Blogpost infested with rightwingers violating rabble policy - hi, mods!

Mr. Magoo wrote:

In the spirit of that, do you think that leaving a meeting early is an example of "violence" and uncontrollable "anti-black rage"?

We have no way of knowing what went on, really, and the BLC seems to think that even asking the question is racist (a repugnant and contemptible stance). Maybe the man just had to take a dump. Or maybe he rolled his eyes at some of the nonsense coming out of some BLC member's mouth and said "What a load of garbage," and got up and left in an actual huff. I happen to think that might have been awesome. But, we may never know.

If a hate crime happens in the forest but nobody is there to hear about it, did it really happen?

But let me ask:  do you feel that leaving a meeting early -- for any reason you wish to imagine -- is an act of violence?

swallow wrote:

Mr. Magoo wrote:

Surely no one.  But should that dictate our actions?

Of course not. But it does illustrate the hollowness of Wente's critique. You won't see her banging out a column about the righgt-wing politically correct authoritarians. 

On some level I agree, but I also recognize that this is kind of an argumentum ad hominem, no? It shouldn't matter that it's Margaret Wente saying it. It it either true, or it is not.

No Magoo. If you have a point to make, say what is on your mind. I am not into being led about by the nose.

I tried to make a new thread about this, in the activism forum, entitled "activists behaving badly." I thought it would be nice to have a place to put footage of activists of all stripes misbehaving and acting entitled to shut down speeches, etc. But it seems that two days later my post is still unpublished. So I'll post here instead:

[youtube]8AKgyWCpJl4[/youtube]

"No speech for hate speech" etc. What a bunch of schmucks.

If it's not obvious, I deplore the tactics deployed by these "protesters." I also think that they're wasting energy that might be better deployed in service of their cause elsewhere, or in service of an actual worthwhile cause, but that's their decision to make, not mine. What should NOT be their decision, however, is to shut down somebody else's speech.

I actually think that security should have forcibly removed them from the premises. The university should treat it exactly the same way as if any other rando came and started disrupting a professor's lecture.

More:

[youtube]SWTwpp3S2CA[/youtube]

I think Peterson's composure is admirable. For my part I would not have been able to contain myself if I came to see one of the smartest men in Canada speak and had to instead listen to people blowing noisemakers and chanting slogans like zombies.

"This is what men's rights looks like! This is what men's rights looks like!"

Deplorable. This is activism? These people are channeling ideological demons, not engaged in anything constructive.

Quote:

"When politics means the difference between life and death, there's no room for discussion!"

Well, when that's actually true, that's actually true.

But it's also a very efficient and effective "end run" to simply declare your cause a matter of life and death.

In that respect, it's kind of like evolution.  Whatever gives any organism the advantage becomes selected for.  And we see this every time some group describes disagreement with them (or some similar) as "violence" against them.  For so long as that has any chance of benefitting them, of course they're going to do it.

Quote:

Sure. It worked for Peterson. when he warned about the right wing backlash.

But it works even better against him whenever someone pretends that his refusal to say "zir" means a trans-person might die.

Was Peterson silencing any of his opponents? Really, now. Do you really not think that one side here is standing up for freedom of speech and the other side is contemptuous of it?

People who can't handle conflicting opinions don't know their own beliefs very well. They're so blatantly manifesting a subconscious fear that if they're exposed to something that undermines a core belief, their entire belief structure will come toppling down. That's scary, I understand that. Chaos is scary. So there's a reason why knowing your own beliefs and having a consistent and secure belief structure is important. If you know every reason why you believe something, and something comes along and proves that one of those reasons is wrong, your whole belief structure won't come toppling down because the foundation is still secure. So you can go out and confront challenges to it confidently, because you'll be able to take on any argument!

The connection, down south, where those laws are under assault, and being rescinded:

https://www.splcenter.org/hatewatch/2017/03/01/four-transgender-murders-...

Well you might want to make fun of how he is expressing himself, and condemn him for wanting to shut down a speech, but the fact is he is right in drawing a connection between Peterson's ideas, and the fact that trans people are being assaulted, murdered, and denied even simple rights like access to toilets.

As an example, when you look at people who have rioted following police murders, is the most important thing to mock or condemn them for expressing their outrage in such an irrational and unproductive way, or consider what it was that made them so angry in the first place?

What... that there should not be a law to prevent that kind of discrimination? That attending a racism education session makes someone a racist? That people who ask for inclusion for trans people are left wing authoritarians and power-mad? That it is a good thing to threaten that there is going to be a backlash?

Sorry, but there is actually a connection between demonizing a community, and arguing against protections, and others taking that next step and resorting to attack. And we see that because those attacks are on the rise.

Calling it "bullshit" is not an argument.

They are doing more to harm the community than police? Really? You think this incident, as terrible as it was, is worse than the legacy of genocide, and ongoing systemic racism that created this climate of fear? That it is worse than what Indigenous people in Canada face every day in dealing with police?

http://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/saskatchewan/violent-saskatchewan-mob-atta...

I was talking not about shutting down dialogue, but whether he had a valid opinion - and challenging your dismissal of it as "bullshit".

And moving the goalposts to claim it is just about activists doesn't really hold much water when what he is opposing is recognition of rights for the entire group.

[youtube]eGcmBqo8mYw[/youtube]

"No platform for bigots!" REEEEEE

I'm not sure if either of us knows what the other is talking about at this point. When Peterson talks about the postmodernists and marxists, he's clearly referring to the activists. When he talks about pronouns, he's saying he won't use made-up words. And when he talks about bill c-16, he's clearly worried about having to watch what he says as either a professor or a clinical psychologist, and he shouldn't have to watch what he says in that regard.

We went though this repeatedly in November, Magoo.

In the first place, none of this criminalizes speech. At all. Period. The only part which is in the criminal code is when a crime like assault or murder is committed with discrimination as an aggravating factor.

The law adds four words - "gender identity and expression" -  to the criminal code and to the Charter. So when you say "what part" I don't really know what you mean.

As for Peterson's claims about the effect it is going to have on him,  he seems to have cooked that up in his head. Remember the video I posted back in November in this thread? Go back and watch it. He really has no clue what the federal law, or the provincial reglation, mean.

Contrary to his claim, it will not force him to say anything. The head of the Ontario Human Rights commission said at that time that using the word "they" or a person's name or just saying nothing at all would be compliance.

None of his wild predictions have come to pass. Not fines, or going to jail, or losing his tenure, or his professional license.

All that has happened is that he seems to be raking in over $20 grand a month based on all this.

Posted by Boze:

When he talks about pronouns, he's saying he won't use made-up words.

Good for him!  We all know things will go to shit if we start using words made up by humans.  Good people only use the words handed down to us from God.

Maybe I should repeat what I just wrote. Or re-post the quote from the commissioner.

“OHRC policies provide guidance on how to understand and apply existing legal obligations. The OHRC does not require any particular gender-neutral pronoun. If in doubt, ask the person how they wish to be addressed. Use “they” if you don’t know. Or simply use their chosen name.”

http://www.torontosun.com/2016/11/13/human-rights-commissioner-weighs-in...

So to repeat, on Peterson's big hair-on-fire complaint, no. No one is forcing him to say anything at all.

Yet we have people worried about him starving himself to death when he is thrown into jail as a martyr to his convictions. With no small encouragement from Peterson himself.

http://citizengo.org/en/sc/37697-support-dr-peterson-against-totalitaria...

Notice that entire grandstand performance has no relation whatsoever to the real law?

(speaking of people weighing in on things they don't know anything about, seems there are over 16,000 who jumped on that one just because)

Well if there is nothing at all in the law about the thing you are concerned about, what does that tell you?

Oh, and on the subject of other rules and made up things:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Singular_they

What if you don't want to say a person's name? Are you serious? 

How about "hey you". Or "that person over there". Is that too much of an infringement on your personal freedom?

Or don't say anything. It isn't against the law, which is my point.

But in Peterson's case it does raise the question of how much he is there to actually do his job and deal with the people he is being paid to teach, and how much he is there to show off the giant chip on his shoulder.

As much as he wants to make up shit about getting thrown in jail and starving himself, none of that is going to happen. I don't know if the biggest factor is him imagining that these nonexistent slights compare to the impositions that people on the receiving end of discrimination experience every day, or if he really believes them asking for fair treatment is all a conspiracy against him.

Whichever it is, there sure are a lot of people who seem willing to buy that nonsense based on zero evidence. Not all that different than those who see a sharia law takeover , or those back in the old days who saw men banished to the kitchen just because women wanted some basic rights like the ability to vote.

Well if it is false, what exactly do you think the law compels him to say, and what do you base it on?

Realizing that the commissioner's statement is just an informal statement of policy, there is nothing there suggesting that anyone is required to use any pronoun or personal reference at all. If there was such a bizarre requirement as Peterson is making up it probably would be unconstitutional.

But there isn't.

Quote:

And the bottom line is that if you do not speak, or speak in a way that leaves out gender pronouns, there is no violation, Cossen's example about the citizenship vow notwithstanding.

First, do you mean Brenda Cossman?

Second, why should anyone have to do that? No shit, if you do not speak, there are no problems with the law! The choices appear to be:

1) Use made-up, ideology-laden words that we'd rather not use

2) Resort to altering our sentence structure, or gesturing and pointing, to denote who we're referring to

3) Don't speak, or

4) violate the provisions of the human rights code.

It doesn't look like there is a good option there. To be clear: if you want to see the world as divided into males and females, he's and she's, that's your right and it's nobody else's place to impose a different model of gender on you. This is absolutely a freedom of conscience issue.

I can't say I *love* those options, but I suppose they're good enough.

There does still feel like there's a strange coercive element to the idea that I should not refer to someone with a beard as "he", but at least it's not "xe" or whatever other one.

Quote:

2) Resort to altering our sentence structure, or gesturing and pointing, to denote who we're referring to

I've seen several online/news articles about this or similar topics in which the journalist attempts to stay on the right side of the line, but we end up with stuff like "We interviewed Pat McDonald, who is non-binary genderfluid and uses the pronoun 've', and ve said that ve is unable to find a job now, thanks to that meddling Jordan Peterson, and ve may need to sell vis car in order to feed verself".

Bit of a trainwreck, IMHO.

Oh, you mean Pat  might have to sell a car in order to have enough money to eat?

You're right. My head is spinning. Scandalous abuse of the English language.

And this doesn't even get into the fact that even if Peterson were to deliberately call someone by the wrong pronoun after being asked not to

(and bear in mind, he did not say it was an absolute, only that it would "depend on how he was asked")

It might result in a complaint. Small chance it might result in a hearing. In someone's wildest dream might result in a fine. Not a chance it would result in jailtime because even if after all that he refused to pay a fine he'd just get garnisheed. 

So I guess he'd have to hold his hunger strike at home.

But really, he's been getting all this mileage out of it. He even had his opportunity at that debate in Toronto, where he was on the same panel as someone on the gender spectrum. They were at his speeches. He still hasn't done it. What is he waiting for?

I suppose expecting him to shit or get off the pot is an infringement on his free speech too, right?

Certainly can't be that that would demonstrate that his warnings actually are not real.

\

Really? These protections have been on the books at the provincial level for years now.

How many complaints have there been? How many hearings? How many fines?

What I get is that Peterson has been ringing the alarm bells over nothing, and he hasn't even taken the great moral stand he has been talking about, because then it will be clear that it is over nothing.