Clubby Insiderism, Capitulation, and the Rhetoric of Appeasement

If I had to pick my favorite media narrative, it would have to be "The Angry Left." We are "crude" and "crass," "loud" and "mean," and above all, we are angry.

We aren't polite. We aren't--at least according to the Narrative of the Angry Left--civil. We're the unwashed masses of the Democratic Party: farting, belching, and cussing as we destroy western civilization with our unregulated series of tubes.

But like most media narratives about the netroots, it's wrong. We're labeled uncivilized, and the beltway establishment--the likes of Senators Lieberman and McCain--gets to appropriate civility for themselves. It's wrong, and it's frustrating just how wrong it is. At the end of the day an energized, people-powered, progressive Democratic Party is the best and only hope for civility.

That probably sounds pretty weird. Civility generally gets a bad rap in these parts, and rightly so. Concern trolls write about the need for "civility", someone complains that people say "fuck" in diaries, and we're called rude for the millionth time by some blowhard from the New Republic. The kool kids have taken civility and turned it on its head. Now, to be civil is to be weak, to be civil is to capitulate, to be civil is to enable President Bush and his Congressional allies.

Here's what Markos wrote about civility:

The media and political establishment have learned to accept "incivility" from the Right. It's expected. It's normal. It becomes like the freight train in your neighborhood that only visitors notice.

But from the Left? Heavens! Liberals aren't supposed to fight back! They're supposed to lie there and take it. Like good liberals.

And when they don't? Well, everyone suddenly gets the vapors.

A couple of weeks ago, mentaldebris, in a zesty rant about civility, astutely wrote:

You know, this call for respectful discourse[...] sounds an awful lot like, "this win was bad for Democrats,"  "criticizing the Iraq War is bad for Democrats," "growing a backbone is bad for Democrats."

Hunter, with his usual eloquence explains:

The problem is -- and this is important -- current national politics has almost nothing to do with policy.

[...]

It's not about the facts of the argument, when there is no place where the facts can be debated. It's not about reasoned discourse -- there aren't any channels interested in showing that right now. It's not about deciding who has the better proposals, on a given issue: there's simply no forum to present them to.

[...]

The way the game is currently played is that you, the Democrat, suggest some new policy; I, the Republican, then hit you with a cinder block, take your wallet, and declare victory.

Kos, mentaldebris, and Hunter are all spot on here. Civility, as defined by the beltway, is not a good attribute. The civility practiced by Senator Lieberman is all clubby insiderism, capitulation, and the rhetoric of appeasement. But there is another side to civility that the Angry Left narrative has stripped from us.

I'm an etymology buff. I know that sounds weird, but the history of words just interests the hell out of me. And I couldn't help but notice this under the entry for "civil" in the Online Etymology Dictionary (Best. Etymology. Site. Ever. By the way):

Civil: 1387, from L. civilis "of or proper to a citizen," alternate adj. derivation of civis "townsman" (see city). The sense of "polite" was in the L., from the courteous manners of citizens, as opposed to those of soldiers. But Eng. did not pick up this nuance of the word until 1606, though civility dates from c.1384.

The first little bit, "proper to a citizen" is the important part I'd like to seize upon. The new meaning of civil, despised by us in the angry left, is an incomplete definition. To be civil means to be polite, but it also means to act in a way proper of a citizen--in a civilized way, and that means standing up for the truth, it means not capitulating to the dangerous and destructive, it means fighting, passionately, angrily for our civic institutions.

A few days ago I published lies written by conservative author Peter Schweizer. I gave him the benefit of the doubt. This was a mistake (read all about it here). And my mistake was the last straw in giving respect to the vast majority of Republican/conservative commentators. If being civil also means a commitment to the truth, then disrespect for those persons who consistently use unscrupulous tactics in the pursuit of their goals is more than warranted by our dedication to civility, it is required.

Civility doesn't have to mean the smarmy, clubby bullshit spewed by pundits and beltway politicians. It can mean standing up for truth, reason, and the health of our civic institutions; in that sense, the progressive movement is the last true bastion of civility in America today.