The Devil Himself
Or, Hysterical Woman Is Hysterical:
Hate speech… makes one wish one was dead or worse had never been born, the ultimate existential black hole. Hate speech is a speech act that can harm the central nervous system, it can result in PTSD, and when used by police and jailers to humiliate prisoners hate speech is psychological torture, a civil rights and human rights violation. In short, hate speech is an act of violence.
So writes Nancy Scheper-Hughes, an anthropology lecturer at Berkeley. She’s referring, of course, to the recent visit by Ben Shapiro. Though quite why Mr Shapiro should be mentioned alongside psychological torture and the violation of human rights remains unclear, and Dr Scheper-Hughes takes care not to offer even a single direct quotation by way of evidence. Instead, we’re treated to some inventive ventriloquism, to the extent that readers are expected to believe that Shapiro has somewhere referred to black people, all of them, as “criminally inclined, drug addicted, homicidal losers.” Those familiar with Mr Shapiro’s actual output may find this a little bizarre. Almost as bizarre as the claim that Shapiro is not only “racist, sexist” and “misogynist,” but also “very dangerous” and a “physical threat” to students.
Perhaps Dr Scheper-Hughes has some thoughts on whether publicly and hyperbolically defaming people – accusing them of racism and misogyny, and of being a physical menace to students, for instance – also constitutes “violence” and a cause of post-traumatic stress disorder.
But they’re so passionate. We should compromise with them. After all, we don’t want to be extremists, do we?
These people live in a fantasy world.
These people live in a fantasy world.
Or a self-inflicted nightmare, at least.
We see a lot of this sort of thing, of course. And we are often left to wonder whether the hysteria is legit or somewhat of a put-on.
(I’m sure it’s often a mixed case. It’s not as if fanaticism and bad faith are strangers to one another.)
It’s not as if fanaticism and bad faith are strangers to one another.
Absolutely. Fanatics lie.
Absolutely. Fanatics lie.
And first of all, to themselves. It’s what makes such a psychological swamp of these people.
I’m sure it is a considerable psychological strain to filter out any evidence that Janice Fiamengo or Ben Shapiro aren’t national socialists. I suspect the endlessly repetitive jargon acts as a defense mechanism against their own internal doubts as much as against external criticism.
My fantasy is that someday the bearded scowling thunder-god of all class-action lawsuits will bring the whole stinking pile of hate-crimes and hate speech law tumbling to the ground. Hate crime statutes are rarely, if ever, applied equally; they are the very embodiment of inequality before the law. Nobody saw the danger of attempting to psychologize the application of justice, the potential to birth a squalling, misshapen perversion of civil and criminal law.
I’m sure it is a considerable psychological strain to filter out any evidence that Janice Fiamengo or Ben Shapiro aren’t national socialists.
The casual, routine dishonesty is quite something. I sometimes wonder what it must be like to be surrounded by supposedly intelligent people whose worldviews and proclamations don’t seem in any way constrained by reality. And when the purpose of academia’s Clown Quarter seems to be to churn out vain and stupefied creatures like this, discussed at length here, then the word pathological scarcely seems adequate.
It’s about the language. Control the language, own the meaning of words and you can control the human mind. The left and other charlatans have understood this for centuries.
I sometimes wonder what it must be like to be surrounded by supposedly intelligent people whose worldviews and proclamations don’t seem in any way constrained by reality.
On the 15th anniversary of 9/11, I heard one of those weekly radios show while driving in to work. On it, they had a panel a numerous professors, who uniformly blamed 9/11 on Bush, the Republicans, and the American government in general.
Of course, there was zero discussion of why the attackers (described only in the vaguest terms) had bothered to attack; it was treated as an act of nature. This went somewhat off the rails when a caller asked why the learned panel wasn’t interested in discussing the attacker’s motives, only the US response, and the panel pointed out that was because the reason for the attack was clear. Obviously, the 9/11 attackers were responding to Bush’s unprovoked war on Afghanistan.
When the caller tried to point out that it was the other way around, the professors all became very excited, and dismissively told the caller to shut up. When the host pointed out (referencing NYT stories on the timeline) that yes, 9/11 had preceded the invasion of Afghanistan, the panel was utterly bewildered. They were convinced that the host must be mistaken. The sainted NYT was beyond reproach, of course, but… no, that couldn’t be right.
You could hear their cerebellums fusing in real time.
Although that was gratifying, it was astounding that several university professors shared the common belief that was not only completely wrong, but easily disproved, and this was in their field of supposed expertise. An 11 year old kid with access to Wikipedia and a search engine could find the timeline of 9/11, but an history department worth of political science professors couldn’t.
Why? Because they didn’t want to. They were all wrong, and they were al insufferably smug about it, of course. The word pathological isn’t sufficient to describe that level of idiocy.
I’m sure it is a considerable psychological strain to filter out any evidence that Janice Fiamengo or Ben Shapiro aren’t national socialists.
You’re assuming that what Fiamengo or Shapiro says has even been considered, let alone precoessed. No strain is needed if they don’t do the work you presume is being done. And per my comment above, words like “natinal socialist” mean only what they choose them to mean. Such people could just as easily classify my dog as a “national socialst” so long as they get a critical mass to go along with them.
Again, you could think of Mr Shapiro as a proxy and shorthand for the mainstream, non-leftist views of tens of millions of ordinary people – people who would also presumably be denounced as “hateful,” a cause of trauma, and a “physical threat” to Berkeley’s students. And so if you happen to think that “white privilege” and “white supremacy” are types of pernicious nonsense propagated by hustlers, and that the cultivation of pretentious and hysterical grievance is a recipe for failure and resentment, then you too are “very dangerous” and a mortal threat. If only to the dishonesties and status of Dr Scheper-Hughes.
vain and stupefied creatures like this
Incoming!
From about 3’54”
I wanna say this press conference is a sham! This has never been about free speech. This has been about a Fascist assault on the American University in the service of a Fascist regime in power … a White Supremacist regime. It’s about normalising Fascism on campus …
[The Free Speech Movement] is a movement about people standing up against White Supremacy not inviting White Supremacists to the hall!
… [R]olling out the red carpet to normalise and collaborate with Fascism in this country. And Still they’re going to sue the university. This just shows you can’t appease Fascism. You cannot placate these Fascists …
We have to rise up! Millions of people! RefuseFascism.org denounce the collaboration of this university. RefuseFascism.org calls on people to be out on the steps … 10 am tomorrow … And we call on people across this country to drive the Fascist Trump-Pence regime out of power – in the name of humanity.
Incoming!
That’s an awful lot of morony to process in one sitting.
That’s an awful lot of morony …
Just so.
I suspect the hand of Yvette Felarca of ‘By Any Means Necessary’ had an influence in there somewhere – certainly with the seemingly endless repetition of ‘Fascism’, ‘Fascists’ and ‘White Supremacy’.
Incidentally, the original has Taylor (the woman speaking) say ungrammatically: “Millions of people RefuseFascism.org denounce the collaboration of this university”
I assumed it was a mistake and tidied it up – I realise of course now that it was almost certainly deliberate and fully intended to leave listeners with the impression that RefuseFascism.org has millions of members signed up to it.
On the topic of errors, Scheper-Hughes’ original post in CounterPunch must have been dashed off with an indecent amount of haste. Not only is it full of smears, half-truths, and outright libel against Shapiro, but at several points it changes direction completely onto an almost wholly unrelated topic but before you can work out how it relates to anything resembling a coherent idea she has changed direction yet again:
Here she is complaining about the apathy of her colleagues and students (“Why aren’t [we] hosting counter events, teach- ins, timed and presented during the controversial atl right line up of fall speakers: Shapiro, Milo, and Coulter’s tirades?”). Then there she is railing against safe spaces (“Feeling bad? feeling sad? We will provide free counseling and tissues.”).
All of a sudden she launches into an attack on the First Amendment that barely rises above the level of gibberish – for she argues first that “The first amendment is a work in progress” and that therefore “We need strong legal scholars and thinkers and researchers to push against it, to recognize when the rule of law is illegal (as Laura Nader put it)”. But this is said without any apparent awareness or concern that there is barely a cigarette paper between what she’s calling for and the kind of scandalous abuse of state power normally found in the only the most corrupt of gangster states.
Before she’s given time for that to sink in or really explain what she means, however, she switches inexplicably to name-dropping some philosophers (““Words are deeds”, according to Wittgenstein. J. L. Austin (1975) and John R. Searle (1970) wrote books and essays on speech act theory.”). To anyone who doesn’t know anything about speech act theory, the references are completely meaningless and to anyone who does it’s incoherent as it barely covers two lines of the text leaving you to wonder what on Earth – other than name-dropping for the sake of name-dropping – she actually intended by making mention of them in the first place.
She then ends with a complete non sequitur involving a demand that she be listened to on the basis of who she is rather than what she has to say: “In short, Hate speech is an act of violence. The First Amendment is ignorant of the vast research on these topics by medical anthropologists, clinical psychologists, and neurological scientists.” – What?
“Perhaps Dr Scheper-Hughes has some thoughts on whether publicly and hyperbolically defaming people – accusing them of racism and misogyny, and of being a physical menace to students, for instance – also constitutes “violence” and a cause of post-traumatic stress disorder.”
Rule #1: Ben Shapiro is not “people”.
Billdehaan, that’s hilarious, if somewhat depressing. But I’ve noticed it a lot recently. It’s easy to assume that because someone is repeatedly trusted by the news media and talks confidently and authoritatively, that he must know what he’s talking about. But all too often these days, it’s obvious to anyone paying the least attention that these people are confidently and authoritatively spouting utter nonsense, and have no better grasp of their subject than any random person off the street. Often a lot less.
1. Hate speech should be illegal. If not illegal, then at least barred from campuses and the internet, and anyone comitting hate speech should be fired.
2. Anything that challenges left-wing doctrine is hate speech.
What could possibly go wrong with that line of reasoning?
What I don’t get is how the SJW’s think that a 5 foot, 9 inch, 140 lb., 32 year old is such a threat…
and anyone comitting hate speech should be
fired.assaulted. FTFY…What I don’t get is how the SJW’s think that a 5 foot, 9 inch, 140 lb., 32 year old is such a threat…
They don’t. It’s another lie.
See also Christina Hoff Sommers, whose on-campus security detail was quite impressive. I’m assuming the armed officers were there to prevent Dr Sommers from jumping off the stage, glassing someone and feasting on their blood.
Hate crime statutes are rarely, if ever, applied equally; they are the very embodiment of inequality before the law.
I thought that was their purpose all along.
They’re trying to normalize their own violent response to non-violent speech. Of course they’re going to pick a non-threatening target.
Not entirely unrelated.
Not entirely unrelated.
LMAO!
(Seriously. I’m still laughing at that.)
Not entirely unrelated.
Given the omnivore nature of Japanese pop and fashion culture, I’m not surprised they’d appreciate foreign folk adopting some of their own style.
But then again, maybe the Woke contingent should visit Akihabara and lecture the “gothic lolitas” about their egregious appropriation of Victorian culture.
The casual, routine dishonesty is quite something. I sometimes wonder what it must be like to be surrounded by supposedly intelligent people whose worldviews and proclamations don’t seem in any way constrained by reality.
This morning’s Doonesbury . . .
Careful, Asians … you’re slipping into “whiteness” and you know what the consequences will be.
Careful, Asians … you’re slipping into “whiteness”
Theirs is by far the most elaborately rationalised racism I’ve ever seen.
See also this.
WOW! hate speech is torture? really?
I`m sure that if I had fallen into the hands of my enemies and had the choice between having sharpened matchsticks driven underneath my fingernails or being caned across the soles of my feet or being water boarded or having a baseball bat taken to my shins OR having my jailer saying nasty things to me I would definitely chose the last one,because that`s just so much worse, isn`t it?
(sarcasm off)
As it turns out, many years later, I’ve realized that I’m a trans, gender-expansive South Asian … (From the Everyday Psychosis article quoted by Darleen).
Would any of those intervening years have been spent at the varsity, by any chance?
So, essentially an ultimatum, the only way to avoid war is surrendering.
It never seems to occur to these pests that their cultures are inferior to the one where they lodge so comfortably and free from fear.
I denounce myself, comrades.
“Slipping into whiteness” means valuing hard work, scholarship, a rewarding career, monetary success, the family, individual freedom, democracy, and the rule of law.
In other words, those attributes that have produced the most peaceful, humane, fair, and affluent society the world has ever seen.
This is what they wish to tear down because … well, I’m not sure. Perhaps it makes them feel important.
“Slipping into whiteness” means valuing hard work, scholarship, a rewarding career, monetary success, the family, individual freedom, democracy, and the rule of law.
I don’t think “monetary success” fits in there at all. I know lots of very “white” people who care little for money, yet value the other things you list greatly. NZ culture doesn’t particularly value people for the amount they earn, and neither does most of Europe. I, personally, have turned down many opportunities to earn more, and so have many of my friends.
Unless by “monetary success” you merely mean rising to the point where money stops being a continual concern i.e. avoiding outright poverty.
This is what they wish to tear down because
Because their success within that system depends on their own initiative and self-discipline, and they’re *entitled* dammit! How *dare* they not simply be given, as by *right*, whatever they want?
Work is for the proles, as is the willingness to delay gratification (which is also racist).
I’m truly sorry. I could not get past the following assertion: “Hate speech is a speech act that can harm the central nervous system,…” Does Professor Scheper-Hughes spend her time at Dune cosplay cons? I bet she looks quite fetching in a Bene Gesserit outfit.
I don’t think “monetary success” fits in there at all.
I have no problem including monetary success as part of “acting white.”
I don’t view monetary success as (necessarily) grabbing as much money as you can. It’s about achieving the level of wealth you desire so that you can be independent, and it generally requires thrift and foresight.
“Hate speech is a speech act that can harm the central nervous system,…”
This is where I think r/K selection theory is on to something. For these people, their ability to handle anything even remotely threatening is so atrophied that harsh words really do provoke a physical reaction, one of extreme fight-or-flight nervous system stimulation.
The rest of the world generally learned how not to lose their **** over being teased on the playground at about age ten, though.
I am constantly amazed by the capacity of the loonies to trump themselves. One starts reading and think that someone calling a Jewish guy a Nazi is the pinnacle of leftist mentalism, but swiftly a twitterloon steps in and patronises 120m Japanese in the cause of antiracism. Then Everyday Mentalism says: “Hold my decaf chai latte.”
Surely we can’t be far off ‘Why Dr King Was A White Supremacist’ ?
Not only is it full of smears, half-truths, and outright libel against Shapiro, but at several points it changes direction completely onto an almost wholly unrelated topic but before you can work out how it relates to anything resembling a coherent idea she has changed direction yet again
What’s revealing, I think, is that Dr Scheper-Hughes has obviously assumed (a) that none of her student readers know anything about Ben Shapiro, and (b) that none of them will bother to check anything she’s said about him, however dishonest or perverse. Apparently, the students’ knee-jerk indignation will prevent them using Google.
And if this is the standard of her polemic on a subject supposedly of great importance to her – an article that reads like the work of a first-year student and is erratic, bordering on incoherent, and premised on wild distortions and numerous outright lies – then it’s reasonable to ask questions about the quality of her teaching, and her probity in general.
Re the above, it looks like one left-leaning student did have the wherewithal to attend Shapiro’s talk and ask if one of Dr Scheper-Hughes’ claims about him is actually true.
Needless to say, it isn’t.
Needless to say, it isn’t.
Once again, we see a student who seems to be unable to process the fact that his/her image of the “enemy” is, at best, a grotesque caricature of the actual person. Further, when confronted with facts contrary to her reality, the student really doesn’t have the mental agility to respond. The irony is, her manufactured hatred of Shapiro leads her to try to formulate a philosophical basis for indicting women who abort their children for murder, a public policy which Shapiro specifically disclaimed.
Perhaps Dr Scheper-Hughes has some thoughts on whether publicly and hyperbolically defaming people – accusing them of racism and misogyny, and of being a physical menace to students, for instance – also constitutes “violence” and a cause of post-traumatic stress disorder.
Consistency is for the little people.
Shapiro is not only “racist, sexist” and “misogynist,” but also “very dangerous” and a “physical threat” to students.
Ben is 5’9″, do you know who else was 5’9″? Hitler!
Case proven bigots.
do you know who else was 5’9”? Hitler!
I’m told his favourite activity is cracking student skulls and scooping out the brains.
It’s thin gruel, but still.
‘Nancy Scheper-Hughes’
Handy old pirate lore:
If there be
Names of three,
Or a hyphen ye see,
BEWARE!
For bat-shit crazy be she!
There used to be a feminist satire site written under the pseudonym of Colleen Hyphenated-Lastname.
Elsewhere in academia:
I’m not sure which is more peculiar – the ball pits, in which students can apparently experience “emotional safety,” or the fact that the university has a “wellness programmes administrator.”
Jim Goad has an excellent piece about ‘Hate’ up at Taki’s.
Donald Trump is already a solid contender for the title of all-time world champion of being accused of hatred in the most hateful terms possible. I sincerely believe that if you were to take everything he’s ever said that is deemed “hateful,” then compare it to the things that are said about him on the premise that he’s hateful, any reasonable person could easily see that the Trump-haters say objectively worse things.
When I was college, the “wellness programs administrator” was the guy behind the bar at Booches. Motto: “No Sniveling.”
Shapiro’s arguments on not prosecuting women for abortions is surprisingly inconsistent with the rest of his worldview. Saying that “most women don’t think it’s a baby” strips females of their agency and accountability. “Doctor’s know full well that it’s a baby” is ridiculous – abortionists do not, on the whole, think there is anything innately wrong with abortion either, and so by Ben’s logic should not be prosecuted.
His view condenses to: Women are too dumb to be held accountable for getting abortions.
I’m a huge fan of Shapiro and pro-life but he’s off by a mile on this one.