by Judith Curry
In response to the tragic shootings at the headquarters of satirical weekly magazine Charlie Hebdo in Paris, there have been a number of provocative essays on freedom of speech.
I have discussed the issue in a previous post In defense of free speech, but the recent events have compelled me to write a post on the broader issues raised by Charlie. Below are excerpts from articles on the topic that have resonated with me or that I otherwise found provocative.
From The Conversation:
While this attack and others like this shock the world, it is governments, as well as the media itself on occasion, that have been at the vanguard of banning free expression and regulating ideas in recent years.
Indeed, it is our confusion over such matters that have acted as a green light to others to take action.
Rather than living in fear, we must stand robustly against anyone who would stifle freedom of expression – be they governments, other authoritative bodies including universities, the media or a handful of self-appointed and readily-offended fools.
From Paper Bird:
For the last 36 hours, everybody’s been quoting Voltaire: “I do not agree with what you say, but I’ll defend to the death your right to say it”
There’s a perfectly good reason not to republish the cartoons that has nothing to do with cowardice or caution. I refuse to post them because I think they’re racist and offensive. I can support your right to publish something, and still condemn what you publish. I can defend what you say, and still say it’s wrong — isn’t that the point of the quote (that wasn’t) from Voltaire?
It’s true, as Salman Rushdie says, that “Nobody has the right to not be offended.” You should not get to invoke the law to censor or shut down speech just because it insults you or strikes at your pet convictions.
I am offended when those already oppressed in a society are deliberately insulted. I don’t want to participate. This crime in Paris does not suspend my political or ethical judgment, or persuade me that scatologically smearing a marginal minority’s identity and beliefs is a reasonable thing to do.
We’ve heard a lot about satire in the last couple of days. We’ve heard that satire shouldn’t cause offense because it’s a weapon of the weak: “Satire-writers always point out the foibles and fables of those higher up the food chain.” Of course, satire that attacks any and all targets is by definition not just targeting the top of the food chain. To defend satire because it’s indiscriminate is to admit that it discriminates against the defenseless.
To protect expression that’s endangered you have to engage with the substance of what was said, not deny it. That means attempting dialogue with those who peacefully condemn or disagree, not trying to shame them into silence. Nothing is quick, nothing is easy. No solidarity is secure. I support free speech. I oppose all censors. I abhor the killings. I mourn the dead. I am not Charlie.
From The Daily Beast:
Charlie Hebdo weren’t asking to be shot. They were asking for a reaction, though, and for half a century now they’ve been surviving pretty much on the notoriety of constantly trying to provoke a reaction. And let’s be real: pushing buttons, by itself, doesn’t make your work more virtuous. Pissing people off is just pissing people off.
Personally, I can’t just let that slide. You see, I’m from the Internet. Things move pretty fast here compared to the “old media” world that Charlie Hebdo occupied, and I’ve already seen what happens when you get a culture that, rather than asking to what end we defend free speech, valorizes free speech for its own sake and thus perversely values speech more the more pointlessly offensive it is—because only then can you prove how devoted you are to freedom by defending it.
David Brooks in the NYTimes:
The journalists at Charlie Hebdo are now rightly being celebrated as martyrs on behalf of freedom of expression, but let’s face it: If they had tried to publish their satirical newspaper on any American university campus over the last two decades it wouldn’t have lasted 30 seconds. Student and faculty groups would have accused them of hate speech. The administration would have cut financing and shut them down.
So this might be a teachable moment. As we are mortified by the slaughter of those writers and editors in Paris, it’s a good time to come up with a less hypocritical approach to our own controversial figures, provocateurs and satirists.
Most of us don’t actually engage in the sort of deliberately offensive humor that that newspaper specializes in. We might have started out that way. When you are 13, it seems daring and provocative to “épater la bourgeoisie,” to stick a finger in the eye of authority, to ridicule other people’s religious beliefs.
But after a while that seems puerile. Most of us move toward more complicated views of reality and more forgiving views of others. Most of us do try to show a modicum of respect for people of different creeds and faiths. We do try to open conversations with listening rather than insult.
Yet, at the same time, most of us know that provocateurs and other outlandish figures serve useful public roles. Satirists and ridiculers expose our weakness and vanity when we are feeling proud. They puncture the self-puffery of the successful. They level social inequality by bringing the mighty low.
In most societies, there’s the adults’ table and there’s the kids’ table. Healthy societies, in other words, don’t suppress speech, but they do grant different standing to different sorts of people. Wise and considerate scholars are heard with high respect. Satirists are heard with bemused semirespect. Racists and anti-Semites are heard through a filter of opprobrium and disrespect. People who want to be heard attentively have to earn it through their conduct.
The massacre at Charlie Hebdo should be an occasion to end speech codes. And it should remind us to be legally tolerant toward offensive voices, even as we are socially discriminating.
From The Daily Beast:
The simple, awful truth is that free speech has never been particularly popular in America.
Today’s threats to free speech are more likely to come from “social justice warriors” on the left who say they are defending the feelings of those deemed to be crushed under the weight of supposedly systemic racism and sexism.
In fact, hate-speech laws may even become a reality. An October 2014 Economist/YouGov poll found roughly equal amounts of Americans supporting and opposing “a law that would make it a crime for people to make comments that advocate genocide or hatred against an identifiable group based on such things as their race, gender, religion, ethnic origin, or sexual orientation.” Thirty-six percent were in favor and 38 percent were opposed. Among Democrats, 51 percent supported such laws.
Those are troubling numbers, for unfettered speech is not incidental to a flourishing society. It’s the foundation upon which everything—from science to religion to community to politics—is built. We need to recover and grow the idea that the proper answer to bad speech is more and better speech. Or, as good, to ignore that which bothers and insults you. Tend to your own garden, to quote the great sage of free speech, Voltaire, and invite people to follow your example.
Universities
Of particular concern to me is what is going on in the universities.
From The Spectator:
Free speech is so last century. Today’s students want the ‘right to be comfortable’
Student unions’ ‘no platform’ policy is expanding to cover pretty much anyone whose views don’t fit prevailing groupthink
Have you met the Stepford students? They’re everywhere. On campuses across the land. Sitting stony-eyed in lecture halls or surreptitiously policing beer-fuelled banter in the uni bar. They look like students, dress like students, smell like students. But their student brains have been replaced by brains bereft of critical faculties and programmed to conform.
If your go-to image of a student is someone who’s free-spirited and open-minded, who loves having a pop at orthodoxies, then you urgently need to update your mind’s picture bank. Students are now pretty much the opposite of that. It’s hard to think of any other section of society that has undergone as epic a transformation as students have. From freewheelin’ to ban-happy, from askers of awkward questions to suppressors of offensive speech, in the space of a generation. In each case, it wasn’t the fact the students disagreed with me that I found alarming — disagreement is great! — it was that they were so plainly shocked that I could have uttered such things, that I had failed to conform to what they assume to be right, that I had sought to contaminate their campuses and their fragile grey matter with offensive ideas.
There is one beacon of light: my alma mater The University of Chicago – Report of the Commission on Freedom of Expression. Excerpts:
“Debate may not be suppressed because ideas put forth are thought to be offensive, unwise, immoral, or wrong-headed.”
“It is not the proper role of the University to attempt to shield individuals from opinions they find offensive.”
Bravo.
At Georgia Tech, we are not one of the universities that enforces political correctness, but I have to say that the ‘Stepford student’ did resonate. Georgia Tech’s students are very bright and motivated, but seem generally lacking in understanding of social and political contexts. The upper administration seems cognizant of this issue – I hope to see some changes in this regard.
While I was at the University of Chicago (late 70’s to early 80’s), discussions of the ‘big issues’ was commonplace and ‘free spirited’ and ‘open minded’ ruled. I hope that the University of Chicago has been able to maintain this among their students.
Climate wars
Anyone defending the satirists at Charlie should have a tough time defending Michael Mann in his legal war against the satirical writings of Mark Steyn and Rand Simberg. It will be interesting to see if Charlie and the defense of satirists changes the dynamics of the Mann vs NRO/CEI/Steyn lawsuits.
David Brooks says it best:
Most of us move toward more complicated views of reality and more forgiving views of others. We do try to open conversations with listening rather than insult.
Healthy societies, in other words, don’t suppress speech, but they do grant different standing to different sorts of people. Wise and considerate scholars are heard with high respect. Satirists are heard with bemused semirespect. Racists and anti-Semites are heard through a filter of opprobrium and disrespect. People who want to be heard attentively have to earn it through their conduct.
In the climate wars, those that use pejorative names for people that they disagree with are the equivalents of racists and anti-semites, and deserve opprobrium and disrespect. It is very sad, not to mention bad for science, to see scientists engaging in this behavior.
We need to open up the public debate about climate change, and get rid of the tyranny of political ‘correctness’ in the climate debate that is being enforced by a handful of self-appointed and readily-offended fools.
Addendum: Upon rereading the post, I realized that I didn’t say anything about cartoons. I am a big fan of satirical cartoons; however I don’t ‘get’ the Charlie cartoons that I’ve seen. I spotted this cartoon on twitter, that seems appropriate for today’s post
“In the climate wars, those that use pejorative names for people that they disagree with are the equivalents of racists and anti-semites, and deserve opprobrium and disrespect.” Amen! If a statement on race used the N-word, you’d regard the writer as an ignorant bigot. I think one should react similarly to a statement on climate that uses the word “denier.”
Hang on, if we’re backing free speech we need to put our bigboy pants on and allow idiots to call us deniers, if they really are determined to demonstrate their idiocy in public.
@Tallbloke The difference is that they get on the BBC unopposed to shout “DENIER” and so preload the debate. It’s a Equality of Opportunity point rather than FoS. They get the smear in without anyone to say “that’s just an ad hom here’s my point without an ad hom”.
Context is everything : The blogosphere as a whole has EoO they can shout “deniers” on their blogs and we can shout “eco-nazis” on our blogs. But the public media is different, it’s neutral territory e.g. Chelsea FC would not be routinely allowed to use the label “the cheats” to mean opponents Arsenal FC.
As long as I can talk about what is is that I deny, I am ok with being a denier.
They decide for others what it is that they deny. They word many questions such that a correct answer does not reflect proper meaning.
I do deny some things, but not all the things I am accused of.
Actually, I would like to see greater exposure to Mann et al and their tactics. Let them be published and featured in every medium possible. The public will quickly understand the type of non-scientists they have before them. Give them all the ammunition they need to shoot themselves in their feet.
If as was naively asserted in a WSJ op-ed touching on climate modeling in 1986:
“intelligent laymen can recognize cartoons when they see them and cant when they hear it”
both sides of K-Street and Madison Avenue would be equally unemployed , and today’s climate wars would never have started.
I don’t mind being called a denier as long as the person calling me one can identify what I am denying. I might agree with them.
Ya- those pruporting CAGW very often deny the evidence which contradicts their view.
I’ve seen you deny just about everything except that CO2 is a GHG, steven. Is that enough?
Willard, enough to say you’ve seen me deny things you haven’t bothered to name? A couple of examples would be great and should be easy for you to provide since you have seen me deny so much. Then we can explore who is denying what.
Same here.
I have repeatedly asked of certain commentors to be specific on what I’m suppossedly denying.
Response is either a change of subject or crickets.
Chris Rock uses (or used) the n-word in his sketches on race all the time. And they are hilarious.
Many stinking hypocrites out and about today. The Conversation standing up for free speech while deleting sceptics comments is a laugh.
Some on Twitter are pointing out the hypocrisy of certain world leaders attending the Paris march today who don’t have the best track record on free expression attending the Paris rally. For example, Turkey’s PM Ahmet Davutoglu and ministers from Bahrain and Egypt.
Only recently Turkey was criticised for the arrests of scriptwriters and Zaman editor-in-chief, Ekrem Dumanli
Yeah.
When the king of Belgium died, Charlie Hebdo ran a cover “Le roi des cons est mort”: the king of twats is dead. The belgians are the butt of french “thickie” jokes like the irish are in England. “Roi des cons” is a french expression meaning “prize twat”.
Great satire to grossly offend a country in mourning and a king who never got noticed for anything.
So I would like to take this opportunity to exercise my freedom of expression to say “Les rois des cons sont morts”.
#IamCharlieandsoismywife.
“Many stinking hypocrites out and about today. The Conversation standing up for free speech while deleting sceptics comments is a laugh.”
Thanks for the smile:
Si monumentum requiris, circumspice
“The Conversation standing up for free speech while deleting sceptics comments is a laugh.”
That you think that is about free speech is the best laugh.
To the writer who wouldn’t have posted the Mohammad cartoons, what about all the insulting art and other acts aimed at Christians? The discussion around this seems really one-sided. A crucifix in piss is OK, but don’t insult Mohammad. Right.
There is one major religion that still kills people for apostasy, blasphemy, etc.
This makes the religion incompatible with a free society.
As far as free speech, I am supportive of fairly unlimited free speech. Killing people because they said something that upset you should be a special circumstances crime. “Stepford Student” types of activities should cause denial of federal money to the institution until they fix the problem.
What few recognize is that the jihadists killing the Charlie Hebdo cartoonists were exactly following the mandate of Muhammad two poets killed for their satirical poems.
David, very few Americans realize the jihadists are blowback. This is supposed to be a blog to discuss climate related topics…but this thread was intended to discuss censorship and media control, so here it goes:
http://www.tomdispatch.com/post/175578/best_of_tomdispatch%3A_chalmers_johnson,_the_cia_and_a_blowback_world/
I don’t necessarily agree with Johnson, but I did spend decades living and working outside the USA and Europe (for the record, I’m a USA citizen using a pseudonym). My first hand impression is that U.S. foreign policy is usually poorly conceived, backfires, and also is too dominated by special interests, including the Israel Lobby. Unfortunately, the way the media is controlled in the USA, and the overwhelming brainwashing Americans undergo, make it impossible to get through to most of you.
Europeans aren’t nearly as brainwashed, but they are a cynical lot, and their leaders are mostly into accommodating the USA so they can shelter under the USA war machine.
So, where does this fit with the climate wars? The USA population is being brainwashed to accept a fairly extreme view of the climate’s future state. Everything from a tornado to a dying polar bear to a drought in Kenya to diminishing ice in the Arctic is seen as a catastrophe, and there’s a clear atempt to silence dissent, asking people to defer to bogus 97% majorities.
Brainwashing, manipulation and censorship are more common than many people expect. And don’t forget they are having a special sale at Walmart this week.
Fernando, I didn’t read all of the Johnson thing. What he misses right off the bat is the context of the Afghan war in the 1980s. It wasn’t some silly ill-conceived CIA operation gone awry. It was a very significant and arguably decisive battle in the Cold War. We clearly won that battle. It was worth it. It facilitated the Soviet Union’s relegation to the ash heap of history. Existential threat defused.
Did Afghanistan become a base for terrorists, yes. But acts of terror are hatched all over the place. We didn’t have to invade Afghanistan following 9/11, but it seemed like a good idea at the time. And the invasion was a brilliantly successful military operation. The invasion of Kuwait/Iraq seemed like a good idea at the time and it was a brilliantly successful military operation. The second invasion of Iraq seemed like a questionable idea at the time, but it was a brilliantly successful military operation. The mistake we made following the invasions was to hang around and try to plant democracy in unfertile, arid territory. The military people didn’t want to have anything to do with that. The military wanted to roll through and teach the bad guys a quick lesson, get out and get ready to teach some other bad guys a quick lesson.
I am not saying there is no validity to your observations, but it ain’t so simple. The cynical peace loving Europeans and fellow travelers really shouldn’t be too judgmental about what we do. The U.S has for a long time borne the heavy responsibility for rescuing the world from evil empires. It’s a hard job. It’s costly for us. Mistakes are made, but somebody has to do it. Believe it or not, but nearly all of the people who make U.S foreign policy and the military forces and intelligence community who carry it out aren’t doing it to impose our will on other people, or for oil, or for glory. If our power and our will to use it continues to degrade, don’t expect any improvement in peace and stability.
Fernando
See the lessons of “The Ugly American” and “Sarkhan”. Most only see those who appeared elite were ugly in action. Look at the parallel portrayal of those ugly in face who were beautiful in action.
Secondly, consider the fairness where the world’s first superpower, the USA, was humiliated in Vietnam, and the world’s second superpower, the USSR, was humiliated in Afghanistan.
The West helped establish Israel. That in itself is enough to upset Muslims. But Jews have to have a place to live just like everyone else and they have a history in the ME. The US has been invited to make war in the ME and has chosen to make war there unilaterally. I understand it has upset some Muslims, but at some point, they need to suck it up. They will be better off living their own lives and leaving the West alone. Otherwise, I predict the flamboyant fashion for militant Muslims in the late twenty teens will be napalm on Kevlar.
Jim2, i’m not referrring specifically to Israel being founded on top of land inhabited by people who didnt particularly care to live in a Jewish nation. The problem is broader. I don’t necessarily agree with everything Chalmers Johnson writes, but the ideas are repeated over and over by others. For example, Michael Scheuer writes about the CIA war against Al Qaeda in “imperial Hubris”, and the same ideas about blowback are present.
And Don, the Afghanistan and Iraq invasion were blunders. The USA lost. Just like it lost in Mogadishu and in Viet Nam. Don, war isn’t really about shooting up people. It’s about reaching long term foreign policy objectives. And what USA civilian leaders do is unconscionable. They put our kids in meat grinders year after year and accomplish what we saw on September 11, in Madrid in March 2003, and now in Paris. They accomplish nothing.
The way I see it, the American people are deceived about these topics. The same bs I see going on in the climate debate goes on when it comes to foreign policy, terrorism, or the way the USA gets involved in wars. Most of what they feed you is a pack of distorted half truths, outright lies, or truly surreal. “We won in Iraq”. We won? Go read “Why we lost” by US General (retired) Daniel Bolger.
For the record: I have a grandson in the US Military, and he isn’t wearing loafers and flying partime like Bush did during the Viet Nam war.
Terror contra free speech
Lord Monckton clarifies the underlying issues in: Why won’t the left tell the truth about Islam?
Transform Islam to a religion of peace?
See: Sisi’s Extraordinary Speech on Islam
Al-Sisi:
<a href=http://www.realclearpolitics.com/video/2015/01/11/will_al-sGEORGE WILL:
Pope believes Islam incapable of reform?
Priest reports pontiff’s thoughts from private gathering
Published: 01/24/2006 at 1:00 AM
http://www.wnd.com/2006/01/34456/
Regensburg redux: Was Pope Benedict XVI right about Islam?
http://ncronline.org/news/global/regensburg-redux-was-pope-benedict-xvi-right-about-islam
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/09/15/AR2006091500800.html
Islamic Jihadism can only be superficially comprehended without a understanding of principalities and powers.
“Anyone defending the satirists at Charlie should have a tough time defending Michael Mann in his legal war against the satirical writings of Mark Steyn and Rand Simberg.”
____
My God, Mann didn’t shoot Steyn and Simber!
Steyn and Simber have the right to free speech. Mann has the right to sue for defamation. That’s the American way.
No, but he wrongly invoked the power of the state, which can shoot them. The real problem isn’t Mann, it’s that DC “judge”.
The judge is the terrorist ?
Awesome.
The night they drove Mann’s sticksie down.
=========================
Ruby Ridge
Aftermath
[…]
[…]
Do you think government terrorism has ended in the US? Any judge has the threat of such behavior in hand; it was used to drag Mann’s innocent victims into trials they shouldn’t have had to face.
I see. You want to deprive me of my right to sue. Shame on you.
kim | January 11, 2015 at 12:04 pm |
The night they drove Mann’s sticksie down.
And all the critics were stinging
===========================
Little maxie is shockingly correct. Mann didn’t shoot Steyn and Simberg. Nice work, maxie. Your best yet. We are finally impressed.
That will be the judges job, who is acting for Mann.
I love true satire. I still think The Life of Brian is the funniest satiric film I’ve ever seen
But satire is wasted on those without sufficient self-awareness to appreciate it – like Maxie. He seems not to understand why we laugh so hard at him
For those who don’t think Life of Brian is funny, how about a re-make with Sharia law as the butt ? Should ignite WWIII … just ask Salman Rushdie. Are you game for this, or is it safer to stay stum about the horrors of Sharia ? Pretend that burying young women alive on the accusation of adultery is just a quaint local village custom (Pakistan) ? Or be a little more forgiving and just flog them in public, as is happening in Aceh ?
Satire is the only sensible reply to this and other irrationality, which is why it is so disliked by those whom it “offends”
Max, rarely ok, cub reporter writes “My God, Mann didn’t shoot Steyn and Simber!”
You’ll doubtless not believe me, but when I saw Judith’s post and read through a bit of it, I felt almost sure you’d make this very “point.” How sad.
“There’s a perfectly good reason not to republish the cartoons that has nothing to do with cowardice or caution. I refuse to post them because I think they’re racist and offensive. ” (Paper Bird)
I’d argue that’s precisely why they should be published.
So which race are we particularly offending? Must be Le Tour de Islam.
Well, Steyn and Simberg may have said some harsh things about Mr. Mann. Mann has made some errors and been somewhat secretive with his methods and data. I look forward to the outcome of the case with interest.
I have noticed that over the last 40 years that people are getting better at suppressing speech that they disagree with.
I tend to favor a absolutist version of free speech and would give people served with DMCA notices (particularly by non-copyright holders) or lawsuits a very profitable legal recourse if the plaintiff doesn’t win his case.
Attending is lip service for most especially Turkey, good points about universities, more and more the students are useful idiots who are easy to brainwash and will riot to ensure their fellow students keep their brains closed to any nonconforming idea. Egypt attending is quite a statement, I have recently seen some positives from this potentially great nation.
Yeah condemning 600 people to death by hanging for being present at a demo where someone killed a policeman was a great move for freedom of speech.
Over turning a democratically elected government with military force, then making the entire party an illegal organisation and imprisoning or hanging thousands, way to go for free speech.
Good to see they are so keen on free speech in other peoples countries though. ” Potentially a great nation. ”
It seems the only people who were not invited to march along side Pres. Francois Holland were the french National Front, who seem to draw about 25% of the public vote.
But that’s different because they don’t like Jews.
#pasCharlie.
My mother had a common expression, perhaps every other week or so upon hearing some such news. She’d accompany it with a sorrowful shake of her head: ‘Man’s inhumanity to man’. It perplexed her tremendously. She had plenty of fun and laughter, but not about that.
===============
“Man’s inhumanity to man.”
Nothing more depressing, not even the near certainty of a godless universe.
It easy to brainwash students. You flunk out the ones who disagree. The ones who agree will pass.
A consensus Climate Scientists told our NASA Alumni group that some of us who disagreed with him could not pass his basic climate course.
Of course we couldn’t, we would disagree.
What is the opposite of Diversity? University.
” It is very sad, not to mention bad for science, to see scientists engaging in this behavior.”
As a non-scientist, this blind spot by some climate scientists is the biggest mystery to me. The integrity of science, above any debate about the particulars in climate science, should trump all else.
Scientists are humans too. It may be sad to see the behaviour, but not surprising.
When any group achieves consensus, they have a tendency to block out and attack any thing and any person that does not agree. I believe that consensus is evil, or at least, extremely bad. Scientists, especially, should remain skeptical, and listen to ideas and look at data that does disagree. Not a single Consensus Climate Scientist, was present at the Skeptical Climate Change Conference that was held last year. There were over 60 extremely qualified speakers from all over the World. Many, or Most are well known and respected, outside the Consensus World. Some had been on the Consensus Alarmist Side and saw too much that did not work right and they switched sides and got excluded from the 97%. They maintain the 97% by excluding any that disagree. Their numbers are getting smaller.
Sounds reasonable to me.
These attempts to apply what happened in France to climate science are misplaced. Militant Islam is the problem, not silly climate science “wars.”
Islam is far more than a religion. It is one embodiment of Eastern values. And it is a barbaric and brutal form of government.
The Muslim problem presents a major conundrum. That conundrum is how to determine what fraction of them are radical or militant. I have no idea what fraction of Muslims are radical or militant. I don’t know how to determine that.
Nevertheless, the problem must be addressed. Many parts of Europe already have so many Muslims that the nature of the problem there is materially different than the situation in the US. Not knowing the fraction of militant Muslims, I think the US should apply the precautionary principle and stop immigration of Muslims until some of the major questions about them can be sorted out. The US has plenty of source countries for immigration. And people from many of those countries already hold Western values in general. It is reasonable to assume as a working hypothesis that NO Muslims hold Western values. In fact, they are taking advantage of our values, such as free speech and freedom of religion, to spread their hate. So, I say, ban them from the US. Do it before it is too late, as it appears to be in France, where Muslims are now 7% of the population and their numbers measure in the millions. Also, infiltrate their organizations in the US and around the world. Gather boots-on-the-ground intelligence. The practice of Sharia law should be banned by law in the US. Finally, the US should declare ISIS and any other militant Islamic group, known or unknown, to be an enemy of the US. Any US citizen that goes anywhere to fight with them, or aid them in any way, should be charged of treason and, if convicted, put to death.
WRT to continued attacks, we have another conundrum. The West have already attempted regime change as a solution. After several years of war, the situation in the Middle East is worse. And this result at the cost of much blood and treasure. This does not look like a viable option.
The idea that the militants are trying fan the flames between the West and Islam is totally unsupported by fact. Militants want to convert the world to Islam. End of story. We do ourselves no favors by interpreting this in any other way. This also includes the idea that Muslim militants shouldn’t be killed because that’s what they want in order to become a martyr. The bottom line is if they are dead, they won’t hurt anyone else.
From the article:
…
But multiethnicity in France goes beyond that in the United States, for it includes a religious dimension in addition to racial and ethnic differences. If the most important minorities in the United States (the black and Hispanic) are overwhelmingly Christian, French minority groups are largely Muslim. American minority groups share many basic values with the rest of the country; in contrast, French minority groups tend to have alien values, to think of themselves as a new nation, and even to have hopes of superseding the present Judeo-Christian nation of France.
…
http://www.meforum.org/337/islam-in-france-the-french-way-of-life-is-in
Then there is the erosion of Western freedom due to the extensive spying by our on governments on all of us. The excuse for this is terrorism, yet this most recent incident in France went undetected. This option isn’t working apparently.
If there are moderate Muslims, they are remaining silent. There appears to be no hope that Muslims will spontaneously rise up against the militants. They haven’t done so to this point. This would be the optimal solution from a Western view point. But it’s just not happening. The countries that host militant Imams and militant Muslims cannot or will not stamp out the militants.
We in the West were better off with our own dictators in place in the Middle East. I suppose that could be one option, but would cost more blood and treasure to get back to that situation. And, it’s not a perfect solution.
In the past, the US and Europe did not have to deal with political correctness. We bombed civilians in both World Wars. In the case of Japan, it took a nuclear weapon to force a culture-changing surrender. In my opinion, the West should adapt this strategy once again. We know where the most militant Muslims live. I say if they kill 10, that we kill thousands. If they kill thousands, we kill 100’s of thousands. In my opinion, this is the only way to move Muslims to change their world view. And this method has the advantage of risking least of our own blood. We have sacrificed more than enough of our own young people and have seen orders of magnitude more maimed. Make Muslims suffer until they stop or stop the militants, as the case may be. This is what has worked in the past, and it will work once again.
The US, most countries of Europe, Australia, New Zealand, and any other Western Country should band together and formally declare war on Militant Islam. An attack on one should be treated as an attack on all.
While some might regard this last solution as a step back in civility, we don’t really have another viable path. These militant Muslims don’t understand any language other than violence. They need to be convinced that their culture, associates, family, and social structures will be eradicated if they don’t change their ways.
JC comment: I deliberately did not mention the religious war aspect to this, since I prefer not to discuss these issues on this blogs. I would like to see a focus on the free speech issues raised by #jesuischarlie
Consensus Climate Science is more than a religion.
Consensus Climate Science tries to become a barbaric and brutal form of government that will take away our coal and other fossil fuels and our economy.
Fail to see relevance of your link David L. Hagen. The point you would like to make is … Could you clarify please ?
jim2 tries to be outrageous. Nice try, jim2.
Since Islam is more than a religion, it is a form of government with associated laws, this issue can legitimately be cast as a culture war. Western culture and it’s ideal of free speech against a realization of Eastern culture – specifically, that of Islam.
Too bad they have something we want.
They can’t cut us off, as oil is a fungible commodity.
jim2
I don’t want to comment on your previous long post, but the outline you gave in 11.35 exactly expresses the issue. For many, Islam is placed above everything, including family, laws, democracy and whatever government a muslim happens to be living under
The religion and free speech/western ideals is basically incompatible and whilst some of the religion who are less devout will just accept the status quo, there are a significant number who will want to ensure that their religion triumphs over the state, with all that implies.
Getting back to the university free speech issue, is not the problem that basically the stepford students are being taught by stepford teachers at all levels of education?
tonyb.
good point about the stepford teachers. There are too many career disincentives for being controversial as a professor.
But the issue is a broader one – the students don’t seem to follow current events or engage in the big public debates. Many non college students (taxi drivers in particular) seem to be more engaged.
Climatereason. Let’s just focus on Islam as a culture, at least a significant subset of it.
In the West, we value free speech, Islamic culture does not.
In the West, in many Western countries, we value the separation of Church and State. In some Islamic countries, Church and State are one and the same.
In the West, when we convict criminals, we advocate for humane treatment. Even when the death penalty is carried out, it is done in such a way as to minimize suffering. In Islamic countries, mutilation such as the cutting off of hand or fingers, or poking out an eye, is acceptable. Women and homosexuals get no respect. When it comes to the death penalty, the means are barbaric and brutal.
Their form of government should be reviled by everyone in the West.
Climatereaon, let’s consider Islam only from a governmental perspective.
In the West, we value free speech. In Islamic governments, speech is controlled.
In the West, we value the separation of church and state. In Islamic countries, church and state are frequently one and the same.
In the West, even if someone is convicted of a crime, they are treated humanely. Even if someone if put to death, it is done in such a way as to minimize pain and suffering. I don’t have to go into how “crime” is handled in Islamic countries.
In the West, we take pains to treat everyone equally. In Islamic countries, women have to take a back seat to men. And homosexuals are killed.
So obviously, I agree with you. The West and Islam are not compatible.
Sorry about the duplicate posts. The first one didn’t show up, so I thought I made a mistake by not hitting the “post” button.
climatereason | January 11, 2015 at 12:11 pm |
jim2
The religion and free speech/western ideals is basically incompatible and whilst some of the religion who are less devout will just accept the status quo, there are a significant number who will want to ensure that their religion triumphs over the state, with all that implies.
_____
Hi Tony,
I’ll bet you didn’t intend to describe Southern Baptists.
max
what is the track record of Southern Baptists using extreme violence to enforce their views?
tonyb
tony, Southern Baptists used to be violent toward black people.
Interestingly, the Old Testament of the Christian Bible includes an extensive law library, in books known as Deutoronomy and Judges. These laws were intended to create the legal code for those who adhered to, or were forced to adhere, to the authors’ religion.
And my impression is that Mohammed was influenced by these laws (and/or he shared cultural traits with its authors). I believe the main difference between all these religions is the degree to which believers stick to the rules. Many Muslims seem to be fundamentalists. This isn’t surprising when the Saudi monarchy spends so much money to spread their strict interpretation of Islam. There are fundamentalist counterparts in Christianity, Judaism, and Hinduism.
For the record, I’m agnostic. I study religion as a hobby, to try to understand what makes people tick.
You don’t remember 1973?
What were you thinking, Judith? The charlie case is all about religious war.
Thank you, but I’ll have my religious discussion without any religion. I’m in training.
=============
The particular issue of relevance to this blog is freedom of speech. The charlie case is also about a whole host of sociopolitical issues (e.g. religion, immigration, etc).
I will help you, Judith. The charlie case is about free speech in conflict with murderous religious fanaticism. The last part is why it is being discussed. If you wanted to focus on non-religious war free speech issues, you picked the wrong case.
I predict that from now on we won’t be seeing a lot of cartoons featuring the Prophet, whose name I won’t mention. I know I won’t be insisting on exercising my right to free speech by putting up displays in my front yard insulting any nimrod’s religious beliefs. Nor will I go to the many countries who jail people for denying the Holocaust and utter any unapproved word. I know the practical limits to shooting my mouth off in public.
Don
Terrorism works – the Aus “meeja” were all over the grandiose rhetoric about freedom of press/speech blah blah … but not one of these meeja outlets will re-publish the satirical cartoons that sparked the Charlie massacre to allow us to decide for ourselves. Too scared to satirise Sharia law
I completely disagree with jim2 on his ban of immigration. Muslims in Western countries have generally adopted the freedoms of those countries. If they can’t tolerate certain types of speech, there are countries that share those views and they can decide to live there. You choose where to live by evaluating the standards of their laws against your own. You don’t go somewhere and try to apply your own laws within their system. If you feel you need to, first of all it is your own mistake for living there. Radicalized Muslims in western countries have this problem. They are learning about laws that apply in religion-driven nations, and feel they have to abide by those in their adopted country. Why do this instead of going to countries like Saudi Arabia that already have those laws? I don’t have an answer for this. It is a mental state of a small minority of Muslims that cannot tolerate their adopted country’s freedoms yet still live there and want to fight instead of move. This mental state is encouraged by their leaders and feeds on the worthlessness they feel in their adopted societies by giving them this sense of worth or belonging to a larger thing, even if that larger thing is an evil cult by any normal standards. How to combat this? I don’t know. Everyone is thinking about this at the moment, but it is the seemingly impossible task of identifying and bringing these people back from their cult before they get too far in.
I respect your opinion.
jimd
you said;
‘They are learning about laws that apply in religion-driven nations, and feel they have to abide by those in their adopted country. Why do this instead of going to countries like Saudi Arabia that already have those laws? I don’t have an answer for this.’
Surely the answer is that it is a consequence of multi culturalism?
Many immigrants choose not to integrate and in effect live in their own state within a state, whereby the cultural mores of their original country still apply, as they watch tv from ‘home’, support their ‘home’ sports team, treat women and gays as they would at ‘home’, expect sharia law to be applied, kill animals in the traditional way without stunning, and don’t like free speech, especially where it applies to their religion.
In this they have been actively encouraged by western governments. In some areas of Europe you would not know you are in a European country but could be in Karachi or Algiers. The general population constantly complain but their govts don’t listen to their concerns.
.
Basically the religion-when practised with fundamental fervour, as is increasingly the case- has ideals that do not match that of a liberal western democracy. Consequently we should not be surprised when the assertive and uncompromising medieval attitudes -of a significant minority (?) clash with those of the supine west.
This has repercussions all through society, not least in learning establishments who do not want to offend anyone.
tonyb.
JimD, I think that you are wrong in respect, at least, of the UK, France and the Netherlands, as well as elements in Australia. Your statement that “You don’t go somewhere and try to apply your own laws within their system” is, unfortunately, not true.
Faustino, I am aware that there are subcommunities, not just Muslim ones, that have their own rules but these don’t try to impose those rules outside of their communities or disobey the local laws, unless they are radicals of the kind that the country can do without.
“You don’t go somewhere and try to apply your own laws within their system. ”
Yes Jim, you do. You insert “counselors” to “mediate” in your community and their decisions just happen to be based on Sharia. Besides, your religion says that it is destined to rule the world and you don’t emigrate to the West to become more Western but to make the West more like home.
It’s a mistake to judge another culture by Western values, they have thier own values and agendas.
Actually, AFAIK, most of them migrate because there are jobs they can be paid for. Jobs the local natives aren’t prepared to do for what the “guest workers” are. After that, there’s a range of opinions how and how much their new environment should be changed to be like the one they left.
–These attempts to apply what happened in France to climate science are misplaced. Militant Islam is the problem, not silly climate science “wars.”
Islam is far more than a religion. It is one embodiment of Eastern values. And it is a barbaric and brutal form of government. —
Islam is more than a religion because it tends towards being totalitarian regime.
But Islam is not alone in it’s tendency of certain group of people to want to control every aspect of your life.
The desire to control what size soda that people can drink by outlawing larger soda is same thing. Same goes for banning light bulbs.
Same goes for, “If you like your healthcare, you keep your health plan”. And etc.
What is a clear example of barbaric and brutal form of government is Cuba.
Whereas Iran in comparison, is a civilized, moderate, and freedom loving country.
Jim2 – “…if they krill 100s we krill 1000s…”
“No one likes us-I don’t know why
We may not be perfect, but heaven knows we try
But all around, even our old friends put us down
Let’s drop the big one and see what happens
We give them money-but are they grateful?
No, they’re spiteful and they’re hateful
They don’t respect us-so let’s surprise them
We’ll drop the big one and pulverize them
Asia’s crowded and Europe’s too old
Africa is far too hot
And Canada’s too cold
And South America stole our name
Let’s drop the big one
There’ll be no one left to blame us
We’ll save Australia
Don’t wanna hurt no kangaroo
We’ll build an All American amusement park there
They got surfin’, too
Boom goes London and boom Paris
More room for you and more room for me
And every city the whole world round
Will just be another American town
Oh, how peaceful it will be
We’ll set everybody free
You’ll wear a Japanese kimono babe
And there’ll be Italian shoes for me
They all hate us anyhow
So let’s drop the big one now
Let’s drop the big one now”
– from Randy Newman’s song “Political Science”
A survey of 600 people is representative of all?
“They’re rioting in Africa
They’re starving in Spain
There’s hurricanes in Florida and Texas needs rain
The whole world is festering with unhappy souls
The French hate the Germans
The Germans hate the Poles
Italians hate Yugoslavs
South Africans hate the Dutch
And I don’t like anybody very much”
Merry Minuet – The Kingston Trio
Jim2: A 2012 survey of Muslims in the U.S.
http://www.wnd.com/2012/10/guess-who-u-s-muslims-are-voting-for/
“Islam is far more than a religion. It is one embodiment of Eastern values. And it is a barbaric and brutal form of government.”
Your argument sounds reasonable to me. An analysis of all the options we have to deal with the fascism of Islam seems to lead exactly to what you write. I wish it weren’t so but I have seen not one solution proposed by anyone, not by any leader of the free world, not by academics on either side of the coin, (though a few writers have expressed your thoughts). I’d love to hear what solutions others on here propose. As a Libertarian I strongly disagree with the Libertarians Party stance of ‘blowback.’ There is always blowback. The only time there isn’t is when you defeat the enemy…if you play with them, what the hell? What do you expect? This Islamic Fascism has cost us a lot in blood and treasure and we can ignore it, muddle on or take the threat seriously and destroy them. That is the only solution when you are dealing with an enemy that ‘loves death.’ Would there another way, an easier way, a less costly way. But I’m afraid your enemy determines how hard you have to fight. And this enemy is not going to be bought off or just go away. The only other solution is to decimate the funding for these groups by decimating Middle Eastern oil. It’s not as good a solution as destroying them, though. Anyone up for that? And the first thing we need to destroy is the moral cachet of Political Correctness. It’s a carbuncle on the soul of morality.
As many pundits have said, the liberal media doesn’t just refuse to run the cartoons: they run from them. That’s pretty much what we see has happened in the global warming debate, a knowing failure by the liberal media to print the real news: that the scientists of the official government-education establishment are fundamentally dishonest.
Yes
Hear, Hear!
That report from the University of Chicago was excerpted in this weekend’s Wall Street Journal. Happy to see you quoted it. Here is the excerpt they published:
Among speech suppressionists on the climatological left, Michael Mann is the biggest offender. In the Climategate emails he was seen engaging in “prior restraint.” Now he’s after bigger game: NR, Mark Steyn and CEI. This after legally hog-tying Tim Ball for years on end for making a joke.
Despicable.
Potter,
COuldn’t agree more. Would you happen to know the current status of the Tim Ball situation?
Mann and his climate imams have form assassinating the careers of those who challenge him, and there’re those on his side who have suggested the wholesale removal of Sceptics from public life You’re on very dodgy ground there..
It’s worse than that. Mann wants to decapitate em’ and then molest their wives and children.
Well, since you brought up molesting children, and though I have the utmost sympathy for the victims of Jerry Sandusky, Penn State’s cover-up of Michael ‘Piltdown’ Mann has caused, and will continue to cause, far more general social harm.
Misty moments pique the eyes, writing thusly through the tears.
===================
Well, of course you would think it was a cover-up because it didn’t go your way. And speaking of children, I wouldn’t let you anywhere near any kid of mine. I wouldn’t want you near my dog, my cat, my goldfish, my plants, my anything.
Max,
It’s a shame you have developed such negative emotion… and all because for some reason you believe in made up squiggly line drawings that squiggle upwards on one end.
Andrew
“Bad Andrew | January 11, 2015 at 1:49 pm |
Max,
It’s a shame you have developed such negative emotion…”
______
It’s a shame you don’ t know a joke when you see one.
And you better not call me a joke, because I had a post deleted for calling someone a joke.
Update: Video: Robert F. Kennedy Jr. wants to jail his politcal opponents – acusses Koch Brothers of ‘treason’ – ‘They ought to be serving time for it’.
http://www.climatedepot.com/2014/09/21/robert-f-kennedy-jr-wants-to-jail-his-political-opponents-accuses-koch-brothers-of-treason-they-ought-to-be-serving-time-for-it/
BREAKING NEWS
Swiftboating Comes to Science
Good on `yah, Michael Mann and all scientists who stand with him!
Why I am not surprized FOMD would equate a Michael Mann rant to his gallantry toward sainthood:
http://judithcurry.com/2015/01/05/applications-of-subseasonal-weather-forcasts/#comment-661650
http://judithcurry.com/2015/01/09/week-in-review-39/#comment-662510
http://judithcurry.com/2015/01/05/applications-of-subseasonal-weather-forecasts/#comment-661650
Fan said “Even worse, Mann and his family were targets of death threats.”
____
Can’t Mann take a joke ?
What reasonable person would take a death threat seriously?
Does that apply to the Koch brothers as well?
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2014/05/30/the-other-koch-brothers_n_5420230.html
“I really shouldn’t say this but here goes. Don’t send death threats to any Koch brother. Don’t send death threats to anyone, in fact. The whole “sending death threats to people” thing is just not a good look, okay”
Fan
“Mann should know: his work as a postdoc on the famed “hockey stick” graph led him to be vilified by Fox News and in the Wall Street Journal”
Mann’s hockey stick was a slight of hand that caused the MWP and LIA to disappear. We now know that it relied on misleading tree ring proxies and statistical manipulation; there are solid reasons to vilify him.
Keep warm,
Richard
You vilify Mann because you fear he’s right.
rls and Max, Vilification is a bit of an overstatement. Most are just laughing at Mann. He does come up with some funny stuff :)
https://lh4.googleusercontent.com/-OvQHzJy8gFU/VLF3XHImAqI/AAAAAAAAMGM/X1vv5Tx0kiI/w689-h411-no/oppo%2Bover%2Bmann.png
You fear what rls says, because you fear he is right. OMG! Where is little joshie with the unintended irony penalty flag?
I vilify Mann because he’s a villain.
This overwhelming preponderance of scientists — and the overwhelming preponderance of the articles and textbooks that they publish — thoroughly discount your claim, isn’t that correct AK?
http://www.skepticalscience.com/pics/97hours_crowd.jpg
Good on `yah … for sustained, respectful, responsible, rational public discourse, Scientific American and Michael Mann!
Question However did Michael Mann’s “Gang of villains” grow so large?
The world wonders … while science-denying demagogues froth!
> You vilify Mann because you fear he’s right
No, Maxie – we laugh at Mann for his pompous vain-glory
Now guess why we laugh at you :)
I hope you laugh at me because I’m funny. I try to be.
Hi everyone
I am looking for a plugin for Chrome to make chosen posters and their replies invisible. Has anyone successfully done this?
Are death threats protected by the 1st amendment? (Serious question; I don’t know the answer.)
No, such threats fall under free speech exceptions
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_free_speech_exceptions
The people making threats to climate scientists (on both sides of the debate) are doing so anonymously.
Another factor:
For example, the Supreme Court has held that “threats may not be punished if a reasonable person would understand them as obvious hyperbole”, he writes.
Thanks. Makes sense.
“threats may not be punished if a reasonable person would understand them as obvious hyperbole”
Seems to exclude a lot of commenters on this blog; I will let everybody make their own list.
It’s unnecessary to look to any court for guidance on this question, as it is self-evident that every right has attendant responsibilities, wherefore no right may be legitimately exercised in a manner that threatens the rights of another.
Political Correctness and “Hate Speech” laws are our version of Blasphemy Laws.
You can’t judge the book by its cover alone.
http://www.sci-tech-today.com/news/Religious-Experience—-in-the-Brain-/story.xhtml?story_id=0200014PRC5G
“Political Correctness and “Hate Speech” laws are our version of Blasphemy Laws.”
Yep! “Hate Speech” laws are an affront to “Free Speech,” “Civil Liberty,” and the 1st Amendment to the US Constitution. The 1st Amendment is designed to prevent Tyranny of Majority or tyranny of those in power. Those who support “Hate Speech” and similar laws, and support repeal of the 1st Amendment will one day find they are no longer in power or in the majority and the laws will be used against them. There are a lot better ways of solving today’s problems than destroying long-term protections.
Mann made the mistake of taking Steyn to court. However, while Steyn belongs at Brooks’ so-called ‘kiddie table’, he became widely quoted by people and what he says now contributes to the thoughts of denialist organizations and politicians. As satire, it should have been treated as an Onion article, which are generally not taken seriously except by mistake. Suing Steyn is also a mistake and the piece should have been left alone. It’s like suing the Onion. The fault is with people who take Steyn’s satire seriously, and that is their own problem.
Steyn does more than just smell an onion. He’s also not afraid to shed a few tears to peel it and see what’s inside.
Regarding free speech, this does not allow people to publicly accuse others of prosecutable offenses such as academic fraud. Yes, satire has as a goal damaging the reputations of people they don’t like, but the line is crossed when using false accusations of crime to damage those reputations. Steyn was clumsy in making this look like what he was doing, and then dug in when given a chance to withdraw the accusation, so at that point it turned from satire into a direct accusation. Anyway, Mann should have ignored it unless he saw any obvious evidence of people taking Steyn’s accusation seriously.
Yep
Neither is really about free speech. Steyn’s is about a serious personal accusation that he leveled in a public forum, while Charlie is about a consequence of speech in free societies attracting a reaction from less free societies. The Interview movie was another example of this. More a culture clash than free speech issue. While Rushdie says no one has a right not to be offended, he can’t impose that. Serious people take serious offense whether he likes it or not, and an awareness of that is needed when making any statement in public even if it is intended as satire. Even without cartoonists, Islamists have non-speech-related targets, like soldiers, Jews, malls, schools, hotels, etc. It is far beyond a speech issue.
–While Rushdie says no one has a right not to be offended, he can’t impose that.–
No one can impose rights.
You can impose privileges.
Interesting participation by Rushdie in this discussion.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GvgdPAEu8vA
Note the unintentional irony from Carly Fiorina at the end: She notes that Muslim societies were examples of tolerance in the 16th century even as she argues that Islam is inherently intolerant.
– She notes that Muslim societies were examples of tolerance in the 16th century even as she argues that Islam is inherently intolerant.-
Comparatively, tolerate 500 year ago.
It was empire was which was, say, quite unlike the Soviet Union’s empire.
Or quite unlike current China.
One could say it was similar to the Anglosphere:
“Anglosphere refers to a set of English-speaking nations with a similar cultural heritage, based upon populations originating from the nations of the British Isles (England, Wales, Scotland and Ireland), and which today maintain close political and military cooperation.”
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anglosphere
And of course it was Turkish in terms of leadership. And then Russia went to war with it:
“The outcome of the Russo-Turkish War of 1768–1774 was disastrous for the Ottomans. Large territories, including those with large Muslim populations, such as Crimea, were lost to the Russian Empire.”
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Caliphate
Of course no where on Earth was very tolerate 500 years ago- or the guests said, we have move on since that time. Age Enlightenment, Reformation, American Independence, and etc.
once again we see the irony of Joshua ritualistically finding unintended irony where there is none.
motivated reasoning is so interesting
gbaike –
==> “Comparatively, tolerate 500 year ago.”
Religous fundamentalist Muslims want to drag society back 500 years because they abhor the arc of history since that time. They are cultists who have followers that want to return to the Middle Ages, not entirely unlike Christian fundamentalists like Jim Jones or Fred Phelps or Jews who plant bombs in schoolyards in Palestine, .
It’s phun searching ‘Al Gore and Fred Phelps’.
===============
“Religous fundamentalist Muslims want to drag society back 500 years because they abhor the arc of history since that time. They are cultists who have followers that want to return to the Middle Ages, not entirely unlike Christian fundamentalists like Jim Jones or Fred Phelps or Jews who plant bombs in schoolyards in Palestine”
There seems a lot people who are deluded about history and imagine
that there were golden ages which are better than the present.
It seems obvious to me that we are presently living in golden age [a global golden age- it being the best of times for most people living on Earth] which includes the Muslim who imagine times were better in the past.
Part of this thinking could related to idea that people lived longer in the Ancient past. Think that could be simply due to people breeding at younger age, coupled poor time keeper, and finally simply tendency of people to exaggerate [a fish tale]. And/or it seems more likely that ancient people were counting moons rather than having any idea about years.
Also I think the “magical” is easier to remember than the mundane so it was a necessity in order to preserve important cultural information.
Jim D | January 11, 2015 at 6:12 pm
Excellent post.
“Have you met the Stepford students? They’re everywhere. On campuses across the land. Sitting stony-eyed in lecture halls or surreptitiously policing beer-fuelled banter in the uni bar. They look like students, dress like students, smell like students. But their student brains have been replaced by brains bereft of critical faculties and programmed to conform.”
I detest today’s student culture. But even back in the 60’s and early 70’s when l was in school and most of us considered ourselves the vanguard of the “counter-culture,” the politically correct, authoritarian seeds were there. I have clear memories of students being heatedly corrected by other students for using the term “colored,” …however benignly well-intended….instead of the newly minted “black.” In my dorm, I took plenty of heat for refusing to participate in anti-war marches. It’s not even that I wasn’t against what was going on in Vietnam because I was. It was that I hated to be pressured in that way. I knew damn well most of those kids knew even less than I did about the world…and had examined their own beliefs not at all.
Throughout history the old folks have disapproved of the ways of youth. I’m not sure why, but I suspect envy.
I dont how old you are Max_OK.
But being forty I am totally non-envious of any youth. Being young is all about not knowing enough. Life is a great adventure and you understand so little of it when you’re young.
Read more carefully Max. Consider commenting less. Did I say I “approved” of youth when I too was young? I did? Where?
I have no envy of youth. Change is the great universal imperative. Fail to accept it at your peril. Interestingly, there are studies that show people actually become more happy as they get age.
http://www.scientificamerican.com/article/age-brings-happiness/
You right, pokerguy!
Age also brings wisdom and compassion.
pokerguy vigorously denies he envies youth.
Ha Ha, that’s a sure sign he envies youth.
Free speech is never completely free. There is no right to falsely yell fire in a crowded theater. There is no right to libel or defame (the Mann assertion against Steyn, where IMO Steyn’s countersuit against Mann for making the assertion likely has much more merit).
On the other hand, there is no right to be unoffended. Radical Islam asserts there is, to an extreme seen in Paris. But mainstream Islam is not far behind. Saudi Arabia just sentenced a blogger to 1000 lashes (50 at a time for 20 weeks) and 10 years in prison for ‘insulting’ some senior religious imams there concerning something or other. That has no place in the the modern world, and indicates a fundamental problem with Islam generally—reminiscent of the Catholic church in earlier times (inquisition, Galileo, …). Religious intolerance seems a recurring historical theme.
The University PC thing is deeply disturbing, and seem. It is no different than Saudi Arabia minus the lashes, only focused on the secular ‘progressive beliefs’ rather than the truly religious (GMO, AGW, gay marriage…pick your progressive cause du jour). Forcibly Shutting down guest lectures and other forms of uncivil disobedience equivalent to the Vietnam war protest days, simply because of the speakers stance on something. In many cases aided, abetted, encouraged by faculty. Several extreme examples reported in the last year.
Skepticism about the CAGW “religion” is met with academic PC. Judith’s own treatment by Scientific American and Mann is strong evidence. The Bengstom affair is another recent example, shunning instead of lashes.
The worse this gets, the more I think it shows the wheels are coming off the CAGW bandwagon. Warmunists (Lysenko allusion from essay Climatastrosophistry) know that, so increasingly resort to name calling. It is all they have left after the scienctific predictions have failed. Led by the current US president, who said the science is settled and anyone who disagrees is a flat earther. Echoed by the current US secretary of state, who also recently declared that global warming is the greatest foreign policy danger we face—not radical Islam.
The price of freedom is eternal vigilance. Now is a time to be especially vigilant on multiple fronts. It was a delight to read Judith’s alma mater UC’s new written policy against PC, and to learn she contributed. That is vigilence just like this blog. She is leading by example, challenging the rest of us to step up our game.
I don’t know, being lectured about free speech by David Brooks is like mayonnaise telling mustard she is not spicy enough.
It is amazing, isn’t it?
Judith wrote:
“Anyone defending the satirists at Charlie should have a tough time defending Michael Mann in his legal war against the satirical writings of Mark Steyn and Rand Simberg.”
That’s a very inaccurate characterization of Mann’s lawsuit, Judith, and you know it. And it’s a rather shameful was to utilize the Charlie Hebdo killings.
Mann isn’t suing about “satire” — he’s suing for defamation. Rand Simberg accused Mann of “deception” and “engaging in data manipulation” — that is not satire. Steyn has repeatedly accused Mann of “fraud” — that is not satire, they are claims. (And claims made with no evidence; indeed, Steyn doesn’t even understand the science, calling Mann et al’s work a “climate model.”)
If the work is fraudulent, why aren’t they pursuing Bradley and Hughes as well? That no one is shows this is all political, not about science or facts.
The Constitution’s protection of speech does not extend to defamation. And I doubt you would think so if you were the one being accused of fraudulent science and data manipulation.
You are plain wrong David. Mann, through his passionate activism and brutal defamation of other people, including his colleagues, turned himself into a public figure and, as such, he is fair game for political lampooning. Read his tweets. His lack of self-restraint is remarkable, given that he should have a well-developed and substantial prefrontal cortex. I have to wonder at that.
Remember the words of the mythical Sri Justinanda:
“Intelligence is knowing, wisdom is knowing but not saying.”
David Appell (@davidappell) | January 11, 2015 at 12:49 pm
Judith wrote:
“Anyone defending the satirists at Charlie should have a tough time defending Michael Mann in his legal war against the satirical writings of Mark Steyn and Rand Simberg.”
That’s a very inaccurate characterization of Mann’s lawsuit, Judith, and you know it. And it’s a rather shameful was to utilize the Charlie Hebdo killings.
_____
It looks like an attempt to conflate the action of Mann with the action of the terrorists. He filed a law suit. The terrorists killed. See the similarity?
max
I think the conflation is unfortunate as Dr Mann uses the law-however much I may disagree with his heavy handed use of it-others kill to get their way, or display a high level of violent intimidation. They are at different ends of the logarithmic scale, of getting your own way
tonyb
Tony, good on you.
Anybody with any capacity for objectivity can see that Judith’s linking this case with the Mann BS is inappropriate. She should close this thread down and move on.
“It looks like an attempt to conflate the action of Mann with the action of the terrorists.”
Not at all.
It can easily be interpreted by the uncharitable as conflating. Why call Mann’s lawsuit a “legal war” in this context? It’s a freaking lawsuit, that Mann had every legal right to pursue. He ain’t the judge, jury and executioner. Don’t inflate the little clown.
==> “She should close this thread down and move on.”
How interesting that Don has so little room for a thread where some % of our much beloved “skeptics” see obvious flaws in her reasoning.
Why wouldn’t he welcome, with open arms, legitimate disagreement with her – disagreement that breaks down the typically fossilized patterns of discussion?
Quite remarkable, actually. It’s ok to discuss issues as long as you agree with Judith. If you disagree with her, you’re either a troll or the thread should be closed down.
Don Monfort = one of the reasons I love Climate Etc.
climatereason: I think the conflation is unfortunate as Dr Mann uses the law-however much I may disagree with his heavy handed use of it-others kill to get their way, or display a high level of violent intimidation. They are at different ends of the logarithmic scale, of getting your own way
A legal judgment against Steyn will be backed by the police power of the government. Should Steyn continue (if the judgment goes against him), he can be arrested and jailed, and should he resist arrest he might be killed. Should Steyn be fined, men and women with arms will cooperate with banks to seize his assets, in case he resists. The distinction between the legal process and volunteer assassins is worth remembering, but so is the consideration that any laws against free speech will be backed by force.
Your invocation of Southern Baptists was intriguing. “Extremist” members of some Christian groups have assassinated Negroes, “meddlers” from outside, and also Doctors who perform abortions. I don’t know that they have recently threatened or carried out harmful acts against people who mock and deride them, but in the past they would at least have bombed the printing presses.
Crispy Equivalencies, Breakfast of Champions.
=================
This is just goofey:
“A legal judgment against Steyn will be backed by the police power of the government.Should Steyn continue (if the judgment goes against him), he can be arrested and jailed, and should he resist arrest he might be killed. Should Steyn be fined, men and women with arms will cooperate with banks to seize his assets, in case he resists.”
That’s a very scary version of the snowball effect. You can say the same about the possible legal ramifications of an unpaid traffic ticket, or for failing to keep your dog on a leash. Getting behind in the child support payments. Or letting the weeds get too high in your yard. Or shoplifting and walking down the middle of the street and beating a cop. I don’t recall hearing of anyone getting killed for resisting arrest over a freaking defamation judgement, but you are probably right.
I have to stop reading this thread. It’s really demoralizing to see so many otherwise rational and intelligent people, staggering around drunk on Kool-Aid.
Mann actually sued over the parallel with Sandusky. Only after that wouldn’t fly did he amend the complaint to remove that. Mann’s “fraud” has been demonstrated in a number of venues; and as journalists, Mann’s victims were entitled to express their opinion in the way they did.
The key reason, IMO, that Mann’s case didn’t get thrown out from was the first was indignation over the parallel: not because it wasn’t justified, it was. Instead, the judge(s) were indignant that a member of their “in-crowd” had been compared to a molester. Despite admitting that Mann had no right to sue over that comparison.
The law is, or should be, about what was said, not about emotional reactions to something not really even implied: nobody ever suggested Mann was a child molester. “Molesting data” is a perfectly good way of describing his behavior, a matter of opinion. And the whole freedom of speech thing is about opinions.
David Appell, I know that the Charlie/Mann link is a difficult stretch for most to grasp, but why are you and others so defensive about people poking fun at the Nobel not-a-laureate inventor of the Mann-O-Matic?
Did you see his latest?
https://lh4.googleusercontent.com/-OvQHzJy8gFU/VLF3XHImAqI/AAAAAAAAMGM/X1vv5Tx0kiI/w689-h411-no/oppo%2Bover%2Bmann.png
Along with his waxing paranoid about the Serengeti he revised his “Northern Hemisphere land based temperature reconstruction to “1000 years of Global Temperature and CO2 Change”. Overlaid on his “science” is a reconstruction of the tropical IPWP.
https://lh6.googleusercontent.com/–MkaCepVwMQ/VLPZjltmIBI/AAAAAAAAMIc/OS0xMr1-W8w/w738-h494-no/tropical%2Bocean%2Band%2Bgmst%2Bcorrelation.png
The tropical oceans have an outstanding correlation with “Global Temperature Anomaly”, really impressive. that should be the case since the tropical oceans are like the boiler for the climate engine.
https://lh4.googleusercontent.com/-b-SFgB_wC40/VLPYpvY7xQI/AAAAAAAAMIU/ty39xNgUNPE/w743-h523-no/tropical%2Bsst%2Bversus%2B30-90N%2Bland%2Bonly%2Bcorrel.png
The northern hemisphere extra-tropical land temperature anomaly has virtually no correlation.
“Scientifically” speaking, Mann does not appear to be the sharpest tack in the box. I can see defending his right to be a dumba$$, but his “science” is a different situation. Don’t you think putting a bit of distance between Mann’s “science” and yours is something to consider?
Oh, the irony. David Brooks, without self-awareness, enthrones his own tribe of “wise and considerate scholars” on the top of the dung heap. Of course, neither wisdom nor consideration are necessary to become a “scholar”. In fact, the thought(less) leaders of political correctness are the “scholars”, more accurately described as university employees, that have brainwashed several generations of “scholars” since the 1970s, especially in the social sciences. The faculty tenure committees of the 70s ensured ideological purity and adherence to the tenets of political correctness – a self-selected group dug in deeper than a tick on a hapless dog.
We can learn from anyone, even the coarse and uneducated, if we open our hearts and minds and listen. Their messages, maybe delivered in crude and emotive language, may contain the lessons learned from a hard life. History teaches us, if we are good students, that the elite ignore these lessons at their own risk.
Free speech means free speech, with no qualifications. If there are qualifications, who will be the judges of speech?
For people that only listen to the speech of “wise and considerate scholars”, you can read this analysis of the impact of political correctness at my alma mater, the University of California:
http://www.nas.org/images/documents/A_Crisis_of_Competence.pdf?utm_source=March+26+Press+Release+-+A+Crisis+of+Competence+2&utm_campaign=CAS+report+press+release&utm_medium=email
Wow, thanks for the link, hadn’t seen this analysis about University of California
You are most welcome. Your blog is the best, a light in the darkness.
Justin, read the report in the link. Shocking, but not surprising. It is as bad or worse at my alma mater. Prof Cornell West published zero research for over 10 years, and used his Afro studies courses for brute indoctrination of the racial victim sort. Worse that Jesse Jackson, Al Sharpton, and Louis Farakhan combined. My took one semester, and was outright told could never do better than a B- because of the wrong race to ‘understand’. When then Pres. Larry Summers finally acted to force West out after massive alumni complaint and Board of Overseers intervention, the PC faculty of Arts and Sciences banded together to force Summers out.
And the situation has gotten worse under PC Pres. Gilpin with hires like Naomi Oreskes, well trained in exteme left PC in the California University system. So bad that I informed the University and Gilpin in writing that they would not see another nickel from me unless Oreskes was delt with. Sadly, I do not expect to donate ever again. The only bright thing is not being pestered by the office of major alumni gifts, who used to want face to faces at least twice a year.
http://www.nas.org/images/documents/A_Crisis_of_Competence.pdf?utm_source=March+26+Press+Release+-+A+Crisis+of+Competence+2&utm_campaign=CAS+report+press+release&utm_medium=email
Thx JW for the above Report which includes empiric data,
* pp19/23 that show the weighting where left of centre
political adherents don’t merely dominate the faculty, they
are the faculty.* 1999 Rothman, Lichter & Nevitte.* 2004
Klein * 2007 Gross & Simmons.
P 30/32 Mission Statements as commitment to political
social agendas reduced to a radical POV reflected in the
focus of History Courses pp 33/46.
‘One has to wonder about the self correcting ability of an
academic culture so inbred that it reflects only of half the
political spectrum. What arguments will be overlooked,
what lines of inquiry ignored?’ p 30.
Yes, like a virus they have penetrated the university and injected their DNA. Now, the university cranks out stepford students – replicas of themselves. They are bright, ambitious, and educated but they don’t appreciate their heritage. They inherited a republic, but can they keep it?
Really interesting report. Thanks for linking it.
Yes, thanks for the great link.
Judith,
The Charlie activities in France are horrific on so many levels. Mark Steyn discusses this in his own unique way on his web site. His political and freedom of speech insights are definitely worth reading.
You say:
We need to open up the public debate about climate change, and get rid of the tyranny of political ‘correctness’ in the climate debate that is being enforced by a handful of self-appointed and readily-offended fools.
Are the self appointed and readily offended fools manipulating the likes of Gore, Obama, Kerry, Ban Ki Moon, Holdren………..or is it the other way around?
I am all for opening up the climate debate, but in truth it has been coopted by the progressive green mafia as a key element in their movement for world government and wealth redistribution.
Other way around. Obama is in charge, no doubt about it, his wax wings, still in flying shape, are warming. Gore, still a rich hero to many, has buffooned himself through his hubris.
Pingback: If All You See… » Pirate's Cove
Judith Curry,
There are ready enough critiques of your arguments and some here will doubtless do that.
But.
For you to co-opt Charlie Hebdo in an attempt to assert the moral high ground in your petty squabbles.
Before the bodies are even in the ground.
For shame.
My post is about freedom of speech, and I criticize those who would try to limit free speech. This is a climate blog so we tend to mention issues related to the climate debate.
What does cold blooded murder have to do with filing a defamation law suit?
Judith,
You claim “tyranny”.
The victims at Charlie Hebdo truly looked tyranny in the face.
You write opinion pieces in major newspapers, testify before congress yet claim suppression! The citizens of dictatorships would love to be suppressed in such a fashion.
And you co-opt the still unburied victims of an appalling crime to your support.
Again. Shame.
If you are unfamiliar with the concept of ‘tyranny of political correctness”, see
http://columbiaspectator.com/2009/11/10/tyranny-political-correctness
I do not claim any personal ‘suppression’ of my own freedom of speech – I blog and tweet what I please.
You are co-opting the unburied victims, veryloudguy. Your hysterical hyperbole is hypocritical. Judith apparently thinks that this is just another opportunity to discuss generic free speech. She can be very naive, at times.
When the Taliban took over in Afghanistan, the murdered the meteorologists, because predictions of the future were god’s domain.
I’m guessing that they’re not too wild about climate predictions either.
VTG –
==> “Before the bodies are even in the ground.”
Sameolsameol. No issue is off-limits for crama-queening and exploitation in the climate wars.
Jihadis slaughtering civilians and Judith’s victimization by “realists” = same, same but different, doncha know.
Judith,
followed your link and it seems to be someone using their right of free speech to openly criticise political correctness.
I see no references to cold blooded murder.
Neither do I see anyone, as you do explicitly in your post, anyone drawing parallels between their opponents and “racists and anti semites”.
Your words are shameful
“And you co-opt the still unburied victims of an appalling crime to your support.
Again. Shame.”
And this isn’t claiming moral high ground?
You are a shameless opportunist, joshie. Judith is wrong in thinking that the charlie case sheds any light on Mann case or the climate debate. She made a mistake. You want to crucify her for it. Well, you just want to crucify her for being a heretic.
This is a quote from a short article I wrote a few months ago:
“How to Survive the Climate Zombie Threat”
“An emerging threat posed by climate zombies has been confirmed by a series of interviews, media articles, and blogosphere items seen in the past 30 days. This newly created “How to Survive the Climate Zombie Threat” effectively communicates information to the public, government agencies, first responders, and the private sector what to do to reduce risk in the face of unquantified statistics. At this time we lack the modeling capability to describe the probability of anything happening. Therefore you should use the Practical Precautionary Principle (PPP). ”
And…
“Is this threat real? By now I´m sure you have heard about the Australian Art Minister´s funding of a play called “Kill Climate Deniers¨.
I´m told this was meant as a joke. However, our intelligence service located this quote in a blog post by Richard Parncutt, a professor at the University of Graz: “In this article I am going to suggest that the death penalty is an appropriate punishment for influential GW deniers”. And this guy wasn´t joking. This means there´s a credible, specific, emerging climate zombie threat.”
Don –
==> ” You want to crucify her for it. ”
I’m curious. When you just make stuff up, is it intentional?
Who is limiting your speech, Judith? You speak all over. You publish lots of op-ed. So I don’t see the tyrannical suppression of your right to free speech.
I did search on “climate change deniers don’t deserve free speech” and got 3,480,000 results. It seems reasonable to bring it up when free speech is a major topic in the news.
steven, the warmista generally refer to corporate death penalties for deniers. Islamic fundamentalists are much more literal.
http://ecowatch.com/2014/10/01/jailing-climate-deniers-robert-kennedy-jr/
I did the same search and got zero. (Do you know how Google interprets quote marks?)
David, yes but I was using the AOL search engine and when I used my quotation marks in my comment they were meant to show what I typed not how I typed it. When I did it again after I saw how my comment might confuse I did it again, again using the AOL search engine. I got 2,940,000 results (at least I did just now but it was similar before) so I left it as it was. Close enough for government work.
Mark Steyn
Good of you, VeryTallGuy, to provide living breathing evidence of the sickness in western society, the stench of your moral equivalence is evident even across the internet, Tell me, did you contribute to Spielberg’s script?
VTG,
About 170,000 people die every day, ten thousand for every death in the terrorist incidents in France. There will be 170,000 more tomorrow and the day after. Within decades that number will double. Many of these deaths are fully as senseless or tragic as the terror incidents’ deaths. This is the human condition. If we were to apply your ridiculous standard of propriety to the 60 million deaths that will happen this year we’d continually be paralyzed. Just because the media and governments have decided this tragedy deserves wall-to-wall coverage doesn’t mean I and others can’t just sigh and go about our lives. In fact history has shown us that those that elevate such tragic incidents to “watershed” moments will generally use them to visit upon the populace horrors that will dwarf the original tragedy. Don’t be fooled again.
+1
Don, I thought the extremists were pretty casual about choosing victims to behead out in the desert. I don’t think they picked blasphemers. In fact, those guys have killed more Muslims than Jews or Christians, so I’m not sure your point holds–and I’ll bet Mark Steyn keeps his eyes wide open these days.
Joshua is a shameless opportunist and Micheal is his mini-me. Michael and Joshua, there is one climate blogger who is very focused on Michael Mann. His name is Steve McIntyre, not Judith Curry. And yet I never see you at his blog–perhaps you know that Judith is much gentler than the reception you would get there and richly deserve here.
The parallel between the moral issues involved in Charlie Hebdo and those trying to silence free speech in the West is not perfectly congruent. But it is close enough to be useful.
Alarmists have called for skeptics to face Nuremburg trials, go to prison, ad absurdium. Alarmists have killed their children and then themselves in a chilling echo of Jonestown. Alarmists have committed suicide by cop at the Discovery Channel headquarters. They trash archaeological treasures, agitate against cheap energy for the poor in South Africa and tell skeptics ‘we know where you live.’ The issue is serious enough to warrant comparison with what happened in Paris, if not exactly the same.
It is the alarmists who say that climate change is a species survival issue. And they are the ones who want to shut their opponents up. The fact that violence has been mostly absent is luck, nothing else.
Alarmists do want to shut Judith Curry et al the hell up. And if they can’t do that yet, they will trash her reputation, calling her a delayer, denier, incompetent, or even showing up at her weblog and clogging up the discussions with their trollery.
The ethical parallel is that neither radical Islamists nor CAGW prophets of doom will engage in honest debate with their opponents. Demonisation is sufficient for their cause. They are not trying to win an argument in either case. They are trying to hammer their opponents into submission.
Nice –
==> “Alarmists have killed their children and then themselves in a chilling echo of Jonestown. ”
and
==> “The ethical parallel is that neither radical Islamists nor CAGW prophets of doom will engage in honest debate with their opponents. Demonisation is sufficient for their cause.. ”
Not quite up to the standards of Chief, but a fine example of unintentional irony nonetheless, Tom.
Your comment makes no sense Joshua. But then that’s not new.
You missed that one, Joshua:
> Demonisation is sufficient for their cause.
Tom Fuller, I know how many of their own people the jihadists have killed in the desert and all the various motives for doing it. I kind of alluded to that. My point was that, as current events indicate, they are particularly incensed by the blasphemy BS. Drives them crazy. That’s why they went after Charlie. You don’t think they went after Charlie for lampooning the inept French politicians, do you Tom?
What is your point about betting that Mark Steyn keeps his eyes open these days? Do you think he is their next target? Is he about to publish some juvenile freaking cartoons insulting the Prophet, whose name we won’t mention? Is he planning a trip to the desert?
Regarding joshie, micheal et al. Yeah, that’s right.
The rest of your comment seems to be an attempt to justify Judith’s linking of the Mann civil lawsuit to the motivation behind the Charlie massacre, without actually mentioning the Mann lawsuit and actually explaining why mentioning it in the same sentence as the Paris massacre serves some useful purpose. It doesn’t work, Tom. And it’s way over the top.
Don, hère is why i don’t think this is ‘way over the top.’ If you lost your life for speaking out and saying controversial things, would you like people to be respectfully silent or talk about these issues in ways that are meaningful to them? I and others that are talking about these issues are honoring their memory arguably more than those who are respectfully silent.
I don’t know what your problem is, Judith. The Charlie massacre is not remotely connected to the climate wars. The real war and there is metaphorical war. Serious people don’t try to make a point by equating real war with metaphorical war. Mann’s metaphorical legal war against Steyn is not remotely similar to the terrorist war on people they want to silence. Mann’s verbal attacks on yourself and others, not like the Charlie massacre. Of course, I could be wrong. Tom’s comment doesn’t put a dent in what I am telling you. It’s just more fodder for the trolls.
The common thread is about freedom of speech, which has been the subject of at least half of the op-eds on the subject, and was a major theme for the march in Paris.
Et two prong.
==========
I’ve no problem linking these two things because they are in fact, linked. No, Michael Mann is not a terrorist, although he most certainly traffics in fear. What does one suppose all those lawsuits are about? To frighten people enough that they won’t dare criticize his work any longer.
Don, these are two assaults on our right to free speech. One is legal and does not involve murder, but that doesn’t mean it isn’t in its way, profoundly damaging. There are many ways to destroy a free society. Mann shows us one, the terrorists another.
This is really getting tedious. Neither Mann nor the terrorists are going to destroy our free society. Has Mann stopped Steyn from talking? Has he Stopped Judith from talking? Has he stopped pokerguy from talking? Get back to us in the unlikely event he wins his lawsuit and we will discuss the likelihood that his victory will destroy our free society. Well, they start small and the next thing you know the free society is destroyed. I am planning to worry about that, every Tuesday from noon to about 1:30.
Now for some totally unrelated news; the terrorists are actually killing people. But they ain’t supermen. They have been after Salmon Rushdie for decades. He is still talking. They blew up some of our biggest buildings and killed thousands of people. We now have a lot more buildings and a lot more people. We are still saying and doing things the terrorist just can’t stand. We are not going to let some terrorists destroy our free society. Believe it or not, some very good people are working on this problem. Don’t panic.
” I and others that are talking about these issues are honoring their memory arguably more than those who are respectfully silent.” – Judith
Yeah, “honouring” by hijacking the tradegy to discuss some unrelated pettty trivia.
Nice work.
–Don Monfort | January 12, 2015 at 5:48 pm |
This is really getting tedious. Neither Mann nor the terrorists are going to destroy our free society. Has Mann stopped Steyn from talking? Has he Stopped Judith from talking? Has he stopped pokerguy from talking? Get back to us in the unlikely event he wins his lawsuit and we will discuss the likelihood that his victory will destroy our free society.–
As you say, it’s unlikely Mann could win his argument.
If Mann could win his argument, then he doesn’t need lawyers nor would he need to do it in a court setting.
The Hockey Stick has already been shown to be incorrect.
Leaving Mann with the limited capability of only fooling whose have strong desire to believe his nonsense.
I will let wiki explain it:
“One case in point is the strategic lawsuit against public participation (SLAPP), which is a lawsuit intended to censor, intimidate and silence critics by fear, intimidation and burdening them with the cost of a legal defense until they abandon their criticism or opposition. Such actions are self-evidently vexatious, but are typically frivolous as well in that the plaintiff does not expect, or even intend, to win.”
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Legal_abuse
Judith, this is how you linked Mann with Charlie:
“Anyone defending the satirists at Charlie should have a tough time defending Michael Mann in his legal war against the satirical writings of Mark Steyn and Rand Simberg. It will be interesting to see if Charlie and the defense of satirists changes the dynamics of the Mann vs NRO/CEI/Steyn lawsuits.”
I know about the well-worn “free speech” thread linking Mann and Charlie. That’s pretty weak and it’s not what you actually said. You could logically be interpreted as having implied that the common element is the terrorists attacked Charlie for satire and Mann attacked Steyn et al for satire, and that there is some level of equivalency there, that in both cases there are illegitimate attacks on free speech. Add to that the appearance that you may be using the progressives’ tactic of exploiting a tragedy to score points in a political argument, and you got yourself into a ____storm.
Rational, intelligent , honest people can defend the deceased Charlie’s right to publish juvenile satire and not be killed by terrorists and at the same time defend Mann’s right to the legal recourse of a defamation lawsuit. Not tough at all. Case closed.
Don,
100% right again.
Judith has lost the plot on this issue. As a social commentator, she makes a great climate scientist.
“We are not going to let some terrorists destroy our free society. Believe it or not, some very good people are working on this problem. Don’t panic.”
Don,
Doesn’t happen all that often, but I couldn’t disagree more. I’m actually kind of shocked at your apparent faith in…. what…. our government? With Obama at the helm, and George Bush before him? No, the terrorists will not destroy our society, they’re just helping us do it to ourselves..
==> “No, the terrorists will not destroy our society, they’re just helping us do it to ourselves..”
Another day, another alarmist comment at Climate Etc.
Don, you seem rational–feel free to defend Mann’s lawsuit, not from a mechanistic POV (of course he has a right to bring a suit if he believes himself injured by Steyn) but from an ethical point of view.
Don.
“Serious people don’t try to make a point by equating real war with metaphorical war. Mann’s metaphorical legal war against Steyn is not remotely similar to the terrorist war on people they want to silence. Mann’s verbal attacks on yourself and others, not like the Charlie massacre. ”
we can find similarities anywhere we choose to look. That’s because things, events, words, stuff, don’t force a response from you or anyone else in any logical or iron clad manner.
I see the similarity. You dont.
The point I would make is that the similarity can be put to uses
that some people like and other people don’t like.
When I say that Mann’s behavior with data is Like the behavior of sandusky some people like it and other folks take offense.
Now, I don’t like it cause it trivializes the crime of abusing kids
When I say that Skeptics are like holocaust deniers some people like the use of that metaphor. Others dont.
Tom doesnt cause it trivializes the holocaust.
When folks find a similarity between killing cartoonists and taking someone to court for defamation, I GET the metaphor. I actually understand it. I see the similarity. I dont like that use of metaphor.
Are the two things different? Of course. That’s how metaphor works.
That HOW similarities work. identity works differently.
Of course they are similar. Of course they are different.
and they are not identical.
How do you know when a metaphor is good, epistemically good.
A good metaphor uses the known to understand the harder to know.
Lets see. The greenhouse effect is a pretty good metaphor. how the atmosphere works is hard to understand. So we say Its like a greenhouse. the unknown is structured and understood by a similarity with the known. Now of course the metaphor breaks down. they all do.
Long ago I wrote a bunch of pages about this. hmm. too long for a paper, too short for a book.
here was the killer quote
“[All] thinking is metaphorical, except mathematical thinking…. What I am pointing out is that unless you are at home in the metaphor, unless you have had your proper poetical education in the metaphor, you are not safe anywhere. Because you are not at ease with figurative values: you don’t know the metaphor in its strength and its weaknesses. You don’t know how far you may expect to ride it and when it may break down with you. You are not safe in science; you are not safe in history….
All metaphor breaks down somewhere. That is the beauty of it. It is touch and go with the metaphor, and until you have lived with it long enough you don’t know when it is going.’
I think the comparsion between the two cases makes sense.
But, it doesnt delight
It doesnt instruct.
its bad poetry.
just to be clear.. the quote is from Frost.
here..
another nice piece
http://www.bartleby.com/155/1.html
Its related trust me
poker, I can assure you that nearly all the people defending you against terrorism are doing a good job, despite often poor leadership and decision making from the political class.
George Bush had some issues, but he would listen to military advice and did everything practicable to support and protect the troops. Obama has other priorities.
I don’t like Mann’s suit and I hope he loses. Is that good enough, Tom?
I agree, Steven. We don’t like what we don’t like. And I don’t like people who try to make a point by equating real war with metaphorical war.
I just noticed I missed something here, Judith:
“The common thread is about freedom of speech, which has been the subject of at least half of the op-eds on the subject, and was a major theme for the march in Paris.”
How many of the op-eds have linked Mann vs. Steyn et al with the Paris Charlie massacre? How many marchers in Paris were even remotely aware of the Mann defamation lawsuit?
Look, Mann lawsuit is a free speech issue. Paris Charlie massacre is a different free speech issue. And never the twain shall meet.
It’s called creativity; i claim to be the first. A number of others have picked up on this; not just GWPF and WUWT, but this has been reblogged by numerous people.
But more significantly, if Charlie is to mean anything, the broad principles they were fighting for in their cartoons, need to be reflected on in a range of contexts and with a range of applications.
Metaphors can be use for rhetorical purposes, or to help someone understand and issue, to be instructive.
This is a case of the former. In other words, Judith is exploiting the murder of journalists to score rhetorical points in the climate wars. As I said many comments ago.
Joshua’s binary thinking
“Metaphors can be use for rhetorical purposes, or to help someone understand and issue, to be instructive.
This is a case of the former. In other words, Judith is exploiting the murder of journalists to score rhetorical points in the climate wars. As I said many comments ago.”
They can be used for both.
More subtlely, you assume that rhetoric is not instructive.
Bad binary thinking.
here is your pharmakon
The “Q” Question
“I agree, Steven. We don’t like what we don’t like. And I don’t like people who try to make a point by equating real war with metaphorical war.”
Yes, but those who have never walked in your boots, wished they had the stones.
You get to dislike it.
They get to like it.
Not everyone will live up to your standards.
if you were god you might have a point.
but, you’re not. so you don’t.
except perhaps the bald declaration that you dont like it.
you have my permission not to like it.
Well that is true, steven.
As I also said many comments ago, Judith’s rhetoric on this topic has been quite instructive. It shows quite well her level of reasoning about the climate wars.
And from that angle, I appreciate her engagement and hope she continues with the greater participation.
Don of course used the metaphor of war to understand the terrorist attack.
because he understands war, he uses that experience to structure his understanding of terror.
Lot’s of military guys do.
How’s that metaphor working?
that’s an open question
Joshua.
you didnt understand the Q question.
look harder.
Through the prongs of a queue.
========================
Steven, the terrorist attacks are not sporadic, unrelated incidents of murder. They are part of a real war. It’s been going on for a long time. Don’t let Obama BS you.
Some examples of wars that are pretend wars:
1) the war on women
2) Mann’s legal war on Steyn and Symberg’s satire
3) the war on poverty
4) the war on coal
5) the war on crime
6) the war on termites
Only #6 is a useful metaphor, in my very humble opinion.
#6 is real.
They don’t put up much of a fight, mikey. It wouldn’t be sporting to call it real war. Oh, I forgot:
7) the war on prongs
Charlie Hebdo live or Rasuli dead.
===============
I don’t know too much about termites in the timbers, Don, but it’s the prongs in the sofa you gotta worry about. Especially the old ones. Oh, that’s prawns. Never you mind.
==========
kim, I wonder if ‘on the prongs of a dilemma’ is a metaphor. We can ask Mosher when he reemerges from the philosophical weeds.
8) the war on the prawns of a dilemma
He’s curley-clued with seahorses, stampeding through the forests, trampling trembling termites.
======================
I want some of what kim is smoking. Kim, do you think anybody would mind if some witty person created a very humorous satirical cartoon depicting Charlie Hedbo getting his head blown off by a very humorous satirical cartoon image of the Prophet, whose name we won’t mention? Notice the thread to free speech, kim?
Don,
No, but they are very sneaky.
The little bastards just ate my skirting boards.
Don, would anybody mind enough to go all Parisian, all AK-47, over that cartoonist? How do you keep them down in the banlieues after they’ve blown up Paris?
===============
Great –
==> “…A number of others have picked up on this; not just GWPF and WUWT, …, if Charlie is to mean anything,…”
If Charlie is to mean anything? Really? Personally, I don’t increase in my understanding of the meaning of terrorists killing satirists through climate combatants exploiting their deaths to score points in the climate wars.
I, for one, know what Charlie means without your input, Judith.
This is just another in your series of posts taking complex social phenomena and simplistically overlaying them onto well-worn tracks in the climate war in entirely predictable ways. Something bad happens = it’s just like Michael Mann. Something good happens = yourself and your noble allies.
It’s trivializing for you to exploit murders for sameolsamol.
I can only hope that the family member of the dead journalists, police, and Jewish shoppers can read English and thus gain the benefits accrued from reading Judith, GWPF, WUWT, etc. describe the similarities between their loved ones getting massacred and Mann pursuing legal recourse against Steyn.
Or maybe they can just uses Google translate.
Don
let me help you. It is, as Frost argues, very hard to avoid metaphorical thought.
See how you use the concept of war to understand terror attacks.
See how other people use it to understand say curbing drugs
here is my criticism of Judith’s metaphor.
She is using the incomprehensible ( attacks on cartoonists) to structure her understanding of mann’s attack on Steyn. The latter is pretty well understood. It doesnt need illumination.
So in the balance between delighting and instructing, she is off.
too much delight, not enough instruct.
So, go back and read the Frost poem about the ax helve.
understand the difference between a strong helve which is true to the grain and one which is machine cut.
My concern.
By engaging Mann she will become Mann.
some one said something similar in the Art of War which Im sure you know
–My concern.
By engaging Mann she will become Mann. —
As in, her next lifetime?
Or in her present lifetime, she will shrink, go bald and gain weight?
–here is my criticism of Judith’s metaphor.
She is using the incomprehensible ( attacks on cartoonists) to structure her understanding of mann’s attack on Steyn. The latter is pretty well understood. It doesnt need illumination.–
Why are attacks of cartoonist incomprehensible?
And how is Mann engaging in lawsuit with Steyn understandable.
Unless Mann did not have a clue who Steyn was.
You can not be vaguely rational to assume that Steyn would be
intimidated on the matter of free speech.
So, assuming Mann paid as much attention to his lawsuit as he did with his hockey stick, we should be able to assume he know something about
Mark Steyn.
Mark Steyn certainly not a secret and google search will give anyone a fairly good idea.
So I am curious how you can explain Mann actions?
Even though know next to nothing about the terrorists, their behavior seems about as simple to explain as a bull that charges a red flag.
They were scum and had nothing to live for, and they thought they needed to get into the good graces of God. They were trying to be famous. But they were morons.
All they did was make Lefty atheist cartoonists into martyrs.
So yeah, the idiot are famous for being the murderers of some atheist martyrs. And no doubt they are basking in Hell with all the other murderers.
“By engaging Mann she will become Mann. —”
one thing that struck me while reading the climategate mails was the way in which people took on the behavior of their opponents
kinda like that ancient chinese wisdom
you dont see deeply enough for me to learn anything by our engagement
–“By engaging Mann she will become Mann. —”
one thing that struck me while reading the climategate mails was the way in which people took on the behavior of their opponents
kinda like that ancient chinese wisdom–
Ah, so is that clue that you are indeed concerned regarding Judith’s next incarnations?
What stuck me about climategate was the lack of professional behavior.
And it seems to me, that Readme, felt he entombed in a kindergarten madhouse with no hope of escape.
Climatgate is one of those too weird for fiction type things- and beyond spoof.
Right on target, Judith..
The Charlie Hebdo tragedy may have us reexamining our values and rules. Our morals may operate across many levels, from the serious to the not so serious. It wouldn’t surprise me if a moral principle that applies to the Charlies Hebdo tragedy would also apply to the Mann/Steyn case. Of the two situations, our moral principle is hoped to cover the more serious situation first. And if it also applies to the less serious situations, that’s all the better. As we may consider consistency is a favorable attribute. We may question where our most important principles are formed? Perhaps from the serious. Then they are applied to lesser but still important questions. It’s my opinion we are seeking a level of consistency with our values that applies to different situations.
Ragnaar, well said. It’s the same general principle.
Ragnaar – Right on!
Can’t miss an opportunity to give Michael Mann a kick. Doesn’t matter how low, disgusting and opportunistic it is – an opportunity is an opportunity. And we hates Mann, so anything goes!
Paedophiles, mass murder – no matter what it is, we’ll make a link to Michael Mann.
Judith,
I had thought there was some positive signs recently that you’d managed to shake off your Mann-obsession, or at least tone it down.
But this??
Using mass murder to make some petty and trivial attack on a scientist you don’t like???
Maybe a good friend will take you aside and explain to you just how low you have sunk.
Michael, you are kidding right? In the week in review Judith linked to Mann’s latest rant. http://bos.sagepub.com/content/71/1/33.full.pdf
He seems to think he is an aging Wildebeest being eyed by skeptical lions that are licking their chops :0
He even went so far as to elevate his questionable Northern Hemisphere tree ring circus to GLOBAL temperature status.
All those other wannabe paleo-climatologists might as well just pack it in since Mikey has the nuts.
https://lh4.googleusercontent.com/-OvQHzJy8gFU/VLF3XHImAqI/AAAAAAAAMGM/X1vv5Tx0kiI/w689-h411-no/oppo%2Bover%2Bmann.png
I mean really, what does Kim Cobb even bother, there is nothing left to do in that field :)
This is ridiculous. There is nothing to be gained, no light to be shed, no moral principle to be extended from the Paris mass murders to the Mann-Steyn et al nuisance lawsuit making it’s way through the silly D.C. court system.
I am very likely the only person here with hands on experience in dealing with the type of people who committed the Charlie murders. Have you noticed that they have not gone after Steyn et al? They don’t care about free speech, until it amounts to what they call blasphemy. They believe that they are obligated by their religion to kill blasphemers. They do it in their own countries to their own kind and it is not surprising to those who know them to see them do it in Western countries. You allow millions of Muslims to immigrate and you will get a significant number, who will take what we would consider to be irrational offense to cartoons that are drawn to deliberately insult their religion.
If this was about destroying free speech in the Western world they would have attacked Le Monde, or gone through the tunnel and attacked the London Times. They are against alcohol and uncovered females. You don’t see them running around attacking liquor stores and strip clubs. They are serious about blasphemy. Charlie knew that. I am sure someone is going to call me a coward, but I don’t see Charlie as a hero.
Ragnaar
I’m sorry
Charlie Hebdo “tragedy”?
what, do you think it was an accident?
a unfortunate mistake?
we need to reexamine our values?
our rules?
our moral principles?
you think “consistency” would somehow bring these religious mass murderers to different POV?
let’s navel gaze ourselves into oblivion
don’t send an army, send battalions of psychiatrists and social workers
John Smith:
I don’t think it was an accident, and the relatives of those killed may see it as a tragedy. I was after a less vengeful choice of words. Suppose we reacted to the aggressors in this case by promoting more free speech? That might infuriate them but it also might have them realize they can’t win on that front. Shrinking our definition for free speech here, sends a mixed message.
We have this:
“To be consistent, we must apply the same moral standards to one situation that we apply to another unless we can show that the two situations differ in relevant ways.” http://www.scu.edu/ethics/practicing/decision/consistency.html Some are saying they’re different and some are saying not so much. Looking back on my college days, some of my Profs would try to relate current events to the course contents. I enjoyed that, the opportunity to apply what we were learning to some things in the real world. Seeing relationships and building frameworks, not a bunch of compartmentalized things.
v. helpful link, thx
“Michael, you are kidding right? In the week in review Judith linked to Mann’s latest rant. ”
capt,
If Mann’s Serengeti analogy is a “rant” what the phuck are we going to call Judith’s insane effort to drag Mann into a terrorist massacre???
Farrk!
Ragnaar and Judith,
oh yes, very relevant
There is no “relevant” difference between the massacre of 12 people by terrorists and a civil court defamation case???
Really, you’re trying to play the ‘moral equivalence’ card here??
Judith,
Have you lost your mind?
Who said anything about moral equivalence? I am talking about ethically consistent application of freedom of speech.
“we must apply the same moral standards to one situation that we apply to another unless we can show that the two situations differ in relevant ways”
Ragnaar is saying that there is no relevant difference between these two situations; terrorists massacre vs Mann/Steyn.
What planet are you people on?
For someone who has trouble clearly communicating in their own field, it is very brave (of the ‘Yes, Minister’ kind), to try and make a point out of a very raw tragedy like this.
Judith on this, you are an ataxic elephant in a Ming Vase shop.
Just stop.
Freedom of speech is a very broad principle, that the marchers in Paris and countless op-ed writers are defending in the wake of the Charlie attacks. If you are going to defend offensive/controversial/satirical writings from Charlie Hebro, I am arguing these same people should be defending other offensive/controversial/satirical writings. Case in point is Steyn/Simberg.
I am making a very straightforward argument.
Judith,
I asked you this somewhere else, but is probably better here.
What is it that you can’t say about science/climate science/ Mann and free speech that you can’t say without reference to Charlie Hebdo??
If, as I believe, the answer is – nothing – then this is just cheap, gratuitous, sensationalism.
I can say what I had to say without mentioning MM; key point is defense of Steyn/Simberg
Michael wrote: “There is no “relevant” difference between the massacre of 12 people by terrorists and a civil court defamation case???”
The jihadists and Mann are both in the business of suppressing speech. Of course there are differences. One of the differences between them is that Mann, essentially a government functionary whose livelihood comes almost exclusively from government and the taxpayers, is using the instrument of the courts to suppress speech he doesn’t like about an important public controversy in which he is an advocate.
A few years back, Mann sued Tim Ball for making what was in essence a joke as old as vaudeville. He used the machinery of government to harass someone who thinks his work is, yes, fr**dulent. Two years ago, he did the same thing to Steyn, NRO and CEI. He is attempting suppress speech on one of the crucial issues of our time. The length and cost of these proceedings are intended to intimidate anyone who might come to the same conclusion Mann’s current victims reached and want to express their disagreement.
While the physical threat of Mann’s actions are not in anyway comparable to what the jihadists accomplished in Paris, they are still pernicious and should be viewed as such, especially because they involve the use of government to silence people.
potter,
It’s pretty simple – if their accusations are true and they can demonstrate that to the court, they’ve nothing to worry about. On the other hand…..
Micheal;
I guess you’re saying they are relevantly different. The magnitude of the force applied and attempting to be applied in Mann’s case is different. A monetary fine is force. While there are two differing degrees of force here, I can’t see that that matters to principles. The first amendment is related to defamation laws. Our defamation laws seem to be a compromise of the first amendment or a partial contradiction of it. While we easily support Charlie Hebdo’s first amendment type rights, we then reconcile that with Steyn’s similar rights. We may ask ourselves are we being consistent? To have a lower regard for the first amendment because it’s a civil court case, I am not seeing why? I bought into the first amendment and I don’t want to dismiss it or weaken it in most situations.
I wonder when Judith will begin examining her own selectivity. Imagine her saying something like this:
Charlie Hebro was known for publishing material that was questionably racist (sometimes to mock racists). The Danish cartoonists were deliberately being provocative and offensive.
Since you expect others to be wearing big boy pants, Judith, put some on yourself.
Yawn, I’ve already defended Mann insulting me, see here
http://judithcurry.com/2014/02/22/steyn-et-al-versus-mann/
However, Mann is not a satirist, he is a scientist insulting another scientist.
==> “The jihadists and Mann are both in the business of suppressing speech.”
Really.
Massacring journalists and filing a suit in court = same, same but different.
The scale of self-victimization, and the exploitation of murders is quite remarkable. It’s sameolsameol, but still, you have to appreciate the art of it.
==> “key point is defense of Steyn/Simberg”
Key point is that you’re exploiting the murder of journalists to score points in the climate wars.
you mean like ‘warmists’ exploit Hiroshima and the Holocaust?
Exactly how am I exploiting their murder? I am taking a stand that the free speech of satirists should be protected, which is essentially why they were murdered. I’m saying that other satirists should be protected.
Michael –
As Ragnaar says:
==> “I guess you’re saying they are relevantly different. ”
Indeed. I guess you’re saying that: (1) going into a building with machine guns and slaughtering 11 people because they published cartoons and, (2) appealing to the rule of law by asking the judicial system to address a perceived reputational injury, are “relevantly different?”
What a unique perspective you have, Michael.
==> “you mean like ‘warmists’ exploit Hiroshima and the Holocaust?”
Why not?
I mean like you referring to people as “deniers,” and using other epithets. I mean like Stevie Mac using holocaust references. Or like people accusing Santer of scientific cleansing, or McKitrick calling an editor a “groveling, terrified coward.”
All of those are examples of rhetorical overreach – which is the basic definition of political satire. As Rushdie said – try to imagine a political cartoon that didn’t offend someone.
Hiroshima and the Holocaust are baby steps. When you get really good you can claim catastrophic weather events were caused by CO2 with no evidence and no need for them to even finish counting the bodies.
==> “Exactly how am I exploiting their murder? ”
Through thetorical overreach, by comparing the situations as if they’re meaningfully similar.
==> “I am taking a stand that the free speech of satirists should be protected, which is essentially why they were murdered. I’m saying that other satirists should be protected.”
Fine. Sounds like a fine point to me. Of course, I think that the issue is somewhat complicated, as i think that there it is reasonable to seek judicial protection from a system of laws intended to address reputational harm. To address it through a judicial system that is designed, specifically, to protect free speech.
In a sense, what Mann is doing and what the Jihadists did couldn’t better illustrate the differences between their believe system and ours. Their approach is diametrically opposed.
So in what way are you protecting satirists by associating the murder of journalists by murderous cultists, and Mann suing Steyn for a perceived reputational harm?
Do you think that the families of the journalists would be encouraged because you’re associating the murder of their family members by to Mann suing Steyn?
There is no moral equivalence between the means used by the Parisian Islamic terrorists and the means used by Michael Mann. Mann should face no penalty other than a financial one imposed by law for his abuse of process. The terrorists got exactly what they deserved, a violent death, for the means they chose.
But there is absolutely no question that the end in both cases of silencing speech with which they disagreed is exactly the same morally. Mann’s real target is not just Mark Steyn, but anyone else who has the audacity to point out his incompetence and dishonesty.
A man who files a false claim in court to obtain someone else’s money, has the same motivation as the street thug who murders someone to take theirs. The acts are not morally equivalent, but the immorality of their end, theft, is identical.
> Hiroshima and the Holocaust are baby steps.
During the adolescent steps, the slope gets slipperier.
==> “Yawn, I’ve already defended Mann insulting me, see here”
Yeah. In between whining about it, and comparing it to tyrrany
==> “However, Mann is not a satirist, he is a scientist insulting another scientist.”
Wow. So it’s OK for someone to insult people if they’re granted a label as a satirist – but if they’re a scientist it is unacceptable?
And further yet, it’s unacceptable only if they disagree with you – as you, yourself, call people “deniers” and use other epithets.
What a fascinating juxtaposition of statements. On the one hand, you defend Mann insulting you, but, well, he isn’t a satirist and satirists should be protected.
I like this new trend of you commenting more, The cryptic nature of your sparse explanations have often left me wondering how your logic works. Filling in the gaps is very instructive, indeed.
Joshua:
I am trying to say our ethics and morality should apply to the large and the small. I don’t see that, we say one thing is greater so we use ethics set a) and when it’s smaller we apply ethics set b). I am trying to say our ethics could be harmonious with many differing situations but come back to the same basic core principles. The alternative might be compartmentalized personal ethical rules that seemingly lack coherence.
This is quickly becoming my favorite Climate Etc.comment thread of all time.
==> “But there is absolutely no question that the end in both cases of silencing speech with which they disagreed is exactly the same morally.
Right. It is morally, “exactly the same,” to walk into an office and machine gun 11 people, and to a suit in court to appeal to the rule of laws designed to protect free speech in order to address perceived reputational damage.
Oh yeah.
“Exactly the same.”
You know, morally.
And of course, Gary’s personal views, politically and otherwise, are just coincidental to his determination of moral equivalence.
Thanks god have the moral arbiter of Climate Etc. to explain it to us. Aren’t we lucky?
Ragnaar –
You’re one of my favorite Climate Etc. commenters, because you tend to employ skeptical due diligence. So with that understood:
==> “I am trying to say our ethics and morality should apply to the large and the small. I don’t see that, we say one thing is greater so we use ethics set a) and when it’s smaller we apply ethics set b).”
i’m not suggesting that we should apply a different or inconsistent set of rhetoric in one situation from what we employ in another – but that a matter of scale and context are important.
==> ” I am trying to say our ethics could be harmonious with many differing situations but come back to the same basic core principles.”
But the same basic core principles can take different shape depending on context. I’d argue that you can’t reverse engineer from context to the principles, but that you need to work in the other direction.
What is the basic core principle here? Absolute free speech (shouting fire in a theater)? Free speech with some level of responsibility for the outcome/impact? The ability to appeal to the rule of laws designed to protect our rights of free speech to address a perceived reputational harm? The right to walk into an office and slaughter 11 people because they published a cartoon?
==> “The alternative might be compartmentalized personal ethical rules that seemingly lack coherence.”
Sure, and the alternative to what I’m suggesting might be globalized personal ethical rules that seemingly lack coherence. We have a set of communal ethical rules related to the freedom of speech. They fully allow for what Mann is doing, and they absolutely disallow what the Jihadis did.
curryja | January 11, 2015 at 9:43 pm |
“I can say what I had to say without mentioning MM; key point is defense of Steyn/Simberg”
So this;
“Anyone defending the satirists at Charlie should have a tough time defending Michael Mann…”
is just completely gratuitous.
No, the defense of Steyn/Simberg satire is not particularly relevant without MM lawsuit
curryja | January 11, 2015 at 10:07 pm |
“you mean like ‘warmists’ exploit Hiroshima and the Holocaust?”
I must have missed the Hiroshima thing.
But I think the timing has some relevance – a few days after the event is distasteful and reeks of ethically questionable opportunism.
oh, you mean something like when the alarmists use a natural catastrophe (e.g. hurricane Sandy) to opportunistically shill for reducing CO2 emissions, to ‘prevent’ future Sandys?
Joshua:
Not sure I agree it’s rhetoric I am talking about. You seem to be saying we apply principles to context, agreed. I’d ask you, what principle did you use in the Paris case and which one to do you/will you use in the Mann court case? I’d say in both cases you apply the free speech principle and adjust the punishment to match the magnitude of the harm. So we would be using the do not kill rule and the free speech rule, and the do not defame rule. The do not defame rule is kind of weak and I say that as it partially contradicts the free speech rule. The first part of this good, showing the origins of defamation laws: http://www.firstamendmentstudies.org/wp/libel.html Seems they were a favorite of kings. Regarding the shouting fire rule, that violates the do not physically harm another rule which is one of our favorites. The rules absolutely allow what Mann is doing, but that doesn’t make them ethical rules. Laws do conflict with our ethics at times. In that case, we vote and hope, and deal with it.
Michael:
You should have seen my communication skills in high school. I could have been some kind of poster child. “Relevant: having significant and demonstrable bearing on the matter at hand.” Is this violence or the first amendment? The violence emerged from the free speech issue.
curryja | January 11, 2015 at 11:51 pm |
“oh, you mean something like when the alarmists use a natural catastrophe…, to ‘prevent’ future Sandys?”
Wow, you really are completely lost aren’t you?
Trying to defend the indefensible is leading you deeper and deeper into sh!t.
If, somehow, your comments were about preventing a future Charlie Hebdo…..but no, you were about using it as a rhetorical device to attack Michael Mann, even worse, anyone who dare support Mann, arguing that they couldn’t defend the satirists and support Mann.
Quite a spectacle to see you leading the charge as the nuttiest denizen, and people like Rob Ellison and Don Monfort playing the role of sensible and sane.
+1
Judith & Ragnaar
I see and hear much lofty discussion of ethics and consistency of such,
from academia
I observe… Climategate
Judith Curry’s treatment by some of her peers
the Sandusky affair
University presidents with million dollar salaries while adjuncts barely make minimum wage
the ludicrous hypocrisy of campus PC
I could go on
how’s that ethics education going?
forgive me if high minded statements on University websites fall on my deaf ears
yet I do get up, and try again
Note the effort by the usual suspects to suppress Judy’s speech, and failing that, sneering.
==============
Joshua
“Massacring journalists and filing a suit in court = same, same but different.”
I believe the argument is they are SIMILAR not IDENTICAL
things that are similar have differences, else they would be identical.
The question is.
1. Is the similarity illuminating
2. Rhetorically, how is it being used.
3. Does it achieve its goals.
In other words its silly to evaluate similarities for their truth status.
but hey, its fun.
Mosher:
Like your point, similar and identical. Lake ice is similar to sea ice so understanding lake ice may give insights into sea ice. People may say, they’re not identical, so don’t apply anything you know about one to the other. We may say my 140 acre lake has nothing to do with the Arctic sea ice and look at the scale difference. There are still many overlapping attributes of my lake ice that in Arctic.
kim | January 12, 2015 at 11:23 am |
“Note the effort by the usual suspects to suppress Judy’s speech….”
Besides not even trying such a thing, not failing, but in fact facilitating Judy’s speech……have you ever seen so many comments from Judith??
No thanks needed.
Don
“This is ridiculous. There is nothing to be gained, no light to be shed, no moral principle to be extended from the Paris mass murders to the Mann-Steyn et al nuisance lawsuit making it’s way through the silly D.C. court system.”
there is a lot to be gained.
Here is what I see.
Let’s look at a continuum of shutting people up and also at the question of speaking with one voice.
I will relay my experience again with Judith.
I found her to be someone who was unwilling to shut people up. Even Steven Goddard. Seriously, I wondered why does she continue to support the rights of idjits to speak?
and then there is defamation and then there is blasphamey.
In all cases I see Judith committed ( overly committed in my view) to letting people speak. There might be some reasons for that. I don’t need to ask her to defend this. I note it as a principle. She gets to have that principle. Kinda on a jihad for freedom of expression. Opps bad metaphor.
In conjunction with this she has a real reluctance to be a part of any
“speaking with one voice”
So her take on the consensus and refusal to participate in consensus making, is in my mind deeply tied to her commitment to protect peoples right to be heard. even if they they are dumb. even if they say nasty things about Mann, or her, even if they offend the Prophet.
She will draw a line in one denizen saying nasty things about An other. That’s an interesting exception. One I would think bears exploring.
all principles have interesting exceptions.
Other folks want to draw lines and distinctions. Its one thing to tell an idjit to shut up, its another thing to call a scientist a fraud and its another thing to blaspheme.
And for each of these categories folks think there are different justifable reactions.
For Judith they are all of a piece. And the various uses of power against those who have a different view are all of a piece. even the drive to speak with one voice is in her mind a use of power to close off discussion.
I understand her unwillingness to close things off. and yet find those areas where she will “close” things off interesting.
like not listening to sky dragons.
Its no great feat to find these inconsistencies. every system has them.
its no great criticism to point them out.
Mosh, interesting comment. My attempt to protect denizens from insults is that insulting mostly anonymous people has no particular value in the debate (and leads to boring back and forth bickering); I do allow insults for people higher up the food chain in the climate debate (including myself).
Regarding the sky dragons, I devoted about a half dozen threads to them, and allow them to comment here on relevant threads (provided their comments are not too lengthy or numerous). But I don’t listen very hard (if someone sends me an essay via email, I will take a look).
I encourage you to listen to christopher hitchens on free speech. It is superb https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=s_s5teo4E_k
He says it perfectly, not sure I can exactly repeat the main sentiment, but by shutting people up we miss what they are saying, and it might be interesting and important.
Over the past five years i have found the discourse here to be enormously educational. Well about 5% of it anyways, but that 5% is highly valued and I wouldn’t have been exposed to it otherwise.
One of the world’s all-time great listeners can’t hear everything. No Sirreee, just cain’t.
===========
“Its no great feat to find these inconsistencies. every system has them.
its no great criticism to point them out.”
No doubt, but if you’re obsessed with Judy’s obsession with Mann it might be central to your being where it becomes a great criticism worth repeating as often as possible.
Just for the record, my obsession with others obsessions with Judy’s obsession with Mann is no great criticism.
Anything that can become a law is a real war.
It can hurt people and even kill them just as dead as in a real war.
Real wars might be more bloody and more in your face horrible, but a law that makes someone a slave or destroys their life is just as damaging.
Free speech is a real war.
The radical feminist attack on men is a real war.
To reiterate, I dont think anyone here would try to compare the horror of a real war to the abstract wars for freedom, but, in the end, the stakes are just as high.
$0.02
Let’s get real, Steven. Michael Mann hasn’t shut anybody up. He may have discouraged some from calling him the f—- word, but he hasn’t silenced anybody. Has McIntyre been shut up? Has Brandon S. been shut up? Has Steyn been shut up? On the other hand, the terrorists in Paris have shut people up. Trying some how to assert or imply there is some equivalency there is silly, bordering on dishonesty.
I am still waiting for somebody to explain how the killings in Paris relate to Mann’s lawsuit. I told my son to shut up and stop whining this morning, or I would take away his video games. Is that linked to the killings in Paris? We can say that a molehill is shaped like a mountain, and that to an ant it looks like a mountain, but it ain’t a mountain.
There is a lot of self-censorship among climate scientists, as a result of the tactics of Mann et al. I hear these stories all the time (and I’m not naming names for the obvious reasons).
“Under this provocation, Kissinger described Hitchens in a television interview last week as “a great fiction writer who accused Mother Teresa of human rights violations and denied the Holocaust ever took place”.
Now Hitchens, pointing out that both he and his wife Carol are Jewish, says: “Kissinger will be hearing from my attorney, who will tell him several things he already knows. What he said is false, malicious and defamatory, and if he says it again, we will proceed against him in court. …”
Don, it’s a little like the difference between grand and light opera. Certainly, the Piltdown Mann is a comic figure, and gunned down Hebdo is pretty grand, the works. But when you consider the billions impoverished, diminished, and extinguished by the policies incurred by calls of catastrophic alarm, then the efforts of Mann and ‘the Green Blob’ to suppress dissent are far grander than bizarre, though not absurd, theatre in Gay Paree.
===========================
That’s not helpful, Judith. We all practice self-censorship. Give us some examples that might shock us. You don’t have to name names. Have climate scientists been so intimidated by Mann’s lawsuit that they won’t call Mann the f—- word? That’s what he is suing about. You can criticize Mann and his work without using the f—- word. You and many others have done it. Isn’t it part of the collegial code anyway, not to call fellow scientists the f—- word? You are struggling with this, Judith. Why don’t you just say that Mann’s lawsuit is not really like the terrorists killing those people in Paris?
Even worse. Many scientists stay publicly silent about anything related to climate change for fear of attacks from the consensus police.
Would any climate scientist who has told J.A. Curry you self-censor because of Michael E. Mann please come forward and prove she is not wildly exaggerating this. And while you are at it, explain why you are so afraid of a mediocre climate scientist who is not very smart.
The issue is this. They tell me they don’t want to have to put up with what I have had to put up with. Or they work for a government agency, or they are untenured, and fear for their jobs. They are not so much afraid of Michael Mann personally, but rather the culture of ostracizing scientists who challenge the consensus, of which Mann is its most vociferous practitioner.
Google ‘Judith Curry’. See what pops up. How is someone supposed to get a new job, or receive external recognition, with the kind of censure and abuse that is apparent here? People looking to hire someone definitely check out their profile on the internet. If a scientist doesn’t want this kind of attention, or can’t afford it in terms of their job or desired career path, who can blame them?
jch
As regards climate science don’t you think people are sometime in awe of the reputation of others who are pre-eminent in their field and may be intimidated to speak out because of this, or don’t want to lose the respect of their peers, or are afraid of being sued?
This moroccan proverb sums it up;
‘If at noon the King declares it is night, behold the stars.’
97% of those who responded said they suspend their critical faculties when it comes to the output of certain leading climate scientists*
tonyb
==> “Google ‘Judith Curry’. See what pops up.”
What pops up is that Judith Curry is an activist. A climate combatant who name calls (“denier,” anyone?), who impugns the motives, integrity, science and character of people who disagree with her about the science of climate change.
Not to say that the kind of flak that you get is entirely deserved, Judith, but it isn’t merely because of your position on the science. If you didn’t choose to be such an activist, then the scale of the reactions would be different.
Joshua, I am all about disagreement. I am trying to bring disagreement and debate back into the public discourse on climate change. The only people I criticize are those who try to stifle public debate.
Interesting how Judith adds noble cause corruption to the appeal to consensus and appeal to authority that she criticizes in others.
Judith –
==> “Joshua, I am all about disagreement. I am trying to bring disagreement and debate back into the public discourse on climate change. The only people I criticize are those who try to stifle public debate.”
I’m all for that,Judith, as a goal. And I support you to the extent that I think that your tactics are useful towards reaching that goal.
What I am disagreeing :-) with, is whether your form of advocacy is improving the discourse of disagreement, increasing or decreasing the likelihood of positive outcomes from the agreement, etc.
It is possible to be critical of your form of advocacy, Judith, and still support increased public discourse. The basic problem, IMO, is that you don’t accept that, and as such, you contribute to the sameolsameol.
So in other words, it’s wild-butted exaggeration.
“Mosh, interesting comment. My attempt to protect denizens from insults is that insulting mostly anonymous people has no particular value in the debate (and leads to boring back and forth bickering); I do allow insults for people higher up the food chain in the climate debate (including myself).”
Ya. So there are cases where the principle of “create value” trumps the value of “allow others to be heard”. And that principle also has an exception. If you are in a position of power over the speech of others, you
do not apply the “create value” principle with regards to speech directed at you.
In a classroom setting, you allow students to say anything about you.
But when it comes to their speech about each other, you dont want to encourage\allow personal wars between say two students
A) because you might have to pick sides and exert your power
B) because the good of all students outweighs the rights of the
two who are fighting between themselves
###########################3
Regarding the sky dragons, I devoted about a half dozen threads to them, and allow them to comment here on relevant threads (provided their comments are not too lengthy or numerous). But I don’t listen very hard (if someone sends me an essay via email, I will take a look).
……
by shutting people up we miss what they are saying, and it might be interesting and important.
##############
Again, the value of being interesting takes precedence.
so the values of letting people speak and the value of listening, is subject to constraint. try to be interesting. try to add value, and if you are in a position of power be more tolerant and patient than others and never stop listening entirely.
I think its a mistake to label these conflicts and your resolutions as “contradictions” or “hypocritical” or “inconsistent” The rules of Judith are a lot more clear than the rules of football or golf.
JCH
You do realize in a court of law your testimony would be inadmissible as speculation while Judith was testifying to personal knowledge of some who have shared their viewpoints. You could always impugn the motives of those who spoke up, or even better, you could hire some neuroscientists to discern whether they truly believed what they said or were just reacting to some sublimated, unrealistic fears. But for the time being why is it impossible to accept her version of what has been told to her.
Judith, you are straying off topic. You made a statement in the post we are discussing that amounts to an assertion that there is a significant level of equivalency, between the Mann lawsuit (which you characterized as a legal war on free speech) and the killings in Paris (an actual war on free speech). It’s a false equivalency. A very basic propaganda tactic easily spotted by veterans of the Cold War, and just about anybody else who can read.
“Anyone defending the satirists at Charlie should have a tough time defending Michael Mann in his legal war against the satirical writings of Mark Steyn and Rand Simberg. It will be interesting to see if Charlie and the defense of satirists changes the dynamics of the Mann vs NRO/CEI/Steyn lawsuits.”
You are placing Mann in virtually the same position as the terrorists. If one is against the terrorists war on free speech, then one is going to have a hard time not being against Mann, in his war on free speech. That’s easily spotted false equivalency and it’s foolishness. You should retract. Just my very humble opinion.
If one is concerned about the interface between freedom of expression and the intolerance of Islamic fanatics, I would think that they would have been discussing this issue long before the recent incident in Paris.
Consider the completely different scale between the impact on freedom of expression resulting from Islamic fundamentalism dealt with on a daily basis throughout the Islamic world, and the negative impact from the massacre in Paris.
The negative impact from the Paris massacre (if not the potential for positive impact, in twisted way) is, I would argue, orders of magnitude smaller in scale.
Yet because climate combatants have forefront in their mind the climate wars, and as such see Steyn vs. Mann as of huge importance, they look at Paris and see the patterns that match the patterns they want to see in Steyn vs Mann (a threat our free speech).
In fact, no matter the outcome of Mann vs. Steyn, the impact on our free speech rights will be minimal. It is one case among many, many cases that test our rules of law regarding free speech. In fact, Steyn vs. Mann represents the very antithesis of fan attack on free speech. It is the very antithesis of Jihadists murdering journalists. It is about the priority we place, in our society, to protect free speech rights by the rule of law.
People see in these issues the patterns they want to see, so that they can draw out evidence for supporting the narratives they want to advance. It is exploitative.
A discussion of free speech implications from Paris, and from Steyn vs. Mann, would require nuance and the consideration of questions such as whether Mann suing Steyn will in fact strengthen our free speech rights rather than weaken them – no matter the outcome.
Exploitation of the free speech implications from Paris, and Steyn vs. Mann, only requires that we find simplistic patterns to advance pre-conceived narratives.
ceresco, do you think a court would entertain Judith relating what someone allegedly told her, whose name she can’t mention? Some of you people are completely blinded and rendered senseless by loyalty.
> There is a lot of self-censorship among climate scientists, as a result of the tactics of Mann et al.
Absolutely. The auditing sciences would be greatly improved if the alarmists were not forcing self-censorship, e.g.
http://neverendingaudit.tumblr.com/post/78844823835
We should discuss the possibility to encourage public denunciations of alarmists. Shaming of those who do not wish to speak against their alarmist peers could become a part of the public broadcasting programs.
INTEGRITY ™ – Greenline Tests for Science
Joshua:
“…the impact on freedom of expression resulting from Islamic fundamentalism dealt with on a daily basis throughout the Islamic world…”
“The negative impact from the Paris massacre (if not the potential for positive impact, in (a) twisted way) is, I would argue, orders of magnitude smaller in scale.”
I am agreeing I think. The easy thing to do is denounce the terrorists now. But there is the bigger more intractable problem that you mentioned.
The first right time to discuss anything is when it is still in the news.
Oh the hyprocrisy
https://pbs.twimg.com/media/BoDxfIVCAAEoWSf.jpg
http://news.nationalpost.com/2015/01/10/rex-murphy-we-are-not-charlie-hebdo/
Kitty Genovese
http://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Murder_of_Kitty_Genovese
Myth. People did not ignore Kitty, that meme was created by a journalist.
I’ve added a cartoon the main post
Pingback: “Charlie,” Free Speech, And Climate Change | Transterrestrial Musings
This is apt.
Freedom of speech – many adherents of disaster would shout down or silence those who point out the lack of disaster.
Religion – climate change takes on a religious nature because a few shreds of what’s actually verifiable are extrapolated to mystical apocalypse.
Yes.
From the article:
…
The statement mentions some of the values that the Founders saw as inherent in the principle of freedom of the press: the search and attainment of truth, scientific progress, cultural development, the increase of virtue among the people, the holding of governmental officials to republican values, the strengthening of community, and a check upon self-aggrandizing politicians. But broad statements such as this may tell us less than we would like to know about what “the freedom of the press” meant to the Founders as a rule of law, when the freedom would yield to competing concerns, or whether the freedom prohibited only prior restraints or also subsequent punishments.
There were very few reported Founding-era court cases interpreting the federal and state Freedom of Speech and of the Press Clause, and very few Founding-era political controversies that would have excited some detailed discussion of what the clauses meant. The governments of the time were quite small, and the statute books thin. There were few laws restricting commercial advertising. There was only one state law banning pornography, and that appears to have been unenforced until 1821. There were a few state blasphemy laws, but they were largely unenforced from the early 1700s until the 1810s. There were no bans on flag-burning, campaign spending, or anonymous speech. This may but does not necessarily mean that such speech was broadly believed to be constitutionally protected; then as today, the government did not ban all that it had the power to ban. But the paucity of such bans meant that few people in that era really had occasion to define what the constitutional boundaries of speech and press protection might be. The only speech restriction that was broadly enforced was traditional libel law. Defaming another person was understood to be constitutionally unprotected.
…
http://www.heritage.org/constitution/#!/amendments/1/essays/140/freedom-of-speech-and-of-the-press
You say “Charlie” and I think Charlie Manson, who was the leader of a cult. Cults are weird things, they have fanatical followers but the rest of us can’t imagine why. Some cults turn into religions. Would you call Scientology a religion? Climate Science? Stalinism? Some of them are banned, such as Nazis and Neo-Nazis. Should “Mein Kampf” be banned as hate speech? If so, why should not the Koran also be banned as hate speech? It’s hard to call Islam the religion of peace when it’s sacred book reads like a jihad manual. Have the billions of Muslims around the world not read the Koran or do they just cherry pick the parts they like? Islam is only a synthetic religion, but Islam is much much more than a religion, it dictates how to run everything from the government to all the personal details. The only thing it leaves out is “thou shall not kill” and other calls for humanity and civilization (e.g., Western Values).
In falling over backwards to submit to Islam’s values, we abandon our own hard-won but tenuous escape from the dark ages. The end of free speech and then science and justice is even worse than global warming. Without free speech, everything else falls apart.
Yes
I am uncomfortable with the common practice nowadays of equating all wrongs to the civil rights movement and the events of WW2
one who calls me a “denier” is not equivalent to a racist or an anti-semite
(is that not the same thing twice?)
they are just poor debaters
religious radicalism, particularly of this ilk, is not new
they don’t care about our nuanced understanding of freedom
Wow! Lot’s here in the unintentional irony and selective reasoning departments.
Let’s start with the outrage, outrage I say, about the use of the term “denier?”
Lets not. Just continues to perpetuate a worn out topic.
And big boy pants for all!
Je suis Joshua
It appears that the incident made the Associated Press face up to its double standard: http://www.politico.com/blogs/media/2015/01/ap-pulls-piss-christ-after-paris-attack-200719.html
I leave to others to judge whether AP’s response was the right one.
appeasement
it astounds me that smart people do not get that the Islamic radicals don’t give a rat’s patooty about cartoons, satire, or free speech
or any of the political imaginings of the West
try to “understand” them
try to make your editorial polices fair and consistent
plow the cultural sensitivity row until the cows come home
they’re coming for us anyway
On the other hand i have never felt free to express my thoughts and sign my real name. And I’m not about to do it. In my case it can be very dangerous.
mrsean2k observes the field of Bully Goats:
Increasingly elderly, tough, semi-domesticated livestock. Kept in line by a single ruthless herds-Mann, they owe their longevity primarily to constantly chewing over the same old cud.
In appearance, dominant Bully Goats can be readily identified, sporting distinctive facial hair (the “goatee”) and a thinning pate.
Behaviourally, Bully Goats are marked by a tremendously stubborn attitude, snorting and defending their ground, and reluctant to concede an inch, no matter how shaky it may be underfoot. Younger examples rarely thrive unless they emulate this behaviour.
On very rare occasions, a member of the herd (or “Team” to use the proper collective noun) breaks ranks and goes rogue. The rest of the Team refer to this as a “Judith Goat”, claiming it’s aim is solely to lead other Team members to a ruinous end.
https://mrsean2k.wordpress.com/2013/04/03/bully-goats/
I had written a much longer post but pulled it. About the only obvious connection between radical Islam and progressive PC is they both bear many hallmarks of ‘faith based’ rejection of contemporary reality. Progressive PC is perhaps a secular religion where, according to PC Hilary Clinton, corporations do not create jobs and wealth.
Judith’s ‘tyranny of university progressive PC’ is real. My own alma mater has had three shocking examples in the last few years, noted in a comment to Justin concerning the NAS California report he called attention to.
Freedom requires eternal vigilence. Judith’s contribution to the new U Chicago statement (that it was thought needed shows the depth of the PC free speech problem) , and her blog here are both inspiring examples of free speech vigilence.
Needed when the PC US President declares that climate science is settled, and anyone who disagrees is a flat earther. Needed when the Secretary of State echoes that very wording in Jakarta, then goes on to opine that climate change is the biggest foreign policy problem the US faces—not radical Islam or a growling Russian bear. Such is the tyranny of progressive PC thought. And not just in academia.
It’s all so alarming!
If you want to respond to my comments, please do so with some semblence of sentient intelligence and substance.
So, you do not think Secretary Kerry’s recent international comments are not alarming given his official State Department responsibilities? Now, that is alarming.
==> “If you want to respond to my comments, please do so with some semblence of sentient intelligence and substance.”
It would be interesting to see Rud, Chief, and Willis have a self-perception competition.
Joshua, as expected from your track record, you fail the requested test.
And I am quite certain Rob, Willis, and myself would disagree on a lot, and agree on a lot. We already have, both ways. But the parry and thrust of debated data would be educational to all, including us.
To which debate you would apparently have little to contribute. Since here almost never have previously.
He was takin’ it to ’em.
=================
Pseudo Silver Star
That’s what he are;
His rice butt war
On cameraw.
==========
Rud et al are against alarmism……but look out for progressives and PC tyranny!
Tyranny!!
I feel alarmed.
Well said. Any Commander in Chief of the Armed Forces of the USA that ignores the threat of Islamist extremism or Russian aggression in Eastern Europe is either a liar or is in denial. He does have more flexibility now, after his final election.
I am old enough that I remember a time when most people could present and describe various positions on an issue and from their descriptions you could not determine what their personal opinion was. In those days you could discuss issues at length and personal perspectives were not an essential ingredient.
I’m afraid the legacy of political correctness is that the overwhelmingly dominant approach now when describing any position on an important issue that is not your own, is to make a caricature out of it and attack it with vitriol.
I was on a board once where someone asked a question as to how does group X think Y works. I offered a dry overview of their perspective. A quick response came back, “how can you think…”, “what about….”, “that is conflicted by …”. My bemused response was, “I am not a fan of X nor do I find their perspective Y with merit and yes I am aware of the shortcomings you mention, but I was answering a question. The questioner seemed to already be aware of the perspective you are advocating, so I did not provide that”. The person challenging me was amazed at that response. I hadn’t occurred to him that you could just describe a position you did not hold without heaping scorn on it. Sadly we appear to have lost the ability to discuss things without emotional advocacy coloring the discussion. It’s hard to build bridges in such an environment.
Amen. In my world, that was still common until perhaps a decade ago. No longer. Of course, my world not THE world.
ahh, back in the old days……
Kids today.
It’s adults and seniors as well. Right and left. Did not mean to single anyone out.
True.
Planning Engineer, I don’t know how old you are (I am 67). I think if the “good old days” you remember did exist it was probably because the extent of media coverage and communication (blogging etc.) back then (the 60’s?) was magnitudes less.
Concerning political correctness, the practice of referring to climate change skeptics as deniers, with the obvious allusion to the Holocaust, has become so common place that to object to it today one would be considered thin skinned. As a Jew, I find it insulting every time I hear it. I find it particularly distasteful when the term is used by other Jews with little regard for the trivialization of history.
As a jew, I find it particularly distasteful when people trivialize the problem of holocaust denial by equating the use of the term “denier” in the climate wars to those who deny that my relatives burned in ovens.
I figured you would have some ass backwards way to spin this Joshua.
Mark – I’m a decade behind and was in college in the 70s. During that time “political correctness” was just making inroads, but more of a fringe idea in most of the places I was. Most professors hadn’t been swept by the tide yet. University’s supported free speech pretty strongly. Even in the social sciences you typically wouldn’t know a Professors politics unless maybe you chatted with them in their office (unless they were in a politicized sub discipline) and upon learning it you could be quite surprised based on the content of their lectures and discussions. It was common practice to encourage students to read journals from differing perspectives. Back then the remedy for bad speech was not suppression of the bad speech, but more speech. The hope was that in a fair exchange of ideas the good ones would win out.
I don’t solely blame the “politically correct” movement that invaded campus as resulting in the problem today. But it did rob the cause of free speech of it’s biggest defenders. There were other groups across the political spectrum that contributed to the decline and as you note people began to tailor their media sources to match their prejudices.
Some might call this a silly longing for the old days, but it shows there was a model of teaching which once worked quite well and possibly could be replicated again.
Thanks, Mark. It’s nice to know that I inspire your confidence.
Joshua gets the trivial. He doesn’t get the non-trivial.
================
Joshua, I wish I were a cartoonist. I would have a field day with your charicature.
“At its core, global warming denial is like Holocaust denial, an assault on common decency.” – David Fiderer, The Huffington Post (2009)
“The deniers of climate change are cut from the same cloth as Holocaust deniers. They’ve never been to the death camps, Auschwitz and Birkenau, so what they haven’t seen does not exist.” – Charles Larson, American University (2013)
“It’s about the climate-change “denial industry”, …we should have war crimes trials for these bastards – some sort of climate Nuremberg.“- David Roberts, Grist Magazine (2006)
“Let’s just say that global warming deniers are now on a par with Holocaust deniers.” – Ellen Goodman, Boston Globe (2007)
“There are many more traits that the climate deniers share with the creationists and Holocaust deniers and others who distort the truth.” – Donald Prothero, Occidental College (2012)
“I think these people are anti-science flat-earthers. …They are every bit as dangerous as Holocaust deniers.” – Guy Keleny, The Independent (2013)
“These are not debunkers, testing outrageous claims with scientific rigor. They are deniers – like Holocaust deniers.” – Jim Hoggan, DeSmogBlog (2005)
“Bluntly put, climate change deniers pose a greater danger than the lingering industry that denies the Holocaust.” – Joel Connelly, Seattle Post-Intelligencer (2007)
“There are now proposals that ‘global warming deniers’ be treated the same as ‘Holocaust deniers: professional ostracism, belittlement, ridicule and, even, jail.” – Paul Payack, Global Language Monitor (2006)
“Surely it’s time for climate-change deniers to have their opinions forcibly tattooed on their bodies.” – Richard Glover, The Sydney Morning Herald (2011)
“Denialism, a concept that was first widely used, as far as I know, for those who claimed that the Holocaust was a fraud, is the concept I believe we should use.” – Robert Manne, La Trobe University (2009)
Sorry I don’t have time to offer a complete list…
“I think these people are anti-science flat-earthers. …They are every bit as dangerous as Holocaust deniers.” – Guy Keleny, The Independent (2013)” – tom
No, not “every bit as”….more!
Really, what actual danger is posed the crank fringe of Holocaust deniers??
‘posed by’
“Really, what actual danger is posed (by) the crank fringe of Holocaust deniers??” – Michael
Maybe consider the words of Walter Reich,
“The primary motivation for most deniers is anti-Semitism, and for them the Holocaust is an infuriatingly inconvenient fact of history. After all, the Holocaust has generally been recognized as one of the most terrible crimes that ever took place, and surely the very emblem of evil in the modern age. If that crime was a direct result of anti-Semitism taken to its logical end, then anti-Semitism itself, even when expressed in private conversation, is inevitably discredited among most people. What better way to rehabilitate anti-Semitism, make anti-Semitic arguments seem once again respectable in civilized discourse and even make it acceptable for governments to pursue anti-Semitic policies than by convincing the world that the great crime for which anti-Semitism was blamed simply never happened—indeed, that it was nothing more than a frame-up invented by the Jews, and propagated by them through their control of the media? What better way, in short, to make the world safe again for anti-Semitism than by denying the Holocaust?”
That doesn’t sound like a dangerous situation for Jewish people?
Maybe consider this from Wiki:
“Holocaust denial is explicitly or implicitly illegal in 16 countries: Austria, Belgium, Czech Republic, France, Germany, Hungary, Israel, Liechtenstein, Lithuania, Luxembourg, Netherlands, Poland, Portugal, Slovakia, Switzerland, and Romania[171]—a country that denied the Holocaust occurred on its territory up until the Wiesel Commission in 2004.[172][173] The European Union’s Framework decision on Racism and Xenophobia states that denying or grossly trivializing “crimes of genocide” should be made “punishable in all EU Member States”.[174] Slovakia criminalized denial of fascist crimes in general in late 2001; in May 2005, the term “Holocaust” was explicitly adopted by the penal code and in 2009, it became illegal to deny any act regarded by an international criminal court as genocide. The Parliament of Hungary adopted the most recent legislation, which declared denial or trivialization of the Holocaust a crime punishable by up to three years imprisonment, in February 2010.”
Not sure why 16 EU countries would consider and adopt such legislation if the ‘crank fringe’ of holocaust deniers were not considered dangerous.
I wonder Michael how you could possibly think there is no actual danger in antisemitism.
Michael, do you think it was just coincidence that one of the French terrorists found hostages at a Jewish grocery? I mean he had a whole country of possible sites to find hostages and he just happened to find a Jewish grocery. How big of a leap would you think that maybe, just maybe his ideology would support the idea of holocaust denial? Is there any reason to be skeptical that his ideology supports antisemitism? And if you are Jewish, is there any reason to not find this dangerous?
But my comments to Michael have really just been preaching to the choir as Michael knows holocaust deniers to be dangerous. So what he is emphasizing is that ‘these flat-earthers’ (climate change deniers) are MORE dangerous than holocaust deniers.
Beautiful… no alarmism there, no none at all.
John,
a lot of hypotheticals. What are the actual dangers posed by Holocaust deniers? Pretty much zero – there are few of them, and their extremist views make them outcasts.
The terrorists – you think they chose a jewish grocery store because they deny the Holocaust??? You don’t really believe that.
Now, Michael Mann, I really think there is some identity issues motivating some of the people who so relentlessly attack and vilify him, but I’m even more sure sure that it’s got absolutely nothing to do with Holocaust denial.
Beaucoup de rien.
Thomas,
I see you found “some” examples of where “some” people compared holocaust denial with denying the science of climate change. But I would say that most people are using denier as a pejorative with the intent to ridicule and holocaust denial is the last thing on their mind. I would hazard to guess that 99.999% are not thinking of holocaust denial or anything related. Have you seen anyone here try to equate denial of climate science with that of the holocaust? I personally don’t use the term in my conversations with “skeptics,” but I do think it is useful in characterizing some of the people who are “skeptical” of climate science.
New paper in new climate psychology journal, Settled Science, by Lewandumpsky, Crook, Nutticelli, et al finds with great robustness that 97% of smarmy little warmist trolls are metaphysically certain that they are morally and intellectually superior to the denier untermenschen that they obsessively annoy on skeptic blogs. I’ll get you link for the non-paywalled site, later.
Typo. It’s supposed to read ‘197%’.
=====================
The trolls spend time on skeptic sites for the luls – they think it is fun to poke “deniers” with barbed words just to make them angry. They are delighted by their power to elicit negative feelings in others. How do you spot a troll? One way, not the only way, is to be aware of your own feelings. If you have been annoyed by a message that otherwise has no information, it is likely coming from a troll. Don’t be drawn into debate with these psychopaths. Instead, give them the opportunity to learn about themselves.
The Hare test for Narcicissim and Psychopathy:
http://www.counseling-office.com/surveys/test_psychopathy.phtml
Of course, they won’t take it – it’s not nearly as much fun as taunting someone and watching them struggle, for the lulz
“What are the actual dangers posed by Holocaust deniers? Pretty much zero – there are few of them, and their extremist views make them outcasts.”
Well, enough potential danger for 16 EU countries to criminalize the denial of the holocaust. Or is this just another an example of the precautionary principle run amok?
“The terrorists – you think they chose a jewish grocery store because they deny the Holocaust??? You don’t really believe that.”
Of course not. That’s not what I said. My point was the terrorists hold an ideology that is antisemitic. Holocaust deniers are antisemitic. I’m not sure there is such a thing as a holocaust denier who is not also antisemitic. Maybe there are vegetarian tigers too. It would not be a stretch to think the terrorists agree with holocaust denial based on their antisemitic ideology. They certainly have displayed dangerous behavior. They are part of a not so small fringe that would like to destroy not only western civilization, but Israel as well. They are not outcasts with extremist beliefs in the areas they control. They control significant amounts of territory in the ME and influence the politics of the region. They are part of a dangerous, antisemitic, holocaust denying people. They pose real danger to Jews and westerners alike.
I wonder if Joshua would consider the idea of equating antisemitic holocaust deniers who control significant territory and influence in the ME as just extreme fringe outcast folks not really posing any actual danger as a trivial matter?
While the “climate wars” surely involve highly visible and outspoken scientists, there are countless academics, government pencil pushers, and propagandists in the media that move the ball down the field behind the scenes.
Even if there was a modicum of transparency to the “process”, the free press is not particularly interested in exposing, investigating, or reporting on aspects of climate science which may be embarrassing for its practitioners. Instead, the media focuses on “narrative” e.g. “hottest ever year”. The details are too nuanced and confusing for both journalists and editors. It is much easier for them to regurgitate talking points provided by scientists, think tanks, etc.
Anyone who challenges the prevailing global warming narrative is immediately called a variety of names. This language is undeniably from one side of the aisle — the professional left. One should look at Mann et al. always through the prism of political ideology when disentangling their motivations which are hardly “pure science”.
Here’s another way to make the parallel of Mann and Charlie Hebdo. Both echo mainstream views, but very vocally and in ways designed to create reaction and to divide opinion, and this attracts anger. In Mann’s case it is from the skeptical fringe, like Steyn and a few others, and in Charlie’s case from the extremists there. They therefore act as lightning rods for the mainstream views by expressing them in an emphasized form, and sometimes lightning strikes. And when that happens, the mainstream majority comes to their defense, although in a qualified way.
skeptical fringe? Would that be deniers, delayers or deminnesotans for global warming?
Well, true, all skeptics are on the fringe, I suppose. It was redundant.
There is more of a parallel between Styne and Charlie. Both express a politically incorrect satirical slant on mainstream political correctness.
Is it possible to dream up a more asinine and self-serving trivialisation of mass-murder than this spluttering garbage??
Michael, Perhaps you should ask Jim D in regards to trivializing mass murder with his self serving narrative. Are his parrallels equally asinine?
As I responded to Joshua, yes, I joined in by trying to make a connection, and am not proud. This is something that couldn’t be discussed on a climate forum unless Judith made a connection, and it was too big to ignore. I appreciate her effort, because it is something it is good to get out even within this forum.
Jim D, I actually thought your narrative was pretty good, as you are capabable of doing, considering the controversial nature of this discussion. I also agree with Michael that trivializing mass murder is dangerous ground. I just don’t know if it rises to that level. I limited my comment being cognizant of that.
good point
see above
Yup. Had not considered that legal angle. Thanks. Relevant.
What legal angle? There is a silly civil lawsuit in the silly D.C. courts and then there is mass murder in Paris.
What troubles me is the warmer mind set.
Warmers have advocated jailing skeptics and there is video from an environmental group showing non-green children being blown up by their teacher.
These are some of the strong anti-free speech statements made by warmers. The warmers come dangerously close to breaking bread with the people who attacked Charlie Hebdo.
You wake up to find out a Climate Etc. denizen has shot to death a bunch of people on the other side. Think about it.
Gotta say, Jim D –
For you to compare Mann to Charlie Hebdo is no better than Judith’s exploitation of the murder of civilians to score points in the climate wars.
More big boy pants & less drama-queening = better dialog.
I took it as a challenge to see any connection. That is all I came up with.
Just sayin’ it’s better to leave that kind of grasping, cynical exploitation to the “skeptics.”
“…Judith’s exploitation of the murder of civilians to score points in the climate wars.”
If you really mean that joshie, you should be too disgusted to hang around here any more. I don’t know why Judith tolerates this crap.
==> “If you really mean that joshie, you should be too disgusted to hang around here any more. ”
I don’t find it “disgusting,” Don. I find it sameolsameol. People from both sides of the fence regularly employ rhetorical overreach to score climate war points. Judith included. The outrage about the term “denier.” The constant appeals from both sides about the “starving children” in Africa. The appeals to “truth” in science.
I don’t question that Judith thinks free speech is important, nor that she’s horrified by the murders in Paris. The fact that she employs rhetorical overreach doesn’t say anything about her personally except that she’s willing to engage in over-the-top advocacy. We all do it from time to time.
One of the problems in these discussions is that victim-card playing combatants need to view their counterparts as sociopaths to reinforce their own sense of self.
You can’t empathize with those who have a sense of self, joshie. Nor are you qualified to judge them. Your smuggy smarminess knows no bounds.
Well, the comparison of Mann’s studies to satirical cartoons is interesting….
It had to happen sometime I suppose:
I agree with Joshua.
Joshua, I am the poster child for outrage about usage of the term denier to describe skeptics. I am outraged still.
It is a political rhetorical device used to equate skeptics with deniers of the Holocaust. There are many who would like to use it in its traditional sense, but the term has been corrupted by those who use it more viciously.
The outrage stems from the deliberateness with which it is used and the obtuseness with which it is defended.
You can whine about it as much as you like. The term is indefensible.
JC SNIP
Tom –
==> “You can whine about it as much as you like. The term is indefensible.”
I don’t “defend” using the term. Never have, never will – despite the self-serving and highly selective outrage from some about the term.
But keep patting yourself on the back for your moral superiority if it makes you feel better. I’m all for people feeling good about themselves.
JC SNIP
Michael, “What a load of piffle you drama queen.”
It might be a bit dramatic, but most believers seem to prefer avoiding a substantial conversation by picking their favorite ad hom. Denier would be an ad hom I believe.
You are a classic example if you think back to the Heimlich Maneuver issue. One “scientist” with 29 data points and one negative result condemned the use of the Heimlich Maneuver while ignoring over 20,000 documented cases that went against his results. You opted for the PITA approach rather than participating it what could have been an interesting discussion :)
JC SNIP
==> “I disagree. There is something special in Groundskeeper’s shirt ripping.”
Well, he is a good writer.
Judith –
Why is disputing Tom’s self-description as someone special, for commonplace behavior, off-limits?
Come on, Joshie.
Wee Willie is OK.
Alarmists are genociding maniacs is OK.
A shirt-ripping character that fits perfectly?
Nope.
INTEGRITY ™ – We Defend Free Speech.
Capt. Cook, in his dashing uniform.
Willard,
You just don’t get it.
Saying that, ethically, ‘alarmists’ and Islamists are the same is wonderful free speech, but your comments are really just too much.
Let’s be clear, though.
Judith’s snipping has nothing to do with free speech.
It’s her blog. We can say whatever we want outside of her crib.
It is relevant to her reasoning, but let’s not drama queen here, boys.
Joshua, you don’t get it..
I’m being oppressed!
It’s PC gone mad!!
Oh, the tyranny!!!!
Michael –
Judith’s snipping is not tyranny, and neither is it censorship.
Now Realclimate moderation? That’s another matter entirely.
That akin morally to massacring journalists.
yes, i snip meaningless pointless comments that insult other another commenter. If you want to be satirical, objectionable or whatever, pick a bigger target.
Joshua,
And ethically equivalent to Islamists?
==> “And ethically equivalent to Islamists?”
Yes, Michael.
‘
It “makes no sense,” to question the moral and ethical parallels.
> pick a bigger target.
I thought this prophet of the lukewarm church was big enough, Judy.
How else can we explain his explosive shirt ripping?
***
Is Joshua a bigger target? I’ve got gulag prisoners waiting to be put on his shoulders.
Joshua, Michael and Willard
You forget that Climate Etc. has a purpose and a focus. Our… what… feud(?) does not advance it. I won’t be offended if Judith snips my comments as well.
If you would like to continue this conversation, I invite you to either of my weblogs, The Lukewarmer’s Way or 3000 Quads. Or you can propose a venue of your own.
Joshua, Michael and Willard, you’re welcome to say whatever you like here: https://thelukewarmersway.wordpress.com/2015/01/12/im-not-charlie-but-i-still-dont-like-what-michael-mann-did/
Tom,
I can say whatever i want here…..unless Judith censors (oh noes!) me.
Joshua=SNIP Joshua, you’ve lost this argument.
I guess I’m not “mainstream”. I find both Mann and Charlie Hebdo quite tasteless.
If you don’t come from a culture of satirical cartoons then you cannot understand either the politics or the humor.
I suggest you visit my blog and tell me if I can’t understand politics or humour. I don’t like to plug my bs here, but your comment is irresistible
http://21stcenturysocialcritic.blogspot.com.es/2015/01/interview-with-oilman.html
http://21stcenturysocialcritic.blogspot.com.es/2014/12/president-obombo-opens-relations-with.html
http://21stcenturysocialcritic.blogspot.com.es/2014/09/drowning-islands.html
http://21stcenturysocialcritic.blogspot.com.es/2014/08/the-nature-of-jesus.html
None are intended to be irreverent. But I think you will see I know where to draw the line. The Charlie Hebdo cartoons WERE tasteless. And it wouldn’t surprise me to see a couple of nuts blow up a similar anti Christian or anti Israel publication in the USA.
The “west” has its share of nuts. Do you remember Oklahoma City and the room full of little children blown up by McVeigh? Or the norwegian guy who murdered a bunch of youngsters a couple of years ago?
Tasteless enough to kill 8 journalists in one room? Taste is mot the issue here.
“The “west” has its share of nuts. Do you remember Oklahoma City and the room full of little children blown up by McVeigh? Or the norwegian guy who murdered a bunch of youngsters a couple of years ago?”
Oklahoma City is not the right case for comparison.
I talked to a Federal agent in the mid 80s who had spend two years in North Dakota and Montana infiltrating the survivalist/supremacist/militia groups.
Then I looked at the information on Waco and Ruby ridge. It is pretty clear that the US was targeting some groups on the right of the spectrum in an abusive way for at least 20 years if not longer and that Federal agents were using their powers in a abusive and arguably illegal way (there were other incidents).
After the US killed about 4 score of them in two separate incidents. At Ruby Ridge, the result of an entrapment effort by the ATF, Federal agents on the Weaver property shot his dog in front of the 14 year old Weaver boy and killed the him when when he (not surprisingly) took shots at them. They then killed his unarmed mother who was holding her baby.
The fact that many of the Ruby Ridge personnel were involved in Waco indicates that a summary firing of the Ruby Ridge personnel could have prevented further senseless tragedy.
The actions of the Federal government as highlighted by Ruby Ridge and Waco outraged certain groups and was going to provoke some kind of reaction sooner or later. Oklahoma City was what is called a “brushback” in baseball. Since Oklahoma city until 9/11 Federal agents were treading more carefully. Not sure of the status since 9/11.
The Fast and Furious operation indicates that the ATF is still out of control and that these tax collectors should go back to collecting taxes and be stripped of their other authority.
It would be better to have Americans armed with military grade weaponry than to allow the continued existence of the ATF in its current form. The ability to use SWAT/No-Knock tactics on American soil should be severely restricted by statute.
I will restate this, because I think it is still relevant. If there is a parallel, it is Mann that is the cartoonist attacking the extremists, and the skeptical fringe, particularly in the US, that single him out for attack, as his recent “Serengeti” article lays out.
http://bos.sagepub.com/content/71/1/33.full.pdf
Mann is not a typical climate scientist because he makes it his business to publicly go after the extreme skeptics while most others would not offer any public opinion on them. Again, this public criticism is a parallel with the cartoonists and invites attack.
The ACLU, The Washington Post, NBC News, The Los Angeles Times and various other…” organizations “…filed amici briefs opposed to Michael Mann…” – Steyn. I might say Steyn was struck by lightning. Then in both cases, support followed, some of it based on the principle of free speech. Charlie Hebdo and Steyn rely on that principle. Interesting comment Jim D.
Of all the links, the one that is most offensive is the one from Paper Bird, where he says it’s bad form to mock the oppressed in society. To my mind, that makes him complicit in the murders in Paris, and wherever Muslims murder those who criticize their religion. I would argue that the jihadist perpretrators were not at all oppressed, or at least they were far less oppressed than they would have been in their native countries. They had jobs, they were able to travel the world, they had all the freedoms the West offered them. Their problem is not oppression, it’s their demands.
Conrad Black wrote an eloquent column on , a href=”http://news.nationalpost.com/2015/01/10/conrad-black-defending-the-christian-west/”>the challenge to the Christian West
The problem is that elements in the Muslim diaspora in the West are claiming special rights. They are claiming their religion is unassailable, when no other religion is allowed to make the same claim or afforded special protection. Call it what you will but I call it Muslim exceptionalism, which is different from American exceptionalism because Muslims are claiming special rights while American are claiming a special place in history but believe in equality of all people, if not equality of outcome. Muslims are newcomers to the West and some are using violence to destroy our tradition of free expression, a phenomenon that needs to be dealt with firmly. If it means deportation, jail, or shootouts, so be it. Religious tolerance only goes so far.
Freedom of expression means everyone is free to speak as they wish with as few restraints as possible. No religion should be beyond the thrust of the critic’s sabre, especially one in whose name 3000 plus people were murdered on 9/11/2001 and unspeakable atrocities are being committed on a daily basis.
Far too general to attack all Muslims. Very few Muslims that emigrated want their adopted country to become a religious state. That may well be what they wanted to get away from.
This isn’t about becoming a religious state. It’s about treating offensive religious imagery in the public square the same as other offensive materials like pornography and race baiting. Free speech is not without limits. This is about where a limit should be placed and what the consequences are of deeply offending a class of people with gov’t blessing.
JimD, the facts are against you in several countries.
I think Paper Bird’s point was that while they found Charlie Hebro offensive, they still defended their right to say it.
Yes, Judith, I see that. No one but a jihadist would NOT defend that. That’s known as cheap grace. It goes without saying if you live in a free country. But the column represents the worst kind of moral preening and self-important ranting. He’s attacking those who are horrified at the idea that someone would kill a dozen people who simply made fun of a wide range of human foibles. He doesn’t have to say, “I am Charlie.” If he wouldn’t publish the cartoons himself because he finds them “racist” and an attack on the “oppressed,” (which is a blatant exaggeration) fine, but don’t use that as an excuse to shift from the criminality of the actual event in order to attack a few people who are upset and perhaps over-reacted.
He seems oblivious to the idea that this act was a deliberate attempt to cow people into not discussing Islam at all in Paris– the very heart of Western Civilization. Rather than scorn those who are upset by it, scorn the perpetrators and their ilk.
Paper Bird called the cartoons “racist,” which would make publishing them a criminal offense in many European countries. Paper Bird is calling for censorship – albeit in a form that it better tolerated by the secular left. The argument is that you can pick on Christianity and Judaism, but not Islam because only the latter would be racist. It’s a pernicious argument and needs to be fought back against at every opportunity.
The “racism” argument is creeping into the climate debate as well. “Climate Justice” is a theme designed to make it off-limits in polite society – “racist” or inattentive to “the oppressed” – to reject the idea that western nations should tax carbon and send the money to the third world.
==> “To my mind, that makes him complicit in the murders in Paris, and wherever Muslims murder those who criticize their religion.”
Wow!
Quite remarkable the breadth of extremism brought out by the climate wars.
It’s not the climate wars. It’s the war on terror, the war on Western values by those who have only recently migrated to the West that provoked that response.
It is bad form to mock the oppressed. It is wrong to kill people because they have bad form. And it is also wrong to crank up islamophobia using 17 murders as an excuse to tar and feather people who had nothing to do with the crime.
Who were the oppressed? The Muslim community in France is not oppressed by any stretch of the definition. They were welcomed to France after the war, and some 900,000 of them fled there in fear of their lives after the Algerian War, putting a huge stress on culture. Many were of mixed French and Algerian blood.
I am not attacking peaceful Muslims, many of whom condemned the attacks. I have questions of whether they are adequately policing their own communities to prevent this type of ideology from gaining hold. The best place to combat this kind of thinking is in the neighborhoods where it originates.
Muslims ARE discriminated against in Europe, most minorities are. It’s human nature to do so, and it’s not exactly a bid deal. Minorities get used to it, deal with it, and life goes on.
My point is that it’s very tasteless to draw cartoons insulting others’s religious beliefs. II notice there’s a tendency to become quite defensive when I point out my opinion that indeed those cartoons are tasteless. And I should also point out I don’t think they should be censored.
On the other hand, there is censorship in Europe in certain areas. And it’s so strict I prefer not to discuss it. I think there’s a bit of hypocrisy involved in this case, the murders are being used by islamophobes to fire up their cause. And this is clearly going to escalate the conflict. Long term, I think this is going to end wearing down all sides, the conflict is fired up by the Netanyahu’s and the bin Laden type extremists, but I’m pretty sure both extremist sides will not succeed. However on the way to the end game we are all going to get dragged into mindless and quite stupid medieval style killing waves. It’s the same thing all the time.
Ah the irony!
Judith rushing to the free-speech barricade again….in theory.
In reality…..what happened when some fool made threats about some comments here?…..whole threads deleted.
Michael, two points.
First, you are free to say almost whatever. Just not wherever. This is her blog, and she has clear previously rules for what comstitues acceptable speech in her forum.
Second, were I her, I would enforce those rules more than she does. Overly tolerant (in my opinion). Free speech here does not mean off topic or irrelevant or vituperous speech. And in general, independent of this forum’s rules, free speech is not unbounded speech. You have no free speech right to falsely shout fire in a crowded theater. Ponder that analogy in relation to some of your own previous blog comment speech here.
The threads are back, btw. I will stand up for my own comments/statements, but not for rather inane and irrelevant comments made by someone I don’t know.
But free speech!?
What, it has limits!!!???
Amazing.
Though, i would defend you right to delete this entire awful post and thread.
I’m not sure I would stand up for inane and irrelevant comments by someone I did know.
Michael: of course free speech has limits – such as yelling fire in the crowded theater or depriving someone else of their free speech right by interrupting them or talking over them. Free speech also includes the right to ignore someone, just because someone wants to talk does not mean you are compelled to listen.
I just realized that the right of free speech should be restricted to people who are polite and well mannered.
curryja wrote: “The threads are back, btw.”
Is the original “Slaying a Greenhouse Dragon” thread back?
Is there another link than the following one?
http://judithcurry.com/2011/01/31/slaying-a-greenhouse-dragon/
just spotted two that were still private; these are now both back also
Tanks Judith. It’s nice to know that we can now refer back to them.
PA – try carrying a pornographic image around in the public square. Not all speech is protected, obviously.
Well David there are slander and libel laws so it is expected that public speak at least skirt the boundary of fact.
No PA. You are free to carry around a sign that says something untrue. Say “Canada became the 51st state yesterday”. March up and down the street with that. Add a picture of two naked people engaging in graphic sex and you’re going to jail instead.
There are limits to free speech. There’s a law against public lewdness. It crosses a boundary where too many people agree it’s in bad taste.
So now we have a group of people who are horrified that their religion is being blasphemed and the powers that be do nothing about it. So they take matters into their own hands. I condemn both the blasphemers and the violence in the response. Two wrongs don’t make a right. The blasphemers paid a steep price for their behavior but I’m very sure they knew they were aware their behavior might antagonize people into just such a response.
Dr. Curry isn’t the government. This is her blog and I support her right to delete whatever comment she sees fit to delete. If she deletes my comments, I can go voice them elsewhere.
If the government swoops in and deletes my comments, THAT would be a violation of free speech. THAT would be censorship.
You should learn the distinction.
So Michael Mann making a defamation case is not a threat to free speech?
Phew!, that’s a relief.
I’ve been so worried with Judith telling us what a terrible threat to free speech it is.
jim2, yes.
Michael, either you are dissembling, or you are ignorant of the legal issues behind SLAPP legislation, the CEI appeal, and the Steyn separation. All of which have been extensively discussed,here and elsewhere,,including posts by practicing lawyers. Whichever of the two possibilities might be true in your case, you have revealed your nature and purpose here. My advice would be either leave for friendlier confines, or seriously up your game. Pathetic so far. Worse than Bears against Packers this year.
Rud,
You don’t like the law – change it.
We all understand that first you must break a few eggs to make an omelette.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nuremberg_Laws
In France, the Summer of 1944, it was not as easy as it sounds today.
Heh. Like Charlie Hebdo, Judith knows that her opponents read what she writes because they regard her as a threat to their vision of the world and their grand desires ‘for the world’.
quite the mini twitter storm over what I have written, mainly the Mann-Steyn angle
how terribly clever it is to say stupid and outrageous stuff.
Michael | January 11, 2015 at 8:11 pm |
“how terribly clever it is to say stupid and outrageous stuff”
Michael speaks from experience.
Mann: “It is similar to what happens when a group of lions on the Serengeti seek out a vulnerable individual zebra at the edge of a herd, which
is why I call it the ÒSerengeti strategyÓ in my book The Hockey Stick and the Climate Wars (Mann, 2012).”
The irony is that Mann and his financial backers did precisely the same thing to Tim Ball.
The lions singled out the weakest paper in the herd.
Here’s anuther that allows one outlier to change the
outcome. In Lewandowski’s study of pesky skeptic
conspiracy thinking ‘n such, respondent 606 turns
out ter be 32,757 years old, but nevertheless quite
forward thinking when asked about GM crops.
http://www.joseduarte.com/blog/how-one-paleo-participant-can-change-the-outcome-of-a-study
In reality, Mann is being nibbled to death by an Okapi, and the tickling is more than he bear.
This post is exceptionally poorly conceived and somewhat distasteful. Threats to free speech derive from powerful institutions of the state and not the actions of random madmen. To fail to understand this critical distinction – in the canon of enlightenment thought – is to elevate a form of words over substance. It is freedom of speech as a mantra for the opportunistically political – rather than a considered position on fundamental human freedoms. An important idea free of the source of it’s legitimacy and so reduced to babble.
Mann attempts use the institutions of the state as a weapon to silence critics. Whether this is warranted or not is a fine balance between individual freedom and protection of the individual from harm caused by unrestrained lies. In this case using the complex, ponderous and expensive procedures of law to remedy a slight of no consequence. The essence of frivolous litigation that is intended to restrain freedom of expression. But it is not the same at all as acts of violence by madmen.
A siege in Sydney recently resulted in the deaths of two innocents. Needlessly tragic – but this is not nearly an exclusively Muslim thing. Mass murderers are unfortunately common enough. Unless the experience results in a stronger, wiser, more tolerant and inclusive society – as it did in Australia – it fuels a descent into social madness. The French are showing signs of a much needed coming together as a people regardless of the differences. It is the way to a bright future for all of us.
My god Rob, you are (almost) 100% right.
Maybe Judith will listen to you and reconsider this whole ill-conceived notion. And comments are, as usual, making a bad situation worse.
==> “My god Rob, you are (almost) 100% right.”
Indeed – aside from confusing an attempt to restrain personal attacks with trying to restrain freedom of expression – you actually got one right, Chief.
And that ain’t no unintentional irony.
From two who understand so little of the philosophy of freedom – it means so very little. Sometimes a great notion is perverted in ignorance to serve other expediencies.
How would these barbarians inside the gates of the scientific enlightenment ever know? How would you ever know it from the moral vacuum of progressive duplicity? It is not however the moral question of our time – merely noisy mouth pieces. Froth and bubble heads.
Is this a source of future mayhem? Already they are withdrawing from an unresponsive world – minds reeling with visions of fire and death. It seems only a matter of time.
==> “From two who understand so little of the philosophy of freedom – it means so very little.
If only some day I could reach just a hope of understanding even a fraction of what Chief understands about the “philosophy of freedom.”
Quite a stunning self-perception. I wonder what it’d be like to see oneself from such a lofty perch?
I stand on the shoulders of giants. Is there any other way to roll? You should try it over a long time of old fashioned inquiry into the nature of nature, art and society – Joshua – rather than skulking in the weeds.
Rob’s initial comment was the exception that proves the rule.
Rob, I think you nailed that one! :)
> … not the actions of random madmen …
Nope
The actions of random madmen have specifically blocked public satire on Sharia law through fear of violent retaliation (one of Montford’s points above)
The intense degree of this is *NOT* reflected in the climate wars
You demand a world in which freedom is given and not won every day with courage, fortitude, sacrifice and resolve?
Why is this generation so soft?
>You demand a world in which freedom is given and not won every day with courage, fortitude, sacrifice and resolve?
Again, nope. Your reply comes from some other planet ? It’s certainly not relevant to my comment. I demand nothing.
I am also from an older generation that is anything but soft. Through humility, I will not claim “courage, fortitude, sacrifice and resolve”, but I have experienced episodes that horrify most people and which were not resolved by softness
Your thematic coupled, non-linear chaotic climate concept I agree with. Your view of social engineering, I do not. It’s just rhetoric
The acts of random madmen cannot take out freedom to make offensive jokes about The Prophet unless we let them. No matter how much freakin’ social engineering slime you throw about.
Veterans with missing legs might ask why this generation is so soft.
Coming from someone who whines to the world about his toe is, well…
http://i603.photobucket.com/albums/tt112/ausador/IronyMeterSplode.jpg
“Threats to free speech derive from powerful institutions of the state and not the actions of random madmen.”
May I ask who murdered Malcolm X, Martin Luther King, John and Robert Kennedy?
DocMartyn, you are right. And yet mad-murderous beliefs are not born in isolation.
Some (but not all) Climate Etc readers will know the name “Medgar Evers” from Bob Dylan’s song Only a Pawn in Their Game (beginning minute 3:20).
Perhaps fewer Climate Etc will have visited the web page of MIT philosopher linguist Norvin Richards, which hosts a celebrated short story by Eudora Welty — written in a single day upon hearing the news of Ever’s assassination and titled Where Is the Voice Coming From? — that (like Dylan’s song) examines the cognition of Evers’ assassin.
Conclusion In susceptible individuals, demagoguery acts to poison reason and incite homicide.
“We must make the building of a free society once more an intellectual adventure, a deed of courage…. Unless we can make the philosophic foundations of a free society once more a living intellectual issue, and its implementation a task which challenges the ingenuity and imagination of our liveliest minds, the prospects of freedom are indeed dark. But if we can regain that belief in the power of ideas which was the mark of liberalism at its best, the battle is not lost.
― Friedrich Hayek
There are long fought for and hard won freedoms bought by the blood of martyrs over centuries in battlegrounds where the battle lines are sometimes very obscure.
You have to ask yourself – is the right to be offensive about The Prophet one of these fundamental freedoms to live or die for? Or do you just want to whine about Muslims who don’t have a sense of humour? .
fan, Dylan was asked by activists (in a good cause) in effect to write a song condemning Ever’s killer – their focus and venom was for the killer. Dylan did not focus on the individual, but put the killing in the much broader social-historical context. This led to demands from the activists et al that he become a political leader, when he only wanted to sing, and, as I recall, had been reluctant to get involved in the event at which he sang.
@Rob ” ….. a much needed coming together as a people regardless of the differences. It is the way to a bright future for all of us.”
Agree with this sentiment as the future of the human race depends on this. I am pessimistic that this will happen any time soon, so instead of the word “bright” I suggest that it be qualified as “brighter”.
The proliferation of better education of our children and a more equal treatment of women in general seems to me to be prerequisites for the resolution of the differences in humanity and for a greater emphasis be placed on areas where we all agree.
Peter, the future depends on individuals developing self-awareness, understanding and wisdom. One of my concerns with Islam is that nothing I can see in that religion supports this. While most major religions and many non-religious thinkers advise “Know thyself, “The Kingdom of Heaven is within you,” etc, putting the focus on the spiritual development of each individual, Mohammed’s teachings are said to be the third and final revelation, there is nothing more to be revealed. In Islam, you get to Heaven by following several religious practices, rites and rituals, which to me have no element which contributes to spiritual development, to understanding and wisdom in the individual. This to me is a fundamental difference between Muslim and non-Muslim communities. The difficulties of a “coming together” between two such differing sets of values are apparent in both inter-Muslim strife and Muslim attacks on “non-believers.”
Thank you for responding Faustino. I honestly believe that there is a lot of common ground between Christianity and the practice of Islam. The two religions share many of their ideals and both acknowledge many of the early prophets including Jesus.
The early practice of Christianity had similar issues in that certain idealogical cliques had caused much pain and grief being inflicted on the Islamic “heathens” in the name of God, such as, for example, the Crusades. The inquisitions carried out in the post medieval period in Spain and Portugal, with the full support of the Church of Rome eventually led to the reformation and toward the practice of Christianity that we know today.
Islam today has been hijacked by cultists and idealological groups, such as the Taliban, and subverted the practice of Islam from their early teachings of peacable co-existence, to the extent that ordinary Muslim families are being alienated from their Christian neighbours. I sincerely believe that a Muslim groundswell will ultimately prevail to bring the practice of Islam into line with modern principles of equity and peaceable co-existence.
The difference between the two major religions seems to me to be accentuated by ignorance and a lack of education and equality such that westernised countries now enjoy.
A serf’s tail on human nay-chur
Messiness prevails, there’s
no Utopia out there, give
pesky humans an inch and
they’ll take ten miles.
… Not jest religious zealots,
islamic fundamentalists.
No, confirmation bias prevails
even among academic associates.
Few will go that extra mile
ter do the Feynman thing,
even freedom of the press
is a ticket ter excess,
… ter irresponsibly seize the day,
salacious gossip and the politics
of innuendo, easy-peasy way
ter sell the ‘news.’
.
Our best hope seems not ter
lie in education, per se,
many philosophy educated youth
in history ended up as dictators.
Colour me sceptical,
not too many Socrates
out there, our best hope,
think serfs, lies in the quality
…of our democratic institutions,
requiring constant and critical
vigilance, toughly applied
minimal law fer all.
Thou shalt not incite violence,
thou shalt not, sans evidence
maliciously slander an individual’s
reputation. Penalties apply.
….Thou shalt not kill except
in circumstances of extreme
physical defence. But no PC.
…. Can’t put limits on free speech
that underpins intellectual
thinking. What are the limits
of censorship?
Who decides?
Where will it
all end?
Peter, you say that you believe that “a Muslim groundswell will ultimately prevail to bring the practice of Islam into line with modern principles of equity and peaceable co-existence,” and that “The difference between the two major religions seems to me to be accentuated by ignorance and a lack of education and equality such that westernised countries now enjoy.”
I’m not convinced. 400 years ago, the telescope was invented in Holland. Within a few decades, telescopes had been introduced from Europe to China, to the Mughal empire in India and to the Ottoman empire (the Caliphate). In Europe, this led to advances through Galileo, Kepler and Newton; a scientific revolution was set in train, which led to great advances, the Industrial Revolution etc and dynamic market economies. The Mughals were interested in the telescope only in respect of their calendar, which was revised on the basis of the Sun revolving around an immobile Earth (the Ptolemaic system). It did not lead to a general scientific advance. Similarly, while telescopes were used by the Caliphate’s navy, the Ptolemaic view prevailed and no advances followed.
European societies were innovative, outward-looking, keen to develop and apply new knowledge, and sufficiently open to prevent the old order from suppressing the new. None of this applied in the Islamic world or China, which were still entrammelled in in traditional religious structures and too subservient to centralised hierarchies to support fee-thinking and innovation. The Islamic countries and China which were once more advanced in many respects than the West stagnated while the West flourished. The discrepancy with Islamic countries was sustained by societies which were, and still are, inward-looking, traditional and hostile to pluralism. So there are entrenched, centuries-long reasons for ignorance and lack of education and equality in Middle Eastern Islam. There are some forces for modernity, e.g. in Iran, but they remain suppressed. The groundswell you foresee does not seem imminent.
(Drawing on Nicholas Wade’s “A Troublesome Inheritance,” which cites many references.)
serf
“Messiness prevails, there’s
no Utopia out there, give
pesky humans an inch and
they’ll take ten miles”
good…nail it on head
ATG Holder is still gonna hold a “conference” about why they’re mad at us
this one goes to 11
Thanks for responding Beth. I enjoyed the way you put your POV across but feel that you and Faustino (and in fact, many of the regular contributors to Judith’s blog) have a somewhat pessimistic view about human nature.
My central point was that cliques seem to be responsible for many of the excesses that have occurred in human history, with the the silent majority looking on and being individually too afraid to do anything about it. But tipping points do occur, when enough was deemed to be enough, and this is the stuff of revolutions.
Not all revolutions have resulted in positive changes but the old orders are swept away and new orders take over. The European reformation certainly assisted in a better uptake of progressive ideas and inventions and this is why they are presently further advanced, culturally and in the equitable treatment of dissidents and the disadvantaged, including minorities. This is not to say that all European nations benefited at the same rate, as we all saw in respect of the Jugoslavs.
The change to the way Islam is practised will not happen anytime soon and probably not in our lifetime, but the average timespans for such socialogical change seem to be in the hundreds of years rather than in the dozens of years, even though, like climate change, the tipping points will come and go relatively suddenly.
Rob, I don’t think the Charlie Hebdo killings were that isolated or self started by those two nuts. The radical Islamist side does get fired up by clerics issuing fatwas or statements which provide cover for retribution for inferred insults. There is an underlying legal framework from which these lone wolfs operate. But the clerics derive their power from islamophobia and the ill conceived wars being triggered in the Middle East. I’m not into censorship, and I myself like tweaking the lion’s nose, but those of us who do it should be wise enough to understand that challenges to dogma can cause adverse consequences. This means Dr Curry was right when she used the Paris event as a trigger for discussion about censorship and retribution in the climate controversy.
Enough with this overblown waffle
Mann just this week wrote an article implying McIntyre and others are willing to destroy the entire planet for secret pieces of silver from the Koch brothers.
A bit of perspective please.
Is a free speech protected the same way as the right to murder? In a Communist Czechoslovakia, we were told: “You can say anything, but you have to be aware that there could be consequences”. What?? You can murder anybody, but you have to be aware that there could be consequences.
Curious George, you have delved to the depths of the ‘philosophy of law’. Which is only optional even at HLS. And to which there is no answer.
On the one side, Hammurabi’s code and the presumption of innocence. On the other side, Critical Legal Studies (PC HLS when I was there) teaching that all law is just a way for rulers to oppress the ruled.
Judith, you said that you’ld like to address the issue of freedom of speech aside from the Charlie Hebdo attack. That’s a bit hard at present, given the post-attack focus on the issue. If I address it here, I’ll do so sans CH. But here are two links to Brendan O’Neill articles which, while prompted by the attack, have broader relevance. The Australian has a paywall – I don’t know whether it allows limited access.
http://www.theaustralian.com.au/opinion/columnists/western-freedom-of-speech-was-under-attack-long-before-the-paris-killings/story-fnhulnf5-1227180052119
http://www.theaustralian.com.au/opinion/columnists/dark-blow-in-a-long-war-against-enlightenment/story-fnhulnf5-1227178831348
I didn’t read the articles, but titles are quite revealing. I live in Europe, and I noticed there are laws I find quite restrictive of free speech rights. They are so repressive I prefer not to discuss the subject in too much detail. I may not end up arrested but I could get my visa suspended and find myself back in Texas.
Yes please don’t get your VISA suspended and thereby punish the entire state of Texas.
Sorry Faustino, but you are misrepresenting the situation
The Aus (and O’Neill) are predictably full of grandiose rhetoric about freedom of press/speech and the core values of society blah and blah, but it will NOT publish any consistent satirical comment on Sharia law – due to the fear of violent retaliation
When this occurs, it is more than evident that terrorism de facto works
Ian, I don’t know if Bill Leak has addressed Sharia law per se, but he has certainly taken on Islamic extremism in his cartoons in the Oz. In general, the Oz doesn’t do much satire except via James Jeffrey’s light-hearted column.
We have a local case of a state appeals court overturning a county judge’s ruling that anti-gay speech was protected speech. In this case, a worker was fired from his government job for his off time public anti-gay speaking. When the fired government worker applied for un-employment insurance, he was denied because: “the attorney general’s office was justified in firing (this person) in 2010 because his posts on Facebook and an anti-gay blog, as well as his campus visits and TV appearances, clearly had an adverse impact on the agency’s (where he was employed) credibility,” “(this person)’s conduct undermined one of the department’s specific missions-ie the integrity of its anti-cyberbullying campaign.” “By employing an individual such as (named person),….the department undermined it own message.”
The content of what was said is not entitled to protection of free speech under the US Constitution’s First Amendment because of his job in a government office was perceived to adversely effect the government agency’s message. (The named person) was viewed by his boss and government employer as a cyber bully.
Free speech is never free.
As content of speech seems to be the determinant of what is allowed given a specific employment setting, I wonder about warming activists in the US EPA who are members of Greenpeace, World Wildlife Federation, Environmental Defense Council, etc and their job description is one that participates in the rule making process and regulation enforcement for greenhouse gas emissions. What is said in public regarding their views, even with the caveat of speaking as an individual and not as a missionary of the EPA, does this rise to the level of conflict of interest or an illustration of free speech in a setting of government authority?
Likely the warmest position in this EPA is secure as it follows the consensus view. Anyone want to guess as to what may happen to a skeptic? Surely not a team player. A disruptive and disagreeable person who should find employment elsewhere. A situation where a government worker can be fired for “cause.”
RiHoO8, on the “what-is-allowed” pointas a public servant I never publicly addressed the issues for which I had carriage (except e.g. in invited forums to help develop policy), I confined my public comments to areas outside my work role. This was normal public service practice in the UK and Australia, I don’t know if it still is. Our last but one Treasury head certainly adopted partisan and political perspectives in public comments.
On”team players,” I certainly suffered because I wasn’t prepared to play the insider-outsider, support me and we’ll both get promoted game, which too often over-rides considerations of good public policy – particularly at the state level, not so much in my experience in central agencies in the UK and Australia. Again, it might have changed, there seems to be a greater tendency to appoint political allies rather than selection on merit.
The thing I have to guard against is my own tendency to groupthink and an “our gang” mentality. After I thought about Climategate I decided I disagreed with the pilfering and with some of the interpretations put on the emails. After I thought about Mann’s case, I decided that he had a right to sue over one specific matter and Steyn needed to defend a case (which I rather hope he wins). I know most skeps think otherwise, but my own skepticism does not rest on Climategate or the success of Steyn’s defence, any more than it rests on the Pause.
The other thing about which I have my doubts is the identification of so many with Charlie Hebdo. While I can think of nothing more tedious than a French shock/satire mag, it is very clear that those people were taking an almighty risk that I would never have taken. How can I claim identification with them? The wanting to lose oneself in a great feel-good mass is so NOT Charlie. Charlie’s problem was its stark lack of anonymity and stark exposure.
I am definitely NOT Charlie and it is too late to pretend I am by joining an enormous sea of protestors. While I comment as mosomoso for practical WP reasons (I am Robert Townshend of 177 Coucal Road Dondingalong, but don’t try posting and think twice about driving here without 4WD), the truth is I find anonymity to be an easier, softer option.
By the way, for me immigration is like fossil fuel power. My society derives massive benefits from it every day, has always had it, and would sink without it. While I don’t approve of abuses and mismanagement of immigration and I am opposed to all multi-culti PC, I think a racially and culturally static society is about as realistic as an industrial society powered by pathetic wind turbines. It’s pretend stuff.
I am not Charlie. I am not Steyn. I’m me.
Very brave thing to write.
Bamboos all rattle together, but Mosomoso thinks for himself.
===============
“I have my doubts is the identification of so many with Charlie Hebdo…”
Probably about as many as identify with Larry Flynt.
Moso, +100. Hope you enjoy Blowing Smoke. Either way, highest regards.
Interesting thread –
Posts by Chief and Mosomoso that I actually (well, in Chief’s case mostly) agree with.
moso,
mostly very sensible.
We need more of it, and less of the kind of sensationalist nonsense that this pot is.
Question for Judith Curry;
Is there anything to say about Mann vs Steyn, that couldn’t be said without reference to Charlie Hebdo?
+1 Mosomoso
I don’t agree with Joshua or Michael at all. They don’t appreciate that threats to free speech derive from encroachment on the civil space from government and are seemingly always in favour of more encroachment.
Mosomoso above says: ” … those people (Charlie H) were taking an almighty risk that I would never have taken”
You say: ” …threats to free speech derive from encroachment on the civil space from government”
It’s both of these things. Co-ordinated madmen (random or not) are rightly perceived by Govt to constitute a threat to the public, so one of Govt’s misplaced responses is to curtail civil liberties (eg. Section 18C) to reduce opportunities for the random madmen to find cause – a diminishing return, since in extremis we finish with no liberties to defend and fanatics will always find cause somewhere anyway
I have free speech and I’m aware of reckless consequences. Nothing more is required, especially social engineering from either progressives or mad jihadis
End of (my) story
Section 18c of the racial Discrimination Act make it an offence to be offensive about anyone – The Prophet included. They could be prosecuted in Australia rather than shot.
But by all means – if you really want to be offensive about The Prophet – take your best shot and your licks. I’ll support your right to be offensive.
The thrust seems to be that being offended is a justification for violence.
It’s here in satirical cartoons, it’s there in Cairo and Benghazi from videotapes.
That elevator must’ve gone swooooosh up somewhere.
================
mosomoso: I am not Charlie. I am not Steyn. I’m me.
Sooner or later, the extremists will force you to decide whom you stand with. Will you stand with the people who support killing Charlie Hebdo (so to speak), or will you stand with the people who support arresting the killers (or killing them if they resist arrest)? This weekend, many people have sided with the killers of Charlie Hebdo, and many have sided with the police who went after them. When Charlie Hebdo resurrects, so to speak, new assassins will go after them — will you side with the assassins (as a few hundred million people seem to in this case), or with the forces trying to prevent the assassinations and arrest the assassins?
There are times in life when you can elaborate your thoughts ad libitum, but the alternatives forced upon you by the world are painfully simple. I think that this is one of those times.
The Steyn and Charlie Hebdo differ in part because no one is attempting to assassinate Steyn. So the choice of sides is more refined. But there are people attempting to assassinate those who criticize Islam, particular Islamic practices, or Islamic leaders. No matter who you are or are not, you will be forced to choose.
Will you buy a copy of The Satanic Verses? It was no great risk, but I did buy a copy for no other reason than the fatwa against the author, translators and publishers. When I can, I’ll purchase some copies of Charlie Hebdo that are especially critical of Islam. Without strong resistance, the zealots will eventually kill all critics, and all criticism.
Matthew, mosomoso can speak for himself (and does so very well), I’ll say that he is an independent and very sensible thinker. I’m sure that he would never condone the attack on Charlie Hebdo, or the motivation behind it, and believe he would condemn them, but will he ever feel “forced” to choose? I suspect not.
Matthew, I find Charlie Hebdo and The Satanic Verses unreadable. On the other hand, I like Max Brenner chocolate so I’m happy to push past tosser leftoid picketers to support that business.
On the other hand, if it becomes legal for citizens to push the button to execute cold blooded assassins I will not hesitate to push if asked. No charge for zapping convicted terrorists.
Nothing – absolutely nothing! – I wrote implied sympathy with the killers or lack of support for those charged with apprehending them. I’m actually tempted to use that hideously patronising expression of some denizens: “read harder”.
But, no, I am not Charlie, and if you check the sorry record, many who claim to be are not.
http://blogs.news.com.au/heraldsun/andrewbolt/index.php/heraldsun/comments/no_you_are_not_all_charlie/
Why can’t someone be against religious pornography that Charlie whatever published, against assassination in response, and for hunting down the killers and bringing them to justice?
Two wrongs don’t make a right.
mosomoso: I wrote implied sympathy with the killers or lack of support for those charged with apprehending them.
I didn’t say you sympathized with anything. “Read harder”: I wrote that (imo) you (and I and everyone) will have to choose whom to stand with. I think that your (and my) freedom to have an independent mind will depend on the Charlie Hebdo assassins and their allies (9/11 bombers, Madrid bombers, London bombers, Jakarta bombers, Boko Harum, etc, etc) being defeated.
Faustino: . I’m sure that he would never condone the attack on Charlie Hebdo, or the motivation behind it, and believe he would condemn them, but will he ever feel “forced” to choose? I suspect not.
I didn’t write that he condoned the attack.
You “suspect” not. Is “suspicion” an adequate state of mind here? For now, probably. But I expect the violent Islamists to force the issue (as the violent KKK did in parts of the US in times past — and there are many examples from many places and times.)
George Orwell wrote, with reference to the Nazis, that “[Objectively, pacifism supports the Nazis.]”
Matthew, I in no way implied that you wrote that mosomoso “condoned the attack.” You said that he would be “forced to decide” whom he stood with. I was confident that moso would be against the attack, hence my statement; I didn’t think, from what I know of him, that he would ever feel “forced” to choose. But I don’t know that; hence “I suspect not.” That related to mosmoso, it had no implication as to whether or not the jihadists would, as you expect, “force the issue.” My view is that they probably will, given their raison d’etre and modus operandi (multilingual? Moi?!), but I was addressing only your comments on moso.
Matthew, I am not going to say “read harder.” I value your contributions and responses on CE. I thought that my post was clear; you have read into it things that were neither present nor implied. So it goes, historically – probably less now – I expressed myself very precisely, but was often misinterpreted. “Only connect.” Well, sometimes, unfortunately, we don’t.
I agree with Orwell, the O’Neill links I gave supported that view.
Asking me, even rhetorically, if I will side with the assassins (“will you side with the assassins”) is implying plenty, don’t you think?
Fortunately, I don’t have to decide whom I stand with. I stand for ruthless pursuit, prosecution and execution of terrorists. And I don’t even care if they have a point of view. I don’t care what Duke Godfrey or Bohemond did to their forebears. Once they start shooting up a Sydney cafe visited by Squiggle, my three year old grand nephew who likes his posh chocolate, they’re only good for execution. I don’t want disrespect, humiliation or pain for these people. I want their death, that’s all.
Being from Australia, where lame satirists are government funded, I am heartily sick of man-boys and man-boy humour. Here our man-boys would not dare offend Muslims or anybody who might hurt them back, so I admire the courage of Charlie Hebdo. But do I identify with either Charlie’s outlook or its courage? I don’t want to agree with its outlook and I can’t pretend to share its courage.
Buying a copy of Satanic Verses or Charlie Hebdo requires no courage at all. (Reading them requires a very high threshold of boredom.) Openly keeping premises where such publications are produced, displayed or sold requires great courage. It requires more courage than I have or would want to have, since Rushdie and Charbonnier do not speak for me. I speak for me.
In short, I don’t want to buy or read Charlie Hebdo or the Satanic Verses. I DO want to read of the death or life-long imprisonment of the loops who murdered at Charlie Hebdo.
mosomoso: Fortunately, I don’t have to decide whom I stand with.
mrm: Sooner or later, the extremists will force you to decide whom you stand with.
Not yet.
I grant that buying the Satanic Verses did not amount to much. The only thing in its defense was that it was better than doing nothing. As to Satanic Verses being boring or unreadable, that was never the issue. Literary reviews made me think that I would not like it, and I have not read it.
*MORE* SCIENCE-RESPECTING COMICS !!!
Thomas Midgley, Jr:
The Most Evil Scientist in History
http://www.qwantz.com/comics/comic2-2771.png
“Let’s say you want to raise sea-levels …”
http://wac.450f.edgecastcdn.net/80450F/comicsalliance.com/files/2013/09/North01.jpg
Good on `yah, science-respecting cartoonist Ryan North!
morediscourse@tradermail.info
A fan of *MORE* discourse
Let me try out Judith’s rhetorical device.
Gee. That reminds me of the climate wars, and what “skeptics” have to say.
Oh, the tyranny.
How’d I do?
To answer your self serving question, quite well at proving your utter irrelevense other than as some echo in this chamber.
Otherwise, not so good at all.
Interesting you had the huge ego to even ask. Wow.
Joshua | January 11, 2015 at 7:45 pm | Reply
“How’d I do?”
If you were trying to portray a drooling retard with web access then you did great!
The Stepford students thing is interesting. It is a sign of a stable culture that people can disconnect themselves from politics and world affairs so much and wrap themselves in a fuzzy warm blanket of American entertainment and culture. The outside world has no effect on the average young person going through high school and college. Occasionally celebs, who are generally better informed by their own travels, will try to raise an issue in world affairs such as global warming, but that doesn’t seem to inspire many. The American public is very isolationist in attitude, even if their leaders aren’t, and I think that is because their life is not impacted by things beyond the borders. Even when we had two wars in the last decade few would say it had a noticeable effect on their lives. Foreign countries are good for little more than the tourism form of entertainment.
“Celebs, who are generally better informed by their own travels…” Good one.
Spare us the celebrities are better informed. Have any of them ever had an original thought in their lives? They come from the same incubator as the leftists in the cloistered echo chambers of academe. They deserve each other.
Those speculating about the impact of unrestricted Muslim immigration on countries idiotic enough to not only allow it, but encourage it, may find this short story by Dan Simmons interesting:
http://www.dansimmons.com/news/message/2006_04.htm
Free speech doesn’t mean free of risk. Freedom carries a price.
Governments routinely make pornography, snuff films, and so forth illegal in public. This was aboout decision of what to allow, individuals who wanted to push the envelope of decency by publishing things that were as deeply offensive as anything imaginable to certain cultures, and they paid a price for it.
From the article:
…
The Center for Security Policy’s report, Shariah Law and American State Courts: An Assessment of State Appellate Court Cases evaluates 50 Appellate Court cases from 23 states that involve conflicts between Shariah (Islamic law) and American state law.
These cases are the stories of Muslim American families, mostly Muslim women and children, who were asking American courts to preserve their rights to equal protection and due process. These families came to America for freedom from the discriminatory and cruel laws of Shariah. When our courts then apply Shariah law in the lives of these families, and deny them equal protection, they are betraying the principles on which America was founded.
…
http://shariahinamericancourts.com/
Current college and university faculty brainwash their students because they have been brain washed themselves. The greatest coup of 60s radicals, when they discovered they were never going to get their Marxist proletarian revolution, was to move into and take control of the educational colleges of this country. (There was a similar move by secular humanists to take control of Catholic seminaries around the same time – see the book Goodbye Good Men.)
Forget the 95% rate by which black Americans vote for the Democrat Party. I suspect that Ph.Ds in education vote for them 100%.
What do you get when all your professors are progressives, and are taught that every subject from philosophy to earth science should be taught from a progressive stand point? Today’s crop of budding fascists on college campuses across the country.
Yeah! And Albert Einstein was among the earliest and worst of the liberal-lot!
http://www.lamarihuana.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/05/Albert-Einstein-2.jpg
That’s obvious to *EVERYONE*, eh GaryM?
Fan,
While am I not surprised that you have fascist demagoguery ready to hand?
And as an economist, Einstein made a great physicist.
That sounds a bit alarmist there, Gary?
–Joseph | January 12, 2015 at 10:08 pm | Reply
Current college and university faculty brainwash their students because they have been brain washed themselves.
That sounds a bit alarmist there, Gary?–
“Total taxpayer investment in K-12 education in the United States for the 2004-05 school year is estimated to be $536 billion. [ * ]
Even in this current time of the war against terror, taxpayer investment in education exceeds that for national defense. In addition to the K-12 money mentioned above, taxpayers will spend an estimated $373 billion for higher education in the same school year. As depicted on the chart below, the United States is a world leader in education investment. However, nations that spend far less achieve higher levels of student performance.”
http://www2.ed.gov/about/overview/fed/10facts/index.html?exp
“In December 2012, the International Association for the Evaluation of Educational Achievement (IEA) released national average results from the 2011 administration of the Trends in International Mathematics and Science Study (TIMSS). U.S. Secretary of Education Arne Duncan promptly issued a press release calling the results “unacceptable,” saying that they “underscore the urgency of accelerating achievement in secondary school and the need to close large and persistent achievement gaps,” and calling particular attention to the fact that the 8th-grade scores in mathematics for U.S. students failed to improve since the previous administration of the TIMSS.”
http://www.epi.org/publication/us-student-performance-testing/
It seems to me if in general, there less effort in brainwashing and more effort in teaching, the students would do better- and they might enjoy it more.
I don’t see what any of that has to do with “brainwashing.”
Do you know why you don’t see elephants in a cherry tree?
Do you know what “brainwashing” entails? Does school really sound like this?
And one of the problems often heard is that discipline problems have gotten worse in some schools. Sounds like the opposite of “brainwashing”
The Early Bird has found the worm among the cherry saplings thriving from the elephant dung.
invisibleserfscollar.com
===============
Elephants don’t like cherries.
Sarah steps in:
http://dailycurrant.com/2015/01/09/sarah-palin-why-do-muslims-hate-charlie-brown/
Gee – I didn’t realise that Sarah Palin was dumber than wee willie.
She’s not.
Yep, it’s satire.
About
The Daily Currant is an English language online satirical newspaper that covers global politics, business, technology, entertainment, science, health and media. It is accessible from over 190 countries worldwide – now including South Sudan.
.> Yep, it’s satire.
No rapists have been abused in the making of it.
Willard –
That kind of ridiculing of Palin is totally unacceptable. I can’t believe that you’d promote something like that. It’s a slur against Palin – obviously something you support because you are a statist, fanatitcal, aulthoritarian who’s indifferent to starving children in Africa. There really should be serious consequences for people like you who smear a good woman like Pal…
Oh.
Wait.
Nevermind.
Willard better watch out for Christians bearing arms. Oh, wait, …
So Joshua is smarter than Sarah Palin too? Never would of picked that.
I detect a note of satire in your writing.
Their toes are painted red.
Purple-fingered majesty
Above the Meso Potami.
==============
Thank you, Professor Curry, for having the courage to comment on the link between the integrity of government science and the constitutional limits on governments.
The destruction of constitutional limits on government is a far more serious problem for society today than any anthropologic changes in global climate.
Re: The term “denier”
I believe people should have the legal First Amendment right to call others deniers in non-holocaust situations (where I believe the term is most appropriately used). However, I believe they should forego the use of that right (just as you should forego using many legal rights you have in particular circumstances) out of respect for the Jewish experience and the currency the term “denier” has obtained with respect to Holocaust Deniers. Based on the past 80 years of history, I believe the term “denier” should be reserved for special condemnation of Holocaust Deniers.
If, however, Jews don’t insist on preserving the use of the term in connection with Holocaust Denial and term comes into general usage as meaning, essentially illogical, in the terms of the people using the term to attack the scientific positions of others, then I am more than willing to use the term to criticize dummies, such as Michael Mann and Peter Gleick. Once the term comes into common usage, it loses the hateful connotations that are intended by AGW extremists, and they will have to invent a new term to heap undeserved opprobrium on others and to excuse their lack of rigorous thought.
So far, I have avoided using the term, but if warmists continue to use it without much push back, then it is appropriate for everyone to use the term to criticize unscientific thoughts and methods.
JD
There is a point being missed in all this tribal chest thumping. Police and armies are paid to hunt down and kill if necessary fringe madman. That’s part of what makes police and armies such critical components of the architecture of freedom and democracy.
These madmen can’t take our freedoms unless we allow them too. It demands a more robust response than whining about these awful people restricting our freedom to make offensive jokes about The Prophet.
We could try the same with Mann’s lawyers – but I suspect that way lies social madness. Imagine a world without lawyers.
I am going to pull a Willis here…I love you Judith, but this is indefensible foolishness:
“Anyone defending the satirists at Charlie should have a tough time defending Michael Mann in his legal war against the satirical writings of Mark Steyn and Rand Simberg.”
First, I don’t recall that satire is a defense that Steyn, Simberg et al have made in the silly D.C. courts. If it is, it remains to be seen if it will have any effect on the outcome.
Second, the case is still alive in the courts and as long as it is being adjudicated Mann’s supporters have good reason to stand by their little man. It is silly of you to suggest that they face some kind of conflict in sympathizing with Mann, while condemning the Paris murders and voicing support for free speech. Follow me, so far? What you appear to be trying to do is to put Mann’s supporters in some flimsily constructed ethical box that requires them to abandon Mann, if they support free speech for Charlie et al. You are confused. There’s more, but that should do it.
The sensible thing for you to do is re-examine your words and decide if you want to keep going with that nonsense.
Wow!
+1, Don.
I know that coming from a runttrolldope that should have been bannedlong ago, that is less than irrelevant to you, but I just had to say it.
No doubt.
The Greatest (Climate Etc. thread) of all time:
Don suffers from motivated reasoning, no way could he criticize judith
Sorry Don, your argument makes no sense. The usual suspects are up in arms on twitter, i have responded:
Oh I see; religious satire is ok, but satire on climate scientists is not?
Don’t be so cryptic, Judith.
Explain why Don’s argument “makes no sense.”
Brandon, in particular I’m sure, will enjoy it.
You are in denial, Judith. Do you know how long the alleged Prophet whose name we won’t mention has been dead? He can’t be defamed. There is no lawsuit that has survived the first level of the silly D.C courts. There is no similarity between the Mann vs. Steyn, Symberg et al case and the murderous reaction of religious fanatics to some really juvenile cartoons.
If you see some significant similarities, please list them. Oh, it’s about free speech. If you support expression by juvenile cartoons about somebody who has been dead for 1000+ years, then you have to support Steyn et al against Mann’s lawsuit. You can’t ethically hold the opinion that Mann has been defamed and call yourself a supporter of free speech. Dems da rules.
Now let’s see how stubborn you are going to be with this foolishness.
I don’t hold the opinion that Mann has been defamed, I thought I made that very clear through about half dozen posts on this topic.
Don,
You are sadly mistaken here, which is uncommon for you. Think this through a bit; the common thread is people who refuse to accept the freedom to express what you honestly believe.
“Oh, it’s about free speech. If you support expression by juvenile cartoons about somebody who has been dead for 1000+ years, then you have to support Steyn et al against Mann’s lawsuit. You can’t ethically hold the opinion that Mann has been defamed and call yourself a supporter of free speech. Dems da rules.”
Judith, that’s me playing your part in the discussion. Since you won’t give a detailed response, I thought I could help you.
Steve, that’s a thin thread. There is no good reason to link the Mann defamation case to the carnage in Paris and the rallying around by just about everybody to support free speech. Everybody understands that means free speech with limits. Defamation is a limit. Mann sued. It’s his right. In may countries saying that it’s your opinion that there was no Holocaust, or that it wasn’t that bad, is illegal speech. Try publishing a satirical cartoon about it. Taking the opportunity to link theis with the Mann case is unseemly. Period.
Judith,
Don (!) makes a perfectly reasonable, quite simple and logical critique.
That you find it “makes no sense” suggests you are so lost in your petty squabble with Mann that you can no longer see straight.
Don,
Not a thin thread, more like a thick rope. It is ONLY ‘offensive’ speech that needs protection, not ‘sensitive’, ‘caring’, or conformist speech. Yes, there are indeed lots of places where speech is much less than free, including much of Europe, with their nutso laws about what you can and can’t say about the Holocaust. And US university campuses are close behind with certain speech officially prohibited. I object to those laws and prohibitions as well, odious as some of that speech may be. As I said before, it is uncommon for you to be so very wrong about something so important. I suggest that you think this through again.
Don is right. When you argue that defamation is protected by free speech, you are saying anyone can just make up any lie about you, including allegations of deliberate fraud, and put it out in public with impunity. What kind of world is that? Thankfully the civilized world does not protect that. Mann is allowed to sue to officially counter the allegations and get the result on record. That is his right. Many publications have been sued for false accusations to get retractions, and this is another such case.
Steve, the Mann case is about one citizen suing another citizen for alleged defamation. It happens every day. Defamation is not protected speech around here. The U.S legal system will decide if there is defamation in the Mann case. I don’t see any reason to mention Mann-Steyn in the same sentence with the massacre in Paris. Different story. Simple as that. Judith has just given her trolls some live ammunition. She should cut her losses.
> That you find it “makes no sense” suggests you are so lost in your petty squabble with Mann that you can no longer see straight.
Alternatively, that there’s a Chewbacca awaiting to roar in everyone of us.
> Steve, the Mann case is about one citizen suing another citizen for alleged defamation. It happens every day
Don Don, #JeSuisCharlie is about ten cartoonists and two policemen getting killed. It happens every day.
Don’t you see the obvious parallel?
Maybe looking at this through the other end of the telescope will help some of you see the light: Boy, this latest school massacre will really put those second amendment supporters in an ethical bind.
Willard,
That makes no sense.
It makes perfect sense. There’s really no comparison between Islamic radicals assassinating those who blaspheme their religion and Michael Mann using legal recourse against those who blaspheme his religion.
Don,
I think the Mann case is a SLAPP, and at some point in the process I expect a court will agree. Mann is no private citizen who was defamed, he is a public advocate for a political POV, and regularly writes very dubious things about people who he disagrees with politically.
I think you are misreading me, Steve. I am not on Mann’s side. I think he’s a creepy little crybaby. I said he is a citizen. I didn’t say he is a private citizen. Public figures are not fair game for defamation target practice. They file defamation lawsuits and win. The suit in the silly
D.C. court should have been slapped out. Like you I expect it to die when saner judges look at it.
Now I am still waiting for someone to tell me how the Mann case is similar to the Paris massacre. If you believe that the Mann case is a loser, then how is it a threat to free speech in the Western democracies? It may be a threat to free speech in the silly District of Columbia, but that’s it. End of story.
Meanwhile, Judith just digs herself in deeper. This silly post has not resulted in a useful discussion on free speech. It has just given the trolls a good excuse to run amok.
Nope, Don, you’re missing a boat here. There is a two-pronged, but unco-ordinated attack on the enlightenment, religiously from militant Islam, and scientifically, from the alarmist establishment, read Green Blob.
It is a fanatic and panicked attack and cannot carry the middle. I’m waiting for them to find cause to attack each other.
==============
Remarkably, both prongs marshall many more forces than merely religion or science.
================
OK, kim. Don’t let them get you. Those prongs can leave a mark.
Settle that souffle.
=============
–First, I don’t recall that satire is a defense that Steyn, Simberg et al have made in the silly D.C. courts. If it is, it remains to be seen if it will have any effect on the outcome. —
No the defense is free speech.
If calls Jon Steward a satirists, then could call Steyn a satirist. But would say Mark Steyn seems to love the absurd and there is a lot absurd stuff to talk about. But Rand Simberg is mostly space policy expert.
But there no defense specifially for satire. Though both obviously thought Mann was fool and idiot.
gbailke, so free speech is the foolproof defense for defamation. Or is it satire? Don’t ever represent yourself in court. Spring for a lawyer.
–gbaikie, so free speech is the foolproof defense for defamation. Or is it satire? —
There are no foolproof defense for defamation, due to the fact there is no shortage of incompetent judges.
But did numerous media organizations made the case in court that is was a matter of free speech?
Yes.
As for satire?
Is Mann living embodiment of a satire of science?
Yes.
“Don’t ever represent yourself in court. Spring for a lawyer.”
Obviously.
But thanks for your advice.
In cases involving public figures, the defendants can only be liable if their negative statements are verifiable facts. If their statements are matters of pure opinion the defendants cannot be held liable under Milkovich. Please listen to the oral arguments that are posted on Steve McIntyre’s ‘s site. To the extent that satire is part of an opinion, satire is a defense to a defamation action involving a public figure.
JD
Satire is a defense, but I get the impression that some of these people think you can run around defaming people and then claim you were just kidding.
Too many of us are affected by an enveloping issue to the free speech one.
Sometimes satire isn’t meant to be funny, Don, and sometimes it’s the dead on truth. Shall we ask Jim Bouldin about Michael Mann?
========================
Steyn, had an article in May where he doubles down using the title: “Michael E Mann: L!ar, Cheat, Falsifier and Fr@ud”. Is this satire or an accusation? Would a reasonable person say he is just name-calling for the sake of kidding around, or is it his genuine belief and defamation?
I know you know what satire is, kim.
Heh, principle and execution both regularly fail me.
============
@ gbaikie: Steyn is a polemicist who uses satirical techniques. As such he’s more than a satirist. He’s a serious opinion writer who revels in hyperbolic statements to drive home his points. He’s defending the freedom to express opinions, which is the essence of freedom of speech. Expressing opinions with salty language is how he makes his living. Mann has attacked his right to practice his craft as he sees fit.
Mann has enraged Steyn by attacking his livelihood. I don’t think this will end well for him.
@Don Monfort who wrote: “Satire is a defense, but I get the impression that some of these people think you can run around defaming people and then claim you were just kidding.
Under defamation law, a claim must be false to be defamation. Has it never occurred to you that what Steyn said about Mann could be true? That he really is a bad guy? That taking down bad guys who are public figures is Steyn’s job? That even if what he said is not entirely true that he shouldn’t have to pay hundreds of thousands of dollars in legal and lawyer fees? What was he supposed to do if he truly believed in what he said? Suppress it for fear of a lawsuit by Michael Mann?
” . . . If you believe that the Mann case is a loser, then how is it a threat to free speech in the Western democracies? It may be a threat to free speech in the silly District of Columbia, but that’s it. End of story.”
Why do you think the anti-SLAPP laws were written in several states and DC? Because this kind of lawsuit has become a commonplace tactic by which public figure can punish people who disagree with them by miring them down in the mud of the judicial system for years. As Steyn said, the process is the punishment. The “silly” District of Columbia is the capital of the world’s greatest nation at the moment. That’s why it was a chosen as the venue for this suit by Mann. He wanted high profile and he got it by suing one of the more respected conservative magazines in the country.
I’m sure that you are full of yourself, Don.
I support free speech. I oppose all censors. I abhor the killings. I mourn the dead.
It is not enough to abhor the killings. The killers must be prosecuted and future killings prevented. Otherwise, the killers continue to censor speech. It isn’t just the killers of free speech, but arrest, jailing, and fining that must be actively resisted. Otherwise we end up back with the Sedition Acts, where all “opposing” speech is considered “offensive” or “seditious”. If we allow the Muslims to decide what speech and print is prohibited because it is “offensive”, then we have to do the same for all groups that feel offended, or else grant Islam special privileges because some Muslims are willing to kill to suppress the expressions that they find offensive.
University presses have declined to publish scholarly works critical of Islam or some Muslims, in response to the threats. In no time someone is likely to be killed for carrying The Divine Comedy, as people have been killed for trying to publish, translate or distribute The Satanic Verses. The idea that you can’t publish what some people deem offensive, merely because they are offended by it, will eventually (if implemented formally or informally) exempt powerful, murderous people from all criticism.
+100 MRM.
Matthew R Marler and Jim2, you good-`ol-boys are both invited to verify that Cambridge University Press alone publishes a catalog of more than one hundred books on the topic of terror, plenty of which are explicitly critical of Islamic fundamentalist violence.
http://assets.cambridge.org/97805216/83791/cover/9780521683791.jpg
http://assets.cambridge.org/97805211/32619/cover/9780521132619.jpg
Seriously, do you guys read much?
Conclusion Some folks prefer discourse no deeper than “After we kill all the bad guys, peace will arrive.” But academic presses have no duty to embrace willful ignorance.
a fan of *MORE* discourse: Matthew R Marler and Jim2, you good-`ol-boys are both invited to verify that Cambridge University Press alone publishes a catalog of more than one hundred books on the topic of terror, plenty of which are explicitly critical of Islamic fundamentalist violence.
“Team America” was produced by a couple of episodes of South Park were suppressed. Not everything has been suppressed yet in consequence of the fatwa against Rushdie and publishers. The question to which we must be alert is whether more and more stuff is suppressed as time is going by.
Is “good-‘ol-boy” one of those liberal “dog whistles”, a pejorative dismissal of a large class of people?
I´m all for free speech. However, there´s a lot of censorship and/or suppression of information going on in Europe and the USA. Some of it is carried out by the government. Some of it is accomplished by ruining careers and ensuring that those with the “wrong” point of view don´t reach a wide public. I can see how it works very clearly because I float back and forth from country to country. Each of them has taboo areas, some of them are enforced more than others.
First they came for the Socialists, and I did not speak out—
Because I was not a Socialist.
Then they came for the Trade Unionists, and I did not speak out—
Because I was not a Trade Unionist.
Then they came for the Jews, and I did not speak out—
Because I was not a Jew.
Then they came for me—and there was no one left to speak for me.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/First_they_came_…
This is actually revisionist in that the Nahtzee’s were the socialists and the first group they trashed were the communists.
Thank you Judith for allowing Michael, Joshua et al the freedom to express their views thus eloquently exposing their hypocrisy in not allowing Steyn any freedom of speech.
Not that we have freedom of speech on any level unless we are not personally threatened by it.
If we insult people, even those who beg to be insulted, we can expect flak.
Cartoons attacking Canadians, Tasmanians, French, Muslims, Women and the Irish to mention a few do not happen if the majority of the audience are those people.
The message here was sadly never one about freedom of speech, it was about instilling an us and them mentality. It was a rallying call to identity to infuse the people back home of the horrors of the western states that go around murdering innocent little terrorists. It will succeed of course but at horrific cost to those involved.
Charlie is a politiical problem, Climate is a scientific problem that has been made a political problem by Al Gore, and others.. Both use free speech as a modus opwrandi. Centuries ago Protestants killed Catholics: depressing ly similar. Why is religion so impottant that we will kill for it?
Alexander, it is ego, attachment, craving and aversion that are, unfortunately, too often important. The external factor, such as religious differences, is always secondary.
Can’t say I agree. Muslims are offered a far better place in heaven than Christians, so the hereafter is not a level playing field. Christians don’t offer promises so Muslims probably gain here on credibility.
Just to clarify the limits on Free Speech; if I notice a fire in a trashcan at a theater I’m breaking the law by yelling “Fire?” Inane? Probably, but after skimming a bunch of the contentious comments in this thread I was thinking there must be a bunch of dyspeptic Cowboys fans here getting some cheap therapy. As a 49er Faithful, Schadenfreude bathes my soul.
By the way as I’m typing this a “Southpark” episode that has Satan and Saddam Hussein as homosexual lovers is droning in the background. I’m not sure I’d give up my life to protect their right to put that on, but I will try to buy whatever junk they are pushing during the commercials as a sign of my solidarity.
Oh dear what a schmozzle !
First off I would like to thank all the closeted bigots for coming out and showing their true colors…I now know who to ignore.
Lots of tone trolling going on here…quite pathetic from a good proportion of you and disappointing to say the least.
Carnage ? Really ? 12 people dead ain’t a carnage folks. We had a blond caucasian in my country slaughter 35 people…funny I can’t recall anyone asking for the expulsion of Caucasian blonds. Another blond Caucasian upped the ante when he took the lives of 77 innocents and he was a christian ! The Danes did not have to apologize for his actions and neither should all muslims be held accountable for what a few misguided youth did in France. The generalizations being drawn here by a few bigots is totally ludicrous.
So the US and their allies have spent the last 20 odd years bombing the crap out of the middle east. In the process they have destroyed several countries along the way and killed hundreds of thousands of innocent people. The region is now in total chaos and resembles what I describe as a Mad Max situation ( after the Mel Gibson early road warrior classics…called something else in the US)The Allies tortured their prisoners with impunity and time and time and time again broke the Geneva conventions. And you wonder why some hot headed and misguided Muslim youths want to strike back…Really?
So the answer from the bigots is to hit back, indiscriminately and hard…jeez we even had one clown here advocate killing hundreds of thousands in retaliation. Well I have news for you Mr Bigot…that will work like it worked to bring the Israelis and Palestinians together in peace and harmony.
And please no more “war on terror” How can you fight a word? One mans terrorist is another’s freedom fighter.
Anyway back to lurking
Anyway 2016 will mark the dawning of the new world…in that year China will surpass the US in having the worlds largest economy. The modern Chinese have learnt that money, not bullets wins the hearts and minds of the people. Sadly my estimation of humans leads me to the conclusion that eventually the rule of brute force will return.
If you could see that almost every point you made is either flawed or wrong your outlook would probably change.
Good point on the bombing. You are off the mark comparing a lone psychopath with a coordinated attempt to undo the enlightenment. This denial, common in Europe, will be your undoing. Have you heard of Ayan Hirsi Ali?
I fail to see the connection between radical islamists bombing children in Nigeria with the events in the middle east.
Western values have been nurtured over centuries, millions have fought and died for them, and they have illuminated the path to civilization for mankind. So, if I desire to preserve those values, I’m a bigot? What an ass.
oops :)
very good idea, better remove this site from your bookmarks. Other sites might be better suited to your utter tosh.
Ah, how precious, you’ve discovered exceptionalism.
=============
Bonjour! Please post a Charlie cartoon that you don’t “get” and we can attempt to clarify the cartoon.
The Charlie Hebdo murders were an act of terrorism, NOT a matter of free speech. Free speech is threatened by Governments or “authorities” who prohibit publishing something. This was not the case here. The French government didn’t prohibit anything (unlike US Universities who have “speech codes”).
This was a pure, horrendous, act of terrorism, unrelated at all to the issue of free speech. The exact grievances that the terrorist claim are irrelevant.
Don’t forget, Jacob, that France doesn’t even have a First amendment.
Which means it’s not unlike all the other progressive, fascist states in the history of mankind.
Semaine des faires, les journaux ware.
===========================
Jacob,
You are mostly correct. However, PC in France, and hate speech laws in particular, have silenced discussion of a problem long in the making, and thus have crippled any attempts to solve the problem.
The limits on freedom of speech just don’t work. Inevitably any rules or precedents you establish become the base for other groups to build further rules to shield themselves from. Protect believers of Islam because they are a minority today? Prepare tomorrow for fruit juice drinking cults to pull the oppressed minority card tomorrow. From there the mission creeps and eventually you can’t criticize anyone any more.
To build on Voltaire: I may not agree with what you have to say, but I’ll defend to the death your right to say it. Not because I agree with what you have to say, but because tomorrow I might need to say something and if you can’t speak today I can’t be surprised if tomorrow I can’t either.
We make analogies between two cases that have similarities and differences to see how the comparison might provide illumination. With no differences there is no chance for illumination, too strong a difference and the comparison is not helpful.
To me the issue making the Charlie Hebdo murders unsuitable for such comparisons is that it involved irrevocable, harsh and cruel vigilante justice. In various cases there may or may not be remedies for satire that is slanderous, but in the Charlie Hebdo case the resolution process was bypassed by those who would impose their special judgment.
Free people everywhere need to stand up to those who would bypass social contracts to impose their specific will on a people. Such actions should not result in any gains for those who employee such means and consequently we should minimize any resultant harms to the victims. Terrorist vigilante justice should not serve as a springboard for any criticism or adverse reflection on the actions of the victim. If Charlie Hebdo deserves criticism and curtailment that should only be done in a forum far away and removed from the triggering action of vigilante justice. That is a fruit of a poisonous tree. Any response to curtail speech through vigilante justice should be met with the threat and understanding that society will respond to such actions by providing more speech of that sort in a non-judgmental presentation. That’s our best hope to avoid such actions. Having a dialogues that “picks” at the satire accomplishes at least some of the goals of the terrorists.
This shows a less than perfect understanding of Muslim culture. As sturdyblog point out, there appears to have been a Death Fatwa against Stéphane Charbonnier. By Muslim standards, this may well have as much legality as the local non-Muslim justice. Indeed, AFAIK this would depend on how Sharia is interpreted.
The problem here is the “clash of cultures” between Muslim/green/PC ideals and the ideal of “free speech”. Certainly there have been climate alarmists who incited against “deniers”, a comparison of such incitement with fatwas against “blasphemers” is certainly in order.
AK – Sincere thanks for the gentle rebuke. It’s kind, as in fact I’m sure I fall well below just having ” a perfect understanding of Muslim culture”. I can certainly agree that from the perpetrators perspective (as with any perpetrator who answer to a higher call) it’s not vigilantism. But for the rest of us I’d think we give precedence to French law in France.
For the bigger picture I can better see the value of a Clash of Cultures” analogy. I was unclear in the above that I was referring to the comparison between the shootings and the Mann-Steyn conflict.
In regard to “clash of cultures”, the ideal (as it seems to FOMD) is the declaration by the families of the Charlie Hebdo murderers *and* their victims:
In regard to free speech in the context of scientific values, the ideal (as it seems to FOMD) is the traditionalist view of Pascal Diethelm and Martin McKee’s “Denialism: what is it and how should scientists respond?” (2009)
Conclusion 1 The rejection of terror does *NOT* require a blanket rejection of Islam.
Conclusion 2 The embrace of free speech does *NOT* require the embrace of denialism’s willful ignorance.
These common-sense conclusions are evident to almost EVERYONE, eh Climate Etc readers?
Fan
I support your right to deny the truth about the science of AGW and to continue to believe it is a dire problem requiring the immediate implementation of economically inefficient actions.
The GWPF has just sent out an email with similar themes:
Charlie Hebdo, Climate Scepticism & Free Speech
Climate Extremism & The Chilling Effect On Free Speech
Here is one excerpt:
The message is clear: climate change deniers are scum. Their words are so wicked and dangerous that they must be silenced, or criminalised, or forced beyond the pale alongside those other crackpots who claim there was no Nazi Holocaust against the Jews. Perhaps climate change deniers should even be killed off, hanged like those evil men who were tried Nuremberg-style the first time around. Whatever the truth about our warming planet, it is clear there is a tidal wave of intolerance in the debate about climate change which is eroding free speech and melting rational debate. –Brendan O’Neill, Spiked, 6 October 2006
http://www.spiked-online.com/newsite/article/1782#.VLPek0uUeKB
Note, Spiked is a staunch defender of free speech
Judith, please let me join with you and the GWPF in praising open discourse in climate-science.
In the wake of the Charlie Hebdo attacks, the graceful peaceful global science-respecting and eminently rational discourse of Naomi Oreskes’ lecture “Scientific consensus and the role and character of scientific dissent“ looks pretty good, eh Climate Etc readers?
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bXS6X3P0sVU&t=8h7m10s
We can look for further good works in 2015:
Good on `yah Naomi Oreskes, as a scientist reaching out to religion!
Good on `yah, Pope Francis, as a religious leader reaching out respectfully to science!
And good on `yah *BOTH*, for doing so peacefully, responsibly, foresightedly, and rationally!
“Verification, Validation, and Confirmation of Numerical Models in the Earth Sciences”
Naomi Oreskes, et al
“Verification and validation of numerical models of natural systems is impossible. This is because natural systems are never closed and because model results are always nonunique.
Models can be confirmed by the demonstration of agreement between observation and prediction, but confirmation is inherently partial. Complete confirmation is logically precluded by the fallacy of affirming the consequent and by incomplete access to natural phenomena. Models can only be evaluated in relative terms, and their predictive value is always open to question. The primary value of models is heuristic”
Good on ye, Naomi Oreskes for pointing out that climate models are BS!
Bad on ye for forgetting it and becoming a zealot anyways.
http://courses.washington.edu/ess408/OreskesetalModels.pdf
Wow!
https://www.ted.com/talks/naomi_oreskes_why_we_should_believe_in_science?language=en#t-886084
” So, if even scientists themselves have to make a leap of faith outside their own fields, then why do they accept the claims of other scientists? Why do they believe each other’s claims? And should we believe those claims?”
“So what I’d like to argue is yes, we should, but not for the reason that most of us think. Most of us were taught in school that the reason we should believe in science is because of the scientific method. We were taught that scientists follow a method and that this method guarantees the truth of their claims. The method that most of us were taught in school, we can call it the textbook method, is the hypothetical deductive method. ”
No, dont use the scientific method to judge science, instead:
“If scientists don’t use a single method, then how do they decide what’s right and what’s wrong? And who judges? And the answer is, scientists judge, and they judge by judging evidence. Scientists collect evidence in many different ways, but however they collect it, they have to subject it to scrutiny. And this led the sociologist Robert Merton to focus on this question of how scientists scrutinize data and evidence, and he said they do it in a way he called “organized skepticism.”
consensus
“But this leads us to one final problem: If science is what scientists say it is, then isn’t that just an appeal to authority? And weren’t we all taught in school that the appeal to authority is a logical fallacy? Well, here’s the paradox of modern science, the paradox of the conclusion I think historians and philosophers and sociologists have come to, that actually science is the appeal to authority, but it’s not the authority of the individual, no matter how smart that individual is, like Plato or Socrates or Einstein.”
“We can also think of science as being a kind of a jury”
” It’s a jury of men and women with Ph.D.s,”
” It’s the authority of the collective community”
Naomi is a quack of the highest order. This way of thinking is the crux of the climate lie.
Then you are in fine company Judith.
Weird that they choose to quote a 9 yr old article…oh wait, no it isn’t, they want to use the Charlie Hebdo massacre to push their climate hobby horse too!
Birds of a feather….
Whereas the alarmist/warmist/cultist/fraud/statist/McCarthyist/Lysenkoists?
Why they are really nice people that just happen to want children in Africa to starve.
Let’s see, Judy.
In #1999, we learn that ExxonMobil sent a letter to the Bush Admin in early 2001 urging the dismissal of Bob Watson and Mike MacCracken.
Would you compare this to jihadism or ethnic cleansing?
According to scientists all we need to do is dust off the old water-boards call everyone that uses a cell phone and get to the truth. No body is hurt.
Even more interesting on the GWPF insanity….
The author they quote from 9 years ago, Brendan O’Neill, just wrote about the Charlie Hebdo incident…….bizarrely he doesn’t mention ‘alarmists’ , ‘warmists’, Michael Mann or his supporters, Mark Steyn or AGW.
Isn’t that funny Judith?
What was the purpose of posting this?
As well as the usual suspects like me who are routinely critical of your site there were a number of comments here from your supportive regulars questioning the wisdom of your piece.
It now appears that after reading these and reflecting you have decided that equating your opponents with “racists and anti-semites” was not sufficiently strong, so you need to go the full Godwin and invoke Nazism to achieve the desired effect.
Please prove this perception wrong.
I don’t expect or ask that everyone like what I write. My post has provoked people into thinking about the challenges of free speech in the context of the climate debate, which was the intent of my piece.
My piece was almost 2000 words long. It seems the following 20 words have upset defenders of Michael Mann, a group of people that I am not particularly concerned about upsetting:
“Anyone defending the satirists at Charlie should have a tough time defending Michael Mann in his legal war against the satirical writings of Mark Steyn and Rand Simberg.”
As for pejorative name calling for your opponents:
“In the climate wars, those that use pejorative names for people that they disagree with are the equivalents of racists and anti-semites, and deserve opprobrium and disrespect.”
When person A calls person B a ‘denier’ or any other pejorative word, in my opinion they deserve disrespect, in the context of the broader discussion in my piece.
At the same time, I have staunchly defended the right of people to say disrespectful things.
If I had more time to write this piece, would it have been longer and more nuanced? Yes, but I would not have changed the text that I did write. Have some of the comments here enhanced my thinking on this topic? Yes, some of them. Have your criticisms influenced my thinking? No, they come across as Mannian partisanship rather than dealing with the meta issues of the situation.
I don’t think there’s anything more to say after your last comment Judith.
You’ve used “tyranny” and “suppression” to describe the climate debate, comparing this to 12 gruesome cold blooded murders.
You’ve equated your opponents to “racists and anti semites ”
After challenge even from some of your supporters you’ve now doubled down and appear to be comparing the climate consensus to the Nazis.
All in a post complaining at name calling by others.
It’s incomprehensible to me how someone as thoughtful as you often seem can behave in such a manner.
> I don’t expect or ask that everyone like what I write. My post has provoked people into thinking about the challenges of free speech in the context of the climate debate, which was the intent of my piece.
So the end justifies the means, Judy?
==> “My piece was almost 2000 words long. It seems the following 20 words have upset defenders of Michael Mann, a group of people that I am not particularly concerned about upsetting:”
I am neither a defender of Mann, nor am I “upset.”
I am critiquing your poor argument, and your weak reaction to the criticism, such as “your argument makes no sense” just as I would from Brandon when me makes a similarly poor counter-argument.
==> “In the climate wars, those that use pejorative names for people that they disagree with are the equivalents of racists and anti-semites, and deserve opprobrium and disrespect.””
So when you call someone a “denier,” and when you use other pejoratives, you are the equivalent of racists and anti-semites? What about in the countless threads here and elsewhere in the “skept-o-sphere,” where “skeptics” regularly use pejoratives to describe those they disagree with about climate change. Are they, likewise, the “equivalent of racists and anti-semites?”
==> “When person A calls person B a ‘denier’ or any other pejorative word, in my opinion they deserve disrespect, in the context of the broader discussion in my piece.”
What if person A goes by the name of Judith Curry?
==> “At the same time, I have staunchly defended the right of people to say disrespectful things.”
By accusing them of tyrants? By comparing them to McCarthy? Buy equating them to racists and anti-semites? By comparing your own victimization to that of journalists massacred by jihadists?
So Judith when you call someone “warmist” or “alarmist”, you are “the equivalents of racists and anti-semites”?
Once again, Judith. I am really enjoying your increased participation in these threads.
The more complete explication of your logic and your thinking is really instructive.
Please keep it up.
==> “So Judith when you call someone “warmist” or “alarmist”, you are “the equivalents of racists and anti-semites”?”
Why limit yourself there? How about when she calls people “deniers?”
“Have your criticisms influenced my thinking? No, they come across as Mannian partisanship rather than dealing with the meta issues of the situation.” – Judith
Could anything have been more crassly stupid and partisan than Judith hijacking a terrorist massacre to have a go at Michael Mann and ‘his supporters’.
The “meta issues of the situation” ?
Fark, what a load of self-serving BS.
I am not a defender of Michael Mann. This post has been a disaster. Fodder for the trolls.
This is hilarious.
Judith doing a drive-by on her own blog.
==> “This post has been a disaster. ”
Interesting.
This post has had patterns of discussion different than 99.9% of the previous Climate Etc. threads.
Typically, you can just look at the issue and the names of the participants and predict the patterns of viewpoint.
I’m not saying that in the real world, the change up in the patterns will have any meaningful impact.
But at least it is 0.1% less sameolesameol. That’s gotta be worth something.
Plus, Judith is participating more in the discussion. I’d say that’s worth an additional .1% at least.
Heh, a circular firing squad with Don Monfort egging them on. From outside the circle, I notice.
Good one.
======
Yeah – Don doesn’t really think that Judith’s arguments here are weak.
The analytical powers of kim’s “skepticism” are a work of art and a thing of beauty.
I don’t think there’s anything more to say after your last comment Judith.
You’ve used “tyranny” and “suppression” to describe the climate debate, comparing this to multiple gruesome cold blooded murders.
You’ve equated your opponents to “racists and anti semites ”
After challenge even from some of your supporters you’ve now doubled down and appear to be comparing the climate consensus to the Nazis.
All in a post complaining at name calling by others.
It’s incomprehensible to me how someone as thoughtful as you often seem can behave in such a manner.
you choose to misinterpret my piece.
Critics, bah! Quite self-revelatory, this bunch.
=========
I am not playing games, Kim. I calls them, like I sees them. Judith is wrong on this one. I am sure her motivation in linking Mann with the massacre was not malicious. But it’s inappropriate and her stubborn persistence is silly. All my very humble opinion. To her credit she has allowed criticism that has in some cases been mean and nasty. They can’t say this is a blog intotolerant of warmist trolls.
I have never seen such a troll feeding frenzy. It is the Indianappolis of climate blogs! Wow!
“So the end justifies the means, Judy?”
Of course what ELSE would justify the means.
you think there is something just in an of itself?
naive.
> Of course what ELSE would justify the means.
Reasons.
***
> naive
Considering the Auditor’s deontological stance, I’m not sure I’d say that.
Judith,
This has been a great topic for your blog. The climate debate, such as it is, and the issue of Islamist extremism within a democratic and pluralistic society, share at least two things in common.
1. Intolerance of opposing views: the CAGW advocates towards skeptics and the militant Islamists towards the modern world.
2. Political correctness: CAGW is now part of the spectrum of beliefs of the left in Europe, the Americas, and Australia that stifles debate and marginalizes outsiders. In Europe, in particular, PC keeps large parts of the population in denial about the long term consequences of their current policies and has effectively frozen corrective action. People are unable to even try to dicuss a root cause analysis without being prosecuted for hate speech. PC is now codified in European law. For Europe, the die is cast.
Sadly, a look at the list of recent commenters and the comments to this thread indicate the trolls have hijacked the discussion.
Keep up the good work!
The trolls are in a dudgeon,
I doubt that we can budge ’em.
=======================
Justin Wonder,
“For Europe, the die is cast.”
In a strange way, you may be right, Caesar crossed the Rubicon igniting another civil war and the dissolution of the Roman Republic.
Yet the phrase is better translated to: “alea iacta esto” let the die be cast.” The imperative mood, or, more in keeping with Climate Catastrophists exhorting fellow travelers to the barricades, almost like the last gasp of a movement, an ideology about to fall.
It is most likely that the notion of “follow the money”, and in this case, ordinary citizens watching money flow from their pocketbooks to service some sort of expensive ideological unsustainable energy like wind and solar that will lead to the reversing of legislation, legislation that has made energy much more expensive, mandating as the laws do, using the esoteric for the common place.
Climate Alarmism, Islam and other religions reflect the weakness of the cause by the call for the strident and urgent actions of others.
As Garfield says: Have others do for you what you would rather not do for yourself.
Vero Possumus
A. Voip
I guess you can if you try hard enough. It does seem to me though that the momentum behind the Climate Catastrophists position is dissipating. Activists in this genre leave a certain disagreeable taste in one’s mouth, that, along with the money flow from disposable income, tends to make yet another momentum change back to Catastrophic Climate difficult if not unlikely.
I just read on the BBC page that there is a movement in Parliament to force energy companies to reduce consumer’s bills in the face of falling Oil prices. Notice I didn’t say energy prices. Solar in the UK is still around 70 cents (USD) per kilowatt hour. It seems that energy companies are mired in forward contract issues.
Follow the money. Follow the votes. Follow the New Energy legislation.
Perhaps excesses in free speech are a natural response to the fact that “the mainstream media and Operation Mockingbird set policy, distract people and use word-play to create rainbow spewing unicorns in a world that is falling apart and on the brink of economic collapse”!
http://www.dcclothesline.com/2015/01/12/propaganda-101-operation-mockingbird-continues/
The hypocrisy of much of the liberal media re free speech is nauseating although not unexpected. Amongst notable examples are of course the BBC who held meetings to instruct their producers about the dangers of presenting a false balance on climate matters , the Guardian newspaper which as a matter of course moderates out any comments on their Environment website which blaspheme against their CAGW religion, NPR which over the last year has been trying to emulate the BBC as a source of propaganda for the green faith and the mainstream television networks and PBS in the USA who faithfully parrot the CAGW party line at every opportunity.
However what is less expected but really much worse is the self censorship by group-think of the scientific community at large. The current system of publication by peer view, academic appointment and advancement and grant sourcing and awards is structured so as to protect the currently politically correct orthodoxies of the core few scores of academics whose positions and relationships with the IPCC and whose individual Government appointments make them prominent and influential with regard to climate matters.
The Guardian won´t let me write comments anymore. And I can´t figure out why. I was always very careful making sure I didn´t upset their apple cart. I guess they got upset because I did write quite a few comments. Maybe it was my stance opposing dictatorships. They have a weak spots for some pretty nasty characters.
Dr Page
I agree with you. Unfortunately, those self-selecting cabals persist over time and become entrenched, like the monolithic social science departments in US universities. They have become dogmatic, ossified, and impenetrable. For an interesting look inside the anthropology world, see Napolean Chagnon’s book “Noble Savages….”.
Fernando, they banned you because you challenged their BS propaganda with reason and intelligence.
The more salient parallel, IMO, between the climate wars and dealing with jihadists, is the way that they both reflect how people approach risk assessment.
In both cases, we have people who focus on proximate risk and events with large emotional impact, rather than consider the impact of events within a long-term view of risk analysis which would include developing policies in the face of uncertainty.
,
In both cases, people take a complacent approach to pattern recognition – satisfying themselves with a recognition of gross similarities that confirm their biases and reinforce their group identifications, and moving forward to pontificate with self-serving narratives.
Realists and Jihadists = same, same but different.
See, the pattern is recognizable. And so I am a victim just like journalists in France, and what we need to do is focus our attention on our intolerant oppressors.
Why bother looking at long-term horizons and discuss tactics and strategies to achieve shared goals? No need. Instead, we can just engage in identity-aggressive and identity-defensive behaviors.
Sameolsameol just feels so good!
I didn´t get your comment at all. But let me ask you, do you kinda lump all muslims in the same group? What about jihadis? Do you think they are all driven by the same issues?
No, not all Muslims are in the same group, IMO.
And no, neither are all jihadis the same, IMO (in other words, are Shiite and Shia jihadis the “same?”) – although in fundamental ways they are driven by the same issues.
In fact, some groups of jihadis take great pains to differentiate themselves from each other.
In terms of tactics and strategies, it is important to not conflate unlike entities because of gross (and sometimes superficial) similarities.
You should take the time to differentiate your tactics and strategies according to the specifics of the target.
You shouldn’t target intolerance in the larger Muslim community in the same way that you’d target intolerance from jihadists.
You shouldn’t target intolerance in our society in the same way that you’d target intolerance in the larger Muslim community.
While you might target intolerance among Shiite jihadists in largely similar ways that you’d target intolerance among Shia jihadists, you might also need to consider context or differences as you develop tactics, if not necessarily strategies.
Part of me thinks the satirists knew they were being provocative and should have limited themselves.
But another part of me thinks all religions are anti-scientific, illogical, and cannot survive scientific or historical scrutiny and have no place for thinking people.
Stereotyping any group is erroneous and overlooking nuance.
Reading Bernard Lewis is instructive. The first civilization to fall victim to jihadists may well have been the Islamic empire of the so called ‘Golden Age’.
That empire was liberal ( meaning free ) and advanced science, mathematics, art and architecture. But the very freedom which led to advancement was distasteful to the fundamentalists who attacked the apostates from within. That was some 900 years ago. Ironically, jihadists led to the fall of the Islamic empire.
Lucifer –
Do you have a Bernard Lewis link you’d suggest?
Consider the Great Kurd, and Rambam.
===================
This one covers the fall:
http://www.amazon.com/What-Went-Wrong-Between-Modernity/dp/0060516054
These are good as well:
http://www.amazon.com/The-Crisis-Islam-Unholy-Terror/dp/0812967852/ref=pd_bxgy_b_img_z
http://www.amazon.com/The-Middle-East-Brief-History/dp/0684832801/ref=pd_bxgy_b_img_y
Whoops – guess I posted too many links.
This one covers the period ( IIRC ):
http://www.amazon.com/What-Went-Wrong-Between-Modernity/dp/0060516054
The “Crisis of Islam” and
the “The Middle East: A Brief History of the Last 2,000 Years”
are good as well. He was very prolific and many of the others are interesting as well.
Lucifer –
Thanks. I’ll check it out.
I’m too tired to target intolerance. I mostly worry about having others tolerate me. I tend to think all religions foster intolerance. Differences of opinion make people intolerant. I’m used to it. And I’m used to hiding when it gets hot.
“Ironically, jihadists led to the fall of the Islamic empire.”
Joshua wont get this
I think we can lump extremists who intentionally murder civilians or who advocate for doing so in a separate category from other Muslims. In the same way we can distinguish those who bombed the abortion clinics or killed doctors from other Christians. It is more of a legal and moral distinction which I think can and should be made.
Do you consider the threat from jihadists to be uncertain? What does the precautionary principle suggest that France do about immigration policy today?
A realist would say the French are at far more risk from jihadis today than man-made extreme weather. Perhaps a shift in focus for the UN is in order?
JeffN –
Directed at me? In case it is.
==> “Do you consider the threat from jihadists to be uncertain? ”
Hmm. There is certainly a threat.
But the magnitude of the threat?
I have an exceedingly small threat of losing my freedom of speech or being harmed physically or materially due to a jihadist “threat.” Even the massacre in France, as horrible as it was, and even with the proportionately greater presences of Jihadists in that country, represents an exceedingly rare event. It is rather typical for people to assess risk, emotionally and on the basis of fear and/or ideologically-oriented behavior, disproportionately to the actual threat.
Far more significant is the threat to women, children, and the vast majority of men who live in Muslim countries. Consider the disproportion in the focus relative to the damage and the threat, in comparing what happened in France to what just happened in Nigeria.
To the extent that the threat to me is significant, it is directly related to analyzing strategies and tactics for dealing with the threat from jihadists vis a vis the larger populations Muslim countries.
==> “What does the precautionary principle suggest that France do about immigration policy today?”
Sorry. I don’t really know how you’re applying the precautionary principle there. Maybe you could explain more?
==> “A realist would say the French are at far more risk from jihadis today than man-made extreme weather. Perhaps a shift in focus for the UN is in order?”
That is, rather precisely, representative of what I was describing with the tendency for people to respond (emotionally, prioritizing proximity of threat, responding based on identification) when assessing risk. Thanks for that.
“I have an exceedingly small threat of losing my freedom of speech or being harmed physically or materially due to a jihadist “threat.” Even the massacre in France, as horrible as it was, and even with the proportionately greater presences of Jihadists in that country, represents an exceedingly rare event. ”
The IPCC says there haven’t been any extreme events that can attributed to man, so you have haven’t experienced any threat from AGW yet. The rate of warming for the past 18 years says, IMO, you won’t see any threat in the future. And, really, you didn’t know anyone who was in New York or Washington DC on 9/11? That didn’t harm you “materially” at all, eh?
“Sorry. I don’t really know how you’re applying the precautionary principle there. Maybe you could explain more?”
You don’t know how the precautionary principle has any relevance to Islam? Seriously? You cannot think of any reason why the precautionary principle might advise France to take a look at immigration policies? How about the ridiculous policies that apparently allowed radicalized French muslims to take jihad junkets to Syria and Yemen and return to France with advanced weaponry training and orders to use them?
“That is, rather precisely, representative of what I was describing with the tendency for people to respond (emotionally, prioritizing proximity of threat, responding based on identification) when assessing risk. Thanks for that.”
Good for you, you almost got it! I’ll explain- I think you disregard the threat of Islam because it’s not in your political wheelhouse and when others think about it, your political team loses. Further, you want to keep the “precautionary principle” as a means of arguing for any left-wing policy as long as you can draw any tenuous line between the policy you want and anything you can call a threat, however unlikely it is to be a threat. In other words, you find the real and serious threat of radical Islam to be a less interesting topic than the minor and weak threat of AGW purely and entirely due to political motivation. Others think the reverse because, well, they’re putting bodies into caskets.
The precautionary principle would tell the French to improve their economy, become atheists and pull their troops out of Afghanistan, if they have any left there.
JeffN –
What I said was that I didn’t know how you were applying the precautionary principle, not how someone might apply it if they were so inclined.
You asked me about a threat of jihadiss, and I explained that I don’t disregard it.
You then moved into a response about how I disregard the “threat of Islam”.
So. I say that I don’t disregard a threat, and then you respond by saying that I disregard a different threat.
I take your questions seriously, assuming a good faith discussion, and you turn it into a pejorative rant?
Unless you explain what you mean, and unless you avoid non-sequiturs, I don’t know how to have a discussion with you. I’m also not inclined to take a discussion seriously with someone who applies guilt-by-association to conclude a moral superiority.
But hey, maybe I can claim moral superiority also if I defend your right to make bad arguments that have little to nothing to do with the comments you’re responding to?
Or maybe I could claim moral superiority by pointing out the moral and ethical similarity between your comment and Jihadists murdering journalists?
Have a nice day!
Fernando –
==> “The precautionary principle would tell the French to improve their economy, become atheists and pull their troops out of Afghanistan, if they have any left there.”
Sure. It might mean that we would tell the French to help improve economies in other countries, which could take any number of forms. It could mean that we should follow the French lead and stop enriching the governments in the ME who deprive large segments of their populations the basic civic infrastructure needed to fight poverty.
We could apply it in any number of ways. Interesting that JeffN sees such a wide-open concept in such a limited framework, and within that limited framework, offer such a simplistic interpretation as that the French should “take a look at immigration policies?”
Perhaps he’s not all that skeptical after all?
Huh.
not even cogent.
Because you can’t align it with your identity-oriented thinking. Try moving outside your little box.
I’m more than happy to answer clarifying questions.
http://toryardvaark.files.wordpress.com/2011/02/nudescientist2.jpg
Looks like Springer’s got another sock.
A whole drawer full!
Thanks for noticing.
This is too funny to last! I’m glad I got to see it before it gets snipped! :)
http://toryardvaark.files.wordpress.com/2009/12/cartoon-cop15_prayer.jpg
They say this prayer in first class on the flight to those conferences! :) Don’t knock ’em, those conferences sre good for the local economy – hotels, taxis, hookers, …
http://i47.tinypic.com/2i7mfex.jpg
Say, where did you get that hat? :)
http://wattsupwiththat.files.wordpress.com/2014/04/josh_climate_inquisition.jpg
What’s more iconic, his face or his stick?
===============
http://therooftopblog.files.wordpress.com/2010/11/global-warming-cartoon-toss-him-in-the-gulag.jpg
Our leaders keep dancing and playing hot potato an wont come to the obvious conclusion that we have a violent religion to deal with:
I’ll let my ex Stanford professor take it from here:
http://victorhanson.com/wordpress/?p=7883
Perhaps you are reaching an incorrect conclusion. Perhaps there are individuals acting poorly in the in the name of their superstition/religion
That’s definitely a magnanimous and appropriate place to start. Until extended reasoning and observation leads to a different conclusion.
‘Nothing to do with Islam’
part I
http://victorhanson.com/wordpress/?p=7787
part II
http://victorhanson.com/wordpress/?p=7809
No, it’s at the very core of the ideology. It is so alien to western enlightenment thought that we can’t even take it in with our senses and interpret it with our mind without projecting our own world-view upon it. Most Muslims are silent and some have become discretely secular, so it can be difficult for us to sort out who has aggressive intentions from those who do not. Among the silent are many supporters of the radical views.
Il y a de la taquille. Les Chretiens n’y ont rien.
=====================
That one has to reach to figures like the Massacre des Innocents to describe Koldie’s French is quite telling.
Heh, you always misplace my fractures. Get it straight, reduction should be simple.
=========
Double heh. Nine minutes is fairly tardy for the stat call to the Here Are.
=========
??
no comprendo
nickels
I used to live in Saudi Arabia and am quite familar with the culture. Try to recognize that all believers in Islam do not share to same detailled beliefs. This is not all that different than Christans having differences in their beliefs.
Imo- the issue with ANY religion/superstition/belief system is when those holding a view attempt to force other to modify their behaviors to be consistent with their beliefs. Sadly, we do this in the US also just not to the same extent.
I currently have a home in TX and you can’t buy booze here on Sunday. A nothing issue, but it is forcing people to modify their behavior in the name of someone else’s religion.
@Rob
The naturally ingrained tolerant side of me wants to believe as you do.
At the same time, I am all too familiar with the side of human nature which silent watches injustice and eggs it on quietly, only shifting to condemn it when called out and pressed hard under the light of scrutiny.
Where is the outrage from people who’s religion has been hijacked?
But not to worry, I despise all religions alike (except science for which I am somewhat fond). The leap of faith required to align oneself with a religion is, unfortunately, the immediate path to its corruption. In order to make that leap of faith one cannot have infidels who don’t believe in it. I(t threatens the adherence to the leap. Thus all religions have a component of condemnation for those who are not a part. That’s the fatal flaw.
Admittedly I don’t know this about ‘all religions’, but its my working hypothesis.
It’s sort of peculiar for a religion to have a precept which on occasion may even demand that the adherent deny his belief. This technique, its requirement satanic, is more useful for a campaign of conquest than of persuasion.
Holy Warriors, Batman! What’s that light in the sky tryin’ to say to us?
============
Knock, knock…
Liquor stores are closed on Sundays in Texas. Little else is effected.by Blue Laws except sporting events and concerts can’t sell booze until 10am on Sunday and everything else not until noon.
There are completely dry counties and cities all over the US where all alcohol sales are prohibited.
VDH is very interesting and I visit his blog on occasion. His books are good too.
He was probably my favorite Stanford professor. Which cracks me up because he was actually a visiting prof from Fresno state. Stanford has always been waaaay too scary PC.
Nickels, you were lucky indeed!
The conclusion of Naomi Oreskes’ twenty-one-year-old article is commended to the attention of Climate Etc readers!
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6hD52H7rQak
Detailed climate models affirm the anthropogenic climate-change picture founded upon:
• the energy-balance principle of James Hansen, and
• the Greenhouse Effect of CO2, and
• anthropogenic CO2 increases, and
• paleoclimate correlation of CO2 and temperature, and
• the observation in recent decades of ocean-heating, ice-mass-loss, and sea-level-rise — all without pause or evident limit, — sustained throughout the 21 years since Oreskes’ article, and
• 2014 as the warmest year in the historical record.
Conclusion The combined scientific evidence strongly supports James Hansen’s climate-change worldview, and supports too Naomi Oreskes’ historical analysis of that worldview, and supports too Pope Francis’ moral assessment of the moral implications of anthropogenic climate-change.
http://www.desmogblog.com/sites/beta.desmogblog.com/files/10517246_10154370397800422_164358103378123105_o.jpg
Nowadays these aggregated climate-change implications are evident to almost *EVERYONE*, eh Climate Etc readers?
Great, fan – promote religion over reason.
Having a paper that says climate models cant be validated or verified but concludes they can be used to corroborate hypothesis isnt helping me dig Naomi.
Her ditching the scientific method for a “jury of PhD’s” at the gate of science is enough for me to disregard her for good.
It surprises me zero that she is in league with religion however, since she is effectively arguing that we should ditch the scientific method and install instead a clergy of PhDs.
https://ipccreport.wordpress.com/2015/01/08/converts-to-scepticism/
Well…
CAGW (Cult of Anthropomorphic Global Warming) is a sciency religious order. “Converts to Skepticism” says Dr. Curry used to be a “high priestess” in the cult. She has apparently been excommunicated.
Sounds religious to me. We should stop government funding of CAGW since it is unconstitutional to fund a state religion.
@PA
I buy your analogy.
Science and religion are all too close. Without the nifty little ‘verifiable hypothesis’ I certainly see little difference.
+1
Nowadays the STEAM consensus promotes science *WITH* religion:
Q Which holds better hope for the future of humanity?
A1 The peaceful Wilson-Francis science-religion collaboration.
A2 The murderous Islamist jihad against secularism.
A3 The abusively ignorant CEI/WUWT/Heartland jihad against progressivism.
The world *DOESN’T* wonder, eh Climate Etc readers?
“Let the waters teem with countless living creatures, and let birds fly above the earth across the vault of heaven.’”
The people promoting more life and abundance should be trying to crank up the CO2.
http://time.com/3297045/california-blue-whales/
California blue whales are near historic levels. There are signs that CO2 is doing some good.
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/earth/wildlife/8255922/Tags-created-to-help-penguins-could-be-killing-them.html
The problem with some of the endangered animal monitoring efforts is there are some signs the doodads they put on the animals are killing them – which distorts the estimates.
Why do `yah suppose, PA, that no professional wildlife-conservation society in the world agrees with your bizarrely unfounded claim?
Conclusion James Hansen, Ed Wilson, and Pope Francis — as leaders in planetary science, ecology, and religion — are well-justified to regard anthropogenic global warming as a grave threat to the health of our planet and every living creature on it.
It isn’t in the interest of conservation societies to go “life is great, everything is wonderful”. That leads to fewer donations.
I’ve noticed that nobody seems to keep close tabs on recovering populations – only declining ones.
http://iwc.int/estimate
“The estimated rate of increase is 8.2% (95% confidence interval 3.8-12.5%) per year between 1978/79 and 2003/04”
The blue whales have been increasing in population about 8% per year (wiki, a bastion of liberalism, says 7.3). Most area population estimates are from 2000, 2007 or earlier. The global estimate in 2002 was 5000-12,500. That would mean there are about 12,000-30,000 blue whales today. The excess of diversity in DNA samples would lead to the conclusion the population wasn’t as bottlenecked as claimed and the population is on the high side. In about 30-35 years populations will be at historic highs. The Japanese can then harvest a new variety of sushi.
Fan, we had a colony of an estimated one million-plus flying foxes across the Brisbane River from us. The total population in SEQ must be humungous. They obviously thrive in the local climate and environment, and will survive the occasionally more extreme heat; which, I might add, is not more extreme recently than it has often been in the past. People probably said “Good riddance!” then rather than count the bodies..
http://boykinandcompany.com/images/bannersduck.jpg
http://c3405147.r47.cf0.rackcdn.com/bpop/bpopBannerB.jpg
Lesson-learned Denialism’s conspiracy of willful ignorance is no match for scientific conservationism’s long view!
Lesson-learned (redux) Denialism’s conspiracy of willful ignorance is no match for science’s reasoned synoptic view!
Faustino | January 12, 2015 at 9:47 pm |
Fan, we had a colony of an estimated one million-plus flying foxes across the Brisbane River from us. The total population in SEQ must be humungous. They obviously thrive in the local climate and environment, and will survive the occasionally more extreme heat; which, I might add, is not more extreme recently than it has often been in the past. People probably said “Good riddance!” then rather than count the bodies..
Maroochydore apparently has too many of them.
.
I’m used to smaller insect eating bats. We are sort of protective of those. The flying fox is about 50 of my bats big. It has to take a lot of fruit to feed a million of them. The suggestion to net your orchards is sort of crazy.
I’m not resistant to netting orchards if the the environmentalists pony up the cost. But the cost of netting and the extra work of dealing with it and maintaining it (spraying the orchard becomes problematic) has to be covered.
How does an animal with a million bat local herd get considered endangered or threatened anyway? That is like saying starlings are endangered. They can still shoot the bats as an orchard pest so the foxes can’t be that threatened.
Flying foxes were perishing en masse in the extreme summer of 1791-2 at Sydney and Parramatta. There would have been no lack of tree cover then, but the drought may have made the difference. (It was part of the monsoon failure which killed millions of humans in India’s Doji Bara famine of the early 1790s).
I’ve never seen mass bird deaths around here, even in the high summer nor’westers a few years back, but they were reported elsewhere. (We’re talking about special conditions which don’t come often, spring winds coming in high summer, and far more lethal than any heatwave. 1791-2 was nor’wester dominated.)
The flying foxes have left me alone lately, since the bower birds have obliterated all that can be eaten. They were heavily hunted by the aborigine, and very easy prey. Even I could hunt a flying fox. Now they are in such numbers here that they can darken the sky a little, on their way to the wild figs in nearby limestone country – or whatever else they’re devouring.
A fan of *MORE* discourse | January 12, 2015 at 10:20 pm |
Of the ‘big five’ mass extinction events in the Earth’s history, the end-Permian extinction was the largest.
Lesson-learned Denialism’s conspiracy of willful ignorance is no match for scientific conservationism’s long view!
1. The CO2 level (from ocean sediment studies) in the Permian went up 3K-5K years after the warming started. This Permian story needs work
2. On your ducky thing. Humans have repurposed a lot of animal habitat and distorted the balance of a lot of the environment near them.. I’m somewhat sympathetic to cost effective measures that reduce stress on the native species populations and to managing these populations as a resource. The fact the duckies are doing well is a good thing.
What is needed is a clear and agreed on set of objectives for managing the native species population. If you have taken (for example) 90% of their habitat about the most that can be supported is 10% of the original population. Stories complaining that 90% of the animals have disappeared is repeating the obvious. About the best that can be done is trying to maintain the remaining populations at the carrying capacity of their habitat.
mosomoso, summer of 1791-92, eh? This tends to confirm my suspicion, based on your historic climate knowledge, that you are a First Fleeter whose balanced outlook on life has engendered great longevity. Or vice-versa.
I’ve long thought that Patrick O’Brian owned a time machine.
============================
Absolutely not! No convict or serf, I! No military type on half-pay, either. Why does everyone want to belong to the lower orders? My ancestors were back in Ireland still, courteously leaving the work to the working classes. Not that the working classes ever thanked us. Bloody serfs.
Re flying foxes: I think it was the aborigine who accompanied Eyre who amazed by his ability to consume flying fox. It seems that when you got a good bag of them you ate till you were stuffed…and then ate the same again. Before the bower birds learned to strip my shahtoot mulberries when barely formed, the flying foxes would hang feasting in the small tree by dozens, not seeming to care about danger from humans. I’ve heard that, in the normal course, the work of hunting them was left to women and children. I can see why.
I’ve seen flocks of birds getting drunk under a mulberry tree.
Also lesser flocks from the vomitus down at the nearby Shout and Sack.
=============
Appeals to sentiment dont gloss over the obvious scientific disagreements about CAGW.
Fan says its a horrible problem.
Others say it is a red herring.
Appeals to sentiment are cloying and annoying.
nickels | January 13, 2015 at 11:38 am |
Appeals to sentiment dont gloss over the obvious scientific disagreements about CAGW.
Fan says its a horrible problem.
Others say it is a red herring.
Appeals to sentiment are cloying and annoying.
CAGW at this point appears to be off the table. The consensus and other arguments are about AGW and there are failed efforts to claim they support CAGW.
It should be fairly easy from CERES data to show that GHGs have an effect. Apparently water vapor, clouds or other factors are having a greater effect since this data isn’t presented often (a CERES based defense of GHG warming being greater than other factors would be welcome).
Most of the warming since 2000 has been CGAGW (computer generated anthropomorphic global warming) which has little or nothing to do with GHG emissions. The predicted 21st century warming would make CGAGW unnecessary.
So AGW is somewhere between CAGW and a red herring.
It seems that things are changing but it isn’t as fast as predicted and we have time to figure out how great the change is and whether it is mostly good or mostly bad.
Michael Mann called Judith a denier and she rightly complained. Now commenter Michael is upset she analogized the defense of free speech in the Charlie Hebdo case to defense of free speech in the Mann vs. Steyn/Simberg case.
Of course Judith Curry has every right to complain about what names people call her.
The difference between Judith and Michael Mann is she didn’t bring a suit for defamation.
Michael Mann’s lawsuit lacks all merit – everything complained of is opinion and not defamation and it is only a matter of what stage the lawsuit will be won by Steyn/Simberg.
It is very ironic that Michael is trying to get Judith to stop saying something (her analogy).
Perhaps Michael Mann will file a defamation suit against Judith?
That does seem to be his response to free speech.
Hey Michael Mann – in my opinion you are a big baby and your hockey stick is bad science, intended to deceive and be used as propaganda for advocacy purposes.
–Hey Michael Mann – in my opinion you are a big baby and your hockey stick is bad science, intended to deceive and be used as propaganda for advocacy purposes.–
Obviously, but I wonder did he actually have delusion that people would regard him as scientist, or was he simply trying to make a buck- like Al Gore?
In my opinion he thought people would regard his advocacy as science. Not unreasonable since Michael Mann is a scientist.
His problem is once you get into advocacy and propaganda, you lose credibility.
He wants to be treated as a purely factual science based scientist when in fact he has strayed from that role into advocate. The ends justify the means to Michael Mann.
He is so worried about the future that he is willing to lie (deceive) in order to prompt action he believes to be necessary.
He has set back his cause 50 years.
What an idiot.
Hubris
“In my opinion he thought people would regard his advocacy as science. Not unreasonable since Michael Mann is a scientist.”
I think one could easily be misled to assume Michael Mann is a scientist.
Just as, if someone who was state certified a carpenter, and that one could also assume that person is carpenter.
But personally, I have seen no evident which leads me to the conclusion
that Michael Mann is scientist. And all what he does say, leads me to conclusion that he is not scientist.
I would say, that I have a great deal of respect for scientists- in all subjects- even in questionable fields.
But this is related to what and how do they things.
Though the exception to this respect would be an actual scientists doing things which morally a problematic in terms scientific ideals and standards.
For example the EPA testing of pollution on “volunteers” is example something which could be immoral in terms scientific standards [and probably is]. Therefore scientists involved with EPA human testing could be scientists which I could have zero respect [though I kinda doubt real scientists were actually involved- though it is possible]. .
I mention this exemption not because it related to Mann, rather I am just clarifying the exemption to idea that I respect all scientists.
So I have waited and I have yet to see any evident that Michael Mann is scientist.
And will use Wiki’s definition {or any better one, that anyone could point to}:
“A scientist, in a broad sense, is one engaging in a systematic activity to acquire knowledge. In a more restricted sense, a scientist may refer to an individual who uses the scientific method.”
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Scientist
Of course don’t limit my respect to just scientists.
But scientists are doing important stuff and more importantly they part of a scientific process, and that process has made living on earth better for everyone.
–His problem is once you get into advocacy and propaganda, you lose credibility.–
Yeah- though there very good specific reasons one loses credibility.
As scientist one can speak for the state, or be spokesperson for many difference causes, and one can actually increase your credibility.
Propaganda which is of the brainwashing variety- such as parroting talking points and and not allowing questions to be asked, is quite unscientific.
One should lose credibility even if the person was not a scientist- but for a non scientist, it might help their credibility [though generally it’s mostly about the manner and style employed].
From the article:
…
The Earth Liberation Front (ELF), also known as “Elves” or “The Elves”,[1] is the collective name for autonomous individuals or covert cells who, according to the ELF Press Office, use “economic sabotage and guerrilla warfare to stop the exploitation and destruction of the environment”.
The ELF was founded in Brighton in the United Kingdom in 1992[2] and spread to the rest of Europe by 1994. It is now an international movement with actions reported in 17 countries[3][4][5] and is widely regarded as descending from Animal Liberation Front because of the relationship and cooperation between the two movements.[6] Using the same leaderless resistance model, as well as similar guidelines to the ALF,[2] sympathizers say that it is an eco-defense group dedicated to taking the profit motive out of environmental destruction by causing economic damage to businesses through the use of property damage.[7]
The ELF was classified as the top “domestic terror” threat in the United States by the Federal Bureau of Investigation in March 2001,[8][9] and its members were categorized as “eco-terrorists”.[citation needed][dubious – discuss] On the lack of deaths from ELF attacks, the FBI’s deputy assistant director for counterterrorism has said, “I think we’re lucky. Once you set one of these fires they can go way out of control.” [10] The name came to public prominence when they were featured on the television show 60 Minutes in 2005.[11] The group was further highlighted in the 2011 Academy Award nominated documentary, If a Tree Falls: A Story of the Earth Liberation Front.[12]
…
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Earth_Liberation_Front
Have I missed something here in CE Threads? I just don’t see citations of published papers (hopefully peer reviewed) of reporting of AGW in Journalism. I see a lot of cherry-picking and anecdotal citations.
Here is an example — where reporting was shown to be close to 50/50 pro and con on the AGW debate:
http://www.eci.ox.ac.uk/publications/downloads/boykoff04-gec.pdf
http://www.amazon.com/While-Europe-Slept-Radical-Destroying/dp/0767920058
> Now I am still waiting for someone to tell me how the Mann case is similar to the Paris massacre.
Perhaps this have been missed:
http://judithcurry.com/2015/01/11/charlie-challenging-free-speech/#comment-663210
Demonization is sufficient for the cause of these alarmists, Don Don.
You know how opportunistic they are.
Willard –
Which item in Mr. Fuller’s list do you think is untrue?
Equivocating on “alarmists” like that is more than untrue, Tom C, it’s comparable to ripping off one’s shirt.
Thank you for asking.
They are both reactions to speech which someone didn’t like. Therefore, they both relate to free speech.
Killing people for speech you don’t like is different in degree from suing someone for speech you don’t like – but they are both reactions to speech.
> Killing people for speech you don’t like is different in degree from suing someone for speech you don’t like – but they are both reactions to speech.
Exactly. The fact that one is legal while one may not be is just a matter of degree. A lawyer reminds us so, Denizens. No less.
Since this comment is in reaction to speech, that makes me, Mike, and terrorists alike, in a matter of degree.
The best thread ever.
Willie is really enjoying his fodder. That was too easy, willie.
–Willard | January 12, 2015 at 4:01 pm |
> Killing people for speech you don’t like is different in degree from suing someone for speech you don’t like – but they are both reactions to speech.
Exactly. The fact that one is legal while one may not be is just a matter of degree. A lawyer reminds us so, Denizens. No less.–
What if the killing was legal. As it might be in some states and those involved consider themselves a members of that state [and escape and live there].
“Exactly. The fact that one is legal while one may not be is just a matter of degree. A lawyer reminds us so, Denizens. No less.”
Wrong.
Killing a writer is legal under Islamic law
http://www.theguardian.com/world/rushdie-fatwa
The actions against the cartoonists speech and the actions against Steyn’s speech are both sanctioned under different legal systems.
The penalties are different but both systems allow for the crimilization of speech.
I’m just glad we can finally seek a level of consistency with our values that applies to different situations, Don. Now that we can consistenly point out the alarmists among us, we prevent them to violate our ability to discuss and think.
These cartoonists and policemen will not have died in vain.
> Wrong.
Read again what I wrote.
Nice try.
> What if the killing was legal.
What if we burn 3k quads of coal by 2075?
Here is an insider’s view. She thinks that the west is in denial about the danger.
http://www.amazon.com/Infidel-Ayaan-Hirsi-Ali/dp/0743289692
“Sticks and stones will break my bones
But words will never harm me.”
I think I learnt that when I was about 5. I’m looking forward to the day when the adherents of all faiths can rise to that level.
P.S. This short educational video might help:
Except “denier.”
That’s tryanny, McCarthyism, equivalent to racism and antisemitism, and morally and ethically indistinguishable from slaughtering journalists.
Joshua
Wrong-“Denier” is a very easy description to not get upset about. Just ask the person using the term- what exactly I am being accused of denying? That the person is avoiding using good science to reach conclusions seems frequently correct.
Look at Fan as an example
> what exactly I am being accused of denying?
Among other things, that mitigation is required, e.g.:
http://judithcurry.com/2014/06/24/uneasy-expertise/#comment-601058
Willard– You are correct! I deny that most CO2 mitigation proposals make economic sense. I deny that those advocating such activities can show that the benefit is worth the cost. Try to prove me wrong?
No – it is ok to complain when people name call.
It is not ok to sue – which is what Michael Mann did.
That alarmists sue should be the lesser of our concerns, RickA.
Alarmists destroy relics, kill innocent people, or abuse their psyches so much they force other alarmists to kill children, suicide themselves in mass, or become martyrs.
Even worse, they agitate, and prophecize doom. Even worse still if possible, they come here and clog the discussion. Alarmists prevent you to even think – have you tried to think when they’re around, RickA?
Were I an alarmist, I have no idea what I’d do to alarmists. I would certainly not demonize them, because that would make me an alarmist. Only alarmists demonize. Demonization is sufficient for their cause.
Whatever means justify their alarmist end.
Don’t be naive.
“Alarmist” (as someone here corrected me) is a term for a person who inappropriately rasies an alarm or raises the alarm prematurely.
Willard incorrectly seems to use the term to describe the activities of many in the ME.
Willard seems to miss that the term seems appropriate for those who are claiming near term future disasters will come about due to more atmospheric CO2.
> Willard seems to miss that the term seems appropriate for those who are claiming near term future disasters will come about due to more atmospheric CO2.
Not at all, Rob. I am perfectly aware that this is a way to personalize the good ol’ CAGW crap. If the shoe fit and all that jazz.
You, on the other hand, seem to miss that the term is extended by Denizens to refer to many other predicates.
Willard writes: “You, on the other hand, seem to miss that the term is extended by Denizens to refer to many other predicates.”
My response- I notice many silly comments, but usually don’t see a need to reply
I am not listed as one of the blogs
Me neither, Rob. Which is why I haven’t followed through your mitigation denial.
Willard
I deny that you have shown that mitigation actions are cost effective in a world of limited financial resources. (which is a fact in the real world) Since you can’t demonstrate that the activities you support will actually eliminate or even lessen your feared results all you have is appealing to authority and spreading fear of what might happen. Fear is powerful, but not necessary
“Muslims are the least likely to say it’s OK to kill civilians”:
http://www.fair.org/blog/wp-content/uploads/2013/05/civiliansindividuals.gif
http://fair.org/blog/2013/05/03/killing-civilians-is-a-more-popular-than-youd-think-especially-among-pundits/
Denizens are the new Muslims.
““Muslims are the least likely to say it’s OK to kill civilians”:
No, they are the most likely to lie to folks taking surveys.
or
Ya, but they are the most likely to kill civilians
or
Ya, but they dont think their enemies are civilians, it depends what you mean by civilians.
You realize that FAIR is run by a terrorist
No. Alarmists were more likely to lie to folks taking surveys, or to kill civilians, or to quarrel over the meaning of “civilian.”
Alarmists are also run by terrorists, of course.
Willard realizes very little.
==> . “No, they are the most likely to lie to folks taking surveys.”
And you know that because….(oh,wait, I forgot, you just know things)
==> “Ya, but they are the most likely to kill civilian”
How many civilians died in Iraq?
==> “Ya, but they dont think their enemies are civilians, it depends what you mean by civilians.”
Are civilians in Iraq civilians?
==> “You realize that FAIR is run by a terrorist”
Yeah, so’s Gallup: everyone who disagrees with me is a sociopath.
http://www.gallup.com/poll/148763/Muslim-Americans-No-Justification-Violence.aspx
Just a coincidence, of course.
Joseph
The poll you cite was taken of Americans. Polls taken in the middle east are scary.
Richard
> Polls taken in the middle east are scary.
Coincidentally, the number of alarmists in the Middle East is staggering.
I can’t speak for Joseph… :-), but i guess you’re saying that differentiation is important?
That context, such as social conditions is important?
That saying that “Islam” is the problem is simplistic?
That strategies and tactics should be considered accordingly?
If so, i agree.
Willard
Please explain what you mean regarding middle east alarmists.
Richard
And rls
They are scary, considering the implications for women who want equal rights in this countries, or children who want to be educated…
I do fear for those people.
Richard,
By “alarmists in the Middle East” I am referring to the alarmists that live in the Middle East.
As for “alarmist”, I defer to this usage:
http://judithcurry.com/2015/01/11/charlie-challenging-free-speech/#comment-663383
Hope this helps,
W
Willard
Your explanation has narrowed my guess but did not eliminate it.
Regards,
Richard
I would never want to infringe upon your liberty, rls.
Only alarmists would do that.
The truth is out there.
Willard
Lived through one semester of law school, had fun. My criminal law professor was highly skilled in the Socratic method, and perhaps you too are such a professor. Assured that you would not infringe upon my liberty, less assured that you would not warp my brain.
Regards,
Richard
Yep don’t mistake me for Joshua even though we have similar names and generally trust climate scientists. I suspect you don’t trust them..
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Iraqi_presidential_referendum,_2002
100% of Muslims voting in Iraq voted for President Saddam Hussein.
Given Saddam killed way more Iraqi civilians than the average Iraqi president the result raises some interesting questions.
Did they vote the way they did out of fear of retaliation?
Did they vote the way they did because they support mass murder of civilians?
Don’t think too hard about it Willard and Joshua else the cognitive dissonance might become unbearable.
Thanks for being such perfect straight men, by the way. JC SNIP
Joshua –
Do you maintain that the civilians killed in Iraq (probably more by other Iraqis than Western forces BTW) were targeted and killed because they were Muslim?
No tom, that’s not what i mean.
Then why did you respond to Mosher saying that [Muslims] were most likely to kill civilians by saying “how many civilians died in Iraq?”
because he didn’t ask who were most likely to target civilians….
I have mixed feelings about collateral damage when fighting against murderous fanatics, but there is a certain calculus that effectively means that civilians are targeted. I have no idea about the total numbers.
http://www.fas.org/irp/doddir/usaf/afpam14-210/part20.htm
Then there is the question of how we, as a society, accepted a military invasion that resulted in hundreds of thousands of civilian casualties in the name of policies where the cost/benefit ratio was highly uncertain.
Interesting how trust in government, wariness about unintended outcomes, concern about expensive government initiatives can be rather…um…er…selective, isn’t it?
An optimist might see today the beginning of the end of violent Islamism and the beginning of the end of the mannian cult.
Richard
Please explain what you mean regarding the mannian cult.
W
What’s more iconic, The Piltdown Mann’s face or his Crook’t Stick?
==================
Could be related to this;
“No, they come across as Mannian partisanship rather than dealing with the meta issues of the situation.” – Judith
Willard
The mannian cult is the community of people who believe that the hockey stick created by The Mann is true :-)
Regards
Richard
Hi all,
Having only recently paid much attention to the climate wars, I wonder; has the harsh dialogue emerged only in the last few years? Was it present in the 1990s?
Richard
Ozone Man
JCH
Thank you. Do you think that characterization of Gore was the start of a wide spread dialogue between both sides of the climate wars? I remember it as a cartooning of Gore, with his pretending to be smart guy from Harvard; comparable with his claim to have invented the Internet. Wasn’t it limited to presidential campaign talk?
Richard
rls,
I think it started with stuff like this;
“comparable with his claim to have invented the Internet.”
http://www.snopes.com/quotes/internet.asp
Michael and JCH
OK, slight correction, he didn’t say “invented”. Rather, he said “During my service in the United States Congress, I took the initiative in creating the Internet”. Not much difference in my mind.
Regardless, the criticism by his political opponents was related the political campaign, not related to the climate wars. My question is sincere, did the harsh dialogue in the climate wars start in the 1990s?
Regards
Richard
““During my service in the United States Congress, I took the initiative in promoting the development the Internet”.
what Gore meant.
Steven
Really? You replace what Gore said with what he meant, and put it in quotation marks? Another acceptable example of infilling?
Regards,
Richard
“Another acceptable example of infilling?”
ROFL
The aftermath of these moments at their best bring soul searching and heartfelt affirmations of our common humanity.
This trivializes the events under the rubric of freedom. Appallingly insensitive at best.
DEFAMATION CAN BE COSTLY
INDIANAPOLIS — The largest defamation verdict in Indiana history — more than $14.5 million awarded to a contractor who claimed State Farm Fire & Casualty ruined his business and reputation — has been upheld by the Indiana Court of Appeals.
http://www.usatoday.com/story/money/business/2014/09/17/court-upholds-145m-defamation-verdict-against-state-farm/15805097/
I doubt Michael Mann will get anywhere near that much if he wins. My guess is he would get between $1 and $100,000.
Max
If you want to learn a bit check out:
http://rankexploits.com/musings/2015/mann-defamation-lawsuit-oral-argument/
Thanks, Rob, but I read that one last week. I suspect the author’s view of Michael Mann may affect his observations and opinions.
True Max-OK, for most commenters here, including yourself.
But not you, I’ll bet.
Me too Max_OK because while confirmation bias affects most ordinary people, it seems to be even more pronounced with people who comment on blogs as a hobby. Not a criticism and no judgments are being made, its just the way it seems!
Peter, you said for “most commenters here.” Most is not all. Who here do you believe is least influenced by confirmation bias, excluding you and me?
A few come to mind Max_OK. Matthew Marler, John Carpenter, Tony Brown and Vaughan Pratt seem open to all POV’s and would IMO change their mind if the data points that way.
The rest of us seem pretty well entrenched as far as AGW is concerned but there seems a lot of areas outside climate science where many of us are in general agreement.
As far as you and I are concerned Max we share a love of country life and a belief that the younger generation gets everything too easily. We appreciate that hard work is good character building stuff.
Although I’m not religious, I live pretty much by the protestant ethic, which values hard work. For different view, see
http://www.alternet.org/labor/why-protestant-work-ethic-menace-society
Enjoyed your link Max. Tongue in cheek but nonetheless rings true.
Pingback: Charlie Hebdo, Climate Scepticism & Free Speech | Atlas Monitor
Nice compilation by jbuc912 @ Atlas Monitor.
=====================
Isn’t Freedom of Expression Great !
Mosher, there was no nudity in this video and I couldn’t read the subtitles.
sorry Max
To add to yesterday’s enjoyable discussion we have this:
“An “ethic of justice or rights” is based on abstract, impersonal principles, like justice, fairness, equality or authority. People who prefer this style see ethical dilemmas as involving primarily a conflict of rights that can be solved by the impartial application of some general principle.” http://www.lmu.edu/Page23070.aspx That’s pretty much me. Conflict of rights in my case refers to a hierarchy of rights. For instance high up in my hierarchy is, Do not physically harm another. It would generally trump free speech rights. On this thread, I’m trying to apply a general principle to both cases. In Mann’s case some defamation principle is conflicting with the free speech principle. And there may be other principles in play as well. If the decision is clean, one principle will eventually win. Joshua pointed out context. That will change, but we strive for unchanging principles. At the link, the Ethic of justice is compared to the Ethic of care. That might explain some of the disagreements. The Ethic of justice “…seems to fit with a more legalistic approach to life that gives allegiance to some external source of authority.” That’s me again. I’ve spent some time promoting the CPA code of ethics as an example. We are legally bound to it if we want to be a practicing CPA. But I am merely suggesting scientists consider a voluntary code. The Ethic of care “approach is flexible, caring and subjective–appropriately so. It can respond quickly to changing circumstances and is not preoccupied with the idea of setting precedents.” I am not so much in favor of that approach. In my job the hard part can be the gray areas of the tax laws. I don’t want subjective guidance for subjective questions. Gray on gray. No thank you. Take the quick test: http://www.lmu.edu/Page23849.aspx Are you the Ethic justice or the Ethic of care? If the page doesn’t format correctly, try hitting the tab key.
For what it’s worth, I scored 5-4, as close to balance as you can get in a 9-question survey. Sounds fair.
I was Justice 7-2.
I was care 6:3
After reading a lot of opinions here, and I do think this post has been very productive in the airing of the situation(s); I can see that Mann and the Muslim low life murderers are both trying to put a chill on free speech. Beyond that, the details diverge quickly.
One nice thing about today is that three million copies of Charlie Hebdo have been published with Mohammad cartoons, partly with money set aside from Google. Charlie Hebdo was going broke, now CH is everywhere. That that, slime ball murdering Muslim militants!
From the article:
…
Paris (AFP) – This week’s three million copies of Charlie Hebdo, the first post-attack issue of the French satirical weekly, will defiantly feature caricatures of the Prophet Mohammed, its lawyer said Monday.
Related Stories
Mohammed holds ‘Je suis Charlie’ sign in new Charlie Hebdo AFP
Charlie Hebdo ‘survivor’s issue’ to sell outside France AFP
Charlie Hebdo to publish 1 million copies next week MarketWatch
Charlie Hebdo will publish one million copies of its new issue next week The Week (RSS)
Attacked satirical French weekly to print a million copies next week Reuters
The special issue, to come out on Wednesday, will also be offered “in 16 languages” for readers around the world, one of its columnists, Patrick Pelloux, said.
Charlie Hebdo’s lawyer, Richard Malka, told French radio the upcoming publication will “obviously” lampoon Mohammed — among other figures — to show staff will “cede nothing” to extremists seeking to silence them.
…
http://news.yahoo.com/weeks-charlie-hebdo-feature-mohammed-cartoons-lawyer-145010472.html
Regarding the problem of intolerance of speech on campuses, I recommend a trip over to the Foundation on Individual Rights in Education http://www.thefire.org/
Among other things, they rank campuses on a red-light, yellow-light, green-light score for freedom of speech based on universities’ formal policies and “speech codes.” Georgia Tech earned a red-light rating, meaning that it has at least one policy that on its face, regardless of interpretation or implementation, unambiguously infringes on protected expression:
http://www.thefire.org/schools/georgia-institute-of-technology/
It turns out that Tech has this First-Amendment-violating gem on the books: “Each member of our community must be committed to the creation of a harmonious climate because one cannot be neutral to this challenge. Those who are committed to it strengthen Georgia Tech and themselves. Individuals who choose not to commit to the challenge, via acts of intolerance, jeopardize their continued affiliation with the Institute. Those acts may be defined as attempts to injure, harm, malign, or harass a person because of race, religious belief, color, sexual orientation, national origin, disability, age, or gender.”
On the plus side, Judy’s memories of the University of Chicago appear to be relevant today as well:
http://www.thefire.org/fire-endorses-university-of-chicagos-new-free-speech-statement/
The skepticals have decided it is too hard to attack AGW scientifically, so now their tactic is to bring it down one scientist at a time. So far they are still struggling to bring the first one (Mann) down, and he keeps doing inconvenient things to defend himself like using legal recourse. This is making the plan a lot more of a hard slog than it might have seemed a few years ago. I think they need to try something or someone else. How about Hansen? There must be some material there.
Piffle.
Which is what I think putting their full force to bear on Mann is. They are just wasting time and energy on this sideshow. It doesn’t advance their cause against climate science and mitigation one bit.
Skeptics get off on vilifying Michael Mann. Addictions are hard to break. Try to imagine ClimateAudit without Mann.
JimD, after what has happened to Lomborg, Pielke pere, Judith Curry and more, I cannot believe you would advance that line of argument.
Have these people had their emails hacked or been brought to court to reveal more emails or had their postdoctoral research scrutinized by multiple committees, or had blog sites still devoted to nitpicking his work from 15 years ago? There is no parallel.
You’re right, JimD. There is no parallel. Pielke had his career derailed, Lomborg was hounded to high heaven and Curry has acknowledged that her career path has been more or less truncated because of her involvement in the debate. Oooh, a critical website… Oooh…
The Climategate emails were probably not hacked, by the way. It was probably a whistleblower. As for long-lasting blog criticism, I fail to see that as problematic–for someone who insists that scientist never graft instrument data on top of proxy data, sites that say otherwise probably sail right on by.
Mann has had over 100 papers, and they are still only criticizing two of the early ones. They have a long way to go to derail his career, but they keep pounding away on those two papers while he has moved on. People need to move on and find some more recent papers. There has been a lot of better tree ring and proxy paleo work since 1999, and you wouldn’t know it by reading their sites. Curry still does OK getting onto congressional panels and doing op-eds or being interviewed and quoted probably more than most scientists on climate. I wouldn’t call that derailed either. Not sure what you mean about Pielke.
Tom,
Really??
Judith chose an administrative career and slowed down on the science a looong time before stated this blog.
If Lomborg has been “hounded to high heaven” how the hell would you describe the Jihad against Mann?
IMHO, there’s an element of identity politics in the illogical and relentess vilification of Mann.
JimD, as Mann has published over 100 papers and is a tenured scientist who is invited to appear before the media and speak at conferences, it is hard to see how he has been injured. Pielke has had funding requests denied and invitations to write for IPCC withdrawn.
Max, I imagine McIntrye does imagine life without Mann. He would probably be happier playing tennis. But as long as Mann keeps doubling down on his errors, why should McIntyre let him get a way with it?
You seem to forget in all this that McIntyre was right and Mann was wrong. Or does that not matter any more?
Ack, tennis? And I just called you reliable.
=========
“Pielke has had funding requests denied…” – Fuller.
Oh, the poor darling….
Tom, anyone who has ever done research has had funding requests denied.
That’s a piss-poor conspiracy theory.
thomaswfuller2 said on January 13, 2015 at 2:28 am
“JimD, as Mann has published over 100 papers and is a tenured scientist who is invited to appear before the media and speak at conferences, it is hard to see how he has been injured. Pielke has had funding requests denied and invitations to write for IPCC withdrawn.
Max, I imagine McIntrye does imagine life without Mann. He would probably be happier playing tennis. But as long as Mann keeps doubling down on his errors, why should McIntyre let him get a way with it?
You seem to forget in all this that McIntyre was right and Mann was wrong. Or does that not matter any more?”
_____
Thomas, re Mann’s “hockey stick” I know McIntyre claims Mann’s methods were wrong, and I know the claims are controversial, but I don’t know he claims Mann’s conclusions were wrong.
I doubt McIntyre would rather be playing tennis than nitpicking Mann’s work. Most people like to do what they do best, and I’ll bet he’s a better nitpicker than tennis player.
Mann is McIntyre’s life. He should take out an insurance policy on Mann.
McIntyre is a world-class squash player in his age group. But I get the impression that pursuing Mann’s errors is not the binding constraint on his participation in that sport. More to the point, McIntyre has a much broader interest in the methods of paleoclimate study. He’s kind of a proxy nerd.
OK, here’s the lowdown, and it’s illustrated by a paradox in the principal. Though he’s loathe to discuss policy, and will loose the zamboni over the mere odor of it, I suspect he’s deeply concerned about the misapplication of science to policy. The Piltdown Mann’s Crook’t Stick is not the way to use science for policy; it is an error and can only have bad results.
But, that said, he’s a complex man, and I only hint at part of his motivation.
=====================
The skeptics are just shredding one crappy paper at a time. Did you see this?
http://wattsupwiththat.com/2015/01/12/monday-mirthness-more-sceptical-science-kids-scienz/
Check out the link to N. Lewis’ comment on The Blackboard. Precious.
What I don’t like about Lewis’s comment is how he uses precise numbers to three decimal places for the forcing when the error bars don’t even justify confidence in the first decimal place. He is too confident by far about the numbers. Judith needs to talk to him about that.
C’mon, we know the aerosols are fudge. All that chocolate ooze has helped elevate the calculations for sensitivity, so this irony is rich and milky. Jim, are you unaware what this mess has done for sensitivity, estimated or however precisely measured?
====================
It’s the ‘they multiplied when they should have divided’ meme. That’s the juicy bit.
kim, Lewis believes the IPCC aerosols to three decimal places. Even the IPCC doesn’t have that much confidence in them. There is a significant chance, according to the IPCC, that the total forcing does not exceed the CO2 forcing.
…but there’s also a significant chance that it does – and it’s the latter which you try to play down.
Of course the full range has to be considered possible and that is what the IPCC does with these uncertainties. Plus it is no comfort if other GHGs minus aerosols are between them enhancing the CO2 effect by 30%. This leaves even less room for natural variability, and leaves the Lewis and Curry estimate for CO2 doubling alone lacking an important factor in the real warming to be expected.
I love Jim D’s wide range great depth of climate science knowledge, his civility and skillful communication, but especially his certainty. Yes, that’s special.
================
‘range & great’. Jim D’s whipping his racehorse in the backstretch now, though.
=========
Jim Cripwell is having a horselaugh about now and Max Anacker is cackling in rhyme.
===============
A few comments.
1. Great thread today, Dr. Curry. Thank you for that.
2. Lots of very good comments. And, in general, very civil. That’s always a pleasant surprise.
3. I don’t have much to say about the current hot topic that occurred in France. Not because I’m afraid of expressing my opinion, but because I don’t think I have enough information to make a valid comment (and see #4). I will say that I find the deaths very sad. Life is already too short and precious.
4. I find the root issue of this subject, and thread, intriguingly similar to the one on Dr. Curry’s interview with Mrs. Green. And, it is (in my humble (and I sincerely mean that) opinion) perhaps being treated with the same level of thought and discussion. In short, I find the issue of “global climate cycles” (the ones whose cycle is in the 50,000 to 100,000 years of length) incredibly (to date, I suspect beyond comprehension) complex. And I think the same is true of our various social, ummm, problems (issues? well, whatever). And yet, we attempt to see both issues in terms of black and white. Or, 1 + 1 = 2. Or, the sound bites of our politicians. Or …. well, the list is lengthy.
I suppose I could be wrong. In fact, I’ve been wrong a lot of times. That said, I may need to use the above (# 4) in some work I’m doing. It has potential. Even if it’s wrong.
Thanks,
GeoffW
Freedom of speech, UK-style:
Mr Farage, leader of the anti-EU UK Independence Party, said mass immigration had “made it frankly impossible for many new communities to integrate.” “We do have, I’m afraid, I’m sad to say, a fifth column that is living within our own countries, that is utterly opposed to our values,” he said. “We’re going to have to be a lot braver and a lot more courageous in standing up for our Judeo-Christian culture.”
Leading British politicians criticised Mr Farage last week for speaking about a “fifth column”, accusing him of trying to use the Paris murders to score “political points”. Commenting on his latest remarks, Liberal Democrat foreign affairs spokesman Tim Farron said: “Nigel Farage’s politics of blame has no place in modern, diverse and tolerant Britain.”
http://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-30776186
Faustino, I do enjoy Farage’s fulminations, and he annoys all the right people. While I am no fan (at all!) of Le Pen and the French National Front, it’s worthwhile to remember that there was a campaign back in 1996 by senior staff of a far-left magazine with the specific purpose of having that party banned by law. The campaign collected 170,000 signatures.
The name of the far-left magazine was Charlie Hebdo.
Mosomoso (Je Suis Hypercacher Kosher)
We’ll have to cache that fort poudred irony in a special vault in my museum. Perhaps a 24 hour armed guard?
==============
What should be sympathy for private individuals and rage against terror has been turned into a promo for a dreary, offensive, extremist rag which was deservedly going under. Peter Hitchens, but few others, are seeing it.
I can only put it down to a cooler-than-thou mentality which makes it okay to ridicule the alleged misdeeds of a Bill Cosby (Tina Fey and friend pulling up just short of black-face) while pouring sympathy and excuses on that darling of the luvvie left, Roman Polanski. (And it was rape-rape. He enjoyed it so much he did it twice.)
How many conservatives marching for Charlie and identifying as Charlie know what a gutter of talentless, humourless drek that magazine is?
http://imworld.aufeminin.com/story/20130224/charlie-hebdo-une-14309_w1000.jpg
Even when they appal, they bore.
Mosomoso (Je Suis Hypercacher Kosher)
Sorry, I just meant to link, not show the pic on Judith’s site. My apologies. Please feel free to eliminate the pic, and my comment if necessary.
I so much like that ‘annoy’ and ‘ennui’ are cognates. ‘Ennuyer’ for form, w, are you happier?
===============
That might be worse than the New York Times.
I think most conservatives realize what a rag Charlie is but……
“It is right and good to say we are not at war with Islam, but it is dishonest to claim that there are no Muslims waging war against us. Falling back on sanitized euphemisms is the rhetorical equivalent of pixelating Mohammed; it fools no one except fools.
A free society cannot allow freedom to be held hostage to murderers. And that is why I favor running those images of Mohammed even if some of them offend me. Moderation, tolerance, and respect are essential to a free society, but we are in a moment where moderation, tolerance, and respect are too easily confused for appeasement. And that is why the jihadists are winning. They are forcing us into only bad options. The center is not holding.”
Chuckr, I’m perfectly fine with hunting down and killing the assassins. I’m fine with people publishing and saying what they like on the subject of religion, immigration, islamisation etc.
But why am I supposed to repeat, disseminate, re-publish or amplify what I do not like and do not agree with? I had no say in producing those oafish and unfunny cartoons. Even if they were not controversial, I’d be embarrassed to look at such lame scribblings, let alone help circulate them. If someone wants to provoke someone in the extreme that’s their business. If they get injured or killed as a result of their provocation I want the law to intervene and apply. And I will support the law with vigour.
However, if I hurl an insult at someone on this blog I will not expect others to “show courage” and insult in the same measure because of a perception that we are on the same team on a particular issue. I start it, I finish it.
I will never be Charlie. To me they are dreary, beige people trying to be colourful by shocking the bourgeois without realising they are themselves the bourgeois. Furthermore, they have shown in the National Front matter that they want free Charlie, not free speech.
I just want the thugs who murdered at Charlie Hebdo to be tracked and killed. On the other hand…
Je suis Hypercacher.
I agree with you in principle but sometimes you’ve got to stand with people you might otherwise not… to support a more important cause. Of course if you don’t think that cause is more important or the support is not effective then you’re going to come to a different conclusion Me(Je Suis Mayor of Rotterham)
The Moroccan-born mayor of Rotterdam has said Muslim immigrants who do not appreciate the way of life in Western civilisations can ‘f***off
Appearing on live television just hours after the shootings, Mayor Aboutaleb said Muslims who ‘do not like freedom can pack your bags and leave’.
Labour politician Ahmed Aboutaleb, a former journalist who was appointed mayor of the Dutch city in 2008, is known for his straight-forward stance on integration.
‘It is incomprehensible that you can turn against freedom,’ Mayor Aboutaleb told Dutch current affairs program Nieuwsuur (Newshour).
‘But if you don’t like freedom, for heaven’s sake pack your bags and leave.
‘If you do not like it here because some humorists you don’t like are making a newspaper, may I then say you can f*** off.
‘This is stupid, this so incomprehensible. Vanish from the Netherlands if you cannot find your place here. All those well-meaning Muslims here will now be stared at’.
So the scientific enlightenment diminishes to defending the right of pissant progressives to gratuitously offend an entire religion – and of a journalists right to slander anyone they feel like and call it lampooning? A sad day indeed in the decline of the west.
The prime duty of a citizen in a democracy is to respect the rule of law. Although that sometimes leads to the necessity of civil disobedience and in the extreme – if democracy itself is under threat – the grave responsibility to take up arms. It doesn’t lead to taking innocent lives it futile conflagrations. That’s just nihilistic madness.
I do think think Mann needs to go down big time – but it is a matter him bringing the lumbering weight of the law to such trivial ends.
… in futile… of him….
Pingback: I’m Not Charlie. But I Still Don’t Like What Michael Mann Did | The Lukewarmer's Way
http://www.theguardian.com/world/2015/jan/12/saudi-arabia-snowmen-winter-fatwa
Hey, sounds just like the federal EPA.
Why do enviros always look like fundamentalist extremists?
#pasCharlie
I lost the freedom to burn old tires in my back yard and pour used motor oil in the nearest creek. It makes me want to cry.
I am personally skeptical of the anti-Muslim bandwagon.
Is it not possible that fanatical Muslim groups are the main barrier to a one-world tyrannical government now that Western Europe and the United States have capitulated?
Speaking of Free Speech, Mark Steyn is on topic this morning:
http://www.steynonline.com/6751/allahu-hackbar
There are commenters here who are furiously rejecting any connection between Michael Mann and the perpetrators of the Charlie Hebdo massacre. And they have a point. It’s a matter of degree. The slaughter of satirists is immediate and shocking. By comparison, Mann’s methods to suppress speech are much more subtle and in fact would have been nearly invisible were it not for the Climategate emails that exposed the machinations of the coterie of climate scientists who control the IPCC and its output. Mann et al haven’t just suppressed speech through his lawsuits, they did it by exercising prior restraint of a sort by exerting pressure on the process of publishing scientific literature.
What makes Mann and his ilk as dangerous as those who would wantonly murder is his position as a favored agent of the state. They have a reciprocal relationship: Mann et al provide the state with the dubious science they need to assert firm regulatory control over energy production and consumption (trillions of dollars worth around the world), and they provide Mann et al with a lifetime of grants and salaries, as well as the courts in which to harass and disarm his (and their) enemies.
When Judge Weisberg ruled in Mann’s favor on the dismissal of the case on anti-SLAPP grounds, he repeatedly did so “in the light most favorable to the plaintiff.” Why he did that, rather than in a light most favorable to the First Amendment is a mystery that I’m sure will have judges in the higher courts scratching their heads. He makes only one passing reference to “actual malice,” and says, in effect, “let the jury decide,” presuming thereby that a magazine like National Review publishes columns in which their writers make statements they know to be false. Thus the courts become the knife of a thousand cuts with which to bleed the First Amendment to death in the service of the climate alarmist agenda– the lifeblood of the EPA’s recent power grab. In the same way that many magazines refuse to publish material that is even marginally anti-Islamic for fear of retaliation, so is it with those magazines who might want to accuse establishment climate scientists of producing a flawed product. Again, a matter of degree, but still effective.
As of December 2009, Mann and his associates had received over $6 million in government grants to pursue their studies.
http://spectator.org/blog/21046/manns-mad-money
(That does not count their salaries, which, in most cases, are also paid by the taxpayer.)
In June of 2009, in the depths of the Great Recession, Mann personally received $541,184 in economic stimulus funds, which was criticized by the National Center for Public Policy Research:
http://newsbusters.org/blogs/noel-sheppard/2010/01/14/climategate-scientist-received-economic-stimulus-funds-media-mum
Mann et al (and their friends in government) and the jihadists are in the same business: suppression of speech that confronts their ideology. The only difference is in their tactics.
Nice post. Totally agree on the seriousness of the Mann lawsuit and for the reasons you point out.
Since the 60’s our political system seems to have gone into an unstable oscillation between right facism and left facism. All we need is a few select laws to enable a runaway of power and this country and its long history of freedom is done. Its a boring example and I wish I knew history better and could provide another example, but just look at sequence of events that led to the power grab in Germany. Its was a grab by legal maneuvering, not by weapons.
Remember this old joke…
“Osama bin Laden, the leader of Al Qaeda, blamed the United States and developed countries for not halting climate change and said that the global economy should immediately abandon its reliance on the American dollar, according to an audiotape released Friday by the broadcaster Al Jazeera.
“Talk about climate change is not an ideological luxury but a reality,” Mr. bin Laden was quoted as saying in a report on Al Jazeera’s English-language Web site. “All of the industrialized countries, especially the big ones, bear responsibility for the global warming crisis.”
The authenticity of the tape could not be immediately confirmed, and Al Jazeera, which is based in Qatar, did not say how it had obtained the message.
But if substantiated, it would be Mr. bin Laden’s second public message within a week. On Sunday, Al Jazeera broadcast a one-minute tape in which Mr. bin Laden hailed the Dec. 25 attempt to bring down a plane bound for Detroit and warned of more attacks against the United States.
Mr. bin Laden, who is believed to be hiding in Pakistan near the Afghanistan border and has issued several other taped anti-West invectives, had not put one out in four months before the one about the attempted airline bombing.
In the message broadcast on Friday, Mr. bin Laden veered away from his traditional vows to inflict death and destruction on the United States, and instead discussed climate change, globalization and monetary policy in a message that he said was directed to “the whole world.”
He called for a worldwide boycott of American goods and the dollar. He faulted the United States for failing to sign the Kyoto Protocol, which sought to curb global warming by restricting greenhouse gas emissions. And he offered a word of praise for Noam Chomsky, the American linguist and liberal political activist.
“Noam Chomsky was correct when he compared the U.S. policies to those of the Mafia,” Al Jazeera quoted Mr. bin Laden as saying. “They are the true terrorists, and therefore we should refrain from dealing in the U.S. dollar and should try to get rid of this currency as early as possible.”
Bank and government officials in China, Russia and elsewhere have previously floated the idea of abandoning the dollar as the world’s reserve currency, replacing it with a basket of other currencies and commodities like gold.
But Mr. bin Laden’s aim in turning away from the dollar appears to be to inflict harm on the American economy.
“I am certain that such actions will have grave repercussions and huge impact,” he was quoted as saying.”
same punch line.
The light most favorable to the plaintiff is the rule the Judge has to apply to dismiss the case at this early stage (before discovery). This rule is applied to all such motions in all such cases – not just to the Mann defamation case.
Whenever you move to dismiss at an early stage – for example by saying that the case fails to state a proper claim – the court looks at the pleadings and assumes everything plead is true – then asks if everything is assumed true – is there a case?
If not – the case is dismissed.
Even if the appeal affirms the DC court’s decision not to dismiss there is still time to move for dismissal based on summary judgment or even later for a directed verdict.
Voip –
Exactly.
Why can’t we go back to the way it was before this assault on our freedom of speech?
You know, like some 200 years ago, when a black man had the right to protest the r*pe of his wife, or a black woman could speak out about having her child taken away? Or how about some 60 year ago, when a black kid could say they wanted to eat at a lunch counter or ride in the front of a bus. How about maybe 30 years ago, when a g*y person would be able to state their s*xual preference without any fear of discrimination?
Like you, I so alarmed that I won’t be able to express my views – ’cause you know Michael Mann and all. First they came for climate “skeptics,” you know what I mean? It’s the exact same alarm I might feel if I run into a jihadist wielding a k*lashnikov.
Well, not exactly, the same – only similar. You know, same, same but different.
==> “What makes Mann and his ilk as dangerous as those who would wantonly murder”
Thanks, potter. Imagine how impoverished the public discourse about free speech would be had you not made that contribution
Bakers.
http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2015/jan/12/colorado-cake-case-pits-religion-against-tolerance/
???
So showing how our free speech rights have grown enormously, for vast sectors of the public, violates blog moderation rules?
Ok. It us what it is.
Now back to alarmist whining about our road to tyranny.
RickA –
==> “Only if she sues.”
So someone can’t be a bully unless they sue someone? And all suits = bullying?
If Mann’s case has solid merits, he’ll probably win. In that case,I wouldn’t consider that bullying.
If Mann’s case has no solid merits, he’ll probably lose. In that case, I wouldn’t consider that bullying.
If the case is close, then he might win or he might lose; in that case, then it is probably a situation where we’ll benefit from more precedent and greater clarity regarding the laws we have in place to protect freedom of speech. In that case, I wouldn’t consider that bullying.
Our system of laws will survive this case no matter the ruling. Our freedom of speech will survive this case no matter the ruling.
All this self-serving hand-wringing about the Mann vs. Steyn case, and about bullying more generally, is amusing, IMO, on both sides.
IMO, Judith was right when she suggested more wearing of big boy pants – only she forgot to take her own pair out of her pants drawer.
Joshua – Mann is bullying by using lawsuits.
Against Ball and against Steyn/Simberg.
Judith is not bullying Mann by using lawsuits.
She merely defended herself against name calling by writing a post.
Perhaps Mann should think about that form of defense against name calling in the future.
Filing a lawsuit which has no prayer of winning makes it crystal clear he is a bully.
In my opinion history will not be kind to Michael Mann.
RickA –
OK. I think I understand now. And from that, I have a plan for going forward.
From now on, when anyone thinks that they have been defamed, they should just consult with you first to see if their case has any merit. If you say that it doesn’t, then they’ll just know to drop the case, because otherwise they’d be “bullying” (in this case, someone who makes a career out of insulting people for political reasons).
In fact, let’s just do away with the judicial system entirely. Who needs it? What role could it play? We’ll just let you decide on the merits of cases; if you can’t handle them all, you could appoint a few friends to take up the slack.
Thanks, potter. You have shown that you can make all the points you want to make about Mann without trivializing your arguments by piggybacking on the Paris massacre, which has nothing to do with Mann.
Do –
I do think it was ill-advised for Judith to have explicitly brought up the events in Paris in connection to the Mann-Steyn lawsuit. However, I also think you are going overboard in stating that there is no connection whatsoever between the tactics that Mann habitually uses and the tactics of the Islamists. In both cases they seek to win the argument by force: the Islamists by force of violence; the warmists by force of law. But in both cases by force rather than persuasion.
Can you sign on to that?
Really, this is spectacular –
==> “In both cases they seek to win the argument by force: the Islamists by force of violence; the warmists by force of law. ”
Yeah. Those dang Jihadis, taking Charlie Hebdo to court, to win an argument by using the “force of law.”
And the intolerance of Mann!! Imagine that, appealing to the rule of law = “using the force of law.”
If only we could go back to the days before people tried to “use the force of law.”
You know, beating each other with clubs would be a lot less expensive.
Joshua | January 13, 2015 at 2:14 pm |
Really, this is spectacular –
“If only we could go back to the days before people tried to “use the force of law.””
Some still don’t. Jihadists for example.
“You know, beating each other with clubs would be a lot less expensive.”
Yup. And just as fair.
Tom, why can’t you just say that Mann is trying to do whatever you think he is trying to do, by force of law? Why bring a massacre, which is heinously unlawful, into the story? Why give your detractors a reason to point out that you are using the tired old propaganda tactic of false equivalency and to ridicule you mercilessly on your own blog and on twitter? I am trying to help the lady to avoid these kinds of unforced errors. She just keeps digging herself in deeper. Tell her it’s ill-advised. I know what I am doing. I don’t need your advice.
Error? Can’t have that. Off with its head.
====
Sounds like Tom C wants to deprive us of the freedom to sue.
Joshua –
Your comment is unintelligible, as usual.
But from some of the other things you have written it appears you think that Mann truly thinks his reputation was damaged by Steyn and he is seeking just compensation. This is B.S. He calls other scientists “frauds”, etc. all the time and is not charging data falsification per se. He is seeking to bully others into silence.
Don –
Look, this was not a good rhetorical strategy on her part. All I’m saying is that there is, on some level, an analogy. In fact, Steyn often makes the point, in a satirical way, by speaking of the “climate mullahs”. McIntyre has also spoken of warmist “jihad”. It works on a satirical level but not on a serious prose level.
Tom –
Unlike you, i am not able to determine what Mann “really thinks.” i guess I’m just not enough of a skeptic, eh?
Anyway, judith calls scientists “deniers,” even Asia she describes such actions as intolerant. Dies that mean that she’s trying to bully people onto science, or engaging in rhetorical over reach? How do you know the difference?
Tom –
This is also beautiful:
“All I’m saying is that there is, on some level, an analogy.”
Ok some level, everyone here is analogous to an octopus, and not analogous to a blowfish.
Or is that the other way around?
You know, at some level.
Joshua-
You wrote:
“Anyway, judith calls scientists “deniers,” even Asia she describes such actions as intolerant. Dies that mean that she’s trying to bully people onto science, or engaging in rhetorical over reach? How do you know the difference?”
Do you realize that this is incoherent?
–Don Monfort | January 13, 2015 at 2:30 pm |
Tom, why can’t you just say that Mann is trying to do whatever you think he is trying to do, by force of law? Why bring a massacre, which is heinously unlawful, into the story? Why give your detractors a reason to point out that you are using the tired old propaganda tactic of false equivalency and to ridicule you mercilessly on your own blog and on twitter? I am trying to help the lady to avoid these kinds of unforced errors. She just keeps digging herself in deeper. Tell her it’s ill-advised. I know what I am doing. I don’t need your advice.–
But it is possible the Judith knows something that you do not.
Even if Judith wasn’t wildly successful in what she wants to do, and even if she wasn’t very bright in general, it’s still possible she knows something
which you do not.
Don: Suppression of speech connects them. It’s a danger regardless of the means used to impose it. Mann is obviously not a violent man, but he knows how to wreak havoc in other people’s lives. Ask Tim Ball who got sued by Mann for making a joke from the age of vaudeville. Anyone who reads the law knows the chances of these suits succeeding, at least in the US, are slim. The higher courts are almost certainly going to reverse any judgement that goes against plaintiffs. But Mann still wins, unless Steyn somehow prevails in his countersuit, which, according to some of the legal eagles who’ve posted at ClimateAudit, is unlikely, however devoutly to be wished. As Steyn has said, the process is the punishment.
I don’t know about you, but I don’t have several hundred thousand dollars laying around to defend myself in a frivolous and ideologically-motivated lawsuit.
Joshua asks “Dies that mean that she’s trying to bully people onto science . . .?”
Only if she sues.
Tom –
Typing on the phone while on the elliptical doesn’t work too well
Anyway, Judith calls scientists “deniers,” even as she describes such actions [calling people deniers] as intolerant. Does that mean that she’s trying to bully people onto silence, or that she’s engaging in rhetorical over reach? How do you know the difference?”
Kim, Judith is not some usually thoughtful and amusing anonymous blog character. I presume that she wants to maintain a reputation as a serious scientist. There is no good reason for her to try to argue some point, or to air some peeve, by linking a freaking civil lawsuit to a very recent massacre. It’s not working for her. It’s unseemly, for obvious reasons. And tasty fodder for the trolls.
Tom, you are just shifting the story line slightly away from the recent massacre to generic Islamist’s force of violence and on to satire about mullahs etc., but you are sticking with the false equivalency BS. Serious people understand that a civil lawsuit is not analogous in any meaningful way on any level to mass murder or any other kind of unlawful violent intimidation. No reason to go there.
Mann is within his rights in using the law to try to sanction some clown monetarily for a few easily avoided words that may or may not be found to be defamatory. Mann will probably lose. Even if he wins, Western civilization and skeptical climate scientists will very likely survive. And people will go right on criticizing Mann, with the smart ones using a different “f” word to describe the little runt. Steyn can even go on calling him the f—- word, as long as he can afford it.
SLAPP, crackle, pop, crisp AKs.
========================
Muslims aren’t doing anything new. Nothing about what and how they think has changed recently. With Western dollars flowing there since the 70s they’re now able to bring it here. They may now be able to change the political climate but neither them nor the West can change the climate of the Earth, which is still, Steady Eddie—
Jiansong Zhou and Ka-Kit Tung (Deducing Multi-decadal Anthropogenic Global Warming Trends Using Multiple Regression Analysis), looked for evidence of humanity cooking the globe. After excluding the effects of the AMO (Atlantic Multi-decadal Oscillation) trends, they found what they were looking for. However, humanity’s contribution had to be less than half of, previously deduced anthropogenic warming rates. Moreover, Zhou and Tung found no statistically-relevant evidence of neither an acceleration nor a pause in global warming over the last 100 years.
I like this example of restraining speech.
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/asia/china/11342151/Chinese-restaurant-promises-free-food-to-the-beautiful.html
Goota love Korean plastic surgery
I love Korean food, particularly live squid. You know it’s fresh.
I eat korean food exclusively.
this is great
Northern or Southern Korean?
=======
I’ll pass on the blowfish. Those fish contain a deadly poision. A small mistake in preparation can be fatal.
SK
my goal was to write one of these
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sijo
then I got distracted as I started my research.
blowfish as well.
U.S. military social media accounts apparently hacked by Islamic State sympathizers
H/T Steyn Online. An article well worth reading.
Skeptics approve of hacking, so what’s the problem?
Under “twitter” ClimateEtc has a link to an interesting article on self-censorship.
http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2015/jan/11/paris-attacks-we-must-overcome-fear-or-selfcensorship-will-spread
The author seems to be saying we should not be afraid to use freedom of speech to antagonize. I’m not sure using freedom of speech to put a bullseye on my back is always a good idea. It depends on what’s at stake. If nothing can be gained, what would be the point of inviting trouble?
but its not cyber terrorism
its cyber vandalism
Plectus, my boy, plectus.
=====
Est-ce qu’on peut voir des idées pour ce qu’ils sont?
http://cbsnews1.cbsistatic.com/hub/i/2015/01/12/d2cf3344-706c-46bd-bf9d-a6877467f406/70be98de65dbfc4f763d937de2feafc7/hebdo.jpg
Interestingly, if the French decide there is no place for religious-based violence in their place they must use force.
Also interesting is how the French use force against self-interest based violence, such as rape and mugging.
Except in in hundreds of French “no-go” zones?
The U.S. has “no go zones” too, but probably less self-policing than those in France. The U.S and France probably wouldn’t have “no go zones” if each country had only one culture, but it’s too late for that. Anyway, it’s people like you who caused this problem in the first place.
http://www.snopes.com/politics/religion/nogozones.asp
Max –
==> “The U.S and France probably wouldn’t have “no go zones” if each country had only one culture, ”
What are you talking about?
Well, if a country’s population was all one race and one religion, there would be no “no go zones” based on race and/or religion. But it’s too late for that in the U.S. and France, so different groups have to find a way to get along.
Contrary to Joshua’s citations, there is a huge problem with the Muslim-dominated regions in France. Making up only about 8-10% of the population, they account for 60% of the prison population. And no, this is not due to “islamophobia” or (as is bizarrely charged) racism.
Max –
How are you defining ‘no-go zones,” in the U.S. and in France?
I recently lived for 14 years in a neighborhood that some might call a “no-go zone.” It wasn’t a “no-go zone for me,” although many people might be afraid to go there – because they don’t have a realistic perception of the associated risk.
Joshua, to me a “no go zone” is an area with a high crime rate. I avoid poor all-black neighborhoods in large U.S.cities because crime rates in these areas are high. All I know about poor all-muslim neighborhoods in France is what I read, but if crime rates are high in these areas I would avoid them too.
My fear of crime does not make me want to exercise my freedom of speech by drawing hateful cartoons of blacks and muslims. Hate can give freedom of speech a bad name.
https://pbs.twimg.com/media/B63_50aCQAAZ0JS.png:large
…spoken like a Frenchman.
Max –
First, Wags’ reference to the Fox News meme of “no-go zone,” was different than what you’re describing. Did you look at the link I provided?
Second, I would suggest that you consider thinking a bit about your perception of risk versus the reality of risk. Up to you, of course.
When CNN talks about the “Republican model of integration” which even they put in quotes, they’re talking about the Leftist establishment of the French republic, which are a reflection of the French people, who are very prejudiced people –e.g., they’re anti-Semitic too. The Eurocommie global warming agenda is more an act of anti-Americanism than science and Obama was their presidential choice.
Joshua, a high crime rate is not my perception, it’s a fact. I used to work in an area that had a high crime rate, and although I never was a victim, a co-worker was. I prefer to avoid these areas.
Yes, my description of a “no go zone” is different than the French description, but in France would these places be called “no go zones” if their crime rates weren’t high?
Max –
Of course, a crime rate is not just a perception. And I’m not saying that you should or shouldn’t avoid those areas. Just questioning the reality of your risk perception.
Anyway, have a good night.
When name calling is all you’ve got, is the name mightier than the word ?
“There can be little political ambiguity behind the French government’s decision to deploy Daesh as a linguistic weapon.”
http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/worldviews/wp/2014/09/17/france-is-ditching-the-islamic-state-name-and-replacing-it-with-a-label-the-group-hates/
http://judithcurry.com/2015/01/11/charlie-challenging-free-speech/#comment-663729
@TomC, who wrote:
I think it was a perfectly reasonable grouping to make. Satire IS serious prose, deadly serious. Judith, on the other hand, in an offhand remark pointed out that the Jihadists and Mann have a similar mission and that if you defend Charlie, you should also defend Steyn and Simberg. Who can disagree with that? Speech suppression is abhorrent no matter how you execute it. As one who has herself been professionally smeared by Mann and who did NOT respond with a lawsuit, she had every right to do so.
You can take Steyn’s satire even further by saying that the climate mullahs come together at the IPCC and issue fatwas and it’s not even a stretch since the Assessment Reports almost have the force of law. They are often the basis of the reams of environmental law and regulation that are being written around the world. That’s not necessarily a bad thing, but a lot of fatwas are not either. Because the tactics of Mann et al are so subtle, because people can’t see how despicable the methods being used by the climate mullahs frequently are, because this is made to appear as just another nasty political dispute between warring political factions therefore anything goes, the danger to free speech is even more pronounced than it is by an obvious frontal assault like the one in Paris. People are incensed by a violent attack. They respond more passionately than they would to the kind of below the radar tactics that the climate mullahs use, which they always deny and soft-peddle anyway.
potter –
I think I meant “literal” in my comment rather than “serious”. Using satiric language signals that the comparison is not literal, even though it might be very serious.
Mann v. Steyn is very serious, maybe not in and of itself, but like all cases, in that it can establish precedent.
Je suis Charley Chaplain!
Judith –
Considering that you provide Congressional testimony on behest of Republicans, and you don’t listen to anyone who doubts that ACO2 affects the climate, you may have a bit of a problem:
Chairman of the House Subcommittee on Energy:
emphasis added so you can get right to the point, Judith.
And your point is … ?
A long time David Brooks reader and listener, he is once again spot on. End the oppression.
Pingback: Je Suis Hypocrit | Drawnlines Politics
Charlie on forgiveness and freedom of speech:
http://www.theguardian.com/media/2015/jan/13/charlie-hebdo-cover-magazine-prophet-muhammad
“You cannot have a march through the streets of Paris attended by 46 world leaders, 4 million people, climaxing with a shout of ‘We are not afraid’ and then not print the central object of contention.”
I’m like that when I’ve got 4 million around me, all agreeing with me.
Charlie Hebdo represents that French urban Left which strives to reconcile stifling socialism with green beggary and unending bistro lunches for themselves. They are grim conformists right down to their grunge grooming and Bertolt Brecht leathers. I doubt they care much about anybody’s freedom but their own.
But Charlie Hebdo did NOT have 4 million around them. They were isolated and exposed in a correctoid, litigation-fearing culture too timid say Merry Christmas. And yet they were NOT afraid.
The 4 million herd kind of misses the point, don’t you think? Let people stand alone as Charlie Hebdo did, and then try some heroic defiance. (I just heard the sound of thousands of Guardian readers folding their protest banners.)
Je Suis Hypercacher.
==> “too timid say Merry Christmas. ”
War on Christmas!!! Everybody drink!
The turkeys are winning.
–The 4 million herd kind of misses the point, don’t you think? Let people stand alone as Charlie Hebdo did, and then try some heroic defiance. (I just heard the sound of thousands of Guardian readers folding their protest banners.)
Je Suis Hypercacher.–
I am impressed by a nearly 4 million herd.
But it seem the point was to be in that herd.
They were summoned and they came- that is about it.
When people try to get a million man march [and fail] and you
get the magic of 4 million showing up.
Something about it is important.
One can spin it, And it will be endless spun.
But in the end, one can’t capture it.
It just happened and it will have consequences.
gbaikie, can’t help but think there would be no herd at all if it had just been the Kosher Supermarket. Wrong martyrs, no luvvie appeal.
Hope I’m wrong.
Je suis Hypercacher.
mosomoso said on January 13, 2015 at 11:42 pm
“Charlie Hebdo represents that French urban Left which strives to reconcile stifling socialism with green beggary and unending bistro lunches for themselves.”
_____
I probably could tolerate the stifling socialism if I got unending bistro lunches. I’m not sure about the green beggary. Does it go on the sandwiches?
Hasn’t been worked out yet. The guys producing the sandwiches are slow to live the dream.
Je suis Hypercacher.
–gbaikie, can’t help but think there would be no herd at all if it had just been the Kosher Supermarket. Wrong martyrs, no luvvie appeal.–
You could be right.
It seems to me the French tend very keen on blasphemy.
I can’t say I really understand it. Though it seems to be obviously related to France and it’s myths/history.
Anyhow and whatever the reason, seems to point out the importance of blasphemy.
Long live blasphemy!
The French have lived for centuries with open public hostility to religion and this has produced interesting results. For example, the only periodical on the long-term rise in France is La Croix, the main Catholic paper.
In France, I am far more conscious of active Catholicism and strong family values than in Spain or Italy.
The other thing – and I’ve noticed it myself tramping across France – is the high fertility rate. And, no, it does not come from immigrant births or church prompting. The French natives marry and have plenty of children, regardless of religion or economy. Interesting.
Something tells me she is still a great nation, capable of going against the grain in a very sudden way, just like those famous rugby counter-attacks from Les Bleus’ own line.
Her sudden conversion from dismal energy poverty to nukes still surprises the world in a way no shoddy and blasphemous cartoon ever could. Odd that it happened, odd that we are still digesting it. Some pretend it hasn’t really happened, half a century on. French nuclear: that’s what I call French radicalism. Allons, enfants.
Je suis Hypercacher
moso, Janet Albrechsten wrote in a similar vein in today’s Australian. Execrpts:
“…We won’t win this long and sinister battle over Western freedoms with unity walks, neat slogans and hashtag trends on Twitter.
“Among the leaders standing shoulder to shoulder at the front of the free speech march in Paris on Sunday was Egyptian Foreign Minister Sameh Shoukry. How about he return home and release from prison journalists such as Peter Greste? Turkish Prime Minister Ahmet Davutoglu marched too. Perhaps he should admit that marching for free speech doesn’t sit well with Turkey holding a two-year record — ahead even of Iran and China — for jailing the most journalists. When Turkey reverses that record, it can hold its head high at free speech rallies. Anything less is shoddy grandstanding. …
“But how does it sit with [Tony Abbott’s] decision to drop reforms of 18C of the Racial Discrimination Act, a section that prohibits speech that is offensive, insulting, language that humiliates or intimidates? Section 18C is a direct hit on free speech in Australia. Section 18C feeds the marketplace of outrage where people are treated as victims and encouraged to scream loud to shut down debate they find offensive. Hence Andrew Bolt’s legitimate opinions were struck down when a judge, relying on section 18C, said he objected to the “tone” of Bolt’s column.
“The only difference with the attack in Paris is the terrorists opted for guns, rather than laws, to shut down offensive words and pictures. The means is different. The aim is the same. …
“As Charlie Hebdo cartoonist Bernard Holtrop told a Dutch newspaper on the weekend, “we have a lot of new friends.” Holtrop then said “We vomit on all these people who suddenly say they are our friends … They’ve never seen Charlie Hebdo.” “A few years ago, thousands of people took to the streets in Pakistan to demonstrate against Charlie Hebdo. They didn’t know what it was. Now it’s the opposite, but if people are protesting to defend freedom of speech, naturally that’s a good thing …”
“Yes, it’s a good thing. But it’s only meaningful in a battle over Western values if we, the people, and our leaders do something more than protest and talk.
“In the hours after the Paris terrorist attacks, Newsweek featured this headline: “After Paris Attack, News Outlets Face Difficult Choice Over Controversial Magazine Covers.” Difficult? Really? How little we have learned. Publish the damn covers. As political academic, Jytte Klausen, ironically from Brandeis University, said last week, “The editors and cartoonists at Charlie Hebdo were targeted because, over the past five years, they have been left alone standing in defence of press freedom against the jihadist Kulturkampf.”
“When Australians who march under the chic ‘‘Je suis Charlie’’ slogan start demanding we repeal section 18C, then they can claim legitimate solidarity with Charlie. Until then, their actions are feel- good gimmickry. Charlie Hebdo deserves the last word. In 2012, Gerard Biard, the newspaper’s editor-in-chief explained his magazine’s decision to publish the Mohammed cartoons: “If we say to religion, ‘You’re untouchable’ we’re f* ked.””
http://www.theaustralian.com.au/opinion/columnists/feel-good-friends-of-free-speech/story-e6frg7bo-1227183812325
A friend of mine was legal officer for a university union. He told me once that if he dared to match a female colleague’s Gough Whitlam screensaver with one of his own, perhaps one of Sir Robert Menzies, he would be the subject of a complaint and could easily lose his job. When I chortled in disbelief he told me he was quite serious.
At a very large gathering around the time of the republic debate one of the university’s leading academics demanded a public show of hands by any monarchists in the auditorium. Hardly a hand was raised, of course.
Seems to be the era of the reverse thumbscrew. They have ways of making you not speak.
Austalian Newspaper 15th Jan, Brendan O’Neil commentary:
‘Why the Left won’t stand up to the new left anti-Semitism.
…as the [kosher store] act of anti-semitism was taking place,
what were the opinion-formingset and right-on glitterati
worrying their well-groomed heads about? Islamphobia.
The possibility of post-Charlie Hebdo violence against
Muslims.’
http://media.boingboing.net/wp-content/uploads/2015/01/Freedomwww-scarfolk-blogspot-com.jpg
Here is a simple rules of thumb about freedom of speech: if you aren’t offending someone, you aren’t making full use of your freedom of speech.
Does referring to ISIL in the pejorative , as more national leaders are wont to do, celebrate or offend freedom of speech ?
http://www.theguardian.com/world/2015/jan/12/tony-abbott-say-hell-now-use-daesh-instead-of-isil-for-death-cult-but-why
Is freedom of speech in the hands of the ignorant & malevolent just a license to insult and offend ?
Mosh:
<blockquote.My concern.
By engaging Mann she will become Mann.
Possibly. But it’s also true that by not engaging Mann, by staying silent, she becomes what Mann wants her to become. His whole schtick is to intimidate and silence.
What about Steve Mc? Does he become Mann if he engages Mann? Of course not. But, I know what you are getting at. If she engages Mann on his terms she risks the danger of becoming Mann. I don’t think she’s done that here in this thread. She made a quick and incisive point: if “I am Charlie,” then I should support Steyn et al against Mann. For obvious reasons.
Yeah potter, she made a point that will resonate. The next time she goes up to D.C. to testify before Congress some smarmy Democrat will take his turn at the mike to hit her with this: “Dr. Curry, aren’t you the climate scientist who equated your fellow climate scientist, Dr. Michael Mann, with the terrorist perpetrators of the Charlie Hedbo massacre? They are bedfellows in the war on free speech, or something equivalent to that?” I wonder what she will say. I hope she comes up with some explanation that I haven’t seen here.
The operative term there, Don, is “smarmy Democrat.” Who cares what they say?
She made a valid point. You don’t need an AK-47 to threaten freedom of expression.
That’s a good one, potter. Maybe she will use that thing about the AK47. You should probably make sure she knows what the AK47 is. They will have follow-up questions. I hope it’s televised.
Speaking of AK47:
http://www.hackneygazette.co.uk/entertainment/ak47_the_porn_star_turned_artist_who_held_banksy_to_ransom_1_2979043
I really hope potter is not suggesting we ban alarmists from expressing themselves through the use of AK47s.
No, willie. Potter is suggesting that a civil lawsuit in the hands of Mikey Mann is just as malicious and destructive as an AK47, in the hands of a murderous terrorist. It’s called false equivalency. It’s pathetically weak. I hope Judith has learned her lesson and doesn’t go there again.
Thank you. Finally. A civil lawsuit in the hands of Michael Mann is like putting an AK-47 in the hands of a child.
Let’s make that a suicide vest.
===================
That’s pathetic, kim. You are losing your balance. You are in danger of falling off your perch. Get a grip.
Don, I’m trying to make the point that you are arguing an extreme point. There is some equivalence, and there is value in the metaphor. I understand that you don’t see that.
But you hurt your case, which has merit, with the extremity of your rhetoric. Now, me, I’m allowed.
====================
You are lost, kim.
“She made a quick and incisive point: if “I am Charlie,” then I should support Steyn et al against Mann. For obvious reasons.”
“She made a valid point. You don’t need an AK-47 to threaten freedom of expression.”
Potter is saying that Judith says the obvious reason we should support Steyn et al against Mann is because you don’t need an AK47 to threaten freedom of expression. WTFreak does that mean? Can you explain? Do you agree with that nonsense?
WTFreak does a little run-of-the-mill tort lawsuit have to do with AK47s used to commit premeditated mass murder? They are about as equivalent as 7 and 42,807,027. Oh, but there are some sevens in the big number.
I asked you to rate a tort lawsuit and premeditated mass murder on a scale of 1 to 10, and you wouldn’t do it. I know why. I will have to help you. Let’s use a scale of 1 to 43,000,000. The tort lawsuit weighs in at 7 and the premeditated mass murder tips the scale at 42,807,027. Not even close. But you can call it somewhat equivalent, if you want to. I never took you for a Kool-Aid drinker, kim.
I think Steve has avoided becoming his enemy.
He knows his enemy but has largely avoided
Adopting mannian tactics.
Judith seems to be slouching toward mannian
Tactics.
In the end looked at from above the fray both
Sides adopt the tactics of the other
Stalemate.
Delay
A draw is win for skeptics.
Briar patch or tar-baby, you pick ’em, Uncle.
===========
A draw is win for those milking the tax payers.
It’s apparently a win-win.
In the meanwhile the important question is will Obama further
destroy the democratic party and will the US continue to lead
the world in oil production?
No, not Judith. Mann should have realized the silliness of his lawsuit and dropped it.
Dr. Curry has used science to “fight” the warmists. Mann has used the courts. I’ve thought before this post that he should have been able to use science to defend himself – but by using the courts, he implies he knows his science is weak. At least, that’s my take on it.
It would have been much less expensive to fight through reason and persuasion than through the courts.
If Dr. Curry’s science silences the opposition, it will be because she was right and they were wrong.
Jim, Mann is exercising his right to file a civil lawsuit because he says he feels bad and has been damaged by defamatory speech. He is suing over a few words that could have easily been avoided and the writer could have still thoroughly lambasted Mann. See how Steve Mc. does it. Nobody has been stopped or inhibited from making scientific arguments against Mann. That is a strawman argument. Steyn is still attacking Mann with the same language. See Brandon S. Let the courts and a jury decide. Isn’t that how we do it here? Michael Mann’s little tort lawsuit is not going to end free speech as we know it. That is hysterical, hyperbolic nonsense.
I apologize, jim. I reviewed what you wrote and I misread you the first time.
Lesson for, Judith. That’s how you pull your foot out of your mouth. As quickly and as gracefully as possible.
Steyn isn’t even a scientist. Steyn did use some strong language concerning Mann’s work, but, in a nut shell, who really takes him seriously? I suppose some people might, but will other scientists? Did some people in the government take Steyn to heart and refuse grant money? Legally, the courts will decide that, but the rest of us can opine on it at will.
Sure, Mann has every right to take Steyn to court. No one can stop him. But OTOH, it’s OK for people to object to it if they choose too. There’s no lead involved in that.
A lot of people take Steyn seriously, jim. He is a political commentator, who sometimes uses satire. Send him an email and ask him if he is just a joker, or does he want his opinions to be taken seriously. Ask him if he was just kidding, when he said what he said about Mann.
Of course, people are free to criticize Mann’s lawsuit and his shiny head, his science and his portliness. And when those of us who want Mann to fail see some critics make fools of themselves, we are free to encourage them to stop the self-defeating foolishness. I am on your side, jim.
Breaking news which have an impact on our current search for common values:
http://www.newyorker.com/humor/borowitz-report/republicans-expose-obamas-college-plan-plot-make-people-smarter
Let alone for alarmists, we all want free speech.
However, do we really want more people to express smarter ideas?
–However, do we really want more people to express smarter ideas?–
Not sure. How about giving an example of one smart idea.
You can’t have more people expressing smart ideas unless you have more smart people. I think the question is can we have too many smart people? Too many could result in a mismatch between the jobs people want and what employers need.
You really should think about what you say before you say it
Why, you don’t?
Ha Ha ! That was to easy.
Know any college graduates who would be happy in careers flipping burgers, mopping floors, or mowing grass?
The problem is that companies want experienced people when they have only entry level people usually who have just graduated. The companies won’t bite the bullet and train new recruits in their particular niche. They would rather hire an Indian with experience and a green card with the added bonus of paying less than 80% of what a US citizen would expect.
Right on, jim2. No wonder why so many educated people become alarmists.
That we leave our youth spend time studying prevents them from getting what matters: experience. That only makes one smarter. The only tuition that ought to be free should be programs where you get to get experience. The military has this. There are also good programs in retail.
As far as thinking is concerned, what Denizens provide here ought to be enough for most of us.
Willard sounds bitter, but at least he isn’t whimpering.
===============
Obama has benefited from the low information voter – the one smoking dope on the couch and sucking money from the rest of us.
Willard –
Most analyses show that it is the Dems that benefit from low information voters.
He completely missed the point about the value of propaganda on the low information voter. It’s always the same question, the same question; will you have fries with that? Only a hundred and fifty calories and lots of that is fat which is good for you today anyway.
================
You got that right, Tom C. See how alarmists conspired to transform this into a tragedy:
http://www.forbes.com/sites/cedricmuhammad/2013/08/27/the-tragedy-of-rush-limbaughs-low-information-voter-theory/
How many liberal couch-potato pot smokers do you think Rush finances with the work of his more than freewheeling speeches?
Silly Willard, nobody has enough information going into the voting booth, except, of course, me. But most of the names I’ve never heard of, and the issues are couched in legalese lawyers can misinterpret.
=========================
Tom makes a good point.
For example, if only blacks had the information that conservatives have, they’d realize that they’d be voting in their own best interests if they just voted Republican. And conservatives keep trying to tell them that, but they just won’t listen.
You know, folks like Tom C are big adherents to the “information deficit” theory… If only people had more information, they’d see the truth…
Oh.
Wait.
Nevermind.
Heh, ‘What’s the Matter With Everywhere?’
==================
Joshua | January 14, 2015 at 1:45 pm |
Tom makes a good point.
For example, if only blacks had the information that …
+++++++++++++++++++
Josh is the only one who brought up black people. We were discussing low information voters. Not sure where you got this.
==> “Not sure where you got this.”
It’s an argument I see made often (and I’ve seen it made by “conservatives” here at this site) linked to elitism about how if blacks only knew what was good for them (i.e., had more information and realized that Republicans promote policies that would be more beneficial for the AA community) they wouldn’t support Demz. I don’t know whether you, in particular, have ever made that argument.
So what information in your opinion is it that they are lacking? Do they not know that giving tax breaks to the rich, cutting benefits to the poor, and deregulating the Republican’s corporate sponsors is good for them?
jim2 –
Joshua brings up race because he is an unscrupulous demagogue. I was referring to numerous studies that show republicans to be more literate about politics and current affairs. Here is one from Pew just picked at random, but there are dozens of others.
http://www.people-press.org/2011/11/07/what-the-public-knows-in-words-and-pictures/
Absolutely, Tom C. That Republicans are more knowledgeable about who controls Congress, where’s Israel, and how much is the Dow Jones was the knock-out argument that we needed to show that Dems benefit from the LIVs.
The picture gets even more defined when we turn within the party:
http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/wonkblog/wp/2014/12/02/tea-partiers-and-traditional-republicans-are-split-on-science/
More important freedom of speech developments;
Charlie Hebdo was facing bankrupty, but the French Govt has stepped in to fund it and ensure it keeps going.
And a French comedian was been arrested for saying something not appropriately sympathetic of Charlie et al.
My friend’s gonna have to rename her dog. Her pit bull is named Charlie and is having an identity crisis.
=======================
Yep, Dieudonne, another lecturing bore who gets his fame from shocking, has been arrested on the strength of a Facebook entry (typically lame and nasty). Like Charlie Hebdo he is a gutter controversialist but his targets are of a different flavour, and he aims much lower, going well beyond insult. The mood (rightly) is against him and for the bores of Charlie. It will be interesting to see if the Charlie bores speak out in favour of Dieudonne and his free speech. Mind you, the guy is low, and this time has expressed sympathy for one of the Hypercacher gunmen.
There have been other arrests and prosecutions just for uttering opinions seen as favouring terrorism, but nobody should be surprised. Some years ago I spoke with the widow of a French scholar who was responsible for reviving Occitan language in the media in southern France. She showed me a children’s book he had written in the old tongue. The word for parrot in Occitan, papagai, was on the front page. He was investigated by the police just for using that word, which they thought might have deviant or sexist connotations. Apparently a police investigation was easier than opening a dictionary.
If you’re wondering where’s a policeman when you need one in France…now you know.
Should my country legalise citizen participation in executing convicted terrorist assassins, I’m right here, ready to pull any levers or push any buttons. But I am so not Charlie…or Dieudonne.
Je suis Hypercacher.
News on war on free speech, just in: Dozens arrested for supporting murderous terrorist attack on free speech. No report yet from authorities on the number of supporters of Mann’s little civil lawsuit that have been rounded up in the crackdown. Update coming at the top of the hour.
http://www.cbc.ca/news/world/charlie-hebdo-attack-france-arrests-54-for-defending-terrorism-as-magazine-sells-out-1.2900109
This is how professionals use false equivalency to ridicule false equivalency. It’s easy. Once someone has played the very weak false equivalency card, they are a sitting duck.
This is exactly what needs to happen, Don. The Muslim militants need to be eliminated from Western society. You can call it moral equivalency if you like, but we in the West need to defend our values and our way of life. Muslims have several Muslim countries to choose from, the West isn’t the place for them.
Yes jim,
To protect free speech, we need to start arresting people for saying things.
Yeah, Don.
We need to keep giving all that money to Egypt and sending all those dollars to Saudi Arabia for their oil and hatin’ on Mann, because they are all a part of protecting free speech.
It will be interesting to watch libertarians like so many of my much beloved “denizens” line up in support of an enhanced security state and greater enforcement of (politically correct?) hate speech laws in France,
The “tyranny of political correctness,” Judith?
Perhaps horrific events shouldn’t be exploited and simplified to pursue partisan agendas?
Michael – you are too PC for your own good. This is an “us against them” situation. It probably doesn’t fit into your “I’m OK, You’re OK” world view, unfortunately.
I rejoice every time I get cut off by a ‘Co-Exist’ bumpersticker. Makes my day.
==============
I agree with the need to defend our values and so on. I would have to know about the people arrested, on a case by case basis, to decide what was justified. I have some Muslim friends, who are very nice people and good Americans. Some of them working to catch terrorists. We should not lock them up, or gratuitously insult their religion to make a point, or to make a buck. I will explain why we should show some sensible restraint:
First , it’s not right to mess with innocent people and their religion, period. Second, in a war on terror wherein the terrorists gain support and recruits when one burns their holy book or insults their prophet, one should avoid doing those things, unless one is not very smart and one doesn’t care about one’s protectors who have to face the terrorists in actual firefights and the innocents who are potential victims of suicide bombings, planes flown into buildings, etc. One might say; well let’s do it anyway. Free speech! I say, if one feels compelled to poke the hornets nest, one should try to control the urge and wait to do it until after the front-line defenders of Western democracy have defeated the terrorists. Just my humble opinion. I don’t think you are the one I am talking about, jim. Don’t take it personally.
I was not commenting on moral equivalency or the justification for the arrests. I was ridiculing the false equivalency drawn between Mann’s little civil lawsuit and the murderous attack on Charlie et al.
I understand what you mean now, Don. While I currently don’t have Muslim friends, I have in the past. But the ones I was closest to were agnostics. I knew some who were practicing and they didn’t have much good to say about the US, even though they were here. That’s why I would just watch and infiltrate their organizations. But when we find one militating against us, we should act swiftly and decisively.
I don’t feel the need to insult them, but if someone does, I do not support Muslims killing them or harming them.
of course jim.
I have noticed a odd little dynamic in this glorious defence of free speech (oh, except for saying ‘denier’ ).
Naturally, it’s the fault of the PC crowd and their tyranny of tolerance etc….and the same time the anti-Islam brigade are bemoaning the lack of equality and tolerance in Muslim countries.
Michael
==> “oh, except for saying ‘denier’”
One of the more amusing ironies is watching “skeptics” whine incessantly about the use of the term “denier,” even as they whine incessantly about the “tyrrany of political correctness,” even as many of them (for example Judith) call other people “deniers” and routinely sling other pejoratives.
It reminds me of when Judith and other “skeptics” complain about referring to a “consensus” even as she tells us that she doesn’t listen to any scientists that doubt that ACO2 affects the climate (because they aren’t part of a consensus view).
It reminds me of when Judith and other “skeptics” complain about an “appeal to authority” even as they highlight the opinions of people like Dyson and Keenan because of their “authority.”
Irony-a-palooza.
Mikey and joshie, do you fellas think it’s OK that many countries jail so-called Holocaust deniers, but it’s OK in those same countries to dump on the Muslim religion? I will add, that they don’t jail deniers of the Christian Armenian Holocaust. What say you merry gentlemen?
Don –
I don’t really know much about the specifics of the jailing of holocaust deniers – the details might be important. My instinct would be that such laws are overreach; In general… it would obviously be a potential infringement of free expression. But when speech violates the laws that are democratically drafted and implemented, the issues become complicated. I’m not one for standing on abstract principles without considering context (see discussion with Ragnaar elsewhere in this thread).
I think of the practice in Japan after the war to shun patriotism, with the more recent development of laws being implemented to mandate patriotism in educational curricula. How could you make any sense of that w/o understanding the post war and contemporary contexts?
Thanks for the meandering, joshie. You could familiarize yourself with the details of people getting jailed for being so-called Holocaust deniers and get back to us. Use your irony detector. You should get a few loud beeps. That will turn you on.
Don,
I don’t think people should be jailed for saying that the Holocaust didn’t happen.
Joshua
“I don’t really know much about the specifics of the jailing of holocaust deniers”
just click for a start.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Laws_against_Holocaust_denial
Not sure why I should care much about it. But I spent 5 minutes perusing the Wikipedia site…
As a philosophical question, it seems quite problematic to me. As a practical question, it seems unlikely to me to be a measure that is likely to achieve the intended goals.
I find it quite interesting that in Poland, holocaust-denial laws are accompanied by legal restrictions on denying the crimes of communism.
In a general sense, it’s not my cup of tea (, but I’m also a little reluctant to pass judgement on democratically drafted and implemented laws that reflect the majority sentiment of people who directly experienced horrendous impact of intolerance that was accompanied by hate speech. I understand why others wouldn’t share my sentiment.
However, on a larger scale – I don’t see a meaningful parallel to Steyn vs. Mann or the drama-queening that is so pervasive in the climate wars. Holocaust denial is about meaningful issues. I suppose the case could be made that unfettered holocaust denial might occur on a ignificant scale that could actually result in significant hate crimes. I don’t see that happening in the climate wars. That’s one of the reasons why, although don’t defend the use of the term “denier” (I see it’s use as evidence of poor reasoning on the part of the user), I think that the pearl clutching from fainting couches from “skeptics” about its use to be exploitative of a real problem.
Well, one thing’s for certain; the holocaust happened differently than anyone’s told it so far. And most likely will again.
Think how many times it has re-happened since then. I can name nearly a dozen without searching anywhere but private neurons.
Ever again.
========
Joshua, the term “denier” is clearly used at the same level as those who deny the Holocost. It’s a loathsome and poor choice of description.
I would allow the Muslims that have already immigrated to stay, but watch them like a hawk and if they militate against the host Western country convict them of treason and carry out the death penalty.
Jim I am sure they are watching any known militants. But no we can’t drive out all people who hate the government unless you want a police state.
The police state thing is already out of the barn as far as I can tell.
==> “Well, one thing’s for certain; the holocaust happened differently than anyone’s told it so far.”
If that were anyone else but kim, I’d be tempted to ask what that means.
But given that it’s kim – most likely it just amounts to ODS in one form or another.
Muslim vs Muslim: http://www.breitbart.com/london/2015/01/14/muslim-coffee-shop-boss-faces-death-threats-for-je-suis-charlie-sign/
A Muslim shop owner “stands with” Charlie Ebdo, and another Muslim threatens to kill him.
The Kouachi brothers respond to what they perceive as defamatory material to the Prophet by raiding the office of the publication and shooting dead 12 people.
Michael Mann responds to what he perceives as defamatory material to his reputation by following the judicial process and establishing a civil case that the material may be unlawful in the jurisdiction in which it was published.
Any attempt to claim that condemning the first requires that you condemn the second is an egregious ethical error.
That sums it up nicely, izen. Let’s see if they will stop, now.
SLAPP, crackle, pop, crisp AKs.
======================
And Hitchens terrorized poor Henry Kissinger into shutting his mouth.
izen –
Mann’s actions are the antithesis of the Kouachi’s…but
==> “Any attempt to claim that condemning the first requires that you condemn the second is an egregious ethical error.”
I don’t agree. It’s sameolsameol. We frequently see people exploiting horrific events as proxies for pursing a variety of agendas.
In this particular case, I don’t think it really amounts to an egregious ethical error because I don’t think that we can interpret anything meaningful about Judith’s ethics because she has engaged in shallow reasoning.
What her reasoning shows us is that very smart and very well-informed people can allow biases to influence their reasoning processes in obviously flawed ways. I happens when people identify so strongly with advocacy on a particular issue. It’s a basic function of human cognition and psychology.
It’s human nature.
I think that over-dramatizing these tendencies is actually a form of the same phenomenon.
Give us some perspective, kim. Explain the difference between a tort lawsuit and first degree mass murder.
There is a threat to dissent from two religions. I fear the one more than the other.
============
I was hoping for something less cryptic. Which threat do you fear more? Rate the threats on a scale from one to ten.
All you need to do is “connect the dots.” If you connect the dots, you can paint any picture that you want, including a picture that there is only one picture. You don’t need to connect thema ll.
‘
Well, Don, one’s got an archaic structure, verses monomaniacal, and windfall money. The other’s thoroughly modern, verses multiform, and heh, windfall money. Skeert silly of both, but one is the more clear threat, to dissent, et al, going forward.
===============
Thanks for the link, Joshua. There’s a nice discussion on the thread in that link of Michelle Obama interfering in an ethical vaccine trial in Chicago. Portents of things to come, so the link is much appreciated.
There are many more dots, Joshua, than even then, as we eagerly awaited the videotapes sequestered by the LATimes. It is pretty clear now that Obama has misplaced sympathy for a religion unable to control its militant fringe. In a charitable moment, I can ascribe it to nostalgia for the order and command inherent in the call from the mosque. Large comfort for a small child.
============
OK. That’s all I want from you, kim.
We aim to please. Love ya, Don.
=============
I could put it this way, Don. You don’t see a million or more people gathering, some of them spontaneously and some conspicuously absent, to call for increased exposure of the views of dissenting skeptics.
There’s something happening here.
What it is ain’t exactly clear.
There’s a man with a pun over there,
Tellin’ you, you’ve got to beware.
=================
Yeah, kim. Clearly, it’s all just a cover to spread the caliphate. Thanks god there’s folks like you with the mad dot-connecting skillz.
You ain’t seen nuthin’ yet, or, at best, you’ve only seen a bit of the picture.
===============
I enjoy your sweet treats, kim. Sometimes I am seeking nutrition. I don’t go to a pastry shop for a meal. I don’t go to a pastry shop to get a haircut. I am purposely using bad analogies/metaphors. All analogies/metaphors are bad. It’s better to say what you mean, when someone asks you to explain what you mean. In my very humble opinion.
That’s all very nice, Don, if you know what you mean. That’s the difficult part for me, but truly, it’s not hard to understand what you mean, and I appreciate that.
=====================
Don – This thread has not been painful and tortuous enough, so I thought I would re-stir things a bit. Given your talk about poking hornets’ nests etc. what is your take on Obama blaming Benghazi on the film, jailing the filmmaker, and standing at the UN podium and saying “the future does not belong to those who slander The Prophet..”
Heh. Benghazi!!!!!!!
Ya’ just gotta love the climate wars.
I am trying to get you to focus, kim: ) So that we can gain better advantage of the more serious side of your intellect. I not kidding about that last part.
Tom, Obama is partly motivated by a sensible desire not to stir up the hornets unnecessarily. Kissing them on the end that holds their stingers is motivated by his warped ideology.
> If you connect the dots, you can paint any picture that you want, including a picture that there is only one picture.
Even if you don’t connect the dots:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YLO7tCdBVrA
I believe, I believe, everyday’s a good day when you paint.
Let’s build a happy little cloud.
======================
“I was hoping for something less cryptic. Which threat do you fear more? Rate the threats on a scale from one to ten.”
now you agree with Judith.
Can you be a little bit less cryptic, Steven? Explain? Should I have asked for a rating on a scale of 0-10? If this is just a driveby, I am going to spray some herbicide on that little patch of philosophical weeds that you call home. I suspect that Eli the silly Rabette is in there with you.
That there is equivalence that can be measured. Er, estimated. Well, quantified, anyway. Is everybody happy now?
======================
I will have to help you , kim. If you rated the little tort lawsuit as a 4.2, and the premeditated mass murder as a 9.8, would you try to tell us that they are equivalent enough for Judith’s purpose? But you declined to rate them, so I shouldn’t be talking to you about it.
However, I will leave you with one last thought. I can repair the false equivalency in Judith’s claim that supporters of the attack on Charlie should also be supporters of the victims of “Mann’s legal war” on satire. Instead of the terrorists attacking and killing Charlie et al, they filed a run-of-the-mill civil lawsuit alleging defamation by Charlie et al. That is equivalency that is legit.
Thanks for standing in for Mosher. He may still be trying to remember why he said that.
That should be “supporters of the victims of the attack on Charlie”.
So which religion alarms you more?
==========
There’s something meta you don’t seem to getta.
I said that the modern form of religion has verses multiform. Mann is singing a version of satanic science.
====================
–Don Monfort | January 14, 2015 at 11:53 am | Reply
Give us some perspective, kim. Explain the difference between a tort lawsuit and first degree mass murder.–
&
–I will have to help you , kim. If you rated the little tort lawsuit as a 4.2, and the premeditated mass murder as a 9.8, would you try to tell us that they are equivalent enough for Judith’s purpose? But you declined to rate them, so I shouldn’t be talking to you about it. —
Kim might not rate them because it hard to understand how.
I assume it something to do with morality.
I can do, how hot some chick is.
I can do, how many years someone should go to prison- so, maybe that would related.
But that would depend on the law.
But regardless of confusion to how one can rated morality, the issue regarding Paris march has little to do with the murders.
Rather it was a statement of support for free speech.
Or there is nop shortage of vicious murderers doing sick and stupid things- one does not have 4 million people marching about them.
Plus there are people who are murdered who are wonderful people.
So not about the murderers and not about the victims of murder.
Rather it was about the french and their values- it’s essentially about solidarity.
So French values: Liberté, Égalité, Fraternité, French for “Liberty, equality, fraternity
And American have different values- and one related to free speech,
So the terrorist *real crime/offense* was they were ignoring the french values, and those marching were upholding the french values- the theme of demonstration was regarding the action done by the idiots who to insulted french values.
Religion doesn’t alarm me, kimmy. Isn’t it time for your meditation? That lint must be building up in your navel.
It’s not the lint that alarms me, it’s the AK-47s bursting out of my belly-button.
==================
Have Hellfire Missile Will Travel
Tee ’em up, top ’em out, dimpled hide!
===================
Wire:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Palladists
Here’s an interesting post by the Prussian comparing Charlie Hebdo and anti-Semitic cartoons:
http://www.skepticink.com/prussian/2015/01/14/no-anti-semitic-cartoons-are-not-cool/
Former Congressman Joe Walsh::
Does anyone know his position on Steyn vs. Mann?
Without knowing that, how could I possibly evaluate his views on freedom of expression?
http://www.thedailybeast.com/articles/2015/01/14/are-all-terrorists-muslims-it-s-not-even-close.html
1. When people have committed terrorist-like crimes in the US, they typically have been hunted down and tried for their crimes. Amazingly, even Christian criminals are prosecuted.
2. The article you posted doesn’t tally up the number of people killed. I don’t know the answer to that, but if we are going to look at stats, we should be thorough.
Gee, that’s funny, Willard.
I always figured that all those terrorist acts in Northern Ireland were committed by Muslims – because, you know, Islam is unique in inspiring murders…but given those numbers, I’m thinking it might not have been the case after all. I heard a rumor that the violence was committed by Protestants and Catholics….but I always figured that couldn’t be the case.
From the link:
“An FBI study looking at terrorism committed on U.S. soil between 1980 and 2005 found that 94 percent of the terror attacks were committed by non-Muslims.”
http://www.muslimpopulation.com/America/
Moslem population of the US is roughly 2.11% or about 670,000, in 1980 there were about half as many.
So depending on how you look at it Muslims commit 3-6 times as much terrorism as other people in the US.
national_iq_scores_country_ranks.html
And there is another factor. There were 9 serious Moslem terror attempts In 2012. Eight were foiled in the early stages, the one attempted bombing in Arizona didn’t kill anyone. The average IQ of Moslem countries is less than 90 which may impact their effectiveness as terrorists.
And of course a fun chart:
http://i2.wp.com/www.loonwatch.com/wp-content/uploads/2010/01/piechart2.jpg
> In 2012. Eight were foiled in the early stages, the one attempted bombing in Arizona didn’t kill anyone. The average IQ of Moslem countries is less than 90 which may impact their effectiveness as terrorists.
No wonder Obama wants to socialize education.
” violence done in the name of Islam”
Cant say “islamic terror”
Steve –
==. “Cant say “islamic terror””
You can use whatever term you want, IMO.
I lean more towards descriptivism – so for me, it would depend on what the terms mean and how they are interpreted.
Personally, I wouldn’t use the term “Christianity-inspired terrorism” for terroristic activities carried out by the National Party in apartheid South Africa – which had an official religion associated with the NGK.
I don’t think it would be particularly useful. Determining the causality of “inspiration” seems problematic to me.
Is referring to terrorism carried out by religious cultists in the name of Islam “Islam-inspired terrorism” useful? That’s a judgement call, I guess, but it doesn’t seem particularly useful to me and I don’t think that making the distinction is merely overly sensitive political correctness. The question must necessarily lie, IMO, in what your goals are and what think are well-considered tactics and strategies to reach those goals.
I note that many security experts consider it very important to discuss why such language might be misleading and counterproductive.
For example, I find listening to Malcolm Nance on the related questions to be instructive:
http://wamc.org/post/wamc-s-alan-chartock-conversation-malcolm-nance-international-terrorism-expert
http://wamc.org/post/open-forum-terrorism-counter-terrorism
“The average IQ of Moslem countries is less than 90 which may impact their effectiveness as terrorists.”
IS that right? That’s a little scary somehow, that roughly half the people have an IQ below 90. I wonder if there’s a correlation between low IQ scores and fundamentalism. Sounds like one of those things that are probably true, but you’re not suppose to say so.
Al –
==> “I wonder if there’s a correlation between low IQ scores and fundamentalism.”
As you consider causality…
At least a quick Google shows a study indicating that the lower mean IQ “…is not related to strength of Muslim culture as defined by the percentage of Muslims in the country.”
Also, consider, for example:
http://www.vdare.com/posts/indian-iq-again
More from our friends at vdare:
http://www.vdare.com/articles/indians-arent-that-intelligent-on-average
AFAIK all “IQ tests” have a great deal of cultural expectation built into them.
Willard you fool – In the last 50 years about 3,500 people were killed in Northern Ireland. More people have died from Muslim violence in the last 90 days.
Tom –
A correction?
If I’m not mistaken, I’m the fool not willard.
So you’re saying that the Catholics and Protestants that committed terrorist acts in Northern Ireland were Muslim converts?
And let’s not forget all those Indian Muslim terrorists pretending to be Hindus.
Yes, Joshua, you are a fool also. Sorry for the ambiguity. You and Willard proceed on this topic with the same admixture of obfuscation, mis-direction, and general dishonesty that you exhibit on the climate issues as well.
I caught you earlier on this thread insinuating that the civilian deaths in Iraq were somehow to be counted in the “Christians killing Muslims” side of the ledger. In fact, the majority of these deaths were due to sectarian Muslim conflict. Moreover, it was dishonest to make the insinuation that the Coalition forces targeted the civilians qua Muslims.
My point to Willard is that the comparison to Northern Ireland fails on several levels. Most prominently, that was sectarian Christian fighting and so would best be compared to sectarian Mulsim fighting. 3,500 lost their lives in N. Ireland over 50 years. Sectarian Muslim fighting has led to hundreds of thousands of deaths in the last year alone.
Mulsim *terrorist attacks* have killed about 5,000 in the last two months alone. There is simply no comparison with any other religion over the last 30 years. The type of attacks, planned and financed by large groups of people, also can’t be compared to those of any other religion. How can people forget the Peshawar attacks of just 1 month ago. Show me the comparison to an attack perpetrated by any other religion in recent years.
> My point to Willard is that the comparison to Northern Ireland fails on several levels.
Where have I made that comparison, Tom C?
Speaking of terrorism, please rest assured that it’s a French invention:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Terrorism
Please continue.
> Show me the comparison to an attack perpetrated by any other religion in recent years.
Why would anyone need to do that, Tom C, and why would you restrict your comparison to religions?
You’re chasing windmills, but please continue.
Tom –
==> “Yes, Joshua, you are a fool also. Sorry for the ambiguity.”
Much better.
==> “I caught you earlier on this thread insinuating that the civilian deaths in Iraq were somehow to be counted in the “Christians killing Muslims” side of the ledger.”
Wrong. Read again.
==> In fact, the majority of these deaths were due to sectarian Muslim conflict.
Which doesn’t discount the simple fact that many of the civilian deaths were directly attributable to the coalition forces.
==> Moreover, it was dishonest to make the insinuation that the Coalition forces targeted the civilians qua Muslims.”
First, just because you say I’m “insinuating” something doesn’t make it so. Second, a civilian dies in a bomb intended to kill a terrorist, those civilians are still in the bomb sights. And often, the potential or reality of those deaths is known beforehand.
I’m not playing games of moral equivalency – but pointing out that there are real moral and ethical issues to be dealt with there, not to mention important strategic implications.
==> “My point to Willard is that the comparison to Northern Ireland fails on several levels. Most prominently, that was sectarian Christian fighting and so would best be compared to sectarian Mulsim fighting. 3,500 lost their lives in N. Ireland over 50 years. Sectarian Muslim fighting has led to hundreds of thousands of deaths in the last year alone.”
The relevance is that like Muslim violence, be it sectarian or not, the terrorism is committed by ideological extremists. The relevance is with respect to whether it is meaningful to find causality in Islamic doctrine or in the manifestation of cultism.
==> “There is simply no comparison with any other religion over the last 30 years.”
Sure, if you find the causality in religious beliefs, then there is “no comparison” over the last 30 years, and yes, if you get your rocks off by assigning guilt by association to 1.5 billion people on the basis of cultists who murder in their name, go ahead and knock yourself out. Of course, then you’re left with a problem of tactics and strategy.
But fortunately, the intelligence experts and people in the position of power, those with actual responsibility for developing tactics and strategy, take a more sophisticated approach to analyzing causality.
Willard tells me that our word ‘terrorism’ comes from French and ultimately Latin, so I am to rest assured that the French invented terrorism. Keep ’em comin’, Willard; you’re so cute.
=================
Tom C is correct. The internecine violence among Muslims in Africa, for example, have been horrendous in terms of the overall numbers (especially children) killed and who have died afterwards of disease and starvation due to being displaced from their homes.
I agree with you Tom C, but oddly enough, even among Buddhists, there have been recent ugly affairs.
Years ago I thought that future civil spirituality would be Confucian in essence, private spirituality imbued with Buddhism, public holidays to have a Hindu flair, and the cults of Abraham marginalized as too violent.
I’ve developed a little more sympathy for the believers in Christ since then.
================
You know, Tom – no matter how hard you try, you won’t be able to top Carly at the very end of this clip…
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GvgdPAEu8vA
Where she points out that the “irony” is that center of the Muslim world was highly tolerant in the 1600s — as a way of making the point that the roots of current-day terrorism is in the Muslim religion.
As a fan of irony, I gotta give Carly some serious props.
Peter –
==> “The internecine violence among Muslims in Africa, for example, have been horrendous in terms of the overall numbers (especially children) killed and who have died afterwards of disease and starvation due to being displaced from their homes.”
Has someone here disputed that?
==> “but oddly enough, even among Buddhists, there have been recent ugly affairs.”
I was going to mention that also,kim, hoping that Tom wouldn’t realize that those terrorists in Sri Lanka, Myanmar, and Thailand are actually Muslims just pretending to be Buddhists.
You and Willard have not disputed this, true, but you both seem to be dissembling from this to take issue with the undoubted collateral deaths due to the presence of the coaltion forces in Iraq, which I suspect is due to your political leanings.
I respect your right to disagree with the sending of the coalition forces but suggest that the central topic in this subthread is whether Islamic inspired violence is problematic, I agree with Tom C that it is.
Willard’s ivory tower, intelligentsia-based analysis has concluded that a three year old’s biting of a compatriot is the same same as the millions slaughtered by Militant Muslims over the centuries – from day one the religion existed.
Ugliness on both sides, Joshua. Surely you know that.
===============
Joshua – Carly Fiorina is right and you are wrong. Religions change over time.
> the central topic in this subthread is whether Islamic inspired violence is problematic, I agree with Tom C that it is.
I disagree, Peter. The topic of this subthread is an article about the number of muslim acts of terrorism in Europe and America. Here’s the article again, with another quote:
http://www.thedailybeast.com/articles/2015/01/14/are-all-terrorists-muslims-it-s-not-even-close.html
Please do as Judy implores and think about that one.
That Tom C burdens me with the need to defend atrocities is despicable.
Peter Davies, shall we mention the Lancet’s disgraceful statistical treatment of collateral deaths in Iraq? They ruined centuries of prestige with that one disastrous article.
===================
Peter –
==> ” but you both seem to be dissembling from this to take issue with the undoubted collateral deaths due to the presence of the coaltion forces in Iraq, which I suspect is due to your political leanings.”
I can’t speak for willard – but w/r/t me.
I don’t know what you mean about “dissembling” to take issue with collateral deaths.
If you look elsewhere in the thread, I spoke a few times about the real and meaningful issue with intolerance in Muslim communities, and how it far outstrips the problem with Muslim intolerance in Western communities and lies on a completely different scale than any “intolerance” issues remotely related to Mann vs. Steyn – to the extent that it is exploitative to argue that there is any meaningful comparison.
And Peter –
==> “but suggest that the central topic in this subthread is whether Islamic inspired violence is problematic, ”
I haven’t spoken about what the central topic of this subthread is, and I don’t care.
If you think that I don’t consider violence done in the name of Islam to be problematic – then you are completely mistaken.
My point has been w/r/t the arguments about causality – as it relates to a larger discussion about terrorism.
As such, your description of “Islamic-inspired violence” is problematic, IMO.
Do you consider the mass murder-suicide of the “People’s Temple” to be Christianity-inspired violence?
I don’t. I consider it to be extremism-inspired violence.
Willard and Joshua. Perhaps we are all getting a bit hot under the collar. I agree that there are all sorts of terrorism and that Muslims are only a small percentage of them.
What Tom C is saying is that in terms of overall deaths in the last 5 years (just to keep the discussion on the same page) Muslim inspired violence has resulted in far more deaths, directly and indirectly, than terrorism
from any other source.
Agree or disagree? If you disagree, then lets do a body count and see who is correct. I agree with Willard that it would be a horrible thing to have to do just to prove a somewhat weak point, in a thread that Judith, IMO, should not have made.
Peter –
==> “Agree or disagree?”
It is abundantly obvious that violence in Muslim communities, committed by extremists, is a huge, huge problem. Not so much to us in western countries (where our difficulties with sound principles of risk analysis come into play in how we view the size of the problem), but in places like Nigeria, Pakistan, etc.
As I already indicated, I think that the question about “Muslim-inspired violence” is unfortunately simplistic and in the end, more likely to reflect attitudes that are counterproductive w/r/t developing effective tactics and strategies for dealing with the problem. There are plenty of security experts who share my views in that regard.
Not sure where else to go with that. It seems to me that I’m already repeating myself. So maybe it’s just time to move on.
> What Tom C is saying is that in terms of overall deaths in the last 5 years (just to keep the discussion on the same page) Muslim inspired violence has resulted in far more deaths, directly and indirectly, than terrorism from any other source.
That’s right, and he asserts so without proof, without showing how this is relevant to what I’m saying and, more importantly, indulges in more stupid ideological crap, as if this will automagically solve all this and make us think.
Think, Peter. This is so ridiculous that all this deserves is satire.
Satire. I use satire and look how Tom C reacts. Fancy that.
The Buddhist and Muslim animosity has a long history. It took well over 1000 years to write it.
Willard –
The Daily Beast article that you linked to is pathetic. Everyone knows that the actual number of Islamic-inspired terror attacks in the US and EU is fairly low. The concern – in the EU especially – is that growing, restive populations of largely unassimilated Muslims will eventually bring the mayhem that is occurring in the rest of the world.
> Everyone knows that the actual number of Islamic-inspired terror attacks in the US and EU is fairly low.
This this not cohere with Laumbaugh’s LIV theory, Tom C.
Your “Islamic-inspired” and your concern look tailor-made. Let’s look for it. (Searching, searching.)
Compare with what you just said:
http://thehill.com/blogs/ballot-box/presidential-races/228790-huckabee-radical-islam-inspired-extremists-attacked
Another post at Judy’s, another set of well-timed political slogans.
Some things may never change.
From the article:
…
Kano, Nigeria (CNN)Boko Haram militants opened fire on northern Nigerian villages, leaving bodies scattered everywhere and as many as 2,000 people feared dead.
…
http://www.cnn.com/2015/01/09/africa/boko-haram-violence/
You might be interested in this one, Willard.
http://markhumphrys.com/islam.killings.html
http://abcnews.go.com/International/wireStory/israel-paper-cuts-merkel-paris-march-photo-modesty-28215283
Well now – this could be interesting:
Given that Judith has testified before Congress at the invitation of Republicans, I wonder what she’ll do if they show that they disregard her views and insist that ACO2 emissions have no impact on the climate?
Will she ask to testify again to straighten them out? Will she tell them that she’ll no longer listen to them unless they change their views?
…
Joshua
It will indeed be interesting. Be careful what you wish for.
Richard
Actually the proposed climate change amendment is a start, but its format is unacceptable. A proper legislative amendment would read like this:
Whereas, The extent of global sea ice is at or above historical averages;
Whereas, The populations of polar bears are generally growing;
Whereas, The sea levels have been slowly rising at the same rate since the Little Ice Age ended 150 years ago;
Whereas, The oceans will not become acidic due to buffering from extensive mineral deposits and marine life is well adapted to pH fluctuations that do occur;
Whereas, Extreme weather events have not increased in recent decades and such events are more associated to periods of cooling rather than warming;
Whereas, Cold spells, not heat waves, are the greater threat to human life and prosperity;
Therefore, This chamber agrees that climate is variable and prudent public officials should plan for future periods both colder and warmer than the present.
There it is. Simple, no?
=======
http://www.israel21c.org/images/stories/culture/surfing/top_surf_girls.jpg
http://tracks.roojoom.com/r/6917#/trek?page=8
https://toniandgary.files.wordpress.com/2012/07/israel-beach.jpg?w=500&h=517
https://toniandgary.wordpress.com/2012/07/18/israeli-beach-attire/
Thanks god that conservatives and libertarians are ascendant in our government – you know, to bring us back to the good ol’ days when policy analysis was about cold, hard facts and not activism:
Joshua – that program is about to go broke. It is a good thing to ensure anyone granted disability is actually disabled as the law defines it. That way, we can help people who REALLY need it.
==> “That way, we can help people who REALLY need it.”
So let’s start by destorting the facts and demagoging?
Joshua
Per the SS, rolls have more than doubled in the last 20 years. The work force certainly is not engaging in more physically demanding or risk prone activity. Criteria for eligibilty have been liberalized per an analysis of the National Bureau of Economic Research. I am sure millions who have been employed for a few years have their own anecdotes of someone they knew who received DI when their qualifications were questionable. My own story, which has no statistical validity, involved a fellow who I worked with for 20 years and he was approved due to excessive stress in the workplace. He left Michigan and is now in Florida. He worked in an office just like the rest of us and faced the same kinds of stress the rest of us did, but he was able to receive DI. Right or wrong? Who knows, except that the program is going broke and that financial information is easily obtainable. BTW contrary to Liberal myth the SS and DI and Medicare are all adding to the deficit ($352 Billion) which is outlined in the 2014 SS Trustees Report. Something must be done and the solution is not what the Democrats favor which is to sweep it under the rug and just wait for another day.
Ceresco –
My partner’s son is mentally ill – with a history of related addiction problems (he’s clean – been on methadone for a couple of years now).
He has no benefits except medical insurance, due to a combination of all cash benefits being cut (in PA) and the difficulty he has in doing what it takes for him to get food stamps.
He is completely incapable of getting, let alone keeping a job – for a variety of reasons.
He is completely incapable of doing what it takes to get on disability on his own, and even with out help, due to the ways that his mental health issues make it very difficult for anyone to help him out, we will be lucky if we can ever get him to qualify.
We can exchange anecdotal stories ’till the cows come home, but it won’t substitute for careful analysis. Neither will demagoging, as in the example I provided. Keep in mind that with the lack of resources available to him, the likelihood of outcomes far more expensive to our society – such as a lapse into drug use and resulting incarceration probably increases. Along those lines, notice the complete lack of sophistication in how you assess the cost to society of social safety net programs.
Get a lawyer, joshie. You and your partner are obviously not up to a small task. If it was hard to get on disability, there wouldn’t be so many in the program and it would not have grown so fast in recent years. You know squat about it. Makes me wonder if you have really tried to get anyone into the program.
Don –
We’ve worked with lawyers, and are doing so again now.
1) Getting disability due to mental illness is difficult (more so than due to physical difficult) – especially when addiction issues are involved
2) As I indicated, the situation is complicated by his mental illness. He is pretty paranoid and very proud with a fragile ego and a) doesn’t want to be on disability because he thinks that it will prevent him from being able to achieve his (grandiose and unrealistic) goal of self-sufficiency and, b) wants to handle the application process on his ow – partly because he feels infantilized and incompetent if anyone tries to help him and partly because he is paranoid and has trouble trusting anyone.
This is someone who has a loving parent of means who in turn has a strong support network of people who are highly educated. I can only imagine how much worse it is for people who don’t have those resources to call upon.
I also took care of my brother, who was mentally ill, for the last 15 years of his life. He also had benefits, and there is absolutely no doubt that if he didn’t have so someone to take care of him he would have never gotten the benefits, let alone sustained them. He would have died on the street under some bridge along with so many other schizophrenics. Of course, some might say that result would have been a cost benefit.
Joshua
Note I did not question the need for the program. I acknowledged my anecdote as such without any claim other than it being an anecdote. My point continues to be that there are now 12.1 million on the rolls, double the level 20 years ago and it is adding to the deficit. That is not an indictment of the intent of the program, just a statement of fact. When millions make the same observations that are individually only anecdotes, they may take on a new quality if they reach critical mass and all of a sudden there are reasons for those anecdotes to be characterized as data which in turn should be used in developing public policy proscriptions. Trying to sort out the difference between gross generalizations and legitimate appraisals of facts is what separates a demagogue from a responsible public policy maker.
ceresco –
==> “Trying to sort out the difference between gross generalizations and legitimate appraisals of facts is what separates a demagogue from a responsible public policy maker.”
I think that is what’s most important, and something about which we are in, it seems, complete agreement.
You either have been working with incompetent lawyers, or you are grossly exaggerating the alleged disability.
==> “You either have been working with incompetent lawyers, or you are grossly exaggerating the alleged disability.”
Thanks for that insight, Don.
I’m sure you’re an expert on the topic, and so now I’ll know to disregard my own first-hand experiences and the advice of people with an established track record of getting people disability benefits.
Sorry, I forgot one other possibility. You may have been working with honest, incompetent lawyers. Not likely in the disability field, but possible. I know people in disability f—d detection and prosecution. They tell me that millions of slackers on disability should be in jail, along with the lawyers that serve them.
Don –
==> “Sorry, I forgot one other possibility. You may have been working with honest, incompetent lawyers. ”
I’ve worked with lawyers who have proven track records.
Call me crazy, and I love ya’ bro, but pardon me if I value their expertise on the matter (that they’ve actually worked on) more than yours (based on knowing absolutely none of the related details).
Have a good night
Your story is transparently phony, joshie. Work on it and get back to us.
Joshua,
was his DAA material?.
sorry to hear about the difficulties you are having. Some folks I know
skate easily through the system, but others , as you know, have a harder time. Even if they seem deserving to you or me.
good luck.
Thanks steven, We’ll see in the future whether DAA might be appropriate.
Joshua you said he had a substance problem.
That means he is already coded as DAA.
My question was this.
Is his daa material. If his daa is material then
It can’t be used to establish his eligibility.
If he is dual diagnosed both daa and some other qualified condition then materiality doesn’t matter
Your answer is odd.
steven –
I misinterpreted the acronym you were using.
The main issue at this point has been in getting a mental health diagnosis that qualifies him for disability.
The process of being more active in helping him manage his life has been gradual, and is relatively recent. He was an active addict for a long time, and helping him was pretty much out of the question. He was in jail for a while, so again, helping him apply for disability was a non-starter. Upon his release, while he’s been clean (or as clean as he gets since he “self-medicates” with ativan and benzoids) we’ve been supporting him financially and otherwise and trying to work with him to do what it takes to get disability. Although it is clear to me, for a variety of reasons, that he just isn’t capable of holding on to a job long-term at this point, it has still been difficult to get a mental health diagnosis that would qualify him for disability. There are a couple of reasons for that. One is that judging what someone is or isn’t capable of doing is difficult. He can be high-functioning in some ways, so a determination of whether he is mentally ill so as to render him unable to get employment (unless we just try to find a quack) takes time – particularly because of his resistance and his not wanting to be labeled. We’re working on it. He’s an adult, so we can only do so much, which means that ultimately whether he gets on disability rests on the actions and behaviors of someone who is mentally ill.
The issue about him “self-medicating” is a tough one. On the one hand, I tend to think that he just needs to suck it up and stop taking any medications and stop his dependencies. Otherwise, how do we really know what he is capable of. On the other hand: (1) his history of drug addiction has clearly affected his brain functioning/chemistry (he was labeled as a “genius” as a youth, was very precocious, etc), (2) he had underlying mental health issues anyway, and the meds he’s taking are probably to address real problems like an anxiety disorder,(3) his reliance on other meds probably helps him to stay off of heroin – so should we try somehow to force him to stop those other meds if it increases the likelihood of him using again?
There is an approach to addiction called “harm reduction,” which is useful here. Ultimately, because he has a support system with resources, the issue of disability is in some way secondary to his basic survival.
One day at a time. This one seems to have much more family support than many. For this, Joshua & P get gold stars. I’m not trying to make a joke of this.
==================
The reality is that virtually everyone who is remotely qualified to be on disability is on disability, if they have applied. And there are millions on disability who are not remotely disabled. Everybody who works in the system knows that. Getting on the foodstamp rolls is a breeze for those remotely qualified, but joshie’s addict stepson can’t manage to get that together due to “the difficulty he has in doing what it takes for him to get food stamps”. Presumably, all the lawyers joshie hired to help his addict stepson get on disability don’t do foodstamps. But at least the poor kid got medical insurance. Has he got his Obama phone, joshie?
Home is where they have to take you when you show up.
================
See – this is what I love about Climate Etc.
So here we have a self-described “skeptic” weighing in on an issue, with complete certainty, despite having no expertise and perhaps no personal experience.
His explanation is that he’s talked to people.
I love it!
FYI Don, actually he was on food stamps in the past but lost them because he failed to consistently take the steps necessary to be re-certified. I know that someone like you would have a hard time understanding why steps that seem simple should be difficult for someone else, but dealing with any variety of logistical obstacles – working with social security offices, providing records, keeping track of deadlines, conforming to requirements, etc. can be difficult for some people. We haven’t used lawyers to help him get back his food stamps – the lawyers were to help him apply for and get disability for mental illness.
Oh, and I forgot to add that not only is he completely certain about something that he doesn’t actually know about, he’s also so certain that he’s determined that someone who has a different perspective than he is necessarily either incompetent or lying.
Ladies and gentlemen, I present to you the reasoning of a “skeptic.”
Thanks, Don, for just being you, bro.
@Joshua…
Do you suppose things would be different when/if charities are administered by people with direct contact with both the donors and recipients, rather than run by a government bureaucracy?
If not, do you suppose your answer owes something to your own m0tivated thinking?
AK –
==> “Do you suppose things would be different when/if charities are administered by people with direct contact with both the donors and recipients, rather than run by a government bureaucracy?”
Would things be different? Sure. Would they be better? In some ways probably, and perhaps in some ways worse. Having a fair amount of experience in dealing with the bureaucracy you’re peaking of, I am well aware of many of the downsides.
Consider my experience with my brother. At times, he was pretty psychotic, and I remember one experience where I was in a large room with him and perhaps another 100 social security disability beneficiaries, waiting to be called so that the social security employees could perform the pro-forma review of his disability status. We were waiting for hours, because the office runs in a state of constantly being understaffed, and my brother started telling me about how the computers in the room were stealing secrets from his mind. He needed a smoke (a huge number of schizophrenics are heavy smokers) if he tried to smoke in that room he would be kicked out. But if he left the room, he might miss being called for his appointment. He started to become incredibly anxious, and felt urgently that he needed to leave the room. Meanwhile, I knew that it had taken me days to figure out which category of worker he needed to speak to, and to schedule an appointment. I knew that if we didn’t take care of the issue at that time, it could mean that his case would be bumped into a category of “non-compliance” that would mean the process of re-registering would be only that much more complicated, require that much more documenting of history and acquiring yet other documents. To top it off, I knew well that once we managed to get called to speak to someone, and assuming that we could confirm that I was legally qualified and certified to help my brother, and assuming that we hadn’t been directed to the wrong category of worker, and assuming that the worker we got to speak to was reasonably competent (many weren’t), and assuming that the worker was not overtly hostile (many were). And I remember the feeling I had at the time, incredibly frustrated by the government bureaucracy and wishing for some other means of getting my brother help – while at the same time feeling so incredibly fortunate that I lived in a country, in contrast to so many where I have lived and/or traveled, where a government bureaucracy existed to help my brother afford medical care and a meager couple of hundred dollars a month to help him pay rent and buy clothes and buy food and pay electricity, and buy heating fuel, and have money to take public transportation.
Would the situation be better if there were no such government bureaucracy existed, and instead mentally ill people and people with other disabilities were to rely only on charities where administrators were in direct with donors and recipients? Maybe. I would certainly be in favor of controlled experimentation to find better mechanisms, but I’m not inclined to advocate simply dismantling the existing system in hope that something better would magically appear. I’m also, as the result of my personal experiences, and watching the struggles of many people whose circumstance were like my brother’s but who lacked the support system that he was lucky enough to have, not inclined to binary thinking about the problems with the existing system – but to see them as a reinforcement of the lesson that just because a system has problems, that doesn’t mean that it provides no meaningful benefit.
==> “If not, do you suppose your answer owes something to your own m0tivated thinking?”
And absolutely, my views of the situation are “motivated” by my personal life experiences – and that would be true no matter which direction my answer took – not only if my answer went in a direction that didn’t align with your views
You said that he is clean. The story is changing: “Upon his release, while he’s been clean (or as clean as he gets since he “self-medicates” with ativan and benzoids) we’ve been supporting him financially and otherwise and trying to work with him to do what it takes to get disability.”
You have been working hard on this problem for some time and you don’t know what DAA is. And you didn’t mention this before:
“The main issue at this point has been in getting a mental health diagnosis that qualifies him for disability.”
He is not qualified for disability. If he were remotely qualified, he would be on it. Now let’s see if Judith wields her little AK47 and deletes this one.
Well, now I have to apologize to Judith. She didn’t delete the post I thought she deleted. This thousand comment thread is getting increasingly ridiculous for a variety of reasons. I am out. Carry on with the foolishness without me.
Bye Don. Have a nice day.
And btw, thanks god that you have never yet lived up to your many promises to stop exchanging comments with me. I’ve noticed that you haven’t made any of those promises in a while. Maybe it’s time for you start up again?
Joshua
sorry to hear of your family problems
tonyb
Tony –
Thanks.
The hard part is for my partner. Imagine having a child in desperate need of help and in deep pain, and finding huge obstacles to being able to help him.
But there are many families that have problems, and in balance mine is incredibly fortunate – so I try to maintain that awareness, and to find some benefit in having a greater awareness of the kinds of problems that many other people face.
“It is the psychological effect using fear as it is not the victims of a terrorist act, but the wider audience who are the target because the victims become instrumental as they are the message carriers. It is symbolic violence, a communicative act, with the sole purpose to get the message across.” – http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Critical_Terrorism_Studies#Definitions_of_terrorism “The term terrorism gained prominence during the French Revolution when it was used by the Jacobins to kill known supporters of the Ancient Regime and to eliminate those labeled enemies of the revolution. Thus the state was the first proponents of using terrorism as a political tool.” The word terrorism may give a state the ability to change ethical rules. The movie Zero Dark 30 comes to mind. Using the definition of a word to allow acts not previously allowed or supported.
Speaking of France, looks like Hollande is going George Bush on their collective Muslim Militant Arse.
From the article:
…
President Francois Hollande declared on Wednesday that France would dispatch its only aircraft carrier, the nuclear-powered Charles de Gaulle, to reinforce the campaign against Isil.
Addressing the warship’s crew, Mr Hollande prepared them for a deployment in the Middle East where France has joined the US-led air campaign against the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (Isil).
“Thanks to the Charles de Gaulle we will have precious intelligence,” he said. “We may also conduct operations in Iraq, if necessary, with even more intensity and more efficiency. The aircraft carrier will work in close cooperation with coalition forces.”
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/europe/france/11346285/Charlie-Hebdo-France-will-send-aircraft-carrier-to-Middle-East.html
Finally, a barrier for the border.
From the article:
…
Revealed: Saudi Arabia’s ‘Great Wall’ to keep out Isil
Middle Eastern Kingdom building 600-mile wall and ditch along its border with Iraq in effort to insulate itself from the chaos engulfing its neighbours.
…
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/middleeast/saudiarabia/11344116/Revealed-Saudi-Arabias-Great-Wall-to-keep-out-Isil.html
Steyn on free speech and the Charlie Hebdo controversy:
http://www.steynonline.com/6756/where-the-lead-in-the-pencil
Amazing.
Steyn supports those cartoons and complains that the US media are too sensitive to show them. First I thought, yes, free speech is always great. But, I now have mixed thoughts about such provocative cartoons. It’s not just free speech. Two things to think about. 1. How much do you think Muslim school children in France are being taunted at school by these cartoons? 2. What about cartoons about right-wing nationalists being violent to other races? For example in Germany nationalists may not like Muslims or Jews for example, so perhaps a Jewish cartoonist would make fun using a German caricature, perhaps always portraying them as Naz!s in a way somewhat like Charlie Hebdo depicts its Muslims by their extremists. Would that be acceptable?
“For example in Germany nationalists may not like Muslims or Jews for example, so perhaps a Jewish cartoonist would make fun using a German caricature, perhaps always portraying them as Naz!s in a way somewhat like Charlie Hebdo depicts its Muslims by their extremists. Would that be acceptable?”
If you think it’s important to run the story on some Germany nationalists.
If run a story on car accident- one doesn’t need to get the pictures the gore.
But if topic is the gore, than that different issue.
Or if don’t want to cover the topic, don’t.
Basically, grow up.
Here ya go, jimmy. How Muslim students are being affected:
http://www.breitbart.com/national-security/2015/01/14/french-muslim-students-yell-allahu-akbar-dishonor-moment-of-silence-for-charlie-hebdo-victims/
Or we can imagine non-Christian cartoonists making fun of Catholics, depicting them and the Pope, perhaps even Jesu$, as child molesters. The point is, just because they are cartoons, doesn’t mean they can’t incite or spread a hateful, or at least disrespectful, viewpoint, or somehow make it acceptable to generalize a hate or disrespect to a broader population. Free speech has to be used responsibly. It is a privilege for a country that has it and should be treated as such. Wrong use doesn’t help it. There are limits even in countries that have it, and those who push the limits should equally expect to be called out on it when they are inciting.
–Two things to think about. 1. How much do you think Muslim school children in France are being taunted at school by these cartoons?–
You mean something like student being taunted with Playboy/Hustler magazine in America?
Personally I don’t recall that kind of stuff being a problem. But these days
with smartphone I Imagine there is a lot stuff on the internet. Such as Muslims sawing off various heads.
I don’t recall kids bringing in many newspapers or magazines for the purpose of taunting anyone. And that would seem to require too much planning and effort- though if they allowed to carry a phone, then they got the type of stuff, kids might use.
gbaikie, it is probably difficult for someone in a population’s majority (racial or religious) to understand. Try to imagine, if you are a minority in any way, having that made fun of in such a public way as popular cartoons, or your children facing that at school because schools really are the least constrained places for this type of thing to come to the surface. Cartoons accepted by adults would make it seem acceptable for children to follow suit with the message because then the message becomes part of what is seen as normal behavior. Cartoons are also used in bigoted ways or as propaganda by regimes wishing to encourage certain ways of thinking.
In my day we had school bullies who actually physically hurt people, seriously in many cases.
And not much got done about it – we just had to grin and bear it.
Basically, grow up!
–Jim D | January 14, 2015 at 11:44 pm |
gbaikie, it is probably difficult for someone in a population’s majority (racial or religious) to understand. Try to imagine, if you are a minority in any way, having that made fun of in such a public way as popular cartoons, or your children facing that at school because schools really are the least constrained places for this type of thing to come to the surface.–
I think instead I will try to imagine that I am in the majority in which I thought conformity was very important.
Yep! that works!
I can see how blasphemy is very scary.
I suppose if turn I around and I imagine I lived in a majority and I was trying [and I suppose failing] to be somehow unique, that this would tend to make me quite fond of blasphemy.
That also seems to work. And I think it helps a bit explain France and their love of blasphemy- and Jerry Lewis.
Jim D | January 14, 2015 at 11:44 pm |
gbaikie, it is probably difficult for someone in a population’s majority (racial or religious) to understand. Try to imagine, if you are a minority in any way, having that made fun of in such a public way as popular cartoons, or your children facing that at school because schools really are the least constrained places for this type of thing to come to the surface. Cartoons accepted by adults would make it seem acceptable for children to follow suit with the message because then the message becomes part of what is seen as normal behavior. Cartoons are also used in bigoted ways or as propaganda by regimes wishing to encourage certain ways of thinking.
Well, in the absence of some context this sounds like a reasonable defense. Salman Rushdie had a fatwa put on him. People are killed for blasphemy every year usually in groups of four or less (they don’t have a big backlog so they usually don’t have to kill more than 4 at once). The disturbing thing is in non-Muslim countries radical Muslims try to dispense the same justice ala carte, vigilante style. Radical Muslims have an almost religious conviction that they have a right to kill those who say or write things the Muslims don’t like.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Asia_Bibi_blasphemy_case
The Aasiya Noreen blasphemy case is interesting reading (a Christian women sentenced to hang in Pakistan).
Now, it is pretty obvious that if Muslims kill both Muslims and non-Moslims, for things they say, both here and in their own countries – the problem isn’t that they feel oppressed but simply they are intolerant. The people we call radical islamists used to be called fundamentalists and fundamentalists are about half of the Muslim population.
The US has a tradition of individual freedom and free speech. The average American does not believe he should be beheaded/suicide bombed/shot if he says something his neighbor doesn’t like.or writes something that offends someone.
The radical Moslim’s belief system is not amenable to change and is not compatible with a modern free society. Radical Muslims should be banned from America until their belief system changes.
There are elements in societies that don’t help, for example nationalists, and sometimes cartoons may fuel the fire. This is the environment that breeds radicals who want to look for an identity outside of a society that doesn’t accept them, and this can start from school age. It is also generational where the younger generation will want to rebel against their more moderate Muslim parents. What can be done? I don’t know. I only know not to fuel it if you have any ambition of a truly mixed and tolerant society.
Potter, did you notice that Steyn didn’t take the opportunity to equate his own defamation issue with the Charlie massacre? He didn’t mention the Mann civil lawsuit at all. Why bring that up in the context of a recent premeditated mass murder? Cause there is none but a most tortured connection, a very thin thread. And piggybacking on the Charlie massacre to complain about his relative molehill of a problem would be unseemly and make him look like a foolish little whiner.
By the way, does his article look like satire? Is he kidding us on this?
Yes, but he did compare it to his struggle against the Islamic Congress and the Canadian parliament on the Hugh Hewitt show:
I predict he will get to connecting it to Mann eventually. It’s about free speech. Mann is for suppression of free speech. Steyn has noted that on several occasions. He had more important things to connect it to in the column I linked above. He was attacking those who self-censor, which allows the jihadists to isolate those who don’t censor and go it alone. Mann’s censorship is of a different type, but the end result is the same: people are cowed into silence and/or compliance.
btw, I don’t consider Steyn a satirist, although he uses satirical devices. He’s a polemicist and one of the best. Because he is one of the best, he became a target of Michael Mann, who wants to destroy Steyn’s ability to make a living by censoring what he writes and by extension, anyone who would dare write like him.
As I said above, Mann doesn’t have to carry an AK-47 to wreak havoc in people’s lives. Ask Tim Ball. Ask him what his bank balance looks like after several years of insidious litigation. Simply for making the well-worn Penn State/state pen joke.
How does Mann destroy Steyn’s ability to make a living by suing him over a few words? Steyn could have made his point by avoiding using those few words. Send him a book of synonyms, if you are that concerned. I’m not getting into that AK47 BS again. We have covered that.
Look if you Kool-Aid drinkers feel so strongly that Mann is going to destroy free speech by exercising his right to file a common garden variety defamation lawsuit, then you need to rise up and start a war on tort law. Show some guts. Demand that defamation be ignored. If you are really serious, you will demand that defamation be encouraged, even subsidized. Defamation is the essence of free speech. The more of it the better.
I will help you get started. Here is your chant, no charge:
Two-four-six-eight, you’re evil if you litigate!
I can get you tons of inexpensive signs with simulated hand-lettered Alinsky slogans, only slightly used. Make up your own little “Je Suis Steyn” placards to hang around your necks and stage die-ins at courthouses across the land. The Occupy Courthouse movement is born. Bring your sleeping bags and plenty of Kool-Aid.
You characters are impervious to reason.
Well, actually Michael Mann would be an AK-65 (the Kalashnikov weapons series is designated by year the prototype was released to the military for testing). The AK-47 was a 1947 revised prototype based on the AK-46 prototype.
There were plenty of friends of the court willing to weigh in at the figurative AK-47s they saw Mann aiming at their printing presses.
And their printers.
===========
Heh, we’ve come full circle. Most of those worried media outlets are full of denizens drunk to the bellicose stage with global warming Kool-Aid. What could they be thinking, Don, for them to weigh in for the First Amendment?
It’s practically an admission against interest, so I pay attention.
=====================
Jocose-the Grinning Gore, the Oughts.
Bellicose-suppress dissent, er, uh, up against the wall, Denier, the Teens.
Morose-dawning light, the Twenties.
Comatose-hypothermic, with a weak but detectable pulse, the Thirties.
Heh, the Lost Half Century.
===================
Hitchens threatened to sue Kissinger. You know, all voices need to be heard except, well, poor Henry’s.
In other words, Hitchens is the champion of other people being slandered and libeled, but when it comes to him and his family, well, get out the AK-47 briefs and motions and fire them into Henry’s home via the mailman.
> These guys are dead because back in 2005, these Danish cartoons were published in an obscure Jutland newspaper, and a bunch of fanatics went bananas and started killing people over them.
A fine Charlie Hebdo connoisseur we have there.
You are playing the fool, kim. The First Amendment and tort law have co-existed for a long time. The First Amendment doesn’t include the right to defame people, period. Filing a garden variety civil lawsuit against someone is not remotely like slaughtering a bunch of people with an AK47. Or even remotely like threatening someone with an AK47. In more primitive times it was common for perceived affronts to honor to be settled with guns, swords, battle axes. In civilized countries now, we have tort law.
A defamation lawsuit is like a defamation lawsuit. Not, I say not, like a freaking AK47. But you are free to continue to make fools of yourselves.
It seems that any word remotely like the words that Steyn is getting sued for, and a lot of other everyday words that might be considered mildly offensive send comments into moderation. OMG! It’s like being threatened with an AK47. What about the First Amendment! Mann the barricades! Ain’t it ironic!
Wel,l Judith more often than not let’s it through. But still, justice delayed is justice denied. Mann the barricades!
Well, Don, you say it yourself. ‘In more primitive times it was common for perceived affronts to honor to be settled with guns, swords, battle axes.’
The equivalence is staring you in the face. You have a point, there is certainly a difference in the form and the degree of the aggression. Nonetheless, aggression. Tyrannical, terroristic, you pick ’em.
Sic semper tyrannis.
============
You are missing something JCH. You say that Hitchens was the champion of those being slandered, libeled. OK, when Hitchens feels that he is being slandered and libeled, he is not supposed to defend himself? Why do you think Henry K. backed off? Because Henry K. is a lot smarter than you are and he knew he had made a mistake. Smart people stop digging, when they realize they are in a hole.
==> “OK, when Hitchens feels that he is being slandered and libeled, he is not supposed to defend himself? ”
Looks like that one went right over Don’s ‘head, eh?
You should understand that sentence construction, joshie. Or is there some other point you are trying to make? Give us one of your 2000 word meandering essays.
Ah, I see what you mean joshie. You should have told me to read harder. You finally scored a point. Be proud, joshie. Be proud.
Still, JCH is still picking on the wrong guy. Even a dead Hithcens would wipe the floor with JCH.
> Smart people stop digging, when they realize they are in a hole.
They also stop digging when they have no shovel, or when someone puts them a shovel and ask them to dig, etc.
Smart people should come to realize that if they dig long enough, they will get in a hole, which means they would never dig were they to follow that advice.
More on Kissinger c Hutchins:
http://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Trial_of_Henry_Kissinger
INTEGRITY ™ – We Sell Moral Outrage
I didn’t see you down there, kimmy. Too funny to ignore. Did all of those powerful media and legal folks sending in friend of the court briefs in Steyn’s defense say anything about AK47s and premeditated murder being in any way equivalent to a freaking defamation lawsuit? No! Because they are not silly Kool-Aid drinkers. They are not grinding axes or airing personal peeves. They are serious people. Not a bunch of anonymous blog characters.
Don Monfort | January 15, 2015 at 2:57 am |
How does Mann destroy Steyn’s ability to make a living by suing him over a few words?
————–
Oh please. If Steyn loses and it costs him and NR millions of dollars, you think he’ll be able to easily find the same kind of employment again? You think he’ll easily recover financially? You think the First Amendment will be not be abridged and freedom of expression more secure? Come on, Don. This is a serious attack on freedom of speech and possibly more insidious than the attack on Charlie Hebdo because it’s coming from within and is far more subtle. An agent of the government is trying to shut up a member of the free press by destroying him and the magazine he writes for. NR is covered by insurance, but this will set back Steyn a lot of money and diminish his prospects in the future. That is what Mann is intending to do to him and Tim Ball and its working. Why do you keep soft-peddling this?
> If Steyn loses and it costs him and NR millions of dollars, you think he’ll be able to easily find the same kind of employment again?
I don’t see why not.
First, put all on his dog’s name.
Second, file the company for bankruptcy.
Third, call Donald Trump.
Fifth, profit.
Willard wouldn’t try it himself, given the opportunity. Mebbe he’s just skipped a few of the early steps.
=================
==> “and possibly more insidious than the attack on Charlie Hebdo”
I see that potter is giving Daniel a run for my newest most favorite Denizen.
I love these guyz.
So you are saying that half of the Muslim population believes that it is acceptable to kill someone for blasphemy or some other slight. Where did you get this from??
I’m willing to accept a better figure if you have one.
http://freethoughtnation.com/blasphemy-laws-around-the-world/
At least two high ranking elected officials in Pakistan who opposed Aasiya Noreen’s execution have been killed. There are 8-16 countries with capital punishment blasphemy laws and Muslims are pushing for sharia law in many countries where they are minorities .In countries like Nigeria without a blasphemy law the vigilantes perform the service.
https://selfscholar.wordpress.com/2012/12/19/blasphemy-laws-in-the-middle-east/
It seems that most of the remaining Muslim countries have some sort of 1-3 year jail sentence for what would be considered blasphemy.
Evidence seems to suggest the percentage of Muslims against blasphemy is quite high.
http://www.thewire.com/global/2013/12/13-countries-where-atheism-punishable-death/355961/
There are 13 countries that have a death sentence for atheism so there are some upsides to Islamic law.
Took my “father-in-law” to see “Selma” this afternoon.
As I watched, I couldn’t help but chuckle as I though of Judith trying to portray her advocacy about Mann vs. Steyn as some kind of noble endeavor to protect our civil rights.
Does an hour ever go by, that you are not thinking of Judith? Get yourself a life.
Hi Don,
Don’t feel left out – I think of you too, bro. In fact, whenever I see an Alpo commercial, you come to mind.
http://tinyurl.com/mprbjjb
You prove my point, joshie. Get a life. And grow TF up.
last word
Pingback: Pas Charlie! – De Dagelijkse Standaard
I wonder if Judith has learned anything from her mistake in linking Mann with the terrorists who committed premeditated mass murder in Paris. I haven’t seen any indication from her that she has.
She’s still listening. That’s so flattering. Shall we go on?
============
This was the ultimate ‘Six Degrees of Michael Mann’ post.
I don’t see how Judith will ever be able to top this.
Yes kimmy, we shall go on. I don ‘t know about you, but I am very good at dodging actual bullets from actual AK47s. You would be very smart watch what I do.
Heh, hearing like John Kerry’s. Hey, I think there likely was one there.
=====================
What’s with John Kerry, kimmy? Hearing what? Try to give it to me as Spongebob would. So I can understand your meaning, if there is one.
Je Suis Abused
Stars and hearts for panicking, injuring himself, and overboarding a crewmate, spooked at the bark of a lone AK-47.
========================
I didn’t get my stars and hearts for panicking, kimmy. You are dismissed.
At ease, commander; I suspect you didn’t write your own action reports.
=============
Er, ‘medal recommendations’. Won’t happen again, c.
======================
You are ill-informed, kimmy. Kerry is a wuss, but there is no credible evidence that he ever got a medal by making up stories in an after action report that he wrote himself. Don’t believe everything you read in a book or on the internet.
It’s the pix, kiddo, dontcha know.
========
Meaning what, kimmy? I’m wrong?
You really don’t have a clue. Little Lt. JGs do not write themselves up for a Silver Star, give the paper to the guy who hands out the medals, along with a $5 filing fee, and the guy pins on the JG’s shiny new Silver Star. Now think up something that’s cute, or indecipherable, and totally irrelevant.
Don Monfort | January 15, 2015 at 1:42 pm |
You are ill-informed, kimmy. Kerry is a wuss, but there is no credible evidence that he ever got a medal by making up stories in an after action report that he wrote himself. Don’t believe everything you read in a book or on the internet.
—————
The doctor who treated his “wounds” had a different opinion.
All three self-inflicted. Two during enemy action, once blowing up a pile of rice, ‘ol Ricebutt heself.
The man was a danger to himself and others.
==============
You nimrods are way too clever. You know from you years of experience on the front lines that little Lt. JGs can pin medals on themselves, willy nilly. I can’t fool you jokers. Carry on with your foolishness.
There seems to be some controversy about Mr. Kerry and his service.
Nobodies story seems quite square.
It is known that Mr. Kerry didn’t take any time off, so we do know his injuries weren’t life threatening. He accumulated an interesting and numerous (especially the purple hearts) collection of medals for the brief period he was in the field. He did leave about eight months early. He has citations from three different people years apart for the same Silver Star which is odd. He also left the reserves early.
On the hand he apparently served ably and has an honorable discharge.
Another nimrod making assertions that he pulled out of his a–. At various times in our military history you could get a purple heart for what some nimrod who watches a lot of TV would call just a flesh wound. Most of the officers I served with would not leave the field, unless they required more medical attention than they could receive from their medics. Or they would go to a battalion aid station or field hospital for treatment and go right back out.
Kerry accumulated three quick purple hearts for minor wounds and he asked to be excused from the war. He shouldn’t be proud of that. During that time he was in action that resulted in him being awarded a Silver Star. You can find the original copy of the after action report and the citation for the Silver Star on the web. They are legit. Kerry can be proud of that. I worked on the Bush campaign and I researched this crap thoroughly. Kerry turned over his military records to some news organizations during the campaign, and I saw them. I know what military records look like and they are legitimate.
What most actual veterans find despicable are Kerry’s statements and actions after his service that denigrated and dishonored the service of all of those who served.
You anonymous blog characters should do a little research before you sling the defamation. You are cheapening all awards for valor by insinuating they are passed out to any junior officer for the asking. Google: kerry military record. Look at both sides of the story and the actual evidence. Or just keep making fools of yourselves.
PS: I googled: kerry medals and it took me about 3 minutes to find this:
http://kerryvietnam.org/PDFs/Monthly_Historical_Summary.pdf
It’s the report on the incident related to Kerry’s SS. There were about a hundred guys there. You don’t see Kerry identified by name, but his actions are described as they are in his SS citation. He did not write the action report and it’s highly unlikely that it was a made up story, unless there was a very big conspiracy.
It’s sad that you brought this up, kim. Were you taking a shot at me? I don’t expect a straight answer.
Was that Silver Star action valorous or a lethally foolish maneuver, the example of which may have killed a good friend of his?
=========================
The information I have that you don’t, Don, is an extended conversation, years and blogs ago, with a soldier who was there. He defended Kerry’s actions unsuccessfully.
==============
OK, kimmy. That’s all I need to know. Enjoy your life.
You coulda talked to him. We did.
========
Well, he was several hundred yards away and did not directly eyewitness Kerry’s naval action. That ‘there’ mistake won’t happen again, C.
And Don, please, this is no torpedo attack on you, only on your conception of Kerry’s service in Vietnam.
============================
The military is loathe to make cowardice dishonorable. It cheapens their own valor. The Admiral(s?) did right by Kerry and by the rest of their command, they got him the Hell out of there.
=============================
Come on, Don.There’s little you can do against Koldie’s swiftboating.
Heh, like Kerry couldn’t do with the originals.
================
Like I said kimmy, it’s sad that you brought this up. In the context of our little discussion, I am going to have to think that it was a shot at me and my service. You don’t seem to like or trust the military/intelligence community and the government. A healthy skepticism is useful, but we are not all liars, cheats and oppressors. I am going to guess you are a 9/11 truther. I feel sorry for people who wallow in fear and ignorance.
I am not defending Kerry. I am defending truth, justice and the American way, as is my habit.
The doctor was full of chit.
And Kerry was full of rice, self-inflicted shrapnel, and the ecchymotic consequences of having a prat fall from the tiller.
=============
Testimony, metaphor, or both?
I have a comment stuck in moderation and I want to move on from this weird thread. I will try it without the only word I can figure that tripped the modertation machine:
Like I said kimmy, it’s sad that you brought this up. In the context of our little discussion, I am going to have to think that it was a shot at me and my service. You don’t seem to like or trust the military/intelligence community and the government. A healthy skepticism is useful, but we are not all liars, cheats and oppressors. I am going to guess you are a 9/11——-. I feel sorry for people who wallow in fear and ignorance.
I am not defending Kerry. I am defending truth, justice and the American way, as is my habit.
I’ll try to escape the moderation monster with this variation:
Like I said kimmy, it’s sad that you brought this up. In the context of our little discussion, I am going to have to think that it was a shot at me and my service. You don’t seem to like or trust the military/intelligence community and the government. A healthy skepticism is useful, but we are not all —-, cheats and oppressors. I am going to guess you are a 9/11 ——. I feel sorry for people who wallow in fear and ignorance.
I am not defending Kerry. I am defending truth, justice and the American way, as is my habit.
That enough already, moderation machine.
Here’s a good take on freedom of speech in Australia, where Tony Abbott, who backed down from his election promise to repeal anti-free speech laws, spoke out for fos post-Charlie but has ruled out revisiting the law. This is from Trisha Jha at the Centre for Independent Studies.
Free speech and the aftermath of Charlie Hebdo
The debate about reform of Section 18C of the Racial Discrimination Act has bubbled up again in the wake of the slaughter at the Charlie Hebdo office, and has been met with predictable outrage over political point-scoring from opponents of reform who argue debate should not be re-opened. For what it’s worth, I agree. The debate should have never been closed in the first place.
It is a strange defence of freedom of expression that simultaneously condemns the killing of people for drawing cartoons and implicitly affirms that Australian law should nevertheless have a chilling effect on those who might produce similar words or images. Implicit in the exhortation to restrict speech are the ideas that free speech is a zero-sum game where the ‘loser’ is almost always a minority community; that minorities gain little from freedom of expression and that they do not lose much from restrictions on speech.
The reality is that, across the globe, people fight for liberal democratic ideals and for free speech in particular. Just this week, Saudi Arabian blogger Raif Badawi was sentenced to 1000 lashes for calling himself a liberal. Anti-blasphemy laws – part of India’s strange tradition of secularism – undermine free speech in that country in the name of unity. Free speech is no less important in the Western world, and the same conviction that defends it abroad should defend it here.
Minorities of all stripes – Muslims included – can and do defend the liberal democratic values that underpin our society, and this includes the right to free expression. The solidarity expressed in #JeSuisCharlie was complemented by #JeSuisAhmed, in honour of the French Muslim police officer Ahmed Merabet who was gunned down outside the Charlie Hebdo office. The Muslim mayor of Rotterdam, Ahmed Aboutaleb, also used rather colourful language when defending the centrality of a free press to Dutch society.
While it’s obvious that some speech does offend and hurt particular minority communities, it does not follow that restrictions on speech are therefore necessary. Free speech is just as important to minority communities as it is to society as a whole. British author Kenan Malik argued in the wake of the Charlie Hebdo massacre that “once we give up on the right to offend in the name of ‘tolerance’ or ‘respect’, we constrain our ability to challenge those in power, and therefore to challenge injustice”. It is patronising to suggest otherwise. Jonathan Rauch wrote “the open society is sometimes a cross we bear, but it is also a sword we wield, and we are defenceless without it”. He was writing specifically about one particular minority community, but it’s a lesson we could all bear to learn.
> Once we give up on the right to offend in the name of ‘tolerance’ or ‘respect’, we constrain our ability to challenge those in power, and therefore to challenge injustice.
Once we give up the right to defend our people with weapons in the name of peace and democracy, we constrain our ability to challenge those in power, and therefore to challenge injustice.
Interesting that in France, quite a few people were arrested recently for inciting violence (through speech) among Muslim extremists.
And you find that particularily interesting why? If someone in another country (pick one) was determined to be attempting to incite violance what would be the result?
It’s interesting because it shows that it is easy to simplistically grandstand about freedom of speech,,and exploit the concept for partisan purposes, but that in reality the issues are complicated.
Dieudonne’s alleged crime: writing “Je suis Charlie Coulibaly” (I am Charlie Coulibaly) on his Facebook account.
These issues are necessarily relative. What comprises “inciting violence?
What I find is that people argue for absolute standards and then back them off selectively based on convenience.
Sorry –
Meant to provide the link:
http://www.npr.org/blogs/thetwo-way/2015/01/14/377201227/controversial-french-comedian-arrested-over-facebook-post-on-paris-attacks
Read the article. You don’t find that interesting?
I’m not saying that this is interesting because it is happening in France.
It’s horrible when Islamic terrorists suppress freedom of speech, but perfectly OK when state terrorists oppress comedians like Dieudonne, or political advocates like Steyn.
“It’s interesting because it shows that it is easy to simplistically grandstand about freedom of speech,,and exploit the concept for partisan purposes, but that in reality the issues are complicated.”
It is not really all that complicated.
There is a clear difference between expressing an opinion and asking others to harm people because someone expressed an opinion.
Writing that I think your religion is an unsupportable superstition is different than asking people to kill the person who wrote about religion = superstition. Yelling “fire” in a crowded theater is not proteted free speach for simple reasons
Anyone inciting terrorism should be arrested or deported. Your idea that all principles have to be blinding adhered to is asinine.
blindly, not blinding – although Joshua appears to be blind to the truth about Muslims.
Rob –
==> “There is a clear difference between expressing an opinion and asking others to harm people because someone expressed an opinion.”
Did you read the article?
AK –
==> “It’s horrible when Islamic terrorists suppress freedom of speech, but perfectly OK when state terrorists oppress comedians like Dieudonne, or political advocates like Steyn.”
Do you really think that the arrest of Dieudonne can simply be characterized as “state terrorists” suppressing free speech?
Do you really think that Steyn’s speech and Dieuudonne’s speech are analogous?
Do you really think that the situation with Steyn and the situation with Dieudonne are analogous?
jim2
==> “Anyone inciting terrorism should be arrested or deported. Your idea that all principles have to be blinding adhered to is asinine… although Joshua appears to be blind to the truth about Muslims.”
Since you seem to know what my views are w/r/t the arrest of Dieudonne, I’m hoping you could explain what they are?
“…although Joshua appears to be blind to the truth about Muslims.””
Perhaps you could explain to me also, what “truth about Muslims” I am blind to?
It’s quite amusing that it’s so easy to provoke knee-jerk reactions merely by talking about the complexity of issues.
Hard to understand how that facebook post could get im convicted of any crime
Rob –
What about his use of N*zi-like salutes?
And do keep in mind the context, as a country that was invaded by N*zis.
Do you think that it is ridiculous to consider his actions as significantly along the road to inciting violence? To advocating hate crimes?
Keep in mind, also, jim2’s pronouncement:
What comprises “militat[ing] against the host?”
I didn’t say anything about Dieudonne. Islam is a violent religion. Western countries should ban the immigration of Muslims until they can figure out what Muslims are dangerous and which aren’t.
It’s really pretty simple, not to mention obvious. Read up on the history of Islam before you comment again.
jim2 –
I’ll ask again. What is the “truth about Muslims” that I am bind to?
Read up on the history of the Muslim religion Joshua. I think you can figure it out.
And jim2 –
You seemed earlier to be confident that you knew my opinions about the situation with Dieuudonne, when you posted the following in response to my comment about the arrest of Dieuudonne.
==> “Your idea that all principles have to be blinding adhered to is asinine.”
Are you now saying that you have no idea what my opinions are about Dieuudonne?
jim2 –
I’ll ask again. What is the “truth about Muslims” that I am bind to?
I’ve had enough of your liberal, nit-picking BS, Joshua. Bye.
jim2 –
==> “I’ve had enough of your liberal, nit-picking BS, Joshua.”
You opened the discussion – by responding to my comment at the top of this subthread.
In your response you said that I am “blind to the truth about Muslims.”
I’m trying to discuss your statement. We can’t go anywhere with that unless you explain what the “truth” is about Muslims that I’m blind to.
If you want to come back and carry out the discussion you started, I’m game. Personally, I don’t see much point in engaging in a discussion if you’re not willing to explain your views. But it’s up to you. Maybe you’ll change your mind and decide to explain. I’ll check later to see if there’s a response.
Interesting remark at about 6:30 in the youtube video:
“Don’t take refuge in the forced security of consensus. And the feeling that whatever you think you’re bound to be Okay because you’re in the safely moral majority.” – Christopher Hitchens. Is the consensus not be appreciated by some of those in it?
> Is the consensus not be appreciated by some of those in it?
Cf. your schoolyard days.
Say what you want but, there will be streets in Gaza named after these two who engaged in massacre. The French may finally choose sides because of this atrocity — for whatever the justification — but, when we were looking, the French did not side with America and help Bush over the Twin Towers atrocity and to justify their trading with the enemy they pretended to hate Bush.
We need to forgive the French for that and band together with them and other Western countries to neutralize Militant Islam.
… to protect an artists right to –e.g., submerse the Koran in a glass of urine?
???
Militant Islam in action.
From the article:
…
Tens of thousands are taking to the streets in a display of national unity as the Pakistani national parliament moved to condemn the French satirical magazine Charlie Hebdo for publishing cartoons of Mohammed.
Rallies saw chanting against the West and “blasphemers”, and the burning of the French flag. Yesterday, the Pakistan parliament passed a resolution on the release of the Charlie Hebdo survivors edition, which prominently featured images of Mohammed, a practice condemned by Muslims worldwide.
…
http://www.breitbart.com/national-security/2015/01/16/massive-pakistan-protests-against-charlie-hebdo-filthy-blasphemers/
This is what I mean by suggesting that it might be smart to not unnecessarily stir up the hornets nest. Enduring sporadic terrorist acts to avenge the Prophet, whose name we won’t mention, might be a price that most of us are willing to pay so some clowns can continue to publish nasty, provocative cartoons, but Pakistan is a nuclear state that is in danger of falling into the hands of Muslim fanatics. Iran is a state that is already run by the fanatics and they are about to go nuclear. You all can fill in the rest of the story.
Kill the hornets.
That’s what I am talking about, jim. Now some Islamic radical terrorist recruiter can show your comment to some kid and tell him that the Crusaders are coming to wipe out the kid and his family. What I suggest you do jim, is to focus on the problem. Most hornets just go about their everyday lives. We are after the nasty ones.
Jim, the people who have to do the actual fighting take a dim view of their fellow citizens who gratuitously insult the Prophet, whose name we won’t mention. Pretend you are in charge of a platoon of marines, or a seal team with some sketchy local militia, and you are manning a little outpost along the Afghan-Pak border. I am guessing you would discourage your people from going down to the village and passing out flyers featuring Charlie Hedbo cartoons, just to show that they could do it.
Don, I’m not suggesting that Westerners should poke the hornet’s nest. But if one does, then our tradition is to defend free speech.
We have sacrificed enough of our own in the Middle East. We need to change Islamic culture in a manner that puts the fewest of us at risk.
IMO, this problem won’t away on its own.
Would you support the banning of immigration from the Middle East to the US? That doesn’t put us at risk, not the military and not civilians. It’s imminently doable.
As we deal with jim2’s approach to risk, it might be worthwhile to remember:
Jim, a ban on Muslim immigration is not going to happen in the U.S., unless there is a sustained wave of terrorism. We need to start by being very careful about who we let in. Old folks with children here, spouses and children reunited with parents would be my preference. But that kind of restriction is not likely either. Best we can hope for under the current circumstances is that the politicians in charge forget about bending over backwards to avoid the appearance of profiling. We need to keep out anybody that even “looks like” they will cause us trouble. Am I being too soft?
I appalled some State Department functionaries at a cocktail party a few years back by outlining my idea of a foreign policy that would focus on our own national interests. State Dept. in collaboration with Defense Dept. has constructed an official looking wheel of fortune. Make a numbered list of cities scattered around the world. Don’t include cities in countries that have any long range nuclear weapons capability, for a reason that will become obvious. This can be set up in a day or so and you are ready to go. You spin the wheel and whatever number comes up, you find the city on the list assigned that number and you nuke it. This will have a very chilling effect on anybody who has any inkling of a desire to mess with us. The hornets will say to themselves: What TF will they do if they really get mad? I bet we wouldn’t have to put on this demonstration, very often.
Don, your ideas sound reasonable to me. I agree that with the current administration nothing rather than something will be done.
I left something out, jim. I wouldn’t want to restrict the immigration of Muslim women, if they are single and attractive. Especially the Persian ladies. Some real stunners.
I used to date one, Don. But, still, I wouldn’t discriminate due to gender, being that’s un-American and all.
I was actually thinking we should take out the first 4 or 5 levels of the terrorist’s command structure, be it governmental, civilian, or religious; with conventional weapons. If religious and a leader is an imam with a mosque, take out the mosque and everyone who supports it. Take out the leadership and social support, whoever or whatever the leaders are.
She was agnostic, so not Muslim, I guess?
“Anyone defending the satirists at Charlie should have a tough time defending Michael Mann in his legal war against the satirical writings of Mark Steyn and Rand Simberg.”
Michael Mann is Charlie Hebdo.
John Stewart pointed out yesterday that following the Charlie Hebdo massacre, the French government canceled the scheduled performances of a Muslim comedian whose material is anti-Semitic. It turns out that obscene, irreligious hate speech is only arbitrarily protected in France. It’s not really a sacred cultural value, after all.
Similarly, there is the arbitrarily protected: 1. ‘Hide the Decline’ and 2. denigration of Curry, which IMO equate to: 1. scientific obscenity and 2. hate speech. I repeat: Michael Mann is Charlie Hebdo.
(Remember, simile is the comparison of unlike things, so Steyn does not have to literally massacre Mann for the simile to hold, he can do it literarily, i.e. in a literary manner.)
That’s quite bogus, blue. But it makes as much sense as Judith putting Mann on the same side as the terrorists, in the war on satire.
Maybe that is the point that blue is making.
From the article:
…
(CNN)The suspected Islamist terrorists who had a shootout with police on Thursday in Verviers, Belgium, have ties to ISIS-linked cells in other European countries, a senior Belgian counterterrorism source told CNN on Friday.
The two suspects who died in the shootout are believed to have fought with ISIS in Syria, the source said. Another man was captured but hasn’t revealed any information.
…
Besides the two killed, 17 have been arrested in the investigation — 13 in the Belgium raids and four others in France, including two who were detained while trying to cross from France into Italy, van der Sypt’s office said.
…
In France, police also made at least 12 arrests Friday in the probe of last week’s slayings of 17 people.
Additionally, two people suspected of involvement with the alleged Verviers suspects were detained while trying to cross from France into Italy through the Frejus tunnel, a spokesman for Belgium’s federal prosecutor’s office said Friday.
Belgium is asking France to extradite those two, said the spokesman, who would not disclose the suspects’ names or nationalities.
Read: Web of terror surrounds Paris attacks
In neighboring Germany, police in at least two cities arrested men they accuse of supporting jihadis in Syria. These suspects did not appear to be planning homegrown attacks, German authorities said.
…
http://www.cnn.com/2015/01/16/world/belgium-anti-terror-operation/index.html
From the article:
…
Washington (CNN) – As terrorism increasingly becomes a tactic of warfare, the number of attacks and fatalities soared to a record high in 2012, according to a new report obtained exclusively by CNN.
More than 8,500 terrorist attacks killed nearly 15,500 people last year as violence tore through Africa, Asia and the Middle East, according to the National Consortium for the Study of Terrorism and Responses to Terrorism.
That’s a 69% rise in attacks and an 89% jump in fatalities from 2011, said START, one of the world’s leading terrorism-trackers.
Six of the seven most deadly groups are affiliated with al Qaeda, according to START, and most of the violence was committed in Muslim-majority countries.
The previous record for attacks was set in 2011 with more than 5,000 incidents; for fatalities the previous high was 2007 with more than 12,800 deaths.
…
http://religion.blogs.cnn.com/2013/10/28/terrorist-attacks-and-deaths-hit-record-high-report-shows/
From the article:
…
19,000 French websites hit by DDoS, defaced in wake of terror attack
Posted on 16 January 2015.
Since the three day terror attack that started in France on January 7 with the attack on satirical newspaper Charlie Hebdo, 19,000 websites of French-based companies have been targeted by cyber attackers, AP reports.
According to Admiral Arnaud Coustilliere, the French military’s head of cyberdefense, most of these attacks were carried out by three Islamic hacker groups: Middle East Cyber Army, Fallaga team and Cyber Caliphate.
This unprecedented avalanche of cyber attacks targeted both government sites and that of big and small businesses. Most were low-level DDoS attacks, and some were web defacements.19,000 French websites hit by DDoS, defaced in wake of terror attack
Posted on 16 January 2015.
Since the three day terror attack that started in France on January 7 with the attack on satirical newspaper Charlie Hebdo, 19,000 websites of French-based companies have been targeted by cyber attackers, AP reports.
According to Admiral Arnaud Coustilliere, the French military’s head of cyberdefense, most of these attacks were carried out by three Islamic hacker groups: Middle East Cyber Army, Fallaga team and Cyber Caliphate.
This unprecedented avalanche of cyber attacks targeted both government sites and that of big and small businesses. Most were low-level DDoS attacks, and some were web defacements.
…
http://www.net-security.org/secworld.php?id=17832
Pingback: How much is climate change going to cost us? – Stoat
Good topic, Judith.
I’m surprised you did not draw a distinction between free speech and academic freedom. In the climate debate, those who are making authoritative comments as experts in their field should be couching their rhetoric carefully so as not to go beyond what they know (and as you point out quoting Don Rumsfeld, admitting there is likely stuff we don’t even know that we don’t know). That’s different from the completely freewheeling public debate about climate that we have on the soap box, which has far fewer constraints. As scientists, we should poke each other in the intellectual eye, but always with the goal being the greater scientific good rather than simply to see how much noise we can make. Somewhere there is a line we need to draw between speaking as subject matter experts and speaking as public citizens who know more than the average bear about the subject matter. Somewhere….
good point, i have some draft posts that relate to the issues you raise here