“Their smug civility was infuriating; their invitations for debate, inflammatory. I could barely seethe out my opinion about the misogyny of holding such a debate at all…
The discussion never should have been entertained, because simply opening space for this ‘logical, respectful’ debate itself is a threat to human rights that should never be up for debate…
Some arguments aren’t worth engaging with, and quite frankly are dangerous for even existing.”
She added that “Yale should be more cognizant about the environment it fosters for women. We don’t need perfunctory celebrations of the anniversary of Yale’s women that accompany endorsements of misogynist dialogue.”
The editorial perfectly captures the rising intolerance and orthodoxy on our campuses. Nam insists that even allowing such debates is “an insult to our personhood, experience and rights.”
This is consistent with other editorials that we have previously discussed. A Berkeley columnist denounced civility and called for violent resistance. Dartmouth faculty and students demanded that the university shutdown a conservative newspaper. Wellesley editors endorsed shutting down conservative speakers and said that “violence may be warranted.” We have also documented repeated incidents where university newspapers have fired writers and editors for questioning Covid masks, challenging systemic racism claims, or holding other opposing views.
There has also been a repeated attack on civility as racist or reactionary. Even reporters at National Public Radio (NPR) have denounced civility as a “weapon wielded by the powerful.” Hillary Clinton has called for the end of civility toward any Republicans.
This tirade at Yale against free speech captures many of these elements from the attack on civility to the view of opposing speech as harmful. Given the increasingly anti-free speech culture in our elementary through high schools, it is not surprising to see this rising generation of censors. These students have been constantly told that free speech is harmful and that they should not have to be harmed by the exposure to opposing views.
The irony is that it is important to hear Nam’s views, which can be the basis for productive discourse — the type of civil discourse that she rejects. I would oppose any effort to silence her. This is precisely the type of open discussion that is valuable on our campuses. However, it should occur in an environment of civility and tolerance — values that Nam clearly rejects.
The Yale editorial gives an insight into what educators have created in this speech-phobic, viewpoint-intolerant generation.
Rage and hate. That is the Democratic Party since 2016.
This is the same anti-free speech twisted logic that was used to attack Nicholas Sandman when he was confronted by the Native American Nut-Job in Washington. He too was condemned for his calm equanimity.
Incidentally, a common bitter question raised in parallel by the Hyerim Bianca Nams of the planet who are saturated with hate is wondering why men don’t like them. Unfortunately for Hyerim, she is probably going to be a very lonely woman.
The old McCarthyism was defeated when people saw the lack of decency. In this new McCarthyism, lack of decency is a bragging right.
When they tell you who they are we should believe them. I don’t believe in silencing anyone, especially when they are revealing their true self.
GEB says, “I’m not sure where this comes from . . ..”
A few days ago a seemingly-unrelated event shed some light on that question. A black woman walked into a Target store and demanded slavery reparations from the store.
How is that related? Like this incident, it made no logical sense. But it clearly came from a sense of extreme entitlement that had been drilled into this lady’s head by the Left. Same thing here: extreme entitlement to blast out one’s own propaganda without it ever being challenged in any way, even in a polite, reasoned way.
The reason she pretends to be so offended, and declares the subject to be above debate, is because she can not “win” a civil, logical, rational, debate.
It’s easier to put on airs and simply declare that the subject of killing an innocent developing human life is above debate.
The left equates debate with shouting, personal insults, doxing, and, on occasion, violence. And abilities they once had for a respectful, low-volume conversation have long since atrophied. They seethe with contempt at the very notion of such a thing.
Encouraged by the woke left of the Democratic party and the Biden Administration, professors and students at many of America’s colleges and universities have adopted the “temper-tantrum” philosophy as their winning formula. I would start investing in companies that make Bullhorns as business will be brisk through the end of 2024 at least. Thank you, Jonathan, for keeping this vital issue in the forefront.
(oldmanfromkansas) ” As reflected in the above quote, there are enough like-minded voters that she will be elected.”
Agreed that AOC will be groomed to run some day, much like Newsome’s grooming.
But her Ethnic Group’s sexual-ceiling (Patriarchal vs Matriarchal) may or may-not be a problem for her election dependent upon the atmosphere at that time.
re: …
a patriarchal society is where men hold control and make all the rules and women stay home and care for the kids. Matriarchy, however, is a social system in which females hold the primary power positions in roles of political leadership, moral authority, social privilege, and control of the property. …
Anon – I predict that when she runs, it won’t be a problem for her but an advantage. In 2008 BHO was the first black POTUS nominee, and that didn’t hurt him, the time was right in many people’s minds and he won. I believe that when AOC is nominated a similar phenomenon will propel her to victory.
The irony is that it is important to hear Nam’s views, which can be the basis for productive discourse — the type of civil discourse that she rejects. I would oppose any effort to silence her.
I don’t see it as ironic at all. Surely the professor agrees that one of the features of free speech is that it can rip away the curtain, show speakers as they really are. Nam has certainly revealed herself to be, at best, a person who rejects reasoning in favor of emotion, and at worst a person incapable of reason or of recognition that her interlocutors are people with rights just as inalienable – as unable to be surrendered, even by the person herself – as she considers hers to be.
It doesn’t occur to her for a moment, apparently, that questions of ethics don’t always redound to the benefit of the person who is the most passionate, or even the person who most strongly feels her “rights” are at risk (I am a pro-life woman, for the record, who would reluctantly go along with Europe-style abortion laws – and I don’t see a “right” to abortion, only a desire for an expedient solution to what is almost always a consensual act). I wonder how she feels about the ethics of making a man who impregnated a woman in a consensual one-night stand pay child support for eighteen years? Or the ethics driving a “boyfriend” who keeps several women on the hook insisting on his “girlfriends’ ” getting abortions every time he knocks them up, but what a guy, he’ll take them to PP and even maybe pay for it? Could it be that ethics exist outside the realm of her personal feelings and experiences?
I would also vehemently oppose efforts to silence her, now matter how rant-y and freshman goth she sounds. How else am I going to know who and what she is?
What this group was, an example of how open minds, debate, interaction, and adults behave.
Is that why she is so upset?
Have Bianca Nam and Keith Olberman ever been seen at the same time? This nasty, angry, ugly, juvenile, fascist and censorious personality seems to be gaining ground among the leftist “un”educated tyrants. Civility is bad, punctuality is bad, neatness is bad, obese is healthy, parents should get out of the way of their kids choices, China is good vis a vis America, Russia is the biggest threat to us, trans men have no advantage over female athletes, Dylan Mulvaney isn’t a nut case, keeping porn out of elementary school is book banning and of course Biden is coherent are all lies that we are now forced to live with and to accept.
I would agree with James. There is a great deal of mental health pathology in that editorial. I’m not sure where this comes from but then I attended high school long ago. I know that the ones near my home here in the Midwest don’t teach and indoctrinate in this manner, but they are not perfect. Colleges only seem to reinforce this rage and passion. With the demonstrations of certain teachers and their organizations, I can see where a lot of this intolerance came from. I fear we have been asleep at the wheel while “educational experts” ran amok in our schools. What is encouraging is that there are many students who show civility and tolerance and kindness and can function like a normal human being. It is true that in many situations that the person who remains cool, calm and collected can win the day. Calmness and civility also tends to really infuriate people who “are passionate” and tend to be unhinged. Intelligence tends to work best when used in a calm and rational manner. Which is likely why the leaders of this intolerance want rage and passion. Passion can be directed and effective but must be aimed with intelligence and a goal, especially if you want lasting and useful change. Rage only casts real thought and intelligence to the winds and then when the passion and rage is spent and you crash then you get to see the wreckage you have wrought and eventually the regret at what you did.
Hyerim Bianca Nam wrote, “Their smug civility was infuriating; their invitations for debate, inflammatory. I could barely seethe out my opinion about the misogyny of holding such a debate at all…”
That absurd statement is the signature significant statement of a psychological snowflake that’s snowflaking very hard.
Signature Significance: Signature significance posits that a single act can be so remarkable that it has predictive and analytical value, and should not be dismissed as statistically insignificant.
. . . so civically ignorant and/or stupid, like Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez appears to be . . .
I’d change “appears to be” to “is.” And yet . . . she is likely going to be POTUS one day. She turns 35 next year, and the Dems will almost certainly nominate her within the next few election cycles. As reflected in the above quote, there are enough like-minded voters that she will be elected.
oldmanfromkansas wrote, “…she is likely going to be POTUS one day. She turns 35 next year, and the Dems will almost certainly nominate her within the next few election cycles.”
Dang it oldmanfromkansas, that’s enough to scare the he!! out of any rational thinking adult. Now I’ll be thinking about that possible scenario the whole freaking weekend. ARRRGH!!!
Steve – LOL, sorry about that. Think of it as an early warning to help you prepare, whatever that looks like to you.
Wait, so if in her mind everything bad is good, and everything good is bad, then why is smugness bad? She should be praising their smugness but denouncing their civility. She is internally inconsistent.
Expecting any kind of rational consistency in thinking from the social justice woke cult is futile.
When absolute drooling hate is the permanently attached industrial-strength weapons-grade thickened ideological blinders (#Cornelius Gotchberg) that clouds the view of the world around the wearer, rational thinking is impossible in a very absolute way. Like the barking dog that James wrote about in his comment above, “No one can argue with a barking dog, you can’t appeal to reason where there is none.”
The argument is that rather than conducting a discussion quietly and with logic, discussions should be unhinged?
Putting this politely, the editorial is absurd, divisive, and dangerous.
These clowns do realize that they have the right not to participate or otherwise engage? Probably not. Doing so would infringe their right to be offended.
The leftists claim that words are violence, how should we consider this editorial? While radicals call conservatives Nazis they employ the same tactics a the Brown Shirts.
We all, as citizens and taxpayers, spend a huge amount, in tax exemptions, grants, scholarships, etc., to support institutions like Yale, Harvard and Princeton. Remind me why we do that.
Hyerim Bianca Nam is welcome to her opinion even when it shows that she a bigot¹ advocating for persecution².
Nam, and those with a mentality like her, are the primary problem with discourse in the 21st century. Ignorant fools, like Nam, have their heads buried up that place where the sun doesn’t shine that they cannot see what the absolute absurdity of what they have become – pure Orwellian totalitarians that use the same kind of social tactics that actual fascists used in 1930’s and 1940’s Germany. People that think like Nam will likely never become very productive members of society, their obsession will drive them to always be in search of something to demonize, they are unofficial members of a lunatic fringe woke cult and need psychological deprogramming.
¹Bigot: a person who is obstinately or unreasonably attached to a belief, opinion, or faction, especially one who is prejudiced against or antagonistic toward a person or people on the basis of their membership of a particular group.
²Persecution: hostility and ill-treatment, especially on the basis of ethnicity, religion, or sexual orientation or political beliefs.
Steve,
Well said and spot on.
The word “absurd” truly reflects leftists mentality.
this ‘logical, respectful’ debate itself is a threat to human rights
Further proof, High Schools indoctrinate, not teach. Kid are told what to think, not how to think. Only the approved “narrative” is allowed.
iowan2 wrote, “Further proof, High Schools indoctrinate, not teach. Kid are told what to think, not how to think. Only the approved “narrative” is allowed.”
Was Charlotte Thomson Iserbyt right that the consolidation of public schools and dumbing down to the least common denominator in our public schools would be our downfall into the abyss of totalitarianism?
This was inevitable; unfettered, entitlement evolves into intolerance evolves into hatred. We are at the point where, at least in these individuals, rationality has virtually ceased to exist. They are not well, and were they to succeed (which they won’t) in destroying the other, they would soon enough turn on each other and destroy themselves. That could actually happen regardless, but not without great damage.
We have created a generation of monsters to whom the word ‘No’ is a foreign concept, and the time has come to begin isolating them through a concerted return to all that they, in their madness, denounce. No one can argue with a barking dog, you can’t appeal to reason where there is none.
Thank you for your commitment to this issue, Professor Turley.
Very well stated James.
James,
Well said.
I see your point, James. They want speech codes to foster civility, but civility is also a crime??
Stanford and MIT are now defending freedom of expression. Harvard, Yale, Columbia, and Northwestern remain conspicuous threats to democracy.
Diogenes said,
“Harvard, Yale, Columbia, and Northwestern remain conspicuous threats to democracy.”
That right there.
Thank you, Professor, for continuing this discourse on free speech. I believe there is no more important topic for public discussion than that which is the core basis of our constitution and republic.