{"id":976,"date":"2010-10-29T01:55:00","date_gmt":"2010-10-29T01:55:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/vyrdolak.com\/wordpress\/?p=976"},"modified":"2010-10-29T01:55:00","modified_gmt":"2010-10-29T01:55:00","slug":"my-last-comment-on-wiscon-elizabeth-moon-and-the-islamic-community-center","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/vyrdolak.com\/wordpress\/?p=976","title":{"rendered":"My last comment on Wiscon, Elizabeth Moon, and the Islamic Community Center"},"content":{"rendered":"

I have been, more or less compulsively, following the blog postings and debates, from both sides of the issue, precipitated by Elizabeth Moon’s September 11 blog post<\/a>. Moon, as everyone on earth and most of the extra-galactic sentient universe now knows, objected to the Cordoba Initiative’s plans to build a Community Center near “Ground Zero” in New York.<\/p>\n

That led to a furious uproar in the blogosphere<\/a> about Moon’s “bigotry against Muslims,” and that led, ultimately, to Wiscon<\/a> rescinding Moon’s invitation to be a Guest of Honor at the 2011 convention, and that<\/i> led to an immediate backlash about Moon’s mistreatment by “leftist” elements in fandom, and that<\/i> has led…<\/p>\n

…to me feeling extremely<\/i> depressed.<\/p>\n

I’m a communicator. That’s why I write. That’s why I perform. That’s why I do art. It’s not about me. My deepest yearning is to connect with other minds and spirits, and I just hate, hate, hate<\/i> it when I have to admit to myself (and I often do) that all communication is futile. I hate it when all<\/i> minds are closed. I hate it when everyone<\/i> in a conversation is being totally<\/i> non-rational, totally self-justifying, totally self-righteous, totally dismissive and contemptuous of the opposing view. I hate it when I know that I’d be utterly stupid to say a single word, when I know that the last thing this sloshing mud puddle needs is another foot stepping into it. I hate it when the only response I have is a logical, reasonable, non-partisan one, and I’ve learned from long experience that when debates are this furious, the worst thing you can do is be impartial. “If you’re not for us, you’re against us.” *sigh*<\/p>\n

It’s been a severe distraction. Over and over, I started to write responses and then stopped in despair. If I couldn’t say<\/i> anything…if communication and reason were unwanted and worthless, and would only make matters worse…what could<\/i> I do?<\/p>\n

Tonight I saw a link to a blog piece by Michael Moore<\/a>, which included a link to the Cordoba Initiative’s website. I went and took a look at it. I was very impressed. I want to support what they’re doing.<\/p>\n

So I donated some money to them. If the Community Center gets built, that’s great. If not, they sound like they’re doing some really wonderful work, and they can use my money for any of it.<\/p>\n

I feel a lot better now. I’ll stop feeling so frustrated that I can’t say anything about Moon, or Islamaphobia, or any of the roiling issues. This is a much more practical and concrete way to express where I stand in this controversy.<\/p>\n

You can donate, too. Cordoba Initiative<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

I have been, more or less compulsively, following the blog postings and debates, from both sides of the issue, precipitated by Elizabeth Moon’s September 11 blog post. Moon, as everyone on earth and most of the extra-galactic sentient universe now … Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[9,8,10],"class_list":["post-976","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized","tag-cordoba-initiative","tag-elizabeth-moon","tag-wiscon"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/vyrdolak.com\/wordpress\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/976"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/vyrdolak.com\/wordpress\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/vyrdolak.com\/wordpress\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/vyrdolak.com\/wordpress\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/vyrdolak.com\/wordpress\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=976"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/vyrdolak.com\/wordpress\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/976\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/vyrdolak.com\/wordpress\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=976"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/vyrdolak.com\/wordpress\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=976"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/vyrdolak.com\/wordpress\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=976"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}