Who runs the universities nowadays?

[Unseen]

jakelafort wrote:

So does the state have a right to censor the trafficker’s speech? Or is unabridged speech the answer? It is silly to even analyze this. Yes the balancing of interests justifies the censorship. I could go on an on with instances in which speech is or ought to be censored.

I think that putting pimps away isn’t a matter of stifling his speech, and I think you’re stretching a point beyond all recognition. We don’t put pimps away because we disapprove of the way they express themselves. We put them away because of what they do. Not what they say. What they say can be used as evidence, but the courts have been clear when it comes to freedom of speech: prior restraint is unconstitutional.

Yes, there’s the “Yelling ‘fire’ in a crowded theater” thing, but even there the authorities can’t legally respond until the offender does that, but at that point the cry of ‘fire’ is treated basically as an act not so much as an utterance.

Censorship doesn’t come into it.

• This reply was modified 5 years, 10 months ago by Unseen.

[Unseen]

Simon Paynton wrote:

Some speech is deliberately harmful and destructive. Just look at Milo Yiannopoulos’ troll campaigns. The internet is a playground for sociopaths and their flying monkeys.

And…?

That some people abuse free speech is pretty much a given. But what counts as a bad use of free speech varies with the values and politics of the observer, doesn’t it?

[Unseen]

Davis wrote:

Having said this, yes university lectures being cancelled because the speakers are far-right ones or say stupid biggoted bullshit, is a very bad precedent to set. It’s one thing to call such speakers out and that they pay a social price for what they say, its another thing to shut them up. I am very much against it. None the less, this phenomena is not as widespread as some journalists have claimed and it is overblown. It should be stopped, but it is not an infectious phenomena as has been stated in some articles.

One of the surest ways to get cancelled is to speak on make a case for Israel. Camille Paglia is a bundle of seeming contradictions, a lesbian feminist who is a proponent of the value of a male-driven culture. Try to get her a speaking gig on almost any campus. She is also one of the great scholars of our time.  Her book Sexual Persone is a modern classsic. She is also one of the greatest living essayists. But she is controversial. Some quotes may give you an idea why some would rather she didn’t speak on their campus:

If civilization had been left in female hands, we would still be living in grass huts.
There is no female Mozart because there is no female Jack the Ripper.
Leaving sex to the feminists is like letting your dog vacation at the taxidermist.

These quotes are undeniably inflammatory but is that a good reason to ban her or—as would have been when I was in college—to bring her to the campus to talk and submit to intense questioning by the faculty and students?

Here she is in conversation with another controversial anti-feminist feminist, Christina Hoff Sommers. And of course Youtube is full of her giving her controversial views. Should Paglia be banned from giving her views on your campus (were you still in school)?

BTW, she does get the occasional campus gig, and sometimes gets gigs cancelled, but more frequently she is passively banned by being not considered, with far less intelligent but easier to digest speakers speaking instead.

• This reply was modified 5 years, 10 months ago by Unseen.

[Simon Paynton]

Unseen wrote:

But what counts as a bad use of free speech varies with the values and politics of the observer, doesn’t it?

Not if the intention is simply to cause harm and humiliation.  Milo Yiannopolous’ answer to people (i.e., women) who didn’t like being trolled half to death, was “why, just stay off the internet and you’ll be OK”.

[Simon Paynton]

I would listen to Camille Paglia all day long, she’s an intelligent person.  Intelligent people have interesting things to say, we don’t have to agree with them to be entertained.  I don’t think she’s got a hidden agenda like so many of the racists / men’s rights activists / other unpleasant people.  She reminds me of Germaine Greer, in her outspokenness.

[_Robert_]

Smart alpha men are benefiting the most from feminism. Many young men don’t feel the pressure to get high paying stressful jobs, court women with all the head games, get married, and have kids like they did throughout the decades. They are free to follow their passions with zero stigma from society. Besides careers, young women are encouraged to have a rich sex life so the playboys really make out. Sometimes these women have kids. A super busy, pissed off and tired career woman with some other guy’s rotten kids in tow, LOL. No thanks. Think I will just take a vaca in Thailand.

[Unseen]

_Robert_ wrote:

Smart alpha men are benefiting the most from feminism. Many young men don’t feel the pressure to get high paying stressful jobs, court women with all the head games, get married, and have kids like they did throughout the decades. They are free to follow their passions with zero stigma from society. Besides careers, young women are encouraged to have a rich sex life so the playboys really make out. Sometimes these women have kids. A super busy, pissed off and tired career woman with some other guy’s rotten kids in tow, LOL. No thanks. Think I will just take a vaca in Thailand.

Hitch doesn’t deny that women are among the best comedians. His point isn’t about individuals, it’s about the gender in general. His point is that women don’t need to be funny so funniness isn’t cultivated among women to nearly the degree it is in men. Why? Because a witty, funny guy is far more likely to get laid Saturday night than a guy with interesting views on the world economy or existentialism as it relates to post-modernism.

[Simon Paynton]

It’s obviously wrong of me to call men’s rights activists unpleasant people.  I’m sure many of them are very nice.  But I find many of the ideas deluded, misogynistic and creepy.  It shades into incel terrorism.  Not a very healthy outlook.

[Simon Paynton]

Unseen wrote:

His point isn’t about individuals, it’s about the gender in general.

I find it about 50/50 – men and women equally funny.  I don’t get the “gender in general” versus individuals distinction.  Maybe men are required to cultivate being funny – if so, it’s not noticeable.

If you ask me, someone is attractive if they’re having a good time.

[jakelafort]

Unseen, you linked a vid that includes a snippet of Chomsky chiding a student about speech. I gave the quote. It is a nonsense viewpoint that Chomsky gives. There are so many nuances to take into account. Even our pinnacle A1 political speech can be censored under some circumstances. Sure you can burn a flag as a political statement. But lets suppose you intend to take over the government in a bloody coup and express your intentions or announce that you and your aryan boys are gonna kick some kike and nigger ass at a hate rally. Is that speech sacrosanct?

Our constitutional rights depend on the circumstances. They are not absolute. The often quoted fire in a theater is irrelevant other than to discard the simplistic notion that speech is never to be censored.

As another example of the (it depends) nature of constitutional rights, consider free exercise of religion. Supreme court ruled that natives can do peyote as part of their religious rituals even if the peyote is illegal otherwise. But what about one of those religious nuts who wants to let Jesus cure the kid who has some treatable illness but will die without medicine? Nope. It is a balancing of interests. And the stance Chomsky takes is just plain stupid.

[jakelafort]

Davis rightly points out that cancel culture cuts both ways. And if ya think about it that is what happens when groups or institutions have a concentration of power. Powerful Islam and powerful christianity would sooner cut your nuts off, stone ya to death, auto da fe your sorry ass and burn you at the stake as look at ya for saying anything contrary to their doctrine. And there is a very strong tendency among political groups especially as they are newly developing to rail against any expressions that are critical of their agenda.

I knew Paglia’s family. They were not outspoken. I say that to say absolutely nothing…i just need to hit this pick 3!

[Unseen]

Simon Paynton wrote:

Unseen wrote:

His point isn’t about individuals, it’s about the gender in general.

I find it about 50/50 – men and women equally funny. I don’t get the “gender in general” versus individuals distinction. Maybe men are required to cultivate being funny – if so, it’s not noticeable. If you ask me, someone is attractive if they’re having a good time.

Men use humor to attract women. Women do it a different way. Simple as that. That’s his entire point in a nutshell.

[Anonymous]

🙂

[Davis]

Men’s rights activists are overwealmingly toxic and unpleasant people Simon. If you take individual men who advocate for a specific issue that men face, like say, testicular cancer or father’s rights during divorce proceedings, then yes, I agree, they are ordinary people advocating for an issue they care about. However, and this is important, the moment it all falls under some umbrella term such as “mens rights” then it becomes a toxic shit fest. The label should be “men’s issues advocacy”. I’d say a good 90% of men’s rights forums and internet bullshit is hard core anti-woman shittery if not outright hate. It is so full of hyper-generalizations, ridiculous victim hood and many suggesting the most preposterous claim ever made in the history of humanity: “men are actually the oppressed gender”. I have read so many protrayals of women as succubi gold-diggers chasing after assholes who treat them badly, and that is the nicer version. It can then fall into a significant group of men who advocate for “entitlement” to sex, where an actual human right for men should be the right to have sex with serious talk about finding ways to compel women to help enforce this right. It is somewhat connected to the group of incels who believe that they are fated to a life without sex because they had a few shitty experiences with women and are incapable of not generalizing their bad experiences to the entire female gender, or in some cases, prefer not to do some soul searching and ask themselves just why it is they are not having success or if they are perhaps setting extremely unrealistic goals. It is incredible how a meaningful discussion about a serious “men’s issue” like testicular cancer turns into a disgusting rant about “men’s rights” which usually involves women bashing, men are the victims talk and a series of really sad if not frightening regressions, including a hyper-skepticism or even denial of sexual assault in general.

This is extremely sad, because men face serious issues and because many men have been conditioned to not express certain problems and a hesitancy to seek help, these issues are not being addressed. And they need to. However, the “mens issues” gets so easily side tracked into “men’s rights” garbage, that it becomes a ridiculous distraction. Instead of focusing on seriously needed support, resources and useful information it becomes an obsessive gender debate and terrible unconstructive rabbit hole of douchery.

[Simon Paynton]

@unseen – we all like someone who makes us laugh.

[Author]

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