Darwin Fish

An excerpt from Jonah Goldberg:

I find Darwin fish offensive. First, there’s the smugness. The undeniable message: Those Jesus fish people are less evolved, less sophisticated than we Darwin fishers.

The hypocrisy is even more glaring. Darwin fish are often stuck next to bumper stickers promoting tolerance or admonishing that “hate is not a family value.” But the whole point of the Darwin fish is intolerance; similar mockery of a cherished symbol would rightly be condemned as bigoted if aimed at blacks or women or, yes, Muslims.

As Christopher Caldwell once observed in the Weekly Standard, Darwin fish flout the agreed-on etiquette of identity politics. “Namely: It’s acceptable to assert identity and abhorrent to attack it. A plaque with ‘Shalom’ written inside a Star of David would hardly attract notice; a plaque with ‘Usury’ written inside the same symbol would be an outrage.”

But it’s the false bravado of the Darwin fish that grates the most. Like so much other Christian-baiting in American popular culture, sporting your Darwin fish is a way to speak truth to power on the cheap, to show courage without consequence.

Comments

[Noumenon]

Couldn't you take this as a criticism of your COEXIST graphic?

[Marcus Auerlius]

Tom,

Were I not at the office when I read Jonah's blog I would have e-mailed him reference to your bumper sticker.

Noumenon, I would actually say Jonah's criticism criticism is more on target to the original bumper sticker than Tom's spoof.

In fact, Jonah & Christopher Caldwell capture very nicely what happened with Tom's spoof here:

"As Christopher Caldwell once observed in the Weekly Standard, Darwin fish flout the agreed-on etiquette of identity politics. “Namely: It’s acceptable to assert identity and abhorrent to attack it. A plaque with ‘Shalom’ written inside a Star of David would hardly attract notice; a plaque with ‘Usury’ written inside the same symbol would be an outrage.”"

[Tom McMahon]

I think the criticism would apply more to my recent War Relic post, but maybe the crescent moons inside the swastika were just too subtle.

[Champagne and Gunsmoke]

May i say that the Darwin fish (featuring legs and sometimes a fishing rod) is simply our way of expressing our belief that life evolved from from the simplest forms inhabiting our oceans today?

If you can flaunt your beliefs, we can flaunt ours, and I think that you're being a bit intolerant yourself to be so closed minded as to post a blog about an imagined symbolic attack on your beliefs.

Here's a real symbolic attack on MY beliefs though. A fish that said "truth" eating a fish that said Darwin. I might add that the only proof that the stories in the "good book" are 100% true is the book itself, which is a bit like someone saying "I'm right, because I say I am."

It has nothing to do arrogance. Only with saying "this is what I believe, and if you don't like it, tough."

I respect your choice of religion, but the following quote from Gandhi sums up my feelings about this entry.

"I do not like your Christians. I love your Christ, but not your Christians."

Although since you probably feel you are permanently and irrefutably in the right simply by being Christan, you probably won't understand why that quote makes sense.

[Tom McMahon]

The undeniable message: Those Jesus fish people are less evolved, less sophisticated than we Darwin fishers.

Once again Jonah Goldberg is proven right by his critics.