Criticizing critics of the critic

There's little doubt that dominant society (meaning mainstream society) favors the optimist over the pessimist, the pollyanna over the critic -- at least when it comes to protecting its own ideological and normative turf.

The critic of the status quo, things as they are, and apparently as most people want them to be, is immediately put on the rhetorical defensive for being too negative. A recent debate I had with friends over the socially constructed nature of fatherhood and its limited and restricted contours illustrates this point.

Not long after I challenged the notion that women are "naturally" more nurturing, my friends were on me for being "too negative." And once you're labeled as negative, as pessimistic, as "too critical," then everyone is allowed to shut you out, shout you down, and so on -- on the "obvious" grounds that a critic is, well, "bad."

In the end, no one needs to entertain your ideas, thoughts, or criticisms intellectually. That's too much work and/or it's too threatening to the status quo. Basically, many people don't want to (or aren't able to) to do the intellectual heavy lifting to defend things as they are. So, they label you a "cynic," or in the case of the mainstream media, a "radical" and tune you out, turn you off, etc.

(Hmm...wonder how one arrives "objectively" at the decision that something/someone is "radical"; actually, one does so subjectively, by invoking a particular set of social values that determine what is "normal," what is "abnormal," who and what is "mainstream" and who and what is "radical"; once again, "objectivity" turns out to be an ideological instrument wielded to keep particular people and points of view in positions of domination over others).

"Love it (the way it is because I want it to stay that way) or leave it (because your criticism is threatening to me)" baby!

(Gotta love logically fallacious reasoning like that, eh?)

Or you can stay and struggle to change things and be a thorn in pollyanna's side.