Professor Kaveny's response did not respond to - and perhaps confirms - what I pointed out about her conduct. She is behaving hypocritically by engaging in the very behavior for which she condemns others.
During the 2004 campaign, Dean Roche argued in the New York Times that pro-life Catholics could and indeed should vote for John Kerry despite the fact that – in Dean Roche’s words – “History will judge our society's support of abortion in much the same way we view earlier generations' support of torture and slavery - it will be universally condemned.” Picking up on Roche’s equating abortion with slavery, Professors George and Bradley published a careful, logically rigorous, point-by-point refutation of Dean Roche's claim that pro-life Catholics should vote for John Kerry. Roche and George/Bradley used argument for their respective positions. They did not insult their intellectual adversaries. They did not call them names. They did not accuse them of being dupes. They did not resort to caricature. Both pieces were attempts at persuasive argument. Since I rarely if ever engage in partisan political discussion on MOJ (if someone wants to know my reasons for this, I’ll be happy to oblige in a separate post), I’ll refrain from saying who I think was more persuasive. In contrast to Roche and George/Bradley, Professor Kaveny, instead of engaging the arguments of George and Bradley in a scholarly and responsible way, wrote an abusive reply in which she even sank to calling her opponents names – “Rambo Catholics” and “bullies.” She continues to refuse to apologize for her misconduct or even acknowledge it. The most she is willing to say is that her reply to George and Bradley was "heated."
Why is this important today, two years later? Because, in her recent Commonweal article in which she calls for a new civility - a new rhetoric, Kaveny continues to call her now unnamed interlocutors names even as she condemns them (without evidence) of name calling and demonizing. If Professor Kaveny cannot see that her tactics violate the civil discussion she wants, perhaps it is because, to use her own words, “You can’t argue someone out of a culture war mindset – on either side.”
In an effort to turn the tables on me, she professes to be "saddened that Catholics like Professor Scaperlanda can't see how deeply hurtful" it was to people like her that unnamed "prominent conservative Catholics" were suggesting at the time that voting for pro-abortion candidates was a mortal sin. This tactic of Professor Kaveny's will not substitute for either (1) an acknowledgment that her reply to George and Bradley was an example of the sort of abusive rhetoric she now condemns, or (2) an argument to show that it wasn't. Indeed, this "rhetorical strategy," as Professor Kaveny would label it if it were to be used by an intellectual adversary against her, merely compounds her offense.
I hope that readers will go back and read Kaveny’s 2004 response to George and Bradley to judge for themselves whether I have accurately portrayed that response. (Rick has provided links to all the relevant documents) I also hope that readers will go back and read George and Bradley's critique of Roche so that they will be able to evaluate for themselves the credibility of the following claim by Professor Kaveny: "I thought then, and continue to think now, that the rhetorical strategy Bradley and George used was not a helpful way to conduct a discussion of complicated issues involving prudential judgment. It shuts down conversation, it doesn't open it up."
Kaveny goes on to say "I didn't know -- and still don't know -- how one can effectively protest what one believes is an attack on one's fundamental integrity as a Catholic." I have a suggestion for Professor Kaveny. But since this suggestion also applies to me (and all who profess to be Catholics and/or scholars), I will state it in the "I" form. When I encounter serious arguments by serious scholars with whom I disagree, I should not hurl abuse at them or call them names. I should try my best to answer their arguments (just as George and Bradley answered the arguments advanced by Mark Roche). If I can formulate a credible answer, then there is no need for name-calling. If I can't, perhaps I should consider the possibility that my opponents are right.
Friday, November 10, 2006
In reading the Commonweal article by Cathy Kaveny posted by Michael Perry one might consider whether Kaveny is guilty of the very offenses of which she accuses others. Consider, for example, her sarcastic and vitriolic attack on Robert George and Gerard Bradley for their careful critique of Mark Roche's New York Times op ed article claiming that pro-life Democrats should vote for John Kerry despite the fact---explicitly conceded by Roche---that abortion is an evil on a par with slavery. (The pieces by Roche, George and Bradley, and Kaveny were all posted on or linked to MoJ.) Kaveny even sank to the point of engaging in name-calling, branding pro-life scholars like George and Bradley as "Rambo Catholics." Yet now she accuses others of "taking delight in demonizing the opposition."
Kaveny depicts those "theocons" whose steady focus on defending the lives of the unborn seems to annoy her so much as holding "a Manichean world view: it’s Good v. Evil, the forces of light v. the forces of darkness." Who does Professor Kaveny have in mind? Professor George and Bradley? Fr. Richard John Neuhaus? Pope John Paul the Great? Who exactly is it who treats the battle over abortion as pitting "the forces of light" against "the forces of darkness"? I've done a search, and found someone who fits the description precisely.
Here is what he had to say:
Three years ago, in Webster v. Reproductive Health Services 492 U.S. 490 (1989), four Members of this Court appeared poised to "cas[t] into darkness the hopes and visions of every woman in this country" who had come to believe that the Constitution guaranteed her the right to reproductive choice. Id., at 557 (Blackmun, J., dissenting). All that remained between the promise of Roe and the darkness of the plurality was a single, flickering flame. Decisions since Webster gave little reason to hope that this flame would cast much light. See, e.g., Ohio v. Akron Center for Reproductive Health, 497 U.S. 502, 524 (1990) (Blackmun, J., dissenting). But now, just when so many expected the darkness to fall, the flame has grown bright . . . I fear [however] for the darkness as four Justices anxiously await the single vote necessary to extinguish the light.
Who was the "Manichean" who depicted the struggle over abortion in these terms? It was Harry Blackmun, the author of Roe v. Wade, writing (and quoting himself) in the 1992 case of Planned Parenthood v. Casey.
Tuesday, October 31, 2006
MOJ friend, John Breen, points us to an article by James Hitchcock entitled "The Strange Political Career of Fr. Drinan." The article suggests that in addition to being a darling of the pro-abortion lobby, Drinan (and his immediate provincial superiors) put a political agenda ahead of obedience to the Father General of the Society, Pedro Arrupe, leading them to employ various tactics, including delay, casuistry, obfuscation, and calculated deception, to achieve their objectives.
Saturday, October 28, 2006
In the September/October 2006 Houston Catholic Worker, Geoffrey Gneuhs, who served as chaplain to the New York Catholic Worker near the end of Dorothy Day's life, has an article entitled "Dorothy Day's Unsentimental Spirituality." Here is an excerpt: "For Dorothy the works of mercy were the way to incarnate Christ in daily life: she honored the sacramentality of life. It gave her joy that the little acts in creation bespeak God's eternal love. And we must not wait. She maintained that in modernity governments and bureaucracies had usurped - and very inadequately - our responsibility for our brothers and sisters. ... The "servile state," or welfare state, she said, citing Hilaire Belloc, was the breakdown of community, depersonalization, and loneliness. Our I-poded, blackberryed, self-absorbed culture has no time for the other in need, for the other who might just inconvenience us."
Wednesday, October 25, 2006
Yes Lisa, at some stage in the parenting process it is possible to engage in "the silence of contemplation." I am glad you used the word "possible" because it turns out that I would rather speak (to God or others) and write my "lofty" thoughts rather than listen. Even though the kids have all gone off to college, I still find the silence of contemplation extremely difficult. But, I have hope that God will increasingly grant me the grace to be still and know that He is God.
Monday, October 23, 2006
In an earlier post, I quoted several paragraphs of Francis Beckwith's review of Boonin's book, In Defense of Abortion. Here is the link to the full text of Beckwith's review. (HT: Christopher Green)
