Return of the Pissant Twat
In a distant post a long time ago I mentioned the pissant twat. I thought I’d divested myself of him but he’s returned. He’s come back up from the margins from my blindside, being so pissant I’d brushed him off but I’m having more and more confrontations with him.
The recently he came at me whilst in a vulnerable self-reflective mode. He’s been coming at me for a while asking for proof of my arguments, as if everything returns to fact. Yes, he’s returned as a logical positivist! He’s favourite recently has been to bluntly state that I’m wrong. I say fine, if I am so I can learn, can you tell me why. But he can’t, he just states that I’m wrong. Is there a reason why i’m wrong I ask. You’re wrong, is all he can say. Fine I say, so you just don’t like what I say, even though you can’t explain whyI’m wrong that’s a good enough reason for me to be wrong. I find the logic of ‘I don’t understand it so it’s wrong’ bad enough, but now I’m stuck with ‘It’s wrong because I don’t like it.’
This time I was accusing myself of being an intellectual bully, for reasons of intellectual insecurity. I described myself as an intellectual Audi driver (for reasons if you’re a regular UK car driver need not be explained). That’s right, you’re always wrong, states the pissant twat in my period of self-hate. Fine I said, losing it and in doing so proving myself right, then you’re an intellectual Honda driver. Car generalisations that really should be consigned to the same hell as Top Gear, aside I’d come to the end of my tether. He’d got at me one morning before, a few days ago. I hadn’t realised who he was but I’d managed to shut him up with this quote from Habermas quoting Toumlin, Rieke and Janik:
“Anyone participating in argument shows his rationality or lack of it by the manner in which he handles and responds to the offering of reasons for or against claims. If he is ‘open to argument,’ he will either acknowledge the force of those reasons or seek to reply to them, and either way he will deal with them in a ‘rational’ manner. If he is ‘deaf to argument,’ by contrast, he may either ignore contrary reasons or reply to them with dogmatic assertions, and either way he fails to deal with the issues ‘rationally.’” (S. Toumlin, R. Rieke, and A. Janik, An Introduction to Reasoning (New York, 1979), p. 13 in Habermas, J, The Theory of Communicative Action Volume One (Cambridge 1986), p. 18)
I thought I’d dealt a killer blow, but he returned, (in his Honda, insisting that the 30 mph speed limit should be followed at all times because it is the law, no discretion allowed; driving at 40mph on single lane bendy country roads that are set at the national speed limit because driving slow is all you need to do to drive safely, whilst holding up 15 or so more competent drivers who have their wits about them because it is his right to drive at any speed he wishes, unaware he is denying them their rights to drive at the speed they choose, thus lacking a social conscience (actually I believe if one is holding people up it was once customary to pull over and let people pass). But then roads are a naturally fascist system where driving slowly is a form of selfish rebellion [car rant over now, sorry]. Anyway,) and on his return I realised in his ultimate irrational annoyingness who he was, he was the pissant twat. He had returned to haunt me.
[Can I get my job as a prejudiced fuck on a car based magazine program now?]
