The Weakness of the Middle

I saw Jon Stewart at Casino Rama last night. Probably for the last time. He was funny and enjoyable; we laughed; and afterwards we talked about some of the parts we liked best.

And that's all. When it comes down to it, Jon Stewart -- the standup Jon Stewart -- doesn't really have the power to challenge me any more.

Maybe the most telling part of the show was when he started to talk about gay marriage. First, he was making the case for gay marriage. Maybe that's all edgy in the USA, where 45 states (can that figure possibly be right!?) have defined marriage as a man and a woman. But in the audience, there was barely a ripple.

But worse was his assessment of the Terri Schiavo case. He put it as science versus religion; on the Bill Frist side, they were saying "she'll snap out of it any second now"; on the "science" side, they were saying "dehydrate her like a turtle behind the radiator".

That's a completely unfair duality. The secular humanist view, as an example I know fairly well, would be that euthanasia is neglected in our society, and would lead to a swift and painless end for the already-dead Ms Schaivo.

So in an attempt to find a middle, the two sides are lampooned erroneously. (Surely Bill Frist doesn't speak for everyone on the right -- if he does, then my comments only apply to Stewart's views on the left.) There are big, complicated issues here, that require a sane and measured view that incorporates all of them before a reasonable solution can be found.