Slacking for Social Justice
It’s the latest thing, according to Riyad A Shahjahan, an assistant professor at Michigan State University, and whose areas of expertise include “social justice theory” and “pedagogies of dissent.”
In recent years, scholars have critiqued norms of neoliberal higher education by calling for embodied and anti-oppressive teaching and learning. Implicit in these accounts, but lacking elaboration, is a concern with reformulating the notion of ‘time’ and temporalities of academic life. Employing a coloniality perspective, this article argues that in order to reconnect our minds to our bodies and centre embodied pedagogy in the classroom, we should disrupt Eurocentric notions of time that colonise our academic lives. I show how this entails slowing down and ‘being lazy’.
Yes, comrades. We must “disrupt Eurocentric notions of time.” And temporalities, obviously. Postcolonial theorising is the only way to challenge the “neoliberal higher education climate” – hold that thought – and those “colonial binaries such as superior/inferior.” We must “dislodge higher education from neoliberal personhood.” As the exact nature of Dr Shahjahan’s problem has been buried under rhetorical rubble, I’ll translate as best I can. You see, being expected to keep up with the pace of lessons and deliver course work on time can induce feelings of discomfort and inferiority in those less able and conscientious, thereby resulting in “exclusionary effects,” which, it turns out, are oppressive and unjust:
These internalised temporalities may have especially exclusionary effects on bodies and selves. For example, Brandt (2008) found that the hurried pace of homework, exams and research associated with molecular biology laboratory class conflicted with a Navajo student’s sense of time. Thus, Navajo students internalised a sense of ‘being less than’ and felt guilty.
However, armed with our postcolonial theorising and postmodern bafflegab, and by stressing the mystical exoticness of people with browner skin, we shall set the people free from the “dominant culture of disembodiment” and the “temporal colonisation of our bodies” – i.e., expectations of punctuality, attentiveness and general competence:
To undo this colonisation of our bodies, we should strive to ‘embody’ ourselves: inhabit our bodies fully, acknowledge the interconnection between mind, body, spirit, and contest the insertion of the body into the market.
Yes, we must contest the insertion.
To re-embody the body in the learning environment, we need to slow down, be mindful, and embrace present moments… How can we embody ‘laziness’ in the classroom?
Well, according to our expert in education, “we” should work more slowly and distractedly – say, by pondering the “parts of our bodies” that are “rendered invisible.” Like stomachs and knees. And we must embrace “sensorial ways of knowing,” which are, we’re informed, “tactics of resistance,” along with “the burning of medicines, cleansing ceremonies and/or the telling of personal stories.” “Music, dance and artistic expression” are also recommended as classroom diversions. Because the way to “disrupt” stereotypes of dimness and sloth among “indigenous and subaltern individuals” is to behave in ways that suggest dimness, sloth and a serious lack of focus.
Those of you itching to read the whole thing, preferably in a slow and half-arsed way, can do so for a mere £26. Or just click here.
Via Damian Counsell.
I’m too lazy to read the whole thing. What do I win?
You see, being expected to keep up with the pace of lessons and deliver course work on time can induce feelings of discomfort and inferiority in those less able and conscientious, thereby resulting in “exclusionary effects,” which, it turns out, are oppressive and unjust
They always want to level down.
In recent years, scholars have critiqued norms of neoliberal higher education by calling for embodied and anti-oppressive teaching and learning.
So they want neo-illiberal education.
If by disembodied teaching they’re referring to online education, yeah I can see why they want to hold on to the model that has them as gatekeepers.
I stopped after the third buzzword. Of course, that’s the point: to try to keep regular people from understanding.
I stopped after the third buzzword. Of course, that’s the point: to try to keep regular people from understanding.
Oh, it’s dismal writing, and dismal thinking, and something close to racist; but it’s typical of its type. It’s a pile of assertions, glib citations, question-begging phrases and status-hungry chest-puffing, all of which makes it wearying to read, practically opaque. And intentionally so. Stating things clearly would invite correction. Half the terms used are never defined, but declaimed as if self-evidently evil or self-evidently virtuous. It simply assumes the reader’s political agreement, which itself may be telling.
Though the standard of the article may offer clues as to why our assistant professor seemingly thinks that tardiness, distractedness and slacking are somehow virtuous, something to encourage. For the sake of those brown kids.
the “neoliberal higher education climate”
Actually laughing.
These internalised temporalities may have especially exclusionary effects on bodies and selves.
Especially? What else would these ‘internalised temporalities’ have an effect on?
What I’m taking from this is anything he calls ‘neoliberal’ is really bad. Because capitalism or something.
I doubt if he would be any more enthusiastic about archeoliberalism.
Maybe what he really wants is some goldilockseoliberalism
Would taking 7 or 8 years to complete an undergrad degree “disrupt Eurocentric notions of time”? It would certainly “contest” (or at least, delay) “the insertion of the body into the market” or, as the oppressors call it, growing up and getting on with your life. Or is this theory only for the professors’ professional life?
If you can stomach the needless jargon and relentless pretension, there are some rather odd assumptions in there, most of which are mouthed as if self-evident. Apparently, planning ahead and making effective use of one’s time are merely “Eurocentric notions,” tools of “colonial logic,” and therefore bad. (Because, er… capitalism, obviously.) And the way to “disrupt” stereotypes of dimness and sloth among “indigenous and subaltern individuals” is to behave in a way that suggests dimness and sloth.
As to the kind of person we’re dealing with, I think the first clue is the proud use of the phrase “pedagogies of dissent.” It practically screams “self-admiring tosser.”
What would his view be if his payroll department adopted such a position, or the fire brigade and rescue services?
And the way to “disrupt” stereotypes of dimness and sloth among “indigenous and subaltern individuals” is to behave in a way that suggests dimness and sloth.
That. 😀
That.
If you can disentangle the verbiage, a thankless task, it does sound rather silly.
I wonder if he reverts to the colonialist sense of time when his paycheck is late.
Employing a coloniality perspective…
At first glance I read that as “colonic perspective”, then realized I must denounce myself first for misreading, then for realizing that the word fits better than the original.
Perhaps I should click over and read the article, but I’m too lazy. Nonetheless, I have questions. How does one implement this theory in the classroom? Does the professor just allow students to turn in work whenever? Never? Does he just hand out credits willy-nilly without any objective criteria upon which to judge performance?
‘I think the first clue is the proud use of the phrase “pedagogies of dissent.” It practically screams “self-admiring tosser.”’
He’s probably too fucking lazy to turn up to classes he’s got to teach, or to mark essays, and is treating ‘post-colonial theory’ as an excuse.
What a chunt.
Reading these posts is a little like Tantalus’s torture…the meaning just keeps slipping away.
It often makes me quite angry, especially as I lost my position in academia because I hold a conservative Christian worldview and in the world of the arts, few things alienate more than that.
Still, the comments often cheer me up so I persevere. Keep up the good work of exposing the fraudulent nature of so many down the academic rabbit-hole David.
PS the ‘colonic perspective’works well I think Farnsworth…well done.
I’ve updated the end of the post with a tiny bit more. Apparently, the university classroom should be enlivened with suitably anti-capitalist diversions, including “music, dance” and “the burning of medicines.”
It’s the only way to re-embody the body.
Western-educated brown guy becomes professor to teach how western education is racist while getting paid racist western money.
Do I have that right?
Does he just hand out credits willy-nilly without any objective criteria upon which to judge performance?
Well, any such degree would be utterly useless anyway. So it’s a variation on the old Soviet workers’ gripe: we pretend to work, and they pretend to pay us.
I can not count the number of times when that thought occurred to me when I was a student.
Down with linear time!
“Your marking is late again. And you missed the department meeting. That’s the third time it’s happened.”
“Didn’t you read my essay? I reject your Eurocentric notions of time.”
Perhaps the regular deliver of his paycheck should released from the Eurocentric notion of time. Heck, why does he not forgo a paycheck entirely and free himself of the colonisation of his bank account and the eurocentric notion of actually earning ones keep. I wish he’d have this discussion with me at the pub and I would gladly liberate his spirit from the burden of its colonized body.
The word ‘lazy’ has “racist connotations,” says Dr Shahjahan. Though how students of any colour are supposed to challenge such connotations while behaving in ways that confirm them isn’t clear to me.
Incidentally, Dr Shahjahan and his wife consider themselves “activists” (but of course) and declare their “life project” as being “to slow down the world and/or help those who want to slow down as a means to advance social change and healing.” Though readers may not be entirely convinced that their advice – e.g., classroom “cleansing ceremonies” and “the burning of medicines” – will help students find academic success or lucrative careers.
I grow weary of such lefty-drivel, no matter how entertaining it is superficially.
But one thing I have learned from it all: if we in the west (aka white people) are so nasty, so horrible, so racist, why do people flock here to live among us? If I were so unsure about the horrid patriarchy, dirty capitalism, the displays of privilege and all the rest of it, I wouldn’t go there in the first place and if I made the mistake of doing so, would soon head to happier places.
As I am a despicable white male, I would not go and live in, say, a country ruled by islam or dominated by machete-wielding tribes. I doubt I would be welcome anyway, so I don’t go there.
So if these oppressed people are so much better than me and deserve better than the likes of me and my kind, why settle here at all?
I keep thinking that higher education in the humanities will implode due to its political advocacy, lack of value for the student, and shear ludicrousness, leaving only a few enclaves where serious scholarship has maintained a toe hold.
So far I see little evidence of this implosion.
neoliberal higher education
Er, no.
http://www.mindingthecampus.org/2016/01/social-psychology-a-field-with-only-8-conservatives/
“why do people flock here to live among us?”
How dare you ask such an insulting question, you horrible, racist [INSERT INSULT HERE]?
Also, no.
http://heterodoxacademy.org/2016/01/09/professors-moved-left-but-country-did-not/
This is just a rephrasing of white privilege and it is not surprising that we would see it come up at a time when more and more minorities (well, minorities in the West. Curiously, they’re majorities in all the less developed countries. But I wouldn’t want to draw any conclusions from that) are being put in competition of sorts with the white majority thanks to affirmative action. There is a significant body of academic work that shows that “over-matching” in a university setting, i.e. the practice of admitting “disfavored” minorities to educational institutions for which they are not objectively qualified, leads to worse results than if these candidates had instead been admitted to institutions in which their qualifications are in line with those of the other students. The cries of white privilege as this has become the norm are only to be expected. Imagine a minority student whose GPA would qualify him to be admitted to Podunk State U. suddenly finding himself at Harvard or Yale. His “peers” are significantly brighter than he is, they have no trouble following course work that is incomprehensible to him, and, lo and behold, these people who run rings around him are all, almost to a man, white (Note: I use “man” in its archaic sense – as human, non-gender specific). Clearly they must be benefitting from some special privilege, a secret handshake, that allows them to understand what is going on while the poor minority student flounders on. The system is rigged! By white people! What Riyad Shajahan is doing is to take affirmative action to its logical conclusion: having admitted candidates who can’t compete with their “peers” on the merits and are thus in peril of not getting their degrees, we should now change the graduation requirements for these candidates so that they don’t have to be judged by the same criteria as their peers and they will still get the certification of the educational institution rather than having to drop out.
Analysis: 99.357% pure bullshit.
This is just a rephrasing of white privilege
It did remind me of Dr Caprice Hollins, who was paid $86,000 a year to tell Seattle educators that “students of colour” needn’t learn the grammar and fluency she herself enjoys – and which employers generally expect of job candidates – and that foresight and punctuality are “white values,” and expectations thereof constitute “cultural racism.” Instead of encouraging “students of colour” to articulate their thoughts and plan ahead, we must, said Hollins, see people as “racial beings” and “teach [children] to view the world through a racial lens.”
David,
re Dr Caprice Hollins:
There is nothing undemocratic, though there may be something unreasonable, in expecting a great deal from the butler, and being filled with a kind of frenzy of surprise when he falls short of the divine stature. The thing which is really undemocratic and unfraternal is to say, as so many modern humanitarians say, “Of course one must make allowances for those on a lower plane.”
G.K.Chesterton had their number, all those years ago.
In the case of Dr Hollins, it’s hard to think of an educational worldview more likely to ruin the life chances of students with browner skin than mine.
“…we must, said Hollins, see people as ‘racial beings’ and ‘teach [children] to view the world through a racial lens.”
…and I thought this kind of thinking went out of fashion in 1945.
Dr. Hollins doesn’t appear to have included Prof. Shahjahan in her white privilege scheme.
She’s clearly doing her part to insure that her offspring don’t face status or academic competition from the brown kids and their uppity desire to better their situations in life. She’s busy handicapping them in order to reinforce white privilege and to insulate her children’s social and class standing. How better to that than to ensure the poor brown dears can’t read or write?
Except, well, by teaching them that punctuality and rational thought are to be shunted behind dancing and incense.
None, really. Or at least, none that doesn’t involve an even more overt expression of racism.
These people are to human progress what termites are to woodframe homes.
Coherent news from an actual scholar has turned up regarding how different cultures interact . . .
As noted earlier, Gwynne Dyer has also commented that
. . . and in parallel, he also points out that the New Years attacks in Cologne are an issue, but particularly There will be rotten apples among refugees
For the most part, Shahjahan spews woolly waffle that can’t be argued with because there’s no there there; a content-free load of hogwash and a series of greatly overextended metaphors that have become disconnected from the facts.
But sometimes he makes a fairly clear claim that can be evaluated as true or not:
And promptly demonstrates that he’s historically illiterate. I guess this is why that sort of person mostly sticks to bullshit. When he traces dualism to colonialism I can say with confidence that he’s wrong; when he talks about how our bodies ‘navigate colonial time’ I can only say he’s talking nonsense, and he gets to enjoy the privilege of being offended.
If you can’t tell time maybe it’s not such a bad thing that you feel a little ‘less than’.
The only way these chronically pampered idiots are going to be able to pay off their student loans will be by inserting their bodies into the market – in one fashion or another.
When you take in one million refugees, that number of people will include a considerably larger number of ignorant hicks who think that it is not a crime or a disgrace to attack non-Muslim girls sexually.
No good deed goes unpunished, and this is part of the price Germany will pay for its generosity. It’s not an unbearable price
This coming, I suspect, from someone who has never been sexually assualted.
“Eurocentric notions of time”
It’s obvious ain’t it?
– Euro for Euros
– Africa for Africans
– Asia for Asians
etc.
Kick out everyone who doesn’t “conform to the norm”
This coming, I suspect, from someone who has never been sexually assualted.
Oh, y’mean, like Dyer’s wife, as he does note in that same article?
So, the point remaining, When you take in one million refugees, that number of people will include a considerably larger number of ignorant hicks . . . . and in a couple of years most of the young Muslim men who attacked women in Cologne will have figured out that . . . .
. . . Particularly noting that the number of refugees that have come to Germany keeps being stated as about one million, where the New Years’ attackers get stated as about one thousand . . . Noting one particular representative of that remaining most of a million;
Definitely not any of that basically only a thousand, that one . . .
Hedgehog: “these people who run rings around him are all, almost to a man, white…”
Actually, no, lots of them are east and south Asians. Nearly all “prestige” American universities have secret quotas to hold down the admission of hyper-qualified east and south Asians.
(Also secret quotas to increase admissions of less qualified blacks and hispanics.)
As the exact nature of Dr Shahjahan’s problem has been buried under rhetorical rubble, I’ll translate as best I can.
That could be the most badly written essay I think I’ve ever read.
That could be the most badly written essay I think I’ve ever read.
It doesn’t quite match the Dadaist jive of Dr Caroline Guertin, but it’s certainly awful. And apparently it’s what now passes for scholarship – a comical mix of New Age voodoo (deep breathing, listening to your stomach) and the standard leftist posturing (post-colonial ‘theory’, race and gender ‘privilege’, everything being ‘neoliberal.’) As noted above, there’s not much there there, almost no substance or logical structure, so it’s difficult to parse. At no point is it entirely clear what point Dr Shahjahan is trying to make, or what his reasoning is, beyond some glib, question-begging citation that’s meant to impress us.
And remember, this type of opaque language – which hides so many sins – isn’t arrived at by mere incompetence or some neurological accident. It’s something that’s been taught and encouraged. It’s basically an exercise in signalling, in conformity.
It doesn’t quite match the Dadaist jive of Dr Caroline Guertin,
*speechless*
@ Caroline
This coming, I suspect, from someone who has never been sexually assaulted.
Caroline, you must realise that in order to cook the omelette of multicultural utopia you have to break a few hymens. And remember – as Barbara Spectre would say – without multiculturalism “Europe will not survive”. So be quiet and take your medicine, ok?
RE: internalised temporality – this sounds like something you deal with the day after a bad curry.
norms of neoliberal higher education
He’s lost me already.
As an Australian, I am ashamed to note that this paper was published in the journal of the Philosophy of Education Society of Australasia, whatever that might be. I can’t help but wonder how Shahjahan ever completed it, but I hope he learns from his research, adopts a path of sensorial resistance to Eurocentric requirements for tenure, and remains idle and unproductive for the rest of his career.
Speaking of academia’s Clown Quarter, where the left holds court:
The course, which is blatant in its political bias, is a requirement for all undergraduates pursuing a teaching role. If the arrogance and overreach sound at all familiar, you may be thinking of these rather sinister incidents.
But hey, it’s who they are. It’s what they do.
So, the point remaining, When you take in one million refugees, that number of people will include a considerably larger number of ignorant hicks . . . . and in a couple of years most of the young Muslim men who attacked women in Cologne will have figured out that . . .
There are a couple of things about this argument that don’t add up. First, why would we expect these guys to enlighten themselves “in a couple years”? By his own admission, this stuff has been going on since at least the early 80s in Turkey and apparently they still haven’t figured it out. Why are they going to straighten up after a couple years in Germany? Because some blonde social worker tells them “Rape is bad, mmmkay”? Not buying it.
Second, and more importantly, does this guy not realize that this migration is an ongoing process? It’s not a one-time deal where you take a million ignorant Muslim hicks and absorb them into the larger population over 20 or 30 years. They’re getting ignorant Muslim hicks at a rate of 200K a month, so even if they actually do learn to behave themselves in a few years time, you’ll always have this newly arrived, ignorant and somewhat rapey cohort to deal with.
As we’re on a crazy academia kick, why don’t we “enact a lively engagement with Canada’s Rocky Mountains”, via: Intimacies of Rock – Ethnographic Considerations of Posthuman Performativity in Canada’s Rocky Mountains.
It has all the usual hallmarks of awful academic papers we’ve come to expect – the deliberately obtuse post-modern writing, the nods to feminism, and the assertion that “memory” and “the analytic of performativity” is a good way to commune with the several million tons of limestone and shale that is the Canadian Rockies.
“By the end of the semester, you are required to write your own personal/professional commitment to social justice (7-8 pages), given all the new knowledge(s) that the course participants generated every week,” Schalin quotes from the syllabus of the ELC 381 class scheduled to be taught by Revital Zilonka during the Spring 2016 semester.
This probably goes a long way to explaining why such people’s political rhetoric continually weaponises shame (i.e. ‘That’s racist / misogynist / homophobic / transphobic / ablest / Islamopobic etc.), as it’s clear that’s a quality in which they are are very evidently lacking.
Well, that and the fact their arguments are shit.
“To re-embody the body in the learning environment”
Analysis: 99.745% horse shit. Good for roses, I hear.
@ JerryC – There are a couple of things about this argument that don’t add up.
True, and I’d add a few more. The experience of Rotherham, where men of “Asian” descent (read Pakistani) raped and sexually exploited something like 1,400 young women, some of them no more than children, sometimes for years, during the period 1997-2013, shows that things don’t necessarily improve in a couple of years. Admittedly, in that instance, the police and the politicians never told the perpetrators that what they were doing was really naughty, because, well, they didn’t want to come across as racist and Islamophobic. Of course, that was also the first reaction of the powers that be in Cologne (and Hamburg and Stuttgart), where the press and the police decided to hush it all up until they were forced to come out with the truth after social media exposed their silence. And then the reaction of the Minister of the Interior was to say that the right-wing chat rooms were at least as bad as the rapists, and the mayor of Cologne (a woman, incidentally) said that women should keep men at arm’s length in order to avoid being molested. So I’m not sure there’s a self-correcting mechanism that ensures that the perpetrators will eventually become nice multi-culturally sensitive lads who respect the right of women to not being treated like whores.
And then there’s also the quaint rite that seems to exist in certain parts of the French capital called “la tournante,” which I gather is the gang-rape of women who do not abide by local customs on sartorial modesty. The perpetrators in these instances seem to be second- or even third-generation descendants of immigrants, which again would tend to invalidate the thesis that after a few years the excitable lads become upstanding card-carrying multi-culturalists.
So, yeah, a few things don’t add up.
As an aside, when it comes to his reaction to his wife’s molestation at the hands of Turkish “villagers,” Mr Gwynne Dyer reminds me of nothing as much as of Mr. Dukakis, erstwhile candidate to the presidency of these United States of A and last seen in a tank wearing an oversize helmet…
You know…I most often come here when things at work are depressing me. This certainly isn’t helping. Though not sure why I should think it would.
No refunds. Credit note only.
I think there’s one section where the wanker might have a serious point:
He’s abusing “vis-a-vis”, overusing “discourse”, using many long words where a few short ones would do, injecting political offense, pretending the issue is a lot more one-sided than it is, and yet I think something is salvageable here. If I were to try writing this sans various offenses against the English language, it might look something like this:
Today’s classrooms look far too much like rubber rooms or monks’ cells. Removing distractions, which started as a means to encourage people to focus, has gone too far and is turning into something like asceticism. It’s not only the room itself which suffers this problem, but also the behavior required from students: Sit still, don’t fidget, be quiet, don’t hum, don’t blow your nose, etc. We should be more accepting of a learning environment which is not perfectly sterile. I would like for us to allow students to eat and drink in the classroom, and I feel we can afford to loosen the rules a bit without necessarily descending into utter bedlam.”
I would still disagree, having been to a few overly disrupted schools in my life, but I think this formulation of the argument is at least clear enough that there’s something to disagree with, and I can envision a reasonable man agreeing with it because he was convinced by argument, rather than browbeaten by the implied threat to label dissenters as neoliberal colonial racist otherers unjustly occupying the temporal discourse of… whatever the poem was about.
@Microbliionaire- well done.
I tried really hard, without any open windows, sans music and hamburger smells. I almost got to the end, but when I reached ” Scholastic rituals in classrooms and meeting rooms subjugate and construct our bodies into academic vessels…” I broke down.
Construct…into? I just couldn’t take anymore pomo word salad. I feel like I’ve let myself down, like one of those unfortunates who collapses 200 yards from the finish of his SAS “beasting” in the Brecon Beacons.
To Hal: I believe that if I were Mr. Dyer, I would first endeavour to defend my wife and next help her learn to defend herself. Perhaps a firearm would have been out of the question in Turkey, but certainly a knife would be available. The fact that his/your argument boils down to “MY wife got molested so you have to put up with your DAUGHTER being molested” makes me question his alleged status as a human being.
. . It’s not a one-time deal where you take a million ignorant Muslim hicks . . .
Ah, No, rather blatantly obviously no . . .
Your attempt at an argument might start to resemble having credibility if the issue were of one million or so attackers, but what you are already aware of is that what’s involved is mebbe one thousand for the instance in Cologne, following the arrival of about one million who you’ve noted did not attack anyone . . .
And, as the additional article notes . . .
Sooo, as you’re already quite aware, the issue is not immigration—aka OMG!!! My Plumber Here In The UK is Polish!!!!—the issue, as already noted, remains, There will be rotten apples among refugees, Etc.
—Rather like rotten apples among otherwise valid observations, that . . . .
Sooo, as you’re already quite aware, the issue is not immigration
This after having quoted a long piece that makes it entirely clear that it is about immigration. Your confused explanation seems to be that once said rapey immigrants have been here a while they upgrade to criminals and that there’s therefore no need to worry about immigration. You’ve also completely ignored the previous commenters point about the tendency of second and third generation Muslim immigrants to regress. The rotten apples excuse is always a cop out and what if, as in nature, some varieties of apples are more prone to going rotten than others ?
Logic torturing isn’t going to deal with this any better than appeasement.
This after having quoted a long piece that makes it entirely clear that it is about immigration.
Actually, this after quoting two pieces that both make it entirely clear that it is about bad apples rather than immigration. What you’re making clear is that you wish this was about immigration instead of bad apples.
Grabbing three easy and handy confirmations, all of which you’re trying to ignore;
and . . .
. . . and . . .
I do realize your annoyance that reality is not following your agenda, but then such demands for fantasy ridden agenda rather than the reality I’m pointing out do get noticed rather a lot around here.
The point is, surely, that this is a purely cultural “thing”. If your original culture has it that “women not of the faith and demonstrably dressed to prove it” are fair game for sexual molestation, then such acts will likely occur. If you then assimilate into the culture you migrate to, such acts will (presumably) reduce. But then again, if you are encourage NOT to integrate but to remain cheerfully “multi-cultural” then such acts will, criminal sanctions notwithstanding, continue.
Assimilation is definitely a two way street, your chosen safe haven must allow you to assimilate, but you must also be prepared to be assimilated. Strong religious beliefs *can* be a serious barrier to assimilation unless that belief has a personal/public and belief/government separation structure.
And that’s where Islam is the issue, there is no religion/government separation, and strong pressure to resist assimilation. Hence Hal’s little bit of wishful thinking is just that, wishful. Sure, if all the pressure was on assimilation much as it was in the USA in the times of the great inflows then a generally assorted by largely harmonious society can result. When the current accepted status is NO assimilation and “multi-cultural”, then you will get enclaves and a fractured society. And I would suggest that what research we have supports this point of view.
So, we should find ways to encourage students to be even lazier as a way to storm the bastions of white hegemony, disrupt Eurocentric concepts of time, etc. Taking our dear associate professor’s view in good faith, I think we should dismiss from our minds the naughty thought that the implementation of such a policy might result in him having far fewer papers to mark each semester.
But I can’t help thinking that encouraging students to be lazy, tardy and wasteful of their time is, even from a coloniality perspective, rather like teaching grandma how to suck eggs.
I hear a rumour that our enlightened associate professor is currently working up a paper calling for academia to encourage students to masturbate more. Well, yes. With all that free time they now have, what better way for them to “reconnect their minds to their bodies”?
I do realize your annoyance that reality is not following your agenda, but then such demands for fantasy ridden agenda rather than the reality I’m pointing out do get noticed rather a lot around here.
I don’t have an agenda. Not for the first time with your comments I’m left wondering what it is you imagine you are trying to say.
Assimilation is definitely a two way street, your chosen safe haven must allow you to assimilate, but you must also be prepared to be assimilated. Strong religious beliefs *can* be a serious barrier to assimilation unless that belief has a personal/public and belief/government separation structure.
Bingo!!!!
And that is the issue . . . . And for the ongoing contrast with such reality, wishful fantasies such as Hence Hal’s little bit of wishful thinking is just that, wishful still keep hoping that Duh Rite Wing Agenda might win out, someday, mebbe, hopefully, if they hold their breath a lot —That’s why Minnow keeps coming to mind—for any recent arrivals to David’s soiree, Minnow was/is a left wing brother in arms to any right wing extremists, where Minnow would also be greeted with conservative facts, and just like many right wing extremists, demand that conservative fact is just wishful thinking.
I was just reminded to do a bit of Googlemancy and actually hit the jackpot on the first hunt, and thus quickly found what to really search for.
We all know that in this case Islam is not the problem.
With the easily found study, we all reminded that in these sorts of cases that right wing and left wing extremists are the problem.
Soo, conservatives like Dyer will remain factual and conservative and rather probably continue to get bookended on the right by right wing liberals demanding that there must be . . . no religion/government separation, and strong pressure to resist assimilation.
And just the same, immigration will continue, assimilation will continue, and the bad apples will get weeded out . . .
I think the prof’s theories are great.
I wouldn’t want to be late for one of his lectures.. would you?
I wouldn’t want to be late for one of his lectures.. would you?
Why not? According to his thesis, A) you would be doing what he recommended, B) one wonders if he follows his own recommendations . . . !
The perpetrators in these instances seem to be second- or even third-generation descendants of immigrants, which again would tend to invalidate the thesis that after a few years the excitable lads become upstanding card-carrying multi-culturalists.
Technical point, but using France as an example of attempted multi-culturalism is a mistake. The French aren’t interested in multi-culturalism. They are happy with French culture. They want assimilation by the immigrants, but are not prepared themselves to change.
The French are also as racist as all shit, so the situation there is unlikely to get much better.
I don’t know the German situation, but I don’t think they are aiming at multi-culturalism either.
It’s pretty much only English speaking cultures that have any substantial portion of the population that is actively multi-culturalist. We are also the least racist cultures, and the ones where minorities embed quickest.
For English speaking cultures to take large immigrant populations is a problem, but we can move and adapt. For most European cultures it is a disaster.
@Nikw211 I wonder what would happen if the commitment to social justice was something like “My commitment is to do something worthwhile with measurable results and not let any of the garbage that was generated every week in this sideshow impact upon that.”
It’s pretty much only English speaking cultures that have any substantial portion of the population that is actively multi-culturalist. We are also the least racist cultures, and the ones where minorities embed quickest.
I’m on the left coast of the North American continent and the one time—ideally only so far–I was in London I was all of seven and only remember the outside of some hotel and waiting for a taxi. Therefore, my experience with British variety assimilation issues is only what I’ve read, where even I have read of the Polish plumber.
“the insertion of the body into the market” I take it this means doing something of actual measurable (£$Y) worth to society as opposed to their parasitism of those who do add value by extorting and punishing them for this.
This is what lefties call “being moral”.
The French are also as racist as all shit… Yep, check!
… the English-speaking cultures (…) are also the least racist cultures, and the ones where minorities embed quickest. Yep, two for two.
But the upshot of the matter remains, that in Paris the police don’t intervene in some areas because they don’t care about the “brown” people – les basanés, they used to call them when I lived there, don’t know if they still do – while in Rotherham the police don’t intervene because they don’t want to offend multicultural pieties. For the rape victims, though, the result is pretty much the same.
I would also add that the undeniable success of the USA in absorbing waves of immigrants and allowing them to embed quickly was fostered in no small part by an insistence on integration – the melting-pot, that sort of thing. But I think we have seen in these pages that calling America a melting-pot is now a micro-aggression because it invalidates the experience of people who are different, or somesuch. So I’m not sure that the rise of multiculturalism will allow the US or other English-speaking countries to continue to have the same success that they have enjoyed.
Immigration works only if the receiving country expects that immigrants are treated exactly the same and are subject to the exact same rules as the population already there. It doesn’t work in France because France actively discriminates against immigrants, and it increasingly doesn’t work in English-speaking countries because the basic tenet of multiculturalism seems to be that people from different backgrounds shouldn’t be expected to behave in ways that conform to the ways of the majority.
Bear in mind that the success of the Roman Empire was furthered by the fact that the Romans co-opted local aristocracies in the conquered provinces, with the local grandees taking on all the trappings of a Roman way of life – the baths, the villa, the education, even down to the taking of a Roman name. Barring that, it is doubtful that it would have lasted as long as it did. Empires are usually undone by the contradictions between the parts – see Empire, Austro-Hungarian; Empire, Ottoman; etc. A strong unifying culture is necessary to bridge these gaps. By definition, multiculturalism doesn’t provide that. That way lies Balkanization.
“No good deed goes unpunished, and this is part of the price Germany will pay for its generosity. It’s not an unbearable price and in a couple of years most of the young Muslim men who attacked women in Cologne will have figured out that being free, as German women are, does not mean being immoral or freely available.”
Not an unbearable price, huh? Well, he certainly thinks he won’t be paying the price, so it’s completely bearable FOR HIM.
Gosh, Hal, I don’t feel like being raped so that you can feel good about your tolerance towards “immigrants,” 75 percent of whom are men between 18-25. You feel it’s an ok price for me to pay, though. That’s both interesting and unfortunate.
Gosh, Hal,
Uh huh, and now go ahead and actually read the actual numbers. It’s ok, we’ll wait while you do. While the current immigrant population may indeed be 75 percent of whom are men between 18-25. , we’re already going to consider that a separate matter aside from the main issue.
Yes, we are going to consider that a separate matter.
Because, as you’re already aware,
If your effective claim that “immigrants,” should equate to attacker, that one counter example among the many would be different. As that does remain one factual counter example among the many, your failing attempt will remain both interesting and unfortunate.
As Hedgehog points out in a couple of places . . .
and
. . . we see there an issue of multigenerational criminal activity and thus a police enforcement issue rather than a problem with the greater number of immigrants. For as Hedgehog also points out,
. . . that also remains far from being an immigration problem, and will remain entirely a police enforcement issue . . .
Yes, we are going to consider that a separate matter.
Of course, if anyone really, really, really, wants to consider the existence of immigrants to be the same thing as the documented much smaller number of idiots, that can indeed be indulged, after, of course, the preliminary preparations for that have been carried out.
One such example of that preliminary preparation will be to note the continuing existence of the Mafia. Given that being Mafia is obviously considered the same thing as being Italian—which is the same thing as claiming that all refugees in Germany were attacking women in Cologne and elsewhere—Therefore, the first step in sending the refugees back to Syria and so forth is going to be to find all Italians across the planet and ship them all back to Italy. Next, because the Unione Corse is French, all French across the planet are to be tracked down . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
Well, don’t just sit there. If being an immigrant is the same thing as being a criminal, there is a Lot of work to get started on, and the sooner the better.
What the hell is Hal even talking about? He’s in his own little world.
Meanwhile,
So there’s that.
He’s in his own little world.
Granted, it’s being shared with everyone else . . . .
Of the offerings at the link,
. . . is a rather nice one . . .
A nice young Syrian is not all of the young Syrians. I’m sure one could have found a nice pirate in olden times, too, who eschewed rape and was kind to his dear old granny, but I wouldn’t bet on it. There have been sex mob attacks this new year in Austria, Finland, and Switzerland that are of the same type, carried out by the same type of people, and then there’s Sweden. Sweden, the rape capital of the Western world. Interestingly, the VAST as in numerical majority of the rapes committed in Sweden are against native-born Swedish women by immigrants from Muslim-majority countries (did I phrase that delicately enough for everyone here?). Please do go tell the Swedish women that you appreciate their paying the price for your smugness, Hal.
A nice young Syrian is not all of the young Syrians.
Hmmm. Would you care to show us exactly what you mean by smugness? Y’know, an actual example of something factual? An actual example based on reality, such as noting the reality that as the many recurring reports are showing—as cited—all the young Syrians are not attackers . . . .
Or, if you like, you can show a different part of reality, a demonstration even—as cited from reality in the Troy Campbell and Aaron Kay study. You can show an example of the right wing liberal extremist or left wing liberal extremist encountering reality again, and then immediately announcing that reality just doesn’t exist, time to trot out the already discredited agenda.
Demonstrating the reality of the political spectrum is one of the facets of the last British general election that I rather enjoyed. Labor and the Edstone rather clearly marked out the left wing. UKIP almost getting chased out of the House of Commons rather delineated the right wing and reminded all again that right wing is not conservative. In between the left and right wings, the Conservatives took the Commons and formed the standalone government.
Put simply, The Right Wing Got Booted, the Conservatives succeeded.
As you keep demonstrating, the left and right wing liberal fantasies are that there is only the right and left wings, where the left wing liberal fantasy is that all immigrants are just poor unfortunates who must be helped and will never be capable of causing anyone any trouble. In turn, the right wing liberal fantasy that you’re citing is that all immigrants Are Evil Attackers, Cue The Mood Music Of Evil—No, really, you don’t need to cue anything, I’ll select my own music, thank you . . .
Fortunately, or unfortunately for you, the reality will remain that of the repeatedly stated millionsomething recent immigrants to Germany, the cluster of attackers in Cologne was about a thousand, dunno numbers for elsewhere. To our complete lack of surprise, your fantasy that immigrant equals attacker doesn’t even try to account for the missing 99.9 percent of those recent immigrants, plus or minus here and there.—and even that note of plus or minus underlines that the definitely smaller number of criminals effortlessly contrasts with the greater number of assimilating immigrants.
As we conservatives have noted all along, and effortlessly and accurately will keep noting, the attackers are the problem.
As we conservatives have noted all along, and effortlessly and accurately will keep noting, absolutely by contrast, the immigrants are merely an issue, with good points and bad points and with a continuing history of the good outweighing the bad.
And no we’re not going to be impressed as you sob in basically racist demographic ignorance and racial bigotry.
Oh, yes, you cited Sweden.
Yes, yes, we know: According to your right wing liberal fantasy, Abu Ali is supposed to be a Bloodthirsty Attacking Immigrant mean nasty ugly looking people on the bench there. Mother rapers. Father stabbers. Father Rapers! Father rapers sitting right there on the bench next to me! And They was mean and nasty and ugly and horrible crime-type guys sitting on the Bench next to me. And the meanest, ugliest, nastiest one, the meanest Father raper of them all, was coming over to me and he was mean ‘n’ ugly ‘n’ nasty ‘n’ horrible and all kind of things . . . . and all you got to do to join is sing it the next time it comes around on the guitar.
Well, no, we’re not going to just sing along.
We’re not going to sing along with the right wing. We’re not going to sing along with the left wing.
In this instance, while we conservatives keep proving that conservative does not mean right wing, we will also accept the reality that the attackers are a noted crime problem that involves only solving the criminals and aiding the attacked. What will remain a separate issue is the rather immense and completely different majority of the immigrants, where such an issue will probably also remain beyond the comprehension of blatantly fraudulent right and left wing posturing . . .
In turn, the right wing liberal fantasy that you’re citing is that all immigrants Are Evil Attackers, Cue The Mood Music Of Evil—No, really, you don’t need to cue anything, I’ll select my own music, thank you . . .
No it is not, you contemptible snob. This is highschool debate level stuff you’re spewing. You cook up a ridiculous position then huff and puff at it with snide remarks. The point is that you don’t know how many of these people are a threat and neither do the governments who are letting them in. What we do know is that the authorities are purposefully trying to hide the extent of the problem, and the general public is becoming more and more suspicious and upset with their leaders.
No, Hal, I’m saying the statistical likelihood of rape has gone sky-high in Sweden, not that all the immigrants are rapists. I don’t think tourists from Finland or the States or Britain are running amok in Sweden. But let’s say that only 30% of the immigrants are rapists–how can we tell them apart from the others? Can we? Oh, let’s not waste our time with trying to cull the herd of young men who subscribe to a doctrine that declares a woman alone deserves rape–after all, some nice fellow like Abu Ali might be needed to tow your car, and certainly no one else in the entire country would have been available to tow it!
Father rapers? Really? It’s almost too bad there aren’t any–because then you, too, would have some skin in the game.
What we do know is that the authorities are purposefully trying to hide the extent of the problem . . .
Uh, really?? Could we see some numbers or examples or something other than more fearmongering hand waving?
And no, initial police reports of All Is Calm don’t count, that’s an example of flatfoots getting caught flatfooted
The police chief of Cologne has been sacked after his force was slammed over its handling of a string on New Year’s Eve sex attacks by migrants.
Wolfgang Albers was heavily criticised for the police’s response to the attacks on women by the groups of men among a 1,000-strong crowd.
Oh, look, once again there’s that number you’re trying to ignore, of about 1,000. Oh, once again—and even from the same article—how many immigrants into Germany, for that example?
. . . Chancellor Angela Merkel’s open-door policy that allowed nearly 1.1 million people fleeing war and poverty to enter the country last year.
So the real sorts of numbers, without having to invent some Grand European Consipracy, still continue to point out that 99.9% are just immigrants . . . . .
Oh, and like it or not, yet another story underlining reality; Cologne attacks: American woman tells how Syrian refugees rescued her from New Year’s Eve sexual assault
Oh, and Quint&Jessel, But let’s say that only 30% of the immigrants are rapists–how can we tell them apart from the others?
. . . . . 30 percent??!?!! With the apparent actual numbers being one tenth of one percent in Germany, even for Sweden you’re not even trying to show where you’re getting that bit of blatant and unadulterated hand waving.
But Let’s Say?
No, we won’t say. What we will do is keep observing what is.
Teaching ‘appropriate behavior’ in Munich.
https://twitter.com/charles_hawley/status/688060197965803522
“Swedish police will no longer be able to give descriptions of alleged criminals for fear of being seen as racist. According to an internal letter, police in capital city Stockholm are instructed to refrain from describing suspects’ race and nationality.”
http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/europe/swedish-police-are-not-allowed-to-give-descriptions-of-alleged-criminals-so-as-not-to-sound-racist-a6810311.html
Swedish police will no longer be able to give descriptions of alleged criminals for fear of being seen as racist
Or put another way, “Please do not notice what is happening.”
Iran’s killed between 4,000 to 6,000 gay people since 1979. I cannot think of a Western country that kills people for being gay (in the legal system! In case anyone drags in Matthew Shepard to beat us with). Yesterday 3 Muslim men stoned 2 transgender women in Germany, and told the police that “such people must be stoned.” (Thankfully, the women are ok.) But let’s import more! After all, some tow truck driver in Switzerland would probably be helpful to a journalist!