Media Criticism, Political Commentary

Projection Watch

6 Comments

I (and others) have often noted the tendency of leftists to do psychological projection — that is, to impute to their political enemies their own beliefs, traits and political tactics. Obvious examples: accusing them of lying, accusing them of being willing to do anything to attain/maintain power, being full of “hate,” being “racist.” I’m thinking about starting a web site to track this ubiquitous phenomenon

Anyway, if I had such a site running, here would be another example. They often accuse the right of being violent, but look at these lurid fantasies coming from JournoListers. They don’t just want to kill stories — they luxuriate in thoughts of injuring and killing people with whom they disagree:

Considering Weigel’s talk of setting Matt Drudge on fire, Ezra Klein’s off-color recommendation for Tim Russert, and now Ackerman fantasizing about putting conservatives through plate-glass windows, there is a bizarre addiction to lurid, violent, threatening language — not just among the commenters of liberal blogs, but among the folks who we are told represent their best and brightest. It’s disturbing, and the fact that it doesn’t bother more people is disturbing.

And then we have this, from Sarah Spitz:

If you were in the presence of a man having a heart attack, how would you respond? As he clutched his chest in desperation and pain, would you call 911? Would you try to save him from dying? Of course you would.

But if that man was Rush Limbaugh, and you were Sarah Spitz, a producer for National Public Radio (update: Spitz was a producer for NPR affiliate KCRW for the show Left, Right & Center), that isn’t what you’d do at all.

In a post to the list-serv Journolist, an online meeting place for liberal journalists, Spitz wrote that she would “Laugh loudly like a maniac and watch his eyes bug out” as Limbaugh writhed in torment.

In boasting that she would gleefully watch a man die in front of her eyes, Spitz seemed to shock even herself. “I never knew I had this much hate in me,” she wrote. “But he deserves it.”

Spitz’s hatred for Limbaugh seems intemperate, even imbalanced. On Journolist, where conservatives are regarded not as opponents but as enemies, it barely raised an eyebrow.

I wouldn’t say that no one on the right does this, but I can’t imagine such things being uncommented on were there such a thing as a right-wing JournoList. One occasionally sees such things at Free Republic, but the poster is usually admonished when it occurs. In fact, one thing that I have noted over there is that even when someone with whom the Freepers disagree politically (e.g., Ted Kennedy) actually is dead or dying, the general response is prayers and condolences to the friends and family, not glee. I have certainly never wished death on anyone for their political beliefs or advocacy of them, and like Rush Limbaugh, can’t get my head around the nature of someone who does. I guess that’s one reason I’m not a leftist.

[Update a while later[

Limbaugh responds.

6 thoughts on “Projection Watch”

  2. While her reaction to Rush’s death is hypothical, there was very real hate directed to former White House Press Secretary Tony Snow when he was diagnosed with cancer and when he later died.

    There’s no hate like liberal hate. And yet they claim that they’re as pure as the driven snow and anyone who disagrees with them are “haters.” Projection, indeed. Not all liberals, certainly, but quite a few of them.

  3. Along with projection there’s a lack of sense of proportion. If a lefty can point to one example, they can negate a million examples on the other side. We definitely need that website.

  4. I think this just shows how the Golden Rule is one fundamentally powerful philosophy wrapped into the simplest of phrases. Due unto others as they due unto you. It is so powerful that the Dem’s succumb to it without even knowing.

    They wrap themselves up in these ideas that there are the oppressed and the oppressors. The problem is that Dem’s don’t realize that they themselves are the oppressed becoming the oppressors. They fantasize about how social ladders and power structures are organized into evil people victimizing lower status people. In turn the powerful people take advantage of lower status people to gain power and increase wealth. Then when they actually find a way to move up in the power structure they carry that since of entitlement with them. They themselves feel entitled and justified in actively living out the fantasies they’ve carried with them their whole life. They continue to play out the power struggle because they feel they are getting payback. But the payback doesn’t really hit back at those that were supposedly victimizing them. They morbidly strike out in such a fashion that really just hurts their cause on multiple levels even more.

  5. Why wouldn’t they have lurid fantasies of violence? These are people who get off on coercion. There’s always been a strong sadistic (in the broadest sense of the term, although sometimes–as here–in the narrower, more popular sense) aspect to Leftism, coupled with a masochistic streak. (I’m an evil money-grubber! Tax me, Obama–tax me hard!)

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