Silencing opponents because you can

Jewish World Review ^ | Jan. 31, 2003 | Michael Long

[SJackson]

There is a scary trend on the left just now, and it's scarier than the standard battles over Social Security, gun control, abortion, etc. Members of the left, even those who are welcomed inside respectable mainstream party politics, are actively working to silence those with whom they disagree, and they don't care that this is a fundamental violation of not just the Constitution, but the human right to freedom of speech as well.

We're accustomed to the Democrats' looking the other way when Al Sharpton, Jesse Jackson, and Cynthia McKinney start up their paranoid and fact-free race baiting. But the blind-eye syndrome is spreading a lot more lately: Hillary Clinton recently blasphemed Martin Luther King by saying his "I Have A Dream" speech should be updated to note that, well, no, in fact, we shouldn't be judged just by the content of our character, because race is a part of character. Her bizarre assertion is obviously anathema to the very words King spoke. But no one on the left did anything but nod in agreement.

One troubling phenomenon grows because it gets little media coverage, the shouting down or "disinviting" of speakers altogether from college campuses, and related harassment not just of opponents, but even of those who question leftist orthodoxy from inside the left.

One case in point is described in a lengthy letter from the editor in Psychology Today, brought to wider attention by Rod Dreher of National Review. The author, Dr. Robert Epstein, who is editor-in-chief of the magazine, received a harassing phone call at his home and 120 letters threatening a massive boycott of the publication. Why? The advertising department of the magazine accepted a tiny ad for a book on "reparative therapy," which in some cases seems to diminish homosexual tendencies for those who seek out such a change.

The therapy is widely derided and misrepresented by its opponents. It is, however, a form of treatment with serious adherents in the medical and scholarly communities, and it is recognized by the American Psychological Association.

But many of Dr. Epstein's correspondents didn't bother with those facts. They couldn't even get the editor's alleged offense right. They accused him of everything from publishing an anti-gay book to running an anti-gay article. They compared him to the Taliban and called him a Nazi, and, a "surprising number of letters asserted that gays have a right to be rude or abusive because they themselves have been abused."

This is a despicable approach-and the failure to denounce it is just as bad. But instead of distancing themselves from this dirty episode, look for the cultural left to sit by quietly, and appreciate whatever damage it does to their enemies, executed "by any means necessary."

Elsewhere, JWR's Daniel Pipes, the Middle East expert who soldiers on in the face of near-violent confrontation with the anti-Israel left, was recently the target of the ironically named "Coalition for Academic Freedom."

Continued........

[harpseal]

If anyone doubts that the entire Bill of Rights would be totally trashed by the Liberals let them look at how they treat the speech of their opponents. Liberals have long been trying to abolish the Second Ammendment and supporters of the Decond asked if the First would be far behind. With their attempts to silence their opponets we now can see clearly that there is no personal liberty these new guardians of our fate would allow to remain.

[fporretto]

Mike Long is spot-on here. In his diagnosis, he illuminates the exact reason why America no longer has anything resembling a real political dialogue:

One side cannot argue. It knows that both the evidence and logic are against it.

A lot of rice bowls are endangered by the continuing conservative resurgence. People don't allow their careers and reputations, to say nothing of their emotional and social capital, to be shorn from them without a fight. And if they can't fight fair, a distressing fraction of them will fight dirty.

Be ready, my friends. Be well-informed, thoughtful, and secure in your convictions. If it's right, it doesn't matter how many people think otherwise.

"Any man more right than his neighbors constitutes a majority of one." -- Henry David Thoreau.

Freedom, Wealth, and Peace,
Francis W. Porretto
Visit The Palace Of Reason:
http://palaceofreason.com

[sheik yerbouty]

They're the children of Stalin.

[StopThePress]

Did Hillary really make this proposal (to change King's speech)? I would LOVE to see a link to that quote.

[StopThePress]

You have a bit of a problem mam - the Jewish World Review happens to represent a strong opinion has some influence on how Jews vote when it comes election time. The dems cannot afford to continue an errosion in their "base" . . . and this just adds more fuel to the fire. Hack on over at DU.

[oyez]

We'll have an execellent opportunity in 2004 when the 94 'Assault Weapon' Ban comes up for re-auth

We'd better not loose any time due to the fact one of the biggest news events last year was the snipers and ther AR-15. I wouldn't mind my prebans loosing a little value for some more realistic legislation, though.

[Billthedrill]

Nat Hentoff is one of my favorite lefties - in Free Speech For Me But Not For Thee he addresses this tendency of the left for insistence on lockstep adherence to the party line. One of the enduring conundrums of liberal (in the old sense) democracy is how to insist on free speech for all and still protect against those who take advantage of that for themselves in pursuit of enough power to deny it to others. The commonest manifestation of this is the notion that some folks are "freer" than others and that for them free speech includes shouting down dissent. It isn't much of a stretch, really, for people for whom the meanings of words are infinitely plastic and subordinate to an overweening political agenda, not nearly so much as redefining "speech," for example, to burning flags and to taking off one's clothing and pouring chocolate over oneself. As it is today in the United States.

[Quix]

GREAT POST.

THANKS.

[gcruse]

Okay. Liberals are bad for the First Amendment--except for separation of Church and State, which Conservatives like to trash. And yes, liberals don't like the Second. But take a look at the Tenth and see what Conservatives are complicit in destroying. The Consitution is in safe hands with neither major party.