From: ceb@dbrus.Unify.Com (Caroline E. Bryan)
Subject: Many Flavors of Bigotry (Was Re: Republicans vs. Centrists?)
Organization: /usr/lib/news/organization
Date: Fri, 2 Oct 92 20:39:25 GMT

In article <66951@cup.portal.com> Arthur_T_Hu@cup.portal.com writes:

[ stuff having absolutely nothing to do with California or politics deleted ]

>Centrists and Republicans

[ unsubstantiable and invalid extensions to all Democrats of what some Demo-
  crats support deleted ]

[ plug for Libertarian party immigration position deleted ]

> Being a defender of the values and culture that made America
> a magnet for peoples of all other cultures does not make
> Buchanan or his supporters bigoted Nazis.

Of course not.  Did you really want to come to America because you perceived
its culture to be anti-Catholic, anti-Semitic, anti-Asian, anti-Afro-American,
anti-Native-American, anti-education, anti-science, anti-woman, and pro-war?
Of course Buchanan and his supporters defend *some* of the values and cul-
tures of the United States.  But there are plenty of Americans -- and non-
Americans -- who somehow manage to refrain from hating Catholics, Jews, non-
Europeans, information, women, and the opportunity to die of old age instead
of war.  There are even members of the Republican Party who find Buchanan's
and his supporters' positions execrable and don't hesitate to say and behave
so.

[ claims that all Americans who call themselves Christians are bigoted
  deleted ]

[ unsubstantiable and invalid extensions to all gay people of what some gay
  people do deleted ]

If *I*, a German-American, said "all Asians" do this or that, I would rightly
be flamed at least for making stupid generalizations, at worst for bigotry.
The cake gets sliced the same way for someone who says "all Democrats" or
"all Christians" or "all gays" do this or that.

The fact is that there are plenty of Democrats who disagree with one or more
of the positions the most liberal wing of the party have espoused.  One of
these multitudes of Democrats happens to be the Democratic Party's presiden-
tial candidate.

The Baker campaign has labored hard to convince potential voters not to look
at the differences between people who can be described with a single label,
and to ignore the value of the incredible amount of variation in people that
has made the United States successful.  They would prefer that potential vo-
ters save themselves the trouble of thinking about the issues and the candi-
dates.  Thinking *is* a lot of trouble and is also a serious threat to bigot-
ry.  Whether Hu is avoiding the activity because it is difficult or because
it threatens his bigotry is a question only he can answer.  It does interest
me, though, that after several paragraphs celebrating his native culture
transplanted to this country, he declares his support for a man who has stated
publicly that he wants all traces of non-northern-European culture expunged
from this part of the United States.


Carrie		ceb@rechenau.unify.com	x6244
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