5 ms·

I don't think this is really about free speech in the sense of the First Amendment. Universities are supposed to be about the pursuit of knowledge, and it's pre

by nilkn 9y ago

I don't think this is really about free speech in the sense of the First Amendment. Universities are supposed to be about the pursuit of knowledge, and it's pretty unlikely that conservatives are wrong about everything and liberals are right about everything. Moreover, I don't think any reasonable person would say that any historical political party has ever been correct on every issue. So again it's quite unlikely that the present-day left is the first ever exception to that pattern. You mentioned white supremacists, but I think you're focusing on a fringe and extreme element of the right in an attempt to discredit all right-leaning speakers. There are similarly fringe left-leaning speakers, and a lot of interesting, well-spoken, articulate folks in between, so I don't find this argument very compelling.

stupidcar 9y ago
How are white supremacists a "fringe", when you have a US President who openly supports and defends them? Who spreads their propaganda to his 40 million Twitter followers? You can argue about to what extent his views are shared within the wider conservative movement, but when the conservative movement's democratically chosen leader supports an ideology like this, it is clearly not a "fringe".
- Helloworldboy 9y ago
  Openly supports and defends? I'm no Trump fan but this seems blatantly false. He seems to have been disavowing racists since the start.
  - nasredin 9y ago
    Have we discovered parallel alternate realities while I was asleep? The ones were Trump quickly condemned people shouting Nazi slogans without qualifications? Not to mention the vehicular murder.
  - Buttes 9y ago
    > He seems to have been disavowing racists since the start Pandering to racists since the start: * Initial refusal to rebuke David Duke. * "Rapists" remark. * Violence on "both sides". * Not mentioning the Jews on Holocaust Remembrance day. * No traditional White House Ramadan celebration. * Attacking the hispanic judge in the Trump U case because of their race. * Calling for and attempting to implement a "Muslim Ban". * Appointing Jeff Sessions, who had been denied a judgeship due to his racist beliefs. * The dog whistling about the lawless "inner cities". * Supporting the birther theory. The list goes on and on. Even when he does rebuke racists, it's never prompt, and always with a wink and a nod. If you don't believe me, go peruse stormfront and look at all the threads celebrating their "victory" when Trump says these things, they recognize what's going on.
    - Helloworldboy 9y ago
      You just listed a bunch of events with zero context that require initial bias to dry racism over. This "wink and nod" idea seems pretty tin-foil hat to me
      - Buttes 9y ago
        You're hopeless, this is not subtle stuff, you're being deliberately obtuse, or you're just plain stupid.
lordCarbonFiber 9y ago
The "interesting, well-spoken, articulate" folks have no issue speaking at college campuses. Playing the "good people on many sides" card ignores who these people are that are being forced off of college campuses. Alan Greenspan could show up to give a talk and be well received; Richard Spencer is going to spark riots (for good reason). Most issues have a gradient or contextual answers so I don't buy the argument that just because someone maybe wrong implying their opponents are necessarily correct. The "pursuit of knowledge" predisposes that not all ideas are created equal. That "fringe, extreme" element of the right holds the presidency of the United States; pretending they don't exist, or don't hold power is ridiculous in 2017.
- Helloworldboy 9y ago
  When you have riots over right-leaning moderates like Ben Shapiro, I think it's clear that there is a free-speech problem at universities in the US.
  - lordCarbonFiber 9y ago
    In which universe do you live in that Shapiro is a moderate?
    - ZoeZoeBee 9y ago
      Curious which views of Shapiro's do you believe are extreme? Are you a person who believes gender is merely a social construct whereby the genetics of a person hold no bearing on their attributes?
      - lordCarbonFiber 9y ago
        He's cited a solution to the divide between Isreal and Palenstine as being >"The Jews don't realize that expelling a hostile population is a commonly used and generally effective way of preventing violent entanglements...." That's decently non-moderate if not extreme as far as that debate goes. Nice strawman with the gender thing. The nature v nurture debate will continue but the fatalist "genetics trump all" sort of thinking is pretty solidly false. And the amount of bad stats in trying to apply population level trends to self selecting sub groups is just mindnumbing (ie the school of thought around woman tend to have these traits ergo the self selecting group that go into this field must also follow that distribution). As for the specifics of current progressive politics, I think the pendulum has swung a bit too far in direction of needless specific taxonomy; however that's a better state of affairs than the prescriptive "a man is this; not that" sort of thinking that dominated previous generations. As a bisexual man Im a bit biased though; I think the average American is way too hung up on tying sexuality and gender into their identities.
AnimalMuppet 9y ago
More: Thinking you're right about everything and your opponents are wrong about everything, and therefore not bothering to listen to your opponents, is a great way to become more and more wrong over time.

by nilkn 9y ago

stupidcar 9y ago

How are white supremacists a "fringe", when you have a US President who openly supports and defends them? Who spreads their propaganda to his 40 million Twitter followers? You can argue about to what extent his views are shared within the wider conservative movement, but when the conservative movement's democratically chosen leader supports an ideology like this, it is clearly not a "fringe".

Helloworldboy 9y ago
Openly supports and defends? I'm no Trump fan but this seems blatantly false. He seems to have been disavowing racists since the start.
- nasredin 9y ago
  Have we discovered parallel alternate realities while I was asleep? The ones were Trump quickly condemned people shouting Nazi slogans without qualifications? Not to mention the vehicular murder.
- Buttes 9y ago
  > He seems to have been disavowing racists since the start Pandering to racists since the start: * Initial refusal to rebuke David Duke. * "Rapists" remark. * Violence on "both sides". * Not mentioning the Jews on Holocaust Remembrance day. * No traditional White House Ramadan celebration. * Attacking the hispanic judge in the Trump U case because of their race. * Calling for and attempting to implement a "Muslim Ban". * Appointing Jeff Sessions, who had been denied a judgeship due to his racist beliefs. * The dog whistling about the lawless "inner cities". * Supporting the birther theory. The list goes on and on. Even when he does rebuke racists, it's never prompt, and always with a wink and a nod. If you don't believe me, go peruse stormfront and look at all the threads celebrating their "victory" when Trump says these things, they recognize what's going on.
  - Helloworldboy 9y ago
    You just listed a bunch of events with zero context that require initial bias to dry racism over. This "wink and nod" idea seems pretty tin-foil hat to me
    - Buttes 9y ago
      You're hopeless, this is not subtle stuff, you're being deliberately obtuse, or you're just plain stupid.

lordCarbonFiber 9y ago

The "interesting, well-spoken, articulate" folks have no issue speaking at college campuses. Playing the "good people on many sides" card ignores who these people are that are being forced off of college campuses. Alan Greenspan could show up to give a talk and be well received; Richard Spencer is going to spark riots (for good reason). Most issues have a gradient or contextual answers so I don't buy the argument that just because someone maybe wrong implying their opponents are necessarily correct. The "pursuit of knowledge" predisposes that not all ideas are created equal. That "fringe, extreme" element of the right holds the presidency of the United States; pretending they don't exist, or don't hold power is ridiculous in 2017.

Helloworldboy 9y ago
When you have riots over right-leaning moderates like Ben Shapiro, I think it's clear that there is a free-speech problem at universities in the US.
- lordCarbonFiber 9y ago
  In which universe do you live in that Shapiro is a moderate?
  - ZoeZoeBee 9y ago
    Curious which views of Shapiro's do you believe are extreme? Are you a person who believes gender is merely a social construct whereby the genetics of a person hold no bearing on their attributes?
    - lordCarbonFiber 9y ago
      He's cited a solution to the divide between Isreal and Palenstine as being >"The Jews don't realize that expelling a hostile population is a commonly used and generally effective way of preventing violent entanglements...." That's decently non-moderate if not extreme as far as that debate goes. Nice strawman with the gender thing. The nature v nurture debate will continue but the fatalist "genetics trump all" sort of thinking is pretty solidly false. And the amount of bad stats in trying to apply population level trends to self selecting sub groups is just mindnumbing (ie the school of thought around woman tend to have these traits ergo the self selecting group that go into this field must also follow that distribution). As for the specifics of current progressive politics, I think the pendulum has swung a bit too far in direction of needless specific taxonomy; however that's a better state of affairs than the prescriptive "a man is this; not that" sort of thinking that dominated previous generations. As a bisexual man Im a bit biased though; I think the average American is way too hung up on tying sexuality and gender into their identities.

AnimalMuppet 9y ago

More: Thinking you're right about everything and your opponents are wrong about everything, and therefore not bothering to listen to your opponents, is a great way to become more and more wrong over time.