When Christopher Hitchens died the other day, many people learned about polemics. Considered the greatest polemicist of our time, Hitchens’ work was for the elite. He was no mere blogger. He challenged lowly bloggers with his command of the English language. He showed bloggers a finer future. Polemicists such as Hitchens can take a controversial stand and use words and images as the artist wields his brush. You did not have to agree with him but he could put you in awe of his command of the subject.
Polemics is controversy. As a Brit, Hitchens despised his country’s pretentious royalty. He was a revered atheist. He was happiest when ranting for the causes of the left wing. He was a civilized Philip Roth. He betrayed those of us who believed in him when he supported the Iraq War. That was how he made the point that nobody is perfect.
Hitchens proved that only the good die young. He must have really pissed off God. The rest of us are cowards. The trouble is we want people to like us. Hitchens got them laughing and then he would outrage them. He told them God, Jehovah and Allah were all full of crap and he almost got away with saying it. We advise you not to try this at home, boys and girls!
Hitchens could debate with the Prime Minister of England on the subject of dumping the Royals and win the debate hands down. He lived in the United States later in life because he found more to laugh at there. Living with a bunch of Brits can depress anyone.
His attitude towards the American right wing was outrage. He understood that these people were among the stupidest on earth and could not believe that they thought they should be the world’s leaders. He would expose their hypocrisy, ridicule their leadership, denounce their direction, laugh at their liturgy and denounce their demagoguery. He agreed though that their basic problem was probably poor potty training.
Living in the Washington area provided him with a plethora of material to polemize. Only living in the Vatican could have given him more opportunity for derision. What might have shortened his life was that he was running out of intelligent opponents. People were starting to be entertained by him when what he really wanted to do was inform them.
Bloggers can only learn from Hitchens as the master. He knew his opinions and bon mots were of value. He did not cast them as pearls to the swine. He was not like the blogger who is a slogger in the fields of the environment. He knew that people would seem to agree but you would know they could really care less.
Maybe Hitchens was right. Blogging is just practice.
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Copyright 2011 © Peter Lowry
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