“While free speech permits students and faculty to make arguments that are bold, provocative, or even offensive,” Eisgruber said, “we all have an obligation to exercise that right responsibly. Joshua Katz has failed to do so.”
No, don’t worry about the underlying subject here. Just regard the logic there.
The correct answer to “sure, free speech, but only if it adheres to the current orthodoxy” is “Fuck Off”, isn’t it.
I’d be tempted to say something stronger…
‘Eisgruber‘, eh?
“Fuck off, you grubby little totalitarian”, I suggest.
A right that you’re punished for exercising ‘irresponsibly’? I think remedial English courses are required…
In his latest substack essay, On the Failure of Conservatives to Mount Effective Opposition to the Most Insane Policies Ever Visited Upon Mankind, Eugyppius reviews what seems like an interesting German book which looks at the mystifying failure described in the title.
It’s preaching to the converted, obviously, but the conclusion it and he reaches is that we are way past the time of beating these people through reason (ie exposing their idiocies, as Tim has been doing on here for 15 years, and others have done for longer), and that there is no hope of a reverse Long March Through the Institutions.
Appealing through the legal process doesn’t work, as Professor Katz is discovering. Ditto expecting fair play and justice to out, as they might in a novel or a a Hollywood film.
More vigorous methods are needed and the hope, if hope there be, lies with the Proles.
The leftist system is not meant to produce political stability or prosperity, and it feels a lot like it’s entering a death spiral. Getting these lunatics out of power, before they crash the entire West with no survivors, is the most urgent problem we face. Here MKH has the right idea: Respectable conservative politicians have failed above all, in neglecting those people who have suffered the most at the hands of globalisation, renewable energy, immigration, lockdowns and all the rest of it. We must defeat the leftist elite, not win them over; and to do this we must deprive them steadily of popular support, beginning among the lower classes and at the periphery, where the greatest gains are to be made, and working inwards. From the hysterical, crazed opposition men like Trump, Orbán and Salvini have inspired, you can measure the power of this approach.
https://www.eugyppius.com/p/on-the-failure-of-conservatives-to?token=eyJ1c2VyX2lkIjo1MzUxNDk4LCJwb3N0X2lkIjo1NTE4OTUxNywiXyI6Ik1nWXdBIiwiaWF0IjoxNjUyODYyODI4LCJleHAiOjE2NTI4NjY0MjgsImlzcyI6InB1Yi0yNjg2MjEiLCJzdWIiOiJwb3N0LXJlYWN0aW9uIn0.AFerDhxrmGyl309OztEr45WrMtqJahhIOAEwLSJ6Tfg&s=r
In 2021, a mandatory, university-sponsored online module for incoming freshmen featured Katz as the latest offender in the history of racism at Princeton, placing him in the same category as the slaveholders among the university’s founders
Universities can’t be “saved”, they need to be burned, salted, lioned instead.
@ Interested:
…and to do this we must deprive them steadily of popular support,
They’ve already thought of this; hence mass third-world immigration.
How about a series of ‘Times when Fuck Off isn’t enough’?
Interested said:
“to do this we must deprive them steadily of popular support”
We also need to deprive them of money, particularly cushy public sector jobs.
Universities can’t be “saved”, they need to be burned, salted, lioned instead.
I don’t disagree.
But aren’t you meant to be anti-fascist? Because, for an anti-fascist, you seem awfully, well, fascist.
Trouble is, if we say “Fuck off” here, nobody hears or cares. If you say “Fuck off” where people hear or care, then they’ll sack you and ruin your life.
I think things are going to get nastier. What other option is there?
Chester – But aren’t you meant to be anti-fascist? Because, for an anti-fascist, you seem awfully, well, fascist.
Are you still awfully upset about Ukraine?
If government funds universities and tells them that funding is dependent on the universities following government instruction, isn’t that state control of private enterprise. In other words…. that particular system defined by El Duce….
Removing state funding from universities and state dictat over them would be the complete opposite of fascism.
Interested @8.36, not that I am advocating anything like his actions, but the main reason (Ok, you could argue the main reason is that he’s a nutter) Anders Bering Brevik gave for doing what he did, was that people have been screaming about the moslem menace for years and TPTB had done nothing about it, whilst said proponents of the religion of peace were massacring all and sundry. He reasoned that if you can’t beat them, join them.
There are feelers and facters.
Feelers base their opinions on feelings and emotion.
Facters base their opinions on facts, reality and evidence.
Feelers are impervious to facts, reality and evidence.
Eg:
Feeler: “I saw a video of a starving polar bear. The experts say the ice is all melting and the bears are dying”.
Facter: “ There is roughly the same amount of arctic ice as 50 years ago and there are 5 – 6 times the number of bears as then.
Feeler “I saw a video of a starving polar bear. The experts say the ice is all melting and the bears are dying”.
Quite right, Steve. Carpet bombed, bulldozed & sown with the radioactive material from their own research facilities is ©
@JuliaM: Yes, but also ‘Katz’; I suspect they’re both ((()))).
Chester, how is trying to end the state indoctrination system ‘fascist’? Has Steve shagged your missus or something?
DB – I didn’t shag her, it was a Special Sexual Operation
Better, Fuck off you ugly little four-eyed bastard.
Indeed “In 2009, a Holocaust claims tribunal awarded Eisgruber and his three sisters 162,500 Swiss francs, representing the value of the bank account of their maternal great-grandfather, Salomon Kalisch” would justify addressing him not as Eisgruber but as Moneygrubber.
I’ve known a couple of cases of tenured professors being sacked in the UK. Even then one was disguised as an early retirement. Their crimes were far greater than Katz’s – for a start they had both committed actual crimes.
So, Princesston has turned fascist. Or, rather, has stopped bothering to disguise the fact. The great irony is that Moneygrubber claims to be an expert on Constitutional Law. Face it: the West has fallen.
The logic is not unlike the currently fashionable, “If you don’t do it voluntarily, we’ll have to make it compulsory”.
At least the US has its First Amendment, which is pretty damned clear: “Congress shall make no law … abridging the freedom of speech”. Make no law. End of. But Eisgruber’s logic is written into the ECHR. Article 10.2, “Freedom of Expression”: “The exercise of these freedoms, since it carries with it duties and responsibilities, may be subject to such formalities, conditions, restrictions or penalties as are prescribed by law and are necessary in a democratic society, in the interests of national security, territorial integrity or public safety, for the prevention of disorder or crime, for the protection of health or morals, for the protection of the reputation or rights of others, for preventing the disclosure of information received in confidence, or for maintaining the authority and impartiality of the judiciary.”
@Sam, but Princesstown is not owned by a government, State or Federal. So the constitutional protection does not apply. It would seem that free speech in “private” unis now needs contractual protection. How dismal.
I put “private” in inverted commas because presumably much of their income comes from governments in the shape of research grants, or indirectly through the form of student loans. It may be rich enough to say “stuff your student loans” but I’ll bet it’s not rich enough to say “stuff your research grants”. I could imagine a federal government attaching a free speech clause to research grants but God knows what future interference and censorship that would open the door to.
Interested:
Many thanks for that link. That’s excellent writing and a superb analysis.
Pleasure Sam, he’s well worth following.
Another substacker I recommend – in case you have time on your hands – is chrisbray.substack.com
I’d love to see what “making an offensive argument responsibly” looks like.
1. Stop funding private colleges with tax money.
2. Get rid of the “General Welfare” clause.
3. Yes, we have the First Amendment, but politicians try to circumvent it every chance they get. And by the time the case gets to the Supreme Court, you’ve spent tens of thousands of dollars in legal fees and had your entire family’s reputation dragged through the mud. Your children likely aren’t safe from reporters and extremists, either. If you live in a blue state, you’ll almost certainly be denied the right to carry a firearm to protect yourself from these people in public.
Just a few days ago, Governor Kathy Hochul (New York) is looking at ways to force social media companies to censor “violent hate speech.” The plan very well might fail (as Biden’s “Ministry of Disinformation” just did), but Freedom of Speech is constantly being threatened here. It would be nice if just one other country could have this amendment as well, as a matter of insurance.
Dhdhdxbch, you’re reminding me of a case in Oz. Some white blokes, at the Queensland uni I believe, attempted to enter a lecture that was reserved for abos——oooops First People these days. They were refused entry and commented on social media about the racism involved.
I understand a complaint was made about these comments to the Australian Human Rights Commission by the abo woman involved. It took them a long and expensive legal fight to get the Commission’s ruling nullified.
Sam Duncan: I have occasionally wondered whether ECHR 10.2 was consciously inspired by one or both of Tiggers like everything except… or What have the Romans done for us?.
@JuliaM: Yes, but also ‘Katz’; I suspect they’re both ((())))
Yup. Chancellor Moneygrubber is playing all sides in this game, using the fact of his being raised a Catholic, being (presumably) a practicing Episcopalian and having a Jewish traditional heritage via matrilineal descent. He is, like Schrödinger’s cat in different superpositions of religion at the same time, Jewish when it benefits him to be so and Catholic/Episcopalian when it doesn’t.
Oy Vey!
Oh, I realise that, dearime. I was just pointing out that at least there’s some genuine understanding and protection of free speech over there, while on this side of the Atlantic, clown logic rules.
Personally Sam, I think it’s Clown World both sides of the Atlantic.
The only difference is the nature, diversity and propensity of the clowns.