Blogs as Journalism -- Not

Jeff Walsh (as linked in Dave Winer's Scripting News) presents an extremely coherent and ultimately convincing dicussion of the blogs as journalism debate that awakens periodically in the blog community.

Jeff Walsh: I think blogs are amazing, powerful things and that we're at the beginning of a curve that no one can quite predict. [...]

I just think [...] there seems an awful lot of chatter about trying to prove you're part of something wholly irrelevant to the bigger picture. Blogging and Journalism

10:58:58 AM   permalink: []   feedback:   comments: []  

I Refuse to Choose

And so here it is, we are forced (or seemingly so) to stake our ground, to choose sides, to stand with the rabid hawks or with the whining peaceniks. There can be no middle ground we are told, by others perhaps but by our own selves mostly.

Yet I refuse to choose. For although it is easy to label the two sides, these hawks and peaceniks, with pejoratives, the fact of the matter is that both sides are right and both alternatives are wrong. To side with one is to reject that compelling logic of the other side, to choose a wrong path.

I refuse to paste a flag to the back of my car and root for an invasion of Iraq. I refuse this not because of some admiration for Saddam Hussein or for some deep hatred for the nation of my birth. No. I refuse because of the certainty I see that no equivalent effort will be applied to cleaning up the mess or to addressing the ultimate causes of the problem. Look for yourself: our administration forgot to include money for Afghanistan in its latest budget request. It forgot. Right.

Yet I equally refuse to stand on the bridge waving signs and shouting simplistic slogans. I refuse this not because of some conviction in the ultimate supremacy of the United States or in the notion that Saddam Hussein is a unique menace to the forces of civilization. No. I refuse because of the childish behavior of protesters painting Bush as Hitler and the fact that Saddam himself makes Marcos and Pahlevi look tame in comparison. We demanded the demise of the other two, why not this monster?

Both alternatives are distasteful. So I simply refuse to choose. And I am not alone.

ColbyCosh: Thus are we forced to choose between unpalatable policies. One is to constantly X-ray the hearts of other heads of sovereign governments for signs of generalized dodginess, and to behave imperially--and, sub specie aeternitatis, somewhat randomly. Under this policy you will certainly be wrong about what your enemies are up to sometimes, and the innocent will die for no reason at all. The alternative is to await an actual act of war--one which may, in fact, destroy your society altogether--and hope you may identify the perpetrator after the fact, and be able to do something about it, which you probably won't. (Rome Wasn't Built in a Day[1])

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[1] http://www.colbycosh.com/#rwbd (This link evidently will expire as the story is moved from the main page at colbycosh.com to the archives. As of right now, there is no permalink for the story. If you notice that the link breaks when the story moves to the archives, please let me know and I'll patch it to point to the archive.)
10:02:05 AM   permalink: []   feedback:   comments: []