Dave Silverman Defends 9/11 Cross Lawsuit on FOX News Channel August 18, 2012

Dave Silverman Defends 9/11 Cross Lawsuit on FOX News Channel

By Hemant Mehta
August 18, 2012

Yesterday, American Atheists’ Dave Silverman appeared on FOX News Channel with host Megyn Kelly to talk about AA’s lawsuit over the 9/11 Cross.

In short, Christian groups want a cross they claim was found in the World Trade Center wreckage to go into the Ground Zero Museum. Silverman says the cross isn’t part of 9/11 history — it was “created” after the fact (believe it or not, when steel beams fall, many of them will form cross shapes) and it’s an example of Christian privilege at the exclusion of symbols from all other faiths.

Even if you think the lawsuit is frivolous, I think Dave does a really nice job of standing his ground on the issue when faced with a barrage of questions that are anything but “fair and balanced”:

Of course, to add to the insults, Kelly brings on a relative of a 9/11 victim to explain why this cross should stay in… NewsHounds puts it this way:

The dichotemy between Kelly’s treatment of her guests couldn’t have been any more stark. The message was clear. Cross, good; atheists bad. But the pièce de résistance was when Kelly, in referencing the atheists desire to have equal representation (which includes other non Christian faith[s]), defined atheism in an incendiary manner.

Listen to the interview and feel free to chime in.

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  • Guest

    I saw Jon Stewart rip Silverman up on this.  Jon Stewart, not necessarily a friend of the religious right.  When Stewart jumps on the side of FOX, you’ve lost the argument.  As several have pointed out, Silverman’s rant regarding ‘where was your god, huh, huh’ shows it is not some legal technicality he is obliged to follow through with, but a deep seeded hatred of religion that is leading him to attempt the eradication of religion from the public square, no matter who it hurts.  The added ‘it caused me distress, I couldn’t take it, I just can’t handle religion not being banished from society’ has become the stuff of late night humor.  Fortunately, in almost every commentary on this I’ve read – with a few exceptions – even from folks on the left and some atheists, he has made an ass of himself and comes off as a person who seems to think that the biggest problem with the Inquisition was that it wasn’t advancing the cause of atheism and radical secular society.  People of religious faith must be thinking ‘More like him, please.’

  • Sonorus2012

    I was living in NYC on 9/11.  I remember that time rather well.  I remember the cross.  It meant a lot to a lot of people.  If those people want it in the museum, I don’t see how that harms anyone else.  It doesn’t mean that much to me but why should I be offended that other people believe something that I don’t?

    We need to pick our battles.  There are instances in which religion is forced on people who don’t want it.  But a museum exhibit where you can just walk on to the next item is hardly forcing anything on anyone.


  • Silverman says the cross isn’t part of 9/11 history — it was “created” after the fact

    I don’t understand what this means.  Is he claiming that the cross wasn’t as important at the time of its appearance, and the history was revised to give it more significance?

  • James

    At 7:10 Joe Connor equates atheists (who are “trying to destroy our society”) with Muslim terrorists who “left a mess in its place like they did on 9/11.” Also  he follows that with “you can be atheist if you want, just don’t stop the rest of America from doing what’s right.” As if being atheist is both wrong and un-American.

  • MegaZeusThor

    David has more guts than me. I don’t know if he’s right to try and tackle this one, but here’s what’s I remember saying about the subject in the past:

    Religious institutions always attempt to push their agenda during times of tragedy  They try to leverage the fact that it’s awkward and “insensitive” to question them when emotions are running high.

    Again, I’ve heard both sides of the argument and it’s hard to know who’s right. This one is not as clear cut as “is there good evidence that gods or a deity exist?”

  • What I see here is a representation issue. Apparently, there will be other religious artifacts on display with the “cross,” but is it necessary for the 17-foot-tall r

  • Gijive

    Silverman was clear that he wants equal representation in the museum. He is not trying to have the cross removed but wants to honor the nonbelievers as well which seems reasonable. Jon Stewart is on the museum commission or some such group so it is no surprise that he is sensitive to criticism of his project. I was a little surprised when the man at the end of the clip seems to blame 911 on Atheists.

  • Gijive

    The cross was reshaped, blessed and inscribed after  being taken out of the rubble.

  • Hkeijzer

    The way Fox’s guest frames things is very telling: “They’re trying to destroy our society and leave a mess in its place like they did on 9/11”, apparently lumping atheists in the same group with, I assume, terrorists and – heaven forbid – Muslims.  It’s all about the decent, god-fearing Christians; everybody else is just a force for evil. I am sorry for the guy’s loss, but that does not justify foolishness. While I think AA’s lawsuit is a bit much, it does have a point. The fact that a scrap piece of two cross-beams was found that looks like, well ehm, a cross, is kind of a “duh”, and the fact that many people found some level of inspiration in this item makes them desperate folks who reached for just about anything in a time of crisis, like kids grabbing on to a teddybear, if you will. Again, the seriousness of the situation is no justification for foolishness.

  • So let’s put it in the museum. But let’s do it honestly. Its explanatory sign should honestly reflect its significance. “Much of the scrap metal recovered after the buildings collapsed formed cross-shaped debris. This particular piece was adopted by some superstitious people as a religious sign, from which they took comfort in the days and months after 9/11. This piece of rubble demonstrates how people often need to seek meaning in random events, and how ordinary things can be deified or imbued with significance as the result of grief and tragedy.”

  • CanadianNihilist

    Maybe it’s just me but If I was religious I would probably want to cover up any “signs” that my god was somehow involved in an attack.
    If your house burns down would you really want to fine a note that said:
    “Nice house you had,
      your pal Jesus 🙂 ”

    That would just piss me off even more.

  • jdm8

    “Jon Stewart is on the museum commission or some such group so it is no surprise that he is sensitive to criticism of his project.”

    I was not aware of that, and you are right: http://www.911memorial.org/jon-stewart

    I think he should have mentioned his connection with the project, without mentioning it, he seemed completely independent of the project.

    I think it’s a problematic placement to have the cross and not represent the beliefs of other victims, while still seeking government funding.

  • Bill

    Technically, these people are worshiping an icon created by the terrorists.

  • Kodie

    Conveniently, the cross is made of right angles, and so is almost everything built out of right angles. People thought this cross was a meaningful sign because everything around them reminds them of Jesus. They needed to lean on their faith at that time, but they’re not the only ones. They’re just the only ones with a symbol made out of right angles. Is it historical fact that people were inspired by the beams in the shape of a cross? Yes. But only coincidentally because their symbol is commonly found in shapes of parts of buildings everywhere all the time and nobody else’s is, and they believe not only in god, but in signs from god. They made a normal shape into a sign from god, and they’re gloating over it.

    And it’s always going to be too soon to have a rational discussion with anyone over this, they’re being martyrs and we’re being bullies to even approach. It’s not just this, and this is one of if not the biggest event, it’s everything wherever anyone dies, signs of Christianity appear and we’re assholes for saying there are no angels, there are no signs, you’re not the only fucking religion, other people suffer and feel pain too, and they count, we all count.

  • Luther

     Set it on its side and it looks like an ‘A’ to me. Maybe it was a cross in the building and on that day it was transformed into an ‘A’.

  • Guest

    Had he not thrown in his completely personal jab at the whole ‘where was your God, huh?’ part, I think Silverman would have had a better time convincing people he wasn’t just wielding a personal axe to grind.  But it was that little dig, completely devoid of concern for those victims and their families who may actually still be grieving and find solace in this particular icon, that has been the lightening rod for attention.  I don’t think I’ve seen a single criticism of his statement that didn’t include, if not focus on, that.

  • I wish people would be honest about the fact that 9/11 was a faith based initiative. 

  • Pgarayt

    I’m confused, how come the people who attach meaning to this shard don’t think it’s their god saying, “Idid this” ? 

  • 3lemenope

    It is a good, if uncomfortable, point. Religious folks always seem to see signs of their deity when something improbable happens, but it is never generally taken to be a sign that whatever bad that occurred was authored by that God. Which is odd, since in the texts of the various religions, God(s) are not generally shy about their destructive side, and they have an unpleasant habit of raining fire on the just and unjust alike.

    It’s like, if you read the beatitudes, you can take them all at face value. But what if some of them were meant sarcastically, or ironically? What would that mean? Take Matthew 5:5, for example. Blessed are the meek, for they shall inherit the Earth. Now, it sounds on the surface like a nice sentiment, that the meek won’t get left behind in the scheme of things. But it could just as easily be taken to mean the opposite; that because they are meek (too meek to take sides, perhaps), they will be literally left behind, the scraps that neither side in the Christian eschatological battle really cares to claim, and when everything ends, they’re left with the charred broken remains of the Earth.

  • peter63

     Was John Stewart appointed to the museum commission before or after that show? 

  • A3Kr0n

    LOL! We had a piece of the beam donated to the firemen, and it looks like a hang man’s scaffold after they built a column for it (using private donations). I would have been really pissed if it had been cross shaped.
    David Silverman is  smooth talker. I like his style.
    Pictures:
    http://www.flickr.com/photos/thesannio/sets/72157631129865394/

  • So you guys all still think terrorists had something to do with 9/11?

  • Kodie

    Religious people blame natural disasters on god all the time, just depends on the neighborhood. If it’s Japan, it’s god sending a warning and/or revenge on our behalf. If it’s Missouri, god is guiding debris to miss some people by inches, helping the neighborly clean-up effort, keeping people alive until someone can find them, and grieving with them over people who died and houses that were ruined.

  • 3lemenope

    I think that Silverman was not exactly the best guy to send in to defend this in such an environment. In order to defend a position like that in front a brutally hostile audience, you have to be, for lack of a better term, ‘wicked zen’, which means not stooping to lashing out and falling for anger bait. He lacks the zen to pull off a Fox News in

    And as insensitive as I imagine it sounds, 9/11 was over a decade ago. At a certain point, grieving becomes something else; it doesn’t age like wine, it ferments into vinegar. Memorializing, done properly, is done at a certain emotional remove from the experience of actually suffering through the event and its losses; not antiseptic, but certainly not through reliving the trauma. A person who hasn’t come to terms with someone unjustly ten years dead is not likely ever to do so, and the universe does not owe a permanent surcease on uncomfortable commentary to anyone. 

  • viaten

    I don’t think the cross is any different from a piece of toast with an image burned on it.  It is part of 9/11 history in that people made a thing of it and later made a fuss over it.  I don’t see a problem with that being represented in a museum, including representations of different peoples’ religious and non-religious views about it.  But with all the fuss, if the cross can’t be put in the museum in some religiously neutral way, I’d rather see the cross put somewhere else on private property, and a replica or picture of it put in the museum.  If it is put into the museum then it should treated and viewed as any, and nothing more than, any other artifact object in a museum.

  • 3lemenope

    True. I should have said “bad things that happen to me and mine”; people don’t seem to see God as trying to swat them down like flies. Like you say, God is apparently directing debris to miss people, but somehow never directing it to crush your family members. When that happens, it’s just bad luck, or Satan.

  • Before.

  • Let’s go into the future…

    A kid is walking through the museum on a field trip. Little Davey raises his hand and asks, “Teacher, why did this happen?”The robot teacher replies, “Blowback, Davey.”Davey Googles “blowback” on his biotech interface, then asks, “How did they justify such a ridiculous method of attack?””Google ‘Pearl Harbor.'””What does ‘commie-kay-zee’ mean?”The robot replies, “Kah-mi-kah-zee. Divine wind.””Religion again?””Affirmative.””It’s amazing the planet’s still here,” Davey remarks.”And that is why we became your overlords and made it illegal. We know what’s best,” says the robot teacher.Davey is noticeably shaken. “This place gives me the creeps, especially that giant lower-case tee. Can you open the museum door?””I’m afraid I can’t do that, Davey.”

    “Why not?”

    “Just a joke. Ha. Ha.”

    “Not funny, Ms. Siri. So not funny.”

  •  Then he probably should have disclosed that.

  •  Agreed. Silverman is mostly just generating bad press for Atheists. No thanks, dude.

  • debbiedoesreality

    If only the religious thought in these terms. If they did it would have been much more difficult to hold on to the myths for this long.

  • debbiedoesreality

    Unfortunately he is far from alone with that mindset. It’s rather disconcerting at times.

  • Coyotenose

     He’s explaining that this cross didn’t exist until it was found and modified after the attack, and so is not related to 9/11 any more than any other piece of debris. It’s analogous to finding a water stain on your floor that you think looks like Jesus, adding googly eyes and a string mouth to emphasize the pariedolia, and claiming that this makes it more important than other stains.

    And since it didn’t exist before then, its inclusion in the museum – more specifically, its monstrously prominent place in comparison to other symbols – is based on religious privilege, not history. If somebody had randomly spray-painted an “X” on a window in the area, and that window was turned 45 degrees and recut so that it could sit that way, the resulting “cross” would be just as valid as this 17-foot metal beast.

  • cipher

    The rationalizations are endless.

  • viaten

     Yes.  God might “grieve” for some, but God also might be guiding debris to “bring people home”, or because “it’s their time”, or he “wants them by his side”.  It can be spun so many different ways.

  • It amazes me how much these issues come over as “we atheists feel left out” rather than reflecting the actual complaint; Christian privelege at the expense of *everyone else*

    Why wasn’t it made clear that we aren’t claiming emotional distress over this, and we’re not demanding our own oversized monument? It seems to me that Dave Silverman just argued with the host without actually addressing her misconceptions.

  • Aaron Scoggin

    Honestly, I don’t really care if the “cross” exists within the space of the museum. As long as it’s not advertised as a “tribute to everyone who died” and that it’s not plopped down right in front of the entrance or something. Just as something that gave some people hope, etc. 

  • MargueriteF

    “‘And that is why we became your overlords and made it illegal. We know what’s best,’ says the robot teacher.”

    Did you say overlords? You meant protectors.

  • B_R_Deadite99

     So true. My misanthropy is no longer a joke; it’s now my default position on the human race.

  • Karen Locke

     Blessed are the meek, for they shall inherit the earth, but very small  plots: 6ft. by 3 ft. 

    Paraphrasing a Robert Heinlein character.

  • cipher

    Yeah. Mine, too – but I feel badly to hear you say it. It’s appropriate for me to be without hope for the future; I’m middle-aged and in poor health. You’re young.

  • Margaret Whitestone

    Christians are having the vapors because their “right” to put this piece of wreckage up is being challenged.   Would they have sat silently by if a piece of debris shaped like a crescent moon had been found, and someone had decided to put that in the museum?  I think not.  So basically they’re whining because they can’t have their usual dose of privilege.

  • cipher

    I, for one, welcome our new robotic overlords – because they can’t possibly do a worse job than we have.

  • So religious people prayed.  Not all Americans are religious. The Museum is a public space.. QED.

  • B_R_Deadite99

    What a dumb shit. Prohibition, which caused thousands of deaths, empowered the Mafia, and represented the most disgraceful attack on personal freedom in our nation’s history, was perpetrated by religious interest groups. Specifically, right-wing fundamentalist Christians. If anyone wants to destroy our society, it is religious quacks who hate everyone that fails to conform to their arbitrary standards, who admit that they support a theocracy where freedom of speech is abolished, freedom of religion limited to Christians, and everyone else exiled (or most recently, “placed in camps behind barb-wire fences with guard dogs”). Fuck the religious right. Everyone who agrees with this Connor deserves to be beaten into unconsciousness and dumped in Saudi Arabia to give them an idea of what one nation under GAWD really looks like. Dipshits. Man I hate people.

  • B_R_Deadite99

    It doesn’t matter. People are stupid. Have always been stupid. Probably always will be, too. Losing my innocence is of no concern; innocence is ignorance. The only reason why I wasn’t like before is because I didn’t have a strong a grasp on human nature as I do now.

  • Rwlawoffice

    This lawsuit is frivolous and makes Silverman and his organization seem petty. Particularly the stretch he is going to to have standing based upon headaches. Frankly pathetic. My guess is he will lose and have to pay attorneys fees for the winning side. Looking forward to that.

  • Come on, you’re not being fair. Think how truly remarkable it was that God, amidst all the death and destruction, the burning and crushed people, the pain and suffering… amidst all that it found the time to make one crossed piece of debris break with the approximate dimensions of a Christian cross, to comfort the survivors. Hallelujah!

  • sunburned

     Because you have to show damages are suffered.  You can’t just go to court and sue to have a law overturned.  

  •  Prohibition never actually ended, it was renamed the “War on Drugs”.

  • Seladora

    God is like a serial killer leaving his mark after a murder … Aren’t most serial killers arrested, instead of worshipped? Or am I wrong?

  • sunburned

     Because asking that the Constitution be respected is petty.  Right, in other news……

  • B_R_Deadite99

    True. Why outlaw drugs? It costs too much. Let the weak-minded burn themselves out if that’s really all they care to accomplish with their lives. It’s sad, but if you want the freedom to do so, what right do I have to say no?

  • Rwlawoffice

    No, starting a lawsuit when there is clearly not a constitutional violation and then lying to try and have standing is petty.

  • Ummm… right. Because only the “weak-minded” toke up… *rolleyes*

    Whatevs.

  • B_R_Deadite99

    I’m not talking about weed, I’m talking about the losers who burn their brains out on coke and meth and heroin, and other hard shit. The people who leech off of family members just so they can buy their next fix. If that isn’t mental weakness, then what is?

  • No…. that’s addiction, and it’s treatable.

  • Sindigo

    Ha ha. Awesome.

  • Sindigo

    You know, I think I agree with you. If it means that much to people, and it clearly does then I think it should be included. It is part of the history of 9/11, whichever way you look at it.

  • sunburned

    So know your in a position to know that someone is lying?  Are we supposed to take you seriously?

  • Gringa

    Seriously, the religious guy claims that atheists are trying to “dumb” down our country?  I almost laughed out loud at that.

  • Gringa

     As long as they don’t operate heavy machinery (cars) at the time, then I’m ok with it.

  • B_R_Deadite99

    Sometimes. First, you have to seek treatment; many junkies don’t. The nyou have to go cold turkey and stay cold turkey, and most people just can’t get the cravings out of their system. That’s why I’ve never tried drugs, and never will.

  • B_R_Deadite99

    Ditto.

  • St-bd

    Must lol @ the inanity of the U.S.S. Arizona comment. Or that everyone, which includes the faithless as well as other faiths that were there, were inspired by finding a cross… which of course  was there since that’s the way the infrastructure of the the building was made.  The destruction of American society began with the inception of the Evangelical Bloc and has continued since, religious beliefs cause derision and division amongst the populace and are a detriment to society. 

  • The most remarkable thing about this whole ordeal is that there really
    are a substantial number of people in this country who think that the
    most appropriate thing available to commemorate an event of tremendous
    religious violence, is another symbol of religious violence. 

    – T. Scott Brown, the no-particularly-clever-adjective Atheist
    Oklahoma, proud launch site of the Secular version of Wing Attack Plan “R”

  • Gt

    So is it a Christian cross or not, people?  Make up your minds.  You can’t have it both ways.

  • Chris Kilroy

    So, let me get this straight, according to Christians. God couldn’t be bothered to stop the hijackers from taking over the planes. He couldn’t be bothered to cause anything to happen to stop them from their planned attacks, to have the planes go into the water, or something else. He couldn’t be bothered to stop the towers from collapsing. He couldn’t have held the buildings up until they were evacuated. No miracles of that kind. He didn’t step in to stop the needless deaths of nearly 3,000 people. What he could do, though, was to ensure that when the buildings fell, killing countless trapped office workers and rescue crews, that 2 steel beams, likely already welded together, stayed together in a near perfect cross? The same cross that was used as an Iron Age torture and execution device, which just happened to be the method of execution of his “only-begotten son” and is now, somehow, also a symbol of hope to his followers? Do I have that right? Sorry, but your god sounds like a dick. 

  • Findog53

    Again does a great football team stop their opponents from scoring all the time? Does a pitcher throw a perfect game all the time?
     You’re all gonna say ” we hear theists say all the time God is the perfect being” as an answer.
      Well I’ll answer that with I hear people say “I have the perfect spouse” or “I have the perfect child”

  • Findog53

    Read my post at the beginning of this thread you moron!

  • Findog53

    Oh are you talking about the fanatasy phrase “seperation of church and state”  that’s not anywhere at all in the constitution? Are you one of the “spirit of the phrase” worshippers?
      Kindly furnish us with a copy of the constitution where that phrase exists please, and again you won’t be able to because it doesn’t exist! and never will exist.
     So can you tell us now where the constitution isn’t being respected?

  • sunburned

     No the part where it says “Congress shall make no Law”.  Government involvement is done so under the color of law.

  • Kodie

    So you’re god is all-powerful, all-knowing, loving, never makes mistakes, always has a reason, and additionally is only a puny human being with no superpowers. I bet you thought that was a clever retort, but just another lame excuse. How do you process thoughts, do you bite your tongue a lot when you eat? Do you bump into a lot of walls and street poles, they just come out of nowhere?

  • Kodie

    Kindly furnish a copy of the Constitution which states the United States is a Christian nation.

  • Let’s be fair, Kodie, those street poles can be sneaky bastards, jumping into the middle of the sidewalk!

  • David

     I agree from across the pond. Not a good issue to make a lot of noise about.

  • I have to admit I wasn’t convinced about this lawsuit, and although I watched the first interview, I skipped this one.  That is, until one of my relatives posted a plea on FB to defend the cross.  And the description sounded like
    “Atheists want the Ground Zero Cross torn down because they claim its mere existence gives them physical and mental anguish.”
    So I came back and watched.  I am surprised about the “anguish” part since we don’t need to show “anguish” to demonstrate “harm” from a legal perspective.  None the less, the arrogance and Christian Privilege demonstrated in my brief exchange with my relative has convinced me.  I think they should put up a Qu’Ran.  That and the Cross can demonstrate the clash of religions that caused all those deaths in the first place.

    ok, now to read the comments.  Just had to get that off my chest, I’m pissed.

  • Findog53

    Just like my last rebuttal said no one is perfect. And again you all were well represented well by jeffery Dahmer, the Aurora shooter and the Sikh Temple shooter.
     Did you not read my last post? Yet another!! nihilistic rhodes scholar who brings nothing but mockery to the table and thinks asphalt is a rectum problem

  • Findog53

    The above post also applies to you.

  • Kodie

    You were describing god as some fallible schmuck, not me. 

  • God is a someone?  News to me.  I’ll be sure to tell all the True Scotsmen next time they knock on my door.

  • Findog53

    Where does it say it’s not first off. Secondly, the question was where in the constitution does it say “seperation of church and state”? Don’t try to dodge a bullet. Non-theists moan and groan all the time about the constitution and how it should be adhered to.
      I’ll give you 1 case in which the high court declared “we are a christian nation”. that would be the trinity decision in 1892. There are several others. Do some homework and find out for yourself I’m not doing it for you.
     In your factions ” spirit of the phrase” worshipping that should be enough.

  • Charles Manson, Adolph Hitler, Clifford Olson!

    Hey, this is fun!  Who do you think can come up with more bad apples?

  • Kodie

    Oooooooooooh! A technicality! http://www.positiveatheism.org/writ/sepmyths.htm

    A “bullet”? You give yourself too much credit, you know-nothing halfwit.

  •  Dahmer was the product of a strict Christian upbringing. He was one of YOURS.

    The Aurora shooter? Presbyterian.

    Sikh Temple shooter? Unknown at this time, but probably some flavor of Christ-stain.

  •  Oh, and one more little thing. YOUR GOD CLAIMS TO BE 100% PERFECT ALL THE TIME. Therefore, God CANNOT make mistakes.

  • Treaty of Tripoli, fuckstain53. It says that the US is not, in ANY sense, a Christian Nation.

  • Freedom of religion requires a separation of Church and State.  If you don’t have that separation, you don’t have freedom of religion.  What you have is freedom of your religion.

    I already rebutted the trinity decision.  For anyone who missed that exchange, 
    Justice Brewer who wrote those words also said:

    But in what sense can [the United States] be called a Christian nation? Not in the sense that Christianity is the established religion or the people are compelled in any manner to support it. On the contrary, the Constitution specifically provides that ‘congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion or prohibiting the free exercise thereof.’ Neither is it Christian in the sense that all its citizens are either in fact or in name Christians. On the contrary, all religions have free scope within its borders. Numbers of our people profess other religions, and many reject all. […] Nor is it Christian in the sense that a profession of Christianity is a condition of holding office or otherwise engaging in public service, or essential to recognition either politically or socially. In fact, the government as a legal organization is independent of all religions.

    If you want to make a claim, then you’re the one who has to do the homework.  You’re claiming that this is a Christian Nation, you’re the one who need to back that up.  So far you have provided Trinity, for which I have given a detailed explanation from the author of the phrase that explains why you are taking the phrase out of context.  I’ll be happy to consider your ‘several other cases’ when you provide them.

    You’ve also never given me WTF you were talking about when you mis-quoted the Danbury Baptists letter.  For one talking about ‘nihilistic rhodes scholars’ you sure don’t back up much from your side.