As an example, here is an intelligent person talking in a way that MAY be using the reasoning I outlined above (spurious metaphysical reasoning) or may be appealing to historical fact. The problem is that is is unclear what he is doing exactly, probably even to himself. One CAN have a justified line of reasoning in giving some recognition and support to the underdog. But too often, this is not what is occurring, but rather an attempt to reward those who have been ACTED UPON, whilst casting aspersions at those who are capable of ACTING.
See the following:
“My last word on the Charlie Hebdo massacre. Of course it is deplorable and outrageous and basically wrong to murder 12 people. The publication’s cartoons and jokes have been racist but that is no reason to murder people. (There is no reason ever to murder people). One can take a principled opposition to this atrocity without endorsing the positions taken by the journal. Many people have tried to justify Charlie Hebdo’s brand of humour by 1) emphasizing the general ‘leftist’ direction of the paper and 2) by pointing to the historical precedents of such humour being deployed against the Catholic church in France. However, France has a history of imperialist aggression and violent colonial domination in Muslim countries. There is a world of difference in crude humour about Catholicism (a dominant power and ideology within France and against which it is justifiable to polemicise) and deploying the same ‘humour’ against victims of French imperialism. The equivalent of the Charlie Hebdo brand of humour can be imagined by assuming an Australian ‘satirical’ journal making similar cartoons about Aboriginal people, or a German mag making such ‘jokes’ about Jews. Two wrongs do not make a right, and this is not a retraction of sympathy and solidarity for the murdered workers at the paper, nor is a justification of the atrocious murder.”
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