... is the name of the term I have just invented to describe "an unreasonable fear or hatred of the Right." This phenomenon has been manifest amongst left-wingers in both Canada and the United States of late and needs to be regarded with pity and loathing by all decent folk.
Dextrophobia can be most clearly diagnosed when its sufferers show signs of "argumentum ad Hitlerum" -- an uncontrollable tendency to compare their enemies to Nazis. We saw this when a Manitoba Metis leader linked historian Thomas Flanagan to Adolf Hitler for proposing policies that would treat aboriginals as any other Canadians. Yesterday Al Gore referred to Republican critics of his policies as "brownshirts" and earlier this week Guido Calabresi, an appeals court judge, compared George Bush's 2000 election to the way Mussolini and Hitler came to power.
It is not enough to cite "Godwin's Law" -- that the first party to mention the Nazis has automatically lost whatever argument is in progress -- there is something very serious at stake. No one is in real danger from a Harper or a Bush victory this year. Puppies wll not be eaten. Virgins will not be sacrificed. Gay men will not be forced to marry lesbians in remote Alaskan breeding camps.
Attention, lefties: conservatives are your neighbours and fellow citizens. We teach in your schools; we sit next to you at CFL games; we buy your kids' raffle tickets; we share the land in peace, if not harmony. Drop the hate speech and let's argue in a civilized manner.
Posted by Dexter at June 25, 2004 09:35 PM