While the Christian right has been making a case against Planned Parenthood, a healthcare provider, on the basis of its “affront to ‘Christian values,” some see room to defend the organization on religious grounds. Mara Willard, “Can There Be a Religious Response to Planned Parenthood’s Critics,” looks at the way this defense is being made. [...]
Tag archives for civil rights
Rhetoric at Work: the long history of Minnesota’s Marriage Amendment Defeat
A well-made, in-depth story on everything that went into defeating Minnesota’s Marriage Amendment. Although the word “rhetoric” never comes up, anyone doing rhetoric will quickly recognize the forces behind the successful campaign. “Eighteen Months to History: How the Minnesota Marriage Amendment Was Defeated–money, passion, allies” (via Minnesota Public Radio)
category: Things Rhetorical
Who Created the Voter-Fraud Myth?
Imagine this: “You are hereby notified that your right to vote has been challenged by a qualified elector…” Writing for the New Yorker (10/29/12), Jane Meyer tells about the man behind the myth that American elections are threatened by fraudulent voters. Many election experts say that Hans von Spakovsky, a conservative Republican lawyer who served [...]
category: Things Critical, Things Rhetorical
on Talking Back via Identity Politics
Deedee Garcia Blase (R-AZ) forms the National Tequila Party in the hopes of motivating would-be Latino voters to get out to the polls in 2012 in response to the anti-immigration rhetoric of the Tea Party. Note that Garcia Blase is Republican, and note that National Tequila Party doesn’t overtly identify with either the Left or [...]
category: Things General, Things Rhetorical
tags: civil rights, class, discourse, ethnicity, history, immigration, latino/a, national identity, race
Bartering for Citizenship
A few weeks ago I wrote about the possible (read: likely) effects of employing certain rhetoric when advocating for same-sex marriage (namely that which aligns homosexuality with heteronormativity…homonormativity?). Historically, civil rights discourses have pitted minority groups against the dominant group in a sort of “tit-for-tat”; if you want this, then you have to give this [...]
category: Things Critical, Things Rhetorical