David Brooks needs to shut up

[Hermit-The-Prog]

The NY Times columnist believes gun violence will be solved by “respect” for toxic gun culture

https://www.mediamatters.org/blog/2018/02/20/David-Brooks-needs-to-shut-up/219430

David Brooks is back on his bullshit. Ever since Donald Trump was elected president, the New York Times columnist has become an outspoken proponent of ideologically vacant centrism as the one and only solution to toxic partisanship and intractable tribalism. The fact that “the center” of Brooks’ dreams has no political appeal, no coherent philosophy, and no agenda beyond tongue-clucking rebukes of partisanship is of no concern to him; it can and will fix everything simply by scolding everyone in Washington to be polite to one another.

Brooks’ ridiculous faith in this feeble worldview animates his column this morning on gun regulation. Under the impossible-to-parody headline “Respect First, Then Gun Control,” Brooks argues that the way to prevent more gun massacres like the one that left 17 people dead at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School in Parkland, FL, is for proponents of stricter gun laws to show unlimited deference to gun-rights extremists and cede them control of the legislative agenda:

If there’s one thing we’ve learned, it is that guns have become a cultural flash point in a nation that is unequal and divided. The people who defend gun rights believe that snobbish elites look down on their morals and want to destroy their culture. If we end up telling such people that they and their guns are despicable, they will just despise us back and dig in their heels.

So if you want to stop school shootings it’s not enough just to vent and march. It’s necessary to let people from Red America lead the way, and to show respect to gun owners at all points. There has to be trust and respect first. Then we can strike a compromise on guns as guns, and not some sacred cross in the culture war.

It feels almost gratuitous to critique this passage given how self-evidently devastating it is to Brooks’ ridiculous centrist fetish. Here we see Brooks attempt to confront the gravely serious and deadly problem of gun violence, and his paramount concerns are: 1) the reputations of elites such as himself, 2) the civility of public discourse, and 3) “compromise.” What would that compromise look like? Brooks has no idea and makes no attempt to work it out. That’s because he doesn’t actually care -- compromise for the sake of compromise is the goal, the details don’t matter.

[More lambasting at the link]

[scarletwoman]

1. Yes! Thank you! David Brooks is, unfortunately, an idiot.

I say "unfortunately" because every once in a while he seems to seriously flirt with rationality. And, stupid me, I get my hopes up that he will finally eschew and repudiate whatever delusional ideas he still clings to regarding being a "conservative".

But he never fails to disappoint.

I read this piece of crap editorial by Brooks earlier, and just wanted to vomit.

The people who defend gun rights believe that snobbish elites look down on their morals and want to destroy their culture. If we end up telling such people that they and their guns are despicable, they will just despise us back and dig in their heels.

Oh, PLEASE!!!

Yes, I definitely WANT to "destroy their (damn, idiotic, stupid) culture" - their "culture" is totally fucked up. Their "culture" is toxic. Their "culture" is backward and ignorant and pathetic and disgusting. Damn right they are "despicable" - and it's way past time they were told so and fucking told off!

They have NO fucking "morality"! Why the hell should any actual sentient being defer to such unevolved troglodytes?

These are the people who are directly responsible for the degradation of our democracy - they are responsible due to their willful ignorance, their stupidity, their firmly closed minds.

FUCK THEM!!!

[Gidney N Cloyd]

2. Brooks is an idiot. I suspect a search of DU posts would produce several instances of me saying that

[world wide wally]

3. I am sick to death of being called an "eltist"

I promise you won't find anyone less elitist than me. (Except, of course, Donald trump who I am sure will tell you that no one is less elite than him)

[Dawson Leery]

4. Brooks is full of shit.

His idea of compromise is for the left to give in to what the right wants.

Ban assault weapons!

[Skittles]

5. I will NEVER respect gun humping cowards

*NEVER*