Tuesday, February 23, 2010

I'm Sorry, Sir, But You're Going to Have to Come With Me...

That's a violation of Moff's Law, sir.

Moff's Law (as described on the Racialicious blog) was born here, on i09. Moff's Law is the brainchild of Grand Moff Bastard, an io9 poster. You should read the post yourself, but I shall summarize it thusly:

"If you aren't interested in deeply analyzing a piece of art, stay the hell out of conversations analyzing art. Sharing thoughts to the effect of "don't share your thoughts" is stupid, rude, and hypocritical."

I will add that insisting "it's just art, you're over-analyzing it" is a way of shutting down discourse, which I consider the greatest intellectual sin. It's invariably a rank attempt to stop a debate the lawbreaker doesn't think he can win.

I mean, seriously, have you ever heard someone say "I agree that X has some complicated racial themes and maybe isn't as well thought-out as it could be... but why are we bothering to talk about it?"

No.

It's always someone who thinks that things are just fine the way they are, but rather than argue their actual point they're trying to shut down the conversation, which is sneaky, stupid, and doesn't contribute to the discourse.

Well, that's all done. Now that Moff's Law has been passed we can finally prosecute (and persecute!) these people, confiscating their computers and fining them one million internets each.

What do you mean "it doesn't work that way?"

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