I’m really sorry to break the bad news to them during this season of peace and goodwill, but after this week the right-wingers in Bend and vicinity won’t have The Wandering Eye to kick around anymore.
The decision to stop writing this blog was my own, and it was prompted by several factors. One of them is that I’m just tired of being a punching bag.
I’ve been writing editorials, columns and blogs for newspapers and the Web for more than 40 years. I never shied away from controversy, and I drew my share of criticism and angry comments. I thought I’d grown a pretty thick skin.
But the Internet has changed the whole dynamic of the relationship between an opinion writer and his or her readers. Back in the day, if somebody wanted to attack a columnist he or she generally had to write a letter and sign it. The only other options were to call the writer on the phone or confront him in person and chew him out, which took even more guts.
You knew who your critic was, and you could take him on one-on-one. And the absence of anonymity tended to make even the worst crackpots tone down their rhetoric a little.
Now, thanks to our marvelous modern communications technologies, any ding-dong with access to a computer can be as vicious as he wants in complete anonymity and without the slightest fear of any personal consequences.
Being on the receiving end of this stuff week after week feels sort of like standing under a continuous drip of toxic waste. It corrodes the body, mind and soul. At this stage of my life I don’t need it.
The toxic tone of Internet dialogue has a further unwanted side-effect: It repels rational, well-mannered people. I believe there’s a kind of Gresham’s Law at work here – bad posts tend to drive out good ones.
To make things worse, the progressives and moderates seem more easily driven out than the right-wingers. Most of them don’t appear to have much taste for rough-and-tumble debate; they’re barely able to express even polite disagreement for fear of sounding “rude” or (heaven forbid!) “negative.” In Yeats’s words, “The best lack all conviction, while the worst are full of passionate intensity.”
The result is that dialogue becomes more and more degraded, more and more an exchange of snarky and/or crude comments and less and less a worthwhile exchange of ideas.
But is a worthwhile exchange of ideas even possible in today’s political and technological environment? More and more, I wonder.
Decades ago Sen. Daniel P. Moynihan said people were entitled to their own opinions but they weren’t entitled to their own facts. These days, though, a lot of people seem to think they are entitled to their own facts. And thanks to the Internet, at any given moment they’re only a few mouse clicks away from being able to locate “facts” to support whatever crack-brained idea they’ve decided to embrace.
Do you want to “prove” that Barack Obama is a secret Muslim who was born in Kenya? A few minutes with Google will find half a dozen or more sites to fulfill your requirements. Do you seek “evidence” that the CIA – or Donald Rumsfeld, Dick Cheney, Wall Street or whoever – secretly planted explosives in the World Trade Center towers to bring them crashing down on 9/11? No sooner said than done. Do you want to establish that George Soros is plotting to make himself czar of the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics of America? Piece of cake.
And thanks to the proliferation of such Internet “news” sources, not to mention TV and radio programming specifically dedicated to particular political viewpoints, you can live your whole life inside an information bubble where you hear nothing but your own opinions endlessly echoed and amplified.
America today is more deeply divided politically and ideologically than certainly at any time in my memory – maybe even since before the Civil War. But at least back in those days people could more or less agree on what they were divided about – slavery vs. abolition.
If the argument over slavery was being played out today, the advocates for slavery would have their own websites, their own news channel and their own talk radio shows, and they probably wouldn’t even concede that the slaves were slaves. They’d call them “volunteer agricultural workers” or some such claptrap.
How can you have any rational debate when you can’t even agree on what you disagree on and each of the two sides has its own separate reality? I don’t know what the answer to that question is. I don’t know if there even is any answer.
All I know is that I don’t want to be part of this non-dialogue dialogue anymore. It’s pointless, it’s unproductive, it’s frustrating, and it’s worn me out.
So this is The Wandering Eye’s last post. To my friends, thanks for your support; I wish I’d had a little more of it. To my foes, goodbye – and good luck living in the kind of country you’re making.
This article appears in Dec 23-29, 2010.
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Well Bruce, I’ve enjoyed or rather been bemused over the last few years by your observations and I have to say I’ll miss taking issue with them periodically. You certainly have been one of Bend’s leading liberal protagonists and given the huge dichotomy of political viewpoint in our country, I suspect it has taken it’s toll writing your blog. Though you and I are seldomly on the same page, so to speak, I’d like to offer a tip of the hat to you for the courage of your convictions and putting them out there!
Bruce, I’m one of those liberal/progressive types who long ago gave up trying to have meaningful discourse with much less understand the folks you’ve described. I’ve enjoyed your spot-on posts that bring a dose of reality to the raging rhetoric the righties engage in. Just sorry you’ve had to endure their slings and arrows, in particular because they don’t even know what they want or care the least about the damage those slings and arrows cause. I keep waiting for them to make sense, but now realize that’s about as likely as waiting for them to construct a meaningful sentence or spell correctly. It’s disheartening to know how many of them run loose in Central Oregon. The sheer beauty of the place I call home almost compensates for the fact that I share space with such intemperate souls who I’m guessing have little appreciation for the awesome area they are privileged to inhabit. It recently came to me how much energy it saps out of a person, being that irrational and angry. Almost makes me feel sorry for them…well, almost… Meanwhile, thanks to you for fighting the good fight and speaking truth in the midst of all the insanity swirling around us. I shall miss you. Like you, I cringe to think about living in the country your foes have created. I could hope they might soon figure out just what they have wrought, but I’m not counting on it.
Peace, blessings and best wishes.
The internet also provided a talentless hack like you the opportunity to continue to “write.”
I have never had a problem with your views. I have had a problem with the fact that you were being paid to write when you clearly had no idea what you were doing. You have bad sentence structure, poor word usage and bad grammar.
So long to you…
Your last column is the only one I have ever seen. It was called to my attention because you are quitting.
Sorry to hear that. I guess I will have to carry on in your stead on the ex-Tektronix listserv where there is at least one whacko gun toting conservative who thinks I am plotting the destruction of the USA, and several others who get their infomation from anonymous posters. Fortunately, I am not alone and there are at least two others who express my same views.
John
You are delusional.For one thing kerosene jet fuel will NOT melt steel.and building 7 was not even hit by an airplane.Dont discount the internet for getting the truth out.So long,and happy trail’s as you carry on with your programmed view of realty.
What?
Get back here, you…..
Mr. Miller,
Reading this was quite disturbing for me. I have always entered my posts on this forum under the assumption that the skin you mentioned was indeed thick enough to handle dissention of your opinions, which I think anybody who reads this even occasionally knows, differ greatly from my own. However, for me, this site is lively distraction from the rigors of daily life, not my career. So in this vein, I had not considered the wear and tear fighting ideological battles over the internet could cause. At this time, I would like to sincerely say that for whatever part of this decision I am responsible for, I apologize.
I feel strongly about the things I believe, as do you, and sometimes write emotionally about certain issues. But please know that I tried my best to maintain civility (at times failing), affixed my own real name to each and every post and attempted to support my positions with the facts, at least as I know them. I never, ever wrote from a place of personal animosity.
However, when anything in life reaches the point where it “corrodes the body, mind and soul”, it’s time to move on for one’s own wellbeing. If your wellness is jeopardized, suddenly taxation, Greg Walden, and home prices in Bend don’t make a damn bit of difference. Take the time to rejuvenate yourself; your family needs you much more than local conservatives need an internet sparring partner.
Take care, God bless, and best wishes.
I guess a writer (or commentator) must have simple goals. The world is not perfectible. At best we win some, and lose some.
In that environment it is up to each of us to choose how much we want to engage. For me the one I try not to sweat too much is global warming. I think it has a high probability of being true, but a very low probability of being accepted and acted on in any meaningful sense. Or, I don’t really expect “normal people” to admire the Prius until gas gets to $4/gal.
But at the same time, other people with aliases don’t really bother me that much. Obvious idiots are just that. They don’t always win. I mean, Christine O’Donnell is not the new Senator from Delaware.
Now THERE would be a reason for despair.
Any endeavor should not be a Sysyphean punishment and if the blog has become that, piss on it.
I’ve enjoyed your blog–and always tried to keep our give and take civil. I’ll miss it. You’re right though. A couple of the posts thus far have proven your point. Enjoy whatever you do.
…and just think about the days you have ruined of those with nothing more to look forward to than: ‘How can I insult and contradict HB today?’
Later…
HBM, you plea to the progressives and especially the moderates. You conflate your views/positions with theirs and bemoan the lack of civility afforded you by those who disagree.
But then you come up with this: “If the argument over slavery was being played out today, the advocates for slavery would have their own websites, their own news channel (i.e. Fox News…my comment) and their own talk radio shows (i.e. Limbaugh, Hannity…my comment again), and they probably wouldn't even concede that the slaves were slaves.” Clearly a bigoted smear of all conservatives/republicans. Yet this is your idea of civil?
Until you were called out on it, you freely threw around the pornographic pejorative “teabagger” to describe those who now have found their political voice and refuse to be part of the silent majority.
No, HBM, you were clearly a PLAYER. You dished out personal insults as well as anyone. To whine about the rough and tumble discourse that you promoted is at best disingenuous and at worst, the display of the self-pity, victimizing, depressive nature of most liberals.
One thing that you have forgotten or perhaps never accepted is that this country is center-RIGHT and the community you live in is probably a bit further right of the country.
So stop feeling sorry for yourself. Get back up and fight (rhetorically) for what you believe.
Otherwise I gues you’ll now have more time to enjoy the 300+ days of sunshine we get in Central Oregon, watch the construction of new homes now going up in Northwest Crossing (with more to come), attend city council meetings where more business incentives are considered, or perhaps be a guest columnist with the Bulletin.
“So long,and happy trail’s as you carry on with your programmed view of realty.”
Ha! Thanks for the laugh, Bruno. I happen to like sub-literate conspiracy theorists who not only live in glass houses, but have an open mind about selling them too.
aaychbee’em, if I may say so, the tea party made a huge strategic error when it admitted “teabagger” was a dirty word. Before that they were sending tea bags to congress in protest. I think they used the word themselves in those early days.
When the first person claimed that it was pornographic, you should have said “what’s the matter with you?” If someone said “do you know what that means?” the best answer was “someone protesting taxation.”
On the other hand, to admit you know what the word means … that kind of makes you a creepy as the people who use it as a pornographic slur.
Johnny P, when I first heard of the term, I too did not think there was anything to it until a liberal commentator mentioned it in its pejorative sense. Then I had to look it up (on the internet of course).
If you think liberals/progressives who continue to use the term, mean it as “one who his voicing his dissatisfaction that taxes are to high,” then I have some lakefront property in Arizona to sell you.
HBM was called out on his use of the term on more than a couple of occasions and then he stopped using it. Ask him what he truly meant by the term.
JP: “On the other hand, to admit you know what the word means … that kind of makes you a creepy as the people who use it as a pornographic slur.”
You’re kidding, right? Using your logic, if you know what the word “pedophile” means, that makes you just as bad as one. HBM, I miss you already.
HBM,
Good luck to you in your future endeavors. At first, you had me very sympethetic and saddened…..right up to the point where you threw in the latent smear at conservatives. A blanket “RACIST” accusation???? So long, and good riddance.
aaychbee’em, I have a cupboard full of tea bags, not pedophiles.
Think about it. OK, I’ll help you. The problem was never the meaning. Tea and tea bags, are nice things. I made tea yesterday! The problem was a metaphor dirty people created with them.
The metaphor you did not, do not, need to acknowledge.
“Critic,” if you’re dumb enough to fall for that “300 days of sunshine” bullcrap you’re dumb enough to fall for anything. No wonder you’re a conservative.
(I hadn’t planned to respond to any of the comments here, but I just couldn’t pass that one up.)
I knew you wouldn’t see the sarcasm in my parting shot with the 300 days of sunshine remark. You’re too easy, always were. Good-bye.
I, for one will miss you Bruce…sorry, I will not be using the “big” words that others have used…just ‘cuz the average reader of your BLOG and the Wandering Eye, would not pick up a dictionary to “translate”. I enjoyed YOUR views, most times I agreed….other times I did not. However, I understood that it was YOUR point of view. I guess, I fall into the group that got tired of being beat up by misinformation. One just ends up saying “Yeah…whatever” to those that don’t understand, that one actually investigates information that is printed.
I will miss you…just as I did when you left the Bulletin.
Kim Staack Read
I’M NOT AFRAID TO PRINT MY NAME!!
HBM, your sign-off almost made me want to shed a tear.
TSW may suffer a bit, here’s my “why that may be so’ opinion. Although the TSW complete read is usually time well enough spent, your article’s enticed me to reach out and grab it. Your articles were hunted down, read, and usually chewed on.
“I’m just tired of being a punching bag”, I doubt that, but it’s your quote. You were a moving punching bag and you hit hard. I’m gonna miss chewing on your far-out left-wing declamations. Maybe you’re a Rocky, a few more comebacks in the future would be a welcomed read.
Best wishes friend and please let us know where you decide to put your pen to the paper in the future, because I really doubt H. Bruce Miller is done punching the progressive’s point of view into the face of a conservative.
Mr. Miller,
I have for years greatly enjoyed your wonderful insights, analysis, humor, and opinion. Your writing is without equal in Central Oregon. I share your disgust with pervasive ignorance and rudeness, but I sincerely hope that you will find a forum or format in which you feel you can continue to write and to which I have access! Thank you for all the years of great reads, and please keep up the good fight!
Nathan R. Hovekamp
Mr. Miller,
Your departure calls to mind Mike Cuthbert’s regrettable resignation from WAMU Radio in D.C., back in 1991. He was hounded by vicious and personal attacks, directed at him and his family. The insults and attacks lacked a logical basis or solid reasoning, and rarely addressed the merits of any discussion. They escalated until Mr. Cuthbert feared for his personal safety and resigned.
Fortunately, my familiarity with your work was based solely on the weekly print edition. I shared your opinions sometimes and I enjoyed your column always. I hadn’t visited the on-line “discussion” until today. Like you, I wouldn’t want the stupidity and animus expressed in many of the comments above to be part of my life, so I won’t return and I won’t use my real name or email — I am afraid, sorry. Best of luck and thank you for the good work.
First and Last: Thanks for your thoughts. I never feared for my safety, just my sanity.
read a review of below link a while back thought it would be a fit.
i am a friend of Mitch and have read your stuff on occasion…enjoyed it.
i hear you well about the United States of Mean People. The internet has started to reach a critical mass of near madness.
ras
http://www.hup.harvard.edu/catalog.php?recid=30891