{"id":664,"date":"2009-08-07T19:15:09","date_gmt":"2009-08-08T00:15:09","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/helian.net\/blog\/?p=664"},"modified":"2009-08-07T19:18:52","modified_gmt":"2009-08-08T00:18:52","slug":"astroturf-democracy-and-doublethink","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/helian.net\/blog\/2009\/08\/07\/us-politics\/astroturf-democracy-and-doublethink\/","title":{"rendered":"Astroturf, Democracy, and Doublethink"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Logically, it&#8217;s impossible to simultaneously believe in democracy and the notion of \u201c<a href=\"http:\/\/tpmcafe.talkingpointsmemo.com\/talk\/blogs\/robert_reich\/2009\/08\/astroturf-along-american-highw.php?ref=fpblg\">astroturfing<\/a>.\u201d  Democracy assumes free will and belief in the ability of individual citizens to act responsibly on their own behalf.  Belief in \u201castroturfing\u201d is based on the assumption that any organized opposition to one\u2019s own point of view must either consist of evil political puppet masters or mind numbed robots who obey them thoughtlessly like so many Pavlov\u2019s dogs.  Belief in \u201castroturfing\u201d logically excludes the belief that \u201cthe right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the government for a redress of grievances\u201d is legitimate or even desirable if extended to political opponents.  <\/p>\n<p>Similarly, it&#8217;s logically impossible to believe that all of one\u2019s political opponents are <a href=\"http:\/\/andrewsullivan.theatlantic.com\/the_daily_dish\/2009\/08\/what-the-gop-now-is.html\">morally bankrupt demons <\/a>and simultaneously accept the principle, inherent in democracy, that opposition to one\u2019s own opinion is legitimate.  The two points of view are mutually exclusive.  <\/p>\n<p>Orwell was right again.  <a href=\"http:\/\/www.orwelltoday.com\/doublethink.shtml\">Doublethink<\/a> is real.  We do live in a world where two plus two equals five.  Our political landscape is crowded with those who actually simultaneously believe that all organized political <a href=\"http:\/\/drhelen.blogspot.com\/2009\/08\/new-rules-for-radicals.html\">opposition<\/a> to their opinions is \u201castroturfing\u201d on the one hand, and that they genuinely support \u201cdemocracy\u201d on the other.  We also suffer from an overabundance of pious peacocks who strut about on the \u201cmoral high ground,\u201d shouting down anathemas on the <a href=\"http:\/\/thedanashow.wordpress.com\/2009\/08\/06\/meet-the-mob\/\">evil ones <\/a>who don\u2019t agree with them,  and simultaneously honestly believe they are genuine supporters of \u201cdemocracy.\u201d  <\/p>\n<p>It&#8217;s encouraging to see that these &#8220;defenders of democracy&#8221; are not only playing into the hands of their <a href=\"http:\/\/www.nypost.com\/seven\/08072009\/postopinion\/editorials\/organizing_the_wrong_community_183409.htm\">political opponents<\/a>, but making themselves <a href=\"http:\/\/iowahawk.typepad.com\/iowahawk\/2009\/08\/know-your-town-hall-mob-agitators.html\">ridiculous<\/a> in the process.  <\/p>\n<div class=\"twttr_buttons\"><div class=\"twttr_twitter\">\n\t\t\t\t\t<a href=\"http:\/\/twitter.com\/share?text=Astroturf%2C+Democracy%2C+and+Doublethink\" class=\"twitter-share-button\" data-via=\"\" data-hashtags=\"\"  data-size=\"default\" data-url=\"https:\/\/helian.net\/blog\/2009\/08\/07\/us-politics\/astroturf-democracy-and-doublethink\/\"  data-related=\"\" target=\"_blank\">Tweet<\/a>\n\t\t\t\t<\/div><\/div>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Logically, it&#8217;s impossible to simultaneously believe in democracy and the notion of \u201castroturfing.\u201d Democracy assumes free will and belief in the ability of individual citizens to act responsibly on their own behalf. Belief in \u201castroturfing\u201d is based on the assumption that any organized opposition to one\u2019s own point of view must either consist of evil &hellip; <a href=\"https:\/\/helian.net\/blog\/2009\/08\/07\/us-politics\/astroturf-democracy-and-doublethink\/\" class=\"more-link\">Continue reading<span class=\"screen-reader-text\"> &#8220;Astroturf, Democracy, and Doublethink&#8221;<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_feature_clip_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2},"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[24,21,13],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-664","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-demonization","category-the-media","category-us-politics"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/pwEq0-aI","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/helian.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/664","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/helian.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/helian.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/helian.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/helian.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=664"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/helian.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/664\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":667,"href":"https:\/\/helian.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/664\/revisions\/667"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/helian.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=664"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/helian.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=664"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/helian.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=664"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}