Politics: J'accuse!

[sgtclub]

Originally posted by Mmmm, Burger (C.J.)
Let me put it to you this way:

Liberals regularly used debate-stiffling tactics, including accusations of racism as well as, nearly as damningly, accusations of utter insensitivity to fellow students, on the few* occasions on which someone offered an explanation for racial disparities other than inherent systemic bias.

*The occasions were few because free thinkers learned to take their thoughts to the conservative weekly or the Federalist Society, once in law school, rather than become complete social pariahs.

I can personally attest to this. In a law school employment/labor law class we read a case about whether an employer could require an employee to speak only English while on the job and not speak Spanish. The general consensus in the class was that this should not be permitted because it was discriminatory. However, the employer's conduct sounded entirely reasonable to a guy like me, so I spoke up to defend the argument on the other side.

Dumb move. I was shouted down and verbally attacked by half the class. Not a great feeling to be called a racist in public, or to see the hate in the eyes of certain minorities as I walked into class for weeks after the event.

[leagleaze]

Originally posted by sebastian_dangerfield
Leagl,

You're utterly correct, but if we force politeness rules on threads, these boards will get stale and dry up. Like it or not, what keeps these boards vibrant is people saying what they'd never say in polite society. If I'm debating Islam with a Wahhabist, I'm thinking "Fuck this idiot waterhead and his fear of women... we ought to take his kind and throw them in a prison camp run by half naked Amazons." But I ain't sayin' that. Instead, I'm probably going to politely say "Well, explain to me the problems women have in the Islamic faith so I can better understand your point." That kind of discourse is dishonest. If the dumb son of bitch would have a drink, I'd take him to a bar and after lubing him up a bit, tell him exactly why his piece of shit religion - like all others - is an intellectually dishonest circle jerk which is presently fucking up the global society. On these boards, I'll say exactly that, and if someone doesn't like it, skip my post.

If you don't care for people like me telling you exactly what I think, you're free to rip me a new ass about being insensitive. You've done it before. Its your position, and you can be as nasty in your commentary as you like. When others yell "PC PC" tell them to shit in their hats. You're entitled to your view.

I'm sick of having to bite my tongue for judges, opposing counsel, my broker, my mechanic, and every other person around who can't handle a direct comment. So many syllables, so much dancing, so much wasted time. If anything, we need to encourage people to be more direct in telling people what they think. I say fuck religion. Fuck them all. Its a money machine and a set of rules for scared men to subjugate women. You know what else? So is every problem in this world. Women drive me nuts with their stupid emotional shit and mood swings, but men's twisted desire to keep women down because of fear of their own inadequacies and fragile male egos has done 10000X the damages of all the PMS tantrums collective womenhood has brought us since time began. Radical Islam is another way for a group of men who fear they've got small dicks to assert themselves.

Its all fucking Freud. He was right. Get these waterheads laid, teach them to respect women and this shit will all end. Good luck with that.

Who was talking about forcing anything, and how did you even make the leap to the board itself. I was talking about people being PC, not on the board but in life. Mainly Sebby, I ignore you (not have you on ignore mind you, just ignore you) because I think you are full of shit. But you already know that.

People have a right to say whatever they want. They also however have to learn to accept the ramifications for what they say. Thurgreed is exactly right on the FB. The problem with that sports commentator isn't that he used the word nigger but the fact that he obviously is always thinking about black people that way. His excuse, something along the lines of he was angry at the result so he said it is about as lame as your excuses for talking about people the way you do. Actually, I think it is lamer.

As far as teaching men to respect women, I think, perhaps, Mr. lets focus on women's looks and expect them to live up to absurd ideals, we'll need to start with you.

[leagleaze]

Originally posted by Tyrone_Slothrop
Bilmore mentioned Hitler first, and thus he loses.

Fun!

[bilmore]

Originally posted by Tyrone_Slothrop
Bilmore mentioned Hitler first, and thus he loses.

The pioneer is always most at risk.

[Tyrone Slothrop]

Originally posted by Mmmm, Burger (C.J.)
Well, yes, I guess by PC I mean the cynical term we used for "the attitudes of those using various methods of power to suppres speech by those in power" and "not PC" to mean those who bristled at the existence of this dynamic.

Within the US, where does such entrenched* suppression of viewpoints take place in a way remotely comparable to the academy?

* Tenure is entrenching; being subject to popular vote every few years is not. Nor is being subject to finger movements across the radio dial.

Giving someone tenure is not the same as suppressing the views of everyone else. The academies I know don't suppress viewpoints, even if some views are not as popular there as they are in other parts of the country.

Who is being suppressed? If someone is heckled and shouted down and prevented from giving a speech, I think we all have a problem with that. But the people whom this happens to usually have no problem being heard.

[Tyrone Slothrop]

Originally posted by sgtclub
I can personally attest to this. In a law school employment/labor law class we read a case about whether an employer could require an employee to speak only English while on the job and not speak Spanish. The general consensus in the class was that this should not be permitted because it was discriminatory. However, the employer's conduct sounded entirely reasonable to a guy like me, so I spoke up to defend the argument on the other side.

Dumb move. I was shouted down and verbally attacked by half the class. Not a great feeling to be called a racist in public, or to see the hate in the eyes of certain minorities as I walked into class for weeks after the event.

The problem was not that your view was suppressed. The problem was that other people disagreed with it.

Which is not to defend everyone who attacked you. From what you've said, it's hard to understand why someone would call you a racist, or feel hate. I suspect, however, that they would give a fuller account of their view of the situation than you have. Maybe the remedy here is still more speech.

[leagleaze]

Originally posted by bilmore
The pioneer is always most at risk.

And given your vast age, there is no doubt you are a pioneer.

(sorry couldn't resist.)

[Not Me]

Originally posted by leagleaze
Thurgreed is exactly right on the FB. The problem with that sports commentator isn't that he used the word nigger but the fact that he obviously is always thinking about black people that way.

This is ludicrous. He was one of the first soccer managers to break the racial barrier in UK soccer.

Originally posted by leagleaze
As far as teaching men to respect women, I think, perhaps, Mr. lets focus on women's looks and expect them to live up to absurd ideals, we'll need to start with you.

We'll get to Sebby after we get rid of burkas.

[Mmmm, Burger (C.J.)]

Originally posted by Tyrone_Slothrop
Giving someone tenure is not the same as suppressing the views of everyone else. The academies I know don't suppress viewpoints, even if some views are not as popular there as they are in other parts of the country.

Who is being suppressed? If someone is heckled and shouted down and prevented from giving a speech, I think we all have a problem with that. But the people whom this happens to usually have no problem being heard.

On 2, see Club's post--I don't think that experience is atypical. And, if it is, it's because you need only a few incidents like that to shut everyone else up, except the people who want to sit alone at lunch and do their own outlines for the final.

On 1, bull. shit. my dad was a professor at one of the preeminent universities in the nation (or so it considers itself). The department in which he had tenure came to be dominated by those of a certain viewpoint and approach to the subject. After gaining critical mass they essentially refused to tenure anyone without similar viewpoints, further entrenching their views.

Furthermore, educational institutions are unique in that they are designed (presumably) to foster debate and discussion. Compare that to, say, a corporation or a political entity, both of which are designed to have a heirarchy to achieve a particular purpose. Isn't stiffling of dissent slightly more tolerable in teh latter than the former (putting aside monolithic corporate and/or political entities such as those found in the Soviet Union.

[Mmmm, Burger (C.J.)]

Originally posted by Tyrone_Slothrop
The problem was that other people disagreed with it.

No, the problem was the way in which they disagreed with him. Accusations of racism are conversation stoppers, not debate starters. And, if tolerated, do not permit more speech and/or discussion.

[Did you just call me Coltrane?]

Originally posted by Mmmm, Burger (C.J.)
Since you edited after I responded . . .

No, speech should not be chilled and thought should be modified through persuasion. You're operating under the North Korea model of "wrong thoughts should be punished," which, perhaps not coincidentally, is the model often followed in academe.

The fundamental flaw in the approach of PCness is not the viewpoint or conclusion it ultimately reaches, it's the unwillingness to engage in debate on certain matters because the issue is "closed." That is antipodal to education. If your position is so clearly correct then you should have no fear of challenge from "traditional" thought because it is so easily vanquished and corrected. Yet that is precisely the approach, and if fundamentally undermines the supposed correctness of the liberal viewpoint (in the case of education). If only the strongest survive in the marketplace of ideas, why the need to stifle, rather than to listen, discuss, and explain why the viewpoint is wrong? That's just not what happens. Debate is pretermitted even before the "listen" stage of that approach.

I didn't really address PC.

Of course I think that debate should exist. In fact, if everyone HAD been brought up in Berkley, I would say that college should slant toward what we presently call traditional, conservative thought. Not chilled or suppressed. Just different. The debate should absolutely be there. I'm focusing more on well-roundedness, not PC or politics. Even if you don't "buy" what the other person is selling, knowing it gives you better support for your own beliefs. Most people are raised under a conservative value system. Nothing wrong with that. By being exposed to alternative ways of thinking, one can either reject the alternative and solidify his reasoning for his beliefs, or have the opportunity to change them. But at least the choice is there.

So maybe every philosophy/poly sci class should have two, three or ten professors, each projecting and debating his/her own belief system. This would be ideal, and, of course, completey unrealistic. Hooray for college.

[Not Me]

Originally posted by Tyrone_Slothrop
The problem was not that your view was suppressed. The problem was that other people disagreed with it.

No, the problem was that they intimidated him into not speaking with their tactics.

The other problem is that it is another example of crying wolf. This is why any minority claiming racism gets a deaf ear from me. So many times, the cries of racism are false cries that I don't even bother trying to sort out the real cases from the wolf-crying. I just tune it out.

[Hank Chinaski]

Originally posted by Did you just call me Coltrane?
But college is where you learn progressive and open-minded thought. Idealistic (and many times unrealistic) ways to change the world. Those ideas are necessary b/c there's a chance they could lead to something realistic. You probably used to understand this. Now you are set in your beliefs that something completely different cannot possibly be the best way.

We learn about old, scared white-man thought in every day life.

Traditional thought SHOULD be somewhat chilled in college. Most people were raised with traditional thought and need exposure to the other side. It's not the other way around. Most people weren't raised in Berkely.

The Nazis had new ideas, this isn't about "letting new ideas out." To the contrary, it is more about stifiling consideration of whether left wing "new ideas" are bogus. It certainly isn't about considering new ideas if you are censuring people. Unless you mean "considering new ideas that democrats or greens came up with," and if that's what you mean then you've won notme's arguments for her.

Example:
Islam is fucked towards women because husbands beat their wives.

Potential response #1 You are a stupid fucking racist
Potential response #2 The Koran doesn't say a husband can beat his wife, plus to blame Islam ignores the very parallel behavior in Brazil, plus wives are beated up half to death in America every X seconds.

The first is the type of behavior that people have a problem with, and it doesn't advance fuck-all. the second is consideration of an idea,

and I'm not trying to restart last week's fight about me. sidd thought I was a troll and was responding in kind.

[Tyrone Slothrop]

Originally posted by Mmmm, Burger (C.J.)
On 2, see Club's post--I don't think that experience is atypical. And, if it is, it's because you need only a few incidents like that to shut everyone else up, except the people who want to sit alone at lunch and do their own outlines for the final.

And see my response. It's about substance, not process.

On 1, bull. shit. my dad was a professor at one of the preeminent universities in the nation (or so it considers itself). The department in which he had tenure came to be dominated by those of a certain viewpoint and approach to the subject. After gaining critical mass they essentially refused to tenure anyone without similar viewpoints, further entrenching their views.

So what? Do you think that the government is suppressing poor people if it declines to give them free representation through legal services? I doubt it. Of course universities end up promoting some view points more than others. You know that the University of Chicago Law School is known for an emphasis on law and economics. No doubt they tenure more people there who do that sort of thing. Are they suppressing other views? I don't think so.

Furthermore, educational institutions are unique in that they are designed (presumably) to foster debate and discussion. Compare that to, say, a corporation or a political entity, both of which are designed to have a heirarchy to achieve a particular purpose. Isn't stiffling of dissent slightly more tolerable in teh latter than the former (putting aside monolithic corporate and/or political entities such as those found in the Soviet Union.

Yes.

[Mmmm, Burger (C.J.)]

Originally posted by Did you just call me Coltrane?


Of course I think that debate should exist. In fact, if everyone HAD been brought up in Berkley, I would say that college should slant toward what we presently call traditional, conservative thought.

I have never objected to the presentation of "liberal" viewpoints. I have objected solely to the out-of-hand rejection of "conservative/traditional" viewpoints that occurs with alarming frequency at many of the leading institutions of higher learning.

And if the nuts at the conservative religious schools do it, shame on them. And that's why I would never consider sending a child to one of those places, because they try to indoctrinate as much as anyone. But I'm not so worried about third-rate institutions as I am about the Berkeleys, Stanfords, Harvards and Yales of the world.