Comment by PaulHoule
19 hours ago
I never was a regular listener to Rush but if I were driving from Pt A to Pt B in rural America I might find the only thing Icould find reliably from noon to 2pm was an AM radio station that had The Rush Limbaugh Show. I tuned in deliberately on Jan 7, 2021, just a few days before Rush passed away, and found he was shocked and aghast at what had happened to the day before... but did not draw the connection to how the culture he created contributed to it.
Korzybski and Van Vogt warned us of "A=A" thinking but today I'm aghast at thinking that can best be described as ∀x,y: x=y. Back in the 1960s you'd expect an article in a Trotskyite newspaper to start with "The Red Sox beat the Yankees" and to end with "... therefore we need a socialist revolution." Today teen girls read Man's Search For Meaning because they think their school is like a concentration camp, politicians of all stripes [1] are accused of being fascists, and people delude themselves that adding a stripe to a flag will magically transform people into allies. Glomming together all social causes into one big ball has a devastating effect on popular support
https://phys.org/news/2025-06-social-issues-civil-rights-bac...
across all demographics.
I disagreed with Rush about most things and thought he had a harmful effect on the nation and the world but I'd never accuse him of advocating genocide. No, being against universal healthcare isn't the same thing as genocide and if you're interested in winning elections you'd be better off spraying random voters with pepper spray than talking this way.
[1] sci-fi writer Charlie Stross made the accusation against Keir Starmer
> I tuned in deliberately on Jan 7, 2021, just a few days before Rush passed away, and found he was shocked and aghast at what had happened to the day before... but did not draw the connection to how the culture he created contributed to it.
That's kind of his thing. He's complained about drug addicts and perverts, but yet he was a prescription junkie, and also got caught flying to the Dominican Republic with a bunch of Viagra and condoms in his suitcase.
Even if he was acutely aware of the connection between his rhetoric and Jan. 6 events, it would probably bother him not at all and he'd refuse to acknowledge it unless forced to face it (like with his drug woes).
I think you mean 2021 by the way.
Good catch! I fixed it.
He may not have advocated for genocide, but he did a lot to create a polarized political environment where anyone to his left was at best ridiculed and more often demonized. His general rhetorical strategy was to find some extreme example of something on the left, exaggerate it and then attribute his distorted version to everyone to his left. It made him a lot of money and led the way to Fox News which took it to even greater extremes.
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> No, being against universal healthcare isn't the same thing as genocide and if you're interested in winning elections you'd be better off spraying random voters with pepper spray than talking this way.
How popular is universal healthcare in America?
According to the latest poll data I was able to find on Google (from 2024), about 2/3rds of Americans support universal healthcare[0]. At the very least, one can confidently say a majority of Americans per capita support it.
That said, the American political apparatus is designed such that the votes of rural conservatives (who tend to oppose it) count more than elsewhere, so that doesn't actually matter.
[0]https://news.gallup.com/poll/654101/health-coverage-governme...
> I'd never accuse him of advocating genocide
I heard he celebrated AIDS deaths on air, which is disgusting behavior
Yes he had a recurring segment where he read obituaries of gay men who’d died of AIDS in a mock-sappy voice set to disco music.
I don't understand how anyone can listen to that and come out with clear conscience. "Yes, this is someone I want to listen to."
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It’s going too far to say Rush advocated genocide, but he absolutely preached that all who opposed him were not just wrong but evil, that ends justify means, that people with different views are subhuman.
It’s the age-old populist / proto-fascist playbook. He didn’t attempt to convince on the merits, but on the argument that those who disagree aren’t real people.
How about
https://www.etsy.com/listing/500290818/we-believe-yard-sign-...
? Complex issues get distilled into 3 or 4 word slogans with the total effect of suggesting that the person with this lawn sign is superior in every way to people who disagree with her, that there's one exact right way to think about every issue, people who disagree are evil, deluded, subhuman, affected by perverse psychology, etc. You can find people on Mastodon and Bluesky say the most terrible things about the 70% of people who have concerns about transgender athletes in women's sports.
I don't have the numbers to prove it but my belief is that kind of thinking is basically right wing and that putting one of those yard signs in your yard shifts the vote +0.05 R or something just as 15 minutes listening to Rush does. Advocating that 99.4% percent of people should just shut up and give 0.6% of people everything the want all the time is what I expect out of Peter Thiel, not the left.
Pre-2016, I might have agreed with you. We shouldn't be so strident. We should be more accepting. Today, yeah, fuck that. You take your +0.05 R and you reconsider your position. I'm fine with mine.
It sounds like you think that any statement of values expresses superiority. Is that correct?
Also, this is something you made up, not something anybody on the left has expressed, and especially not represented by that sign: “Advocating that 99.4% percent of people should just shut up and give 0.6% of people what they want is what I expect out of Peter Thiel, not the left.”
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> You can find people on Mastodon and Bluesky say the most terrible things about the 70% of people who have concerns about transgender athletes in women's sports.
I think if this was just an isolated position or opinion it'd be easier to have some charity and understanding. That doesn't seem to be the case.
A good example of this is the international chess federation banning trans women from women's competition. [1] What advantage does higher testosterone offer for someone playing chess? That's where these concerns seem to be more "I just don't want to accommodate trans women" and less "I'm concerned about an unfair advantage".
[1] https://www.npr.org/2023/08/18/1194593562/chess-transgender-...
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How about 2 5-word signs?
https://www.reddit.com/media?url=https%3A%2F%2Fi.redd.it%2F7...
In "reality", the tradeoffs aren't so stark.. (e.g. procrastination & distractions whilst on the path of "wisdom" are worth ~50 miles)
(Got that meme from other upforum sophists)
(Plus a sizable cohort of the lawnowners have an unshakeable faith in the dominance of their sense of humor over "reality" )
The political situation in the Americas, is imho, "just" the Monroe Doctrine reaping it's mimetic oats: US WASPs making their ancestral values the fount of honor in W Hemi => LatAm its political arrangements viable in the US via guerilla psyops (pop culture, Catholicism, etc etc).
Caricature: Bezos vs Thiel (note the swap of cultural affiliations)
Edit: just waking up.
> suggesting that the person with this lawn sign is superior in every way to people who disagree with her
Da fuq? No, it's a statement of beliefs (which I share). None of it is meant to belittle those that disagree, it's simply stating a belief system.
As opposed to calling Democrats DemonRats and implying that they're all evil and are destroying America?
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I see what you're saying but the issues matter, as well as the delivery.
None of the slogans in that sign should be remotely controversial. Where exactly is the "complex issue"? "Water is life"? "Science is real"? This sign is statement that some issues warrant absolutism - a line in the sand regarding fundamental values. Such a line is an unavoidable feature of any moral framework. The specific values in question are what count.
The real moral fight is "you should care about others" vs "fuck you I got mine", and this is what distinguishes left from right, rather than propensity to nuance.
I upvoted you because I think your comment, while wrong, contributes to the discussion.