Hypocrisy and doubletalk: Lessons from Sean Penn

As many of you know, the B-actor Sean Penn took it upon himself to interview the infamous head of the Sinoloan drug cartel, "El Chapo" Guzman. Why? According to Penn it was to open a dialogue about the failed Drug War. Now, I'm not a proponent of the so-called Drug War either, but I'm failing to understand how meeting a man who has beheaded more people than ISIS is going to accomplish his stated objectives.In true Hollywood activist form, Penn, on numerous occasions, has bloviated about a lot of liberal talking points over the years. He has excoriated Bush II for his actions in Iraq and Afghanistan which, on the face of itself, is a fair question to raise. He has repeatedly called him a war criminal in the past which, again, is worthy of debate. So what sense does it make to meet a man who kills 60 people before breakfast if it serves to enrich him if ultimately you're critical of U.S. policies? How is talking to El Chapo going to somehow change drug policies in the United States?And this got me thinking about how many self-professed Progressives are extremely hypocritical. Penn and Progressives have no problem excoriating conservatives over greed and their compunction to kill and torture in the name of money for oil, but neglect to recognize what someone like Guzman does for a living and why. Guzman would torture and kill your entire family for greed. But Penn would never scream at the top of his lungs at Guzman. Rather, he reserves his condemnation for someone like Trump. And while Trump is a monumental piece of shit, it is nevertheless ironic that you don't reserve the same kind of righteous indignation for someone as transparently psychotic as El Chapo.It is good to be critical of your nation and how it operates. It helps keep them accountable. The Drug War is a failure, in my estimation, that does more harm than good, but how to go about bringing that change through Guzman is specious at best and hypocritical at worst. So you meet with a drug warlord who has slaughtered thousands as a way to highlight the U.S.'s failings? Trump is a greedy piece of shit, but no mention of Guzman? Makes no sense whatsoever. This is just typical, bullshit grandstanding from a self-important jackass.

Right. So it has little to do with progressive ideology. Rather, it's a trait common to all of humanity: egotistical opportunists will do whatever it takes to get attention. You see this kind of hypocrisy from conservatives, progressives, transhumanists, Christians, Muslims, etc.

Of course you see duplicity, hypocrisy and egoism from all sectors of life, but I am referring to traits that seem highly prevalent among self-professed Progressives; and that is that there seems to be a tier of good and evil. At the top of the evil list are American conservatives and their policies (i.e. the War on Drugs). Even fanatical Muslims and heads of cartel are not excoriated with the same ferocity. I find that ubiquitous characteristic among Progressives a little odd.Perhaps I wasn't clear enough in the OP. My apologies, if so.

Interesting. So you won't mind when I use Rush Limbaugh to characterize conservatives then? I'm free to pick the single most ridiculous position some conservative pundit holds and then claim I've demonstrated that it is highly prevalent among the rest?Damn. I've been working too hard at this.

YEAH! That's why you are not a conservative, and neither am I. We aren't conservatives because there are qualities among them that we find counterproductive.Likewise, I don't agree with much of the characteristics prevalent among the Progressive ethos, which is why I'm not one.

Actually, all people have counterproductive qualities, which is the point of my comment. For example, attempting to make a case about progressives based on what Sean Penn does indicates a somewhat rough edge of yours.

No more so than making a case about conservative ideology by questioning Donald Trump.

So that's your explanation? You have heard somebody criticize all conservatives by comparing them to Trump so that allows tarring all progressives with something stupid Sean Penn did?Here you hold the shovel. I was trying to dig a hole for you, but you seem intent on digging yourself.

How exactly should I respond to something asinine that is detracting from the OP and offers nothing substantive to the discussion?What I'm tarring is the Progressive concept that what conservative U.S. politicians do is somehow more vile than what even Chapo Guzman could do. Penn is merely the example -- i.e. Lessons from Penn.This isn't an indictment of all Progressives, though I see you're really butt-hurt about it. I'm speaking in generalities, NoNukes. M'kay? There. All better now.Edited by Hyroglyphx, : No reason given.

There is nothing particularly progressive about that concept. It's just stupid. We might just as well call racism a conservative concept.

That might have something to do with you being a Progressive perhaps.I think the spat between Sam Harris and Ben Affleck on the Bill Maher Show highlights what I'm referring to. You have voices on the Left that are too afraid to really be critical of Islam out of fear of being labeled as racists, labeled as intolerant, or of not being politically correct enough, not self-deprecating enough. Maher points a mirror back at Affleck to highlight how the Left is throwing blinders on in the name of tolerance.(Please note that I deliberately chose Sam Harris and Bill Maher to demonstrate that it's not a condemnation of all Progressives, but rather there ARE certain qualities that most Progressives adhere to as a matter of GENERAL principle. And Maher highlights it and euphemistically says, "Look in the fucking mirror some time! We, as Progressives, have some issues we need to sort out as well.").Yes, it is very fashionable to bash Bush and bash conservatism and bash Christianity more so than it is to bash ISIS or, in this instance, the Sinoloan drug cartel.Now, the same thing could be said of conservatives! They bash Obama and liberalism even more than they metaphorically piss on ISIS. But I bet you wouldn't disagree with that, and had my original focus been on Conservatives instead of Progressives, you wouldn't have taken any exception to the thread.Hypocrisy and doubletalk.

Well, somewhat more so: Sean Penn is, as you said, an actor. He isn't a public figure for any other reason. There are no rallies or donations from progressives to support his idiocy.Trump, on the other hand, enjoys strong political support from many conservatives, so it doesn't seem to be a stretch to draw conclusions about conservatives' values and beliefs based on his statements and the support he enjoys from conservatives. Trump laid out a smorgasbord of fear and hate for conservatives, and they came to dinner hungry.Unless there is a mass movement among progressives to support Penn that I've somehow missed, this specific equivalence does not ring true.

It amaze me when people are so self aware that they can post this. and this and this In a thread called Hypocrisy and doubletalk, that he started and be totally unaware of how hypocritical he is.

Whether or not I question you has nothing to do with whether your particular generalization here was appropriate. I note that you don't even try to defend your position here other than to state that there are some things we can generally say about progressives. Instead you are simply defending the right to generalize in an unwarranted fashion.At least if I use Trump as an example, I can cite the poll results which suggest that large segments of Republican voters love what he says. On the other hand, there seems little reason to tar progressives with any particular thing Sean Penn says. In this case, we pretty much all agree that Sean Penn missed the mark here. Of course that statement is true. Maybe you'll hit on one of those issues in a future post. Edited by NoNukes, : No reason given.

Very true. Many actors often suffer from delusions of grandeur. They become so enamored with their own success and so called 'status' in the public eye, that they often develop a messiah complex. And this is true of Penn. But as others have stated, is he really espousing progressive values? I don't think so. Any more than I think Jenny McCarthy is a bastion of progressiveness with her anti-vaccination rants.For the most part, celebrities are attention whores. They are opportunists that are always finding more inventive ways to gain notoriety. Although not entirely true, many believe in the notion of 'there is no such thing as bad press'. So long as they are in the spotlight, they are still relevant.To a degree, Trump is also an attention whore. His dialog is not that of a serious candidate; it is the inane ramblings of someone who will say anything to gain attention. From my perspective, he is just entertainment and I don't for one second think he is a viable candidate for president. For now, he is riding high because his boisterous tone and rhetoric is essentially sucking all the oxygen out of the room. And to be frank, I believe the more left leaning portions of our media are thoroughly enjoying the sideshow. It's great ratings fodder for them and it also allows them to point out his idiocy for all the world to see, thereby increasing the likelihood that he will single-handedly implode the Republican primary and assure a Democratic victory in November.On a side note, the fact that now Trump is playing the birther card with Ted Cruz (much to the dismay of the Tea Party), is one of the greatest acts of political karma I have ever seen.