There is an interesting free speech fight brewing at the University of California Berkeley Law School after nine student groups banned any speakers that support Israel or Zionism. The resolution adopted by the groups bar anyone who supports “Zionism, the apartheid state of Israel, and the occupation of Palestine.” Berkeley Law’s Dean Erwin Chemerinsky, a self-proclaimed Zionist, has observed that he himself would be banned from speaking to the groups under this resolution.
The bylaw, drafted by UC Berkeley’s Law Students for Justice in Palestine (LSJP), stated that such speakers endanger “the safety and welfare of Palestinian students on campus.”
The student groups who adopted the bylaw include the Berkeley Law Muslim Student Association, Middle Eastern and North African Law Students Association, Womxn of Color Collective, Asian Pacific American Law Students Association, Queer Caucus, Community Defense Project, Women of Berkeley Law, and Law Students of African Descent.
The controversy raises a conflict between anti-discrimination policies and free speech. These groups clearly have a right to decide who they will invite as speakers. However, the resolution raises the countervailing question of whether the exclusion is discriminatory. Various groups have denounced the policy as antisemitic and note that the school would not tolerate groups imposing a racial exclusion on speakers.
This is a public university that is subject to the First Amendment. In 2019 San Francisco State University settled a lawsuit of Jewish students allegedly blocked from participating in a human rights fair because of their Zionist views.
What is interesting is that these liberal groups are asserting an analogous free speech right invoked by bakers, web designers, and others who have refused services to same-sex weddings. This term the Supreme Court will consider 303 Creative v. Elenis involving a graphic artist who declined to provide services to couples celebrating same-sex marriages on religious grounds. While these cases involve public accommodation laws in the selling of products, the underlying right is based on the right to refuse to engage in creative enterprises that contradict religious or political views.
What is also ironic is that schools like Berkeley effectively impose such exclusions on other speakers. It is rare for top schools to invite conservative or libertarian speakers. When they do, these speakers are often subject to cancel campaigns or disruptions to prevent them from being heard. There is a de facto exclusion of many conservative and libertarian speakers.
I believe that these groups have a right to pick their own speakers (as opposed to a school barring Jewish groups from a human rights fair or event). Clearly, they could effectively impose such an exclusion by simply not inviting such speakers. This is likely to be viewed differently from the SFSU case in that sense.
Yet, having a right to do something does not make it right. The resolution shows an intolerance for opposing views that has become a common feature on our campuses. These groups should welcome such debate and dialogue.
What is particularly concerning is the use of the common claim that free speech is harmful. The view of speech as harmful is now dominant on many faculties. I recently wrote on this issue in an article entitled “Harm and Hegemony: The Decline of Free Speech in the United States.”
It is also worth noting that the inclusion of an LGBT organization would exclude most Jewish students who may feel marginalized at the school due to their sexuality or identity. They would likely want to join such groups but cannot endorse an exclusion that they consider antisemitic.
The students groups, in my view, have the edge on any free speech court challenge, but they are dead wrong on the use of that right. This is only the latest example of the growing intolerance for opposing views that now characterizes higher education. The difference is that this exclusion has outraged many on the left. Hopefully, it will prompt greater concern for the overall loss of diversity of viewpoints on our campuses.
In the US as in Europe, anti-semitism and anti-Americanism are twinned, and both reside squarely ON THE LEFT.
The American thesis is freedom and self-reliance, not “dictatorship of the proletariat.”
Why would anyone entertain the desires of juveniles, student groups, unions, welfare recipients, “entitlement” beneficiaries and any and all other forms of dependents and parasites.
The Founders ignored the capricious needy among the population; they required that voters be 21 and self-reliant, state by state.
They paid no attention to “persons of indigent fortunes…who have no will of their own…[and are] under the immediate dominion of others.”
These “student groups” are cells under the dominion of communists, and direct and mortal enemies of the Constitution, the Bill of Rights, Americans and the “fundamentally formed” United States of America.
“It’s the [Constitution], stupid!”
– James Carville
_____________
“the people are nothing but a great beast…
I have learned to hold popular opinion of no value.”
– Alexander Hamilton
_________________
“The true reason (says Blackstone) of requiring any qualification, with regard to property in voters, is to exclude such persons, as are in so mean a situation, that they are esteemed to have no will of their own.”
“If it were probable that every man would give his vote freely, and without influence of any kind, then, upon the true theory and genuine principles of liberty, every member of the community, however poor, should have a vote… But since that can hardly be expected, in persons of indigent fortunes, or such as are under the immediate dominion of others, all popular states have been obliged to establish certain qualifications, whereby, some who are suspected to have no will of their own, are excluded from voting; in order to set other individuals, whose wills may be supposed independent, more thoroughly upon a level with each other.”
– Alexander Hamilton, The Farmer Refuted, 1775
I support the 26th amendment that lowered the voting age to 18.
Good to know.
You disagree with the American Founders; you agree with their antithesis and nemesis – the Communist Manifesto and Karl Marx.
The age to vote was 21 in 1788, when turnout was 11.6% by design.
______________________________________________________
“Most people, especially men, do not reach full maturity until age 25.”
“At this age, our brains fully develop and can make more mature, well-thought out life decisions.”
– Dr. Sandra Aamodt, Study on Maturity
________________________________
21 years
“A Minimum Legal Drinking Age (MLDA) of 21 saves lives and protects health. Minimum Legal Drinking Age (MLDA) laws specify the legal age when an individual can purchase alcoholic beverages. The MLDA in the United States is 21 years.”
– CDC
_____
THE 26TH IS INJURIOUS
“…AMENDMENTS DESIRED, OF SUCH A NATURE AS WILL NOT INJURE THE CONSTITUTION,…”
” And if there are amendments desired, of such a nature as will not injure the constitution, and they can be ingrafted so as to give satisfaction to the doubting part of our fellow citizens; the friends of the federal government will evince that spirit of deference and concession for which they have hitherto been distinguished.”
– James Madison, Proposed Amendments to the Constitution, June 8, 1789
The expansion of freedom, liberty, and voting has been a good thing for the country and that is why I support the 13,14, 15, 19, and 26 amendments.
FORCED LEGISLATION IS COMMUNIST DICTATORSHIP
Abraham Lincoln had no mandate with his 39.8% 1860 election, certainly not a mandate for political oppression and war. Abraham Lincoln seized power and declared marital law after initiating an unconstitutional war by occupying and not retreating from a sovereign foreign nation. Abraham Lincoln was Karl Marx’s “earnest of the epoch” leading America toward the ”RECONSTRUCTION of a social world.” The “Reconstruction Amendments” are as illicit and illegitimate today as they were immediately after the Civil War.
The Supreme Court must now act 150 years retroactively to correct the unconstitutional acts of Lincoln and his successors, as it recently acted 50 years retroactively to correct the unconstitutional Roe v Wade. The Supreme Court cannot continue to support the Communist Manifesto in the form of the Marx/Lincoln legacy of the 13th, 14th and 15th amendments. The Supreme Court swore an oath to support the Constitution which Lincoln wildly violated for the benefit of the principles of Karl Marx. Lincoln et al. had no constitutional authority or legal basis to act for the benefit of illegal aliens which must have been deported, per the sole legal remedy.
_________________________________________________________________________________________________________
“…THE RECONSTRUCTION OF A SOCIAL WORLD.”
– KARL MARX TO ABRAHAM LINCOLN
___________
“These capitalists generally act harmoniously and in concert, to fleece the people.”
– Abraham Lincoln, from his first speech as an Illinois state legislator, 1837
__________________________________________________________
“Everyone now is more or less a Socialist.”
– Charles Dana, managing editor of the New York Tribune, and Lincoln’s assistant secretary of war, 1848
______________________________________________________________________________________
“The goal of Socialism is Communism.”
– Vladimir Ilyich Lenin
__________________
“The workingmen of Europe feel sure that, as the American War of Independence initiated a new era of ascendancy for the middle class, so the American Antislavery War will do for the working classes. They consider it an earnest of the epoch to come that it fell to the lot of Abraham Lincoln, the single-minded son of the working class, to lead his country through the matchless struggle for the rescue of an enchained race and the reconstruction of a social world.”
– Karl Marx and the First International Workingmen’s Association to Lincoln, 1864
https://www.marxists.org/history/international/iwma/documents/1864/lincoln-letter.htm
____________________________________________________________________
Corruptly and improperly ratified under the duress of brutal post-war military occupation and oppression, these “fake” RECONSTRUCTION-OF-A-SOCIAL-WORLD orders from Marx remain antithetical and unconstitutional. The Founders intended for a rational amendment process conducted in a contemplative and equable environment, not one of political violence, tyranny and war. Lincoln used the Army for unconstitutional war, oppression and election tampering in 1864.
The “Reconstruction Amendments” are moot in that they incoherently address a population segment of illegal aliens, per extant immigration law, the Naturalization Act of 1802, which, by law, must have been compassionately repatriated on January 1, 1863.
Lincoln must have been prosecuted for his egregious and impeachable crimes of high office against the Constitution and America.
He was:
“The clause in the Constitution which authorizes the suspension of the privilege of the writ of habeas corpus is in the ninth section of the first article. This article is devoted to the Legislative Department of the United States, and has not the slightest reference to the Executive Department.”
“I can see no ground whatever for supposing that the President in any emergency or in any state of things can authorize the suspension of the privilege of the writ of habeas corpus, or arrest a citizen except in aid of the judicial power.”
“I have exercised all the power which the Constitution and laws confer on me, but that power has been resisted by a force too strong for me to overcome.”
– Chief Justice Roger B. Taney, May 28, 1861
____________________________________
American freedom persisted for a mere 71 years until “Crazy Abe” Lincoln’s “Reign of Terror.”
The Supreme Court must do its sworn-oath duty.
American freedom must be restored.
Jonathan: In the midst of devastating Hurricane Ian what was Donald Trump doing across the state at Mar-a-Lago? Was he sending out a message to his fellow Floridians offering his “thoughts and prayers”? Or maybe saying he would donate a $1 million towards the cleanup and recovery? Nope. None of the above. Trump was busy fundraising–for his favorite cause, the defense of Donald Trump. On Wednesday Trump told his supporters: “We have a fundraising deadline…so I say whatever you can do to help out, we have to meet the deadline”. So for all you MAGA supporters in this blog don’t bother sending money to the Florida relief fund. Trump has a greater need for your money. Classless, clueless, distasteful, self-centered, tone deaf–and an absolute jerk! That’s the Trumpster.
But there’s more. This week Golf Digest declared Trump the “greatest” golfer among US presidents. No big surprise since Trump played more golf than any other president. There was a lot of snickering and mockery from the golf world. Sports writer Rick Reilly says of Trump’s golfing prowess: “He throws it [the golf ball], boots it, and moves it. He lies about his lies. He fudges and boozles and fluffs. At Winged Foot, where Trump is a member, the caddies got used to seeing him kick the ball back into the fairway they came up with a nickname for him: ‘Pele'”.
So Trump lies and cheats–even at golf. No big surprise.
Funny that Jack Nicklaus, greatest golfer of all time, just wrote his support/agreement/endorsement of Golf DIgest’s declaration of Trump as “greatest golfer among presidents.” Tiger Woods might do the same. Take two aspirin and call us in the morning. Maybe sunshine will allow you to broaden your horizon.
And Biden was out fundraising. He hates Americans and the people of Florida, so it is hardly surprising that YOU ignore that.
Dennis – Actually, Trump was campaigning for Republican candidates in the mid-terms, as he should be, as party leader. [“Fast-forward four years, and Trump is busy hitting the campaign trail, aiming to energize his party’s conservative base and boost some of the candidates he endorsed during this year’s GOP primaries.” https://www.foxnews.com/politics/biden-midterm-campaign-schedule-nearly-nonexistent-trump-rallies-republicans-across-country%5D
Trump is mobilizing conservatives so that we can reverse the damage of the Biden administration, which is doing what Ian did to the west coast of Florida.
Pro tip: Look past your nose.
“Berkeley Student Groups Vote to Ban Any Speakers Who Support Israel or Zionism”
– Professor Turley
_______________
“KNOW YOUR ENEMY”
These are not student groups, they are adversarial and hostile, communist cells.
These are subversive, insurrectionist, direct and mortal enemies of the Constitution, Bill of Rights, Americans and the “fundamentally formed” United States of America.
_____________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________
“If you know the enemy and know yourself, you need not fear the result of a hundred battles. If you know yourself but not the enemy, for every victory gained you will also suffer a defeat. If you know neither the enemy nor yourself, you will succumb in every battle.”
– Sun Tzu, The Art of War
Professor Turley, you say that people on the left are outraged by the banning of speakers at Berkeley. If you would, please tell us who these defenders of free speech on the left are. I spend a great deal of time surveying the political atmosphere and I am having a hard time recalling when a prominent person of the left has condemned the cancel culture. I am open to your knowledge. There may be a few but they are few and hard to be found. Thanks.
I take it he is referring to himself, a card carrying member of the left
Actually, they’re quite easy to find. For example, consider the response from the Dean of the Berkeley Law School, Chemerinsky: https://static.foxnews.com/foxnews.com/content/uploads/2022/08/Our-community2.pdf
He’s quite a prominent legal scholar.
Defenders of free speech on the left:
Bret Weinstein and Heather Heying
Eric Weinstein
Glenn Greenwald
Konstantin and Francis from Triggernometry
Bari Weiss (center-left?)
Russell Brand
to name a few
Bret Weinstein is a pretty liberal guy. But I have heard him say that he fears where the left is taking us.
The left is different from liberal. Perhaps that is the distinction he is making.
The progressive left began to stink. Just think of the Racism of Woodrow Wilson, so they stole the name, liberal. Bill Buckley, years ago, tried to distinguish between the true liberal and the progressive Liberal. using a capital L for the progressive Liberal, and a small l for the classical liberal.
There is no liberality in the Liberal from the left, but some liberals like Alan Dershowitz and Jonathan Turley are true liberals, not Liberals, even though they stray to the left side of the aisle. (Left and right have lost their meanings long ago, perhaps longer ago than I think, and their meanings in different parts of the globe differ.)
Take note of how the liberals Turley and Dershowitz can discuss things peacefully, and though they may disagree with others, they hear them out and can listen and understand. That is something not seen from the left, which is in lockstep with the Borg.
You mentioned a bunch of names, I don’t know all of them well enough, so I will guess that all of them are liberals today as opposed to Liberals or leftists. They are not the problem, though possibly as members of the other side are persuaded to support the wrong things.
“The bylaw, drafted by UC Berkeley’s Law Students for Justice in Palestine (LSJP), stated that such speakers endanger ‘he safety and welfare of Palestinian students on campus.'”
Any lawyer–or in this case, future lawyer–who is incapable of hearing an opposing viewpoint without melting like the Wicked Witch of the West needs to consider another profession. Either that, or find a nice totalitarian country, where no dissent is allowed, in which to practice. I hear North Korea is hiring.
I just can’t rap my head around the support of a muslim nation by the LBGT++++ community. The most egregious laws against Lesbianism and homosexuality are imposed by muslim nations. Can the gay students on this campus be so misinformed that they would support a nation that makes being gay a crime. https://antigaylaws.org/regional/middle-east/. We can also see the Palestinian position on the rights of the LBGT people in their nation. https://genderandsecurity.org/projects-resources/research/nowhere-run-gay-palestinian-asylum-seekers-israel. When it comes to the hatred of the Jew all things are overlooked. In Israel there are openly gay politicians. When it comes to hatred of the Jew nothing else maters.
Used to be the insane weren’t allowed to run the asylum.
Now, the asylum’s product is insanity itself.
Jonathan: I don’t know what you are complaining about. A variety of student groups at Berkeley voted to bar speakers who support Israel’s apartheid policies toward the Palestinians. You admit “[t]hese groups have a right to decide who they will invite as speakers”. You further admit that [t]he students (sic) groups, in my view, have the edge on any free speech court challenge”. With these admissions it’s pretty clear the students get to decide, not you. You may think the vote was “wrong” but that’s hardly a legal argument. It’s all about “majority rule” when it comes to who gets invited to speak at the University. Maybe you have another solution. Perhaps, requiring the University to compel students to hear from “conservative or libertarian speakers”? I don’t think so. Maybe the solution is for you and your conservative and libertarian brethren to convince students they should hear your views. Good luck on that one!
So let’s move to a topic that’s on everyone’s minds. Now that Florida and South Carolina are beginning to dig out from Hurricane Ian we see the effects of global warming emerging. Stronger and more destructive hurricanes. And how is Gov. DeSantis is handling the cleanup and rebuilding. For some time the gov has fought the feds on just about everything–from Covid, immigration policy–you name it–he has led the GOP charge against the Biden administration and it’s “intrusion” on states rights. When DeSantis was in Congress he voted against federal aid for the victims of Hurricane Sandy in New Jersey and NY. But now with Ian he immediately called Biden and asked for help. Biden responded as normal presidents do–help is on the way! DeSantis speaks out of both sides of his mouth! He doesn’t think the federal government should pay for disaster relief–except in Florida!
So now Floridians have found their homes completely destroyed. Where will they go? They probably will become migrants because living on the coast or on barrier islands is no longer tenable as climate change makes hurricanes more destructive. And how does DeSantis treat migrants? We saw what happened in Martha’s Vineyard. Frank Cerabino writing in the Palm Beach Post (9/29) thinks DeSantis should bring back the migrants he dumped in Martha’s Vineyard:
“So, please gives us back those migrants. There were a lot of able-bodied workers in that bunch…In fact, we can use all the Central
American labor–documented or undocumented–the rest of America can spare. And we promise, as long as they’re here, working
and putting our state back together again, we will not cast them as evil drug mules, pedophiles and terrorists”.
Can we expect DeSantis to get “woke”–to finally acknowledge the reality of global warming and welcome migrants to join in the effort to rebuild his state? Don’t hold your breath.
Another other off-topic query:
Ken White asks “Has any elected Republican, or prominent figure in the current Republican Party, criticized either Trump’s unhinged and racist attack on McConnell and Chao or CPAC’s explicit endorsement of Putin’s justification for war of conquest?”
I doubt it, but if someone is aware of condemnation on the right, please do say.
Despite your innuendo, Trump is not a racist. Next thing we will hear is that you think he is an anti-Semite despite his Jewish daughter and grandchildren.
You see Trump calling Elaine Chao “Coco Chow,” and you excuse him. You love authoritarians. You’d have been among the Verband Nationaldeutscher Juden had you lived in Nazi Germany.
You wouldn’t recognize a racist if they surrounded you. Why? Because you have surrounded yourself with racist leftists and don’t know anything different.
There is a difference between a taunt and racism, but you wouldn’t know that. You fit in with the socialists, national socialists, and the Italian fascist socialists.
Dennis McIntyre, you are correct when you write that these student groups have a right to invite who they want to speak. The problem lies in the fact that they do not want to allow anyone with an opposing viewpoint to speak on campus. They reach their goal to intimidate the faculty with threats of violent protest. You respond with a no big deal exclamation. It makes no difference to you that Berkeley is a public not private institution that receives its funding by people on both the left and the right. You brush censorship of your shoulder like it’s just so much dust. We understand where your coming from.
“who support Israel’s apartheid policies toward the Palestinians.”
Dennis, the word apartheid seems to be a little big for you as the way you use it is wrong. Can you tell us what causes you to use that word and defend its use?
Israel is not apartheid. Arabs are on the Israeli Supreme Court and Knesset, having voting and property rights equal to the Jewish citizens of Israel. The only exception is they do not have to serve in the Israeli army though many are and have fought bravely to protect Israel and its democracy.
. Now that Florida and South Carolina are beginning to dig out from Hurricane Ian we see the effects of global warming emerging. Stronger and more destructive hurricanes.
He says with out evidence. Even NOAA had to correct the clueless Don Lemon that climate change had nothing to do with Ian.
PowerLine has a short post explaining the bait and switch, ACGCC worshipers use to fool the rubes
https://www.powerlineblog.com/archives/2022/10/on-hurricane-ian.php
Number of major Atlantic hurricanes rises in recent times:
https://www.statista.com/chart/11009/hurricanes-over-the-atlantic-basin/
“As a simple fact-check, I accessed the NOAA HURDAT database and tabulated all 15 hurricanes to landfall in Florida as a C4 or 5. In the sample, 10 occurred at or before 1960, five of which made landfall between 1945 and 1950. Those saying it’s the “new norm” are full of crap.”
https://twitter.com/physicsgeek/status/1575470462779461633?
David, did you follow the link? The one that starts at 1860? Notice how over 280 years there is no difference? It is a lie to use data that covers 60 years to prove “CLIMATE” change. If you talk to a real climatologist, they talk about 14,000 year cycles. Not 60 year cycles. 60 years is weather, not climate.
picking data sets in not science.
I strongly support Israel’s right to exist, and I strongly condemn Israel’s treatment of Palestinians.
I encourage people to read Chemerinsky’s entire response to these students: https://static.foxnews.com/foxnews.com/content/uploads/2022/08/Our-community2.pdf
It’s consistent with Turley’s own free speech views, but I’m not surprised that Turley didn’t want to acknowledge that.
“I strongly support Israel’s right to exist, and I strongly condemn Israel’s treatment of Palestinians.”
This type of comment is typical of leftists. Try to demonstrate impartiality and generalize. Then turn the argument against one, “I strongly condemn Israel’s treatment of Palestinians.”
One can condemn any nation for some actions, but in comparison, some will stand out as good while others will not.
Israel is a good nation, so one wonders what comparison anonymous can provide. Very little, I suspect.
Israel exists based on Democratic notions. Despots rule the Palestinians.
One feature of the Israeli is his respect for life, whether Israeli or Palestinian. Yet the Palestinian leadership offers financial rewards to the families of martyrs who kill Israeli children, bomb school buses, etc. They name roads after these killers.
I believe that is enough to demonstrate a significant mindset difference between the two. One can add that it was the Arab leaders that dealt with the Nazis and agreed to exterminate the Jews living in the Levant.
I will go right to the core of the dispute, the so-called occupation because there is no Israeli occupation. Jordan occupied the disputed lands illegally. Israel is sovereign over Judea and Sumeria based on international law that preceded Israeli independence. There is no legal right of Palestinians to ownership of Judea and Sumeria. Additionally, the use of the name Palestinian today is a misnomer. Post World War 2, one will note that the Palestinians were the Jewish settler in the land of Israel.
We have discussed these things before, so there is no need to use a shotgun approach to dispel any of your inaccuracies. Instead, you can tell us what you think are the three worst features of Israel. Then you can do the same for the Palestinians. When we get to an accurate account of those features, others can judge by themselves our respective correctness.
Berkeley vies to Balkanize
Busby must be turning in his grave.
(He’s their founder, right?)
That’s antisemitic, and completely unacceptable. So is racially discriminating against Asians in college admissions, but they do that, too.
Imagine banning any Latino speakers who have ever expressed pride in la raza, or have supported Mexico or Ecuador.
It’s time to talk about the normalization of antisemitism on the Left, most especially how it motivated attacks on Jews and Jewish businesses during BLM riots.
There were about ten groups listed as parties to the banning orgy and yet I’m curious if there are ten Palestinians in the law school.
These little morons leading these rallies love being the person with the megaphone as well as the idea that they are burnishing their credentials for later in life. The funny thing is that later in life they will be trying to hide this activity or they will lie about it, just as today’s Dems claim they never wanted to defund the police.
Watch when one of these narcissistic idiots tries running for office in NYC or in parts of LA or FL and they try to court the Jewish vote.
OT
The question isn’t how stupid is Kamala Harris, the question is how stupid are Americans?
George, you eliminated the best part, where she [accidentally] refers to North Korea as our ally.
Funny how Turley can turn this into a “left” position, wait till this SCOTUS gets their hands on “Religious Freedom”. Christian privilege will be off the scales. Christianity will be a de facto law of the land.
“Funny how Turley can turn this into a “left” position”
Though intolerance is seen in many places, it is especially obvious on the left.
the groups bar anyone who supports “Zionism, the apartheid state of Israel, and the occupation of Palestine.”
Why doesn’t the group bar anyone who supports “Islamic supremacy, any apartheid Arab states that doesn’t even let any Jew enter the country, let alone live there, and the continued violent and lethal war/insurgency against the state of Israel”?
Good question. But we know the answer. Some grievances are more equal than others. Some grievances must be roundly and loudly promoted. Some grievances must be roundly and loudly condemned and not allowed to be expressed.
This is what you get when you lower the admission standards.
How does this help further education or inclusivity? My legal analysis is that these students just suck as human beings.
My legal analysis is that these students just suck as human beings.
If you are correct, why do these students x, y and z? How did they come to be this way? Dig deeper.
“This is only the latest example of the growing intolerance for opposing views that now characterizes higher education.” Unfortunately, said growing intolerance of opposing views is not limited to higher education or either political party–it is happening among all Americans generally. Why can we not disagree respectfully, debate with an open mind, and challenge our own views as much as we do those of others?
Why can we not disagree respectfully, debate with an open mind, and challenge our own views as much as we do those of others?
With a hat tip to Kant; because it’s easier to go through life ignorant and apathetic.
Touche. Although, my glass just went from half-full to half-empty.
Not so fast. Kant also says the chasm one has to cross from “self-incurred immaturity” to enlightenment is “the narrowest of ditches.”
So the other side is easily knowable. All it takes is something to nudge them to take that first “scary” step.
This modern Democratic party is doing everything imaginable to shove people away towards enlightenment. The midterms will tell us if they took that first step.
Olly: “it’s easier to go through life ignorant and apathetic.”
Yes….and the Democrats are showing us just how easy it is!
“Now anti-Zionist groups target Jewish Americans directly.
Anti-Zionism is flatly antisemitic. Using “Zionist” as a euphemism for Jew is nothing more than a confidence trick. Like other forms of Judeophobia, it is an ideology of hate, treating Israel as the “collective Jew” and smearing the Jewish state with defamations similar to those used for centuries to vilify individual Jews.”
Anti-Semitism and anti-Zionism have converged since 1948, so today, in avoidance of being named anti-Semites, most of those calling themselves anti-Zionists are anti-Semites.
As distasteful as Professor Turley’s conclusion is, “The students groups, in my view, have the edge on any free speech court challenge, but they are dead wrong on the use of that right.”, I agree with the conclusion but think we need more focus on anti-Semitism. It and other forms of dscrimination need to be attacked more broadly, perhaps in the form of reduced cash flows to such universities and more active administrations. The voices of reason do not seem heard.
We need to recognize that anti-Semitism, whether or not hidden by the term anti-Zionism, should not be tolerated by any Americans of any race or religion. Unfortunately, the cancel culture of today promotes that type of hatred.
—
https://jewishjournal.com/commentary/opinion/351854/berkeley-develops-jewish-free-zones/
“Berkeley Develops Jewish-Free Zones
After we published this op-ed by Kenneth Marcus, Erwin Chemerinsky, Dean of Berkeley School of Law, sent us a response. You can read it below, followed by a response from Marcus.”
This is religious and racial discrimination, but probably legal as Turley concludes. But it is sad. And these groups are expecting their decision to be respected. However they would not respect a student group that adopted such a bylaw excluding LGBTQ+ or anyone who supports LGTBQRSTUV+ rights from being invited to speak. This is anti-semitism, racism and stupidism. Students are so emotionally and intellectually fragile that they not only don’t want to listen to anyone with anyone who thinks differently, they don’t even want someone to even be allowed to speak at all if they don’t agree with it. This is just as ugly as the Berkeley law student KKK group passing a resolution that blocks any speaker who is not white, Christian, and of Anglo-Saxon descent. Intolerance in the name of tolerance. This is thought disphoria that keeps driving the divisions between our people. I remember law school and college full of students trying to make the world better and trying to unite to stomp out the bigotry on display at Berkeley.
kunstslerghost: Bravo for your statement, “Students are so emotionally and intellectually fragile that they not only don’t want to listen to anyone with anyone who thinks differently, they don’t even want someone to even be allowed to speak at all if they don’t agree with it.”
There is an additional dimension involved in this situation of exclusion, fear in those being excluded.
It’s not religious or racial discrimination.
The set {Jews} and the set {Zionists} intersect, but are not the same. The former is a religious group; the latter is not. Neither group is a race.
Nonetheless, anonymous, anti-Zionism has become the catchall word used by anti-Semites.
Who’s talking about religious or racial discrimination? I thought most of us were talking about viewpoint censorship? –It’s only the identity-politics of the censoring student groups that might try to turn it into categorically-protected discrimination, n’est ce pas?
lin asks “Who’s talking about religious or racial discrimination?”
Are you having a hard time following the exchange? I was responding to kunstlersghost’s 12:29 PM comment, which started off “This is religious and racial discrimination.”
Not the exchange, but the thread, starting at 11:36 a.m., thanks
If you understood the exchange, and given kunstlersghost’s claim that “This is religious and racial discrimination,” why did you ask me “Who’s talking about religious or racial discrimination?”
Sorry, I see now that you weren’t asking me. I misread the threading. My mistake.
This is fine. As individual groups, they have a 1A right to control their own speech. If they choose to not have specific speakers they are allowed to do that. Other groups are still free to have Zionist speakers. As normal, the details are lost on JT.
I agree. Just like Facebook can moderate off content it doesn’t like and Twitter can ban twitterers if doesn’t like and Youtube can demonetize posts it doesn’t like. The good professor is into a bad place on many fronts on this issue
Sammy: For once, I cannot disagree with the wording of your comment, particularly the reality that “[o]ther groups are still free to have Zionist speakers.” However, I at least question whether organized student groups affiliated with-and representative of- the educational institution-can usurp the restrictions placed on the institution. Poor analogy, but would Berkeley cheerleaders at a Berkeley v. Cal Tech football game be allowed to wear the colors and uniforms of Cal Tech? I don’t see an organized Berkeley student group as mutually exclusive to its affiliated school.
Case in point, the blog’s reference to Dean Chemerinsky’s observation…
LMHO @ the idea of a Berkeley vs Cal Tech football game.
DB: Yeah, you’re right about that, ha!
I was trying to remember the Cal Tech colors. Maybe there’s a red shift.
Orange on, usually, white
Pursuant to my earlier post, I cursorily looked up whether Berkeley funds student groups/organizations. See, e.g., https://lead.berkeley.edu/manage-your-organization/fund-your-org/ and other UC sites.
The details are not lost on him. He says that the student groups have this right to adopt exclusionary bylaws bc they have a 1st Am right to do so. He also distinguishes this case from San Francisco State case. So the personal barb on Turley is completely unfounded. But as a strong believer in the 1st Am, I believe that you have a right to spread even disinformation, even though it may not be wise or responsible to do so.
I agree. Anybody who can’t handle reality should be allowed their little echo chambers–as long as those echo chambers don’t take federal funding.
I am Muslim. I get sick of other Muslims who are both insensitive to others and yet oversensitive about every freaking thing, all at the same time. That kind of third-world cognitive dissonance pisses me off beyond belief, but what can I do?
You know who kills the most Muslims by far? Other Muslims who hate Jews, Christians, Hindus, Buddhists, etc. and are looking for Islamophobes under every rock. The little third-world dictators in Tehran and other hell holes who murder women and call it God’s will. That is a fact that embarrasses me more than I can ever put in words.
Your thoughts, Sammy and Dennis? Or maybe you’re too offended to discuss it.
Berkeley Law School is not allowing them to live in a “little echo chamber,” as is clear from Chemerinsky’s full response:
https://static.foxnews.com/foxnews.com/content/uploads/2022/08/Our-community2.pdf
Your thoughts on Chemerinsky’s response?
I read it. So what? The students are enforcing an echo chamber, not the University: “Furthermore, in the interest of protecting the safety and welfare of Palestinian students on campus,” student organizations signing the statement “will not invite speakers that have expressed and continued to hold views or host/sponsor/promote events in support of Zionism, the apartheid state of Israel, and the occupation of Palestine.”
How is it an echo chamber when they’re confronted by other viewpoints, including Chemirovsky’s?
Even if you just focus on student groups in the law school, which certainly aren’t the only ones who sponsor talks on campus, there are 100 such groups, the vast majority of which have not signed on.
They are creating safe spaces where they don’t have to listen, and it looks like they succeeded. It’s a bad reflection on them. These organizations were never meant to be exclusion zones, but that’s what they have become.
I am Muslim. I get sick of other Muslims who are both insensitive to others and yet oversensitive about every freaking thing, all at the same time. That kind of third-world cognitive dissonance pisses me off beyond belief, but what can I do?
You can be a holy Muslim. I know quite a few Muslim physicians, nurses and medical researchers. Humble, meticulous, thorough and inspiring men and women. Devout husbands and wives with lots of children. Ive said it many times: immigrants are the hope of America
Thanks for sharing, Diogenes!
Estovir,
FYI, One of my sisters, her husband & kids are Catholic as are Owen Shroyer of Inforwars/War Rm, as are the Hoft Bros that run the Gateway Pundit, other Catholics etc..
I don’t hate them, I like most of them.
*********
Judaism & Christianity they were able to go through a reformation.
A reformation is not possible with the Islamic nuts.
If Islam reformed itself it would have to completely throw out all mohammad stuff & thus all they’d have left is that they’d be following the jews or christains.
Note the Islam hasn’t renounced all of mohammad’s Pedo Crap, Lying to all non Islamic people, enslaving/k*illing non-Islam among other issues. Etc.,Etc..
If they wish to air in public their noise 5 times a day they should do it in the Middle East or China.
Why is there even one Islamist here??
Maybe you should ask yourself why are you even in the US if you’ve no concept of what it was might to be.
And Check out Matt: 6-5.
***********
a short story for you & others.
https://gatesofvienna.net/2016/01/the-alienork-way/
https://banned.video/watch?id=633b517911fd4f36d303ee48
Robert Barnes Joins Infowars In-Studio for Powerful Interview on the Collapsing State of the Justice System
7,589 views
·
Oct 3, 2022
4
Share
Download
The Alex Jones Show
The Alex Jones Show
Robert Barnes of https://vivabarneslaw.locals.com/ joins The Alex Jones to break down the state of the failing Justice System.
Left-wing radicals are attempting to destroy Alex Jones via the court system! Please help Alex by making a donation to his legal defense to keep him in the fight! Don’t let the NWO be successful with their latest weapon against Free Speech!
Thank you, Estovir. I agree, there are wonderful Holy Muslims. I consider my wife and her family among them. I wish such Muslims got more airtime than the 10% who embarrass the faith.
Repeated we have discussions about the political corruption in the FBI.
While so many on the left are defending the FBI.
This would be the same FBI that after 9/11 had an entire industry going targeting muslim teenagers entrapping them and often succeeding in sending them to jail.
Most of us understand that Muslims are just like everybody else. They are straight and gay. peaceful and violent. Terrorists, and charitable.
Idiots and geniuses.
The FBI missed the Boston Marathon bomber – but targeted muslim teens for innumerable cases where – like the Michigan Wolverines – everything was driven By the FBI and informants.
There are some idiots I have a huge beef with – who happen to be muslim.
Nor do I have a problem with more scrutiny of immigrants coming from countries with high degrees of violence, criminality, and terrorism – whether that is Somalia or Venezuela.
I agree, John.
Diogenes,
I’ve read some of your stuff here & it seems ok.
Around here (Ok) we have Cherokee Indians, Shawnee, Osage, Pawnee, Creek Indians,etc., they’re born
& thus they are part of that tribe just like us
Scots, Irish & Germans are tribal & born into Clans. (Clans)
I just wonder how people fall in with Islam, were you born into it or was there something you found attractive about it?
Like everything in the house of Islam is Peace & everything outside of the house of Islam is War & Islamist must Conquer those people or Ki*ll them. (sic)
Myself, I’m funny in that I don’t take kindly towards those declaration of their violent intentions & past actions.
Like Ft Hood, Pulse Nightclub Fl, etc. X 1000 plus, + GWBush-Cheney-DARPA-CIA stirring up a Crap Storm gaming us all then-now against others in the largest Psyop Crap ever.
Maybe you have a few words?
If they choose to not have specific speakers they are allowed to do that.
And…when that’s how you opperated when you went to college, it goes a long way to expaining your ignorance of almost all topics. You just choose not to expose yourself to new ideas. The perfect example of “ignorance is bliss”.
“If they choose to not have specific speakers they are allowed to do that.”
Not at a government university, which UCB is.