Silicon Investor (SI) -- The First Internet Community

STOCKTALK

We've detected that you're using an ad content blocking browser plug-in or feature. Ads provide a critical source of revenue to the continued operation of Silicon Investor. We ask that you disable ad blocking while on Silicon Investor in the best interests of our community. If you are not using an ad blocker but are still receiving this message, make sure your browser's tracking protection is set to the 'standard' level.

Politics : Foreign Affairs Discussion Group -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: JohnM who wrote (46919)	9/25/2002 1:23:28 PM
From: LindyBill	Respond to of 281500

I think the Campus Watch stuff is an attempt to limit speech. I look on it as an attempt to expose the speech of the ME Professors, and to show their on-campus attempts to shut down speech by the other side. There seems to be little doubt these ME Departments are made up almost exclusively of Pro-Arab teachers, and that the "Seminars" being put on under ME Department's are all Pro-Arab, with the other side marginalized. We could probably discuss this for a year and not agree. Another interesting thing is the identity of the people who are running Campus Watch. They are American academics, not "Bill Bennett" types. You may disagree with their POV, but they have the proper credentials to speak up on this subject. My last thought is on the students who are protesting Pro-Israeli speakers and shutting them down. The press is careful not to "profile," but the demonstrations appear to be led by "Visa" students from the Mid East. This could end up backfiring on them. We can get down on our present College Kids as being apathetic, or only interested in Grades and "Hooking Up" on the weekend. But they are not the "Campus Radicals" of the '60s, and they can get resentful, in a hurry, of this type of behavior from the Foreign Students.

To: JohnM who wrote (46919)	9/25/2002 2:03:28 PM
From: LindyBill	Respond to of 281500

I'm not certain that tells you much about me. But I thought a while before I posted that story. I am glad you did. I have found that the more personal BG people put out on a "tight" thread like this, the better the thread works. We are here for fun and "Community," and the personal stuff really helps. I urge every regular here to unburden a little. I have never seen a problem when people do it. Oh, there are always some "Lurker" who will jump in with a snide comment, but to hell with them. They go away just as fast. Nobody is going to blab your secrets to the world. Frankly nobody else gives a damn!

To: JohnM who wrote (46919)	9/26/2002 1:32:56 AM
From: D. Long	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 281500

But if you want to know where I'm coming from, it's the quote from, I think, John Stuart Mills, that the best way to deal with offensive speech is more speech, not limiting speech. I think the Campus Watch stuff is an attempt to limit speech. And a dangerous one. Personally, for the faculty members involved; and educationally for the institutions involved. Not quite how JSM put it, John. In the case of "other regarding actions" that do not meet the criterion of the Harm Principle, ie do not violate someone's rights, society isn't justified in restricting the action by act of law, but only justified in social sanction in expression of opinion. He wasn't arguing that the solution to offensive speech is "more speech" but rather that offensive speech that isn't causing specific harm should only be sanctioned by, essentially, public distaste and scorn. Which, I believe, is the upshot of Campus Watch from what I know of it. Derek

To: JohnM who wrote (46919)	9/26/2002 7:49:35 AM
From: Ilaine	Read Replies (2) \| Respond to of 281500

The organization behind Campus Watch is Middle East Forum, and the brain behind Middle East Forum is Daniel Pipes. You know that Nadine and I approve of Pipes and admire his writing. Unlike the bloggers, he almost never hits a bad note. I guess this could be justified as an ad hominem argument, but you are the one who wants to consider the source. Pipes is a reliable source. He has spent his life studying the Middle East, and its interaction with the West. I see Campus Watch as an extension of that. Seeing how other academics deal with the Middle East is information. I don't see how it could be used for repression. Academics publish in peer-reviewed journals, they speak to large audiences, their ideas are not kept private. Pipes is getting those ideas a larger audience. Ideas have consequences. Maybe the professors are nervous about the consequences of their ideas? Because I think it would be disingenuous of me to deny that once the public at large learns that hating Israel and hating the US is being taught to their children, they may find this objectionable. danielpipes.org meforum.org campus-watch.org

To: JohnM who wrote (46919)	9/30/2002 7:51:08 AM
From: Ilaine	Read Replies (4) \| Respond to of 281500

the best way to deal with offensive speech is more speech, not limiting speech I still haven't figured out what you and Derek are arguing about. Mill was certainly a supporter of free speech, although he did not use that term. He used the term "opinion." I don't think he said "the way to deal with offensive speech is more speech," but he certainly believed that mistaken, even false, opinions should be expressed, not suppressed. Here is a quote from "On Liberty. "But the peculiar evil of silencing the expression of an opinion is, that it is robbing the human race; posterity as well as the existing generation; those who dissent from the opinion, still more than those who hold it. If the opinion is right, they are deprived of the opportunity of exchanging error for truth: if wrong, they lose, what is almost as great a benefit, the clearer perception and livelier impression of truth, produced by its collision with error." bartleby.com Apparently it was Mill who first described free debate as "the marketplace of ideas." I do think it's ironic that you would accuse Campus Watch of attempting to stifle free speech. From my perspective, their opinions bring new light and fresh voices to the debate in the marketplace of ideas. Pipes, rightly or wrongly, believes that the academic study of the Middle East is now dominated by one point of view. He is not alone in that idea. Foreign Affairs magazine recently reviewed a book by Martin Kramer who also has that point of view. foreignaffairs.org A real problem that we face today is that we must understand some things which have heretofore been rather obscure. We seem to be facing an enemy we don't understand. Middle East studies, previously a cozy ivory tower in the backwaters of academia, has come to the fore. If academics in the field of Middle East studies are giving spurious explanations, it's no longer of little consequence. More than ever before, their ideas have consequences.