On the touching faith exhibited by some on this thread in the authorities not to abuse state power granted through the Terror laws, see this online diary by someone who probably doesn’t have any in the UK authorities anymore. Via Nicholas at Troppo.
So, basically the Police have decided that wearing a rain jacket, carrying a rucksack with a laptop inside, looking down at the steps while going in a tube station and checking your phone for messages just tick too many boxes on their checklist and make you a terrorist suspect. How many other people are not only wrongly detained but wrongly arrested every week in similar circumstances as myself? And how many of them are also computer and telecoms enthusiasts that fit the Police’s terrorist behavioural profile so well? I accept and understand spot checks can be useful, but profiling… this would be a joke if it didn’t affect many ‘innocent bystanders’.
The ‘touching faith’ with authorities could also be supplemented with this mix up.
Now imagine that was you, and you weren’t confused with some hick, but a ‘terror suspect.’ You’d better hope you had access to a lawyer to clear it up damn quickly.
Sheesh! That ain’t good either!
Or, reinforcing Lefty E’s point about police and administrative abuses in the Joh era, the time two special branch detectives visited my share house in 1987, with a warrant (under the Drugs Misuse Act which among other things had reverse onus of proof provisions) in someone else’s name nevertheless searched our place, strangely appeared to know our names and spent all their time asking us questions about politics rather than dope. We asked if we could phone a lawyer, and if we were going to be charged with anything, and were told that the Drugs Misuse Act enabled them to “detain” us with no requirement to lay charges for 7 hours or something, and it didn’t matter if we weren’t named in the warrant. They determined what probable cause was and it wasn’t judicially reviewable, unless they charged us. Which they had no intention of doing – the intent was to intimidate. These sorts of arbitrary laws succeed very well in creating a climate of fear.
This article by <a href="http://www.theage.com.au/news/opinion/when-at-war-words-can-kill/2005/10/31/1130720478184.html?page=2"Ted Lapkin, calling for a crackdown on “enemy propaganda” (which could include practically anything) is a serious worry, especially when you read this excerpt:
In World War II, Australia enacted emergency regulations that were far more restrictive than anything contemplated now. From arbitrary mass detention to absolute censorship of the press, the wartime strictures were incompatible with the normal principles of democracy. But as US Supreme Court Justice Robert Jackson famously remarked: “The Bill of Rights is not a suicide pact. In times of exigent peril, liberty must often be defended by less than liberal means.”
Anglospheric democracy has proved remarkably resilient and resistant to the pressures and temptations of rule by executive fiat. The histories of Australia, Britain and America all demonstrate that, as danger receded, emergency decrees were consigned to the dustbin of history.“
As comforting as Lapkin’s final sentence may appear, keep in mind Vice President Dick Cheney’s statement last year that the War On Terror “will take many years to see through” and, more recently, claiming that it may even “require decades of patient effort“.
Similarly, at the beginning of the Cold War, prominent US “conservative” William F. Buckley wrote “…we have to accept Big Government for the duration — for neither an offensive nor defensive war can be waged given our present government skills, except through the instrument of a totalitarian bureaucracy within our shores“.
You’d think this was a gigantic racket, or something.
…then they came for the eight year-old boys.
Eerch….did you have to do that, C.L.?
Mark said: Shorter RWDB line: offensive speech by pastors = free speech, offensive speech by Imams = throw away the key.
A false comparison. Sedition as defined by the draft legislation is incitement to use force or violence to overthrow the government. Religious vilification is saying that Mormanism is a fake religion and its fundamental text a transparent forgery. (To enunciate this self-evident truth is arguably a criminal offence in Victoria.)
I’m certainly more comfortable with the former being a crime than the latter.
Oh dear, it seems that police are capable of making mistakes.
We must therefore abolish the Police Department and repeal all laws.
Agree with Steve
Have the ‘Neo-Cons’ merely been bribed by giant corporations who benefit from giant government.
rob,
you can be tried for merely showing the thoughts of how the 11/9 terrorists intrepreted the koran!
my comments have been arrested and detained!!
Now you’re talking like the anarchist you claim to be, Evil.
Shorter CL: brutality in another country means we should curb our liberties at home.
now I cannot even comment on Germn polity.
Gadzooks what is happening!
CL, do some research before posting stuff. It’s not clear what those pictures are about. No one has been able to translate from Farsi the original
Take a look at some of the later comments – nothing to do with Islam or Sharia.
what is happening to the comments section??????
my comments are being repressed.
I DEMAND an apology or I am taking over!!!!
why are my comments being repressed?
Is LP merely a ASIO blogging device?
I would like to comment on Germany!!!!
I am being prevented from commenting obviously by ASIO who are using a blogging device!!
why is my ‘friend’ being prevented from commenting here.
He wants to comment on Germany but can’t not any other area.
What has Homer done?
Don’t be precious, Rob. I thought I’d provide a reminder of what a truly backward culture really looks like. I think the government’s security laws may be over the top but the kind of commentary they’re provoking is comparably hysterical. Commenters on the other (long) thread seem to tilting towards preposterous denialism – almost saying there’s no such thing as ‘terrorism.’
I find this comment hilarious:
If it was a punishment they wouldnÄôt put the soft thing under the boyÄôs arm.
And they provide a last meal of your choice at Changi right before they hang you.
Jason, your ‘research’ consisted of reading the thread. Very von Rankeian but the thread didn’t exist when I posted the link. Either way, you’ve demonstrated how some people interpret a pair of panties on a prisoner’s head to be ‘torture’, while going out of their way to apologise for genuine barbarianism. Even if they’re circus performers, the father would still be arrested in a civilised country.
I also find this post’s header to be somewhat offensive. This is the problem with the modus operandi of liberals in contemporary history: even when they’ve got a solid case, they ruin it themselves with exaggeration. Howard the overly-zealous is transformed into Howard the Exterminationist. This, as always, will be followed by the collapse of the liberal argument’s crdibility.
Iran’s president last week advocated something genuinely exterminationist. Naturally, liberals everywhere yawned.
I’m reading an old book by William barclay called Ethics in a permissive Society, and a chapter titled Situaution Ethics whihc is based on his response to a book of the same title by Joseph Fletcher. In it Fletcher states that bsically men do not want freedom.
‘He quotes the legend of the Grand Inquisitor in Dostievsky’s book, the Brothers Karamazov, which is a parable of the terrible burden of freedom. Jesus returns to the earth. The Inquisitor recognises him in the crowd, watching a religious procession, and immediately has him arrested. In the dead of the night the Inquisitor secretly goes to Jesuss. He tries to explain to Jesus that people do not want freedom. They want security. If you really love people, he arguees, you want to make them happy, not free. Freedom is danger, openness. They want law, not responsibility; they want the neurotic comfort of rules, not the spiritual open places of of decision-making. Christ, he says, must not start again all that old business about freedom and grace and commitment and responsibility. Let things be; let the church with its laws handle them. Will Jesus please go away.’
I think the fewer laws we have the better, so that we are actually free free to use our conscience. sadly there re groups which like the middle ages inquisitors, want law, rules and regulationss to control the masses. This forces freer nationss like Australia into producing added laws which counter the legalism of religiouss fanatics. it will always be an ethical dilemma for free thinking nations.
Homer: ten of your comments (including some under the names “jimmy the commenter” and “Sylvia”) were flagged as spam. I’ve let them through, and hopefully there won’t be any more problems.
Breaking – Terror threat immediate: PM
The Opposition Leader:
A door prize to the first conspiracist who says this news is a legislation-related stunt.
You missed the bit about not raising the level of terror alert, C.L.
I suspect it means they want to arrest some folks, not that someone is about to blow up the Opera House. Be interesting to know why they can’t do it now. Perhaps they don’t have evidence that would stand up in a court and need to detain someone.
I see the problem has been rectified, obviously part of the warning by Howard!
CL,
I think we agree Iran is an oppressive theocracy, with laws and standard of behaviour that seem medieval. What I fail to understand is what it has to do with the anti-terror laws in Australia? Merely seems like a frantic effort at distraction.
It’s just C.L.’s usual clash of civilisations theme, as far as I can tell, Steve. I also have no idea what relevance it has to the laws of Australia.
For clash of civilisations, see proposals for Victorian police to go easy on Muslim wife-beaters. By referencing life in an exterminationist culture, I was demonstrating the inappropriateness of the Howard-as-Himmler header.
Buckley was right, Steve, by the way. It took several decades and America won – despite people like Manning Clark denying the mass murder in Christ-like Lenin’s Soviet Union.
That wasn’t the intention of the title, C.L., and that’s a long straw to demonstrate relevance. Perhaps we could have an open “clash of civilisations” thread and you could just refer people to your examples posted there and get on with talking about what the thread is actually about?
My take from the earlier thread on the Victorian police is as follows:
Interestingly, the laws are introduced into Parliament a day after ASIO settled out of court for wrongly raiding the home of a Sydney man and his family. Perhaps C.L. would think, given his Victorian police thing, that federal agents with drawn weapons refusing to allow the man’s wife to dress in modest clothing is showing appropriate cultural insensitivity.
And, of course, the media couldn’t have reported on this case if the proposed laws had been in force, according to the couple’s lawyer.
So, many more such incidents, no public scrutiny? Collateral damage in the clash of civilisations, C.L.?
I think I read somewhere Mark that the idea is to be ‘propylactic’, or at least I think that’s the term. In other words to stop it happening, whatever it is, rather than arresting suspects afterwards. I don’t think the current laws allow for it, as you said. But not sure. I did read this morning that there were some home grown terrorists that the authorities were worried about. (SMH)
Currently, Mindy, ASIO are able to detain people for 7 days without charge, if I remember rightly. Presumably that’s time enough to gather evidence if they have strong intelligence to suggest these people are about to do something. I don’t see how extending the time period and removing safeguards would materially increase our safety in this regard.
The Koran instructs men to beat their wives. If they do so, they should be jailed. Where are the feminists on this?
robert obviously Jimmy was me but Sylvia was not.
I thought ASIO were launching an attack on me because of sins committed some thirty years back
Lordy, C.L. – and it wasn’t condoned by Christian culture until recently? No doubt the feminists are strongly opposed.
I know your constant refrain is that by pointing out that the “War on Terror” is overblown and politicised, and that our civil liberties are under attack, and that communal integration is harmed by promoting alienation, Lefties all defend eveything that’s bad about Islam. Well, actually, we don’t. And I’m sure feminists oppose this – that’s if your interpretation is correct – one would want to look at the commentaries and legal tradition – and your source gives no particular confidence in its understanding of the Qu’ran and Islamic tradition. But if it’s a cultural practice, no doubt all right minded people would oppose it, just as they would oppose domestic violence from people in this country of any faith or ethnicity.
It’s a crap argument, my friend.
Well said, Mark. Cases like this show the importance of sound cultural sensitivities, policies and practices; lest we just stop them at our borders/ship them back to where they came from. CL’s ‘shock and awe’ rhetoric only lends support to those who seek the latter.
Homer, I wouldn’t take it personally. My comments are/were being picked up by Akismet too.
“Interestingly, the laws are introduced into Parliament a day after ASIO settled out of court for wrongly raiding the home of a Sydney man and his family.”
Which goes to show that ASIO are not into ‘disappearing’ people or racing them off to Howard’s Gulags, and they have been agreeably compensated for the error. There is no reason to expect this policy to change in future, nor that authorities’ activities will ever be error free.
There is, observa – it’ll be impossible to report on such bungles.
Mark, from the Herald letters section today:
Nice to know, dk.au!
It’s amusing dragging liberals kicking and screaming back to their former beliefs! As your header’s famous words teach, Mark, silence is consent. You say the left doesn’t support the inherently dangerous teachings of Islam.
Then say so! Often!
I don’t support the secretive, over-the-top measures in the new legislation. I’ve said/written so for several weeks. But the attempt to trivialise the risk of terrorism – as with your comment yesterday about how we’re in the South seas, a long way from, I dunno, ‘the world’ (or something – can’t remember) – is absurd. As I always say, when the ‘left’ has an argument they destroy it themselves by hysterical exaggeration.
Another example has been afforded by the increasingly despicable Kevin Rudd who has been running around this week saying the AWB’s Oil-for-Food drama somehow means the government allowed 300 million dollars to get into the hands of terrorists. Labor, of course, believes – as a matter of logic – that Saddam Hussein is the lawful president of Iraq and should be restored to power. Illegal war, illegal arrest etc etc. And so the party that once sought funding from Saddam Hussein implies John Howard has funded terrorism – through the AWB’s O.F.F contracts. They also wanted to withdraw troops when even the UN said this would have contributed to a sense of crisis that would have cost many lives. Rudd: despicable.
This is the kind of insanity that drives people away from the sounder arguments of the ‘left’ in matters of national security.
I still believe, as I’ve argued all along, that more time should have been devoted to this legislation, that it should not repudiate Australian common law in any way, that it should not be built on premises redolent of James Bond scenarios and that impartial and widely respected figures from the judiciary and both sides of politics should have been brought in to review the preliminary legal processes and the eventual drafting. Then it should be reviewed during each parliament.
I note that the ASIO raid you mention above went badly – like a thousand conventional police operations and false arrests every year. I also note that it was dealt with in court and the complainants have been compensated. The woman concerned was dressed. It appears she wasn’t given time to cover in an Islamic fashion the body that her husband (and culture) demand she covers – contrary to Australian culture.
Conversely, C.L., I believe that the right hyperbolise and exaggerate the dangers of terrorism. My belief that the danger is low in Australia is not an ideological but a pragmatic one.
So you do think that suspects have to be dressed according to Australian culture when they’re raided? Just stop and think for a bit. I know you harp constantly on your belief that Islamic women are forced to dress as they do – but many choose to – and there are feminist justifications for it, as you must know.
I’ve also noted that you’ve introduced the demand “you must say so frequently” which is reminiscent of the sillier debating points of tim Blair’s acolytes – “why doesn’t the Left constantly post on this or that – it means that they support Saddam/the Devil/Mad Mark Latham?”…
I look forward to a series of posts on why daughters and wives of members of certain Protestant sects are “forced” to dress in headscarves and modest dresses/skirts, and how contrary to human rights this is. And denunciations of Sydney Anglicans for their headship doctrine.
Or not.
I don’t believe that Saddam Hussein is President of Iraq according to international law.
C.L., I’ll take that prize, as long as I can name it. How about the Howard/Reith/Vanstone/Ruddock “There were illegal children of mass destruction thrown in the water” trophy?
There’s another major problem with insufficiently accountable executive power – it not only leads to corruption and abuse (inexorable law in my view – I challenge anyone to find a single exception), but, perhaps of more interest to the state-o-phile Right, lack of accountability also tends to lead directly to incompetence. Errors are forgivable, yes, but only if and when they are reviewable, from which policy and practice lessons are then drawn.
Otherwise, its just a licence to stuff-up.
“Jason, your ‘researchÄô consisted of reading the thread. Very von Rankeian but the thread didnÄôt exist when I posted the link. Either way, youÄôve demonstrated how some people interpret a pair of panties on a prisonerÄôs head to be ‘tortureÄô, while going out of their way to apologise for genuine barbarianism.”
CL, this is a diversion from the main thread (your modus operandi, I know) but I must reply
1) I detest sharia law. I wouldn’t want to live under it. I wouldn’t want anyone to live under it. But there’s enough wrong with it without making up absolutely ridiculous stories about 8 year olds being amputated by having a truck driven over their arm.
2) Lots of these horrid things happen not just under Islamic societies e.g. child prostitution, acceptance of domestic abuse, etc so your original link was a diversion. Your problem is with pre-modern societies or societies which have not evolved to reap all the fruits of modernity we take so for granted. And BTW the Iranians aren’t even Arab. They’re the original Aryans.
You can’t fight totalitarianism with totalitarianism, CL. And you can’t fight it with treason, either. More specifically, the US continually, even after the US$120 billion funnelled to the tyrant Stalin under the Lend Lease Act, subsidised, credited, technology transferred and bankrolled the Soviet Union right through to the 1980s. And when they weren’t committing national suicide directly, they were doing it indirectly through the World Bank, sending sub-market loans to Communist satellites such as Romania and Ethiopia. And that’s to say nothing of the US Government’s treasonous conduct during the Vietnam War, when they wilfully left North Vietnam’s ports wide open (allowing Soviet supplies to arrive without check), and were effectively underwriting their own ruin by subsidising the Soviet Union.
In other words, they actually prolonged totalitarianism by funding it (and thereby conveniently creating the need for a gigantic military-industrial complex), when a more prudent course of action would have been to disengage from foreign entanglements, cut the Soviets loose financially and diplomatically, and purge the US Government of Communist sympathisers.
“….and purge the US Government of Communist sympathisers.”
McCarthy tried to do that. Few thanks he got!
C.L. – squaemish, not precious.
The difference is that in several Islamic societies such abuses are sanctioned by a not unreasonable reading of Muhammed’s words and deeds. For the West, the analagous figure in a discussion of Islam would be Jesus Christ. By all means give equal attention to his violent precepts against women.
Knock yourself out.
Who said the Iranians were Arabs? WTF?
I’ve contributed extensively to the topic, Jason. (This accusation is becoming a conventional and unconvincing kind of polemical escapism).
As it happens, you have not.
Steve, I direct you to my comment above:
Your brief history of America and the USSR is just silly but this contradiction seems, well, please exploin:
You canÄôt fight totalitarianism with totalitarianism…
Followed by:
…purge the US Government of Communist sympathisers.
What, like in a House un-American Activities Committee you mean?
A bit Rudduckian, surely.
“IÄôve contributed extensively to the topic, Jason. (This accusation is becoming a conventional and unconvincing kind of polemical escapism).
As it happens, you have not”
well buggery, CL.
I’ve only had the opportunity to check into LP three times today.
1) Once to click on your spurious link and find out it’s some hoax about amputation by truck, and point that out.
2) A second time to have to defend myself against charges of condoning barbarism because I happened to point that out
3) And now again to respond to this.
Is this your new strategy? Derailing and putting people on the defensive through spurious links as a means of fending off contenders?
Rudduckian? What a horrible, raspy word but perfect for its intention.
Shorter Jason: three visits, no contributions to the topic.
Steve could just as easily be referring to the AWB and Saddam Hussein!
Rob:
What are you suggesting, Rob? That a notoriously alcoholic and ethically bankrupt Senator looking for an issue to build his power and ensure his re-election – detested by Eisenhower as well as most Democrats – is setting some sort of positive example?
Mark: can we have a moratorium on these shorter xxx comments. Not having a go at you specifically CL but they are really starting to annoy me. If you don’t have a coherent argument then shut up. Don’t belittle others because you don’t like what they say. (rant finished now, thank you)
Err… that’s one for another debate and another time, Mark. Shouldn’t have raised it.
Ok, Rob.
Mindy, I think it’s up to commenters to regulate themselves. The absence of an argument sends its own message as well.
Ok.
McCarthy was actually admired by JFK, and was described by him as a “great American patriot”. And of course, McCarthy was at least partially vindicated in 1995 following the release of VENONA files, showing that over 300 hard-core committed Communists, including numerous government officials, were working for Soviet espionage, including many of those named by McCarthy.
The problem is not that McCarthyism was incorrect in spirit – just that McCarthy himself was the wrong McCarthyist. Exposing the International Communist Conspiracy requires sane and dedicated leaders, such as me!
“…notoriously alcoholic and ethically bankrupt Senator”. Leave Teddy Kennedy out of this!
Steve, I couldn’t have put it better myself. Venona also nailed the atomic spies, and there are interesting reflections of Soviet espionage in Australia as well.
I thought we weren’t going to discuss McCarthy, Rob. The support of JFK probably had more to do with the fact that brother RFK had worked for McCarthy (before breaking with him) and JFK’s heavily Catholic McCarthy supporting constituency, than the gentleman’s merits.
I was just responding to Steve, couldn’t resist, sorry.
Yes, let’s not discuss McCarthy. Except as an excuse to mention the related new George Clooney film Goodnight and Good Luck with the fab David Strathairn as Edward R Murrow and the Senator from Wisconsin as himself. Can’t wait.
Might I suggest C.L. start a blog where he can digress to his heart’s content?
What’s that …?
Well why is he wasting our time here? Is it because nobody reads his blog
How did a post about the misuse of “anti-terrorism powers” in the UK become an argument about whether or not “the Left” condones all Islamic practices?
CL not only was that link to a set of photos a total diversion from the topic of the post, but it was also an extremely successful one.
That’s a shame really, because the topic itself is a really interesting, relevant and concerning one.
How do we limit we limit the ability of the police to misuse their powers (or “make mistakes” as some put it), without “disbanding the police department”?
Are we so concerned about the threat of terrorism that we are willing to give up more civil rights, and put up with more incidences of police intimidation, brutality and harrassment?
Will giving up more civil rights actually make us any safer? Has anyone actually proven that it will?
Surely maintaining (or, perhaps, demanding) a high level of transparancy and accountaibility within the police force will not increase terrorism. Surely we have already decided as a society that we are willing to strike the balance on the side of protecting the innocence from the State (hence why we have the rule of innocent until proven guilty).
We have also seem the negative impacts on Australians in the past when parliament has introduced ‘Emergency Powers”, why would we want to replicate these experiences?
Roper: So now youÄôd give the Devil benefit of law!
More: Yes. What would you do? Cut a great road through the law to get after the Devil?
Roper: IÄôd cut down every law in England to do that!
More: Oh? And when the last law was down, and the Devil turned round on you — where would you hide, Roper, the laws all being flat? This countryÄôs planted thick with laws from coast to coast — manÄôs laws, not GodÄôs — and if you cut them down — and youÄôre just the man to do it — dÄôyou really think you could stand upright in the winds that would blow then? Yes, IÄôd give the Devil benefit of law, for my own safetyÄôs sake.
- A Man For All Seasons, Robert Bolt.
C.L.!
Nice quote Nabakov! I’ll have to remember that one.
Mark: can we have a moratorium on these shorter xxx comments. Not having a go at you specifically CL but they are really starting to annoy me.
Agreed, Mindy. What started with Hendo has become an epidemic of literary laziness. Ban them, Mark.
(Along with all criticism of Bobby Kennedy, if you please;)).
Cristy, I’ve discussed the substantive issue and I essentially agree with the liberal critique. Furthermore, I’ve actually made suggestions about how this process could have been improved and I really feel strongly about those ideas.
An irony in all this is that if a terror attack had occurred six months ago, the government’s liberal critics (and the lunar left) would be asking why the government hadn’t done somethin’. As an example of this kind of disgraceful opportunism, see Kevin Rudd. He’s trying to fit up Alexander Downer for funding the Iraqi insurgency via the Wheat Board. And remember all those ‘what did the government know and when did it know it’ questions after Bali I? The government obviously felt it had to act decisively in the national interest.
I think their consultative process, the basis for some of their concerns and several of their proposed measures are questionable. Two final points: the trivialisation of the terror threat and of a national government’s responsibility to re-formulate security laws is far more questionable, indeed reckless. Second, Labor is free to get itself elected to office and change the laws in approximately 22 months’ time. Not exactly ‘nothing to see here’ but not exactly ‘zieg heil!’ either.
Is it because nobody reads his blog?
Close enough, Zoot. At the mo, I have to complete a project for lovely money. But amongst the many thousands of SantaSoc blogs in the world, mine was always – *sob* – up there with the best.
The point about all of this – when I bring up the treason of the US government and McCarthy’s role in exposing it – is that the treason is still continuing to this very day. The US Government is currently being shown yet again to be a nest of traitors, who are either working for a foreign power, or collaborating with foreign espionage agents to subvert American intelligence.
And don’t get me started on the role of the British and German governments in setting up and funding neo-nazi parties to ferment chaos and create the pretext for a crackdown on civil liberties!
I’m just saying that we should be aware of all these layers of subterfuge, even if the facts don’t fit into an ideological straitjacket…
Mark, can you moderate me?
It’s a great blog, zoot – the best-written weblog in Oz.
Done, Steve. Too many links!
What happened to the comments threads, though, C.L.?
And how many Santa Soc blogs are there exactly?
Steve, don’t you mean ‘the treason of US government officials….’
Rob – it was actually both. Soviet-sympathising US Government officials were handing over secrets to the Soviets, and the US Government (along with American industrialists such as Armand Hammer who “extended earlier entrepreneurial ventures with a successful business importing from and exporting pharmaceuticals to the newly-formed Soviet Union. He moved to the USSR in the 1920s to oversee these operations, especially his large business manufacturing and exporting inexpensive pencils” – so much for a “workers’ revolution”!) itself was allowing aid, technology assistance, investment and sub-market loans to the cause of international communism.
Threads still exist in HaloLand, Mark. With Blogger/Halo, however, one can’t turn off specific post threads but only all of them. (Unless I’m technically mistaken). I decided to turn them off during the current hiatus.
How many SantaSoc blogs? Um…
I don’t accept that I derail threads, by the way.
Pluto Has Three Moons, Hubble Images Show.
Say, this thread was originally about how big business got into bed with western governments to spread communism, right?
Its good to see mark b. come out for traditional civil liberties and against the new fashion for police authorities. I am definitely on the side of the Wets in this issue – this also happens to be the conservative side.
I wonder, did mark b. support Drew Fraser’s right to free academic expression and the general principle of protecting the publication of unpopular views? Or did he cheer whilst the authoritarian jack boot came down?
Those interested in his answer to this burning question can see it here and here.
Gotta love blogs.
Shorter this thread [sorry, Mindy]: kick off with the credulous CL getting snookered by dodgy photos, followed by Helicopter Steve kicking off a rant about traitors and the Red Menace, followed by the CL-ash of Civilisations, again, more Helo Steve ranting and all capped off with the Jackerstrocchi whinging, again, about the terrible injustice of racists not getting their garbage published in academic journals. Oh, and Rob led the cheers. Bring it on!
What’s MY valuable contribution, I hear you ask? This: what about the computer nerds, huh? Who’s gonna stand up for those poor buggers?
Thanks, Fyodor, for bringing the discussion back on topic.
I can just see a blogger in an anorak in summer oblivious to what’s around him heading for the train station and typing furious defences of Drew Fraser on his PDA getting pinged by the cops as a likely bomber…
Just envisagin…
And, Jack, the issues with McConvill/Fraser were academic freedom (not the same as freedom of speech) and academic standards. You seem to forget freedom of speech implies responsbility.
I love threads going on a hard drive off topic floppy around with little memory.
at least it shows the blog hasn’t been invaded by terrorists like it was yesterday
Shorter C.L: It’s okay that we get punched in the head twice a day in Australia, because in Iran they get punched in the head ten times a day.
And how dare Fyodor bring this thread back on topic! The hide of the man!
Homer,
your comments were obviously being prophylactically blocked to stop your puns causing crimes against humanity.
Unfortunately Jack doesn’t have a leg to stand on even though he could have. He spent the entire Fraser thread conceding that the existence of the Vilification Act wasn’t in itself responsible for Fraser’s failure to get published, but that the university just wanted an excuse not to publish him. Nothing to do with *government* supression of free speech, Jack, which is the sole concern of us classical liberals as long as the private market has sufficient other avenues for expression.
Fyodor says: November 3rd, 2005 at 8:31 am
No, I am not all that pertrubed by the low level injustice meted out to Fraser. There are a zillion other worse injustices to get outraged by.
I am shocked by the hypocrisy of “small ‘l’ liberal” Wets, and their fellow travellers and camp-followers, in the Drew Fraser brouha. The Wets claim to be supporters of civil liberty but went silent, or joined the ideological and commercial authoritarians, in shutting down academic debate.
This shows that the Wets purported committment to freedom is a sham put on by them to prettify themselves in the media’s moral vanity mirrors. Which is what Tom Wolfe and the present commenter have maintained from the beginning.
Hypocrisy, thy name is “Fyodor the Wet”.
Funnier Jack Strocchi: there are a zillion worse injustices to get outraged by, but I choose to get outraged – nay, monomanically fixated – by the Deakin Law Review not publishing the rantings of some racist blowhard, despite the fact that the moonbat got himself published in a newspaper and teh internets. Tom Wolfe agrees with me. I distinctly remember a reference to Wettist perfidy in “From Bauhaus to Our House”, that brilliant but all-too tragically short ode to the primacy of Western civilisation and the debilitating effects on moral fibre of excessive wetness. Hypocrisy, thy name means something in Greek.
Mark says: November 3rd, 2005 at 10:04 am
Correct. I have never argued that Fraser’s general civil liberty was curtailed. It wasnt. I have argued that his academic liberty was curtailed. It was.
Fraser’s academic freedom was curtailed by commercial and ideological authoritarians. The ethical question is whether an academic’s autonomy to publish and teach is a right that protects him from the authorities or a privilege that can be revoked at the discretion of university authorities.
Obviously the Wets have come down on the side of university authorities against academic autonomies. They can justify this on grounds of propriety, equity, responsibility, commerciality, ideology – you name it. But not on grounds of liberty.
Thats why I condemn the Wets as hypocrites towards freedom in the Fraser case. Because they claim liberty to be their priority value but they ignored it when it came to the crunch.
No it doesn’t. Individual freedom does not imply social responsibity from the agent, except reciprocal respect for the like freedom of law-abiding others. (The “clear and present danger” rule excepting.) Have we forgotten Milton, Voltaire, Mill already?
It is institutional accountability that implies individual responsibilty. Institutional accountabiity and individual liberty are both good things, but they are not the same things.
I argue that Fraser was accountable to the university and breached no legal statutes or ethical rules in his professional work. He was shut down by the authorities for political (and commercial) reasons.
The Wets argue that Fraser was irresponsible and incompetent in his professional work and deserved to be shut down. Maybe, but we have seen what a dangerous principle this is – most academic Wets would lose their jobs if it was applied accross the board.
Fraser’s academic work fell below good scientific standards. But, as I argued repeatedly, the majority of academic work in the humanities now falls below good scientific standards. Are we, as thorough going professionals, now going to sack all the commie-symps, marxists, post-modernists, queer theorists, gender studies etc in the Australian humanities academy? Not bloody likely.
I say that the authorities should err on the side of academic autonomy for professionally inept academics, whether Cultural Wets or Cultural Dries. However the Wets argue that we should err on the side of university authority.
This is relevant to the anti-terror laws because I am suspicious of the libertarian Wets, who claim to be on the side of liberalism but seem to use this as a Trojan Horse to smuggle in their beloved multiculturalism.
Hypocrisy, thy name is Wet.
Longer, and much more serious Jack Strocchi, but summarised: I am not all that pertrubed by the low level injustice meted out to Fraser. I just go on and on and on and on about it because it’s really quite unimportant. Freedom is all about getting academic journals to publish your hateful garbage. Wet academics also write garbage, so they’re all hypocrites. The Wets are opposed to draconian “anti-terror” laws because they’re MultiCulti smugglers. Hippopotamus, thy name is flogging a wet horse. Sort of – it’s the vibe.
Jason Soon says: November 3rd, 2005 at 10:26 am
Ahh, so “classical liberals” are only concerned with political suppression of free speech? That would come as news to classical liberals like Milton, Voltaire and Mill who were greatly concerned with clerical and tribal suppression of free speech. (Obvious modern day parallels to the new politically correct clerisy.)
This is the ideological skeleton hiding in the closet of modern day “libertarians”. They claim to be concerned with individual liberty. But when it boils down to it they just want to protect the property rights of the powers that be. ie corporal property.
The Fraser case is a perfect example of how the Wets will sacrifice a broad general principle (academic liberty) in pursuit of partisan commercial and ideological interest. Likewise the anti-terror laws are a good example of how the Hawks will sacrifice a broad general principle (civil liberty) in pursuit of a partisan political advantage.
The anti-terror Hawks and the anti-Fraser Wets have a lot in common – sacrificing liberty they claim to protect for the sake of power.
It is the Wets who are on trial here. I see that Pr Fukuyama has joined the chorus of partially reconstructed Wets who are now having second thoughts about multiculturalism. Civitas, a sort of UK version of the Brookings Institute, has also rejected the hard-core version of multiculturalism. Its great fun to see a favourite Wet program getting a hiding…from Wets mugged by 7/7 reality.
I am simply amazed at the ability of this blog’s resident Wets to stick their heads in the sand about the unravelling of the multicultural racket. And the inconsistency of political correctness with Open Society liberalism.
They seem to be only concerned about certain forms of freedom when critics threaten multicultural statism (Phil Gomes, Fyodor and mark b.) or university capitalism (Jason Soon). They are oblivious to the way that political correct/economic rationalist agencies constrain academic freedom. And they remain silent about the multicultural (and indigenous) bureaucratic rackets that consolidate the power of ethnic patriarchs and rogue males to visit misery and oppression on womenfolk and youngsters.
They should visit some actual and existing ethnic communities in outer-suburban West, and indigenous outstations in the outback Bush, to see how this works in practice. Or certain no-go zones in the EU and US. I have and its not pretty. Who speaks for the freedom of women and children who must suffer under the constant lash of pre-modern tribal customs locked in urban ghettos and rural out stations? Not the Wets, apparently.
Are the Wets fair dinkum about standing up for institutional protections for individual freedom? Or do they just want to help their friends (bureaucratic multiculturalists) and hurt their foes (academic conservatives)?
The latter is the vibe I am getting.
Yes Jack
It’s all about priorities.
However influential you think universities might be, only governments have the legalised power to coerce and detain.
And BTW I spent my teenage and university years in the outer-suburban West. Nice place, young families and old timers getting along. A bit too quiet and boring for my tastes. Nothing like Beirut, you’ll be surprised to here.
PPS for a ‘man of the people’ you sure like putting down the western suburbs a lot, don’t you, Jack?
If Jack wants to pay for a plane trip and accommodation for me to Sydney, I’ll happily check out the Western suburbs…
Jason Soon says: November 3rd, 2005 at 12:30 pm
Quite the opposite. I drive Holden’s and Fords do work out West.
The Westies, heartland of the Labor movement, have always been opposed to economic rationalist types of class-divison, a pov which I have much sympathy for. Many of the Westies also opposed to politically correct multiculturalism, including the majority of ethnics who just want to settle in and get ahead.
That is why the Westies opposed Hewson’s rehashed New Rightism in 1993 and Keating’s warmed over New Leftism in 1996.
Multiculturalism (ie clan seperation) and Economic Rationalism (ie class division) are two sides of the same coin. It is the New Racketeering whereby cultural and financial elites put one over the populus by setting groups apart so they can divide up the spoils. It is immoral.
“The Westies, heartland of the Labor movement, have always been opposed to economic rationalist types of class-divison, a”
Wrong again, Jack. Your idea of the West is 20 years or so out of date. The West is where Latham’s so-called aspirational classes are based. While these people may not be principled economic liberals, they’ve mostly benefited from the economic rationalist policies instigated by Hawke and by and large, they’re aware of this.
* penny drops *
Oh, I get it. Because the DLR refused to publish some racist tripe written by an unhinged academic, multiculturalism is dividing the nation. The illogic is powerful and compelling.
Holdens and Fords? I thought all true-blue Aussies were meant to take sides?
Jack doesn’t like to take sides. It’s why he drives in the middle of the road.
Joh Bjelke-Petersen used to warn against the injuries often inflicted by straddling a fence!
Jason Soon says: November 3rd, 2005 at 12:25 pm
Its revealing that the new standard for success in multicultural settlement is “Not Beirut”. What happened to the glories of “Oh Canada”? I guess they are nothing to write home about.
The reality is that Western Sydney suffers a much higher crime rate and social pathology than would be predicted by citizens SES (There is quite alot of money out West, double garages, smart cars, inflated property prices). These bads are the result of poor immigrant selection and settlement.
So far we have not yet got to the Bronx and Beirut, cross fingers. (Crime rates have gone down in the past few years, as the Federal government has tightened up immigration laws and the State governments have toughened up on law enforcement. But Australia still has one of the worst crime vicitimization rates in the OECD.)
Police have been warning of the potential havoc of ethnic crime gangs for years. But they were shut up by guess who…the politically correct ethnic lobby. The SMH 25 JAN 2004 reports
The Wets seem to think that we need to replay the Balkan or Levantine experience before rasing the alarm bells. And now, since 2001, we have the added threat of sectarian terrorism to the woes that poor immigrant selection and settlement can bring in tow.
Wouldn’t it be a good idea to stop the rot first? Try to salvage multiracial nationalism from the doomed wreck of multicultural segregationism?
Paradoxically, most residents consider the West a safe enough place to live. It is, providing one keeps ones nose clean.
And no vested social interest would ever stoop to enlisting a hired-gun lawyer to do its dirty work, eh? Dont be so naive.
Fyodor says: November 3rd, 2005 at 1:37 pm
No, Fyodor does not get it. [sighs as if patiently explaining things to a particularly dim-witted child]. Both political correctness and multiculturalism are vices of the Wets, whether New Left or New Right. But they are not the same vices.
University authorities, either as political correctors (Cultural Wets) or economic rationalists (Economic Dries) have conspired to curb campus freedom of expression eg Fraser and Abelson. This is not dividing the nation, it is chilling free speech and dumbing down the academy.
This deformation is recognised accross the ideological board, by both Right and Left. Wets should be against this, but we know what they stand for and it aint freedom.
Yes, “multiculturalism is dividing the nation”. Since 7/7 the deafening sound of multiple pennies dropping amongs former Wets should by now have reached even Fyodor’s cloth ears.
The underlying logic unifying these tendencies is indeed “powerful and compelling”.
It is really amazing that Fyodor is so obtuse about commonplace facts and basic theories of social organization. This despite my Sisyphean efforts to bring him up to speed. I should not blame myself.
* sighs, as if enjoying the solypsistic rantings of a monomanic boor *
Kinda more concise and entertaining Jack Strocchi: multiculturalism in Sydney’s West causes the whole of Australia to have a higher rate of crime victimisation. Try as I might I just can’t seem to convince Fyodor the Wet – or anyone, really – that the DLR’s decision not to publish racist bilge constitutes a violation of academic freedom. This is probably because I don’t understand the difference between free speech and free publishing. Or between the rantings of a bigot and academic discourse. I’m obtuse that way. I also don’t quite “get” the story of Sisyphus, which is the essence of my problem, when you get down to it.
Fyodor says: November 3rd, 2005 at 4:09 pm
Academic freedom means the academic is free to publish on matters of interest without fear or favour from the authorities, providing authorised journals are happy with the standard. It is a tradition (right or privilege, you make the call) in Western universities that dates back to the Middle Ages. Evidently the tradition is waning in the age of political correctors and economic rationalists.
In the fifties Menzies understood that it would be a “violation of academic freedom” for authorities to constrain communist from publishing much worse Leninist bilge on campus.
This was at a time when Australia was waging a Hot War with two communist powers. And a Cold War with the major communist powers and its fellow travellers.
Yet Fyodor, et al Wets, have tolerated, encouraged and even participated in the publication of “culturalist” bilge which bears some measure of blame for modern political misfortunes. They even believe some of this stuff, much to the merriment of conservative critics. See Sokal Hoax.
It just goes to show the degeneration of the defenders of the Open Society, from “realistic liberals” to “ritualistic libertarians”.
Thank you Fyodor and Jack, you have just provided me with many a laugh!
Problem is; I’m not so sure that Jack was jocking…
“The Wets” – what a ridiculous category!
Well Jack’s the blogosphere’s Wetfinder-General, ceaselessly patrolling threads to sniff out heretics like you Cristy.
Cristy, the hypothesis that the JackerstrocchiѢ is a commenting bot gone awry is yet to be disproven.
In fact, we need a dedicated Wet blogger. Come on someone, Im doing my bit for right-wing fantasy categories. Time to ante up.
I know Fydrich flirts with such a character… but we need a regular wet viewpoint for Jack.
Im thinking ‘Luvvie DeLuge’; or ‘Always Wet’ (erm… hang on, no); or just plain ‘Culturalist Wet’…. Hmmm?
Rising Damp – A wet’s effort to undermine the foundation of Caucasoid Judeo Christian Civillisation.
How do I get myself one of those little picture thingies?
Cristy says: November 3rd, 2005 at 10:25 pm
Google reveals 45,700 page hits for the classification “Wets + liberal”. This connatation is synonymous with the clumsy “small ‘l’ liberal” phrase that used to be used to desrcribe these people.
Obviously you are missing more than just my sense of humour.
I actually don’t mind Wets. They are nice people. Some of my best friends are Wets.
They used to confine themselves to promoting good causes, doing good works and making boring speeches about civil rights. Worthy-but-dull stuff of the Ian McPhee type.
However in the past generation they have gotten heavily involved into two areas – politics and “the Yartz” – which they had should have just skimmed once over, once lightly. Since then the general populus have come to mistrust the idea of a legal free-for-all and moral licence for the Wets “clients”. And the Wets-dominated “Yartz” (see MOCA) is now a standing joke amongst persons who have a dim recollection of past glories.
So well done Wets of all parties. They have managed within the space of a generation to make the noble term “liberal” on the nose with decent people.They have also made the careers of the two greatest English language satirists: Tom Wolfe and Barry Humphries.
And, looking at current conservative trends, it appears that the joke is on them.
Shorter (about 3′, NOT 3″) Jack Strocchi: curses the Wetses! They’re everywhere! I hates them! No, I loves Wets! Wets are my friends! No, I hates Wets!
Auntie Jack, DLR made a commercial decision not to publish Fraser’s bilge. No regulatory authority stopped them. Before you rejoinder with irrelevant waffle about the threat of litigation, academic discussion is protected under the Victorian Racial and Religious Tolerance Act 2001.
The article was rubbish and did not deserve to be published by any academic journal. Get over it, Gollum.
Oh, and everyone misses your sense of humour. We’ve searched everywhere and it seems to be irretrievably lost, if it ever existed.
Fyodor … November 4th, 2005 at 8:25 am says:
No, Fyodor is wrong on the facts or making things up again. The “regulatory authority” that stopped DLR and Fraser was Deakin University administration.
Deakin University admin ordered DLR to scrap Fraser’s article based on a desire to avoide legislative and adjudicative sanction. Of course the drive to maintain (commercial) money-making and (ideological) power-mongering rackets was behind this, as is so often the case with the “pricipled stands” made by New Right and New Left Wets.
Here are the facts as reported by the Wets-beloved ABC:
Fyodor, when he lapses into plain language, makes a much easier target. However he might try telling the truth occasionally. Its easier to remember than lies.
Shorter Jack Strocchi: “rejoinder with irrelevant waffle about the threat of litigation”. Universities should subject themselves to litigation by publishing racist garbage that does not qualify as academic discussion.
Nice try, Auntie Jack. Still looking for holes to fall into?
Can someone come and put Jack Strocchi and Fyodor away and in the same cell!
Steve – you can register a gravatar (the picture thingie) by following the link at the bottom of the comments box.
I love that Jack is still smarting over a university administration’s decision not to publish a paper, months after it happened and after the rotten thing was published by John Ray to universal amusement and disgust. As for this:
Presumably ‘authorised journals’ which don’t seem to have any peer review standards whatsoever, for instance the DLR, should be constantly protected by their host universities unconditionally?
Will His Dryness also condemn the Department of Education’s encroachment into the procedures of deciding Australian Research Council grants, vetoing ones not liked by the office of Brendan Nelson MP—or does that constitute a legitimate evaporative tactic against cultural studies, Auslit and bolshie history Wets?
…
I seem to have followed others quite off topic. Sorry about that, I blame the fast-moving current in this thoroughly Wet thread.
I think Jack’s so proud and exciting by his little “Wet/Dry” matrix that he really can’t see the world any other way now.
“Oh, Agent Strocchi, do you think you can dissect me with this blunt little tool?”
And hereÄôs a correctly ascribed Goethe quote for you.
“Grau, teurer Freund ist alle Theorie, und Grun des Lebens goldner Baum.”
Well that was a disappointment.
I know … was expecting nude Kate pool action or something….
and there’s Nabs in a towel speaking German.
Ja wirklich, Mensch. Sehr enttäuschend РKate ist am heißesten.
You were expecting maybe a little circus action?
anything’s better than Jackerstrocchi in a Greek toga declaiming on Judaeo-Christian-Italic mores as rediscovered by Dr Charles Murray
Test
Vielleicht nicht teurer Freund, aber Tierfreund!
I think that must be doubledeutsch!
Das Spiel kommt nicht zu ende als die dicke Frau hat nicht gesang.
(Richard Wagner at the premiere of Die Walkure)
Wow! These Gravatars are retrospective. How cool!
The Saddam taken, Steve? Still, yours is cool!
Yes, well, my body count is sitting on a measley 0.1% of Saddam’s – still, we all know who is more deserving of the wrath of the ICC, right, wbb?
Kim ist am heißesten.
It has to be said…
Is this the Missy Higgins thread?
I was waiting for the little black helicopter, Steve.
.. or the Victor Jara Stadium
I see the children have been at play whilst Daddy is away. I come back from weekend work and see Fyodor, Nabokov and Jason Soon – our illustrious defenders of liberty – make a disgusting mess of the West’s traditional notion of academic freedom.
Now they tell us that academic freedom really means degree-milling universities, ethnic lobbying quangoes and ambuance-chasing lawyers can join forces in censoring unpalatable opinions on campus. Glad that this ancient tradition has finally “been sorted”, as the Kray Brothers might say.
Next they will be telling us all that “Arbeit Macht Frei”.
Meanwhile – on thread and back in the real world – is the the news that Paris is burning courtesy of some nameless mob. Since the aforementioned commenters have proved that only hate mongerers like John Howard prevent certain ethnic cultures from diversifying happily into Open Societies our commenters must agree that Paris is actually as happy as a lark in spring. Nothing to see here, folks. Just keep moving.
I get tired finding new ways of saying “I told you so” on this issue. So I will let Robert Conquest’s traditional valedictory to the deluded Wets of yesteryear do it for me.
Immortal words from Conquest, Jack. And who will be the first to say it about Mao, in light of Chang and Halliday’s new biography – Mao: The Untold Story?
Bit OT, sorry.
I wouldn’t worry, Rob, most of the thread is OT.
I’m half-way through the book at the moment. Mao has just taken over China, and I’m experiencing symptoms of physical nausea.
Where now are the legions of undergraduates that wrote gushing essays on his tactics of ‘revolutionary warfare’? And are they still writing them, I wonder.
[OT by permission
]
Probably working in the APS
I doubt it.
Fyodor says: November 4th, 2005 at 1:07 pm
No, the DoE are only doing their job, which is to serve the taxpayer. There is no such thing as a “right to a grant”.
Only a person trying very hard to be stupid could fail to notice the distinction between the university banning, sacking and censoring someone for the publication of offensive views and the state failing to grant another party funds for to assist the publication of stupid theories. (Sort of like that fine line between black and white.)
But Fyodor has pulled off this feat with ease. Why doesnt he just give up the ghost. Admit that in his philosophy freedom has limits and that Fraser overstepped the mark. Then he can give up this preposterous charade he makes of being a liberal and we can all get some rest.
Jack, are you aware that your name is now spelt with a ‘j’ at the end? I suggest you clear your cache.
Shorter Jack Strocchij, Nederregions: I’ve got a big fat donut on the Fraser-furore, which interests nobody but me, but here’s some really good news! Disaffected youth are rioting in Paris! No, not the middle-class students. No, not the blue-collar workers asking for more baguette-money. No, not the train drivers. No, it’s the DARKIES! Yay! I was right – the sky IS falling!
Auntie Jack, you’re actually responding to Soggy Biscuit in that last rant, not me. You’re still wrong of course, but I really should let others correct you for a change.
Fyodor says: November 7th, 2005 at 8:46 am
Actually my occasional comments on Fraser and cultural policy seem to have hit more than a few raw nerves on this blog, going by the number and intensity of blogs and comments that have been posted by the larv-prodders in response. These guys used to say that my harping on the ethnic issue was just some idiosyncratic obsession. They seem to have changed tack all of a sudden.
I am simply rubbing in the point that libertarian Wets such as Fyodor, Jason Soon and Nabakov are not liberal. They are hypocrites when they claim to speak for liberty.
This is obvious from their support of multiculturalism. In theory this doctrine preaches post-modern tolerance towards ethnic differences. In practice it means state sponsorsip or encouragement of pre-modern sectarian, sexist and racist practices ie tolerating the intolerant.
The Fraser furore also proves my thesis: New Right and New Left libertarians dont really care about liberty. This was an opportunity for libertarians of all parties to show their true colors ala Milton, Voltaire and Mill – that one should stick up for the right of unpopular, offensive view points to be freely expressed, without chilling sanction.
Instead the Wets of all parties fell in lock step with the authoritarians to frog march a dissident off campus. Fancy what scuttling steps they would make to accomodate authority if a real test of principle arose.
I dont care much for Fraser or his racist views. What is worrying is the Wets indifference to freedom. They care about looking good in the moral vanity mirror. And they have sold their souls to the quango and uni company stores.
Lets shoot the messenger, eh? Fyodor’s reaction provides depressing evidence for the suspicion that no confirmed prediction ever goes unpunished. I warn continually that proper ethnic settlement is of crucial importance as failed settlement will lead to civil unrest and strife. When a major ethnic settlement fails and civil unrest follow…I get blamed.
Brilliant strategy, if one wants to assist in a national and civilizational suicide attempt. The Wets, the new Dr Kerkorvians of cultural policy.
I do not enjoy seeing rioters wreck the most beautiful city in the world. I do enjoy saying “I told you so” to people who think they are intelligent but are really only clever-clever. This smack down should wipe the self-satisified smile off their faces.
The kind of criticisms I have been making are hardly “nedderregions” stuff. Most of the sane and decent “small ‘l’ liberals” have, in the wake of 7/7, more or less now come to their senses about the problems of ethnic settlement eg Trevor Phillips in the UK, Pamela Bone, Terry Lane.
There are a alot of ugly rumours bubbling just under the surface. But the way to refute them is by scienfific analysis of the real world, not by putting ones head in the sand. The Wets have imnposed defacto and dejure political correct bans on realistic analysis of this problem. Their authoritarian attitude towards academic freedom is a reliable pointer on this.
Fyodor is also lying about the classification basis for my criticisms. I have continually asserted the crucial differences between multiculturalism (bad) and multiracialism (good). I am not against “DARKIES”. In fact Arabians are, racially speaking, more or less Caucasians ie whites.
But this is biological science and we know that Fyodor is a solipsist not a scientist.
I am against multiculturalism because I am for multiracialism. It is in Australia’s national interest to integrate non-Caucasians into our society. East Asians and South Asians are mostly “darker” than Europeans. But they have generally made good citizens, with a standout cultural exception.
But it is not in our national interest to engage in wanky cultural differntiation policies that help no one except ethic lobbyists and their clients. Western societies have to find some way to integrate Muslims so that normal Muslim ethnics do not revert to pre-modern patriarchy and deviant Muslim ethnics do not resort to post-modern anarchy.
Jack
Get it into your numbskull head. My position is perfectly consistent.
The main concern of classical liberals and libertarians is with restrictions on individual liberty by governments. What corporations, universities, etc do is part and parcel of their freedom of association, property rights and contractual rights and is nobody’s concern as long as they in turn have not violated any contractual or property rights. If Deakin is perceived as an illiberal university because of its conduct then competittion will ensure in the long run that it doesn’t attract good academics. Only governments have the legalised power of coercion. I would abolish anti-vilification laws tomorrow but you’ve dealt yourself out of that argument as you constantly hammer on about how the law was just an excuse to do what the university wanted to do anyway.
Shorter Jack Strocchi: I reckon multiculturalism is all about “state sponsorsip or encouragement of pre-modern sectarian, sexist and racist practices ie tolerating the intolerant”, which is why liberals like Jason Soon, Fyodor and M. Nabokov support it. Or don’t. I get my strawmen confused a lot of the time. It’s probably also worth mentioning that nothing like my “MultiCulti” strawman defines government policy in France, let alone Australia, but then I prefer not to challenge my prejudices with the facts. Where was I? Oh, yes: Ayrabs are whitefellas. I checked on the scienterrific colour palette just to be sure.
“These guys used to say that my harping on the ethnic issue was just some idiosyncratic obsession.”
Yes, Auntie Jack, and your latest spray provides ample confirmation. You’ve gotten nowhere on your pathetic defence of Fraser’s supposed academic integrity and so you divert attention to…your idiosyncratic obsession. Actually, I would have said monomania, but clearly that was too concise for you.
Jason Soon says: November 7th, 2005 at 10:57 am
Oh, I thought their main concern of traditional liberals was to lift restrictions on the liberty of the individual, whatever their institutional source. Jason Soon might try reading Mill for a change, instead of just invoking him for rhetorical convenience.
So libertarianism is all about “property rights”? That concedes the validity of my criticism: libertarians are interested in property or “diversity”, not liberty. Jason Soon is consistent alright, in defence of corporate proprietariansim. Follow the money.
So eternal vigilance is not the price of liberty? The alert citizenry can now go back to sleep, safe and sound in the knowledge that the invisible hand will protect academic freedom. Much as 19th Century free-market libertarians did so much to prevent the onslaught of 20th Century totalitarianism.
yawn
You’re drawing a long bow there, Jack, by equating the rise of Nazism in the 20th century with my alleged lack of ‘vigilence’ against such sinister trends as universities imposing conditions on their employees. If anything the bow looks like backfiring and whipping you in the ass there. It is precisely the speech of the likes of Fraser which has more sinister overtones than the alleged complacency of your imaginary bete-noires, the ‘wets’. And the liberal solution to Fraser is to let the private sphere (like his fellow academics) ostracise him rather than throw him in jail. But you seem to be against that ‘soft enforcement’, preferring that the taxpayers pay their hard earned money to stamp his work with academic imprimatur.
Oh, I see it’s “poking Jack with sticks till he swells up like a puffer fish” time again.
Not sure I can beat Homer’s shorter Strocchi above but I’ll have a go.
Shorter Strocchi: “Anyone who points out real life doesn’t fit neatly into my patented wet/dry matrix is urging on the downfall of western civilisation.And they’re wet, wet, wet too!Yes they are!”
Jason Soon says: November 7th, 2005 at 2:19 pm
Nope Jason Soon is drawing the long bow, in the reverse direction. His comment explicitly argued that the invisible hand of the free market will automaticly preserve liberal institutions.
“If Deakin is perceived as an illiberal university because of its conduct then competittion will ensure in the long run that it doesnÄôt attract good academics.”
This is ahistorical nonsense. If anything, businessmen will fall over themselves ito sell the authoritarians enough rope to hang the free thinkers.
That is exactly what happened when Khomeni issued the fatwah against Rushdie. The New Left Wets went to water in a lather of multicultural pandering whilst the New Right Wets bent over backwards to make sure oil suppliers did not get offended.
The Tree of Liberty may not have to be watered with the blood of martyrs. But it thrives better when the faint-hearted learn to look elsewhere for their thirty pieces of silver.
“The Tree of Liberty may not have to be watered with the blood of martyrs. But it thrives better when the faint-hearted learn to look elsewhere for their thirty pieces of silver.”
And they should do so now before the cows come home to roost in the belfry of the rock that’s teetering on the lip of freedom.
Communists!
hey Nabs,
I have no idea of what you are saying but it sounds good.
you and jack should try politics
Oh how cute Steve. My six year old godson goes around saying naughty words to get attention too. Now why don’t you go and play with this little linky I found and let the grownups get back to talking about important stuff like house prices, Australian Idol and whether this new white shiraz is much chop.
Wherefore Prof. Strocchi’s hithertofore belaboured ‘erudition’ was only unseemly in it’s procustean excess, now we are treated to a gamut of querulous pomp and patrimony masquerading as ‘the voice of reason’ ‘Shield of the West’ and ‘the defender of Open Society’ a performance as convincing as a wombat in a Test match.
For someone who doesn’t hesitiate to don the clothes of Winston Churchill, Jack fits to a tee his definition of a fanatic. Only for him every topic is part of the same topic – the dialectical, age-defining conflict between the forces of Aridity and Liquidity.
Light and Dark, Apples and Oranges Luke Skywalker and Darth Vader and any topic anywhere at anytime are all implict actors and at the same time products of the antithetical conditions that emerge from the actualisation of the operational Essence of Aridity – which is the Highest Good, the absolute Ideal and the flame of Reason and at the same time its Successor/Antecedent.
All else is the idiotic chatter of those who cannot bring them to comprehend the self-evident and yet super-evident reality of every blessed word that cascades from his keyboard of Enlightenment, like a stream in a parched desert, it sweeps ill founded notions before it and leaves only mud for sandbeetles to play in.
I can understand your prickliness, Nabo, as these aren’t exactly swell times for Lefties (or Wets). I’ll let Jack handle the grand narratives, and he is making a good fist of it, in the face of obfuscations, to be sure. On a related topic, I am fascinated by the ideological convulsions on the other thread, as we hear that France’s “multiculturalism” is the new version of “bureaucratic state capitalism” or “stalinism”, whereas the genuine Trotsky resides in Canada, or even Australia. I was glad to hear that Australia is the true “workers’ state”, although it is possibly a “degenerate” one, perhaps requiring another ideological reformulation some time in the future.
Jack Strocchi – the thinking man’s Adam Yoshida, the poor man’s Samuel Huntington
At last! Someone who can spell the excellent Professor Huntington’s name. Am I right in assuming you have also read Professor Huntington, Jason?
This is undoubtedly true. Did you see Geoffry Robertson’s ‘Hypothetical’ on the Rushdie affair, Jack? The left sat silent and embarrassed while the ex-Cat Stevens did his rant, the businessmen upbraided Rushdie for disrupting their trade deals with Iran, and only Fay Weldon, out of the whole sorry boiling, had the guts to defend him – indeed, walking up to the policeman on the set and demanding he arrest Yusuf Islam for threatening to murder Rushdie.
Yes I actually have. Some good points in his canonical book but his Islam’s bloody borders theory is a load of balderdash since some of these bloody borders (like Malays vs Chinese in Malaysia and Indonesia) are ethnic rather than religious in nature.
Yes, I agree with you to a point, Jason. However, many of those conflicts (obviously not the Malay one, obviously) did take on a religious identity, prompting intervention from the Saudis, Iranians, etc. His theory about Islam’s bloody borders is basically explained through demographic causes more than religious ones, in any case.
“(obviously not the Malay one, obviously)”
*shakes head
I think I’m to blame for starting the spelling error. In my defence, I’d been marking essays when I first wrote Huntingdon – and one of my students had spelt it that way and it stuck in my tired head. You’ll be pleased to hear, Steve, that I set Huntington and other authors with whom I disagree, at any rate.
There’s no doubt some of his insights are valuable, though his earlier work on democracy is more measured and empirically accurate.
Intersting. This begs the question, Mark – did your student cite Huntington’s arguments correctly? (I will not take offence if you refuse to answer – I’m just curious as a Huntington buff who gets frustrated when people think they know what he is saying, but haven’t read a word)
“Intersting”
*going senile
As far as I can recall, Steve, but it was his earlier work on democratisation, which was the more relevant text.
Fyodor says: November 7th, 2005 at 4:49 pm
Shorter, more candid Fyodor, to the tune of “The Singer” or “Running Scared”:
Jason Soon says: November 7th, 2005 at 5:08 pm
Ethnicity is composed of (biologically conserved) race/tribe and (sociologically constructed) religion/sect. So the distinction that can be made in theory between Southern Asian races and Islamic religion often collapses in practice. Or, as John Derbyshire might say, “they are all in it together”.
However I think Jason Soon has a point about the flaws in Huntington’s model. Although, characteristicly, he does not properly spell it out.
The take-up of more militant forms of Islamic religion by disaffected minorities may be an associated effect, rather than cause, of uncivil cultural expressions. More reactionary and militant forms of Islam may be well suited to various tribes and individuals who, for underlying socio-biological reasons, may be having teething troubles in the passage through modernity.
It may well be the case that some form of Islam makes such people “better than they otherwise might have been.” (apologies to Evelyn Waugh’s Catholic profession.)
“Ethnicity is composed of (biologically conserved) race/tribe and (sociologically constructed) religion/sect. So the distinction that can be made in theory between Southern Asian races and Islamic religion often collapses in practice. Or, as John Derbyshire might say, “they are all in it together”.
Err, no Jack, let me spell it out for you then. The conflict between Malays and Chinese which Huntington lumps together in his Islam’s bloody borders thesis is the classic conflict between a middleman minority and customers of a different ethnicity who feel they have been ‘ripped off’ and resent the economic competition. The *perception* of ethnic *difference* has everything to do with it in the sense that visible phenotypic differences exacerbate what is already a heated situation. *Genetic* differences if any are trivial and obviously the fact that Malays happen to be Muslim is even more trivial (Muslim Pakistanis end up as the middleman minority in the UK in contrast to their black customers)
Fuggedabout it Jase. Even when Jack agrees with someone or vice versa, he’s still right and they’re still wrong. It’s like a windmill challenging you to a joust.
My advice is to just gaffer tape orange smoke flares to the whirling arms and sit back to enjoy the show.
Is Missy Higgins wet?
(I hope so)
Jason Soon says: November 8th, 2005 at 12:37 am
The *perception* of ethnic *difference* has everything to do with it in the sense that visible phenotypic differences exacerbate what is already a heated situation.
*Genetic* differences if any are trivial and obviously the fact that Malays happen to be Muslim is even more trivial
I love the ironic scare asterisks around *perception*, *difference* and *genetic*. Jason Soon has spent too much time around the Larva-Prodders and has turned into a caricature of a salt-and-pepper haired politically correct academic.
An individuals ethnicity is basicly a function of race and religion ie biology and sociology. Jason Soon explicitly rules out racial or religious causes of this ethnic clash. He says it is not caused by underlying differences in racial genetics (Sino v Malay). Nor is it caused by overt behavioural differences in religious “memetics” (~Buddhism v Islamism).
Jason Soon then wheels out Amy Chua’s Market Dominant Minorities thesis for a bit of an airing. He argues that the clash between Chinese and Malay ethnics is caused by the entirely incidental fact that Chinese in SE Asia have a social function as successful middlemen. And the Malays, instead congratulating the Chinese for their diligence and savvyness, are persecuting them for it. Much as Slavs used to persecute Jews in Eastern Europe.
Jason Soon says that the Malay natives are acting in this irrational way because of (socially constructed) malicious subjective perceptions. The greedy capitalist social stereotype is reinforced by Chinese physical phenotype. Thus Malay natives construct a malignant psychology by cobbling together some combination of primitive supersition, nasty ideology and group envy. And they peridicly use this toxic brew to whip up ethnic hostility against the Chinese ethnics.
I dont have much of a problem with this account as it stands except that it relies on explanation by ad hoc, superficial and local factors. Chinese act as middlemen and traders the wide world over. Why do Malays persecute the Chinese in SE Asia but Europeans do not persecute them in W Europe? And why do Islamics in S Asia persecute the Chinese but Hindis in India tend to leave them alone?
These questions point towards the deeper and more complicated areas of comparative racial and religious analysis ie Darwin, Weber and the other 19th C titans of social science. (In the 20th C social scicence went forward empirically, with the use of quantitative methods. But it went backwards theoretically, with the spread of the standard social science model’s empty and subjective social constructivism.)
As Roberts points out, Chua’s descriptions are true but her prescriptions are weak:
Jason Soon and Amy Chu are polite to a fault. Why do the Chinese excel at Excel? And why do Malays tend to prefer the Islamic rather than other less militant creeds?
The Chu-Soon theory is true as far as it goes – a perversion of Darwinian ethnology is now trumping the Washington Consensus ideology in the Southern hemisphere. (Look at the chilly reception that Bush got in Latin America.) But it has nothing futher to offer beyond this except the empty platitudes of constructivist sociology and politically correct boilerplate.
So what tactics does Jason Soon suggest the Chinese should use in self-defence: harsh language? The only ways for market-dominated minorities to be safe in a globalised world is by secessionist nation state formation to reinforce their ethnic identity or by emigrating to Open Societies where they will inevitably lose their ethnic identity. The multicultural project is a chimera. Look at the Jews. Look at Jason Soon.
Nabakov says: November 8th, 2005 at 12:53 am
Poor Nabakov. It can’t be much fun being a politically correct spin doctor these days and in this place, can it? The London Bombings and Paris Burnings are pretty hard to spin as the result of the hateful-Howard or the Gulf War. And the new science of socio-biology has made mincemeat of politically correct myths, which are now being discarded like so many losing betting slips at Flemington.
Of course if Nabakov wants to step up to the plate and offer a convincing alternative theory then he is welcome to. I enjoy his little jests but I enjoy knocking his ideology into a cocked hat even more.
Jack, never let the facts get in the way of a good theory, eh? In your obsession with fitting everything into the ‘human biodiversity’ box of your guru, Steve Sailer, you’re willing to torture the odd fact or consign it to a dark cell.
Actually Malacca, one of the earliest civilisations on the Malay peninsula, was a Hindu outpost and its brand of Hinduism, relatively diluted of the caste obsession which bedevilled its Indian predecessor, could have easily morphed into Buddhism, which incidentally, is the nominal religious belief of the Chinese. The Malays on Malaysia and Indonesia were animist/Buddhist/Hindu for a very long time. It was in fact their propensity to develop trading outposts which brought Arab merchants to their shores and led to their conversion to Islam. So I’m sorry Jack but there is no genetic propensity for Malays to prefer ‘militant’ religions like Islam. Incidentally I should also note that Fillipinos are ‘genetically’ virtually indistinguishable from Malays and they are Catholic, not Muslim. And pogroms against Chinese merchants have not been unheard of in the Phillipines and Thailand either.
The ancestors of the Malays themselves originally came from Southern China. The differences between Southern Chinese indentured labourers who ended up in South East Asian countries like Malaysia and the Malays would be too trivial, regardless of whatever ‘just so story’ you choose to make up, to allow for some genetic superiority of Chinese in commerce and Excel spreadsheets. A far more mundane but plausible story to account for the dominance of Chinese in the mercantile areas would invoke self-selection of indentured labourers from China and cultural differences between urban dwellers from China and rural farmers characteristic of Malays.
Perhaps, Jack, that might have something to do with the fact that Chinese shopkeepers in Western countries are emigrants from Third World countries into First World ones and who therefore on average have substantially lower average starting incomes than the native populations whereas Chinese shopkeepers in SE Asian countries with a Malay population started off more or less level with their Malay neighbours and then proceeded to rise in incomes substantially ? Of course this common sensical explanation would be far too mundane for your Sailorite propensities.
” Nor is it caused by overt behavioural differences in religious “memetics” (~Buddhism v Islamism).”
On its face, one would expect Buddhism with its call for the renunciation of desires to be a religion that is hostile to commerce and hence to merchants and their ilk. And on its face one would expect Islam, a religion founded by a businessman and which places far more of an emphasis on the here and now right down to detailed prescriptions for daily living, a religion which is as much of a ‘self help’ guide as spiritual salvation to be the more worldly religion which is favourable to commerce.
Yet the Chinese shopkeeper ends up as the Buddhist.
Well one strike down for trying to infer political ideologies and ethnic conflicts from religion, Jack.