Thursday, November 11, 2010

Be Afraid? Glen Beck on George Soros: Echos of the Past?

I don't know what to make of Glen Beck. I want to think of him as an ignorant, albeit malevolent, clown. However, this piece from The Daily Dish takes my wishful thinking to task. How do we, how should we, respond to what seems to be a real anti-Semitic tirade? Is he really so ignorant that he doesn't know that he's echoing the archetypes of anti-Semitic slander? Do we ignore him? And if not, how does one respond? One has to doubt the efficacy of rational argument in the face of such nonsense? Like the crazies from Kansas, I want to ignore them, I don't want to feed their hatred mixed with a need for attention; however, neither should such statements or prejudices go unchallenged. This is a real dilemma, certainly for anyone who considers oneself any kind of a liberal (at least as it relates to free speech).