Unintended Consequences
I was chatting yesterday evening with someone about current events and something quite startling occurred. First, however, I should point out that this person is very sensible and not particularly prone to outrage on any given issue. In fact, I'd even go so far as to label this person "the moderate's moderate."
Last night, we were discussing the Cartoon Jihad and this person made the following statement, almost cutting me off in mid-thought to get it out (the gist):
You know, I'm not one of those people who gets riled up over every little
thing. I have even gotten past the worst of the pain of September
11th. But this whole thing with the cartoons has me just
pissed! Now, instead of being one of the people who are urging calm,
I find myself ready to go to DefCon 1. Bring it! Bring me their
heads on pikes. There is no compromise possible with people who won't even
allow for the possibility of a different viewpoint. They need to just
be...gone.
All of which, as I said, I found quite startling in that it signals a change. I don't think the idiots who are busy burning embassies and KFC's over some B-level cartoons published last freakin' year thoroughly considered the fallout of their planned outrage. If you lose the compassion and understanding and interest of the folks in the middle of the argument and they all move to the right...how long is it before one giant can of whoopass is raining down upon your ears?
I'm not suggesting that these cartoons will lead to a global war and clash of civilizations, but we are building to something. There just seems to be a crescendo building. If I were one of the thugs acting like it was Mardi Gras on Crack, I'd be mightily concerned by the fact that the conciliators are no longer interested in reconciliation, but in the aforementioned can of whoopass.
