Progressive Hostility: Where Does It Come From?

Recently, The New York Times hired Bret Stephens, a writer with a conservative viewpoint.

Here’s what Mr. Stephens wrote in his column:

 “Claiming total certainty about the science traduces the spirit of science and creates openings for doubt whenever a climate claim proves wrong. Demanding abrupt and expensive changes in public policy raises fair questions about ideological intentions. Censoriously asserting one’s moral superiority and treating skeptics as imbeciles and deplorables wins few converts.

None of this is to deny climate change or the possible severity of its consequences. But ordinary citizens also have a right to be skeptical of an overweening scientism.”

Here are the sort of responses Mr. Stephens received on Twitter:

“bret if you think that tweet was ‘nasty’ i have some news for you: you’re a shithead. a crybaby lil fuckin weenie. a massive twat too”

.@nytimes fuck off

Crazy how in these stories, no one is mentioning the fact that people are mad because Stephens is a giant racist.

Keep in mind that these are not just random comments. These are the statements of people who purportedly write and think for a living, persons who consider themselves journalists. You can read more about it in an article entitled, “Millennial Journalists Behaving Badly”.

Anti-Trump, progressive types love to be seen saying, “Love Trumps Hate” and to imply that reason and dignity override emotionalism. Yet while it’s easy to carry a sign saying such things, it’s another thing to practice the things being said.

Stephens is too generous with environmentalism, so far as I’m concerned. He fails to place the onus for scientific proof on those making the assertion. His criticism of environmentalism is mild compared to what’s warranted. And yet look at the reaction! He suggests that while advocates of “climate change” are essentially wholesome and scientific, they’re also stretching the boundaries of reason by claiming certainty. Yet even this is too much criticism for these dogmatic, hostile and hateful environmentalist-leftists to take.

In their hatefulness and hostility, they’re telling us something. Not just that they’re hostile and hateful, but that they’re afraid. They’re afraid because they have no rational answers to offer in response to Stephens’ claim. So, in true characteristic form, they resort to profanity and gutter talk, again validating the fact that they have no intelligent response to offer.

A lot of us who voted for Trump, or who merely have differing views from the cultural establishment on the role government should play in our lives, often scratch our heads and wonder, “Why are progressives so mean and intolerant?” You don’t have to be a psychologist to figure this one out. They’re seeing in others their own most undesirable qualities. They hate and detest on a level that most of us will never know, or care to know.

Most hatred, prejudice and bigotry arise from fear. These environmentalists who cannot handle even a tiny hint of dissenting opinion on the pages of their precious New York Times must be very frightened people. They often say it. “You scare me,” progressives will say to people with differing views. They think they’re telling us, “You’re an evil and irrational monster, and you frighten me”. But what they’re really saying is, “I have no response to what you’re saying. So instead, I will scream, name-call and put you down. That’s all I’ve got.” It’s called shaming, and it’s a purely emotional tactic, not an intellectual one.

We see this again and again. It started before Trump. Not just on environmentalism and “climate change”, but on everything where you dissent from the leftist opinion. Try criticizing Islam. Try suggesting that socialized medicine is immoral as well as economically unfeasible, because it enslaves doctors and restrains the right of trade for patients. Try even supporting tax cuts. Don’t even think of supporting spending cuts, especially for things leftists treasure like PBS, Planned Parenthood or NPR.

The wild-eyed ferocity with which such people greet opposing opinions is truly frightening, at times. At least, until you grasp that all this rage comes from a profound and almost childlike fear. These people are lost, they sense it and they’re struggling not to know it. Their shouts, screams and name-calling are their way of telling us so.

Good luck at The New York Times, Bret Stephens. You’re going to need it!