Apparently, Rush Limbaugh (Occupation: Demagogue) made a blanket statement about the students at Evanston Township High School not knowing who Hitler was due to their school’s curriculum focusing heavily on multi-culturalism.
Now, I don’t listen to Limbaugh for reasons of mental health and the fact that I sleep all damn day so I can be bright-eyed and bushy tailed when the moon rises. I find him a bit more of a blowhard than I can stand and just avoid his show in general.
Heck, I wouldn’t have even heard about this if I hadn’t stopped by for some comedy at Oliver Willis’ (Occupation: Tool) place the other day.
Having read the background story (here), I am going to have to judge Limbaugh as the one who is more in the right, and here is why; When interviewed by the Chicago Sun Times, Sarah Loeb, an ETHS sophomore, said “I think [a debate] would be great because then we’d prove him wrong and open up his opinion a little bit,”
Sorry Sarah, but before you can go about requesting Limbaugh’s time, you need to go back to remedial English class and learn the definition of ‘Debate’ and if the reporter is doing her job properly, so do a number of ETHS students “Some Evanston kids want to show Limbaugh what they know. They want to debate him on American history.�
Debate: verb, both transitive and intransitive – to discuss reasons for and against something
Debate: noun – 1. a discussion of opposing reasons, 2. a formal contest of skill in reasoned argument
Just how do you ‘debate’ historical facts? Did WWII end in 1948 and not 1945? How do you reason that the Civil War never actually happnened?
I believe that what the students are actually requesting is a ‘dialogue’ or ‘a contest of knowledge of facts’.
But they should be able to voice that instead of just screaming “DEBATE!�.
Then again, the reporter could be an ETHS graduate and have completely fucked up what the students said, but that would be par for the course.
Add to all that the fact that today’s protest youth believes that Bush is equal to Hitler and you can begin to agree with Limbaugh on this. Because anyone with a modicum of historical knowledge knows that to become a Fascist, one must first be a Socialist.