http://www.ordinary-gentlemen.com/2009/06/not-nearly-enough/

Was this blog posting, or the one it referred to, unethical, immoral, or indecent?

For the record, I don’t think it was. I think that it was, in fact, making a fair statement… even though I disagreed with it.

If there is a culture where people jump to conclusions, outrageously fear monger, accuse others of treason, etc, then people should not be surprised when the reaction of those of whom to which wrong conclusions were jumped, fears mongered, and treason accused that those jumped upon, mongered against, and otherwise accused act the way that you would if the tables were turned.

Manners are good, I guess.

Surely there is no harm in asking a question.

The problem, I find, is that, every now and again, the topic of whether this is *REALLY* an exception or *REALLY* an example of what these people are *REALLY* like deep down and the murderer was merely honest enough to act on his beliefs (which are representative of those people).

We saw that discussion pop up after Tiller.
We saw that discussion pop up after Ft. Hood.
We saw that discussion pop up after Kentucky.
We will see this discussion pop up again the next time a tragedy involving murder (apparent or otherwise) happens.

While hoping that people will keep their pants on until we find out what CSI says is probably too much to hope for, one can hope that situations like this one can provide us, at least, a moment’s pause before we start explaining how this particular Amish person going postal is representative of all Amish everywhere the next time an Amish guy blows up a buggy in a crowded craft fair. Or whatever.

I *DO*, however, think that the dynamics of this particular case are *VERY* interesting. The speculation by some (including not just low-profile bloggers and not just high-profile bloggers but also Time magazine, of all places) was not (as I’ve pointed out) off-limits.

A person is (apparently) murdered, it’s *NORMAL* to speculate about motive. It was the case for Tiller, it was the case for Fort Hood, it was the case for this as well.

The problem comes when, just like with Fort Hood, there comes up a bubbling group of voices that screams “this murder is representative of a dangerous and virulent ideology and we need to do more to protect ourselves from people who share this dangerous and virulent ideology!” Or, like so many Andy McCarthies, just asks the important questions that the other side surely finds too difficult to answer honestly.

This is a very interesting case. An apparent murder turned out to be an actual suicide… that’s interesting. The fact that the suicide was staged to shift suspicion onto people who hold anti-government sentiment is *ALSO* very interesting.

There are a lot of exceptionally interesting dynamics going on here.