Shut Up Or Go To Jail
The left is pretty darn serious about making people shut up. It can land you in jail.
Emma West, 34, of New Addington, London, appeared before magistrates today charged with racially aggravated harassment.
She was arrested and remanded in custody on Monday night, after complaints were made to police in relation to footage uploaded to Youtube.
A British Transport Police spokesman said: “I can confirm that Emma West of New Addington was charged with Racially Aggravated Section 4a on Monday, 28 November 2011.
“She was remanded in custody overnight. This is in relation to an incident onboard a Croydon Tramlink.”
West was arrested yesterday after the footage was posted on YouTube.
The clip, which was apparently filmed on the Croydon to Wimbledon Tramlink route, has been viewed by thousands of people after appearing online on Sunday.
West was remanded in custody and is due to appear at the court again on December 6.
I wonder if they’ll limit their censorship to the words of people. Maybe they also want to censor G-d himself. I could easily see leftists insisting on policemen being stationed in synagogues on Yom Kippur afternoons threatening to arrest the rabbis of they dare offend people by reading certain politically incorrect verses from the Torah at that time. (The Torah reading on the afternoon of Yom Kippur is from Leviticus Chapter 18).
Science: Saying things that must not be said since 1203
Science is the process of querying nature to find the truth.
Apparently, what we all know is the truth: fatherlessness has a pretty strong tendency to make boys into criminals.
From the study:
The study, undertaken by the Melbourne Institute of Applied Economic and Social Research at the Faculty of Business and Economics, found that the presence of a father figure during adolescence was most likely to have a preventive effect on whether male youths engage in risk-taking and deviant behaviour.
While active involvement and interaction between fathers and youths was found to be beneficial, it did not explain the positive benefits of children who grow up with fathers in the household.
“The sense of security generated by the presence of a male role model in a youth‟s life has protective effects for a child, regardless of the degree of interaction between the child and father,” Professor Deborah Cobb-Clark, Director of the Melbourne Institute said.
“Fathers provide children with male role models and can influence children‟s preferences, values and attitudes, while giving them a sense of security and boosting their self-esteem. They also increase the degree of adult supervision at home, which may lead to a direct reduction of delinquent behaviour.”
Using American data from the National Longitudinal Study of Adolescent Health, three factors were studied in the role of fathers influencing youth delinquency: parental involvement and interaction, contribution to household income and engagement with a father figure by simply being present at home.
Unlike previous studies in the field, “Fathers and Youths‟ Delinquent Behaviour‟ which was co-authored by Professor Erdal Tekin from Georgia State University, examines the full range of father figure roles and modern family structures, Professor Cobb-Clark said.
“Our study included residential and non-residential, biological fathers and residential stepfathers and their influence on adolescent behaviours,” Professor Cobb-Clark said.
“We find that adolescent boys engage in more delinquency without a father figure in their lives. Adolescent girls‟ behaviours are less closely linked to this, which may be attributed to the inherent levels of risk-taking that vary between males and females.”
Additionally, higher family incomes were found to have little effects on solving the problems associated with youth delinquency.
The full study ‘Fathers and Youths’ Delinquent Behaviour’ is available for download at http://melbournein … p2011n23.pdf
I have great skepticism of studies in general. But studies that confirm every single thing I saw in eight years of criminal defense work sure are believable to me.
The History of “Shut Up”
Where did the purveyors of “Shut up” get their ideas to use their hateful tactics of “shut up” to discredit the opposition?
This video gives a pretty good account of the history of political correctness.
The Theme of This Blog
Contrary to what anybody might say, the theme of this blog is not about picking on anybody. It’s not about oppressing gays. It’s not about my opposition to redefining marriage. It’s not about any of that stuff.
It’s about the theme of my book “Bias Incident: The World’s Most Politically Incorrect Novel.”
This video sums up the theme of Bias Incident quite nicely:
As it happens, the inspirations for Bias Incident (the persecutions of Ezra Levant and Stephen Boisson and Guy Earle in Canada) were done by jihadis and gay activists. It is they who seem uniquely prone to the argument “Shut up.” Anybody else who wants to use that despicable tactic will be pilloried here. If you can come up with genuine examples of right-wingers saying “shut up” instead of “you’re wrong and here’s why” then I will lambaste them here too.
Carthago delenda est
For those of you who don’t read Latin, the title of this post comes from a famous quotation from Cato the Elder. For a period between the Second and Third Punic Wars Cato concluded every one of his many speeches to the Roman Senate with the above quote, usually translated, “Furthermore, it is my opinion that Carthage must be destroyed.”
I have no great affection for the Ancient Romans. But one has to admire the tenacity and determination embodied in that quotation. It is that type of tenacity and determination that got the Romans through the darkest days of the Second Punic War when Hannibal had destroyed almost all of Rome’s military force. It is that type of tenacity and determination that made Rome the great world power that it became.
It is that type of tenacity and determination that we, the religious folk, need to show if we are to win the culture war against those who are as determined to destroy us as Hannibal Barca was determined to destroy Rome.
In Canada, citizens have been much more successful in getting the government to correct the thoughts of political heretics. Moslem extremists and gay activists seem to be particularly keen in the use of the Canadian Human Rights Tribunals to cleanse Canada from impious speech, thought and action.
Ezra Levant, for instance, is one of my main inspirations for Bias Incident: The World’s Most Politically Incorrect Novel. He was hauled before the tribunal for, among other things, republishing the now infamous Danish mohommad cartoons. Pastor Stephen Boisson was fined and forbidden from preaching about the topic of homosexuality by the commission because his views on the subject offended gay activists. (Is my mind playing tricks on me, or am I beginning to notice a pattern here?)
Although homosexual conduct is forbidden by my faith, just as it is forbidden for Christians, I have never heard a rabbi mention the topic in all my years as a congregant. I’m glad of this, because the unequivocal nature of the authentic Jewish teaching about this subject would make for a boring sermon. Better to hear from the pulpit words of inspiration or discussion of issues that are made more interesting by there being some sort of gray area.
There are people who are offended by my opinion. They are offended by my right and the right of my religious teachers to express that opinion, even if they almost always decline that right. They are offended even though homosexual conduct is one of many, many acts that are forbidden by my religion and even though homosexual conduct occupies no special place among the things forbidden by my beloved faith.
I have little doubt that the persecution of Stephen Boisson has had a chilling effect on the speech of Canadian clergy. This has to change. Religious people must act if they are not to lose their rights one piece at a time. They must defy the “enlightened” and “tolerant” forces that would oppose them.
The defiance doesn’t have to be hateful. It doesn’t have to be over-the-top. The simple, defiant declaration to conclude every sermon in the manner of Cato the Elder will suffice. “Furthermore, I feel it my duty to call your attention to Leviticus 18:22 and Leviticus 20:13,” should be all that is necessary to stand up for free speech and to defy the bullies who would use the government to correct the thinking of its citizenry.
If enough clergy were to do so, it would be all the harder for Canada to trample on the rights of its citizens.
A Happy Thanksgiving to All!!
(All, that is, who don’t sue others in an attempt get the government to correct their thoughts).
I would have had a lot more respect for my critics…
…if one, just ONE person had said, “You know, Ari, I don’t like it when Keith Olbermann exaggerates and calls a person who’s not a murderous terrorist the ‘worst person in the world.’ Now, don’t you start in on that.”
That seems to me to be a respectable criticism.
Seeing as how nobody has said that, I detect a bit of a double standard. It’s not okay for me to say that overly litigious people are contemptible to people who like the cause in which they litigate. But somehow, SOMEHOW, it is okay for Keith Olbermann to say things like THIS:
Insensitivity training
Being the insensitive clod that I am (I’m a right-winger, after all) I’m a big fan of insensitivity.
Here goes:
In today’s Financial Times Lucy Kellaway declares that she has discovered “the single most sensible word that [she'd] seen on the flabby subject of leadership in at least a decade.”
Shakespeare agrees with me.
A knave; a rascal; an eater of broken meats; a
base, proud, shallow, beggarly, three-suited,
hundred-pound, filthy, worsted-stocking knave; a
lily-livered, action-taking knave, a whoreson,
glass-gazing, super-serviceable finical rogue;
one-trunk-inheriting slave; one that wouldst be a
bawd, in way of good service, and art nothing but
the composition of a knave, beggar, coward, pandar,
and the son and heir of a mongrel bitch: one whom I
will beat into clamorous whining, if thou deniest
the least syllable of thy addition.
– Shakespeare, King Lear Act II, Scene II.
I may have been criticized for my objection to a lesbian couple’s contemplated lawsuit against a heretical baker who wouldn’t bake them a cake for their “wedding.”
Well, it seems that my criticism of overly litigious individuals itching to take others to court as loathsome cowards is not new. As you can see from the Shakespeare quoted above, these objections have a long pedigree.
By way of explanation for those who don’t speak Elizabethan, an “action taker” is one who is eager to sue. Note the derision with which Kent treats the litigious Oswald.
Seems to me that I’m not the only one who thinks that those who would use the law as a weapon instead of ironing out their little disputes more civilly are a bunch of cowards.
Using the Law as a Weapon
ROPER: You would give the devil the benefit of law’.
MORE: ‘Yes, what would you do? Cut a great road through the law to get at the devil?’
ROPER: ‘I would cut down every law in England to do that’.
MORE: ‘And when the law was down and the devil turned around on you, where would you hide; the laws being all flat? This country’s planted thick with laws from coast to coast, and if you cut them down, do you think you could stand in the winds that would blow through them?’.
– Bolt, A Man for All Seasons (See: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WMqReTJkjjg )
My post about a lesbian couple’s contemplated use of an Iowa law to correct the thoughts of a Christian baker drew a bit of controversy to this, my humble home on the ‘net.
Until recently, I honestly found it hard to believe that there would be anybody (especially people who are, and always will be, in the minority) who would advocate using the law as a weapon to enforce ideological conformity.
I guess such people never thought about the possibility that, when weaponized, law could be used to harm them just the same way that it is used to harm those that they hate.
Throughout history, fanatics of all kinds have celebrated as the machinery of compulsion has been erected to force heretics to do the bidding of the faithful. Many times, however, those same faithful who cheered the construction of that machinery of compulsion have lived to cry as they were racked on that same machine.
It therefore puzzles me that anybody could react with anything short of horror that people would want to sue (or that the state would allow people to sue) those who refuse, for reasons of conscience, to do their bidding. Those who criticize me now do not see how, when the tables are turned, (and it is a fact of human society that the tables always seem to be turning) that they could be the target of weaponized law.
Let’s see how something like this could happen in a plausible future.
It is conceivable that in the future, as science learns more about neurobiology, that science will discover the reasons for sexual preference, and other aspects of personality. It is also conceivable that science will find ways to modify a patient’s neurobiology in a way that would induce a desired state with respect to the patient’s sexual preference. In other words, science may come up with the dream of many in the religious right: a “cure” for homosexuality. Remember, ten years is a lifetime in neuroscience. Our understanding of the mind is so much greater now than it was ten years ago. If progress continues apace, we may discover things that would horrify advocates of sexual freedom. We do not know what the future of science will bring.
If such a treatment ever becomes a reality (it may not be likely, but it may indeed happen) I would bet LOTS of money that many parents of effeminate sons and tomboy daughters would take their children to neurologists, psychiatrists, genetics doctors or whoever administers such treatments. Heck, if some snake oil treatment that only purports to change sexual nature is touted, I could see certain types of parents trying to take advantage of it. The efficacy is not the issue. The belief in the efficacy is.
And you know what else I could imagine? I could imagine that morays might change so much that state medical boards would require doctors to administer certain treatments (like the one I just discussed) as a condition of licensure. I can imagine state legislatures enabling patients to sue of they are not granted the desired treatments.
Does anybody seriously believe that the future will be free of people who want to use the law to force others to do their bidding? Does anybody take seriously those who say they know for certain that the future will not belong to religious folk who want to force others using the law to conform to their religious ideals? If we model this form of dispute resolution to our descendants, how do we know how they will apply it? It seems eminently plausible that in future weaponized law could be used both to prosecute either LGBTQQI people or their ideological adversaries.
Let us remember, now, that the religious outbreed the secular by a landslide. Patriarchy might be on its last legs now, but there is no guarantee that it will stay that way. Remember, in any human society, the tables are always turning.
Let us not cut down the laws that protect our ideological opponents. We don’t know what the future may bring. Those same laws that I am being criticized for opposing may be all that protects my critics in the future.
What do you think would happen?
Why do you think the government should be in the business of correcting citizen’s thoughts?
What do you think would happen if the government decides to get completely out of the business of correcting citizen’s thoughts?
On Consequences
I’m the kind of guy who simply wants to understand the human condition. If we, as a species are to understand ourselves, we need to discuss the issues that relate to the human condition unflinchingly. We cannot fear any possibly uncomfortable discoveries and we cannot shout down those with whom we disagree. Nothing will suffice but total honesty.
Lately, there is one activist group that uses the tactic of shouting down the opposition with great gusto. These are the gay activists. Obviously, not every gay person, nor even every activist for gay causes stoops to that level. I can, right off the top of my head, think of several honorable counterexamples. But many people do support the censorship or punishment of those with whom they disagree. Many, I might add, in influential positions. The rank and file in gay causes, whom I’m presuming are mostly decent people, have not spoken up to put a stop to this type of behavior.
It is mainly because of this climate that I decided to make LGBTQQI topics the major target of my satire in Bias Incident: The World’s Most Politically Incorrect Novel.
Anyway, since it was my views on marriage abolition via redefinition that got this humble blog the attention it’s been getting, I’d like to set forth my reasons for my opposition to marriage redefinition.
It has little, if anything, to do with homosexuality or my feelings about the practice of homosexuality.
It’s all about consequences.
Let me list a few points about consequences, all of them undeniable:
All actions have consequences.
Every single event in the history of mankind* has had both good consequences and bad consequences. So will every single act that will be undertaken by mankind in future.
The long term consequences of an action may take a long time to arrive. But those consequences will arrive.
The world is a tremendously complex system. It is impossible for any man to predict all of the consequences that will arise from any change he proposes to a complex system. This includes small changes. This principle applies all the more so to a system as complex as the U.S. economy, Western Culture or the world.
Consequences which are, on balance, painful or harmful are much easier to achieve, and therefore, much more likely to occur in the event of a change to society.
Proposed changes to a complex system should, when possible, be small and limited, and done in a way that enables the specific consequences of those changes to be evaluated to the greatest extent possible. Discrimination might be “wrong” but indiscriminate change in a complex system will almost inevitably result in a disaster of some sort.
In order for mankind to achieve any goal, some action must be taken to achieve it. Many of the consequences of those acts will be unpredictable. All of the consequences will follow the laws of nature. Any goal that depends, for its achievement, on consequences that are contrary to any law of nature will not be achieved.
If we are to achieve beneficial changes to society, we must be able to fully evaluate the consequences of our acts or proposed acts. Full and complete discussion of proposed goals and the means to achieve them must be allowed. Closing down discussion by telling disfavored groups to shut up or by shouting “Racism,” “Sexism,” or “Homophobia” makes the achievement of beneficial change less likely.
Those who yell, “Racism,” Sexism,” or “Homophobia” at others who don’t share their policy goals have failed to consider all of the consequences of their proposed policies. This is inevitable because it is impossible to consider all of the possible consequences of any given policy. That said, it is possible that the possible consequences of policies advocated by shouters of those above epithets would include consequences that the shouters consider nightmarish. This provokes bitter laughter in insensitive people such as myself.
Certain consequences are not impossible, but are so vanishingly unlikely to happen that they are indistinguishable from consequences that are, in fact, impossible. Any goal that depends on these as consequences of the acts necessary to achieve them should be considered impossible, and therefore, not attempted.
Some of the facts about human nature are painful to contemplate. If we are to have any hope of appreciating the consequences of our acts, we must look at these facts about human nature unflinchingly and discuss them without fear of reprisal.
The nature of human society is that it will inevitably change. This being said, it is impossible to predict the form into which future societies will take. Seeing as how modern Western culture in the early part of the 21st century is, given the limitations of human nature, probably as close to the best that humanity can achieve, we should do our best to conserve the best aspects of our society. Were we to, willy nilly, make large scale changes, nasty consequences would likely arise.
Many times during the course of history, changes have happened to societies which led to those societies becoming, on balance, much worse. There is no reason that our society is not immune to similar collapse.
This does not mean that a human society can take any form imagined. Man is limited by his nature and by the laws of nature, economics, etc. Certain limitations on the nature of a society are a given. This fact positively precludes the formation of a utopian society without the direct intervention by the Deity.
The nature of mankind is such so to as to make rapid, large scale improvement in the condition of mankind impossible. The consequences of trying to achieve a rapid, large scale improvement in the condition of mankind inevitably include catastrophic loss of human life.
Nothing could be easier than to look at the events of history and think the consequences of those events to have been inevitable. Nothing could be further from the truth.
Nothing could be easier than to look at the events of history and think to oneself about the actors, “How could they have been so stupid?” Future generations will inevitably think the same of us.
The desire to say that certain bad events have had only bad consequences is a manifestation of sentimentality, and is therefore wrong and harmful because sentimentality is, in general, both wrong and harmful. The fact remains that one can find good consequences to the October Revolution, the Atlantic or Indian Ocean slave trades, the Holocaust, the Great Leap Forward or any other catastrophe in the history of mankind. This is not to justify, in any way, any of the above listed events. This also does not mitigate, in any way, the evil of those who perpetrated or participated in these events or those who allowed these events to happen or failed in their efforts to mitigate the evil. This also does not imply that, on balance, mankind benefited from any of these events. This also does not imply that the benefits from any of these events were not vanishingly small. But good consequences, no matter how vanishingly small, are good consequences and ought to be noted as such if we are to evaluate the consequences of any event properly, especially considering how sensitive complex systems are to small changes.
The desire to say that certain policies will have only good consequences or even that they will be free from bad consequences is both sentimental and stupid. It is therefore wrong and harmful because not only is sentimentality wrong and harmful but stupidity is wrong and harmful as well. The explanation of the previous item applies here as well (but in reverse).
I trust that the implications of the above undeniable truths for society’s views on marriage, sexuality, etc need no further elaboration.
* The use of “gender neutral” words is strictly forbidden on this blog.
The “Rabbi” who fools nobody.
My daughter is at the age at which she learns all those little childhood ditties that somehow get handed down from the children of one generation to the next. For instance, the other day, I heard her singing to my son about how she could visually perceive London, France and certain normally hidden garments.
I remember that when I was a child we had our own Jewish-themed silly little parody songs. One of them involved a “rabbi” who bought a Christmas tree. To us six-year-olds, this was absolutely hilarious because it’s something that a real rabbi obviously wouldn’t do.
There are other things that it would be similarly ridiculous to suppose that a real rabbis would do. Examples include eating a cheeseburger, making a blessing before eating a cheeseburger, taking an oath to regularly eat cheeseburgers in future, or encouraging others to do similarly. Any “rabbi” who would do any of those things is obviously not a real rabbi.
You know who is also obviously not a real rabbi? Steve Greenberg, an “openly gay ‘orthodox’ Rabbi.” Recently, a credulous media reported that this “rabbi” performed a gay “wedding.”
People can argue from now until kingdom come about the proper attitude that the general society should have about non-marital sex in general and homosexual sex in particular. But nobody can seriously argue that the Jewish sources encourage or permit this kind of activity. Being an orthodox Rabbi means being loyal to the sources of our faith. The Jewish sources are completely unanimous and unequivocal about the prohibition of homosexual conduct. Steve pretends that they are not. Steve fools nobody who does not want to be fooled.
The Most Loathsome People in the World
“They rob the poor under the cover of law, forsooth, and we plunder the rich under the protection of our own courage”
–Pirate Captain Charles Bellamy
A Christian baker told two lesbians getting married in Iowa that her religious beliefs wouldn’t allow her to bake their wedding cake. That should be her right — to not bake them a cake because they’re lesbians or to not bake one for me because I don’t believe in god. (And again, I say that about the cake for the two ladies getting married as somebody who’s pro-gay marriage and a staunch supporter of gay rights.)
Who are the most loathsome people in the world?
Now, what should the unhappy couple have done in this situation? Finding a new baker comes to mind. I doubt that a search on the online yellow pages is too difficult, even for people who probably graduated with a “Womyn’s Studies” degree. Telling their friends that their proposed baker is a “big meanie-pants” also comes to mind as a possible response.
Or how about this one: live and let live. (more…)
