Hadrien Chénier-Marais

Liberté d'expression—Frapper ou ne pas frapper…  et qui frapper quand on frappe?

To understand America's crises today, one must first understand what has happened to two institutions: the university and the news media. They do not regard their mission as educating and informing but indoctrinating.  [Pour comprendre les crises en Amérique aujourd’hui, il faut tout d’abord comprendre ce qui s’est passé dans deux institutions:  l’université et la presse.  Ils ne considèrent leur mission d’instruire et d’informer mais plutôt d’endoctriner.]    
           —Dennis Prager

Le titre d’un article dans Le Devoir, “Liberté d'expression — Est-ce correct de frapper un nazi?,” a attiré mon attention car il me parait un tantinet aberrant puisque la réponse à la question est archi-évidente. Un meilleur et plus honnête titre, bien que moins politiquement correct, aurait été:  Est-ce correct de silencer (censurer/bannir) les opinions qu’on n’aime pas?  Et donc cela pourrait inclure non seulement le nazisme, mais également le communisme, le socialisme, et surtout l’islamisme.  C’est-à-dire la gauche.  


L’auteur de l’article, Hadrien Chénier-Marais, candidat à la maîtrise, Département de science politique, Université de Montréal, témoigne d’un manque d’objectivité sinon d’une certaine indoctrination universitaire anti-droite, pro-gauche.  Il écrit correctement que “la plupart des sociétés occidentales ont limité celle-ci [la liberté d’expression] en excluant certains types de discours, tels les discours haineux ou incitant à la haine.”  MAIS cela ne veut pas dire que c’est donc forcément bien.  Pourquoi pas?  Parce qu’en toute évidence “haineux” et “haine” sont deux termes archi-subjectifs et donc faciles à appliquer à quasiment n’importe quoi.  Si, par exemple, on cite un fait, on pourrait être arrêté, ce qui s’est passé à Paul Weston, qui a simplement cité Winston Churchill vis-à-vis de l’Islam.  On pourrait également être arrêté sous la guise de discours haineux, si on critique, par exemple, la politique d’immigration d’un gouvernement, moyennant l’évocation de faits qui contredisent cette politique.


L’auteur aurait dû quand-même noter que les Etats-Unis constitue une société occidentale importante qui n’a pas adoptée de la législation anti-haine du fait de ce problème de subjectivité. Il stipule que “Cependant, les autorités n’ont pas tendance à punir certains groupes usant de ces rhétoriques…”  Et pourtant la liste des gens qui ont été punis d’une façon ou d’autre est importante et comprend, à part Paul Weston, Geert Wilders, Robert Spencer et Pam Geller (interdits en Grande-Bretagne), Sébastien Jallamion, Ezra Levant, Mark Stein, Dan Park, John Salvesen, etc.  Un peu de recherche sur internet révélera sans doute d’autres.  Il faut des statistiques à cet égard!  


L’auteur manque d’objectivité car il note la présence de nazis à Charlottesville, mais ne dit rien sur celle d’Antifa et sa violence.  Il cite “le néonazisme, le suprémacisme blanc et d’autres mouvements de ce type,” mais reste silent vis-à-vis du suprémacisme noir (Nation d’Islam, Panthères  Noirs, BLM) et celle de l’islamisme, ainsi qu’Antifa.  Il y a aussi un certain mouvement anti-blasphématoire vis-à-vis de l’Islam (i.e., anti-liberté d’expression) qui semble être en voie d’augmentation au Québec et dans le reste du Canada. 


L’auteur conclut avec les deux possibles réponses à la question présentée:  oui et non.  Mais pourquoi ne pas rajouter au nom de l’objectivité:  “alors, est-ce correct de frapper un nazi ou un islamiste?  Est-ce correct de frapper un communiste ou socialiste ou antifasciste?”  Finalement, l’auteur devrait sortir de son “safe space” idéologique pour vraiment chercher la vérité.  Recevra-t-il cette suggestion à l’université?  Malheureusement, il ne la recevra pas dans les pages du Devoir car, dans l’esprit d’anti-liberté d’expression, ce journal ne permet que les abonnés commentent les articles…   

Doug Lederman and Scott Jaschik

Censored Yet Again on Inside Higher Ed

The left has been praying for an event like the one at Charlottesville.  The left sees right-wing Nazis all over the country, and for that cannot see Muslim terrorists at all.  Finally, their prayers were  answered.  Hardcore left-wing ideology inevitably blocks out uncomfortable and unwanted TRUTHS.  What about the anti-white racist Antifa and BLM protesting instigators?  Silence!  Silence by too many shameful journalists!  After all, if the protesting instigators were not present, violence would likely not have occurred in Charlottesville.  Antifa wants violence.  Antifa got violence.  Why is that not reported?  We hear about white supremacists.  But what about the black supremacists?  Silence.  

It is really sad that so many academics like Patricia McGuire, president of Trinity Washington University (“Charlottesville, American Tragedy Redux”), prefer hardcore ideology (i.e., indoctrination and consequent censorship) to uncomfortable TRUTHS (i.e., education), including blacks were slaveholders in America; whites were slaves; Muslims are still slaveholders and traders today.  Evoke those facts and be “ad hominized" as racist and islamophobe by the ideologically manacled like McGuire.  Reading the latter's article, one would think 95% of southern whites held slaves.  Instead, the figure is more like 5%.  And what about the blacks who sold the slaves in Africa?  Uncomfortable truths!  Silence!  Censorship!  

“The greatest danger the United States faces today is not from a hostile foreign power, scary though the threats may be, but rather from our own domestic terrorists and those who aid and abet them,” argues McGuire.  That has been the left’s spiel.  And yet statistics likely indicate the greatest danger (besides increasing left-wing ideology and resultant censorship, banning, and other affronts to the First Amendment) to be Islamic jihad terrorism.  So much talk about Hitler, and almost no talk about Stalin and Mao, who had many more people murdered!  Why?  Left-wing ideology!  Moreover, Hitler was a devout left-wing socialist, who the left has been trying to turn into a right-wing conservative.  Mussolini, uber-fascist, was a devout Marxist.  

“We must continue to promote education as the best, perhaps only, means to confront our national tragedy of racism,” concludes McGuire.  Education or rather indoctrination?  Promoting ideology inevitably means demoting TRUTHS, including the other side of Affirmative Action (e.g., unprepared blacks intellectually overwhelmed in college).  What might the result of incessant ubiquitous hardcore focus on racism be?  Certainly, the reality has been the increasing divide among the left and right (and blacks and whites) that resulted from 8 years of Obama.  For the left, increasing Stalinist indoctrination is the only way to somehow solve the racist problem, and that includes heavy and constant emphasis on making all whites feel guilty and all blacks feel victimized.  Will it work?  Let's hope not!   

“Charlottesville was yet another act in a long-running saga of racial hatred, writes Patricia McGuire, and the mobs of white men on the march have made the best possible case for affirmative action,” notes a faceless Inside Higher Ed journalist at the very top of McGuire’s article.  Not very objective for a journalist!  Yes, finally we have “mobs of white men.”  But what about the “mobs of black men” in the past riots from Baltimore to UCal?  Was it put that way?  Of course not!  Journalists are the shame of America today because of their egregious lack of objectivity.  Well, will this comment be censored?  Perhaps…  Thus is the way of higher ed today.  [And unsurprisingly, the comment was censored (i.e., removed after it was posted).]

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From: George Slone 

Sent: Tuesday, August 15, 2017 6:48 PM

To: editor@insidehighered.com

Subject: Censoring comments on Inside Higher Education

To Editors Scott Jaschik and Doug Lederman, Inside Higher Education:  

Perhaps you ought to at least inform people, whose comments are censored on your website, as to why your decisions were made.  Wouldn't that indeed be helpful in the realm of "let's have a conversation," as opposed to "let's not counter the accepted narrative"?   You have censored other comments I'd made over the years and w/o notification or explanation.  Does that sound like democracy to you?  It sure doesn't to me.  In fact, have I been banned from commenting all together?  My censored comment figures below and will be posted on my website with or without your response.  And I do expect no response.

From: George Slone 
Sent: Tuesday, August 15, 2017 7:08 PM
To: president@trinitydc.edu
Cc: editor@insidehighered.com
Subject: Re: Censoring comments on Inside Higher Education

To Patricia McGuire, President, Trinity Washington University:
I suspect you are a partisan of censorship of viewpoints you do not like.  If so, that's not very surprising for higher education in this sad day and age of increasing groupthink.  In any event, below is the comment I posted regarding your Inside Higher Education article.  Unsurprisingly, it was censored or moderated as the euphemists like to call it.  And of course it angers me that censorship seems to be the way of higher education today.  But one must still fight on!   You will note, no swear words, no sex, and no threats in it at all.  Ah, but you will also note that it rigorously challenges your assumptions and blindspots.  Thank you for your attention.  BTW, how about getting your library to subscribe to The American Dissident, where your students could actually read and be exposed to such opposing viewpoints.

From: Pat McGuire

Sent: Tuesday, August 15, 2017 8:33 PM

To: George Slone

Cc: editor@insidehighered.com

Subject: RE: Censoring comments on Inside Higher Education

Dear Dr. Slone:

Thank you for your message.  However, you are wrong on many counts.  I have nothing to do with the comment moderation of insidehighered.com, but I can tell you that the comment you offer below [above, not below:  "Censored Yet..."] is incoherent and certainly not publishable for that reason.  As for me, you insinuate a lot about me that’s simply not true, but I have learned through long experience that there’s no point responding to such vituperation other than to thank you for letting me know your thoughts.

With best wishes,

Pat

From: George Slone

Sent: Tuesday, August 15, 2017 8:58 PM

To: Pat McGuire

Subject: Re: Censoring comments on Inside Higher Education

Hi Pat,

Thanks for responding.  I didn't think you had anything to do with censoring out my comment.  BUT I did think you wouldn't care about the comment being censored and would likely not request the two editors not to censor it.  So, I was not really wrong at all on that account.  And at the end of your email, you definitely argued in favor of the censorship incident.  

As far as my comment being "incoherent," how could it possibly have been coherent... for the alt-left?  Also, if it were me, I'd certainly cite an example or two in an effort to back my criticism of lacking in coherence.  You didn't do that.  You simply put forth a general dismissal of all of my comments with one word, "incoherent."  That sort of reaction sadly seems to be widespread amongst academics whenever criticized.  In essence, it is akin to ad hominem.   To argue my comments "not publishable" is really a non-argument, especially when you fail to cite one particular comment that is "incoherent" and thus "not publishable."    

You ought to really contemplate your usage of ad hominem-like argumentation, which is really not a counter-argumentation at all.  It is simply an indirect form of shooting the messenger in an effort to kill his message.  

Why, one must ask, did you purposefully exclude from your article mention of Antifa, which was definitely a part of the Charlottesville problem?  Was that remark "incoherent"?  Why didn't you mention that the cops did nothing to quell the confrontation between the right-wing Nazis and left-wing Antifa fascists?  Was that remark "incoherent"?  Your article really did fail to evoke a lot of what really happened at the Charlottesville riot.  

What precisely did I insinuate about you personally that was false?  Again, you do not stipulate.  Are you not staunch left-wing?  Thus, I cannot even apologize if indeed I were wrong about that or anything else.  Proven wrong, I have no problem at all admitting it openly.  Do you?  

Your final sentence is typical of far too many academics who hate vigorous debate, cornerstone of democracy: "there’s no point responding to such vituperation."  Again, you use another ad hominem-like term, "vituperation," and fail completely to disprove anything at all written in my criticism of your article.  It is a great shame that academics like you and academic journalists like those at Inside Higher Education seem to seek to push only one point of view, while crushing any other viewpoints, including mine, that might question and challenge that point of view.  

Anyhow, thank you for responding.  From my rather lengthy decades-long confrontations with academics across the country, responding is quite rare... and thus I sincerely commend you for it.  BTW, I am a libertarian (i.e., staunch advocate of the First Amendment and vigorous debate, cornerstones of democracy).  

Best,

G. Tod

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[No further response received.]

Scott Jaschik and Doug Lederman

Permanently Banned from Commenting on Inside Higher Ed?

The times are getting quite Soviet-like!  Inside Higher Ed censored my comments twice in one week.  The Nazis censored!  The Commies censored!  But InsideHigherEd.com doesn't censor.  It moderates!  Might I be permanently banned from commenting?  If so, why?  Sadly, neither editor Lederman or Jaschik will respond to that question.  Sadly, they do not really seem to stand out in the ivory tower, but rather fit right into its mold of correct-think... 

Below is the censored comment I posted to former University of Virginia president Robert M. O'Neil's rather dull opinion piece, "Why Charlottesville"?  And in an effort not to get censored, I self-censored by not using the term "dull," and got censored anyhow.  In 2009, I'd sketched a cartoon on Herr Lederman, though posted it in 2014.  It was inspired by Lederman's passion for censorship.  I guess the lad hasn't yet forgiven me for that horrendous cartoon thought crime...

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Perhaps it's time the left, especially academics like Robert M. O'Neil, search for black scientists to celebrate, instead of the tired trope of black ball hitters and players.  Also, the KKK is bad, but BLM is equally bad.  The left needs to open up to TRUTH.  The "far right" AND the "far left" are also "the people."  MissyB, hiding in anonymity, doesn't understand that.  Demonizing Breitbart and Trump does not constitute reasoned argumentation.  Facts do that.  MissyB asks, "When will the far right take responsibility for its incitement of violence?"  Well, the same could be said about the far left!  But successful indoctrination prevents MissyB from making that point.  "Where are all the typical conservative trolls on IHE this morning?" she asks.  [Ah, sweetie, they've been CENSORED!] Calling people "trolls" is also not reasoned argumentation.  Facts are reasoned argumentation.  Focus on a proven lie spouted by an alleged "troll," rather than lazily call the latter "troll."  Now, will I be labeled a right-wing, Nazi "troll"?  Likely!

G. Tod Slone, Ed.

The American Dissident

Donald S. Beyer

Lee Bollinger and Steve Coll

Michael Cavna

Kate Ryan

Issue #18                                        Winter/Spring 2009

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Editorial Issue #18/ 2009

Against the Established Order—Check out the new AD blog wwwtheamericandissidentorg.blogspot.com—

Given the times, The American Dissident ought to be receiving a lot of submissions decrying corrupt politicians, left and right, corrupt lobbyists, corrupt CEOs, intellectually-corrupt professors and poets, etc.  On the contrary, it does not.  And what it does receive tends to be scribbled by writers who cannot seem to comprehend the journal’s focus and guidelines. Poets, editors, and other writers seem content relegating American literature to mere ornamentation. Guernica: A Magazine of Art & Politics boasts, for example, a blurb from Howard Zinn, but publishes interviews with Pinsky, Hass, Kooser, and others anointed by the established order.  In that light, how could it possibly take my criticism of the National Endowment for the Arts seriously (see pp 30-38)?  “We don't do rants, which is what your piece reads like to me. It's really self-involved and paranoid,” wrote co-editor Joel Whitney, who does not have the guts to publish those who would criticize the NEA, preferring instead to publish self-admitting sellouts like Billy Collins, who states unabashedly:  "Suddenly you're asked to stop looking at specifics—I mean, I write about saltshakers and knives and forks—and talk like a politician.”  Well, I don’t write about saltshakers, nor do I talk like a politician (left or right-wing), therefore I must surely be, in the words of Whitney, “blinded by ego and rage.”  A decade ago, Michael Parenti (Z Mag) simply wrote me: “we’re not interested in literature.”  In retrospect, his statement makes sense.  
          The NEA will not be according The American Dissident public grant monies because its panelists unanimously proclaimed: the “artistic merit of the publication is low; the design and readability of the publication is [sic] poor.”  Some pipedream that was, eh?! In vain, I challenged the NEA on its negative unanimity, asked for precision, and got none at all (read the essay). After all, I’m just a citizen “blinded by ego and rage.”  Clearly, the NEA’s decision was a political one, and such political decisions should not be legal… and perhaps are not, but what the hell can I do against the vast government wall?  
          On a positive note, the Concord Free Public Library allowed me to hold a watercolor display in its art gallery for the month of August. There, I was actually permitted to criticize the local pillars, while advertising The AD.  One curator noted: “The only thing I know is that I have never seen anything like your work in the Gallery.  You don't soothe, you awaken.”  That alone made it worthwhile. I asked curator Nick Capasso of DeCordova Museum to check it out. He did.  “While DeCordova Museum does have a long track record of presenting politically engaged contemporary art, I’m afraid that we will not be able to include your work in our exhibition program. Good luck fining [sic] other venues for your work.”  So, I painted a watercolor depicting him as a Nazi at the gates of the art museum autocratically determining acceptable aesthetics (see p. 3).  He’s depicted in the center of the illustration surrounded by colleagues Kois and Rosenfield.  The pig and hearts actually exist at the museum, which tends to promote, despite Capasso’s assertion, diversionary art that doesn’t question or challenge much of anything at all. Now, when was the last time you’ve heard of an artist satirizing an art curator? The editor wishes to thank subscribers for making The American Dissident possible.  Robbins Library (Arlington, MA) is a new institutional subscriber!  

Billy Collins