Wow the things I miss while I am wrapped up in College Baseball. Over the weekend the blogosphere is a buzz that the person behind the legal blog “Obsidian Wings.” A blog that I enjoy.
Everyone is talking about. Suffice to say if you start out at Pro Ecclesia 's post An Outing in the Blogosphere and Feddie's post My friend, Publius and follow the links you shall get the full picture.
I have to say is that I think this makes Ed Whelan at NRO who this look like a mean spirited idiot.
He gives his reasons for not wanting to give his name here at Stay Classy Ed Whelan
I can see numerous reason why a LAW PROF of all people would want to do this. The blogosphere both legal and political benefited by Obsidian Wings. I hope he continues
Update-
In Feddie comments section Courageman makes an appearance. He is a blogger I have linked in the sidebar. He is a Catholic Republican in D.C. that is involved in the game that has to deal with same sex attraction. He mentions somethings that is also involved in the discussion.
CourageMan says:
June 7, 2009 at 12:01 pm
meh …
Before shedding too many tears for publius, Id be curious to know what he thinks about outing conservative gays. Or more important, what has he written about it. A quick Google search and a search of OW suggests “nothing at all” (I will gladly retract and ask Feddie to delete or modify-as-he-deem-appropriate this post if I am wrong.)
I know that many on the leftosphere now tending their garments over this outing positively revel in outing conservative gays or commit it themselves.
This is not “changing the subject” or “tu quoque.” Civility, ma
nners and the standards of behavior they support (and violated in this case by Mr. Whelan) are nothing but social codea amd thus have to be mutual things. They are only viable when both sides of a dispute see themselves as bound — otherwise it is an excuse for aggrandizement by those who choose to violate it.
And it is plain to me that progressives do not now respect anonymity/pseudonymity when it is to their advantage not to, and so self-identified progressives do not deserve the benefit of the doubt, absent specific evidence in a given case.
publius says:
June 7, 2009 at 1:22 pm
CourageMan - it’s not exactly on point but I came out pretty stronglyagainst outing gay Republican staffers:
Here, and here
CourageMan says:
June 7, 2009 at 1:36 pm
Then, my apologies, sir. I obviously didn’t know about your previous blog.
Consider my complaint withdrawn.
Update II
I generally agree with Ann Althouse(a Law Prof Blogger) at her post Obsidian Wings, outed
She states:
Whelan wanted to do a "you a law professor" attack on his opponent. You've got to establish that the person is a law professor first, of couse, but it's not really worth doing, especially if the blogger isn't using his status as lawprof to bolster his opinion."You a law professor" attacks are a running joke here on my blog, because they've been aimed at me so often. I don't flaunt my status as a lawprof, but I know it's part of the sense of what this blog is. Even so, I think "you a lawprof" is a pretty lame argument, normally wielded by opponents who don't want to bother making substantive points. It's about on the level of proclaiming you're a moron.
Don McClarey sums up my views on the matter at The American Catholic:
ReplyDeleteAll of us in our “real” life are constantly held accountable for our words and our actions. Someone blogging under a pseudonym is asking for an exemption from this general rule of life. As a matter of manners and good sportsmanship, I am personally willing to grant this exemption, but I do not see it as a question of morality when the general rule of life as to acccountability is applied to a blogger or a commenter.
Jay I am not sure there is a huge "Moral" issue here. That is there is a moral right to blog under a Pseudonmym.
ReplyDeleteI just think this was just bad manners and mean spirited.
It does nothing to raise the discourse any
I can agree that Ed probably acted out of spite and that the outing was bad manners.
ReplyDeleteI just disagree with those who are blowing the level of harm out of proportion. There is no "right" to anonymous/pseudonymous blogging, and once one has been exposed, I don't see the point of crying over the spilt milk.
Remember: we are talking about expressing one's views in a very public forum. My view is that one assumes the risk when they decide to go into the public square and engage in opinion-making under the cover of anonymity. The risk is that, eventually, your true identity almost certainly will be exposed at some point.
I do not understand what all the fuss is about. So what if a person uses a pseudo or none. Its the idea or the argument that matters.
ReplyDeleteI get tired of trying ot recall all my log in names and passwords and just gave up and don't bother. always try to be civil and never respond to silly insults etc.