Mark Steyn on the power and indecency of the ‘progressive’ narrative: 

It is remarkable how easily vast numbers of people now accept that truth is subordinate to the needs of ideological conformity – as we saw in Europe on New Year’s Eve, when politicians, police and press colluded to cover up mass sexual assault – and, as their cover-up unravelled, self-described progressives and feminists indignantly insisted that the cover-up had been the correct call. In the end, the official lies will cost you your world.

Janice Fiamengo on mythical “privilege” and its mandatory confession: 

The idea of a bunch of PhDs in astronomy having to publicly confess their sinful [male] “privilege” at the opening session of a radio astronomy research conference is shockingly indicative of ideological totalitarianism.

Related: Daphne Patai on the normalisation of bad ideas.  

Josh Gelernter follows the twisted logic of “cultural appropriation”: 

History’s first recorded sandwich was invented by the Jewish sage Hillel, who proposed celebrating Passover by eating the commemorative sacrifice of lamb sandwiched between two soft pieces of matzoh — which reminded Jews of the exodus — along with bitter herbs, to remind them of slavery. Jews [should therefore] demand that non-Jews renounce sandwiches… Of course, it was a Christian — Newton — who discovered Newtonian physics, and a Jew — Einstein — who discovered relativistic physics. Jews and Christians invented the majority of modern medicine and the majority of advanced mathematics. The automobile was invented by the Jew Siegfried Marcus, and the airplane by the Christian Wright brothers, who were the sons of an Evangelical bishop. Christians and Jews [should therefore] demand that young leftists renounce science, medicine and transportation.

And further to the Great Kimono Outrage of 2015, Franklin Einspruch mingles with the cultural authoritarians: 

The goal of Decolonise Our Museums and related efforts is not to end prejudice. It is to remain in a permanent state of antagonism around issues of identity. [Protestor, Xtina] Wang essentially admitted this when she said that it was an American thing to want to come up with a “final solution” to these problems. 

On Twitter, Franklin has been attempting a civil debate with the authoritarians in question. So far, I can’t say the exchange has been mutually enlightening, but you do have to admire his patience. 

Feel free to share your own links and snippets in the comments. It’s what these posts are for.

Lifted from the comments:

A nasty non-leftwing man said that we can’t handle unflattering non-leftwing ideas or even debate rationally. So we smeared paint all over ourselves and screamed so that no-one could hear what the nasty man said. Then we walked out, giving everyone else the finger and leaving a mess for the janitors. Because we care so very much about everything.

I’m paraphrasing, of course.

Evolutionary psychologist Gad Saad casts an eye over politically corrected academia:

There is a disorder known as Munchausen syndrome, wherein I fake illness and I go to the hospital because that will garner me a lot of attention and sympathy… I think this hyper-victimology poker is a manifestation of this type of syndrome. I can garner a lot of sympathy by constantly seeing life through a prism of endless victimhood. People respond to that. “Oh, it’s okay, you’re protected here.” It’s hard to argue this stuff with me, though, because I can always use the card of “I escaped execution in Lebanon, therefore you better have a really strong victimology story to outdo mine.” And usually they run away. So this is what happens when people are using their identity for these types of purposes. It’s grotesque.

Dr Saad’s recent lecture at the University of Ottawa can be viewed in full here. A brief taster, with illustrations by Matthew Drake, can be viewed here.  

Meanwhile, on feminist Tumblr…

Someone wants to buy a shirt that bears the immensely radical slogan “you cannot weigh beauty” and is promptly horrified to discover that said shirt is available in different sizes.  

Apparently, sizing clothes is triggering and oppressive.

Katherine Timpf on when blue hair and facial piercings just aren’t enough to get a girl noticed: 

A Norwegian woman is claiming that she is actually a cat trapped in a woman’s body — and that the fact that she has a human body is a “genetic defect.” […] Because Nano believes that her true identity is as a feline, she sees no choice but to live her life as one, even wearing cat ears, a tail, and fluffy pink paws that she grooms herself with in order to express her true self. Nano claimed to have feline characteristics such as superior hearing, better night vision than day vision, the urge to hunt mice (although she’s never actually caught one), and a fear of water. In fact, she even said that some of her catlike behaviours are involuntary. For example, she claimed to have no real control over how she started hissing at a dog in the middle of her interview.

Happily, there’s a video. 

Kevin Williamson on the inadvertent comedy of identitarian Oscars protests: 

The protest rhetoric inevitably has been concentrated into a Twitter hashtag, #OscarsSoWhite, which invites the longstanding and sometimes uncomfortable question of who is white  —  and who decides. The 88th Academy Awards are hardly an all-Anglo affair: Alejandro González Iñárritu of Mexico has been nominated for best director; Rosa Tran, an Asian-American, shares a nomination for Anomalisa; Gabriel Osorio Vargas and Pato Escala Pierart of Chile share a nomination for Bear Story. There are Danes and Irish and Welsh and loads of Brits, and the nominations were announced by Guillermo del Toro of Mexico and Ang Lee of Taiwan… The convolution necessary to maintain #OscarsSoWhite–type thinking is substantial. If excessive whiteness is the offence, then “white” needs to be defined in such a way that it includes Alejandro González Iñárritu and Pato Escala Pierart. 

And Jacob Kohlhepp on the farce and dishonesty of “diversity” classes: 

[Psychology professor Anna] Lau recalled a situation during which a foreign student asked “what if the reason black males are incarcerated more than whites is because they commit more crimes?” She said there was a total silence in the room. She then stated she wished she knew how to answer, because hard questions should be asked. Shortly after, Assistant Professor Safiya Noble stated “we cannot let unsophisticated comments stand.” She said that as a faculty in residence for the “Afrikan Disapora” dorm floor, she has learned that “those questions outside the norm make black students feel not just microaggressed, but actually aggressed.”

Yes, those unsophisticated questions can really be a bitch. By most credible estimates, black males aged 15-24 – around 2% of the U.S. population – are responsible for around 5o% of U.S. murders, and for disproportionately high rates of other violent crime, including rape, armed robbery and assault. The disparity is so great that even if one assumes police bias and differential rates of conviction, despite evidence to the contrary, one still has to wonder why the victims of such crime  - whose descriptions match rates of arrest and who are themselves very often black – would lie about the appearance of their attacker.

Feel free to share your own links and snippets in the comments. It’s what these posts are for.