That's the best way I've heard it put. I'm so tired of the "go high" means sitting on our hands doing nothing. I'm a firm believer in not starting a fight and trying to avoid them but sometimes folks are just insistent. Then it's game on, play fair but play to win.

the power of explaining the obvious. Thanks!

You're exactly right.

If they go low, we destroy them.

I'm very disappointed Dems tend not to be on point soooo often.

Republicans are on message all the time, so disciplined because they know repeating shit over and over sticks.

Dems need that discipline and a pinch, no, a heaping teaspoon of ruthlessness.

My only criticism of Michelle Wolf is that she could work on her delivery a little bit.

She is not really a stand-up comedian. Given that, she did great.

also an F-22 as backup. I take "going high" to mean that we need to be on top of the game. We don't let the Republicans keep destroying the norms of society and we will fight them with every tool we can think of (yeah, comedians count, too!) and call out every lie Trump tries to pass offmouth. Even more importantly, hold the press accountable. Call them out for their laziness in filling airtime with start to finish coverage of every partisan political rally Trump turns into a hate fest. The media is failing us, not just Democrats, but Republicans as well, when they skirt around Trump's incompetence and ignore his efforts to undermine every aspect of life in this country.

While 1 person goes high, the other person goes low.

Also applicable in other important situations, such as:
"hoping they will eventually learn a valuable lesson from witnessing... our willingness to throw our own under the bus."

A la Al Franken. Ironically, I'm sure the GOP *did* learn a valuable lesson when we did that, just not one that would've been helpful.

=========

Malcolm X explained that "turning the other cheek" can include breaking the aggressive opponent's jaw.

Recommended.

are faced with discrimination and hate from the powers that be.

Not comedians speaking truth to power.

Michelle just wanted freedom to rain down on them from above

Mic drop!!

Its a loser no matter how its recast or spun. Now this OP is an attempt to redefine the common usage of the term, and if that is what you want to do, fine. Lots of words to do so, half of which have nothing to do with going high or low.

What I do know is "I won't dignify that with an answer" is a fucking loser.

'going high' as is currently overwhelmingly understood is a LOSER.

So we'll lose if thats what is done.

+1 what you said, however the proper way to not dignify something with an answer is to not even answer. When bad press stirs up, the less it's acknowledged, the quicker attention diverts as events move quickly these days. Many politicians understand this. Bill Clinton fucked up, but he didn't call his attackers out, and even when the right wing starts yammering about it he feels no need to dignify them with an answer. And he doesn't even need to say "I won't dignify that with an answer."

This is why politicians learn "the pivot". This is why Fox always has a rampaging panda story or an amazing feta cheese nachos recipe to cut directly to when news breaks they don't want to linger on.

betrayed by one of his own close-knit group then publicly executed and tortured by the state in a gruesome method?

In context, they were heretics, and I imagine you might consider His people the analog of protestors.

Skimming through multiple translations of Matthew 5:39 - all of them specify "right cheek" and "other cheek". (Only the "Good News" translation specifies "left cheek".)

http://biblehub.com/matthew/5-39.htm

I like to think the text translations here might be cleverly specifying "other cheek" instead of "left cheek" - specifically "your other right cheek" literally "offer them a view of your ass and run away rather than fight (resist)" - not at all staunchly stand and dare an attacker hit you again. Jesus may have made a very highbrow butt joke.

I'm sure they don't like to teach that in Sunday School though!

Addendum:



Because, you know the cloak probably goes with the tunic, and you're going to look silly standing there naked in a cape. And now the other guy has to stand next to a naked person in the courtroom because he's the one who needs more clothes.

I agree with you forgotmylogin. I checked on the context of Michelle Obama’s saying had to do it for my own sanity. Here is an article from the Atlantic dated October 14, 2016.

https://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2016/10/michelle-obama-goes-high/504203/


Excerpts

But what does it mean to “go high” in a campaign against a man like Donald Trump, whose xenophobic rhetoric and casual calls to violence represent a notable low-point in American politics?

“Going high” is how Clinton’s surrogates explained why she wasn’t nastier to Trump in the second presidential debate. While some pundits were puzzled that Clinton hadn’t delivered a death blow to her opponent, jumping on every opportunity to underscore his deficiencies and hypocrisies, her supporters had an explanation: She was focusing on actual issues and ideas. She was simply going high.

But, as Michelle Obama demonstrated on the campaign trail this week, going high doesn’t mean focusing on policy over politics—and it doesn’t mean avoiding an attack on one’s opponent. Going high doesn’t mean staying silent when bullied, but speaking out. And going high means reframing the focus on Trump’s most repugnant characteristics by zeroing in on how those qualities affect the people who might vote for him. This election isn’t just about Trump and who he is, the message goes, it’s about the rest of America and who we want to be.

“And we simply cannot endure this, or expose our children to this any longer—not for another minute, and let alone for four years,” Obama said. “Now is the time for all of us to stand up and say enough is enough. This has got to stop right now.”

This approach is what made Obama’s speech in New Hampshire on Thursday so riveting, so resonant, and so damning to Trump. Without once uttering his name, Obama laid out—in painful detail—exactly what’s so dangerous about him. And instead of describing the singular threat he’d pose in the Oval Office as a thin-skinned narcissist unfit to lead the country, she drilled down on the fact that he proudly and all-too-typically represents the sexism that women face every single day. He is an uncommon presidential candidate in large part because what he represents is so familiar.

I kept reading so many people saying that Michelle Obama's quote meant that we shouldn't "sink to their level" when it's really about fighting better than they do because we have the higher position and standards socially and philosophically. "Going high" doesn't mean you skip the chance to uppercut.

Thanks for the article!

Yeah, some of those comments were starting to shake the rust off my brain. I remembered it quite differently. We must stand up to the bullies in this world not cower under the blankets.

Thanks for being the impetus for my search.

I believe that to be an objectively true statement. It's also going low.

She wasn't funny or insightful. It's hard to give some credit for "speaking truth to power" when there's no cost to the speaker. You are entitled to think she's something special. Others of us are entitled to think her act was boorish and didn't accomplish anything.

I understand you're entitled to your opinion of her set, but her statements are receiving a ton more media scrutiny and coverage than if she'd gone up and rattled off some "Boy, doesn't Melania look grumpy?" jokes.

I've seen non-comedy news shows relating chafed, pearl-clutching rightwing tweets and soundbites about how people are shocked, shocked at the lowbrow comedian immediately contrasted with the President's similarly boorish and bullying statements about people's appearances. People are hearing Wolf's words, and none of her words were untrue.

Wolf has managed to turn a rock over and expose a rare side to the sunlight that many media outlets had been glossing over. I think there are legit media outlets bristling at the "you created this monster" comments by going "Oh, you think we're not capable of putting him in his place? (papers shuffling...)"