Take That, Kojak
Published February 15, 1987 in North Shore Sunday during somewhat kinder, gentler days of political debate.
I miss
Spiro Agnew.
When the
urge to insult someone overtook our former Vice-President, it had an effect on
him like a laxative. He couldn't have
held back or disguised his innermost feelings even if he wanted to. The injured parties sometimes had to consult
a dictionary before they felt the full force of Agnew's bombast, but they
always got the gist of the jab right away.
Often, though, that's not how it works with insults. Few things are more galling than an insult that is not delivered honestly and openly. Take, for example, Telly Savalas' role in Kojak. Kojak liked to amuse himself in ways not normally associated with a big-city cop. He liked his lollipops and didn't care who thought it was tacky. He also liked calling people "baby" and then slapping them in the face.
Of course, he wasn't really
slapping them in the face. It was done
playfully, not in anger, and no one seemed to mind it
much. After all, wasn't Kojak usually
wearing his best smile while pretending the other guy's cheek was a hamburg
patty?
But think
about it. Being on the receiving end of
such condescending behavior on a regular basis would be irritating and even a
little demeaning. The problem is – what
could be done about it? Do nothing and
you guarantee that your face will soon again play the part of a newborn baby's
backside. Stand up for your rights and
you are quickly made to feel the fool for protesting what easily can be
defended as just a friendly, innocent expression. Either way you end up looking like a jerk.
Clever
man, this Kojak.
Spiro
Agnew never went in for such devilish subtlety. He would rather hit you in the face with a hammer than leave you
wondering whether you just had been insulted.
Something was lost after Agnew turned into the Invisible Man by
pronouncing the magic words nolo
contendre, because today his old enemies, those "effete snobs," those
"nattering nabobs of negativism," are referred to simply as
"those liberals." How dull.
Or, how
Kojak-like.
Consider
the word "liberal." It looks
innocent enough. You read it, hear it,
speak it almost daily, but what does it mean?
If you are
in an argument with someone who responds to your reasoning with a snappy
rejoinder like "You-liberals-all-think-alike-don'cha," does he really
mean that the ideas you share with other liberals are, as the dictionary
defines "liberal" and "liberalism," "marked by
generosity and openhandedness" and "for the protection of political
and civil liberties?"
Somehow I
don't think so.
Nor does a
liberal who purposefully serves up the word "conservative" mean
something as innocuous as "traditional, moderate, cautious." So what's going on here?
Apparently,
certain elements in our society have been fooling around with the rightful
meanings of the words "liberal" and "conservative."
So many
myths, distortions of truth, and outright lies have been told by and about
liberals and conservatives that these words now are supercharged with
connotations which everyone knows and understands, yet which won't be found in
any dictionary. And many of these
connotations can be downright nasty.
Now comes
the insidious part. "Liberal"
and "conservative" still appear to mean nothing more than what the
dictionary tells us that they mean. The combination of denotative and connotative meanings offers a
perfect opportunity for unscrupulous persons to use these words not as harmless
labels for philosophical points of view, but as insults which can be fired off
safely under the guise of benign, unobjectionable expression.
Sure it's
cowardly, but it's also the classic Kojak slap. Check...and mate.
So the
next time you are in an argument with someone who accuses you of being a
"liberal" or a "conservative," make the following bold
move. Determine the specific mythical
association he is applying to you by the context in which the word is used,
then expose the myth as a gross lie and a cheap shot. As your opponent is momentarily stunned by your uncanny
perceptiveness, you can assure yourself of winning the argument in one of two ways:
If your argument is a sound one, use his sudden vulnerability to smash his
reasoning to pieces.
If your argument holds water like a macrame jug, just tell him you don't argue with cowards and walk away the victor.
For your
convenience, I have outlined some of the more disturbing of the myths that have
been built into the once-innocent words "liberal" and
"conservative." Needless to
say, these myths are as unkind as they are untrue. For example:
It is not true that no
conservative patronized a movie in the period between the death of John
Wayne and the birth of Rambo... There is no scientific evidence to support the assertion that a conservative is a liberal who has been mugged... "That Liberal Rag"
is not a Scott Joplin tribute to the Boston Globe... Conservatives don't really understand "Equal Opportunity Employer" to mean
businesses that are willing to take bribes from people of all ethnic backgrounds and religious beliefs... It is decidedly not factual that liberals enjoy paying taxes more than any other human beings on earth... There are many conservatives who are perfectly capable of explaining supply-side economics with a straight face... Liberals deny having trouble getting life insurance because of their bleeding hearts... No, conservatives do not privately refer to SDI as that Silly Damned Idea... Nor do conservatives seriously believe that PBS stands for Propaganda By Socialists... It is not true that Contragate is the most fun liberals have had since watching Sam Ervin's eyebrows do their nightly wardance on national TV... And there isn't a conservative anywhere who actually enjoys having to dredge up Chappaquiddick now and then... The rumor that certain liberal filmmakers want to do a remake of Mr. Smith Goes To Washington starring Daniel Ortega simply is not true... Conservatives do so read books... Bartenders across the nation report that liberals are not unusually partial to Black Russians... Conservatives absolutely do not teach their children that they will become instant liberals if they even once consume brie and white wine... And liberals don't require their pre-school children to memorize their Miranda rights... Uh-uh. Every conservative in America does not personally know at least one Welfare recipient who drives a Cadillac,
buys lobster with food stamps, and wears Gucci... All conservatives do not dream of becoming either CEOs of large corporations or state troopers... The most common name for campus walkways at colleges across America is not now and never has been "Ho Chi Minh Trail." It is time
to end this sham, America. It is time
to return to the days when honest, honorable men had the courage and the decency
to look someone straight in the eye and do him the courtesy of calling him
every rotten name in the book – without hiding behind a smile. Where are
you when we need you most, Spiro Agnew?
