"The Shortest Way with the Terrorists" (with apologies to Daniel Defoe)

I’m teaching an English class where we’ve just finished reading Daniel Defoe’s "The Shortest Way with the Dissenters." (If you’re already familiar with the text, just skip this paragraph.) It was written at a time when high-church Anglicans were interested in new punitive measures against religious nonconformists who refused to be members of the Church of England. In the piece, the dissenter Defoe offers an ironic imitation of the voices of high-church Anglicans in order to expose the uncharitable spirit beneath their rhetoric. Since readers did not initially know Defoe’s authorship, many (if not most) believed the work was written by a high-church Anglican and interpreted seriously (and often approvingly!).

In my class, I tried to recreate these conditions, providing only the historical context necessary for understanding the argument, not the biographical material to reveal Defoe’s ironic intention. What surprised me is how difficult it seemed for the students not to read the work ironically. Rhetorical moves that I associate with persuasive rhetoric–e.g. the use of repetition for key phrases–were interpreted by students solely as indication of an ironic intent. They were reticent to believe that someone could argue in this manner seriously.

I don’t really like to bring up politics in the classroom. But I was very much tempted to bring up the status of the Republicans and the Iraq war–not to argue that Defoe’s narrator and Republicans are responding to similar situations but to suggest that the rhetorical strategies both employ are strikingly similar. What seems to us obviously ironic in Defoe’s writing could carry the plausibility of a serious proposal if it were placed in a different context in which we’re responding to a group by which we feel threatened. I don’t pretend here to analyze the motives of war supporters, whether the Iraq and/or Al Qaeda threat is real, or how to respond to that perceived threat; rather, I’m interested in drawing an analogy with the conditions of our own historical moment and Defoe’s context in order to illuminate why/how Defoe’s original audience might have taken "The Shortest Way with the Dissenters" seriously. Using "The Shortest Way" as a model, I’ve written below a pro-war/anti-terrorist/anti-Democrat statement with relevant passages of "The Shortest Way" included in parentheses.

"The Shortest Way with the Terrorists and/or Democrats"

Now the Democrats are preaching "Peace in Iraq." Have they forgotten that they voted for the Iraq war? Do they forget that decades ago, the Democrat presidents Truman, Kennedy, and Johnson were largely responsible for our presence in the Vietnam War? Another example of their hypocrisy is in relation to the filibuster. Back when Democrats were in the majority in 1975, they tried to prevent the filibuster when it would aid Republicans, but it is only now that they’re in the Senate minority that they become such vocal supporters of the "freedom" to filibuster. Now we have a Republican president and a Republican majority. We have a mandate from the people, and we need to make use of that power to present solid leadership.

("There are some people in the World, who, now they are unperched ... begin ... to preach up Peace and Union and the Christian duty of Moderation; forgetting that, when they had the Power in their hands, those Graces were strangers in their gates!...And now ... the throne of this nation is possessed by a ... member of, and friend to, the Church of England!")

The time of waiting for Hussein to get rid of his weapons of mass destruction has passed. We’ve seen what the terrorists and Hussein have done in Kuwait, in 9/11, against the American people and in his butchery of his own people. We were attacked on 9/11, and the time has come for "Operation Infinite Justice."

("No, Gentlemen! The time of mercy is past!...[the Dissenters] have butchered one King! Deposed another King! And made a Mock King of a third!...[Penalization of the dissenters] can never be called Persecution, but Justice. But Justice is always Violence to the party offending!")

The terrorists hate our freedoms. We must safeguard our freedoms and peace through the Patriot act. We need to protect ourselves from the future threat of chemical warfare and carry out a preemptive strike, before Iraq can attack us. If we show the terrorists that we are serious and will retaliate against their violence, their organization will crumble, and we can see democracy spread throughout the eastern world!

(The dissenters are "to be rooted out of this nation, if ever we will live in peace!...[the dissenters must be punished] "not for any personal injury received, but for prevention, not for the evil they have done, but the evil they may do!...If one severe Law were made, and punctually executed, that Whoever was found at a Conventicle should be banished the nation, and the Preacher be hanged; we should soon see an end of the tale! They would all come to church again, and one Age would make us all One again!")

-Leopoldtulip