York University takes one small step...

As I have pointed out before, the defenders of free speech need to remember that it is wrong for those of us who are not government, those of us who are just involved in daily interactions and in control of our own rightful spaces, to allow people to misuse our shared freedom and to pollute our shared space in order to disrupt others' freedom to discuss the issues of the day. So I am happy to read that York University suspends student running anti-Semitic Website.

Maybe the alumni refusing to give money to York are having an effect. When one student fundraiser recently called me, he had a prepared speech explaining that it was only a small troublesome minority at York who are antisemitic (sound familiar?). I pointed out that whatever the case, it is the administration's siding with the thugs who shut down pro-Israel speech that insures (among other reasons) York will not be seeing my money.

But maybe York has now taken the first in a series of necessary steps. When the University sends an official apology to Frank Dimant, Daniel Pipes, Dr. Mordechai Kedar, Walid Shoebat, Rev. Majed El Shafie, and Faytene Kryskow, and invites them to York, all expenses paid, to give well-publicized public lectures, I will start to be impressed.

Film on Campus Antisemitism - Crossing the Line The Intifada Comes to Campus

CROSSING THE LINE - THE INTIFADA COMES TO CAMPUS
The link takes you to a trailer for a new film discussing the surrender of Canadian and American college campuses to the Global Intifada. It might interest readers to see a little of what is going on at places like York University. However, if the trailer is any guide, the film seems to be only apologizing for Israel, saying essentially "it's not such a bad place, and these lunatics shutting up speech on campus can't distinguish between legitimate criticism and demonization of Israel." Unfortunately, I see no sign the film seeks to analyze the Global Intifada for what it is, for the hateful, nihilistic-Utopian, destructive, deluded, racist, supremacist, Islamic-leftist ideology that it is. Nor does it seem to explain why university administrations allow these destroyers of free speech and thought to remain on campus.

The trailer basically says "those pro-Palestinian people may have a legitimate beef but they don't express it fairly or decently", as if it's somehow possible to distinguish a legitimate Palestinian leadership or program from the core Arab-Islamic refusal to recognize the legitimacy of any Jewish state or political movement in "Dar al-Islam", the refusal that has shaped the conflict and the fate of "the Palestinians" since even before the modern state of Israel was founded. In other words, the film does not admit that we must choose between Islamic or Judeo-Christian views on the nature of God and man, and the legitimacy of nation-states, when it comes to deliberating on the question of Israel. It shirks the difficult question that offends the half-baked totalitarian ideology of multiculturalism that gains power by not allowing its subjects to make the necessary choice. We are told we cannot just look at the different fruits of different world views and choose the better.

So, to use the language of Eric Voegelin, the film does not seem comfortable challenging much of the global left as taking on the form of a Gnostic resentment of the actual, historically-evolved, order of human existence. One senses that if it weren't for the Global Intifada the filmmakers and the Jewish professors they interview would romanticize leftist history, notwithstanding the many tens of millions murdered by the left's Gnostic political religions in the twentieth century. The trials of secular Jews to find their place in the world continue... Meanwhile, our universities are being taken over by those who think they have the only "solution" to the infuriating Jewish question. And, as our previous post shows, the universities are caving in to the totalitarian forces shouting down and physically threatening anyone who would defend Jewish national existence. Who's next?

Why Good Canadians must have nothing to do with York University

Jewish Tribune - York University discriminates against Christian and Jewish coalition ahead of Israel Apartheid Week

On Monday morning, York University informed Imagine With Us campus partners Christians United for Israel (CUFI) that the university was cancelling the event due to the fact that Imagine With Us did not meet their requirements. York had required that the organizers include a formidable police and campus security presence paid for by the organizers, a list of all attendees in advance, a minute-by-minute synopsis of all speakers’ talking points and a ban on public advertising of the event at York and on satellite campuses.

York University has said that the requirements were demanded of the event organizers due to the participation of individuals who they claim invite the animus of anti-Israel campus agitators.

In an interview with the Jewish Tribune, Rob Kilfoyle, director of security at York, confirmed the event had been cancelled and stated that the need for security at events is determined on a case-by-case basis and that the participation of speakers such as Dimant and Pipes was the cause of the stringent requirements. When asked why similar demands were not made of the organizers of Israel Apartheid Week events, Kilfoyle stated that even though the organizers of those events will not be paying for their own security – as the university had demanded of Imagine With Us – York will be there “to monitor the activities.”

Welcome to Egypt. York is now a place where you're either thug or dhimmi - no other way is known to the administration. This of course is not the first implicitly antisemitic decision of the York administration when it comes to defending, or not, the free speech of public defenders of Israel. No one should mistake this place (or respect its degrees) as a genuine provider of education. Boycott! (HT: Catfur)

Bazaar man trades in politically-correct apartheid

Update to our last post. Mike reports that York [University] President Shoukri releases a long overdue public statement.

As Mike notes, there is a lot wrong with this statement. For starters, it is not enough to make statements decrying your school's antisemitic riot without making clear indications of how you will take actions to protect Jewish students and insure all students can freely express their support for unfashionable but nonetheless intelligent and ethical causes like that which holds Israel as a model nation for the economic and social development of the Middle East.

Shoukri writes, in between comments on the woeful economic news:

We have just endured the longest university strike in the history of English-speaking Canada. Our students have returned to class and to examinations, only to be faced with a barrage of disruption, hostility and even intimidation from their fellow students. This state of affairs is unacceptable to me, and it should be unacceptable to you. Intimidation, bullying, and discrimination will not be tolerated here, and we are taking action to protect the rights and the safety of all students and staff.
[...]
at a time when our community should be pulling together, we turn on each other instead — academic disruption, intimidation, sit-ins, name-calling, shouting people down, banging on the doors and windows of Senate or the Board of Governors or student clubs. Then we run to the media and tell anyone who will listen how bad York is.

Is it any wonder our own students are disconnected? Or that turnout at our student elections is so low? Or that our students and their families are voting with their feet? Our public face is not demonstrating the core values a university should stand for:

* Freedom of speech – especially for those with whom we disagree
* Mutual Respect
* Reason
* Discourse
* Objectivity
* Being able to teach — and learn — without disruption
* Being open to other ideas and other people.
* And yes, social justice.

But we cannot demand social justice only for ourselves and for those who think like us. Social justice is for everyone, or it is for no one. York has a history of social activism, but the events of the past weeks — intimidation and shouting each other down — have nothing to do with social activism.

That is why I am asking you today, as Senators and key representatives of the academy, to make your voices heard and say, “enough is enough.”

I want to give a couple of examples of how the academy can contribute to open dialogue on tough issues. At other universities in this province, faculty members participate as guest speakers at lecture series organized by student clubs. These events tackle the very same issues we are struggling with:

* Islamophobia
* Anti-Semitism
* Racial profiling
* Overcoming stereotypes

The goal is not agreement or endorsement of each others’ ideas, it is to create safe spaces where people can come together to articulate their views — without fear and without being shouted down.

I’ll give you another example happening right here at York. Next week, the York Centre for International and Security Studies is hosting an event that will examine the idea of academic boycotts. Speakers will explore the topic in a reasoned way in an academic forum. These two examples share one common element: faculty involvement.

Our faculty needs to become more involved in leading these conversations. Students look up to their professors. They look to you for direction. You are in a position to mentor and guide them and to teach them how to talk with passion about things that anger us, but without anger, without hate, without fear. I am asking you to help us fix our community, because this truly is our problem.

We talk a lot about diversity here at York, but somehow we have allowed that diversity to divide us. We need to focus now on unity, on our common values and on what makes us a community. We must identify the challenges and work as a community to address them.

"But somehow we have allowed that diversity to divide us"? Of course it is a bit jarring to see academics invest in the Utopian lie that humanity can ever exist without conflicts and divisions that need to be mediated intelligently, but not denied. Does he mean to suggest that his idea of "diversity" is one where everyone signs off on some code of politically-correct thought where nothing can really be advanced that is not in the name of some already-sanctioned terms of peace, with due recognition of the officially-sanctioned victim groups? He probably does. The central facet of postmodern man is her recognition that every action and every thought entails a process of figuring a centre of sacred attention and hence a marginalized or alienated periphery of the sacred. Since every thought and statement creates a margin, only actions and thoughts that are "correct" can be contemplated by people obsessed with redeeming alleged victimhood. The centre is always under suspicion and one is not focussed on upholding the norms of those centres that, notwithstanding their limits in building Utopia, nevertheless allow for a maximum freedom of exchange on the periphery.

So, in practise what does this mean? It means, for example, that postmodern ideologues pay respect to the idea of "Islamophobia" without allowing serious discussion (maximum exchange) on the reasons "the kafir" might fear Islam. It means a university president who thinks he can calm tensions on campus by pointing to some professorial pretension to be having a serious academic discussion on the "Boycott Divest Sanctions" movement vis a vis Israel. Mike points us to this little write up of the coming event, whose only listed speaker is the Palestinian activist Omar Barghouti. This does not look like it's going to be a balanced or sober discussion. The write up makes the ridiculous comparison of Israel to South African apartheid and ends:

Is this a sustainable movement that can build on the successes of the similarly inspired movement against South African apartheid or is it engaging in counter-productive actions that threaten to undermine delicate peace efforts in the region as its critics claim? Furthermore, how are those who reside in Canada, seemingly removed from this conflict, most constructively able contribute to the establishment of a lasting peace in the region?

So, for example, anyone with the idea that it is the entire value system that is behind the BDS movement that is the greatest source of violence in the Middle East cannot, one imagines, seriously engage in the "reciprocity" this event pretends to advance. In other words, because the "Palestinians" are the duly sanctioned, unquestionable, victim group, the most realistic ideas about how to maximize reciprocity in the Middle East cannot be mentioned. There can be no mention of the real Apartheid states: the Islamic ones that have effectively cleansed themselves of all non-Muslims; the Arab states that want nothing to do with adopting the Arab "Palestinian" refugees other than to leave them as a festering wound and to point the finger at an American-Jew scapegoat, so as to re-focus their own oppressive societies' many internal resentments; the Muslim countries in which a class of dhimmis still exist as a lower caste relegated to jobs like garbage collecting and recycling. There can be no mention of Jordanian or Syrian or Lebanese massacres of Palestinians, a death toll far greater than that suffered in the Israel-Palestine conflict. There can be no mention of the fact that it is only in Israel that Jews and Arabs may or may not choose to live side by side in the same neighborhoods, as they variously do. There can be no discussion of the fact that only in Israel do Arabs freely make their own politics and elect their own representatives, even including parties that call for an end to the Israeli state. There can be no discussion of why Islam cannot recognize the existence of any kind of Jewish politics in lands it claims for Islam. There can be no discussion that maybe it is the failure of Palestinian politics that threatens to "undermine delicate peace efforts". There can be no discussion of what to do with the Hamas cult of martyrdom that actively promotes the deaths of Palestinians that they may be used as victims to throw before the antisemitic world's attention to fuel more insane hatred of Israel, a state that has been under attack and defending itself from Arabs since before it even came into existence. There can be no discussion of the Hamas butchery of Fatah opponents. There can be no discussion of the international left's role in fostering and encouraging the unproductive Palestinian cult of victimhood. There can be no discussion of those who would protect an unfree society because it is romantically traditional, and hence bound in by all kinds of socioreligious limits, rather than call for a universal modernity bound by constitutional democracies interacting a global free market. In short, the idea that "social justice" is not at all what is on offer in the diatribes privileged by the politically-correct at York cannot be seriously questioned. Nope, instead "Israeli Apartheid" Week will go on as planned, antisemitic riots be ignored.

Respect for reality at York University is at best optional. In President Shoukri's bazaar you can hope to trade peacefully only in that which the cult of "diversity" recognizes as legitimate goods. It will be interesting to see what happens to the Teaching Assistant who unilaterally declared to a student that he is banned from wearing his IDF t-shirt.

York University's moral and intellectual death spiral continues...

UPDATE: Mike has the text of the letter sent out to the York Jewish students mentioned below. The university administration is apparently trying to look balanced by also disciplining the "anti-Israel-apartheid" students, but as Mike points out it was they who started the disturbance the university wishes to sanction.
-------------------

We previously reported on the antisemitic riot at Toronto's York University, an event which has grabbed national attention.

Blazing Cat Fur now reports Jewish Students Attacked at York University now face Charges!

For demonstrating without a permit!

From a source: Prof. Ed Morgan is filing a defence motion for the Hasbarah fellows at York University. You are not going to believe this. The Hasbarah fellows are being charged with demonstrating without a permit, and three Jewish students fined $500 each. The Muslim mob did not have a permit either. The thing is, this is the most critical week because if the Hasbara fellows get banned (even temporarily as is being suggested) then they can't be present on campus to do their planned counter-activism against Israel Apartheid Week.

If this report is accurate, any and every Canadian who values a free society must send York University messages like this one (also via Cat Fur)

Dear Dr. Shoukri,
(President and Vice Chancellor, York University)

I am Shalom Lappin Professor of Computational Linguistics at King's College, London, and I am currently a visiting professor in the Department of Computer Science at the University of Toronto, where I am on sabbatical for the semester.

I was recently invited to give a talk on my research on computational modeling of grammar induction in the Colloquium of the Cognitive Science Program of the Philosophy Department at York, on March 25. I accepted the invitation with great pleasure. I received my BA in Philosophy from York in May 1970, and I welcomed this opportunity to return to my first academic home. It is therefore with considerable regret that I must now withdraw from this engagement in light of the York administration's handling of the attack on Jewish students that took place on the afternoon of February 11.

The reports of this attack that I have read in both the Canadian and the foreign press (confirmed by eyewitness accounts that I have received) converge on a disturbing sequence of events. A group of approximately 100 students supporting the York Student Federation broke up a press conference organized by other students campaigning to impeach the YSF. This group then pursued approximately 40 of the students from the press conference, most of them Jewish,
to the offices of the campus Hillel, where the latter locked themselves in for fear of physical assault. The YSF supporters banged on the door and the windows of the offices, shouting threatening comments at the students trapped inside. The students in the Hillel headquarters appealed to campus security for assistance but received none. They then called the Toronto Police, who eventually arrived to escort them out of the offices, through lines of hostile YSF supporters chanting angry slogans and hurling insults at them.

To date I have seen no public statement by any University official on this incident, beyond the expressionon of an intention to investigate it. I called your office on Monday, February 23 to seek clarification of the administration's view of the attack. A member of your staff called me back today and graciously listened to my concerns. However, she was unable to do more than
reiterate the University's official position that the matter is still under investigation. Given that the incident took place two weeks ago, I find it odd that the administration has been unable to come to any conclusions on what took place. It is particularly remarkable that it felt no need to
release at least a general statement specifying that violence and abuse of any kind will not be tolerated on campus, and confirming that all students have the right to express their views without fear of intimidation.

The fact that the University has not taken up this assault with the students who launched it, nor acted to reassure the students who they targeted indicates a severe failure on the part of the administration to fulfill its reponsibility to sustain a campus free of physical violence and harrassment. Several of the Jewish students at York claim that the assault was not an aberration, but part of a general atmosphere of extreme hostility that they have been forced to contend with over an extended period of time. I am in no position to evaluate this assertion. But it seems to me that the administration is obliged to address the grievances of students who feel that they are being victimized, particularly in light of a significant incident which lends some credence to their charge.

I do not regard the ethnic identities or the political views of any of the participants in this event as of relevant concern. All sides to a controversial question have an equal right to be heard in a civil environment of tolerance and mutual respect. Nor do I see criticism of Israel as the problem here. I have frequently spoken out publicly against the policies of the Israeli government, most recently in a joint letter and comments critical of Israel's operation in Gaza, published in the Observer in January.

If one group of students is permitted to engage in violent harrassment of another without the decisive intervention of the University's administration, then the conditions for a free and unfettered exchange of ideas are completely undermined, and the primary purpose of university life is betrayed.

When I was an undergraduate at York in the late 1960s the University was home to lively political activity on a variety of issues. The Israeli-Palestinian conflict was one of these, and discussion was intense, occasionally heated. However, at no time did this discussion degenerate into systematic bullying, intimidation, or expressions of bigotry. Nor would the administration of that period have allowed it to do so. It is a source of great sadness to me that the current administration is either incapable or unwilling to insure the existence of a basic culture of decency, civility, and free speech on its campus. This culture is a necessary feature of any serious institution of higher learning.

Sincerely,

Shalom Lappin
Professor of Computational Linguistics
King's College, London

It would seem that Dr. Shoukri & Co. need to be reminded that Jews who stand up to organized, systemic racism, encouraged by many an unthinking professor, cannot be treated like dhimmis.
------

For those interested, a truly scholarly and ethical discussion of the latest trends in antisemitism can be found here.

The ebb and flow of Canadian academic freedom

First the evil news from scaramouche:

Déjà vu at York U: Don’t look now, but Toronto’s York University has morphed into a German campus circa Der Fuhrer—or a Gaza campus circa today. I just received the following desperate plea via e-mail:

To Whom It May Concern:
As students at York University Keele Campus we would like to urgently bring to your attention several appalling incidents, which took place today, February 11th 2009 on our campus.

After an attempted media conference, regarding a successful campaign of “Drop YFS”, a racial riot broke out deeming the members of “Drop YFS” racist. “Drop YFS” is a student led group with students from different backgrounds, faiths and beliefs. In addition, the Jewish students involved in “Drop YFS” belong to Hasbara at York, Hillel at York, and other Jewish groups on campus.

“Drop YFS” is a student run initiative to have the executive members of YFS (the undergraduate student government) held accountable for their inactivity during the strike. The media conference was put in place to thank the students for their 5000 signatures, and to congratulate the students for their success.

The conference was interrupted by mobs of people who broke into chants, racial slurs, and anti-Semitic threats. Students fearing for their lives at York University had to be protected and escorted out of the room by Toronto Police - as they were trapped inside this room unable to leave, afraid. The entire Jewish population of York is intimidated, and no longer feels secure on campus. The Jewish members of “Drop YFS” were solely targeted today for their religion and their political views.

There is video footage of this taking place, and we are more than willing to answer any of your questions. Please contact us:
Aaron Rosenberg
aaron_r123@hotmail.com
Elinor Izmaylov
elinorizmaylov@hotmail.com
Please forward this to as many people you can – the community at large must become aware that Jews on campus no longer feel safe regardless of their political views.

Enraged mobs of Jew-haters hurling threats and racial slurs? Where are our politicians? Where are the media? Where’s the Canadian Jewish Congress?
Where’s Barbara Hall?

As far as i can tell, the video is not yet on the web. Background on this story here.

We previously reported on Queen's University's own speech enforcers here Today comes the welcome news that Queen's is dropping the crazy idea. But in true Canadian slackademic fashion, the Americans are to blame for the crazy idea in the first place!

Calling it "incompatible with the atmosphere required for free speech," Queen's University in Kingston, Ont., on Wednesday scrapped its controversial "dialogue facilitator" program.

It caused a scandal last year when it was revealed the six student "facilitators" were mandated to intervene in private conversations to encourage discussion of social justice issues and discourage offensive language.

In a report to the administration, a panel of experts expressed "strong reservations about unsolicited interventions into the lives of students" because of the risk of "making students feel unsafe or under surveillance because of their opinions."

The panel included Leora Jackson, the school's rector, John Meisel, an emeritus professor of political science, and Keith Norton, the former head of the Ontario Human Rights Commission. They had "serious concerns" with how the program was set up.

The panel faulted Dean of Student Affairs Jason Laker for importing an American model of diversity promotion, from the National Coalition Building Institute, while failing to research any comparable programs at Canadian universities.

It's time we all stood up as Canadians and let York University officials know that theirs has become a pariah institution and that it is completely unacceptable that they have become a place for antisemitic riots. From my own experience of York, I blame not only the left-Islamist student alliance, in support of CUPE teachers and their union's official antisemitism, but also the ideologies promoted by many of the senior non-CUPE faculty.(HTs: Blazing Cat Fur)

---------------
UPDATE: Here is a first-hand account of the York incident and here is the B'nai Brith press release (via email):

‘Pandemonium at York University reflects dangerous trend
of anti-Jewish agitation on campuses,’ says B’nai Brith Canada –

B’nai Brith delegation to visit York campus this afternoon

TORONTO, February 12, 2009 – B’nai Brith Canada has expressed deep concern over disturbances yesterday at York University, with reports of Jewish students fearing for their safety and being escorted off campus by police. Turmoil erupted following a press conference by some students to announce that they had successfully garnered 5,000 signatures on a petition demanding the recall of York Federation Student leaders. Amidst the pandemonium, Jewish students were pushed and shoved, antisemitic slurs were shouted, leaving Jewish students to seek refuge in a locked room away from the frantic mob.

“We are disturbed and appalled by reports of Jewish students fearing for their safety and being scared to be identified as Jews on campus,” said Frank Dimant, B’nai Brith Canada’s Executive Vice President. “Just last week we met with York University student leaders who communicated incident after incident of deliberate intimidation of Jewish students, and marginalization and isolation on campus.

“We have requested an urgent meeting with York University’s administration to ensure that immediate measures be put in place to restore order and safety to campus life.

“We have already been in communication with police and demanded that the safety and security of Jewish students at York University and other campuses be dealt with as a matter of top priority.

“A senior delegation of B’nai Brith Canada officials will be on campus this afternoon to witness first hand a day in the life of a Jewish student on the frontlines against antisemitism, anti-Zionist and radical forces that care nothing about democracy, human rights and the rule of law.”

----------------

UPDATE 2: Video showing the aftermath of the riot (with police escorting students out of the Hillel centre while the mob chants) are here.

There is no perfect system: Ed Morgan on hate and free speech

Blazing Cat Fur brings our attention today to an article by Toronto law professor, and former Canadian Jewish Congress top official, Ed Morgan. Professor Morgan explains his about face on the question of Canada's "human rights" hate speech laws, from a supporter to an opponent.

What is noteworthy in Ed's narrative is not that he came through some application of careful legal reasoning to turn on the laws that the CJC has taken a lead in supporting. Rather, his revelation, perhaps like all real revelations, came through an experience of why such laws are not compatible with the pragmatic truths of human interaction in one's time and place.

In other words, there are actually very few opponents of the "hate speech" laws that hold some absolutist position on "free speech", a position defended by some philosophical argument they take to be unimpeachable. The cause of freedom of expression is ultimately a pragmatic one (and I hear no serious arguments against things such as libel laws or the criminalization of incitement to violence, or threats.) I think most defenders of free speech realize that any concerted campaign of vilification against any individual or established group of fellow citizens that was not simply a reasonable or sincere argument against an ideology, religion, or failure to share in the cultural basics by which a free society renews itself, but a campaign against their very existence, would be intolerable.

But the question, best addressed by pragmatic experience and intuition, is how should we respond to intolerable hate speech. The common gut reaction that "there ought to be a law..." appeals to our sense of primitive justice. And I do not mean to be condescending to this "primitive" sense, for I think it is in touch with something true and fundamental to our humanity, as is any honour/shame code, notwithstanding the historical limits (the restraint on freedom and social-cultural growth) of all such codes when taken very much to heart.

Such limits are illuminated by the example in Morgan's article:

This past spring, I was asked to defend the leadership of Hasbara Fellowships at a York University discipline hearing. Hasbara is an activist Jewish student organization that decided, in the face of relentless anti-Israel events at York, to fight bad speech not with censorship, but with more and better speech. Instead of asking for a ban on anti-Israel activities, they counter with strong pro-Israel events – often with a dose of in-your-face chutzpah. Fighting bad speech with good speech has turned out to be the right way to go, and I’m happy to say that we’ve had some legal success with the strategy.

The complaints filed against Hasbara allege that the very image of the blue-and-white Israeli flag appearing on the group’s pamphlets is hateful and must be banned. The complaints filed against Maclean’s allege that the very discussion of radical Islam contained in that publication is hateful and must be banned. That anyone can take either complaint seriously shows how dangerous the suppression of speech in the name of anti-hate can be. It turns out, if we read our history correctly, that the Holocaust began not only with words, but with book burning. Once we go down the road of censorship for the sake of promoting tolerance, we may soon be standing at the heights of intolerance.

How can university officials (not least at a university that once identified itself as a Jew-friendly institution) even entertain the argument that the Israeli flag is a symbol of hate? I know real thinking has been in short supply in our universities for some time now, but seriously...

This kind of thing happens because once we institutionalize the concept of hate speech laws, in an otherwise free society of many identity groups, it becomes extremely difficult, and I think probably impossible, to hold the line to insure those laws are used only in extreme circumstances (circumstances that would not likely ever emerge in a society keen to protect its shared freedoms) and not corrupted by a human pride and arrogance that would understand "justice" as the insuring that every group has an equal go at humiliating or scapegoating its enemies.

After all, human conflict is an inescapable fact of life, and in certain respects all the more so the freer and more complex our society. The temptation to have a go at restraining the other, towards whom we feel conflict or resentment, with such laws becomes almost impossible to refuse because we know that the very same temptation is being entertained by our others. Tit for tat, honour and shame, get them before they get us... all the true, but primitive, human intuitions about justice and reciprocity come into play.

Since conflict is a fact of life, and since resentment only increases in scope and scale the more free and socially or culturally complex one's society, the pragmatic question of seeking relatively non-violent ways of deferring this conflict become paramount. And if the pragmatic choice, some kind of muddling through, or some new kind of conversation that defers tensions without trying to find any permanent "solution", can increase the overall freedom in our society, we need to favor it even if it seems contrary to our more basic intuitions about justice. We cannot necessarily appeal to our core desire for more formal justice and lust after more laws to restrain people, especially where the application of such laws is inevitably politicized.

From this realization comes the pragmatic argument that Ed Morgan offers today, the realization that the best way to fight bad speech is with good speech. If we want a free society, it is our responsibility to stand with those who are unjustly hated, and not make it into a matter for constant intervention from centralized authority, be it the university administration of the national state.

Good summary of Canada's "Human Rights Commissions": our decline into liberal fascism; and our rising against Islamic Apartheid

Check out Paul Tuns' piece for the February edition of Interim magazine, an excellent summary of our "human rights" scandal in Canada. The link is to his blog home page; scroll down to Tuesday, January 29, 2008, "Human rights tribunals – curb ’em or close ’em". Hat tip: Five Feet of Fury.

Don't forget to write your politicians, federal and provincial, and tell them what you think about the current regime's policing of free speech.

I am also glad to discover that a group of students at York University in Toronto are standing up to the tired old leftist lie (nostalgia for simpler days) about Israel being an "apartheid state". They are organizing against Islamic State Apartheid. While women, homosexuals, and religious minorities do indeed live an "apartheid" existence in most Islamic states, I have seen reports that many Palestinians presently living in Israel will not want to live under a Palestinian state if one is formed in the West Bank. They enjoy greater freedom and wealth in a Jewish state than they expect from an Arab state.