incentive to do well disappears.
“When I complain about people at lower levels of government it is because they work for managers who don’t have any accountability. It flows down from there… when you have a monopoly (DMV, IRS, etc.) the incentive to do well disappears.”
There is some truth to this and there absolutely is room for improvement. But I think the mistake you make is thinking this is the whole story.
Your world view completely doesn’t take into account the fact that people come in all sorts of temperaments and are motivated by vastly different things. The idea that a person could work in a government job with a decent work ethic doing the best they can against difficult odds despite not making much money or getting much recognition simply because they believe in the work itself is completely foreign to you, and you never acknowledge that such people exist in government jobs. If someone is a government employee they are automatically lazy and incompetent in your view.
If this is really not your view, then maybe slow down and catch yourself before you make blanket statements that sound like that every time you delight in pointing out government incompetence. Because you do it alot.
It is pretty clear that while the guy made a stupid decision to blend his vacation into his European work trip, this was a political firing. Some partisans got Trump’s ear about outsourcing more services faster from the VA (whether sensible and cost effective or not) and Trump couldn’t take having an Obamacare holdover anymore with the rest of his cabinet imploding.
“What we are seeing is that despite all the chaos within the White House, the country as a whole just keeps moving along as usual.”
You can keep saying that, but it doesn’t make it true. You just block out the changes that don’t affect your personal world or you are aware of them but don’t care since they don’t affect you. Not sure which.
I find the job of Catholic clergy morally objectionable because that job requires defending certain tenets that I find morally objectionable, IE, opposition to birth control. Hence a Catholic priest is more morally objectionable than a porn star.
Do you have any idea how absurd you sound? Of course you do, which is why you’re saying it….
Not at all. I have a strong, heartfelt belief that population control, especially in Africa, is critical for the very survival of humanity. The arithmetic backs up my contention. There is only one way to achieve that object, active birth control measures. A major Catholic tenet is the advocation of opposition to the use of hormonal birth control. That is a position I find abhorent. The principal advocates of this policy are Catholic clergy. By logical extension this reduces Catholic priests to a lower level on the moral hierarchy that porn actors who create a product that is valued by people who are willing consumers of this product. No coercion is involved since the exchange is voluntary. Nothing absurd at all, just logical defection.
Deduction
Morality is about lying, cheating, stealing, or physical violence. It is not about sex… Sex is not immoral unless one of the parties is underage or coerced in some way to participate.
Or are you suggesting, Brad, that any sexual activity between unmarried persons outside the confines of a darkened bedroom without the specific purpose of procreation is immoral in some way? I’d like to understand at what point sex becomes immoral. Getting paid for it? Having multiple partners? Between people of the same sex? Where’s the line where you bless it as being in that higher level of the moral hierarchy?
On the moral hierarchy, who is higher: Rand Paul or John McCain? Show your work.
I’ll give you some help. Which of them had extra-marital affair that resulted in the end of his marriage? Which of them were accused of corruption while in office? Which of them has performed hundreds of free eye surgeries on poor patients?
Doug, I think Rand Paul is a fine man, and I think it’s terrible that one of his neighbors beat him up.
But I don’t trust his judgment at all. I think McCain has a better grasp of issues.
I think the finest man, on a moral plain (or should I say, “Plains”), to serve on the federal level in my lifetime may be Jimmy Carter. But I don’t agree with everything he says and thinks…
How did we get on this topic anyway? Are you misunderstanding me? Are you thinking that I think Trump is morally unworthy to be president because he fooled around with this woman years ago? I mean, that doesn’t HELP me think well of him, but it’s pretty insignificant compared to all the other bad stuff about Trump. I refer you to the first line of this post, “First, I’m with Max Boot. Let’s turn away from the seamy Stormy Daniels saga and look at the real Trump scandals…”
Your comparison of McCain and Paul reminds me of another thing I want to write about. I’ll go do that…
As Boot said:
You claim there is a moral hierarchy, right? That means there are levels. Some are higher, some are lower if it exists.
McCain is closer to Trump on the moral hierarchy than he is to Rand Paul. Adulterer? Check. Questionable ethical history? Check. Prone to uncivil language and a short temper? Check. The only difference between them is Trump inherited his money while McCain dumped his wife to marry into money.
Doug, you — and possibly Bud — are laboring under a misapprehension (and perhaps several of them).
A person having this or that attribute (of the sort discussed on this post) doesn’t automatically make him or her a good or bad person. You and Bud seem to think I’m saying it does, but I’m saying nothing of the kind. I’ve been careful to avoid that impression, but I think you’ve formed it anyway.
Note that I have nothing to say about whether “Stormy Daniels” is a good or bad person. All I said was that it was ridiculous to equate certain actions that were not morally equal — performing in pornography, say, and waiting tables.
A woman who appears willingly in a porn video could be the proverbial “hooker with a heart of gold,” a wonderful, kind person whom you and I and everyone here would be happy to call a friend, and there are no doubt waitresses out there who are as mean as a snake, people we’d all cross the street to avoid. Which of those Stormy Daniels is, or where she is between those poles, is something I have NO opinion about. I know practically nothing about her, and am not really interested in learning more. For instance, I didn’t watch her interview. This post is not about her or her interview — it’s about some observations other people made in commenting on matters relating to it.
A human being, and that person’s moral worth, is not summed up in one attribute or another. But if you remove these attributes from any sort of judgment about the person as a person, it’s silly to say being a porn performer and being a waitress have the same moral weight.
Are you following me here? Because if you are, you’ll see why your attempt to draw moral comparisons between McCain and Paul just doesn’t make any sense to me at all. It has no place in this discussion. I’m simply not interested in summing up a person based on whether he donates his medical skills to charity, or whether he recklessly destroyed his marriage 40 years ago.
I can only assume that the reason you think those questions make sense is because you think I’m making such judgments about this person or that person based upon such single attributes. I most assuredly am not.
The only person about whom I’ve made a moral judgment here is Donald Trump. And I didn’t make it because he fooled around with this woman. Or other women. Or aggressively forced himself on yet other women. And constantly lies about it. And is always out for himself in everything he does, and sees other people only in terms of whether they are loyal to and helpful to him, while he gives loyalty to know one. Or because of his willingness to cynically manipulate the public by appealing to people’s worst, least noble instincts. Or because he holds the most important job on the planet while have zero qualifications for it. Or because he has no principles and hasn’t a clue what the truth is, saying whatever seems to be advantageous to him at a given moment.
No, I judge him because of ALL those things, and many, many others. The sum total of the man is that he’s very bad news. But you know what? Live and let live. Some people are jerks. The only reason it matters in his case is that he is president of the United States, and amazingly, there are still people who don’t understand why that’s a bad thing…
A shorter way to say all that: Donating one’s medical skills to charity is, on a moral hierarchy of behaviors, a better thing than ruining one’s marriage through infidelity.
Similarly, bringing food to people in a restaurant is a higher calling than having sex with strangers on camera in other to facilitate, as Kathleen Parker wrote, other strangers’ onanistic gratifications.
But neither of those comparisons, considered alone, makes this or that person a better or worse human being than the other person.
Do you follow me?
As always, and as I say ad nauseam, people are complicated. The porn performer might also be a waitress. The charitable doctor might also have run around on his wife….
But your definition of morality is related to sexual behavior. I don’t think that is the case. Is sex on camera for money immoral? It is a job.
It is to me, and that is what counts.
“But your definition of morality is related to sexual behavior.”
Actually, my definition of morality is multi-faceted and covers all aspects of human existence. Just because you and bud like to answer me as though I had said something ignorant, narrow and worthy of caricature doesn’t mean that’s the kind of thing I said. I assure you there is careful thought and nuance in the things I say.
What I just said was:
And you answered with:
So I suppose the answer to my question, “Do you follow me?” would be, “No.”…
I suppose I could try again. I suppose I could try to pry you loose from your black-and-white way of looking at what I’m saying. I could say, We’re talking about a hierarchy of moral worth in certain activities. I’m saying, for instance, that being a nurse is a better thing to do with your time than being a real estate speculator. Which is not to say that a given real estate speculator can’t be a better person than a given nurse. I’m just ranking one facet of who these people are. I keep saying this, but you choose to react to some picture in your head of what I said, rather than what I said…
But would it do any good?…
I’m not sure you’ve picked up on the fact (which I tried to indicate) that I would have thought it was fine if Alyssa Rosenberg had simply said she was pleased that Anderson Cooper spoke respectfully to “Stormy Daniels,” as one should to all fellow human beings. I would have agreed with that, and found it unremarkable to the extent that I’d have moved on and said nothing. Yep, end of story.
But she had to bring waiting tables and working in a law office, and suggest they were all the same thing.
I just could not let that one line go. Because some kinds of human behavior are better than other kinds of human behavior.
For instance, being a waitress sincerely doing her best to serve a cranky, hard-to-please customer is better than being the cranky, hard-to-please customer.
Spending a Saturday afternoon working in the yard or taking the grandchildren to the zoo is better than spending it alone watching football (or even baseball, even though we all know baseball is far more uplifting) and downing a six-pack or so of beer. Not that watching a ballgame or enjoying a beer in and of itself makes you a bad person, but some activities are more morally worthwhile and defensible than others. They just are. That’s what I was saying, and that’s all I was saying…
Brad is correct, there is a moral hierarchy. However, it changes from culture to culture, from individual to individual.
Right, Bob.. but Brad believes in some type of mythical moral “consensus” that conveniently aligns with his own personal views — except when they don’t (like on gay marriage and legalization of marijuana) — then it is something that is to be mocked condescendingly as “modern sensibilities”. The reality is that “modern sensibility” is typically the result of dispensing with close-minded bigotry and prudishness related to religious upbringing and indoctrination.
I appreciate both Doug’s and Brad’s moral hierarchies. I am not going to judge which is superior, or even which is most like mine. Diversity is a very good thing; I long for the days when I heard the term “melting pot.” Gestalt, the whole is greater than the sum of the parts – those terms are part of my moral hierarchy.
Why? I judge all the time. Everyone does. Doing judges on here constantly.
I’ve made many judgments about Doug, most very unfavorable.
brad? Almost the exact opposite.
Making judgments about people is a great way to avoid them.
“Judge not, least ye be judged.” There is some wisdom in the ancient writings, mostly metaphorically.
Yeah, I’ve always had a problem with that one.
Stormy Daniels has a problem with the ones about adultery and fornication. I have a problem with judging, which many would (with some justice) say is the greater sin.
But what do you do when that’s your job? Say, if you’re a, you know, judge? Or if your job is making judgments about everything in the world, as was mine as editorial page editor? You’ll say that’s not my job now, but actually, in a small way it is, since I derive a tiny amount of income from this opinion blog.
Whether it’s my job or not, it’s certainly a habit. And that habit, I think was planted in me far before I moved to the editorial board in 1994. When I was fresh out of college and working as a copy editor, my job was most definitely NOT expressing opinions — in fact, opinions were one thing it was my job to hunt out and eliminate from copy.
But my job WAS to be critical about everything I read, in the sense of mercilessly rooting out mistakes. Not just mistakes of spelling or grammar, but mistakes of logic and meaning.
I think if my wife, who knows me better than anyone, were to state my greatest flaws they would be judging, of course, but also a kind of universally hypercritical nature. I’m constantly hunting for the mistakes in things that people write and say. And with those speaking, it extends to the WAY they say things, including their accents and verbal habits, such as uptalk and vocal fry.
Y’all would find me a very irritating person to watch TV or listen to radio with.
And my only defense is that for decades, my livelihood depending upon catching mistakes. So I look at everything super, super critically. (And it’s still a part of my job at ADCO, of course, just not under the same kind of pressure, pressure that after years and years kind of warps one’s cognitive processes.)
And, taking it to the next level, judgmentally…
Yes, there is a dilemma inherent in the statement. My “job” over the past 30 years or so has been to protect children from abuse and neglect while preserving parental rights. I’ve made many decisions and or recommendations, essentially judging parental ability to raise children without harm beyond “minimal societal standards.” At times those judgments were “life or death.”
I wear that hat, put that game face on, when I have to. When I don’t have to, I try my absolute best to not judge.
Way to take the verse totally out of context, congratulations.
Again, I judge all the time, you do too. Pretending otherwise is a lie.
I don’t judge you as anything but a person afraid to put his or her name on his or her opinion. Also known as a troll.
You judge all the time in your posts. To pretend otherwise is yet another lie.
I don’t put my name on my posts because I don’t have to do so. Feel fully secure in knowing Id say the exact same thing to your face as I do on this board. That is a certainty.
Sure, whatever, madam.
Your welcome.
“Your welcome.”
And this is what this blog has become. Two sides to everything with each refusing to bend. I’m part of it, but this blog has become not a place to discuss, but to argue. I’ve only seen one or two other blogs or forums that ended up this way, I don’t know if either are still up… and if they are there are probably only a handful of people who participate. My viewing has declined, and if history repeats itself I expect that I’ll forget this site as well. How many regulars from a year or two ago are still around?
Doug you nailed it! That is exactly what Brad does. But he’s not alone. That kind of nostalgic view of the past, void of any context, is largely what gave us Trump. Ironic isn’t it? Brad’s own sensibilities are present in the minds of millions of Trump voters.
OK, I give up. You and Doug are definitely not going to pay attention to any of the actual words I type, but just criticize a caricature you have in your heads…
Doug and Bud not paying attention?
Water is still wet.
Trolls still trolling? Sky is blue.
Sure, as much as is necessary for you.
There are a couple of S Daniel related trends that disturb me.
A politician’s previous private misdeeds may reveal character, but aren’t per se germane to public policy.
Daniels is not my friend or ally, just because she is a threat to my current adversary.
A public morality that focuses on dirty deeds falls way short of where we should be aiming.
Trump, being already known as a creep and user of people, can use the distractions related to those characteristics to press on in destructive measures related to the environment, education, taxation and spending, foreign policy, unqualified and sycophantic staff appointments, irresponsible public pronouncements and tweets, and tyrannical approaches to governing.
The press just keeps on taking the bait.
“A politician’s previous private misdeeds may reveal character, but aren’t per se germane to public policy.
Daniels is not my friend or ally, just because she is a threat to my current adversary.
A public morality that focuses on dirty deeds falls way short of where we should be aiming.”
I agree. Which is why I don’t think you’ve seen me mention “Stormy” in the past. I almost didn’t this time, but I wanted to make the point that we’ve been arguing about here. I initially passed on the opportunity to do even that, when I first read the Alyssa Rosenberg piece. But when Kathleen reminded me of it, I decided to set out my thoughts on it — which is that while it’s absurd to put pornography on a par with waiting tables, the far worse thing is to be Donald Trump and be president of the United States…
I actually was going to develop a whole Mary Magdalene theme on this, what with it being Holy Week and all, but I restrained myself.
Y’all can thank me later — if I don’t give in to the urge and give you that whole spiel anyway. Which I might.
In the meantime, here’s a hot “Stormy” video for y’all…
Or this updated version:
🙂