Would you not agree that someone doing a parody or a satire is not quoting the subject of the parody or satire?
Definitely. Rev is wrong in saying that what Rush was doing was "quoting" Rham. He did quote Rham, but what he did after that was an attempt to parody the situation. It was satire.
Nigger is not comparable to retarded in any situation.
Says you. It is similar. In both cases they are a SLUR against a group of people for a status that is upon them at birth of which they can not choose. Simply because
YOU and some of society find one to be "worse" doesn't necessarily that:
1) it is worse
2) that even if it IS worse, that its not comparable
Retarded is a slur. Just as calling someone a nigger is. Just like calling someone a faggot is. Just because one of those three are very common vernacular, and the second is relatively common, doesn't mean they're somehow "less" of a slur than the third. Or if we routinely said "nigger" as a way to describe some random stereotype of people and it was more commonly socially used would you suddenly have a lot less problem with it?
You're right, Rushbo's was very very very much worse. I don't see how anyone other than a complete hyper partisan hack would think calling ideas and strategies retarded is anything like calling people retards.
Really? I explained the reasoning behind mine. You know, debate site and all, needing to actually EXPLAIN things instead of just making asinine statements. PARODY AND SATIRE are generally viewed as less offensive than actual, intended insults in our society.
It is why SNL can get up and make mockery of things, such as perhaps Barack Obama becoming enraged and turning into "The Rock Obama" which happens to walk around like a large dumb ape, that if you were to say seriously in society ("When Obama gets flustered he starts acting like a large dumb ape") you would be viewed as offensive.
It is why Comics could get up and make jokes about the stereotypes of people and races continually, and often, in routine fashion and yet if you express those stereotypes and insults in a genuine, insulting way you'll be found offensive.
Our Society in general views and weights PARODY and SATIRE differently than actual, legitimate intentions to insult.
Rush's use of it, while crude and low brow, was done with Parody and Satire in mind, mocking Rham Emanuel's use of the term and mocking the Media's relatively light coverage of the use and their focus more on being negative to Palin than to Emanuel, and highlighting the hypocrisy of them by pointing out how they will take him COMPLETELY out of context and go at him worse than at Emanuel.
Emanuel's use of it was not parody, nor satire. It was meant as an insult. He insulted and belittled the democrats in question by comparing their ideas to mentally handicapped people. There is no way in the context of his speaking that he was stating they were "Retarding" the situation in the form of the word meaning to slow it down or to stall something. He meant it as they were mentally slow, using a slur to do it. He meant it, completely, as an insulting thing.
Those two are not on the same level of wrongness, nor malice, nor tastelessness. The fact they are not on the same level does not necessarily mean one is right and one is wrong, but that they are not equal and that its ridiculously idiotic to expect an equal response.
Now, as I did slightly previously and more thoroughly now, I explained and backed up my reasoning. If you want to make more stupid snide posts instead of actually debate why don't you save it for someone that cares, if you want to actually discuss this then actually do that.