The Illegal Welfare Mosque

The Illegal Welfare Mosque
Posted by David Kaufmann at 4:20 PM
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"It's not a new strategy. It's the Nixonian Southern Strategy. It's the non-existent Welfare Queen, or Black Drug Dealer stereotype. It's the boogeyman - band together, circle the wagons, elect me your leader to protect you because THEY are attacking your VALUES.

"Circle the wagons, the cavalry is on the way!"
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http://justrhetoric.blogspot.com/2010/08/illegal-welfare-mosque.html?spr...
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When beginning a rhetorical analysis, perhaps the first two questions to ask are: "Why now?" and "Who benefits?" In rhetorical terms, we are asking, what's the Kairos and Cui Bono - Greek for timing (as opposed to Kronos, which is time) and Latin for who benefits.

The controversy over the so-called Ground Zero Mosque (it's neither) provides a case in point. If we ask "why now" and "who benefits" it becomes clear why the proposed Islamic Cultural Center to be built two blocks from Ground Zero, in an old Burlington coat factory, has become the latest wedge issue. Why now - it's election season. Who benefits - those whose election depends on demonstrative, what Jay Heinrichs calls tribal, rhetoric.

The issue has been defined as a clash between "sensitivity" on the right and "freedom of religion" on the left. Notice that "sensitivity" here has a religious connotation. (Actually, it has another connotation, but that will be discussed later.) Ground Zero is "hallowed" ground. The terrorists were Muslims, so it is insensitive for Muslims to build near Ground Zero. This is a fallacy, of course, but a powerful emotional appeal. It relies on what we might call stereotyping by association.

Stereotyping is a powerful tactic because it combines pathos - argument by feeling - and demonstrative argument - the stasis of values. Values arguments are primal and emotional. And stereotyping appeals to both patriotism and anger, two of the primary tools of pathos. It's the same kind of appeal that gets sports fans riled up. Make a claim about someone's team, and watch the passion rise - even if the claim is true.

Demonstrative argument thrives when it divides. It categorizes issues, or people, into us vs. them. Circle the wagons, the cavalry is on the way! When the group is threatened, patriotism - loyalty - and anger take center stage, and reason and deliberation are irrelevant, dangerous, and to be mocked.

In the case of the Ground Zero Mosque that isn't, those wanting to build it can't be attacked directly because, although Muslims, they are American citizens. But they can be attacked indirectly, and by association. They can be attacked by code-words (they are "insensitive" - meaning, in part, they want something they shouldn't want).

Who benefits? Those who gain when a group gets patriotic and angry - when a group becomes moved to action. (Only emotions get us to move.) So, who are those who will get patriotic and angry at Moslems, any Moslems? Who are those who benefit from evoking the memory of 9/11? Who benefits from dividing and conquering, politically? Who benefits from distracting citizens from real problems, economic problems, and their causes?

Well, who is it that's protesting the Ground Zero Mosque that isn't?

What's rhetorically interesting is that this is the same tactic Rachel Maddow recently exposed in her segment about Republicans using race to scare (fear leads to patriotism and anger, which frames all argument as demonstrative, us vs. them) white voters. Blacks are out to get your money. Or whatever.

It's not a new strategy. It's the Nixonian Southern Strategy. It's the non-existent Welfare Queen, or Black Drug Dealer stereotype. It's the boogeyman - band together, circle the wagons, elect me your leader to protect you because THEY are attacking your VALUES.

It's also the rhetorical strategy behind the illegal immigrant shoutfests.

All these stereotypes - Blacks, Hispanics, Muslims - are caricatured and scapegoated and villified, in order to make "the group" more cohesive, more passionate, more active.

This is not to denigrate Demonstrative rhetoric. We need it. We can't have a group identity without it. and we can't get to Deliberative rhetoric - policy, what should we do - without the values that tell us why.

But like any tool or form of rhetoric, Demonstrative rhetoric can be used for good or ill.

To see which it is, Kairos and Cui Bono.

And watch out for those Illegal Welfare Mosques