Monday, February 07, 2005

Round Two

The Cole vs. Goldberg thing is still going on. Maybe it's the "gentle Baha'i" in me, but I feel somewhat naughty that I'm enjoying this. It's actually more fun than the debates on Baha'i forums -- because those debates are closer to home, and there's more of a chance that I might be the one out there duking it out in the arena, which I don't actually enjoy that much. Even if I were to pontificate about matters political, Iraqi, or Middle Eastern, I doubt if anyone would pay me even enough attention to call me an idiot. Judging by the comments, the few folks that are checking in here are either Baha'is I know from email forums, and a couple that probably ran into this blog in a Baha'i search.

I suppose I should think of something profound about human nature right about now -- that it says something about us that these sorts of cat fights will get so much attention in cyberspace, whether in blogs or email forums, while attempts at more reasoned discourse are lucky to get any sort of response at all. A friend of mine is fond of saying that the doctrine of Original Sin is the only Christian belief that can be empirically proven: All you have to do is look around you at human behavior!

Yeah, right. Paul, go get me some more popcorn; I'm watching the Monday Night Fights. ;-)

4 comments:

Anonymous said...

Cole vs. Goldberg does seem to be going off the boil. The two are starting to sound like each other, which is a worry. We nedd a fresh new cat-fight to entertain us. Which reminds me, have you seen what blogger Bayani Wahid Azal has been saying about you?

"If there has been any doubt before this about the so called liberal faction of Baha'is represented by the likes of Karen Bacquet being in cahoots with the Baha'i system, a perusal of the manner in which Bacquet caved into Maneck's ridiculous obfuscatory explanation of the missionary expulsions/uhj resignations on TRB should give even the most lock-jawed cultist pause to reflect. As such Bacquet's initial posts can be taken in no other way than a smokescreen and part of the general attempt by the Baha'i system at damage control."
http://wahidazal.blogspot.com/2005/01/bahai-liberals-are-truly-pathetic.html

ka kite,
Steve

Karen said...

Shit-stirring, are we, Steve?

First of all "being in cahoots with the Baha'i system" means nothing more or less than I am a Baha'i -- a religious profession that is not recognized by "the Baha'i system", which does not see me as being "in cahoots" or even friendly towards it. I think the wording of the UHJ's letter was that I have a "deep-seated antagonism toward the administration", so this idea that I'm somehow chummy with the current leadership is just crap and everybody knows it.

Wahid doesn't like me or anybody else being Baha'is; so what else is new? My fundamentalist Christian brother doesn't like me being a Baha'i either. Tough -- nobody gets to choose my religion for me.

Secondly, the "explanation" of the missionary expulsions wasn't Maneck's to begin with; it was mine -- or rather it was given to me my a friend. I don't pretend to more information than I have. I was told there was an economic program, being done on the qt, to help young Baha'is set up businesses and so on, and that it was likely that the deported "missionaries" were engaged in that activity. I simply passed that piece of intel on, and people are free to make up their own minds about its significance. There really isn't any difference between my earlier posts and my later ones, so I have no idea what lit Wahid's fuse -- and don't really much care.

There's nothing to fight about. It would all just amount to arguing about whether or not I'm a poopy-head. At least when Goldberg attacked Juan, he went after something he actually said.

Anonymous said...

Relax, Karen. Wahid's a nutjob and everyone knows it. I suppose next he'll be calling John Kerry a shill for the Bush administration. My only question is, what is he smoking and where can I get some? :-)

Karen said...

All right, all right -- I'll chill. I guess since I've committed myself *not* to get dragged into that kind of pointless argument, I had some steam to blow off.