paradox wrote: ↑January 1st, 2022, 5:40 pm
Just John wrote: ↑January 1st, 2022, 2:40 pm
paradox wrote: ↑January 1st, 2022, 12:22 pm
Another thing to consider when we want to weigh in on other people's personal disputes...what would you do?
Do you publicly denounce and potentially misrepresent people that you consider friends? We should at least be open to the possibility that these people may potentially be opportunists first and friends a distant second. Especially, since they oppose each other on the political spectrum. True friends keep disputes private. Are we honestly expected to believe that KSP and RD did that? Doesn't appear that way.
You have defend Metaxas several times. In this case Dreher isn't talking about a personal, private dispute. No, he is discussing what he believes is a dangerous error in the public arena by someone he says good things about as a person. This is what Dreher does for a living. That he does it of someone he considers a friend only bolsters his point of concern...and how far Eric has gone. When Paul encountered error in the NT church or in fellow workers in the church he wrote books in the Bible about it. This isn't of the same magnitude of course but it's a good example that sometimes things need to be said publicly.
That's a nice rationalization. But, it also evades the question on how friends should treat one another. And whether or not you would actually treat your own friends that way. Would you?
You could pull this Apostle analogy to justify any faulty behavior by this pretext. Let's be careful to not take ourselves so seriously.
Some platforms come with responsibility.
Neither of us know if there was any attempt to discuss privately (although I would guess there was) but IMO it doesn't matter. This isn't about friendship. Both of these guys have public platforms as they debate truth, democracy, religion with others in the public square and it's not like Metaxas has done a one-off that Dreher is blowing him up on.
To use a hugely historical understatement, Jefferson and Adams, though friends, were prone to disagreement from time to time. Doing so, they affected political opinion. That's what these guys try to do today and that people are discussing it shows there is some effect.
“Because power corrupts, society’s demands for moral authority and character increase as the importance of the position increases.” – John Adams