Ridiculous Fox News Claim of the Day: Reason Caused the Holocaust

foundit66 · #1 (**permalink**) 05-03-2013, 07:14 PM

Quote:

Anthony Foxx, the mayor of Charlotte and Obama's pick for the next Secretary of Transportation, issued two city proclamations yesterday. One of them recognized the National Day of Prayer; the other one declared the day to be a Day of Reason. The second proclamation noted that the country was founded on the principles of reason and that "it is the duty and responsibility of every citizen to promote the development and application of reason." Even though we have no evidence that Mayor Foxx was taking a passive-aggressive swipe at the folks at Fox News, they decided to take it as an affront anyway, bringing on Penny Nance, the CEO of Concerned Women for America, to worry that once you start using reason, next thing you know, you're committing a mass genocide and starting a world war.

The relevant quote:
"You know the Age of Enlightenment and Reason gave way to moral relativism. And moral relativism is what led us all the way down the dark path to the Holocaust."

While my reasonable side suggests I shouldn't argue with fools, I can't help but point out that anti-Semitic institutions like the Spanish Inquisition and the myth of blood libel long predate the age of enlightenment. Then again, that's using reason, and we know how Nance feels about that. As Jon Stewart famously demonstrated, Nazis are Fox News’ catch-all villain, used to denounce anything they dislike: being liberal, supporting Obama, criticizing Fox News for its misinformation.

Now that reason is being fingered as the cause of the Holocaust, maybe Fox News will go all out. Literacy led directly to Mein Kampf! Art is suspect, because Hitler was a painter! Could the Nazis have really pulled it off without electricity? Give this strategy enough juice, and you can rationalize a demand that we all live in caves.

National Day of Reason backlash: Penny Nance blames the Holocaust on reason on Fox news.
Video at the site.

So "reason" was part of the reason for the Holocaust?

The stupidity of it all is mind-boggling.

Mikeyy · #2 (**permalink**) 05-03-2013, 07:39 PM

WOW! Fox news again. OMG they took our day away

Concerned Woman for America. Yicks!

saltwn · #3 (**permalink**) 05-03-2013, 07:45 PM

Bring back the dark ages NOW!

cnredd · #4 (**permalink**) 05-03-2013, 09:17 PM

Quote:

"You know the Age of Enlightenment and Reason gave way to moral relativism. And moral relativism is what led us all the way down the dark path to the Holocaust."

If anyone from the Left actually READ the comment instead of hearing something-something-about Fox News and breaking a blood vessel, you'll find she didn't say what the title is at all...

Didn't anyone see the words "gave way"???????...

That means "took a back seat"...

In other words, she was saying that if the "Age of Enlightenment and Reason" stuck around longer and moral relativism didn't rear its disgusting, ugly head to overtake it, the Holocaust would've never happened...

She's saying the LACK of reason caused the Holocaust...

Take it from Slate to not only get it wrong, but be actually wrong a full 180 degrees...

Mikeyy · #5 (**permalink**) 05-03-2013, 09:24 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by cnredd

If anyone from the Left actually READ the comment instead of hearing something-something-about Fox News and breaking a blood vessel, you'll find she didn't say what the title is at all...

Didn't anyone see the words "gave way"???????...

That means "took a back seat"...

In other words, she was saying that if the "Age of Enlightenment and Reason" stuck around longer and moral relativism didn't rear its disgusting, ugly head to overtake it, the Holocaust would've never happened...

She's saying the LACK of reason caused the Holocaust...

Take it from Slate to not only get it wrong, but be actually wrong a full 180 degrees...

I watched. I watched the FOX news guy slow pitch it to this putz,

AzMike · #6 (**permalink**) 05-04-2013, 02:11 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Mikeyy

I watched. I watched the FOX news guy slow pitch it to this putz,

You should have listened, that's your problem.

saltwn · #7 (**permalink**) 05-04-2013, 02:58 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by cnredd

If anyone from the Left actually READ the comment instead of hearing something-something-about Fox News and breaking a blood vessel, you'll find she didn't say what the title is at all...

Didn't anyone see the words "gave way"???????...

That means "took a back seat"...

In other words, she was saying that if the "Age of Enlightenment and Reason" stuck around longer and moral relativism didn't rear its disgusting, ugly head to overtake it, the Holocaust would've never happened...

She's saying the LACK of reason caused the Holocaust...

Take it from Slate to not only get it wrong, but be actually wrong a full 180 degrees...

Quote:

Age of Enlightenment-- a cultural movement of intellectuals in the 17th and 18th centuries, which began first in Europe and later in the American colonies. Its purpose was to reform society using reason, challenge ideas grounded in tradition and faith, and advance knowledge through the scientific method. It promoted scientific thought, skepticism and intellectual interchange and opposed superstition, intolerance and some abuses of power by the church and the state.

Moral relativism encompasses views and arguments that people in various cultures have held over several thousand years. For example, the ancient Jaina Anekantavada principle of Mahavira (c. 599 – 527 BC) states that truth and reality are perceived differently from diverse points of view, and that no single point of view is the complete truth;[5][6] and the Greek philosopher Protagoras (c. 481 – 420 BC) famously asserted that "man is the measure of all things". The Greek historian Herodotus (c. 484 – 420 BC) observed that each society regards its own belief system and way of doing things as better than all others. Various other ancient philosophers also questioned the idea of an objective standard of morality.

Quote:

Though moral relativism did not become a prominent topic in philosophy or elsewhere until the twentieth century, it has ancient origins. In the classical Greek world, both the historian Herodotus and the sophist Protagoras appeared to endorse some form of relativism (the latter attracted the attention of Plato in the Theaetetus). It should also be noted that the ancient Chinese Daoist philosopher Zhuangzi (formerly spelled Chuang-Tzu) put forward a nonobjectivist view that is sometimes interpreted as a kind of relativism.

anthropologists in the late forties promoted moral relativism when dealing with other cultures...that is where our modern lack of values comes from according to historians.

furthermore moral relativism is not all decadence.
Stanford encyclopedia of philosophy states:

Quote:

Harris wrote extensively on how science can influence how we view moral truth. He claims that human well-being, which includes peaks of happiness and valleys of distress, indicate that morality and its consequences can be studied within the realm of science. These “states of the human brain…depend on events in the world. Consequently, there must be scientific truths to be known about it.” Everyone can distinguish between what a happy person and miserable person look like. Furthermore, we can distinguish between a “good” life and a “bad life”. Harris presents a disturbing account of the differences between the two in The Moral Landscape, in which he describes the bad life as being “a young widow who has lived her entire life in the midst of civil war” and witnessed her “seven-year-old daughter [being] raped and dismembered” at the hands of her “fourteen-year old son, who was goaded to this evil at the point of a machete by a press gang of drug-addled soldiers”. The good life, however, is much different and more familiar to most Americans, in which “you are married to the most loving, intelligent and charismatic person you have ever met. Both of you have careers that are intellectually stimulating and financially rewarding.”

Mikeyy · #8 (**permalink**) 05-04-2013, 07:06 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by AzMike

You should have listened, that's your problem.

Listen to what? Faux outrage?

cnredd · #9 (**permalink**) 05-04-2013, 01:27 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Mikeyy

Listen to what? Faux outrage?

Actually, this thread was started as outrage TOWARDS Fox...

Read it again...

Quote:

You know the Age of Enlightenment and Reason gave way to moral relativism.

"gave way"...

That means the FALL of the Age of Enlightenment and Reason...

That means the ASCENT of moral relativism...

Moral relativism TOOK OVER for enlightenment and reason, so moral relativism is the cause for the Holocaust...NOT the enlightenment or reason...

Now whether you agree with that or not is irrelevant to this thread...

The article has it 180 degrees wrong and says this Nance lady said that reason was the cause, when, in fact, she was saying the DEATH of reason was the cause...

Side note - Funny how someone brings up a Conservative blog site and you go ballistic, but Liberal blog site Slate?...Jump right on board blindly!...

Hairy Jello · #10 (**permalink**) 05-04-2013, 02:41 PM

2 problems. First the article title is a lie. Fox never said "reason Caused the Holocaust." Penny Nance, CEO of Concerned Women for America, was the one making the statement. Nance sayin' something and then others saying Fox News made the statement is bush league and pure desperation. Must be a slow news day if we're playing this stupid game. For cryin' out loud stop lying.

Now let's look at the 2nd lie which is the fact Nance didn't even say "reason Caused the Holocaust." She said the Age of Enlightenment and Reason gave way to moral relativism and moral relativism is what she feels led us all the way down the dark path to the Holocaust.

"You know the Age of Enlightenment and Reason gave way to moral relativism. And moral relativism is what led us all the way down the dark path to the Holocaust."

So not only does the article lie by saying Fox News made this claim but they take it a step further and lie about the quote itself. Piss poor journalism and a bad attempt to fool people. Next time just be honest. But hey the truth is not as sensational and won't draw as many people to the story or thread. If a truthful title was there like "CWA CEO says relativism led us down path to the Holocaust" then great. Nothing news worthy there but if you swap out "CWA CEO" for "Fox News" and then change "And moral relativism is what led us all the way down the dark path to the Holocaust" to "Reason caused the Holocaust" you got a story. A lying, heaping, pile of **** story but hey it's Slate and they can't be too picky or concerned about the truth.

To lie about the quote and then lie about who said it is shameful. I wouldn't have posted this piece of crap knowing it had 2 lies in it right out of the gate. My guess is foundit69 saw the title had "Fox" and a Holocaust reference in it, became giddy as a kid, and ran to his computer to post it. If he'd read it he woulda knew the quote was wrong and not even stated by the one they're claiming it was.

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