Friday, February 14, 2020

The "angry Calvinist" trope

Context: Michael Brown plugged Steve's post "Straining Trumpian gnats while swallowing Democrat camels", in which Steve defends Michael Brown against Randal Rauser's criticisms, then out of the blue someone named Stephen J. Graham decided to call Steve an "angry Calvinist". See here:

https://twitter.com/DrMichaelLBrown/status/1227774795812626432 or https://twitter.com/sjggraham/status/1227856666605039616

I'd add:

Suppose my "normal description" of Graham, who is Irish, is that he's a drunken Irishman, simply because "it's the most fitting", even though there's no reason for me to think Graham is drunk. Suppose I just assumed Graham is a drunken Irishman whenever I read a tweet from Graham, even though there's zero evidence his tweet was sent in a state of inebriation. That would be unfair of me to do, to say the very least! Yet that's evidently how Graham treats Steve: Graham's default setting is that Steve is an "angry Calvinist" even in writings or works which have nothing to do with Calvinism.

Also, ironically, many freewill theists call for universal love, but they defame and malign Calvinists for no good reason.

3 comments:

  1. I’ve never considered Steve angry. I’m a Calvinist and I’m usually v. Happy.

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    Replies
    1. Me too (on both counts). :)

      I think the "angry Calvinist" meme is so overplayed. Sure there are some Calvinists who are angry but we could likewise say there are some Arminians who are angry too.

      Not to mention calling someone "angry Calvinist" is scurrilous in cases where it's used to dismiss reasonable debate over important philosophical and theological issues (e.g. free will, predestination). On the plus side, it shows how unreasonable these sorts of people are, which (ironically) is a good reason not to try to reason with them! :)

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  2. "Trump is such a personally immoral character!"

    I don't get it, what great evil in particular has he committed in the past 4 years?

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