I'm curious, Dawg: how are your reasons for thinking "aggrieved law students have no business telling editors of national magazines to run unedited pieces by themselves" different from conservatives' reasons? 'Cause I agree with every word of this post, and yet your blogroll says I'm "on the right." Have I been miscategorized all this time, or could it be that some things transcend the left/right clannism you're so fond of?
The latter, Chris, may be the case. Have I been clannish on this left/right thing? Oh, probably, but I'm not wired to that binary. If you'd like, I'll move you to the "Intelligence on the non-left" category. Just say the word.
My reasons for opposing the effrontery of these law students is their colossal cheek. No, I don't like MacLean's much these days (no offence), and I like Steyn less, but this just isn't the way to go about things.
Some conservatives have focussed on the Muslim angle. But for me, it's not about that. It's about outrageous demands that aren't meant to be met. It's about posturing. It's about bloody arrogance. Surely there's enough of that nonsense to go around, right across the political spectrum.
If the stoonts had just asked to submit a timely article expressing a point of view, that would have been reasonable, and I would have hoped that some version of it might be permitted to appear. Steyn badly needs an antidote: the "breed like rabbits" meme that's had currency ever since the "Yellow Peril" days ought to be confronted head-on, and at speed. But the whole approach here was plain wrong. I don't react very well to ultimatums either.
The student lawyers in question came to us five months after the story ran. They asked for an opportunity to respond. We said that we had already run many responses to the article in our letters section, but that we would consider a reasonable request. They wanted a five-page article, written by an author of their choice, to run without any editing by us, except for spelling and grammar. They also wanted to place their response on the cover and to art direct it themselves.
Good grief. I'm assuming this is true, because it would be silly to lie about it. What crust!
Dr. Dawg
Would you elaborate on this a bit?
"stand up for the meaning of December 6"
Sure.
Recognize Lepine's act for what it was--the crazy end of a spectrum of misogyny that infects our culture, and is part of our socialization as men. Speak out against violence against women. Don't wish that act of mass murder away as that of a single crazed gunman operating in a vacuum. What shaped and gave force to Lepine's murderous rage? Let's ponder that for a while, on this day.
And let's put paid to the "Lepine was a Moozlum" nonsense while we're at it.
December 7 is Pearl Harbor Day.
Mark
Ottawa
It may not be intended this way but the memorial makes me feel as if I should in some way be ashamed that I am a man.
If I had been there I would would have given my life to save those women.
I believe that most men would have made that sacrifice.
I think that misogyny is cultural rather than inherent.
I would rather just speak out against violence.
drat
too many woulds
I agree with you -- up to a point. "Just don't tell me what I ought to do, or not do, in the same vein. Live and let live." It take it you mean you ought to be allowed to do anything as long as it doesn't hurt, or threaten to hurt, someone else. So you agree with the anti-abortion people on that one -- you just disagree on whether someone else gets hurt in an abortion. I'm on your side on that issue, but I see where people on the other side are coming from, and it's not necessarily hatred of women. You'll eat the roast pork because you think no one gets hurt. I disagree with you on that one. So I'll have the tofurky or whatever. ("Live and let live" doesn't include pigs, it seems.) Shouldn't Israelis and Palestinians agree just to live and let live? Unfortunately, it's just about the only thing they agree on.
My point is simply that things aren't as simple as "Live and let live" or "Don't tell other people what to do." The devil, as they say, is in the details.
Aeolus:
Of course the devil is in the details. The devil is the details. That's why these discussions rage. It's not mathematics. I'm just arguing for comfort, like any good Canadian in the dead of winter. And for plain good manners.
doug:
I think misogyny is cultural, too. I don't think the memorial stigmatizes me as a man. It does call for serious reflection, though, on what a social "man" is. There's little harm--indeed, much good--in that.
Good grief. Agreement with Dr Dawg - twice now, in three days. I feel like Mark Twain's father!
I disagree on your observations regarding Lepine, though, Dawg. First, I think it is reasonable to regard his actions as those of a "single crazed gunman operating in a vacuum" - a guy who grew up being beaten by his father until his ears bled is not representative of Canadian society generally, even the male half. Second, the Dec 6 Ecole Polytechnique memorials do stigmatize men - all men. Doug Newton is correct in observing that the intent is that men should be ashamed of themselves simply for their chromosome count: the repeated claim is that "all men are responsible." I cancelled my annual contribution to Vancouver Rape Relief after one of their spokeswomen made exactly that comment at one of the memorials.
Mark Steyn has named you his "reader of the day" and linked to this post.
Steve:
My goodness, so he has. I bet any readers wandering over here will get a bit of a surprise, though.
Deaner:
I disagree completely. There is a fundamental confusion here between the biological man and the social construct "man." We must accept, it seems to me, that much of our socialization includes the way we relate to women (and to each other), and will have its consequences. I think it's every man's responsibility to reflect on what we can do to change things, and to act.
I am suggesting the Lepine's mad rage might have been turned outward at any target or targets, but took the shape that it did because feminism is foregrounded and contested in our society, women are striving for social and economic equality, and for him they just didn't know their place.
That doesn't mean that we're all Mark Lepine. It does mean that we have some responsibility to recast the dominant values as best we might.
Steyn seems to take pride in his critics.
Yes Dawg - all very nice, albeit anodyne...
I would suggest that your construct of biological man versus social construct man is a distinction without a difference, but sure - any reflecting we all do on our relations with any group is all to the good. The point is that when "all men are responsible" is the mantra of the Ecole Polytechnique memorials, I don't see that there is a distinction drawn between biological man and social man, even if there were a difference.
Dr. D - Great post. I dont agree with you every day but on this issue and Robert Latimer I concur.
KC:
Thanks for the accolade and come back anytime! : )
Deaner: I'm not trying to be anodyne. I'm trying to get at a confusion that seems to prevail on this issue, although on one level you are right, because "biological man" is it self a construct, I guess. What I meant was that few feminists I know think that, by virtue of genitalia alone, men are capable of oppressing women and, given the right hot buttons, mass-murdering them.
Instead they refer to the process of socialization/acculturation that creates "men" and suggests that the process needs to be changed. As men, perhaps we do have a responsibility to deal with our own sexism, in all of its manifestations. That's far from "blaming" all men for the psychotic excesses of Mark Lepine.
Dawg - I agree that such an outlook is far from blaming all men; unfortunately, you obviously deal with a more sophisticated group of feminists than I do. The ones I see involved in events like the Ecole Polytechnique memorials do, indeed, "blame all men" - and they are far from subtle about it.
It would go too far to say they were pleased with that tragedy; but since it has happened, they are all too willing to see it as a handy club with which to beat one half of their fellow citizens. I would suggest that Irene Mathyssen (and the NDP caucus, since it was apparently a joint decision that she raise the issue in the House) is an example of this mind-set, where the viewing of pictures on a computer screen (even offensive ones, since "offense" is in the mind of the viewer) that contained no depiction of violence or injury was immediately and deliberately linked to the shooting death of 14 young women. On this issue, we may have to agree to disagree.
Let me just say that I think Irene Mathyssen was well over the top on this one.
Crikey! Something else we agree on. Pretty soon we'll be agreeing to buy each other a beer!
I only wish, first, that Irene M were not pretty typical of the overall feminist approach, and second, that the entire NDP caucus had not signed off on the strategy of slandering someone as a political ploy (and incidently cheapening the memory of 14 dead women). You commented earlier, Dawg, that one 'couldn't wish away Lepine's actions as those of a single lone madman' (my paraphrase). I disagree - but it is even harder to wish away Mathyssen as a single over-the-top nutbar when the subject was brought up in caucus before she raised her point of order in the House. Presumably some portion of the NDP (including the majority of their Parliamentary caucus) think that this sort of thing is just fine and dandy.
Hell, I'd buy you a beer anyway. : )
At least Mathyssen had the grace to apologize.
Sort of... as I have seen it reported, the apology was along the lines of "I'm sorry I didn't approach him to tell him that what he was doing was wrong." I see that as not much better than "I'm sorry that I showed myself to be a shrill, over-excitable haridan."
"At least Mathyssen had the grace to apologize."
*Phfft!* If she hadn't been prying and peeking where she had no business, she wouldn't have had to apologize. And it was a pretty lame apology, at that.
But back to the post: Doc, I think you and I and a whole bunch of others have come to the point where we distrust the language we speak because there are people who agendas we don't like who are using it as a weapon against us. For myself, any time I see or hear a new phrase or buzzword being played with like a new toy, I tend to consign it to the discard pile and go looking for a different way to express myself, so I don't fall into the same trap.
The word "tolerant" is used as if it means "accepting of." That is not the original meaning of the word. It means "put up with, or endure," especially under pressure. And oddly enough, that's one of the words whose original meaning actually matches its current use.
I don't yet know what is actually meant by "reasonable accomodation." But I'll put money on my guess that someone is gonna use it to try to convince me to give up something of mine to somebody else because somebody has decided that if he wants it, I have to give it to him.
As far as the CIC goes, if they want to rebut Steyn, let them publish their own magazine. Everybody else does. Why should the CIC get to be the cuckoo?
And a Merry Christmas to you, too!
Mark Steyn has named you his "reader of the day" and linked to this post.
And that's how Steyn thanks someone who's defending him? How graceless.
I suppose someone has to defend freedom of expression on principle, and it might as well be you, but I find standing up for these types a royal waste of time.
Yeah, I saw that yesterday. I didn't stand up for him--I suggested, in fact, that maybe he should be pursued under the law for that wretched piece of "they-breed-like-rabbits" nonsense--but the students, showing up to Maclean's five months late with a list of absolutely ridiculous demands (to be acceded to pronto or they'd go to the HRC)just rubbed me the wrong way. Whyte even offered them some kind of (unspecified) reasonable accommodation, but what they asked was simply not reasonable at all.
Keith: "Steyn seems to take pride in his critics."
Absolutely - they're his bread and butter.
On Mathyssen, does anybody know what Moore's girlfriend was wearing in the picture he was looking at? I'm curious because the fact that it was his girlfriend has suddenly made the whole thing go from obviously inappropriate to entirely fine. The sharp distinction has me puzzled. It's, like, binary again.
On the Marc Lepine shooting, I don't think that feminists for the most part blame all men. There will always be some louder voices who are over the top, some of them knowingly (hoping to draw attention to an issue) and others not particularly tuned in to reality or parroting something that they've heard and liked the sound of. I once had a woman tell me that "all men have raped". I told her that I must have been really drunk at the time, because I couldn't recall a bit of it. I thought that was really clever back then... In any event I don't take such statements very seriously and wouldn't as a result of hearing such a thing paint the entire movement with just one brush.
Apparently the shot was of his girlfriend in a bikini, swimming with her dog.
but the students, showing up to Maclean's five months late with a list of absolutely ridiculous demands (to be acceded to pronto or they'd go to the HRC)just rubbed me the wrong way.
There's a letter in today's Globe (behind the subscription wall, naturally) from the students that relates a different side of the story.
My issue is not with the merits of the case, but with the process. This is the mechanism that exists, and we should applaud the students for taking that route, rather, as the students wrote, throw rocks at the MacLeans offices, which is what people like Steyn are always accusing those people of doing.
I dunno, Ti-Guy. Maybe I'm getting soft. I used to be all in favour of speech codes and the like--until, as a ProgBlog moderator, I tried my hand at writing one. That was an epiphany.
I read Steyn's moronic "Eurabia" fantasy. He may or may not have crossed the legal line with it--I suspect not. I don't blame the students for being pissed off, though. I just would have preferred something more timely, and a negotiated settlement. Whyte says he was open to a reasonable solution, but we never got to find out what he had in mind, because the students essentially wanted him to hand over editorial control of the magazine to them. You know that wasn't going to happen. So did they.
So, sure, going to have a chat with the editor is better than throwing rocks. But heading into a meeting, one might have had a game-plan. Nothing in their Globe letter contradicted the details that Whyte provided. If I had a fight with an editor, and actually got in to see him, and he told me he was open to a reasonable suggestion, I'd figure I'd damned near won.
At that point I might actually have had some sensible suggestions up my sleeve--not a demand that he publish an unedited five-pager, correct my grammar and spelling for me, and give me artistic control of the magazine cover to boot. Good grief.
So, yes, the students exercised their freedom--and proceeded to do so stupidly and unstrategically. No kudos from this corner for that. Is there a serious suggestion in their letter, maybe a hint, that throwing rocks is the only alternative? I can think of many others. So can you.
I've never believed in speech codes, but I believe in a right to respond to an accusation in a manner that is proportionate to how the accusation was first expressed. Not only do I think it's healthy for dialogue, it's actually very enlightening.
I read and hear very little criticism of Mark Steyn in our mainstream media (other than 'letters to the editor' type responses). Were this the case, I'd feel very different about the objective value of what he's writing; if he enrages people with his baseless assertions, then you'd like to think some good would come of that. All we're witnessing is the power of the media to mislead people. Personally, I hold Steyn (among others) materially responsible for the media having duped Americans (and others, most depressingly, too many Canadians) into supporting the Iraq invasion. The consequences of that go far beyond what we consider reasonable and tolerable for free expression.
Here's Steyn writing last year on the perils of a nuclear-armed Iran:
"The cost of de-nuking Iran will be high now but significantly higher with every year it’s postponed. The lesson of the Danish cartoons is the clearest reminder that what is at stake here is the credibility of our civilization. Whether or not we end the nuclearization of the Islamic Republic will be an act that defines our time."
How many times does he get to do this?
Oh and this...
Is there a serious suggestion in their letter, maybe a hint, that throwing rocks is the only alternative?
You'd have to ask Mark Steyn about that; I don't believe he thinks so.
Via Steyn comes this opinion piece from the Australian, the position of Germaine Greer on rape in Sudan.
http://www.theaustralian.news.co...81-
7583,00.html
SEan:
Thanks for the link--and the prompt: I'm planning (once term papers are completed) to do a couple of thinky pieces, and one is to be about the conservative critique of the Left for not being active enough internationally on matters that have been their traditional "beat." These things are more complex, I think, than the article makes out, but I'd like to give all of this some further thought.
(Incidentally, if I see the phrase "cultural relativist" misused once more, I'm going to have a hissy.)
but I believe in a right to respond to an accusation in a manner that is proportionate to how the accusation was first expressed.
So coming in five months after the fact with a demand for ~5% of the magazine space, plus control of the cover and with remedial spelling and grammar lessons gratis was "proportionate?" To what, may one ask?
To what, may one ask?
To the podium Steyn has been given all these years. In fact, their demands seem trivial, when you think about it.
Dr. Dawg
you said
"It's enough to make me consider becoming a libertarian."
That would be interesting.
and
"if I see the phrase "cultural relativist" misused once more, I'm going to have a hissy."
That would be informative and interesting.
Ohh... so this is catch-up lunacy. On the other hand - they still have the absolute right to start their own magazine, no?
The fact that you don't like what someone says, and moreso, the fact that many of your fellow citizens do, does not give you the right to prevent him from saying it, or to appropriate his platform for your own version of the truth.
The fact that you don't like what someone says, and moreso, the fact that many of your fellow citizens do, does not give you the right to prevent him from saying it...
...and 'round and 'round we go. It's not an issue of disliking what they say, at least not for me. It's the fact that people like Steyn are either lying or simply indifferent to a standard of "truth" in the news media that generally requires one to explain how they know what they know.
It's not an issue of disliking what they say, at least not for me.
Sorry, but I simply don't believe that. For a guy accusing someone of lying or disregarding the truth, you are remarkably economical with it, unless you are fooling yourself. I will grant that you are not "in the media" - you are merely demanding that they bow to the overstated demands of other perpetually aggrieved whiners; in your view, that is a 'trivial' request.
I take it you are satisfied that the five page jeremiad to be penned (but not spell-checked) by our outraged lawyers would have been subject to that 'standard of truth in media' that "people like Steyn" routinely violate - how would that be implemented? If, as is more likely, it would not have been, are your standards of accuracy and adherence to 'the truth' different depending on the message and author? If that's not seeking to prevent someone from speaking (and promoting others) based on your relative preference for their message, then I don't know what is.
I take it you are satisfied that the five page jeremiad to be penned (but not spell-checked) by our outraged lawyers would have been subject to that 'standard of truth in media' that "people like Steyn" routinely violate - how would that be implemented?
How can I be satisfied with something that doesn't exist? Can you answer that for me?
If, as is more likely, it would not have been, are your standards of accuracy and adherence to 'the truth' different depending on the message and author?
There is only one standard...the burden of proof is on those making a particular assertion.
If that's not seeking to prevent someone from speaking (and promoting others) based on your relative preference for their message, then I don't know what is.
Well, you assumed something that doesn't exist, so this conclusion is meaningless.
Anyway, I always find it amusing how lecturing and hectoring and belligerent "free speech" absolutists sound. I'd like to think it's because they're glimpsing a genuine threat to their freedom, but given how civil liberties are being weakened by the State in so many other areas, and which seems to cause them no concern at all, I find it a little precious.
How can I be satisfied with something that doesn't exist?
How can you so confidently assert that the demand was "trivial, when you think about it" - did your claimed "thinking" extend to considering how the veracity of the screed would be assured? If so, how was that to be impemented - particularly given that there was to be no editorial control (aside from grammar and spelling - and you think concern over free speech is precious) outside the group of outraged whiners? If there is no control over accuracy, please explain why your dissatisfaction with Steyn is not matched with caution about the "trivial" editorial takeover at MacLeans. That selective concern about accuracy of media content seems to be entirely based on whether the opinions expressed are acceptable to you.
Excellent rant, notwithstanding quibbles some folks might have with some of the details.
How can you so confidently assert that the demand was "trivial, when you think about it" - did your claimed "thinking" extend to considering how the veracity of the screed would be assured?
What information do you have that the end result would be a "screed?"
A source on the aggrieved parties being "whiners" would also help us.
Call it (and them) what you will - the opposition to what "people like Steyn" (and by the way, how about defining that term - or is insult by inclusion another double standard?) write evaporates when it is "people not like Steyn" writing things that Ti-Guy expects to agree with. So much for the claim of a principled demand for accuracy in the media.
No, Deaner. It has to do with lying.
So you say.
The HRC complaint makes no allegations of inaccuracies, it merely claims that specific incidents are portrayed as typical, that undue prominence (in their view) is placed on some attributes of persons in the news, and that in general they don't like Steyn's (and Barbara Amiel's, among others) comments. It, too, seems to boil down to "I don't like what he has to say about this subject - so the government should shut him down."
Yawn - same old same old... no wonder you like these guys and their "trivial" demand.
In any event, you have still not explained how lies in the five page (unedited) response that Macleans was to publish would be identified and eliminated, or why that is not an issue - what with your repeated assertion that your only concern is accuracy (or at least, prevention of lying) in the media.
Actually, it might have made sense for Whyte to give the whiners exactly what they asked for - without the benefit of grammar, spelling or graphics assistance and on a one week deadline. It would, I suspect, have been a fun and very revealing read.
I don't think, Dawg, that you have to come over to the libertarian darkside just yet. There are principled people on the left who take freedom of speech seriously and they need all the help they can get. At the same time, it is likely time for those people to take a really hard look at what Human Rights Commissions have become. It is a very long way from the original mission of dealing with discrimination in employment/housing/governmental situations.
The problem is that "free speech" is awkward. Nazis use it, imams use it (often to the same end), AGW skeptics use it, environmentalists of the old school use it - whole rafts of people who have opinions which are, from various perspectives, insane, hate filled, life threatening. And it might, just might, make sense to have a very carefully drafted criminal offence with the criminal burden of proof and a built in presumption that speech is protected hate speech rule enforced by the courts. However, to give a tribunal the power to, investigate, make orders and impose fines on what amounts to less than a civil standard of proof is plain dangerous.
With luck the Steyn case is going to underscore the dangers of allowing speech to be criminalized save in the most extreme cases.
You're an idiot, Jay Currie. And everyone knows it.
Come on, Ti-Guy. You're better than that.
That's where you are horribly wrong, Dawg.
I suspect Ti-Guy is working the meme thing.
However, I'm afraid it is pretty typical of the more ardent lefties. Having not a lot to say contra, they resort to name calling.
Is he better than that Dawg? Doesn't look like it.
Oh, Christ. You're an idiot, Jay Currie. You jumped on some WMD shock a few years ago in Iraq...was it about Castor beans...or Ricin...or something?
You're stupid, Jay. STUPID.
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