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Far left students shuts down Professor from speaking at free speech event in Toronto

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justoh said:
That said, even here, they're very intimidating 🙁 There's very little diversity of opinion, since every time anyone posts anything that the circle jerk brigade don't agree with, they commence with the bullying and vindictive sarcasm. It's difficult for the new counter-culture (conservatism) to get a foot in the door, so fewer and fewer bother with p&n, imho.
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You should post the version of conservatism that you support. You might find that there are people with whom you have some issues and values in common.

But to you and UglyC's points I would say that you should value a place where your ideas can be tested with rigor. If they hold up, you have something. If they cannot, then you can modify them to a new position founded on better reason, data, and experience. If that process has no value to you, then yeah, it's going to feel like bullying, I guess.
 
UglyCasanova said:
Deflection
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Freedom of expression is still not freedom from consequences.

And being stopped from a speech is not being silenced. It simply means they must avail themselves of one of the many other media outlets available.

Come back when "the left" is locking up people for their speech as we have seen done by the right in the past and then we can talk about who is silenced.
 
jackstar7 said:
But to you and UglyC's points I would say that you should value a place where your ideas can be tested with rigor. If they hold up, you have something. If they cannot, then you can modify them to a new position founded on better reason, data, and experience. If that process has no value to you, then yeah, it's going to feel like bullying, I guess.
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I do value such places, this isn't it though. The reason they started the Discussion Club is the fact no actual discussions are going on in P&N, just a big circle jerk calling those with opposing viewpoints names and such.
 
UglyCasanova said:
I do value such places, this isn't it though. The reason they started the Discussion Club is the fact no actual discussions are going on in P&N, just a big circle jerk calling those with opposing viewpoints names and such.
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That depends on if you use your ignore functions to filter out noise.

You can take an active role in the signal:noise in here.
 
jackstar7 said:
Freedom of expression is still not freedom from consequences.

And being stopped from a speech "the front of the bus" is not being silenced. It simply means they must avail "sit" themselves of one of the many other media outlets "seats" available.

Come back when "the left" is locking up people for their speech as we have seen done by the right in the past and then we can talk about who is silenced.
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It might help to imagine the speaker was any nationality or political leaning.

The problem with the world is lack of empathy.
 
Freedom of speech does not guarantee freedom from criticism. Some people seem to have a convenient difficulty in understanding this.
 
Commodus said:
Says the guy who worships a leader with a fascist-like approach to the media.
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What worship? I've said from the very beginning that I don't care for President Trump personally and in fact think he's a pretty common New York type asshole. I do like some of his policies and i'm vocal about them.
 
Vic said:
Freedom of speech does not guarantee freedom from criticism. Some people seem to have a convenient difficulty in understanding this.
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It should be a guarantee of freedom from being physically assaulted as seems to be happening in so many leftist institutions. Do you need links?
 
imported_tajmahal said:
It should be a guarantee of freedom from being physically assaulted as seems to be happening in so many leftist institutions. Do you need links?
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Right wing extremists assault people too. Many of them, in fact, are very open about their goal to criminalize any opinion that they disagree with. I try to avoid bringing this kind of thing up though, because using isolated instances of actions performed by a tiny and extreme minority of any group as emblematic of the entire group is simply dishonest.
 
HomerJS said:
Well stated by Van. Totally agree
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+1 On this topic I totally agree that the use of "safe spaces" and "trigger warnings" has gone way, way too far.

To the OP's specific point: I have strong reservations about shouting down any speaker to the point where they can't speak at all. Vigorous dissent from the audience? Ok. But not this. It's puerile. Make your points against their points. But not 100% override such as I saw on this vid.

However, these are 19 year old college kids. What excuse does, say, Bully Bill O'Reilly have for unfairly shouting and shutting down guests he doesn't agree with, to the point of cutting their mikes? He's a grown man with a millions strong audience.

I fear the ugly imbalance of Fox News and Breitbart more than a small clutch of asshole college students. They might yet grow up.
 
imported_tajmahal said:
What worship? I've said from the very beginning that I don't care for President Trump personally and in fact think he's a pretty common New York type asshole. I do like some of his policies and i'm vocal about them.
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Doesn't it make you uncomfortable to support any policies from someone who's both an inveterate liar and genuinely wants to silence the free press?
 
I love the huge disparity between what each side sees as questionable. The left is pointing to those in power committing acts of gross incompetence and/or corruption. The right points to what some kids on a campus are doing.

Compelling stuff.
 
I think it's hard for American Republicans because they are sitting in the minority and thus they feel persecuted or ostracized because the majority do not share their views. The demographics and mindset of the majority is changing from what are some of the archaic viewpoints of the GOP and their supporters, so it's scary for them to see this change. I also think this feeling becomes amplified when they are exposed to the liberal demographic of other countries, because the current day right of the US is so extreme they have little in common with the right of other developed nations. You have to look at Middle Eastern theocracies or African dictatorships to find similar ideas to some of the more extreme positions of the GOP. There is also a lot of propaganda used on them about countries other than their own to scare them into believing ground shaking things are happening elsewhere in the world and they're coming for them next. This is very effective when you're dealing with people who have probably never even left their own country and have no context for other parts of the world. They'll believe whatever has been shoveled at them.

For example, I've voted Conservative here for a long while until our most recent federal election. The Republican party of the US is a shitshow and would never get my vote. The sort of garbage they dogwhistle and the theocratic mindset they have is anathema to democracy. If our Conservative party here started to put the sort of significance on things like abortion, gay marriage, bathrooms or denied proven scientific realities - they would be dead in the water. I couldn't see them ever having a chance at assuming power again, they'd be a laughing stock.

I don't see the massive outrage over this video. These are university students who tend to believe they know it all when they don't know shit. Everything is black and white to you at that age and you haven't developed the ability to hear and tolerate different opinions than your own without acting up. Never mind that this speaker is an extremist and his views are quite alien to the bulk of this country and contrary to our values, left or right. It's worth mentioning that Toronto is the most multi-culturally diverse city in the world, accounting for the GTA and city proper, the population is about 10 million. You go to school and work here with people from every possible background. You'd be hard pressed to ever find yourself out in public anywhere that you wouldn't see every colour of the rainbow represented. For all the crazy propaganda you hear spewed these days about immigration and refugees, Toronto soundly makes the case that you can have a huge population that is diverse in race and faith, with none of the scare mongered crisis some believe would take place in such a situation.
 
Vic said:
Cliff notes: 30 protesters, no violence, and it was the campus police who shut down the event.
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Well, fire alarm was pulled so they had to shut it down. And it was pulled when Ezra was speaking. I think he was the last scheduled speaker of the event.
 
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