Saturday, May 19, 2007

Blaming or Explaining?

You know how the waterboard brigade misinterprets Ron Paul's observations on "blowback" as "blaming America"? In Safety and Sexism, Julian Sanchez points out an example of liberals making the same mistake in their thinking about a different topic:
“In the aftermath of a few well publicized rape/murder cases in New York last year, I wrote that I found it somewhat unsettling how quick some folks were to decry as "victim blaming" or "slut shaming" any suggestion that these ought to serve as tragic reminders that, for instance, there are parts of Manhattan where it's very dangerous to be alone and extremely drunk at 3 am.”
Why do people do this? They have to act outraged, because they can't actually refute the point. I think the definitive riposte to this type of thing is to ask, "Would you accuse a detective looking for motive of saying the dead man had it coming?"

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