I finally got around to listening to Nick Schulz's interview with Andrew Keen, and while I disagree with Keen more than ever, I think I should make a couple of things clear:

TCS's Nick Schulz did a such a good job of debating Keen that he reminded me of the truth of the old saying that the best way to defeat bad speech is with more speech. I take back my concerns about TCS linking Keen, and ditto for Pajamas Media.

I think I was wrong to get upset about seeing the sidebar ad with Andrew Keen's name in it, and my feelings should not have been hurt the way they were. As I explained in the comment to my post, it's because I have been blogging for so long and have put so much of myself into it that I took Keen's attack so personally:

One of the things I should restate is not only am I against any form of government censorship, but I'm against suppressing ideas I disagree with -- even at my own blog. Just as I never asked anyone to pull the Coulter or Santorum ads (I know there's a method to blog particular PJM ads if a blogger finds them objectionable), I'm not asking that of ads for Keen. I think wide-ranging debate is the best solution to these types of disagreements.

The problem here is that censorship advocacy involves a bit more than an ordinary disagreement. By advocating blog censorship, Keen does more than disagree with me on a particular position; he argues that I (and other bloggers) do not even enjoy the right to disagree.

I have spent three and a half years writing this blog. Obviously, not everyone likes it, and a lot of people disagree with what I say. But when someone comes along and says I don't have the right to say anything because blogging is simply wrong, that negates not only my existence right now, but a pretty large chunk of my life.

And I pride myself in remaining calm and logical. Listening to his interview, I doubt it was ever Keen's goal to "negate my existence," or advocate censoring this blog. He sounds worried in a general sense about things like uncontrolled growth of technology, online pornography (which he complains his children see every time they're online), and he says a debate is needed. The problem is, I get a little hot under the collar when I hear that bloggers are "twenty-something" and have "nothing to say," and I consider it a dishonest ad hominem attack. It is one thing to disagree with something I have said specifically, but to place me in a category in which I don't belong and then dismiss me for being in it, well, that reminds me of leftists saying I'm "just like" Ann Coulter -- or rightists who might call me an atheistic "hedonist."

As to the pornography Keen wants cleaned up, I'm sure it's there, but I just don't see it. Yeah, I've been annoyed by an occasional popup, but I'm not interested in online porn, so again, it's hard to see the tie-in between that and his anti-blogger stance, unless he just sees "the Internet" as an interrelated grab-bag of favorite ills. Keen and I are obviously not on the same wave length.

In the interview, Keen also singled out InstaPundit as an example of what's wrong with the blogosphere, although he didn't advocate censoring or shutting down the blog. Considering that Glenn Reynolds is one of his favorite punching bags (Reynolds, says Keen, is "drowning out mainstream opinion" by "shouting louder and blogging more often than the rest of us") I think that if he was truly advocating blog censorship, he'd at least be calling for shutting down InstaPundit.

So, I may be overreacting to Keen. But I think I was definitely overreacting when I dragged the Pajamas Media ad into my personal beef with Keen. My statement that "the PJM connection places me -- and other bloggers -- within the same tent as someone who advocates its destruction" is simply not born out by the facts, nor is it consistent with my belief that these things should be debated. Looking back, it was over the top for me to say that; hence the need for this explanation.

Pajamas Media is not the type of outfit that preaches only to the choir, and just as they feature bloggers and opinions from across the spectrum, it is right for them to encourage the free debate even of ideas I consider dreadful or obnoxious, like Keen's. Any less would not only be dull, it would not encourage people to defend their beliefs.

(Undefended beliefs, like undefended countries, wither and die.)

Pajamas Media has a procedure allowing a blogger to remove any advertising he does not like, and I'll reiterate that I will not remove any ad that I see here. (Although if I don't like what I see, I might very well use it as the starting point for a debate.) In the earliest (Blogspot) days of this blog, Exodus International ran ads with which I disagreed. But it strikes me as evidence of massive insecurity to be unable to handle the discussion of an idea that you don't like or consider wrong, no matter how strongly you might feel about it. To me, the whole idea of blogging is to discuss ideas, and what kind of blogger would I be if I felt so threatened that I couldn't stand to see an idea questioned? I consider Keen's idea of censorship at least as wrong as Exodus International's "reparative therapy" for homosexuality, and at least as wrong as gun control. It is wrong (and of course, evidence of insecurity) for me to argue that my "existence is negated" by any idea, no matter how strongly I might disagree with it -- and that includes Keen's.

I think the blogosphere is mature enough to handle calls for censorship -- even calls for shutting down the blogosphere. (And of course, if the blogosphere is "mature enough," then I should be too.)

I like the fact that Pajamas Media tries to engage a large swath of opinion, and I say this despite the fact that occasionally some of those opinions might disgust me. To the extent that I am disgusted by the opinions of Andrew Keen, maybe I should consider it my goal to disgust him in return with mine.

But far from being disgusted with Pajamas Media, I'm delighted that they're providing a forum for such controversy, and I'm proud to be a part of it.