He won't debate you; he'll only debate with people he perceives himself to be better than (i.e. muslims, minorities, students, etc).
And besides, everyone - Steyn included - knows you'd wipe the floor with him.
I hope he does rise to the challenege though, because a whole lot of people would be happy to see you kick his ass!
Having watched most of the TVO event I'm amazed this guy has J-O-B !
Mr K, you would make salsa outa this guy!
(BTW can I bring the taco chips?)
Steyn was weeping with relief, I'm sure, when he realized his spot was yanked. He's all bravado on his website, or in front of a friendly audience, but get him in a corner, and you'd send Steyn back to writing theatre reviews.
I'd pay to see that happen. But he's such a coward, he'll find any excuse not to show.
This "comments" section is akin to watching six year olds on the playground - my dad it bigger than your dad!! It might be entertaining to watch Mark Steyn and Warren Kinsella duke it out in person. Bring it on!
But I thought that you did not think the case against Steyn had merit, what would there be to debate? I think that TVO should have not had the students and Steyn on together, the students are obviously way over their heads. I watched the show and wondered what was up with the state of Osgoode Hall.. when Steve Paikin, of all people, makes fun of your argument, there are problems.
C'mon, Warren, don't you think the debate would be a bit one-sided? On the one hand, you have an individual with impecable education and experience and on the other, well, you have a high-school drop-out turned radio disk-jockey.
And besides, you'd have to be in the same room with him, a guy that looks like the creepy scotsman in the Alexander Keiths tv commercials that just pled guilty to possession of child pornography.
I dunno- he flew up here for the hearing, he came up to do CTV and TVO and, no doubt, he'll have to put a few days aside for the Mcleans hearings - if he's a tax exile another day in Canada this June might void his non resident status
Man oh man Warren, don't let up on this idea. It would be outstanding. Steyn is a grade A smartass, funny sometimes, but hides behind the comedy to make his racist ideas go down a little easier. I think he would perform poorly against a guy (you) who has sharpened his pen and tongue in the political arena. Keep calling him out. Just like in Rocky...what....2? Or was it 3?
Don, Don, Don. Please do not be a snob. It does not add to your shaky arguments, and merely paints you as a ivory tower rube. A university degree does not impart some mysterious "informed person" status on the recipient. Need I list those, sans degree, whose ideas have changed the world? Okay, starting with the obvious - Bill Gates, Steve Jobs, Michael Dell, and, um, Mark Steyn. His book is read by millions -- how many people have read "your" book? Okay, perhaps an unfair question. How many people have read your "ideas as expressed in a liberal blog? um, 9??? Please tell me you are a BA, or MA at least....
Steyn is Ontario to Kinsella's Western Canada.
I am curious. What would you debate?
Peace
Sorry Michele (or is it Ms. Malkin?), but I don't have a BA or MA. I suppose I do have a BA in the sense that you understand a BA, but where I got my undergraduate degree, they don't confer BA degrees; I have an AB, as in Artium Baccalaureus. As well, I don't have an MA, but I do have a MSc. Both degrees are concentrated in economics, but my undergraduate AB was a double major with political science.
I don't look down upon people that don't have an education, I do look down upon people that don't educate themselves, formally or informally.
Mark Steyn would be far more credible, and actually add to the debate intellectually, if he educated himself beyond, what, the 11th grade when he dropped out. I'm almost certain Bill Gates, et al., did so after quitting school; these people didn't change the world by remaining intellectually static and unremitting. Mark Steyn would do well to learn a lesson from such individuals and not propagate antiquated and groundless ideas.
The rest of the world is changing and finding solutions to existing problems. Exacerbating old dilemmas adds nothing and is in fact regressive.
The "tough guy" that should be debating Steyn is Mohamed Elmasry.
For sure you would need a very narrow question to debate this guy on. He is no slouch. Just watching him on TVO. He is highly emotional. Best tact would be to get him angry and then use his anger to toss him off balance. Again, his gig is to quote statistics, and those numbers viewed in isolation seem to indicate there is a demographic wave that threatens to bury the Judeo Christian foundations of western society.
His opponents on TVO are children, for God's sake, obviously unnerved by his aggressive approach. But the thing is, Warren, the guy is allowed to be aggressive.
The only question to debate him on, as far as I can see is:
Be it resolved, are Muslims intending to take over Western society?
Kinsella getting into a debate with Mark Steyn would be career suicide.
I suspect that Kinsella understands that fact and I predict within 24 hours he will be scrambling to get out of any debate. He has no case to debate, once his emotions settle down from last night's "deer in the headlights" display and comes to terms the truth, I'm sure Kinsella will come to his senses and back down from any kind of debate-he simply cannot win.
There must be some alums or officials of Osgoode Hall mighty embarrassed by the standard of their graduates. Based on yesterday's debate they're graduating students with NO concept of the law-which one would assume is an important component of an Osgoode education.
Oh I like the pompous wind bag quip, very classy.
Thanks, Martyn. Your hero shouldn't be afraid, then, right? The Public Policy Forum will sponsor it, next month in Ottawa. I'll agree to any format your hero desires.
The great man couldn't possibly be intimidated by someone committing career suicide, could he?
I look forward to his response. He certainly lurks on my site enough, so I know he's read my offer.
Be careful Warren! He will suck all oxygen from the room!
Let's be honest here. Steyn would not be "afraid" to debate Warren. He had to drag the "children" into debating him on TVO.
Better to be out in the open than hide behind Human Rights Commissions, or see a privately owned publisher forced into printing something it doesn't want to. I hope this debate happens.
I don't know Mr. Elmasry. I doubt we would agree on much but I would not hesitate to have him over for dinner with my family.
Clink 9..
In fairness to Mr. Elmasry I don't beleive English is his first Language. (If wrong, I stand corrected). I don't blame him for not wanting to go face to face with Mr. Styen. I would not dare debat anyone in Japanese even though I am conversationally fluent. Don't even talk to me about French. Or my typing and spelling skills.
Mr. Elmasry is entitled to his opinions. I might not agree with him but I think the time to debate would be over a civilized beer or tea.
peace
I think DJ Steyn is just looking for some attention, people are starting to forget who he. He probably feels left out because Warmen didn't include him in the suit.
Ol Dirty Beard the Pirate (Steyn) would be a pretty crappy debate for you, WK.
"Arghh! There be Mooslems on the Starboard, and Mooslems on the Portside, and the Crows Nest is filled with little Mooslems, too! Hargggh! Ezra, raise the Jolly Roger! Er, Ezra, I meant the Flag, the flag! Aghhh!"
Re: Mohamed Elmasry's English skills. The person that translated the Macleans magazine for him could do the job in a debate. He must have gone out of his way be insulted.
Having lived in Canada 50 years, the only time I've read Macleans is when the car needs a new muffler!
Johnny Maudlin asked at 9:41 a.m. on May 7, "Be it resolved, are Muslims intending to take over Western society?"
Be it acknowledged, Muslims are intending to take over the WORLD.
They won't, though. The Lord Jesus rules the world.
Can't secular humanists understand that many Christians and Muslims believe their respective religions just as sincerely as secular humanists do theirs?
Wow, is this the WK fan club room or something ?
Or are all the comments written by WK himself ?
Steyn decimated the 'law students' last night.. and rightly so.. he would decimate WK as well.. WK might even be reduced to bringing out a pink dinosaur.
wudjab have you checked the url?
given you have stated in the past that you are in agreement with steyn that the human rights complaint against Macleans should not have been pursued, what exactly would you debate about?
I read on Wells' site that Steyn stood off camera and heckled the students until he was brought into the discussion. I missed the show...did that really happen?
You know I think Steyn doesn't truly hate Muslims. I think he's just decided to take a bad-cop inflamatory roll in the public discourse against those (clerics particularly) radical theocratic Muslims (a small minority with a large megaphone). He's literally a reactionary in action. The three Osgoode students acquitted themselves fairly well and I think Steyn fulfills a function of getting "moderate modern" Muslims to speak out and say "that radicalism doesn't represent us and we can't all be smeared with the same brush." It's too bad the media doesn't go out of it's way to pro-actively find people like this and just wait until someone inflammatory calls them out...
Say what you will about Steyn being a high school drop out, but the man is a brilliant theater critic. I'm not sure if he measures up to P.J. O'Rourke as a political humorist, but as a Canadian political pundit, I believe he'll be remembered as Canada's H.L. Mencken, a man who effectively demolished the myth of Canadian exceptionalism. His healthy sense of iconoclasm was a real breath of fresh air in the pages of Macleans and The National Post, and if he disappears from the Canadian media scene, it'll be a real loss.
Warren:
You don't have the GUTS to debate Steyn, and you don't have the intelligence, either.
To boot, you don't have the GUTS to post this.
I actually think the better and more relevant debate would be between Ezra Levant or Johnathon Kay and yourself Warren.
Steyn and Macleans have a specific difference with the 3 and Dr Elmasery.
The battle between yourself and the other two over the limits of free speech as a broader issue is more relevant.
So might I propose Johnathon Kay and Ezra Levant on one side and youself and Bernie Farber.
Broader topic, more relevant "combatents".....I thnk thats a better match...The Debate on Hate.....
Stephen - interesting idea, but I've already been named in at least one of the Statements of Defence being filed on behalf of that crew.
Steyn and I, however, have no such impediment. And, again, I can't possibly see him being afraid of me, in a forum hosted by the Public Policy Forum.
He is, after all, the great man of letters, and would make short work of me.
The TVO debate was interesting, even riveting in places. Steyn appeared to be almost agitated, really anxious to get it on with these young Muslim law students. And the kids looked exactly like...kids. A bit breathless, but Steyn absolutely did NOT wipe any floor with anybody.
The argument broke this way:
- the students demanded to be given equal time to deliver their main points uninterupted, and then they were willing to sit across from Steyn. Further the students insist that Steyn is misrepresenting their action, which is a human rights complaint and not a lawsuit.
- Steyn insists on representing the thing as a battle to the death for his right to free speech. The students claim that Steyn, with his writings, has exposed a group (Muslims) to hate by suggesting Muslims, as a group, are a danger to western and European civilizations as we know them.
The students made their points, as did Steyn. Steyn is an entertaining speaker, sometimes quite funny, and there is not question he is feeling strongly about the material. Whether he "hates" Muslims or not is impossible to discern, I think.
He repeats that he holds western civilization responsible, by default, for its own decline. Basically he says we cannot be bothered to reproduce, and Muslims can be bothered to reproduce, so on this basis we are doomed to be praying three times a day. That's two times too many for many, six days a week.
Here is why a debate between Steyn and Kinsella would be highly entertaining and perhaps very important:
- Both of them are entertaining and capable public speakers, both able to "perform" before an audience
- Kinsella, like Steyn, is more than able to utilize aggression, if needed, to score points in a one on one back and forth. Kinsella is able to respond to Steyn's habit of disarming his opponents with one-liners by tossing out one-liners of his own.
Steyn, as a matter of fact, IS intimidated by Kinsella, and I dare say Kinsella may be a little intimidated by Steyn, so that could make for a focused and passionate debate....
Finally: the question. Without a clear question and a skilled moderator this debate would not be productive. There is not much point in arguing whose statistics are correct. There IS much point in debating what those statistics MEAN!
You are damn right. He would make short work of you, and he wouldn't have to be that great to do it.
You see, Steyn happens to be correct
on this topic.
Well, golly, Mr. Courageous Anonymous Drive-by Smear Person, then why won't he agree to the debate?
Does he prefer to consort with kids?
(I could make all kinds of remarks about THAT possibility, naturally, but that sort of puerile horseshit is Mark Steyn's specialty, not mine.)
TVO has the Mark Steyn episode up at their web site.
After watching it I'm left with the distinct impression those law students don't like Canada, despite two of them being landed immigrants who made a pledge to honour Canada and her traditions like free speech.
It's sad that people who come here can't leave their baggage behind and try to get along better with ordinary Canadians.
If anything, they showed how thin skinned and unwordly they are given the facts at hand that form the basis of Steyn's book.
Dr. Elmasry should come out of the shadows and speak for himself instead of using those law students as surrogates for his cause.
"pompous windbag"
I'd like to introduce you two,
Kettle, meet Pot,
Pot, meet Kettle.
Go get 'em Warren.
I'd debate the guy myself but the moderators would probably want me to wear pants.
You go Warren!
Since you're itching for a fight, and since you appear not to be getting any takers:
I would be delighted to debate you on the issue of gas taxes and gas prices, as you seem to believe it'd be a smart idea for the Liberals to run on a platform of reducing gas prices.
If you're game, name the venue and I'll be there.
Cheers,
Mike
Good!
Post a copy of your letter too.
Remember though, dangling a stuffed dinosaur might not cut it this time.
Mark-Alan Whittle said "After watching it I'm left with the distinct impression those law students don't like Canada, despite two of them being landed immigrants who made a pledge to honour Canada and her traditions like free speech."
Since when are landed immigrants required to make a pledge or take an oath?
"I believe he'll be remembered as Canada's H.L. Mencken, a man who effectively demolished the myth of Canadian exceptionalism."
I thought that was Peter Brimelow.
Oh wait, no one remembers him, even though his heyday was a mere 20 years ago. Steyn's notoriety will be equally ephemeral.
Poor Simon Fleischman, one of his assertions crushed today, two more to follow shortly...
Warren: I'm not sure what this animus towards Steyn is all about. He is a very talented writer, insightful,and very funny - easily the most entertaining columnist around. I have journalist friends who don't share his general outlook but nonetheless admire his writing. Your observation that he calls the Chinese "chinks" etc. are straight out of the political playbook. To anyone looking over the his columns cited in your references it's clear that he's speaking either in irony or send-up mode. The drive-by smear using someone's words taken out of context is ok in a political campaign, but I hope that's not what this is on your part, since there is a legitimate and serious issue of public policy at stake. OK - so he has a problem with a section of the Canadian Human Rights Act which is so broadly written as to become an instrument of censorship and prosecution, involving processes featuring none of the usual safeguards that would be part of due process in a court of law. It's not just Steyn that has issues with this. Even the guy who is considered the father of Human Rights Commissions in Canada (his name escapes) has expressed serious concern with the way the mandate of these tribunals have come to interpreted. Others - from Keith Martin to Rex Murphy to the editorial boards of various newspapers have expressed similar concerns. No one is arguing that hate speech laws should be repealed. No one is saying the Ernest Zundels of the country are being hard done by. The issue is the broad wording of the CHRAct and its still broader interpretation by quasi-judicial bodies that aren't bounds by the normal safeguards of courts of law. Isn't this in itself a human rights issue? Shouldn't people accused of breaking laws have the normal rights associated with common law? I don't understand why you don't think so. The fact that Richard Warman may be a friend of yours (I'm assuming) is hardly a principled basis for your views. I can also understand that the time you spent with the lunatic fringe when you were researching your book may have filled you with a lasting disgust of their ilk, such that you may consider any and all means of going after these guys to be justified. But at some point people need to step back and temper emotional commitments with rational assessment. There are hate laws in place that allow us to go after the real bastards. Do we really need HR Commissions to run people out of town because they've offended someone's sensibilities?
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