I think conflating questions about where campus protest shades into harassment and questions about when/how it's appropriate to disinvite featured speakers as a single question about "culture of free speech" is going to be a recipe for confusion.
There are elements of discretion in terms of what speakers should be hosted by the university that simply won't apply to how to handle campus protesters, who don't need and shouldn't need any sort of official support from the administration , but hosting a wide range of speakers is critical to the university's core mission of fostering open inquiry and debate in a way that letting students chant "Intifada" just isn't.
While his campaign surrogates back in 2016 then were not an entirely different bunch of authoritarian lunatics from now, I really don't remember any of them saying anything like this:
Kash Patel, a Trump insider touted as a possible attorney general or CIA director in a second Trump Administration, appeared on Steve Bannon’s podcast, where he said, “We are going to come after people in the media who lied about American citizens, who helped Joe Biden rig presidential elections. We’re going to come after you, whether it’s criminally or civilly, we’ll figure that out, but yeah, we’re putting you all on notice.”
Also, didn't make it into Mr Thornton's post, but talking about rooting out his political opponents like vermin isn't great!
In honor of our great Veterans on Veteran’s Day, we pledge to you that we will root out the Communists, Marxists, Fascists, and Radical Left Thugs that live like vermin within the confines of our Country, lie, steal, and cheat on Elections, and will do anything possible, whether legally or illegally, to destroy America, and the American Dream.
More generally, there's a lot of explicit talk about vengeance and retribution coming from MAGA World these days.
IMO Haley is just another Republican. Obviously not going to vote for her, but she doesn't provoke any more alarm than Mitt Romney did.
DeSantis is worse, I think, showing some bad impulses in terms of staffing his campaign with Groypers, pursuing his vendetta against Disney over their political speech, and talking up pardoning Jan 6 rioters (and caping for some of the ring-leaders after the fact).
None of this puts him in the same universe as Trump, but he's definitely worse than usual for a politician, unlike the totally average Haley.
It’s what we should do… however we’re going to find an uncomfortably high number of people are doing the second.
In the broad sense, sure, but it's entirely unclear what light it will shed on the way university administrators should be conducting themselves in the face of protests against Israel.
I think what’s really going on is that prestigious private universities maintain their special place by portraying themselves to the larger public as dedicated to the kind of classical liberal values from which the 1A was derived, while operating much differently internally.
This is plausible. My objection to the original argument is the one I usually make in this context: the commitments you want a university to make to support the classically liberal values that universities are supposed to support line up badly with the requirements of the First Amendment.
That does mean that they’re tollerating speech against Jews that they’d never tolerate against other minorities.
I don't think this is really true, not because I don't believe that they aren't tolerating a lot of very ugly anti-semitic rhetoric (they are!) but because a lot of it doesn't map cleanly to stuff that would be applicable to other minority groups.
Which, again, pushes me to, "It depends."
Crossing lines the rest of society has drawn takes us into “outright illegal” territory and the U deciding that nothing should be done is a problem.
It is, but generally speaking, actually advocating for genocide isn't even illegal.
The first part I generally agree with, and think the attempt to treat private postsecondary educational institutions as if they are (or should be) bound by Constitutional concerns is pretty foolish.
The second part, I really don't know, and am also not 100% sure of the relevance. The rest of society isn't generally subject to threats of expulsion or other academic disciplinary procedures.
Anyway, I think I'm on team, "Depends," given the existing way that universities generally decide these things.
A lot of these arguments--hell, on both Israel and immigration--only make sense under the assumption that both parties are dominated by their Leftward fringes.
You just also have to say that the activist core of the pro-immigration movement has captured the Democrats.
It's not symmetric. Proposed bargains from both the W and Obama administration were scuttled by anti-immigration hardliners, who ended up capturing the GOP by embedding white nationalists (like Steves Miller and Bannon) in the Trump administration.
Democrats--and before them, pro-immigration Republicans--have been trying for almost 20 years to make some sort of bargain around border security, and they have been rebuffed every time.
It conflicts with BSDI-centric political correctness to say it, but the underlying problem is that the activist core of the anti-immigration movement that has captured the GOP is dominated by white nationalists.
They won't accept any workable deal, and they can't even really be addressed by less extreme and repulsive elements of the Rightward coalition, because the Rightward coalition as a whole is much more invested in maintaining the illusion that there aren't any white nationalists in positions of power and influence than it is in having an open conversation about them and their interests.
That's because such an open conversation would inevitably end with a consensus that I expect a wide spectrum of voters could live with, at the cost of immense damage to the GOP's electoral prospects as a whole, but avoiding the conversation means they can fundraise from angry white nationalists while complaining endlessly about how mean liberals are for daring to point out that the white nationalists exist.
People lie all the time about their number of partners, but in the US you generally see men inflating the number, and women deflating it. Supply and demand don’t balance when you look at survey results.
Additionally, it’s generally true that men lie more about this than women.
I don't see how you get to Hamas not being a terrorist group, like, at all. While I dissent from Lee's comment that every Hamas action prior to October 7 is terrorist, that comprised a huge fraction of their "armed resistance". It's just that it wasn't nearly as successful.
And saying that it's racist to call a group using terrorism as its primary tactic a "terrorist group" is racist seems... pretty freaking bizarre.
As for the normies, sure--unlike Lee, I'm concerned much more with fringe entryism than general pro-Palestinian or anti-Israel sentiment.
I would qualify all three of these remarks--admittedly from anonymous randos speaking at the Oakland City Counci meeting--as boiling down to Hamas is Good, Actually:
“I support the right of Palestinians to resist occupation, including through Hamas, the armed wing of the unified Palestinian resistance,” said a community member.
"Calling Hamas a terrorist group is racist and plays into the genocidal propaganda that is flooding our media and we should be doing everything possible to combat," said a person at Monday's meeting.
“The notion that this was a massacre of Jews is a fabricated narrative," said another person at Monday's meeting, who pushed on after being told their time was up. "Many of those killed on Oct. 7, including children, were killed by the IDF."
I also think deranged false flag conspiracy theories like the last are clearly anti-semitic above and beyond the implicit anti-semitism involved in Hamas apologism.
They also go beyond supporting Palestinian liberation, the right of return, etc.
Also in the Good Old Days, when you wanted to vent to your buddies about members of the opposite sex after a breakup/fight/protracted dry spell, you’d do it over drinks in a setting more public than a bar or restaurant, not by broadcasting them to a potential audience of millions in durable, easily searchable, and readily redistributable medium.
I don’t think it’s inevitable or even at all likely that these idiots are gonna take over the party or anything. But having Dem leadership point at them and say, “Can you believe these fishheads?!” is healthy.
A lot of really unpleasant fringe elements have become very powerful parts of Team Red. I think there are structural reasons that make Team Blue more (but not entirely) resistant to entryism, but I don't want to sleep on this stuff.
*Comment archive for non-registered commenters assembled by email address as provided.
On “Free Speech, Harassment and Hypocrisy: What the University Presidents Got Right and Wrong”
I think conflating questions about where campus protest shades into harassment and questions about when/how it's appropriate to disinvite featured speakers as a single question about "culture of free speech" is going to be a recipe for confusion.
There are elements of discretion in terms of what speakers should be hosted by the university that simply won't apply to how to handle campus protesters, who don't need and shouldn't need any sort of official support from the administration , but hosting a wide range of speakers is critical to the university's core mission of fostering open inquiry and debate in a way that letting students chant "Intifada" just isn't.
On “Iowa, Where Political Narratives Go To Die, Gussies Up For Funerals”
The debates were completely irrelevant as soon as Trump refused to participate and paid zero price.
On “Trump’s Authoritarian Tells”
While his campaign surrogates back in 2016 then were not an entirely different bunch of authoritarian lunatics from now, I really don't remember any of them saying anything like this:
Kash Patel, a Trump insider touted as a possible attorney general or CIA director in a second Trump Administration, appeared on Steve Bannon’s podcast, where he said, “We are going to come after people in the media who lied about American citizens, who helped Joe Biden rig presidential elections. We’re going to come after you, whether it’s criminally or civilly, we’ll figure that out, but yeah, we’re putting you all on notice.”
Also, didn't make it into Mr Thornton's post, but talking about rooting out his political opponents like vermin isn't great!
In honor of our great Veterans on Veteran’s Day, we pledge to you that we will root out the Communists, Marxists, Fascists, and Radical Left Thugs that live like vermin within the confines of our Country, lie, steal, and cheat on Elections, and will do anything possible, whether legally or illegally, to destroy America, and the American Dream.
More generally, there's a lot of explicit talk about vengeance and retribution coming from MAGA World these days.
"
IMO Haley is just another Republican. Obviously not going to vote for her, but she doesn't provoke any more alarm than Mitt Romney did.
DeSantis is worse, I think, showing some bad impulses in terms of staffing his campaign with Groypers, pursuing his vendetta against Disney over their political speech, and talking up pardoning Jan 6 rioters (and caping for some of the ring-leaders after the fact).
None of this puts him in the same universe as Trump, but he's definitely worse than usual for a politician, unlike the totally average Haley.
On “Demanding “Yes” or “No” On Free Speech in Higher Education”
The protester who is at the front door of a Jewish student threatening them does not.
Yeah, definitely... but I don't think that changes depending on the specific contours of their anti-Israel position.
The activist who posts herself calling for more dead bodies gets treated as though she’s calling for more dead bodies.
On the other hand, this seems really over-inclusive, unless you mean they're literally saying, "More dead bodies!"
Maybe I missed a viral outrage...?
"
It’s what we should do… however we’re going to find an uncomfortably high number of people are doing the second.
In the broad sense, sure, but it's entirely unclear what light it will shed on the way university administrators should be conducting themselves in the face of protests against Israel.
"
I think what’s really going on is that prestigious private universities maintain their special place by portraying themselves to the larger public as dedicated to the kind of classical liberal values from which the 1A was derived, while operating much differently internally.
This is plausible. My objection to the original argument is the one I usually make in this context: the commitments you want a university to make to support the classically liberal values that universities are supposed to support line up badly with the requirements of the First Amendment.
"
Yeah, but I don't think any of those amount to, "Be bound by First Amendment when it comes to regulating student speech."
"
That does mean that they’re tollerating speech against Jews that they’d never tolerate against other minorities.
I don't think this is really true, not because I don't believe that they aren't tolerating a lot of very ugly anti-semitic rhetoric (they are!) but because a lot of it doesn't map cleanly to stuff that would be applicable to other minority groups.
Which, again, pushes me to, "It depends."
Crossing lines the rest of society has drawn takes us into “outright illegal” territory and the U deciding that nothing should be done is a problem.
It is, but generally speaking, actually advocating for genocide isn't even illegal.
"
The first part I generally agree with, and think the attempt to treat private postsecondary educational institutions as if they are (or should be) bound by Constitutional concerns is pretty foolish.
The second part, I really don't know, and am also not 100% sure of the relevance. The rest of society isn't generally subject to threats of expulsion or other academic disciplinary procedures.
Anyway, I think I'm on team, "Depends," given the existing way that universities generally decide these things.
"
I think the OP is asking for the answer to be “No,” FWIW.
On “We Need A Grand Bargain On Ukraine and Israel”
A lot of these arguments--hell, on both Israel and immigration--only make sense under the assumption that both parties are dominated by their Leftward fringes.
"
You just also have to say that the activist core of the pro-immigration movement has captured the Democrats.
It's not symmetric. Proposed bargains from both the W and Obama administration were scuttled by anti-immigration hardliners, who ended up capturing the GOP by embedding white nationalists (like Steves Miller and Bannon) in the Trump administration.
"
Democrats--and before them, pro-immigration Republicans--have been trying for almost 20 years to make some sort of bargain around border security, and they have been rebuffed every time.
It conflicts with BSDI-centric political correctness to say it, but the underlying problem is that the activist core of the anti-immigration movement that has captured the GOP is dominated by white nationalists.
They won't accept any workable deal, and they can't even really be addressed by less extreme and repulsive elements of the Rightward coalition, because the Rightward coalition as a whole is much more invested in maintaining the illusion that there aren't any white nationalists in positions of power and influence than it is in having an open conversation about them and their interests.
That's because such an open conversation would inevitably end with a consensus that I expect a wide spectrum of voters could live with, at the cost of immense damage to the GOP's electoral prospects as a whole, but avoiding the conversation means they can fundraise from angry white nationalists while complaining endlessly about how mean liberals are for daring to point out that the white nationalists exist.
On “Moral Codes and Alpha Bros”
Eh, periodically, someone comes out a with a list of “dealbreakers” and, inevitably, someone else comes along to critique their list.
Well if you make your dating criteria part of the Discourse, your dating criteria are gonna be part of the Discourse.
"
People lie all the time about their number of partners, but in the US you generally see men inflating the number, and women deflating it. Supply and demand don’t balance when you look at survey results.
Additionally, it’s generally true that men lie more about this than women.
"
It could be satire, or it could be kidding-on-the-square hyperbole used to communicate extreme reactionary views in a deniable way.
Both seem plausible enough to me, as the latter is a tactic beloved of trad weirdos.
On “The Democratic Weakness”
I don't see how you get to Hamas not being a terrorist group, like, at all. While I dissent from Lee's comment that every Hamas action prior to October 7 is terrorist, that comprised a huge fraction of their "armed resistance". It's just that it wasn't nearly as successful.
And saying that it's racist to call a group using terrorism as its primary tactic a "terrorist group" is racist seems... pretty freaking bizarre.
As for the normies, sure--unlike Lee, I'm concerned much more with fringe entryism than general pro-Palestinian or anti-Israel sentiment.
"
Compare to whites who supported South Africa.
Yikes
"
I would qualify all three of these remarks--admittedly from anonymous randos speaking at the Oakland City Counci meeting--as boiling down to Hamas is Good, Actually:
“I support the right of Palestinians to resist occupation, including through Hamas, the armed wing of the unified Palestinian resistance,” said a community member.
"Calling Hamas a terrorist group is racist and plays into the genocidal propaganda that is flooding our media and we should be doing everything possible to combat," said a person at Monday's meeting.
“The notion that this was a massacre of Jews is a fabricated narrative," said another person at Monday's meeting, who pushed on after being told their time was up. "Many of those killed on Oct. 7, including children, were killed by the IDF."
I also think deranged false flag conspiracy theories like the last are clearly anti-semitic above and beyond the implicit anti-semitism involved in Hamas apologism.
They also go beyond supporting Palestinian liberation, the right of return, etc.
On “Moral Codes and Alpha Bros”
Also in the Good Old Days, when you wanted to vent to your buddies about members of the opposite sex after a breakup/fight/protracted dry spell, you’d do it over drinks in a setting more public than a bar or restaurant, not by broadcasting them to a potential audience of millions in durable, easily searchable, and readily redistributable medium.
"
It’s great for “engagement”.
A hate-click is still a click after all.
On “The Democratic Weakness”
That gets you to “more resistant”.
I don’t think it gets you to immune.
I don’t think it’s inevitable or even at all likely that these idiots are gonna take over the party or anything. But having Dem leadership point at them and say, “Can you believe these fishheads?!” is healthy.
On “Moral Codes and Alpha Bros”
Are people allowed to have dealbreakers?
Men, I mean.
Who would prevent men from having dealbreakers?
Isn’t a dealbreaker an indicator of deep insecurity or some other flaw?
For men, I mean.
It seems like it depends on the dealbreaker.
On “The Democratic Weakness”
They aren't now.
I want to ensure that they aren't in the future.
A lot of really unpleasant fringe elements have become very powerful parts of Team Red. I think there are structural reasons that make Team Blue more (but not entirely) resistant to entryism, but I don't want to sleep on this stuff.
*Comment archive for non-registered commenters assembled by email address as provided.