The Bishop and the Butterfly: Murder, Politics, and the End of the Jazz Age
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    The "Brilliance" Game, and How it Works

    By Wattree on Thu, 06/26/2014 - 12:34pm |

    Beneath the Spin * Eric L. Wattree

     

    The "Brilliance" Game, and How it Works
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    Joya, Gregory, I just read your comments, and it's very apparent that both of you have benefited greatly from your old-school education. You were educated in a much different way than people are today. You were taught HOW to think, not WHAT to think.
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    I remember a time during the 60s and 70s when virtually everyone could see what was going on around them. But today, we have PhDs who don't understand as much about what's going on around them as many of us did in junior high school. "Dr." Boyce Watkins is a case in point. Sometimes I have to scratch my head when I listen to that guy. If they're passing out PhDs to people who are that clueless, we're in serious trouble. The dude is, literally, clueless - and Cornel West, with his long, convoluted sentences notwithstanding - is not far behind. But I’m going to focus on Cornel here, because he has the higher profile.
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    Even the way Cornel West speaks is designed to camouflage the fact that he's not saying a damn thing. His speeches are designed in such a way that by the time he ends a paragraph, you've forgotten what the subject was. Thereafter, the people delude themselves into thinking that they don't understand what he said because he's so brilliant that they can't keep up. No folks. You don't understand him because he hasn’t said a damn thing.
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    Cornel West came into prominence during a time when there was a raging debate going on over the racist claim that due to the "artificial boost" that Black professionals were getting from affirmative action, they weren’t as competent as their White counterparts. And during that same time there was also a debate going on over the claim by some White scholars that Black people were innately intellectually inferior to White people and the rest of the population.
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    As a result of those debates, and the fact that West had an association with White Ivy League universities, the Black community embraced him as the poster child for Black intellectual competence without taking the time to vet him like we should have. It was that mistake that has led to the flawed intellectual monster - and the total embarrassment to many in the Black community - that we have today.
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    But I have to admit, he has it going on in one respect - he gets $30,000 a speech not to say a damn thing. So if it weren't for the fact that his stupidity is disrupting our political process, I wouldn’t be mad at him. But whenever you listen to him, always keep two things in mind. First, that this is a brother who takes a very long time to say very little, and secondly, if you don’t understand him, it has nothing to do with your lack of intellect - it’s because, again, he hasn’t said anything.
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    A good working definition of a pseudo-intellectual is one who relates common knowledge as though he’s telling you something new. That’s what Cornel West specializes in. I’ve never heard him give a speech that couldn’t be fully understood and summed up in one sentence. But West will take that sentence and dress it up in long, convoluted, and endless parentheticals, sprinkle in the names and thoughts of a few long dead White men, and embellish it with over-the-top and super-cool (by his standards) gesticulations, and have you thinking he’s the second coming of Socrates, even though he hasn’t said a damn thing of value. 
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    The reason that I’m pointing this out is because this is the way that the Black community allows itself to be bamboozled. The powers that be can control millions, by simply controlling the mind of one man. That isn’t to say that Cornel West is purposely conspiring with the enemies of the Black community to undermine us, but social manipulators can simply take the character of a man into account to know he’ll be useful for their purpose. And I think this is the case with Cornel West.
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    Think about it. The only reason that we even listen to Cornel West is because he’s been promoted by the White power structure. They’ve proclaim him to be "brilliant" (but of course, any Black man who can read without moving his lips is brilliant by the standard they hold us to), they've given him unabridged access to the media, and they’ve conferred the aura of Harvard and Princeton upon him. In other words, they’ve bestowed all of the symbols and accoutrements of stature, significance, and intellectual gravity upon him, and let there be no doubt about it, the system is expert in controlling our minds with symbolism. That’s why judges sit on a podium looking down upon the people and wear long Black robs. How much respect would you have for a judge if he was sitting at a table with you in a jogging suit? So symbolism plays a huge role in helping those who control the system to control our minds.
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    But why would the system want to bestow this favored stature upon Cornel West?
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    The answer is very simple. Due to West’s flamboyance, tendency to be self-serving, and lack of true depth, in spite of his highfalutin rhetoric, he doesn’t pose a real threat to the status quo. In addition, his flamboyance distracts the people’s attention away from more serious and sober-minded thinkers with a serious agenda. And I don't mean to imply that this is some kind of covert conspiracy, to the extent that everybody's involved with the expressed purpose of trying to undermining the Black community. The conspiracy is on a much deeper level, on the level of those who manipulate the mores of our society as a whole.
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    For example, the television producers who schedule Cornel West for appearances are not engaged in a conspiracy. They're simply doing their jobs. It's just the way that our system is set up - to promote the most entertaining personalities to the public. As a result, people like Cornel West tend to be the ones who bubble to the surface, not the people with the more sober-minded agendas. So the conspiracy resides on the level of those who are purposely conspiring to dumb-down America - those who conspired to abolish the Freedom of Information Act, and those who are coordinating the brutal assault on the nation's public educational system. That's where the conspiracy resides, and it's definitely real.
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    The people who control that conspiracy are the social manipulators, and they would have loved to have had someone like Cornel West during the days of Martin Luther King, because with West’s demonstrated zeal to protect "his" turf, and his tendency to attack anyone who might obscure his position in the spotlight, he would have been doing the exact same thing to Martin that he’s doing to Barack Obama, Melissa Harris-Perry, Al Sharpton, Michael Eric Dyson, and Jay Z today.
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    Just like with everyone else he's envious of, West would have proclaimed that there was a flaw in Martin’s character, and he undoubtedly would have claimed that Martin wasn’t the "down for the cause" kind of brother that West proclaims himself to be. And it’s more likely than not that he would have also attacked Martin for not being militant enough, and for being too accommodating to the White man - in other words, just like he said about Obama, he'd have said that Martin was not quite Black enough - but, of course, in order to cover all bases, he would have wrapped his criticism in the false claim of "love for his brother." By now everybody knows that when Cornel starts talking about how much he "loves" a brother, it's time for that brother to put on his body armor, because Cornel West's brand of love is vicious.
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    He probably would have tried to align himself with Malcolm, much like he did with Tavis Smiley. Because he would have been afraid to bad-mouth Malcolm, because as most of us know who grew up in the hood, most people like Cornel try to be super-cool to cover-up the fact that they don't have much heart. Think about it.
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    So there’s a very good reason why the White power structure has embraced Cornel West - because he’s a flamboyant clown, the Liberace of faux intellectualism, and they know his antics are more likely to keep the Black community laughing and giving one another high-fives, than seriously thinking about the gravity of our situation, and the dire conditions within our community. And West has demonstrated repeatedly, in spite of his rhetoric, that he's not nearly as wedded to the Black community as he is to Cornel West. Clear evidence of that is the fact that he's never taught at a predominately Black institution in his entire career.  He's spent his entire career teaching the children of those that he claims is the enemy - the very "oligarchs and plutocrats" that he claims Barack Obama is beholding to.
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    So a good rule of thumb to prevent ourselves from being manipulated, is to never allow ourselves to become so enamored of anyone that we give their ability to think priority over our own. While Harvard, Princeton, and Yale are great in preparing their students for specialized professions, when it comes to pure thought, and the innate ability to assess reality, their water is no wetter than your own. So when the manipulators trot people like Cornel West, or Ben Carson out before you, it's game. Essentially, they're telling you not to believe your lying eyes. For that reason, we should never, ever, take anyone else's word for who's brilliant. Always assess the value of every man for yourself,  and if you listen to them carefully, you're more than capable of making that assessment.
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    But don’t just take my word for it, check out Cornel West "in concert below" - and while you're doing so, take special note of how all of the supposedly "learned" people in the audience have also bought into his total nonsense as brilliance. Just like you, they're looking up to who they're being TOLD  to look up to. It's a weakness in human nature, and requires a pointed effort to educate one's self out of.  It has to do with our tendency to go along with the crowd, and our failure to be independent thinkers.  Independent thought is frowned upon in most societies, because independent thinkers can't be controlled. That's why they lynched Jesus.
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    So in order to see how pronounced this tendency is, when you’re done watching the clip, just ask yourself one question - What did I get out of this that I didn’t already know, or that was of any value whatsoever? The answer to that question should bring you to the very same conclusion that I came to six years ago - not a damn thing.
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    Eric L. Wattree
    http://wattree.blogspot.com/
    [email protected]
    Citizens Against Reckless Middle-Class Abuse (CARMA)
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    Religious bigotry: It's not that I hate everyone who doesn't look, think, and act like me - it's just that God does.

    Comments

    I have no idea how smart Dr. Watkins is, or how much he deserved his PhD, but it is worth pointing out that his PhD is in Finance, and most (all?) of the things I've seen you criticize him about are outside that domain. A PhD in Finance provides very little insight into sociology, I imagine. You might find this amusing, even though Dr. Watkins is only 43:


    by Verified Atheist on Fri, 06/27/2014 - 9:15am

    I listened to C West's speech and found it had merit. I agree with his saying that it "takes courage to look underneath and see the suffering." His speech is not "total nonsense" but rather a call for a social conscience much in the tradition of others who have called for such. His references to the words of "dead white men" is much like the way Martin Luther King Jr. quoted from Emerson, Thoreau, and Gandhi. I particularly liked West's remarks concerning WB Yeats.

    The above observation is not offered as argument for or against the place you have repeatedly assigned the man in the context of his standing in the Black community. It is more than fair to ask what he has or has not done to make their lives better. Politics is messy and the Doctor certainly has put himself into the middle of events. Perhaps you are correct in saying his advocacy is not beneficial to the cause he claims to represent.

    But insisting that West is a faux intellectual and a tool of the Man has the weakness of all ad hominem arguments since such efforts rely upon influencing the perception of an opponent's character rather than responding to what they actually say. However accurate one might be while making such observations, it has the effect of removing oneself from the conversation.

    The player becomes a critic of the play.

     


    by moat on Fri, 06/27/2014 - 5:39pm

    Moat,

    An ad hominem is only an ad hominem if is not true. Cornel West has enjoyed the center stage for over 35 years, and in all that time, I haven’t been able to find ANYONE who can tell me even one quotation or profound assessment of existential reality that can be universally attributed to Cornel West. Nearly every universally recognized quotation attributable to Cornel West is juvenile, unsubstantiated, or inane. Thus, my characterization of Cornel West is not an ad hominem at all. Since his outrageous behavior has made him a legitimate part of the debate, my alluding to the flaws in his character and lack of professionalism constitutes a legitimate assessment of the facts.

    A PORTRAIT OF CORNEL WEST - THE LIBERACE OF FAUX INTELLECTUALISM

    Have you ever noticed that nearly every public pronouncement that spews from the mouth of Cornel West is literally dripping with racial innuendo? His latest racist slander is that MSNBC is the ‘Rent a Negro’ network.
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    Cornel West spews more racist rhetoric than any Republican in America. The reason for that is he’s essentially an entertainer who specializes in shock and race-baiting as his one and only routine. Clear evidence of that is he's over the top in everything that defines him - he's over the top in his personal image, in his overly gesticulative presentation, and his rhetoric is invariably inflammatory. Everything about him is a contrivance that’s specifically designed to bring attention to himself. The actual issues are meaningless to him. They're nothing more than a platform to launch his performance. In short, Cornel West is the Liberace of faux intellectualism.

    CORNEL WEST USES A FALSE "LOVE OF BLACK PEOPLE" TO SLANDER BLACK PEOPLE WHO OVERSHADOW HIM

    West routinely uses policy differences as a pretext for making unsubstantiated and slanderous assertions about the character of the president and every other high-profile Black person who overshadows him:
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    1). President Obama is "a war criminal."
    2). President Obama is "a black mascot of Wall Street oligarchs . . ."
    3). President Obama is "a black puppet of corporate plutocrats."
    4). President Obama is "a Rockefeller Republican in Blackface."
    5). President Obama "has a certain rootlessness, a deracination."
    6). President Obama Is "Afraid Of Free Black Men."
    7). President Obama is "a global George Zimmerman."
    8). Dr. Harris-Perry is "a fake and a fraud"
    9). Dr. Michael Eric Dyson "is a sellout."
    10). Al Sharpton "is a sellout."
    11). MSNBC is the "Rent a Negro Network."
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    Not one of the above assertions is a disciplined, constructive, or scholarly assessment of the facts. On the contrary, they're the reckless and intellectually undisciplined rants of a bitter, self-serving, and severely discredited academic fraud..
    For Cornel West there’s something ‘racially defective’ about every Black person who has the audacity to preempt Cornel West from the limelight. West has a propensity for trying to denigrate the character of people whose been in the trenches for years, while West himself has done absolutely nothing beyond running his mouth. In order to gain clear evidence of that fact one simply has to ask oneself, what efforts have West made to try to improve the plight of the Black community?
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    1). Is he in the community teaching 3rd grade to help ensure a better education for our children, or teaching at an Historically Black College or University to help "enlighten" young Black students?
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    No. He’s never taught at a school that more than 1% of Black students can even afford to have lunch in throughout his entire career.
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    2). Is he in the community teaching our young men to cherish, honor, and respect our Black women - the very womb of our culture?
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    No. He’s out trying to sell books filled with inane and misleading information, doing $30,000 an hour speeches, and trying to become a hip hop star.
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    3). Is he advising his good friend and business partner, Tavis Smiley, to be consistent with his sermons by being "accountable" to the community, and returning the money that he made on the Wells Fargo "Ghetto Scam" loans that he helped to herd over 30,000 poor minorities into?
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    Nope, not a peep.

    http://wattree.blogspot.com/2013/07/beneath-spin-eric-l.html


    by Wattree on Fri, 06/27/2014 - 9:59pm

    An ad hominem is only an ad hominem if is not true.

    Con respetto, as Plato used to say, μαλακίες...(bullshit)

     

    An ad hominem is an ad hominem when it elides direct confrontation of the proposition to which it purports to adduce rebuttal, relying instead upon vilification of the proposer.  It is, alas, the stock in trade of the poster where our dear brother is concerned.

     

    Carry on.


    by jollyroger on Fri, 06/27/2014 - 11:41pm

    Jollyroger,

    RULE OF THUMB: Unless you’re absolutely SURE you know what you’re talking about, always leave yourself some wiggle room. Better yet, always research your subject before you shoot of your mouth.

    Fair Use of an Ad Hominem
     

    "What types of ad hominems might then be justified? Walton argues that an ad hominem is valid when the claims made about a person’s character or actions are relevant to the conclusions being drawn. Consider, for example, former New York governor Eliot Spitzer, who was caught on a wiretap arranging to hire a prostitute for $4,300. Because this behavior ran counter to Spitzer’s anticorruption platform, its unveiling would prevent Spitzer from governing successfully; thus, criticizing this aspect of his character was relevant and fair. In an earlier scandal, in 1987, televangelist Jimmy Swaggart was seen at a motel with a prostitute. Because his behavior undercut his preaching and status as a Christian role model, a character attack based on this incident would have been spot-on."

    And, Jollyroger, stop tying to sound intellectual and communicate. It makes you sound like a pretentious fool.

    http://www.scientificamerican.com/article/character-attack/

     

     


    by Wattree on Sat, 06/28/2014 - 10:46pm

    The article confirms jollyroger's point that an ad hominem is an ad hominem whether the charges made are true or not.

    In regards to my comment, I wasn't condemning your use of ad hominem arguments per se, only pointing out that it places you outside the place of direct confrontation with the man.


    by moat on Sun, 06/29/2014 - 11:57am

    Moat,

    If you’re in a debate with an individual - on, let’s say, the origin of the universe - and an element of the debate is your opponent’s expertise, it is not an ad hominem to challenge the person’s expertise. Likewise, much of Cornel West’s rhetoric is based upon his "love for the people," so it is not improper to challenge his love for the people. And finally, on subjects that are base on speculation, like what motivates Obama to make the decisions that he’s making, much of Cornel West’s credibility is based on his supposed insight and brilliance, so it is not an ad hominem to challenge that insight and brilliance, since everything else is pure speculation. So if he makes an allegation regarding why Obama made a given decision, it is not improper to explore what motivated West to make the allegation, and to take the position that he's taken on the issue. After all, Cornel West's stormy history with President Obama makes West himself an element of the debate, since he's not without an agenda.

     


    by Wattree on Sun, 06/29/2014 - 12:38pm

    The article you cite makes a good case for when the use of ad hominem arguments are justified. To appeal to that logic and also claim that when it is justified, the argument is no longer an ad hominem attack, mystifies me. It is having your cake but also having the cake completely disappear before you take a bite.

    I don't get the feeling that the second paragraph of my original comment was read as carefully as it could have been. West opens himself up for the kind of criticism you deploy by taking the place he claims for his message. I have no problem with that criticism being put forward. But there is a cost for going down that way. You cannot both degrade the voice of an opponent and argue with what they say at the same time.  There is no debate between you two underway.


    by moat on Sun, 06/29/2014 - 5:42pm

    Moat, it is not my intend to debate Cornel West,  I'm merely making it clear to the Black community what they are listening to. This is not an academic setting; this is reality, so it's very important that the people have enough information to assess the value of what they a listening to. And by the way, to call RM a sock puppet WAS an ad hominem - and a completely unsubstantiated and unwarranted assumption as well. In short, it was, for lack of a better word, DUMB, and uncalled for.


    by Wattree on Mon, 06/30/2014 - 9:15pm

    It was dumb and against the dagblog TOS for me to assert that you were writing as rm. I reacted poorly to seeing your same argument being repeated verbatim by him. Please accept my apology.

    I understand that you don't want to debate with West but silence him. For you, he has displayed the direct hypocrisy of the kind demonstrated by Spitzer and Swaggart. West makes personal denunciations of peoples' character and motives so I get how that invites others to return the favor. The point I have been trying to make is that such activity runs the risk of working in the same manner as your adversaries; A circular firing squad of people calling each other Uncle Tom and House Negro.

    This is not an academic setting but there are intellectual consequences of pursing different objectives. For instance, I am of the opinion that the Bush family is a criminal enterprise. There are many people pursuing that line of thought in the hopes of proving it to the world. I am more interested in struggling against the logic of GWB's administration's National Security Strategy. To attempt to argue on the basis of Bush's intentions in the formation of the document would be intellectually dishonest and be dismissed out of hand.


    by moat on Tue, 07/01/2014 - 10:29am

    Wasn't the point of the SciAm article that there were fair uses of ad hominem attacks? Calling Spitzer a "John" is not an ad hominem if you are talking about his ability to remain above reproach when prosecuting prostitutes and their costumers.


    by rmrd0000 on Sun, 06/29/2014 - 3:33pm

    RM,

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    I think it does. But these arguments are academic at any rate, since I don’t let arbitrary rules of the game put in place by some named or nameless dead person guide my behavior anyway. I decide what I think is appropriate, and no one else, regardless to how lauded that person happens to be, because I never give ANYONE’S ability to think priority over my own. That is one of the huge problems that I think we have in our society, and the basis of my challenge of Cornel West in the first place. All of my articles, in one way or another, are dedicated to the proposition that we should never allow anyone else to do our thinking for us.

    So I ALWAYS challenge both "common wisdom" and authority, because those are exactly the things that are used to manipulate us. Thus, when I approach ANY subject, I don’t care what it is, I’m not going to rely on what Socrates said, I’m going to think it through for myself. Because as far as I’m concern, to assume that Socrates has more sense than I do is an unwarranted assumption. As I see it, that’s what it means to be an independent thinker, and that’s what we all should be.


    by Wattree on Sun, 06/29/2014 - 8:34pm

    Rm is your sock puppet. Or if he isn't, he might as well be. Whatever.

    If you really want to oppose what Dr. Cornel says, the opportunity is there. An independent thinker doesn't have to cut down his opponent to zero before engaging with him.

    Just begin.


    by moat on Sun, 06/29/2014 - 9:21pm

    Actually, I was only interested in the SciAm article take on ad hominem attacks,  Thanks for your help,


    by rmrd0000 on Sun, 06/29/2014 - 9:45pm

    Not sure I am helping.

    I wouldn't blame you if you thought I was a jerk.

    I am feeling these matters out with my tiny mind.


    by moat on Sun, 06/29/2014 - 10:00pm

    Moat,

    Much of what you say is true about the danger of circular firing squad, but I don’t think it applies here. First of all, it is absolutely necessary for me to do what I’m doing, because of Cornel West’s credibility is based upon the system building him up in many Black people’s eyes to be so much more educated that many of them are that he’s above reproach. So I can’t go after him in the traditional way; I have to go after him in away that things are done in the Black community. I’ve got to say in no uncertain terms that "He ain’t shit" - and then back it up with facts. It’s a cultural thing.

    So if you notice, I don’t go after Cornel in the way he criticizes President Obama, using broad unsubstantiated allegations - Obama is afraid of a free Black man." I make specific allegations, and then I begin to substantiate them in the following sentence, or no later than the following paragraph. I say, for example:

    "Cornel West came into prominence during a time when there was a raging debate going on over the racist claim that due to the "artificial boost" that Black professionals were getting from affirmative action, they weren’t as competent as their White counterparts. And during that same time there was also a debate going on over the claim by some White scholars that Black people were innately intellectually inferior to White people and the rest of the population.
    .
    "As a result of those debates, and the fact that West had an association with White Ivy League universities, the Black community embraced him as the poster child for Black intellectual competence without taking the time to vet him like we should have. It was that mistake that has led to the flawed intellectual monster - and the total embarrassment to many in the Black community - that we have today."
     

    Any Black person who was around during those times know that’s a fact. Then, even though many people would back me up in my assessment of history in that regard, I still back it up with easily observable facts:

    "But why would the system want to bestow this favored stature upon Cornel West?"

    "Due to West’s flamboyance, tendency to be self-serving, and lack of true depth, in spite of his highfalutin rhetoric, he doesn’t pose a real threat to the status quo. In addition, his flamboyance distracts the people’s attention away from more serious and sober-minded thinkers with a serious agenda. And I don't mean to imply that this is some kind of covert conspiracy, to the extent that everybody's involved with the expressed purpose of trying to undermining the Black community. The conspiracy is on a much deeper level, on the level of those who manipulate the mores of our society as a whole.
    .
    "For example, the television producers who schedule Cornel West for appearances are not engaged in a conspiracy. They're simply doing their jobs. It's just the way that our system is set up - to promote the most entertaining personalities to the public. As a result, people like Cornel West tend to be the ones who bubble to the surface, not the people with the more sober-minded agendas. So the conspiracy resides on the level of those who are purposely conspiring to dumb-down America - those who conspired to abolish the Freedom of Information Act, and those who are coordinating the brutal assault on the nation's public educational system. That's where the conspiracy resides, and it's definitely real."

    So I try to use my writings as a "teaching moment," to help the reader see what I see, and I can’t do that without being highly critical of West, because I see him as malevolent, self-serving, caricature of a legitimate intellectual. I can’t say that and adhere to the niceties of polite society at the same time. So we have a saying in the Black community - "Just call a hat a hat." So that’s what I do.

    While that may seem unduly harsh, or even abusive to you, that’s attributable to our cultural differences and sensibilities.


    by Wattree on Thu, 07/03/2014 - 10:04pm