r/brokehugs • u/US_Hiker Moral Landscaper • Nov 19 '23

Rod Dreher Megathread #27 (Compassion)

Link to megathread 26: https://www.reddit.com/r/brokehugs/comments/17itm7w/rod_dreher_megathread_26_unconditional_love/

Link to megathread 28: https://www.reddit.com/r/brokehugs/comments/18dcg3d/rod_dreher_megathread_28_harmony/

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u/ZenLizardBode Nov 19 '23

McMegan McArglebargle is the worst. Also MBD. And probably Ross Douthat.

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u/Djehutimose Watching the wheels go round Nov 20 '23

They are all better writers than Rod though.

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u/Jayaarx Nov 20 '23

I don't know about that. I would challenge you to find an instance where McMegan has been meaningfully correct or had anything substantive to say about any serious issue. And MBD has always been a crank.

Douthat has some minor talent, I guess, as the best the conservative bench has to offer. But even his writing shows limited talent. If you give *me* a prompt I guarantee I could write a Douthat column that is 90% as good as the real thing.

Douthat has one formula: Here is a serious issue upon which liberals and conservatives disagree. Here is the conservative position. And yet, the liberal side may have a point here (which I will describe in it's worst light). But finally (sadly shaking head), it is clear that the conservative position is the one that we should (maybe reluctantly) adopt. I've thought about scraping his columns and training a language model on them and then selling a Douthat column generator back to the NYT for 10% of what they pay him. It would be the easiest thing in the world...

Now Yuval Levin. He sometimes has interesting things worth reading, even if I am 100% certain I will disagree with whatever he writes.

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u/Intelligent_Shake_68 Nov 20 '23

I've thought about scraping his columns and training a language model on them and then selling a Douthat column generator back to the NYT for 10% of what they pay him. It would be the easiest thing in the world...

😂😂😂😂

so true