Attacks in Paris + Belgium

[Ian_Wrexham]

The main problem to me is that no platforming people is happening more and more (as far as I can tell, maybe I just notice it more) and we're going to be churning people out of uni who think just telling someone they're wrong and to stfu is the right way to do things. In effect all we're teaching people to do is ignore the views we don't agree with, whether those views are extreme or not. Putting a correlation together from personal experience (that I know I'm repeating a bit), one of my friends at uni is very pro no-platforming people and was the one that just walked away as soon as I told her I was a Tory, she only wants to live in the echo chamber that Universities are now creating and talking about opposing views with the people who hold them is clearly not on her agenda, instead she wanted to find a green party supporter to talk to to reinforce her being correct to herself. Now her doing that hasn't stopped me being Tory, and neither has debate (admittedly) but through discussions my views on things and politics have changed, if those discussions never happened then nor would the changes. So yeah, I do think it's an issue that we are going to be creating vast swathes of postgrads that wont make the huge positive differences and changes they can, purely because they cant debate or tolerate being exposed to alternative views.

I agree with much of what Aber Gas has said.

On the subject of no platforming*, it's clear that there are a bunch of people - mostly celebrity activists, journalists or politicians - who expect to be entitled to room and space to speak - often in a totally uncritical environment. It's not that they are being censored - they aren't - they have many well-remunerated platforms to advance their opinions. It's collective action to ensure that people are not able to uncritically advance objectionable positions.

At least one high-profile "no platforming" case concerned a student LGBT officer privately declining to appear alongside Peter Tatchell. His response - to out the LGBT officer in the press and allege he had been "no platformed" was essentially a demand that no-one treat him with anything less than reverence. Which, however much you may respect Tatchell's activism, is fucking bullshit.

There are significant issues of free-speech in Universities, but they're not driven by students. Stuff like Prevent, where academic staff are legally obliged to grass students up for having opinions, or the proposed law to outlaw BDS. But these are issues "free-speech" arseholes are silent on because they don't affect newspaper columnists.

I also think sometimes debate is fetischised and far less useful as either a way of exploring ideas or a way of changing people's minds. Often, you can't talk people out of bigotry - for a lot of people, it's borne of fear, uncertainty and ignorance while other people are paid handsomely to be bigots. While the first class of people are probably more likely to be won over by arguments; by giving them a more compelling and accurate story to explain their conditions - the second group need to be driven into the fucking sea.

And it's the second set of people who are more likely to end up being asked to speak at student debates.

*taking "no platforming" in the student sense of "we don't care if you have a platform elsewhere but you can't have one here" rather than the antifascist sense of "we will actively attempt to shutdown any place you have a platform"

 

[smat]

In lieu of a genuinely oppressed female community, she's appealed to the radical feminist community instead

I think you forgot to say "rad fem" mate.

 

[Alty]

I agree with much of what Aber Gas has said.

On the subject of no platforming*, it's clear that there are a bunch of people - mostly celebrity activists, journalists or politicians - who expect to be entitled to room and space to speak - often in a totally uncritical environment. It's not that they are being censored - they aren't - they have many well-remunerated platforms to advance their opinions. It's collective action to ensure that people are not able to uncritically advance objectionable positions.

At least one high-profile "no platforming" case concerned a student LGBT officer privately declining to appear alongside Peter Tatchell. His response - to out the LGBT officer in the press and allege he had been "no platformed" was essentially a demand that no-one treat him with anything less than reverence. Which, however much you may respect Tatchell's activism, is fucking bullshit.

There are significant issues of free-speech in Universities, but they're not driven by students. Stuff like Prevent, where academic staff are legally obliged to grass students up for having opinions, or the proposed law to outlaw BDS. But these are issues "free-speech" arseholes are silent on because they don't affect newspaper columnists.

I also think sometimes debate is fetischised and far less useful as either a way of exploring ideas or a way of changing people's minds. Often, you can't talk people out of bigotry - for a lot of people, it's borne of fear, uncertainty and ignorance while other people are paid handsomely to be bigots. While the first class of people are probably more likely to be won over by arguments; by giving them a more compelling and accurate story to explain their conditions - the second group need to be driven into the fucking sea.

And it's the second set of people who are more likely to end up being asked to speak at student debates.

*taking "no platforming" in the student sense of "we don't care if you have a platform elsewhere but you can't have one here" rather than the antifascist sense of "we will actively attempt to shutdown any place you have a platform"

The Prevent point is a separate one that I wouldn't want to address quickly when on my phone, but re the general policy of "you have platforms elsewhere but you're not having one here" - do you think it's acceptable for students (or whoever) to protest and get ANY speaker excluded, providing that speaker has some other forum available? If Peter Oborne was invited by a university society, hard-left students protested on account of him writing for the Mail and praising Nigel Farage, then the event was cancelled...that's okay?

 

[Ian_Wrexham]

The Prevent point is a separate one that I wouldn't want to address quickly when on my phone, but re the general policy of "you have platforms elsewhere but you're not having one here" - do you think it's acceptable for students (or whoever) to protest and get ANY speaker excluded, providing that speaker has some other forum available? If Peter Oborne was invited by a university society, hard-left students protested on account of him writing for the Mail and praising Nigel Farage, then the event was cancelled...that's okay?

If there's a bigot in my local pub ranting about muslims and me and some mates confront him, and the pub asks him to leave, have we infringed on his free speech? I was on a rush-hour train the other day and a couple of Jehovah's Witnesses were banging on about the end times. Someone told them to shut up. Not a free-speech issue - they were dead annoying.

I don't get how your hypothetical scenario of a paid speaking engagement being cancelled due to protests is different?

Fundamentally, whether you think it's ok rather than bullying etc has to be taken on a case by case basis. I can come up with examples that are obviously not ok. Different people are going to have different views of that. But idk, this "lefty student threat to freedom of speech" thing is basically a moral panic. A red scare, if you will.

I have issues with the way freedom of speech is weaponised in Western Countries - in that it is a dead selective concept. Revered in the abstract and for privileged, powerful people who rarely have to worry about censorship; non-existent for marginalised people who find themselves engaged antagonistically with the state. See how in France, for example, world leaders marched to say Je Suis Charlie last year, while France quietly outlawed peaceful protest and criminalised supporting BDS.

 

[Ian_Wrexham]

She's a fraud. She was never a gamer and she's not representing any real segment of the gaming community. In fact it's female gamers that have probably attacked her most vociferously. What she has done is found a niche in which to set her stall and become the self-appointed gender relations expert on. In lieu of a genuinely oppressed female community, she's appealed to the radical feminist community instead with tales of Mario reinforcing male sexual entitlement (because the goal is to rescue the princess) and MMOs objectifying women (because of sexy armour that female gamers want too).

And I completely rejection the assertion that the video gaming industry is lagging behind other media. I can't think of a more egalitarian medium out there. I'm not sure who you mean by misogynistic mouthbreathers. Sexist gamers? If so, who cares? They have no platform or influence.

Alternatively, the "gaming community" is so full of entitled misogynist man-children who can't hack even the most tentative feminist reading of their hobby that they wail on the internet about her and try and harass her off then internet.

 

[silkyman]

Most of those 'man-children' are just 'children' mind.

But careful here. It's getting very close to going full gamergate... And you never go full gamergate...

 

[Dr Mantis Toboggan]

threats of rape are just bantz if the ignorant c*** whores can't hack it then they shouldn't be getting into the gaming industry in the first place imho

 

[smat]

I do really enjoy reading balanced debates about how everyone should behave to one another which take in different points of view, like in this thread comprised exclusively of nerdy white millennial males.

 

[Dr Mantis Toboggan]

i'm not a nerd dickhead

 

[smat]

i'm not a nerd dickhead

it's a chrome pluggin not a forum. the millen-nials to snake people one is also fun

 

[Dr Mantis Toboggan]

back to your boat cuntbutt

 

[The Paranoid Pineapple]

At least one high-profile "no platforming" case concerned a student LGBT officer privately declining to appear alongside Peter Tatchell. His response - to out the LGBT officer in the press and allege he had been "no platformed" was essentially a demand that no-one treat him with anything less than reverence. Which, however much you may respect Tatchell's activism, is fucking bullshit.

She declined to appear at the event and in the process denounced him as a racist and transphobe (pretty unpleasant accusations). She's perfectly entitled not to want to share a platform with Tatchell (not everyone will like his brand of activism and he ought not to be immune from criticism) but a "it's him or me" style ultimatum does rather seem to be entering into the "no-platforming" spirit as it forces the organisers into a choice as to who they want to have speak at the event. The accusation that he outed her seems barmy to me - she had already been referred to several times in the mainstream media as a LGBT officer.

It's instances like this that I struggle to comprehend. There seems to be a strange insistence in some circles that every guest be ideologically pure; even when the participants share broadly similar aims and views, minor points of disagreement are not something which are tolerated. Just seems like bullshit grandstanding for the most part.

 

[Ian_Wrexham]

She declined to appear at the event and in the process denounced him as a racist and transphobe (pretty unpleasant accusations). She's perfectly entitled not to want to share a platform with Tatchell (not everyone will like his brand of activism and he ought not to be immune from criticism) but a "it's him or me" style ultimatum does rather seem to be entering into the "no-platforming" spirit as it forces the organisers into a choice as to who they want to have speak at the event. The accusation that he outed her seems barmy to me - she had already been referred to several times in the mainstream media as a LGBT officer.

It's instances like this that I struggle to comprehend. There seems to be a strange insistence in some circles that every guest be ideologically pure; even when the participants share broadly similar aims and views, minor points of disagreement are not something which are tolerated. Just seems like bullshit grandstanding for the most part.

Bullshit grandstanding? She explained, in private, why she didn't want to appear alongside Tatchell. Fair enough, no?

In response, Tatchell, a man who has received more death threats than I've had hot dinners, started acting like a big fucking baby, wrote in the Telegraph about "the intolerant student left" (i.e. one person) "no-platforming" him (i.e. declining to appear alongside him at an event), organised a demo outside the NUS about how people should be more deferential to him (sorry, respect free speech). It's fucking pathetic.

The irony is that Tatchell has (rightly) been a vocal opponent of homophobes being given platforms, especially at universities.

 

[The Paranoid Pineapple]

Bullshit grandstanding? She explained, in private, why she didn't want to appear alongside Tatchell. Fair enough, no?

In response, Tatchell, a man who has received more death threats than I've had hot dinners, started acting like a big fucking baby, wrote in the Telegraph about "the intolerant student left" (i.e. one person) "no-platforming" him (i.e. declining to appear alongside him at an event), organised a demo outside the NUS about how people should be more deferential to him (sorry, respect free speech). It's fucking pathetic.

The irony is that Tatchell has (rightly) been a vocal opponent of homophobes being given platforms, especially at universities.

It's perfectly legitimate for her not to want to appear alongside him - he himself accepted that - although I don't think she ought to have sought his removal. What he objected to was the "with-hunting, McCarthy-style untrue allegations". Wherever people want to draw the line with free speech, it clearly does not extend to making libellous accusations about people.

For what it's worth, I don't think it was an inherently private communication - she had contacted the organisers, made some serious accusations about him and said she wouldn't be present at an event with him there. If I was the subject of that kind of communication to a third party, I think I'd feel pretty aggrieved to say the least.

 

[Ian_Wrexham]

It's perfectly legitimate for her not to want to appear alongside him - he himself accepted that - although I don't think she ought to have sought his removal. What he objected to was the "with-hunting, McCarthy-style untrue allegations". Wherever people want to draw the line with free speech, it clearly does not extend to making libellous accusations about people.

For what it's worth, I don't think it was an inherently private communication - she had contacted the organisers, made some serious accusations about him and said she wouldn't be present at an event with him there. If I was the subject of that kind of communication to a third party, I think I'd feel pretty aggrieved to say the least.

Well, yeah. You'd potentially think the accuser was mistaken or possibly malicious. Potentially you'd want to get in touch to ask why they're claiming what they were.

I doubt you'd write a series of long opinion pieces for national newspapers about your freedom of speech from the censorious student left and picket the NUS headquarters. Because that would be totally unjustified and a massive escalation. You could rightly be accused of using your considerable platform to bully someone.

 

[blade1889]

I agree with much of what Aber Gas has said.

On the subject of no platforming*, it's clear that there are a bunch of people - mostly celebrity activists, journalists or politicians - who expect to be entitled to room and space to speak - often in a totally uncritical environment. It's not that they are being censored - they aren't - they have many well-remunerated platforms to advance their opinions. It's collective action to ensure that people are not able to uncritically advance objectionable positions.

At least one high-profile "no platforming" case concerned a student LGBT officer privately declining to appear alongside Peter Tatchell. His response - to out the LGBT officer in the press and allege he had been "no platformed" was essentially a demand that no-one treat him with anything less than reverence. Which, however much you may respect Tatchell's activism, is fucking bullshit.

There are significant issues of free-speech in Universities, but they're not driven by students. Stuff like Prevent, where academic staff are legally obliged to grass students up for having opinions, or the proposed law to outlaw BDS. But these are issues "free-speech" arseholes are silent on because they don't affect newspaper columnists.

I also think sometimes debate is fetischised and far less useful as either a way of exploring ideas or a way of changing people's minds. Often, you can't talk people out of bigotry - for a lot of people, it's borne of fear, uncertainty and ignorance while other people are paid handsomely to be bigots. While the first class of people are probably more likely to be won over by arguments; by giving them a more compelling and accurate story to explain their conditions - the second group need to be driven into the fucking sea.

And it's the second set of people who are more likely to end up being asked to speak at student debates.

*taking "no platforming" in the student sense of "we don't care if you have a platform elsewhere but you can't have one here" rather than the antifascist sense of "we will actively attempt to shutdown any place you have a platform"

The idea of debate is that they aren't allowed to perpetuate their ideas uncritically. Often these people have been invited by one set of students and get shut out by another...

...In my experience at Manchester 'no platform' are completely driven by students with SU officers and petitions. I dont know enough about prevent to know hoe it works maybe I'm a free speech ***hole for that but I've just not come across it before.

Whilst I dont disagree that the speakers are very unlikely to change a bigoted stance the audience, who I am far more concerned about, are. In my experience more students than I thought possible still have opinions I find damaging because they've never been questioned and they've never been exposed to someone else holding roughly similar opinions being questioned because all we're doing is silencing those people. As I said earlier a larger worry I have is that we're not producing students who stand up for what they believe in and eloquently fight for it anymore, rather we have student activists now who only go with silencing and find an echo chamber to live in, I fail to see how that's of benefit.

And I'm not too convinced by your last point that these people only want them to not have a platform at Universities, regardless of what SUs may say.

 

[Jockney]

That was back when Marxist thought still believably held the answers to inequality in totality. We hadn't properly challenged discrimination back then, so had every reason to believe that that alone was the answer, with no reason to reach for crazier and crazier theories to back it up. The problem is that in the aftermath of the Second World War social scientists were terrified to look to culture or biology for further explanations, for fear of repeating the mistakes of the past, so we end up with academics doing insane mental gymnastics to try and explain why a Western world without much overt systematic sexism/homophobia/racism still has such disparity. That's not to say that doesn't exist within our culture or institutions at all of course, but it's patently obvious that it doesn't tell the whole story in my view.

i'm not entirely sure how exploring biology helps to explain the manifest inequality that exists in industrialised societies, but sure social scientists have studied 'culture' (however vaguely you define that): in fact, they're almost preoccupied with it.

besides marxist approaches aren't obsessed with sexism/homophobia/racism in and of their selves. they're fundamentally concerned with power and how it operates. this extends to racism, sexism and the like but encompasses so much more, it's an holistic philosophy and, whether you agree with it or not, it does set out to tell the 'broader story'.

She's a fraud. She was never a gamer and she's not representing any real segment of the gaming community.

she's a critic. the reaction turned her into an icon and an activist.

In fact it's female gamers that have probably attacked her most vociferously.

Really? Of all the articles, blogs, messageboard posts and videos I've seen attacking her (and I've seen thousands), the overwhelming majority have been by men.

What she has done is found a niche in which to set her stall and become the self-appointed gender relations expert on.

she was getting paid by triple A publishers to do seminars before the femfreq stuff, so not so much self-appointed.

In lieu of a genuinely oppressed female community, she's appealed to the radical feminist community instead with tales of Mario reinforcing male sexual entitlement (because the goal is to rescue the princess) and MMOs objectifying women (because of sexy armour that female gamers want too).

Bizarre. How is the across-the-board reduction of women down to their sexual attributes in lieu of three-dimensional characterisation something that even 'female gamers want too'? These examples are ludicrous when discussed in isolation, which is of course why GG'ers and the like often do just that, but when collated among a thousand other examples it becomes hard to deny. Again, how is this a rad-fem issue? How is representation within the most profitable facet of the entertainment sector not a crucial fucking cultural issue?

[quote]
And I completely rejection the assertion that the video gaming industry is lagging behind other media. I can't think of a more egalitarian medium out there. I'm not sure who you mean by misogynistic mouthbreathers. Sexist gamers? If so, who cares? They have no platform or influence.[/quote]

It's lagging behind in representation both in terms of staffing and artistic depiction: console games are made by and aimed at one specific demographic for the most part. It's very inclusive up to a point: until you disagree and then you're doxed, harassed, threatened and slandered. Of course those are extreme examples. But then you didn't hear of this shit after #OscarsSoWhite, did you. The good folks at IMDb weren't taking to reddit to dig up shit on Jada Pinkett-Smith's sex life, or calling in bomb threats to Bedford-Stuyvesant apartment blocks.

 

[Ebeneezer Goode]

I think you forgot to say "rad fem" mate.

I don't know why you always pick up on this. You realise it's not a slur, right? It's something they came up with and use themselves.

Alternatively, the "gaming community" is so full of entitled misogynist man-children who can't hack even the most tentative feminist reading of their hobby that they wail on the internet about her and try and harass her off then internet.

Tentative? It's some of the most bizarre and extremist feminist ramblings I've ever read. It falls short of the stuff about heterosexuality being a patriarchal plot and men deserving to reside in concentration camps (said the Guardian contributor), but still. And it's not like the worst feminists on her side were any less rabid.

threats of rape are just bantz if the ignorant c*** whores can't hack it then they shouldn't be getting into the gaming industry in the first place imho

I'm not sure holding a group responsible for the actions of it's very worst members is a standard you want to set.

If there's a bigot in my local pub ranting about muslims and me and some mates confront him, and the pub asks him to leave, have we infringed on his free speech?

No, but you would have done nothing to further the discourse, quite the opposite. Not such a problem in a pub, but it kinda is in a place of learning.

 

[smat]

I don't know why you always pick up on this. You realise it's not a slur, right? It's something they came up with and use themselves.

Because it marks anyone using it out immediately as a nerdy little loser. Was a bit disappointed you went for the more formal version tbh.

 

[Womble98]

The worst thing with the tumblrina's is the view that criticising other cultures for the ways in which they treat LGBT/minorities/women is a form of imperialism. Is there anything more racist than saying that because of someone's race or nationality they do not deserve the same human rights that we in the west do?

 

[smat]

The worst thing with the tumblrina's

oh fuck me

 

[Womble98]

oh fuck me

What's wrong with that term? If you want me to post links of the many of tumblr accounts which have posted their views the issue that I described I can.

 

[Ebeneezer Goode]

Because it marks anyone using it out immediately as a nerdy little loser.

You're being a bit of a wierdo about this smat. It's a term Huffpost, The Guardian, the Telegraph and lots of prominent feminists etc use. I don't think it has the connotations you seem to think it has.

 

[Jockney]

What's wrong with that term? If you want me to post links of the many of tumblr accounts which have posted their views the issue that I described I can.

it takes all of 15 seconds to run it through google. the answer should be obvious.

 

[Womble98]

it takes all of 15 seconds to run it through google. the answer should be obvious.

Still not an adequate explanation. It sums up the complaints of a section of tumblr users who's lives must be so intensely miserable and horrific because every 30 seconds they find something new to complain about.

 

[smat]

prominent feminists

prom fems

 

[Jockney]

Still not an adequate explanation. It sums up the complaints of a section of tumblr users who's lives must be so intensely miserable and horrific because every 30 seconds they find something new to complain about.

it's a gendered attack and it is stupid ad hominem, but more importantly it's a gendered attack.

 

[Womble98]

it's a gendered attack and it is stupid ad hominem, but more importantly it's a gendered attack.

No it isn't..... It can describe anyone who is acting in an overly dramatic way. I bet you don't have a problem with "neckbeard" being used as an insult. If that isn't a gendered attack....

 

[Jockney]

No it isn't..... It can describe anyone who is acting in an overly dramatic way. I bet you don't have a problem with "neckbeard" being used as an insult. If that isn't a gendered attack....

it is quite clearly gendered. self-evidently so, even down to the feminine suffix 'ina', which is the diminutive and implicitly infantalises.

and no, i would see it as more infantile and stupid than offensive. that is a facile comparison at best.

 

[Womble98]

it is quite clearly gendered. self-evidently so, even down to the feminine suffix 'ina', which is the diminutive and implicitly infantalises.

and no, i would see it as more infantile and stupid than offensive. that is a facile comparison at best.

It infantalises because the views of these people are childish and immature. "I don't like it= Ban it". It is pointless to get all worked up about the language and ignore the point being made.