Category: Illiberal Left

Recommended readings on evolutionary psychology

February 17, 2020 • 12:45 pm

I’m still a bit under the weather with an incipient cold, but I’m taking zinc lozenges, which do have some science behind them supporting the claim that zinc shortens the duration and severity of colds. At any rate, since I’ve used them I haven’t had a full-on cold for several years. (A confounding factor: I also wash my hands a lot more.) All this is by way of explaining why I don’t have the energy to brain today.

But I will call your attention to three articles on evolutionary psychology that you may want to read.

About 15 years ago, I was known as a critic of evolutionary psychology, mainly because, along with Andrew Berry, I went after what I saw as bad science promulgated in a book about rape being an adaptation (see also here; copy of my New Republic piece available through judicious inquiry). In those pieces, I made a few disparaging comments about the weakness of evolutionary psychology in general, and so we were off to the races, with radio shows and newspapers all wanting to interview me about rape and evoutionary psychology.

Since then I’ve modified my views about evolutionary psychology, mainly because I’ve tried to educate myself about the discipline. Yes, it’s often a purview of adaptive storytelling, but it’s not all like that; and the field has not only matured, but come up with testable hypothesis about the evolutionary roots of human behaviors, including parental care and sexual behavior. I won’t get into all this today, but you can see an excellent critique of evolutionary-psychology denialism in Steve Piner’s book The Blank Slate.

Now I’ve become somewhat of a critic of the critics, for opposition to evolutionary psychology is often motivated more by ideology than by purely scientific considerations. Blank-slateism is the default position of many on the Left, who simply try to deny science if it’s ideologically inconvenient. That includes not just evolutionary psychology, which has been characterized by some as a completely worthless field, but also any kind of sex difference, or, indeed, the absence of discrete sexes themselves.

The idea that evolutionary psychology is scientifically bankrupt baffles me. If we’re willing to accept that, say, differences between male and female bodies reflects selection in our ancestors, why shouldn’t differences in our behaviors and psychologies also reflect that kind of selection? Yes, I know that there’s culture that affects behavior, and that we shouldn’t blithely assume that every difference we see in mentation reflects natural selection in the past (I’m not that dumb), but there are some hypotheses, like the profligate sexual desires of males versus the choosiness of females, that are not only repeatable, but predicted from our biology and, what’s more, observed in other animals. It would be a remarkable coincidence indeed if such differences between the sexes were evolutionary in other species, but purely the result of socialization in H. sapiens—and yet the behaviors were similar.

But I digress, and am a bit feverish. Here are three reads for you today, the first being this good article from last August in Areo.The author is Laith al-Shawaf, an assistant professor of psychology at the University of Colorado Colorado Springs.  It’s not ideological, but simply collects the main misconceptions and then attempts to refute them (largely successfully, I might add).

This is my “favorite” misconception, because it’s the one that you see non-biologists using most often when they want to take down evolutionary psychology. I haven’t read all the papers cited, but so be it.

Misconception 6: Evolutionary Psychologists Think That Everything is an Adaptation

This canard just won’t die—though it is tenable only if you read misinformed critiques rather than the actual primary literature in the field.

In their published writing, evolutionary psychologists frequently state explicitly that evolution yields three kinds of products: adaptations, byproducts and noise. Beyond this theoretical statement, researchers also propose hypotheses about byproducts and conduct studies on byproducts.

For example, here, here and here are three conceptual papers that explicitly reject the notion that all aspects of our psychology are adaptations. This paper on adaptations, exaptations and spandrels explicitly discusses byproducts at length. This paper thoughtfully addresses the question of how to carry out an exaptationist program in psychology. Here is an excellent study suggesting that racism is an evolutionary byproduct, not an adaptation, and that it can be erased. Here is a paper suggesting that the higher prevalence of sexual fetishism among men is a byproduct of their easier-to-cross thresholds of sexual arousal combined with their biased sexual learning mechanisms. Here is an example of two prominent evolutionary psychologists claiming that homicide is a byproduct, not an adaptation, and here are the same two researchers (along with a third co-author) claiming that uxoricide and filicide are also byproducts. Here, here and here are examples of researchers explaining religion and belief in supernatural agents as a byproduct of other mechanisms, such as agency-detection mechanisms that are biased toward false positives, theory of mind mechanisms and the attachment system. My colleagues and I recently submitted a chapter titled “The Products of Evolution” to a new handbook of evolutionary psychology, and, unsurprisingly, byproducts are a central part of the chapter.

The disparity between this criticism of evolutionary psychology and what evolutionary psychologists actually say in their published work is remarkable. The only reason it isn’t surprising is that there are many other examples of misrepresentations of the field—you can find some good examples of such misrepresentations here, here, here and here. . . .

Item #2. Colin Wright, who co-wrote the article on the sex “binary” in the Wall Street Journal that I recently mentioned, also had a related piece in Quillette about sixteen months ago. It’s more ideological, and deals with both Leftist criticisms of evolutionary psychology and their claim that the notion of men and women as distinct sexes is a social construct not supported by biology. I highlighted this 2018 article at length in an earlier post, but if you haven’t read it, I recommend it again. (Click on screenshot.) Finally, here’s a fairly new paper (a year old) that summarizes “psychological” differences between men and women, with an eye to explaining them as products of evolution. I have mixed feelings about this one: the stuff on sexual behavior is good, but that on other traits, like the greater “visuospatial ability” of men than of women (i.e., men better at mentally rotating objects and remembering the location of objects), is much weaker, with the differences falling into the category of “unsubstantiated adaptive stories.” Still,  as a summary of the literature on sex differences in psychology, be they evolutionary, cultural, or a combination, it’s a good resource. And access is free (click on screenshot):

Time for another zinc lozenge (75 mg/day)!

What’s the difference between identity politics and older movements for gay rights, women’s rights, and civil rights?

September 26, 2018 • 1:15 pm

If you’re like me and abhor discrimination against gays, women, or ethnic minorities, and have worked for their equality in the past—and yet are also uncomfortable with “identity politics”—you need to do some hard thinking. Why is it okay to be in favor of all the “rights” movements I just mentioned, yet not be in favor of the kind of identity politics that claims, for example, that blacks can’t be racists and women can’t be sexists? Or that people like Ben Shapiro must be censored but people like Linda Sarsour are heroes.  Is it a false distinction, and we’re really reverting to conservatism in our dotage, or is there a real difference between being liberal and espousing identity politics? I’ve discussed this before, and feel that one can sensibly support the liberal causes given above while decrying the identity politics beloved by many Leftists—and increasingly infecting mainstream liberal media like The New Yorker and The New York Times.

The best discussion of the difference I’ve seen between identity politics and classical liberalism, with the latter favoring equal rights, treatment, and opportunities for all, is discussed in the article below by Helen Pluckrose and James Lindsay, just published in Areo (click on screenshot). This is a must-read piece.

The difference between liberal egalitarianism and identity politics rests, as I’ve said, on the difference between striving for universal rights and striving for narrower group rights that aren’t subsumed in a larger agenda. The former is the task of classical liberalism; the latter of identity politics which, in contrast to the liberal agenda, is divisive.

Let’s see what Pluckrose and Lindsay say about the difference. (Their premise, which is supported quite well, is that identity politics is an extension of postmodernism that claims simultaneously that there is no objective truth but then bases its politics on the objective reality of minority groups and of the oppression of some groups by others. I’ve collected a few quotes (indented) under three topics, but you really should read their whole piece.

What is liberalism and how does it differ from identity politics?

It is vital to distinguish between universal liberalism and identity politics and recognize what they share in common alongside how they differ. Both see and oppose inequality and seek to remedy it, but they do so with very different conceptions of society and use different approaches. These differences matter. Universal liberalism focuses on individuality and shared humanity and seeks to achieve a society in which every individual is equally able to access every right, freedom, and opportunity that our shared societies provide. Identity politics focuses explicitly on group identity and seeks political empowerment by promoting that group as a monolithic, marginalized entity distinct from and polarized against another group depicted as a monolithic privileged entity.

. . . The Civil Rights Movement, second-wave liberal feminism, and Gay Pride functioned explicitly on these values of universal human rights and did so to forward the worth of the individual regardless of status of race, gender, sex, sexuality, or other markers of identity. They proceeded by appealing directly to universal human rights applying universally. They demanded that people of color, women, and sexual minorities no longer be discriminated against and treated as second class citizens. They insisted that within a liberal society that makes good on its promises to its citizens, everyone should be given the full range of rights, freedoms, and opportunities.

Pluckrose and Lindsay then cite the work of Kimberlé Crenshaw, an architect of critical race theory, to underscore the difference between classical liberalism and identity politics:

Crenshaw explicitly rejected universality, at least in the political context in which she wrote, and intersectional feminists and critical race theorists have continued to do so. She wrote:

We all can recognize the distinction between the claims “I am Black” and the claim “I am a person who happens to be Black.” “I am Black” takes the socially imposed identity and empowers it as an anchor of subjectivity. “I am Black” becomes not simply a statement of resistance but also a positive discourse of self-identification, intimately linked to celebratory statements like the Black nationalist “Black is beautiful.” “I am a person who happens to be Black,” on the other hand, achieves self-identification by straining for a certain universality (in effect, “I am first a person”) and for a concommitant dismissal of the imposed category (“Black”) as contingent, circumstantial, nondeterminant.

Within this framework, far from becoming irrelevant socially, gender and race are the sites of political activism.

What are the dangers of identity politics? Pluckrose and Lindsay identify three problems.

The problems with the identity politics approach are:

  • Epistemological: It relies on highly dubious social constructivist theory and consequently produces heavily biased readings of situations.
  • Psychological: Its sole focus on identity is divisive, reduces empathy between groups, and goes against core moral intuitions of fairness and reciprocity.
  • Social: By failing to uphold principles of non-discrimination consistently, it threatens to damage or even undo social taboos against judging people by their race, gender, or sexuality.

By relying so heavily on social constructivist perceptions of society—which sees it in terms of hierarchies of power perpetuated in discourse and on lived experience—as an authoritative form of identity-based knowledge that cannot be disagreed with by anyone outside that group, identity politics feeds, legitimates, and builds upon itself. Because it starts with the assumption that a power imbalance characterizes any interaction between people seen as having a privileged identity and people seen as having a marginalized identity and assumes that this can be shown by interpreting the language of the privileged through this lens and regarding the perception of the marginalized as authoritative, it is prone to highly ideologically motivated confirmation bias.

As for the dubious claim that sexism and racism instantiate a combination of power and privilege rather than bigotry alone, they say this:

It is generally a terrible idea to have different rules of behavior dependent on identity because it goes against the most common sense of fairness and reciprocity which seems to be pretty hardwired. It is also antithetical to universal liberalism and precisely the opposite of what civil rights movements fought to obtain. Identity politics which argues that prejudice against white people and men is acceptable while prejudice against people of color and women is not do still work on a sense of fairness, equality, and reciprocity but it is reparative. It attempts to restore a balance by “evening the score” a little, particularly thinking historically.

I suspect it is this kind of hypocrisy—this “it’s okay when we do it” attitude—that rankles many of us about identity politics. I don’t think ‘reparative’ in itself is a bad way to think, as we need to restore people’s equality by addressing historical inequities, like the poorer schools available in inner-city neighborhoods. But that’s not the same as a form of retribution embodied in the constant demonization of those less oppressed.

What is to be done? Easier said than done, according to Lindsay and Pluckrose. What’s easy is to simply reject this kind of attitude and work for universal rights and a consistent standard of rights that applies to everyone. That’s easy to say, and that’s what I’ve been doing here for years, but what’s hard is that realizing that such a stand leaves you open to accusations of racism and sexism. And those words are anathema to all liberals. Still, we should be willing to tolerate the slurs and the accusations that we’re “alt-righters” if we’re to uphold classical liberal values. As Pluckrose and Lindsay say:

There is a need for liberals of all kinds to push back against the identity politics approach. If we really value principles of not judging people by their race, gender, or sexuality, we must value them consistently. If we want to continue the work of the civil rights movements, we must recognize that identity politics are not doing that, are not working, and may even be undermining the good they achieved. And we must recognize that this originates with and is aided and abetted by Social Justice scholarship, rooted in postmodernism, and diversified into many forms of grievance studies.

We need to call for a more rigorous approach to social justice issues. This should be one which does not rely on a belief in a society dominated by systems of power and privilege perpetuated in discourse, utilizes highly ideologically motivated confirmation bias as an interpretive technique, or regards lived experience interpreted in this way to be authoritative.

. . . Society simply works much better when different segments of it are able to empathize with each other, recognize how much they have in common, and form their relationships, personal and intellectual, with others based on their individual traits, interests, and shared goals. There is very little reason to assume that the people who will understand you best and share your interests and goals will have the same skin color, the same genitalia or gender identity, or the same sexuality. People of all races, genders, and sexualities are intellectually and ideologically diverse. Those who speak authoritatively of “women’s experiences” or ask one to “listen to people of color/trans people” are attempting to constrain individuals from those groups to one specific ideology and conception of society. This is not acceptable, and it certainly isn’t liberal.

. . . Universality does not require assuming that racism, sexism, or homophobia does not exist. Neither does it assume that there is no work left to do to oppose these problems and defend vulnerable racial or religious minorities, protect women’s reproductive freedom, and hold on to LGBT rights. When the need to do all of those things is presented in terms of universal human rights and fairness, it will find much more support than when it is presented in terms of incomprehensible theory, irrationalism, biased interpretations of interactions, cruel irony, demands for reparative justice, and abandonment of the principle of non-discrimination against people by identity markers.

h/t: Grania

Bill Maher indicts the liberal thought-and-language police for Democratic losses

January 28, 2017 • 1:30 pm

This segment of Bill Maher’s “Real Time”, which was published yesterday, blames Democratic election losses on the party’s having gone “from the party that protects people to the party that protects feelings.” Well, I’m not so sure I agree, but it’s a funny piece nonetheless.

h/t: Barry

Dan Arel goes full regressive: accuses “classical liberals” (i.e., me) of “normalizing white nationalism”

January 27, 2017 • 8:30 am

I recently reported that Dan Arel, atheist author and blogger, had justified the sucker-punching of white supremacist Richard Spencer in Washington, D.C., basically saying that it’s okay to punch racists (he called Spencer a “Nazi,” which he’s not). My position is that it’s never okay to use violence against those whose ideas we dislike—unless they use it against you first and you act in self defense.

Incredibly, Arel has expanded his list of Nazis and white supremacists to include “classical liberals,” who are said to include Dave Rubin—and me! In a bizarre post on his website called “How classical liberals helped normalize white nationalism and elect Donald Trump,” Arel takes the position that those of us who favor unrestricted freedom of speech (by that I mean speech that doesn’t incite immediate violence or constitute harassment in the workplace), as well as those of us who oppose the incursion of postmodernism into academic or intellectual discourse, are all not only white nationalists, but also helped elect Donald Trump.

Arel’s thrashings and flailings, in a piece that’s also poorly written, remind me of nothing other than the behavior of a fighting bull that has been goaded by a picador, looking around madly for someone to attack. What’s gored him is apparently the election of Donald Trump, and he apparently has to blame that on somebody. Never mind blaming it on the apathetic Democrats who didn’t come out to vote for Clinton, or on the working-class whites who didn’t respond to the Democratic message. Arel wants to pin it on “classical liberals”. It was we, says Arel, who allowed Milo Yiannopoulus to spew his message of hate! It was we who attacked gender-studies programs in colleges! It was we who tar the entire left as “regressive”, while aligning ourselves with the Right and “white nationalism” on all but a few issues.  And that, he claims, has played directly into the hands of Trump supporters. Before I start masticating the meat of Arel’s argument (which is actually thin gruel), I want to make three points:

  • Arel’s claim that free speech leads to fascism is not only rank intellectual laziness, but betrays him as willfully ignorant of history. There are several well-studied and documented “causes” of fascism, none of which have anything to do with a society fostering the open exchange of ideas.
  • It would be convenient for Arel if everyone who was critical of censorship and thuggery was a Nazi-sympathizing fascist, as he claims. But his flailing and disingenuous hand-waving do not make it so.
  • Arel’s attempt to smear atheists and non-regressive Leftists as “white nationalists” and “Trump supporters” is a transparent attempt to make his readers ignore criticism of his own positions. By calling others names, he conveniently doesn’t have to defend his own positions.

Here, as far as I can make them out, are Arel’s claims. They’re all in support of his thesis that “left-wing” atheists are actually white nationalists who helped get Trump elected, stated below:

The so-called alt-right white nationalists have seemingly infected every fabric of American culture, no thanks in part to the media insistence on normalizing such a movement. Unfortunately, the atheist community, one that readily prides itself on rational thought, has not been immune to such infection, and many of the loudest voices have fought to not only normalize but also help amplify the voices of white nationalism.

Arel’s points:

Defending people’s rights to speak, including Yiannopolous’s, is not defending free speech, because people like him have no right to a platform.  My position has consistently been that anyone invited to a University or other venue properly should be allowed to speak without interruption or cancellation, though nobody has an absolute right to be invited. Nevertheless, given the prevalence of right-wing, pro-Israel, pro-Palestinian, and other diverse student groups on campus, it’s inevitable that speakers will be invited with whom some (or many) disagree. If you don’t want to hear them, don’t go. Or, have counter-talks, or demonstrate outside the talk, or write some pieces for the student newspaper. There are also question-and-answer sesssions if you want to have direct discourse.

As for Yiannopoulos, my dislike for most of his views has been on display here for a while, and I rebuked him for calling out a transgender student at the University of Wisconsin at Milwaukee. Despite that, Arel says this:

Professor-emeritus and author of Faith vs. Fact, Jerry Coyne of the University of Chicago attacked this petition and accused the left of suppressing Yiannopoulos’ free speech rights. Of course, Yiannopoulos has a right to his hate speech, but he does not have a right to a university stage, and the school has a responsibility to protect its students. Had the government shown up and arrested Yiannopoulos for such speech, Coyne would have a case. Instead, Coyne and others on his side are only giving rise to voices like Yiannopoulos’ and doing nothing to defend the people being harassed.

Coyne was satisfied with Yiannopoulos merely agreeing to not mock students again and not actually paying a price for his actions. Yet those students who feared the damage Yiannopoulos to other students was brushed off by Coyne as regressive and anti-free speech. This view is hypocritical.

I’m wondering what price Arel expects Yiannopoulos to pay for his actions. Milo’s churlish singling out of a transgender student surely cut down on the number of his invitations, for that looked bad to many people. Does Arel want Milo to be punched?

Further, Arel makes the serious mistake of saying that a violation of free speech occurs only when the government shuts somebody up. That’s not the case. Violations occur whenever somebody has a legal right to speak in a public place but then is not allowed to speak. On college campuses, that involves either blockading a venue or disrupting a speech so severely that the speaker can’t continue. And it doesn’t just happen to Yiannopoulos: Maryam Namazie experienced this same kind of suppression when she tried to speak about reforming Islam in Britain.

We free-speech advocates try to deny free speech to those whose views we don’t like.

Arel says this:

When Yiannopoulos recently signed a $250,000 book deal with Simon & Schuster, many on the left, including celebrities such as comedian Sarah Silverman and director Judd Apatow called for the publisher to abandon the book deal. In response to this, atheist Michael Shermer called the duo “Milo haters,” and asked when they would be holding a “book burning.” All calls for boycotts became “regressive” leftist extremism and Yiannopoulos’ racism, bigotry, and hate was again defended the loudest by classic liberalists.

The classicists defend “free speech” at every turn unless it’s speech they disagree with. Yiannopoulos, in their view, must be given this book deal, a university platform, and be left to spread his hate without consequence. However, the second you speak up, using your own free speech, you’re attacked and silenced as the enemy.

This new hypocritical brand of atheism is void [sic] of critical thinking. It is void [sic] of compassion. It is completely void [sic] of any sense of humanism. It holds nothing but unquestioned contempt for the left while marching goose-step with the right, turning a blind eye to the bigotry they claim to disavow.

Like that goose-step analogy? Think it’s accidental? Well, that aside, whoever said that Yiannopoulos has to be given book deals or university platforms? A company agreed to publish his book, and if you don’t like what he says or writes, don’t read it. But don’t ban it, either. As for university platforms, well, if some student group wants to invite Milo, and he accepts, then trying to ban him or shut him down is indeed a violation of free speech. I will defend anyone’s right to speak under those circumstances, whether or not I like what they say. When have I ever urged censorship of anyone? Throughout the article, Arel’s characterizations of my positions can charitably called lies.

And there’s this:

It would rather align itself with those Hillary Clinton referred to as “deplorables” simply because they share an equal hatred of Islam, and feminism, rather than align themselves with the left, which has been responsible for the decades of forward progress in the US.

Umm. . . I voted for Clinton and have always despised Trump. On the Rubin show, I said I considered myself a liberal and as someone on the Left, and had always voted Democratic. Arel goes on:

They [Rubin, I, and our minions, apparently] strawman the very idea of “safe spaces” claiming its leftist liberals begging to be coddled in school, refusing or caring not to listen that these are nothing but the same “spaces” we see in Alcoholics Anonymous, or even at private atheist meetings or gatherings.

Instead of listening to these reasonable demands, they attack and mock them. They welcome white nationalist speakers on campus and complain if students try and stop it, telling them to protest instead, and in turn, complain when they turn out in protest, accusing them of trying to live in a bubble and being an enemy of the free exchange of ideas.

I have listened to these demands, winnowed the reasonable ones from the unreasonable ones (not all are reasonable!) and explained why. I welcome all speakers on campus if they’ve been properly invited, and my complaints are not against protesting those speakers, but when those students try to “stop it,” i.e., shut down such speakers. Again, I’ve encouraged those who oppose speakers to picket, ask questions during the Q&A sessions, stage counterspeeches, and argue in the public forums. I have not argued that such protests should not occur (though I think they’re sometimes misguided), but only that their intent cannot be to prevent someone from speaking.

Apparently Arel is the one who’s in favor of censorship, approving of the punching of Spencer, apparently agreeing that publishers should abandon book deals if people protest their hate speech, and urging people to deny Yiannopoulos a platform to speak, even after he’s been invited. Remember, too, that Arel approved of Richard Spencer’s being sucker-punched, which is not only violence but also an attack on free speech. If you want to read two very nice pieces by free-speech lawyers about why we shouldn’t approve of such violence, or of shutting down “hate speech”, see these two articles.

“On punching Nazis,” by Ken White at the Popehat site. One excerpt:

“Applying social and legal norms about punching or prosecuting people based on speech shouldn’t be confused for treating all speech as equivalent. All speech isn’t equivalent. Nazis are scum. They don’t support the social or legal norms in question and in fact support killing people based on skin color, religion, or disagreement. Saying they are scum, and that their speech is qualitatively different than other speech, and that they ought to be shunned and reviled, is not the same as punching or prosecuting them. It is a good thing to identify Nazis as scum and treat them – socially and rhetorically — accordingly.”

“Defend Donald Trump’s right to free speech” by Marc Randazza on CNN. And one excerpt from that:

“It is a fair opinion to think Trump’s speech is offensive, problematic, or hateful. But, the First Amendment requires neither tact nor politeness. It requires that we permit all views to set up stalls in the marketplace of ideas, and we let that marketplace decide which ideas prevail. That is why it is called “the marketplace of ideas,” not “the marketplace of gangs beating each other up.”

Would Trump similarly stand up for the rights of others? I doubt it. But that is not the point.

If you don’t stand up for Trump’s liberty today, someone may come for yours tomorrow

If we believe in free speech, we need to believe in Trump’s as well.”

The regressive norms about speech adhered to by people like Arel will (and have been) used against those who encourage them. For instance, if the person who punched Spencer were black (he wasn’t), could he be prosecuted for a “hate crime” against whites? It’s not inconceivable.

Nobody, including Arel, should set themselves up as arbiters of what is “good” speech and what is “hate” speech that is okay to censor.  No speech should be censored, for the free exchange of ideas is designed to lead to the victory for the best ideas. That this is true is demonstrated by the advance of moral thought is a free society (in the U.S., for instance, civil rights, women’s rights, gay rights, including marriage), and the lack of such advances in societies where discussion is prohibited or criminalized.

Decrying postmodern gibberish and extreme regressive leftism (e.g. excusing Muslim-based misogyny) is an offense to social justice and aligns the critics with white nationalism.

Arel thinks that my mockery of postmodernism, especially in gender studies, amounts to a critique of feminism itself. In fact, he contradicts himself below by saying that we atheist fascists do indeed support women’s rights, but yet we “mock gender-studies”. And look what I’ve put in bold!

These community appointed leaders argue for a further centrist, or a right-of-center libertarian model of government, one they cling to as “classic liberalism.” They break from the right only by supporting women’s rights, same-sex marriage, and a wall between the separation of church and state, yet the join the right in fighting against feminism, progressive social justice, and go as far as to mock gender-studies. Instead of embracing the political left and the strides it has made in those areas of social justice, Rubin, Coyne, and the like, lambaste the left as extremists, while aligning closely with white nationalism.

They give voice to the worst humanity has to offer and work to silence and shame those who stand up against such bigotry. This is because they accuse the entire left of being “regressive.”

There is no contradiction in promoting feminism and, at the same time, mocking the gibberish that comes out of not only gender-studies programs, but other areas of the humanities, including science studies. I am not aware of having written off gender-studies, science studies or other areas of the humanities as a whole; as readers will know, I claim that these areas are infected to greater or lesser degrees with postmodern cant and relativism, and call it out when I see it—as in the notorious “feminist glaciology” study, or academic work on the whiteness of pumpkins or the racism of Pilates.  Such studies are palpable nonsense, and I haven’t particularly concentrated on work coming out of gender-studies programs. Nonsense is nonsense, and a lot of it comes from postmodernism in the humanities. Science itself, which does accept the notion of progress towards truth, isn’t so afflicted.

As for aligning ourselves with “white nationalism”, which I take to mean white supremacy, Arel is simply lying. I’ll speak just for myself when I ask anybody to name one instance when I’ve lambasted the entire left as extremist, or, especially, “aligned closely with white nationalism.”

What we see here is the most classic regressive-Left technique: when you don’t want to deal with someone’s arguments, tar them with the worst epithets you can think of: racist, misogynist, and so on. That puts them beyond the pale, demonizing them to such an extent that one no longer needs to pay attention to what they say. Even on this site a reader will occasionally say that they have written off somebody’s entire oeuvre because of one thing they’ve said. That’s not wise, for everyone sometimes says foolish or invidious things.

 Such tactics have led to the accusation that in fact it is people like Arel, not me, who, through their policing of language and thought, have pushed a lot of disaffected and discouraged people into the Trump camp. As I’ve said, I’m not so sure about that claim, but I bet that accusation has stung people like Arel, leading to his and others’ attempt to throw the blame for Trump on the progressive Left.

I’ve already run on too long, for in truth I don’t think Arel’s slander deserves a response this thorough (and, truth be told, his commenters have kicked his tuchas so hard that he won’t be sitting down for a month), but I want to say one more thing about Dave Rubin. Arel indicts him, as have others, for failing to call out the right-wing views of some of his guests. Arel:

Host of the online talk-show The Rubin Report, Dave Rubin, an outspoken atheist, invites the likes of former Breitbart editor Ben Shapiro, or Breitbart’s controversial Milo Yiannopoulos to speak for hours without offering counter arguments or forcing them to defend their white nationalist and xenophobic ideologies. Instead, Rubin looks for points of agreement and forms bonds. The alt-right, in turn, enjoys Rubin’s large audience to spread their message of hate. Rubin has stated his choice of guests help him push his own agenda, so if one is confused as to why he brings on such voices, it’s because Rubin himself is pushing this same agenda.

Rubin claims to be a champion of the free exchange of ideas, but you’d be hard pressed to find a guest he disagrees with. He goes as far as to blame the left for the election of Donald Trump, accusing the politically correct culture of rallying the right around Trump’s message.

What Rubin ignores is the fact that he gave a megaphone to many of Trump’s loudest supporters, giving rise and credibility to their ideas, empowering the white nationalist movement and bringing them to new audiences. It’s not the left that helped elect Trump, it was racism, sexism, anti-Muslim bigotry, and those who helped raise those voices above the rest.

If you consider who Rubin’s had on, including Sam Harris, Gaad Sad, Milo, Ayaan Hirsi Ali, Lawrence Krauss, Inna Shevchenko, Sarah Haider, and so on, you’d be hard pressed to see these as fitting into any consistent agenda, much less the “alt-right” one or any adherence to “the white nationalist movement” (some of these guests, after all, aren’t white!). Rubin’s model for a talk show is not Jerry Springer, but Larry King, where guests get to simply air their views. Now you may say that Rubin lets some pretty odious views pass uncriticized, but remember that, as he’s always emphasized, he’s drawing out people’s ideas in an attempt to have his audience find a place where both Left and Right can sit on common ground.  It is the division between people, both culturally and politically, that has led to our extremely polarized society. If we’re to fix that, we either have to increase the polarization, and foment a revolution, or try to find compromise within our democracy. Rubin, I think, is engaged in the latter project.

Recommended reading: “The new totalitarians are here” by Tom Nichols on The Federalist (2015).

h/t: Grania

Milo Yiannopoulos talk canceled at University of California at Davis

January 16, 2017 • 10:30 am

Once again, Breitbart editor Milo Yiannopoulos has been prevented from speaking, this time at the university where I did my postdoc: the University of California at Davis.

As CNN reported yesterday:

A speech by right-wing commentator Milo Yiannopoulos’ at UC Davis was over before it even started Friday after protests erupted, forcing sponsors to cancel the event.

Thirty minutes before the Breitbart tech editor was scheduled to speak, the UC Davis College Republicans canceled the controversial talk after consulting with the university’s police department and student affairs officials.

Former pharmaceutical executive, Martin Shkreli had also been scheduled to speak at the event.

“I am deeply disappointed with the events of this evening,” said Interim Chancellor Ralph J. Hexter.

“Our community is founded on principles of respect for all views, even those that we personally find repellent. As I have stated repeatedly, a university is at its best when it listens to and critically engages opposing views, especially ones that many of us find upsetting or even offensive.”

Earlier in the evening, protesters blocked access to the venue. Surrounding the lecture hall with signs, they chanted, “Say it loud, say it clear, racists are not welcome here.”

The implicit idea is not just that Milo is a racist, but also those who want to hear him speak.

Shkreli is the guy who, you may recall, got the rights to manufacture an antiparasitic drug and then raised the price by 56-fold. I have no use for that stuff, but he, too, was invited.

Here’s a video of the protestors:

Note, too, that Milo was invited not by the University, but by (as usual) the College Republicans. I am pleased that the interim Chancellor spoke up in favor of free speech. Yiannopoulos is indeed something of a provocateur, and often says things that I’m not sure even he believes (i.e., “there are no such things a lesbians”), but he also can be serious, provoking discussion about things like feminism, affirmative action, and free speech itself.

Once he’s invited, protestors have every right to picket the venue, but not to shut down an event itself. What we see above are protestors trying to censor speech that they simply don’t like.

In the long run, this will ensure conformity of thought by intimidating those whose thoughts go against the opinion of the majority. And that’s precisely why we have laws protecting freedom of speech.

An editorial in “The Aggie,” the UC Davis student newspaper, is called “Davis college Republicans provide platform for hate speech.” Read it for yourself; it does recount Milo’s unconscionable calling out of a transgender student in Wisconsin (something I decried), but also adds this:

The disclaimer on the event page for Yiannopoulos’ talk states: “[Yiannopoulos] is known for discussing topics, both political or not, that may offend some people but not others.” But the ideas espoused by Yiannopoulos should offend all people — at least, all people with any shred of humanity or decency.

One of those ideas they mention is that we do not live in a “rape culture.” I think that claim is at least worthy of discussion, since the meaning of “rape culture” is not clear, and American culture certainly does not officially condone rape—not by any means. But what bothers me most about the above is that not all of the ideas espoused by Yiannopoulos, such as equity feminism, “should offend all people.” Who can determine which ideas “should offend all people”? And if someone claims that right, do they then have the right to block those espousing such ideas?

A coalition of student groups at the University of Maryland make 64 demands

December 22, 2016 • 1:30 pm

As usual, stories of misbehavior by the Illiberal Left on college campuses come from right-wing sites, and this one comes from CampusReform. It describes a list of 64 demands that different student groups at the University of Maryland (where I held my first job), working together under the rubric of “ProtectUMD” have made of the administration. These demands can be verified by going to the Diamondback (the student newspaper) website.  I’ve put the list of “demands” below, but here’s what CampusReform says about them:

The Pro-Palestine demands are incompatible with the beliefs of the Jewish student organizations on campus, leading the student groups Terps for Israel, the Jewish Student Union, and J Street U to abstain from the project.

Students for Justice in Palestine declined to answer questions from Campus Reform, as did every other organization that was contacted.

“I think [these demands] are ridiculously easy [to accomplish],” said Muslim Student Association member Khaled Nurhssien told The Diamondback.

“We commend the students for their passionate advocacy and for coming together in solidarity on these issues,” a university spokesperson told Campus Reform. “President Loh has convened a group of his staff to thoroughly review the list of demands and make recommendations accordingly. That process is well underway.”

The UMD spokesperson declined to answer further questions.

When I first read this list of demands, I wanted to go through them and put in bold all the ones I considered unreasonable. But then I realized that the majority of these demands would be in bold, so the emphasis would be diluted. Instead, I’ll just bold a very few that I consider either very unreasonable or dangerous to freedom of speech.

FOR ALL MARGINALIZED STUDENT COMMUNITIES

  • Required diversity training for SGA recognized and Greek organizations.
  • The University employ more professors of color in all university departments
  • Increased mental health support and resources for students of color.
  • University scholarships for students of marginalized communities.
  • A statement from President Loh reassuring marginalized UMD students that the University is committed to making UMD a safe space for all marginalized groups in response to the election and urging these students to speak out when they feel that the university is not meeting this goal.

    • Accountability for hate speech or action:

  • Immediate response to hate speech or actions from the University including a consequence (e.g. mark on transcript, potential suspension);
  • Immediate turnaround for the removal of hate speech printed or written on campus property, sidewalks and boards;
  • A task force separate from UMPD officers to look into investigations.
  • Revamping of the Diversity and Cultural Competency General Education requirement.
  • Students that meet this requirement should take a class that allows them not only to understand other cultures, but also by the end of the course have an understanding of privilege, oppression, and marginalized groups.
  • Representation of students of color on UMD Student Judiciary and Senate.
  • Study into the punishment statistics by race/gender/etc. of students at some point in the coming year – the legal system is rife with discrimination against minorities, especially those in poverty. It is crucial that our student judiciary is more equitable and gives all students a fair judgement.
  • Establishing a voluntary accreditation for activist groups.
  • Administration should support and defend activist groups by nullifying slander and smear campaign from bigger group. Example: Many members of SJP were slandered as anti-Semitic for being pro-Palestine;
  • Make free legal advice available for students participating in activism who face slander or other dishonest claims while exercising their rights to protest and free speech;
  • Provide protection during campus events that might make students feel unsafe because of their political implications [ie Israel Fest for Muslim and Arab students, Columbus day and Independence Day for American Indian students etc.].
  • The University of Maryland match the campus minimum wage to Prince George’s minimum wage.
  • An established safe, secure and permanent location for the Office of Civil Rights & Sexual Misconduct at The University of Maryland.
  • The creation and implementation of Dean of Students with supporting staff.
    • Help implement policy change on behalf of student concerns
    • Requirements:
      • Master’s or Doctoral degree in Education Administration
      • Experience in diversity and inclusion on institutional level
      • Preferably a representative from a vulnerable group
    • Approach:
      • Students serve on Dean of Students search committee along with other staff, professors and administrators
  •  Role
    • Serve as liaison for student needs and concerns on behalf of administration
    • Get to know student groups on campus and is actively available for students; makes efforts to attend student engagements
    • Serve as an ally to marginalized students
    • FOR THE AMERICAN INDIAN STUDENT COMMUNITY

  • The University officially remove the Christopher Columbus Day holiday from all university materials and mediums. Replace it with Indigenous Peoples’ Day to take away the stain of colonialism from our University.
  • Acknowledge during every event, that “this is indigenous land.” Make efforts to officially recognize the tribe or nation whose land upon which the University of Maryland is built.
  • Establish an Indigenous Studies minor.
  • Funding for AISU and departments such as Multicultural Involvement and Community Advocacy office, who supports indigenous students and their efforts.
  • The official recognition of the Sarah Winnemucca award in the University awards.
  • An indigenous scholarship for college students as well as high school students.
  • An indigenous cultural center where students can explore their indigenous identity and others.
    • FOR THE BLACK STUDENT COMMUNITY

  • University System of Maryland divestment from Maryland Correctional Enterprises.
  • UMD student divestment from businesses and companies invested in MCE and the prison industrial complex.
  • Tenure for African American professors. [JAC: If this means all must get tenure, it’s unfair.]
  • Increased funding for the Nyumburu Cultural Center and making the Nyumburu Cultural Center a stop during UMD campus tours.
    • FOR THE LATINX STUDENT COMMUNITY

  • A claim to physical space on campus. A school that prides itself on diversity has failed to give students of color adequate, quality space such as a Latinx Cultural Center.
  • University recruitment practices involving students of color that making them and their friends feel welcome and included on campus.
  • A faculty body that is more diverse and representative of branches of academia that deal with the history and discourse of minority populations and integrating this into majors such as a USLT major and a road for tenure for the professors who teach in these departments.
  • More funding allocated for multicultural student organizations in order to execute educational and cultural programming to help bridge the diversity divide on campus.
    • FOR THE LGBTQIA+ STUDENT COMMUNITY

  • Mandated faculty training in the fundamentals of campus inclusion of queer folks.
  • Students be allowed the choice of different gender roommates in the residence halls through random matching.
  • Multi-stall gender-inclusive bathrooms in every building with multi-stall bathrooms.
  • Converting the Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, and Transgender (LGBT) Studies program into a department in order to provide curricular autonomy.
  • Including pronouns in addition to names on student rosters seen by faculty and advisors.
  • Implementing a campus wide policy to replace male-female checkboxes with write-in boxes on all forms, surveys, and applications.
  • Gender neutral bathrooms in all buildings on campus.
  • Faculty (especially those working in the health center and counseling center), students, and college park police take part in queer diversity training, such as the Rainbow Terrapin Network.
  • The administration advocate for and defend the Arts and Humanities, as they are one of the departments most sensitive to LGBTQ issues and also one of the most at risk under new new state and federal leadership.
    • FOR THE MUSLIM STUDENT COMMUNITY

  • Protect the names and religious/ethnic affiliations of students should they be demanded from the government for harmful use.
  • An increase in the number of safe, designated prayer areas on campus.
  • One room in each major building (e.g. SPH, Chemistry, McKeldin etc.) designated for prayer. [JAC: This is a state school and that would violate the Constitution.]
  • Shuttle services to the Diyanet Center of America for Muslim students to have access to a place of worship and participate in the many activities that the center hosts.
  • Increased discussions about the diversity of the Muslim community on campus and worldwide.
  • More classes offered pertaining to Islam and the Muslim world taught by Muslim professors, who will counteract the negativity surrounding the name of Islam that is perpetuated by our culture and media.
  • Measures to prevent situations similar to the “American Sniper” situation from happening again.
  • SEE and other organizations on campus should have better judgement when choosing to show movies that perpetuate false narratives and stereotypes of Muslim and should be held accountable if they do not take this into consideration.
  • More Zabiha options on the campus meal plan to accommodate Muslims who adhere to those rulings.
  • More counselors who are sensitive to the needs of Muslim students. Ensure that the have the training be sensitive to the nuances in the Muslim community and are from the communities we often come from.
  • Additional training or staff is necessary.
    • FOR THE PRO-PALESTINE STUDENT COMMUNITIES

  • The encouragement of equal and positive representation of Pro-Palestinian human rights activists on campus. Specifically, condemning the conflation of Pro-Palestinian activism with racism and Anti-Semitism.
  • Pro-Palestinian activists are people who seek the fair treatment of Palestinians in Palestine and the rest of the world. Pro-Palestinians do not reject the human rights of any group of people, and encourage a fair and just system of governance across the globe.
  • The active encouragement of faculty and students to engage in discourse and learning about the Palestinians’ struggles and the Boycott Divest and Sanction movement without fear of consequences by the university administration.
  • Faculty and students have long been targeted for their political stances and their rights to free speech impeded, especially on this issue. We hope the university administration recognizes their disenfranchised groups and helps develop an environment within which it is safe for them to voice their opinions.
    • FOR THE UNDOCUMENTED STUDENT COMMUNITY
  • A full-time Undocumented Student Coordinator to advocate for, advise, represent, and protect undocumented and DACAmented students.
  • A declaration of the University of Maryland, College Park as a sanctuary campus for undocumented and DACAmented students and their families.
  • Ensured protection of student information about immigration status from local, state, and government agencies.
  • A system to ensure reaction and protection from the UMD Administration if an undocumented or DACAmented student faces detention or deportation proceedings.
  • A full-time immigration attorney for the Offices of Undergraduate and Graduate Student Legal Aid.
  • An Undocumented Student Resource Office to provide academic counseling, legal support, mental health counseling, and to guide students to university resources.
  • Mandatory training about undocumented students’ unique experiences and needs in academic settings for all university faculty and staff.
  • A significant expansion of mental health services for all students of color, especially undocumented and DACAmented students.
  • A system to ensure that DACAmented students can continue to receive in-state tuition if their DACA status is cancelled.
  • An opening up of merit scholarships and emergency funds to undocumented and DACAmented students.

    • Signed by: African Students Progressive Action Committee, Alpha Kappa Alpha Sorority, Incorporated Theta Nu Chapter, Alpha Phi Alpha Fraternity, Incorporated Iota Zeta Chapter, The American Indian Student Union, Ashley Vasquez, BSOS UMD Senator, Committee on Committees Undergraduate Rep, Bisexuals at Maryland, The Black Student Union, Chi Chapter of Hermandad de Sigma Iota Alpha, Incorporada, The Coalition of Latinx Student Organizations, Community Roots, Eta Beta Chapter of Sigma Gamma Rho Sorority Inc, Ethiopian Eritrean Student Association, Kappa Phi Chapter of Delta Sigma Theta Sorority, Incorporated, Katherine Swanson, Student Body President, NAACP, University of Maryland, Lambda Theta Alpha Latin Sorority, Inc. Upsilon Chapter, Lambda Theta Phi Latin Fraternity, Inc. Delta Eta Chapter, The Muslim Student Association, True Colors of Maryland, Political Latinxs United for Movement and Action in Society, Preventing Sexual Assault, The Pride Alliance, Students for Justice in Palestine, Student Labor Action Project, Our Revolution

    Notice all the different types of mandatory sensitivity training for faculty, students, and staff. Were that done, there would be no time for other education!

    h/t: pyers

    Petition started by University of Colorado student to disinvite Milo from speaking there; claims that doesn’t violate free speech

    December 20, 2016 • 10:00 am

    Update: I’ve said previously that, in light of Yiannopoulos’s unconscionable attack on a transgender student in Wisconsin, he should be allowed to speak on campuses with the proviso that he be told to refrain from singling out and attacking individuals students from his bully pulpit. (There may be exceptions if those students are seen as public figures.) I stand by that. Elsewhere, people like Dan Arel are apparently calling for him to be permanently and irrevocably banned from speaking elsewhere. I disagree with that.

    _____________

    Charles Wofford, a graduate student in music at the University of Colorado at Boulder (CUB), has started a petition at Change.org to disinvite Milo Yiannopoulos from speaking there. (Wofford also has a similar letter to the editor in the Boulder newspaper.) According to the petition, Milo was invited by CUB President Philip DiStefano himself, who’s quoted in the petition as saying ““Personally, I feel strongly that discrimination and harassment have no place on our campus.”

    CampusReform adds another quote from Wofford, who apparently considers speech as equivalent to physical violence:

    Charles Wofford, the petition organizer, wants the campus to be a safe space for students.

    “It is, I think, the university’s responsibility to defend its students from being literally attacked, and physical harm isn’t the only kind of harm out there. The university ought to be a safe space to learn and be who you are without fear of reprisal,” he said.

    Wofford explained that he’s “not a censorious person,” but rather that he was motivated to start the petition because he believes the administration shouldn’t be giving Milo a platform to spread his message.

    But the CUB website itself says this, which implies the petition is wrong on one point and misleading on another (my emphasis).

    Conservative journalist Milo Yiannopoulos will talk at the University of Colorado Boulder on Jan. 25 as part of a national college speaking tour.

    The CU Boulder student organization chapters of the College Republicans and Turning Point USA invited Yiannopoulos, technology editor for Breitbart News, to speak on campus. The free event will be held at 7 p.m. in the Mathematics Building, room 100. Ticket details and other information can be found at www.yiannopoulos.net.

    Over the years, the CU Boulder campus has hosted events featuring prominent figures with liberal and conservative perspectives. Those include appearances by Edward Snowden (via videoconference), Antonin Scalia, Karl Rove, Howard Dean, Sonia Sotomayor, Ruth Bader Ginsburg, John Ashcroft, Ann Coulter and Rudy Giuliani, to name only a few.

    And they give the full quote from the college President, which shows he’s drawing a distinction between his personal views and his approval of free speech. The petition, of course, also omitted that.

    CU Boulder Chancellor Philip DiStefano said that the campus will continue to be a forum for a variety of viewpoints, including those that are controversial.

    “Personally, I feel strongly that discrimination and harassment have no place on our campus,” DiStefano said. “With that said, we must support the free exchange of ideas. I would hope that any speaker who comes here can present his or her opinions in a respectful manner. We understand that some topics will be supported by some students and denounced by others. Hosting a speaker on campus does not mean the university endorses or has other viewpoints on that speaker’s message.”

    But the best part is at the end of the petition:

    screen-shot-2016-12-20-at-8-50-42-am

    He’s already been invited, so yes, disinviting him is infringing on his right to freedom of speech. These Illiberal Leftists (is that better than “Regressive Leftists”?) have no idea what freedom of speech is really about.

    h/t: Gregory