In a recent issue of Commonweal, Doug Kmiec has issued an extensive -- how to describe it? -- paeon to his own martyrdom at the hands of the "right wing [Catholic] blogosphere":
A longtime Republican who served in the Reagan administration, I nonetheless endorsed Obama last spring. Ever since, I’ve been subjected to unrelenting personal attacks launched from right-wing Catholic keyboards-blogs (and bloggers) so coarse and uncivil they make the insults of talk radio sound like actual journalism. Further, the lack of civility that rules the right-wing Catholic blogosphere has infected mainstream Catholic journalism as well. ...
Of course, bloggers deny there is anything “personal” in such attacks. My online tormentors like to claim that their beef with me is my alleged abandonment of the prolife cause or willful misstatement of church teaching. Neither charge is true. I remain unabashedly prolife and I have never consciously misstated the doctrine of the church; indeed, I’ve publicly said that were the Holy Father to tell me I had contradicted the magisterium on any given page of my Obama book, I would tear out that page.
No, the real problem with the blogospheric reaction to Obama lay in the responses themselves, which all too often mixed the smallest dollop of substance into a big steaming stew of personal contempt. As the vilification of Catholic Obama supporters progressed over the months, it became something of a bloggers’ sport to conjure up ridiculous explanations for what was wrongly described as my “apostasy.” ...
Noting my continued good health, the editors of Commonweal invited this essay which I submit even as I acknowledge the wisdom of Sr. Pius’s eighth-grade counsel: “Douglas, just offer it up!”
And so on and so forth. Never mind the fact that the "blogosphere" can be rather harsh, (Kmiec, it seems, was not acquainted with the crassness of commentbox conversation, much less the notion that people might react adversely to political turncoats, particularly during a presidential election) -- what is notable is that Kmiec never actually bothers to engage those who respectfully mounted substantial criticisms of his position.
In An open letter to Doug Kmiec (on behalf of the “right-wing Catholic blogosphere”), Thomas Peters (American Catholic) offers his response:
... what Kmiec has in essence done is to complain about any instance of uncharity in the blogosphere. Considering how easy it is to publish a blog, it is almost like criticizing free speech. Kmiec is asking that we shut down (or criticize heavily) an open room of vocal Catholics because of a few hecklers.
Kmiec’s choice to only call out the hecklers has allowed him to avoid other legitimate, constructive criticisms of his position. Here he has perfected the art of misdirection by turning the debate away from the issues onto the personal hurt he feels he has received.
For someone who “never thought it was mainly about [him]”, Kmiec spends most of the time talking about himself, long after he apparently gave up pursuing an open debate in a public forum (or any even playing field). Instead he has chosen to portray himself as some sort of martyr in his Catholic support for Obama.
This is exceedingly strange to me, because a universal trait of martyrs is that they do not complain about or bring attention to the fact that they are martyrs.
See also
"Catholic bloggers respond to Kmiec criticism" Catholic News Agency. January 14, 2009.
Posts
Following the 2004 Presidential election, we've expanded our discussion to cover the public policy decisions of Catholics in public service on both sides of the political divide.
