Thanks for this artcile, Mr. Chapman. It saddens me that all three of the comments refuse to address your points, retreating to full-on whataboutism.
To the whatabouters: Either free speech is important -- or it's not. Either the search for truth, unencumbered by political correctness (whether right-wing or left-wing) is important -- or it's not. Make your choice! Take your stand!
If it's not important, then shut the fuck up about it when the left does it. If it is important, then screech like a banshee when the right does it. (And yes, of course, the same thing applies to the whatabouters of the left.)
If you can't follow this simple rule, then all you care about is your tribe. And you're part of the problem.
"Monkey see, monkey do" goes the old saying. The academic Left's success at intimidating and silencing dissenting voices has obviously prompted the non-Left to adopt and use marginal or even repugnant practices.
This is a reflection of the emerging US Zeitgeist: Aspiring pols will now run for office saying: "Sure, I'm bad. But not as bad as my opponent; so vote for me!"
I admit I stopped reading halfway through, so I don't know if the author also took to task those left wing students who routinely disrupt conservative speakers invited to address the student body, but — sight unseen — I'd bet good money that there wasn't even a hint of that.
The worm has turned. Do you love it? Do you hate it? Here it is, the way you made it.
For an overview of who is doing what to restrict free speech, see https://www.harvard-jlpp.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/21/2022/07/TURLEY_VOL45_ISS2.pdf. Anyone who adopts an authoritarian approach should be criticized. For over 100 years, progressives have asserted that rights are government-granted privileges (See Dewey, Wilson, Roosevelt, etc.) Even Cass Sunstein, whom I admire, seems to say that government officials are not obligated to secure rights that lack popular political support. It is true that over many years some on the right have treated rights as government-granted privileges by advocating laws that impose private morality (restrictions on adultery, homosexuality, contraceptives, etc.), but most of those restrictions have been held unconstitutional. The latest attempt on the right is "common good constitutionalism," but it's too early to assess whether that will catch on. If people on the right (those use call "Trumpists") are now adopting the views of the left about rights, I condemn that. But do you dispute the fact that there is widespread acceptance on the left of a view of free speech that is at odds with our founding principles? Also, do you deny that those who advocate that view have had great success in convincing young people to adopt it? See this for interesting statistics on views about free speech. https://www.cato.org/survey-reports/state-free-speech-tolerance-america#overview
No, I don’t dispute that there is an authoritarian tendency on the left and too little respect for our traditional concept of free speech among too many on the left. Those elements should be resisted. But where I’m mostly reading about it is on university campuses. That is a problem not to be ignored.
But the authoritarian threat from the left appears to me to be dwarfed by the rise of nativist authoritarianism on the right. At the national political level, I can think of a couple possible Democratic congress people that may be too authoritarian to me. The list of right wing authoritarians in power or running for office or have recently run for office at the congressional, statewide, and presidential levels are quite long and they have enormous support among right wing voters.
You want to resist left authoritarians on college campuses, that’s fine. But let’s not kid ourselves about where the current most dangerous threats are coming from.
Multiple blue states have recently passed laws giving the State the right to remove children from parents who do not "affirm" their child's new "gender identity" and consent to castrating drugs ("puberty blockers"), cross-sex hormones, and genital mutilation surgery. What could possibly be more illiberal and authoritarian than this?
Yes, I will choose right-wing "authoritarianism" any day of the week over having my kids taken away from me and mutilated.
I haven’t seen any such statute. All I’ve seen is the California one that gives a California court jurisdiction in a child custody dispute between parents to decide what’s in the best interest in the child, when the child is brought in from out of state. Someone was desperately trying to show it gave the state the power to take someone’s kids away for failing to consent to gender affirming care, but that wasn’t what the statute actually did.
Good point. Tyranny is a recurring theme on both the left and right and has been for centuries. But we're talking about the modern manifestation that currently affects our lives. Also, it is undeniable that the left's current philosophy of free speech is consistent with cancel culture, and that philosophy is dominant in universities, despite outliers like Texas A&M. The left is not just engaged in tribal politics but engaged in a philosophical project that openly rejects our founding principles of liberty.
“The left is not just engaged in tribal politics but engaged in a philosophical project that openly rejects our founding principles of liberty.”
So all these actual continuing acts of authoritarianism we have recently seen and are currently seeing by Trumpists and Trump adjacents on the right are aberrations and it’s the left that represents the true present authoritarian danger to our democratic principles.
They are overreactions to trends on the left that have been accumulating for years. I still think they are aberrations and will subside when their alarmism does. If not, then we are truly lost.
I think cancel culture is a cancer on our society, whichever side in our political divide engages in it. Is there any sign that either side will stop it if the other does as well? It originated on the left. Who on the left is willing to stop it and have a truce? Is it even possible at this point for the left to backtrack given the left's widespread belief that suppressing speech against leftist ideas is justified?
They made sure open debate and pluralism was impossible, and made it clear for conservatives that the choice was between imposing or being imposed upon.
Woke ideology took advantage of liberal tolerance to infiltrate every establishment institution, and discredited liberalism in the process. Our tolerance was seen as weakness.
It's about time the cultural left got a taste of its own medicine. I have no sympathy whatsoever. I hope they are cancelled, ostracized, shunned, and humiliated like they do to those that oppose them all the time.
We gave them an inch, and now they ruin our lives whilst mocking and taunting about how we're powerless to stop them because they're on the 'right side of history'.
We were far too tolerant of all the various 'rights' groups. Society needs to reject completely the paradigm of group civil rights.
Conservatives clinging onto ideas like 'small government' and 'individual liberty' is just taken advantage of by the hegemonic cultural left to impose its own moral vision.
Every time I see a smug LGBT activist laughing about how they'll always win and there's nothing we can do, I curse those conservatives and liberals that gave these civilization destroyers the freedom they now deny to us. They should have nipped it in the bud.
That's against 'American values' you say? Well maybe those values were a mistake. The 'we hold these truths' part of the Declaration is utopian, Jacobin nonsense that has corrupted the soul of the United States.
They're able to be because they stopped the rot before it became unstoppable. Even so, they are under siege by globalists left right and centre, with the EU wanting to impose LGBT ideology under the utterly corrupted name of 'human rights'.
In a country like the US, woke is so hegemonic that more drastic solutions may have to be taken. It must be ruthlessly suppressed and attacked by the state, and be treated like the civilizational cancer it is.
The 'Progress Pride' flag should be as stigmatized as the swastika is today.
Thanks for this artcile, Mr. Chapman. It saddens me that all three of the comments refuse to address your points, retreating to full-on whataboutism.
To the whatabouters: Either free speech is important -- or it's not. Either the search for truth, unencumbered by political correctness (whether right-wing or left-wing) is important -- or it's not. Make your choice! Take your stand!
If it's not important, then shut the fuck up about it when the left does it. If it is important, then screech like a banshee when the right does it. (And yes, of course, the same thing applies to the whatabouters of the left.)
If you can't follow this simple rule, then all you care about is your tribe. And you're part of the problem.
Is this the same GOP that decries it when they feel their freedom of speech has been quashed? What a bunch of fascists
"Monkey see, monkey do" goes the old saying. The academic Left's success at intimidating and silencing dissenting voices has obviously prompted the non-Left to adopt and use marginal or even repugnant practices.
This is a reflection of the emerging US Zeitgeist: Aspiring pols will now run for office saying: "Sure, I'm bad. But not as bad as my opponent; so vote for me!"
Whoo hoo!! Look whose ox is getting gored!
I admit I stopped reading halfway through, so I don't know if the author also took to task those left wing students who routinely disrupt conservative speakers invited to address the student body, but — sight unseen — I'd bet good money that there wasn't even a hint of that.
The worm has turned. Do you love it? Do you hate it? Here it is, the way you made it.
This is why I often say that every right-wing accusation is not only a confession, but a stated intention.
For an overview of who is doing what to restrict free speech, see https://www.harvard-jlpp.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/21/2022/07/TURLEY_VOL45_ISS2.pdf. Anyone who adopts an authoritarian approach should be criticized. For over 100 years, progressives have asserted that rights are government-granted privileges (See Dewey, Wilson, Roosevelt, etc.) Even Cass Sunstein, whom I admire, seems to say that government officials are not obligated to secure rights that lack popular political support. It is true that over many years some on the right have treated rights as government-granted privileges by advocating laws that impose private morality (restrictions on adultery, homosexuality, contraceptives, etc.), but most of those restrictions have been held unconstitutional. The latest attempt on the right is "common good constitutionalism," but it's too early to assess whether that will catch on. If people on the right (those use call "Trumpists") are now adopting the views of the left about rights, I condemn that. But do you dispute the fact that there is widespread acceptance on the left of a view of free speech that is at odds with our founding principles? Also, do you deny that those who advocate that view have had great success in convincing young people to adopt it? See this for interesting statistics on views about free speech. https://www.cato.org/survey-reports/state-free-speech-tolerance-america#overview
No, I don’t dispute that there is an authoritarian tendency on the left and too little respect for our traditional concept of free speech among too many on the left. Those elements should be resisted. But where I’m mostly reading about it is on university campuses. That is a problem not to be ignored.
But the authoritarian threat from the left appears to me to be dwarfed by the rise of nativist authoritarianism on the right. At the national political level, I can think of a couple possible Democratic congress people that may be too authoritarian to me. The list of right wing authoritarians in power or running for office or have recently run for office at the congressional, statewide, and presidential levels are quite long and they have enormous support among right wing voters.
You want to resist left authoritarians on college campuses, that’s fine. But let’s not kid ourselves about where the current most dangerous threats are coming from.
Multiple blue states have recently passed laws giving the State the right to remove children from parents who do not "affirm" their child's new "gender identity" and consent to castrating drugs ("puberty blockers"), cross-sex hormones, and genital mutilation surgery. What could possibly be more illiberal and authoritarian than this?
Yes, I will choose right-wing "authoritarianism" any day of the week over having my kids taken away from me and mutilated.
I haven’t seen any such statute. All I’ve seen is the California one that gives a California court jurisdiction in a child custody dispute between parents to decide what’s in the best interest in the child, when the child is brought in from out of state. Someone was desperately trying to show it gave the state the power to take someone’s kids away for failing to consent to gender affirming care, but that wasn’t what the statute actually did.
To be super clear, you are expressing a preference for fascism over the status quo, as you perceive it. Do I have that drive?
Good point. Tyranny is a recurring theme on both the left and right and has been for centuries. But we're talking about the modern manifestation that currently affects our lives. Also, it is undeniable that the left's current philosophy of free speech is consistent with cancel culture, and that philosophy is dominant in universities, despite outliers like Texas A&M. The left is not just engaged in tribal politics but engaged in a philosophical project that openly rejects our founding principles of liberty.
“The left is not just engaged in tribal politics but engaged in a philosophical project that openly rejects our founding principles of liberty.”
So all these actual continuing acts of authoritarianism we have recently seen and are currently seeing by Trumpists and Trump adjacents on the right are aberrations and it’s the left that represents the true present authoritarian danger to our democratic principles.
You are correct.
I wish they were aberrations. The wide support among GOP voters for them indicate otherwise.
They are overreactions to trends on the left that have been accumulating for years. I still think they are aberrations and will subside when their alarmism does. If not, then we are truly lost.
I think cancel culture is a cancer on our society, whichever side in our political divide engages in it. Is there any sign that either side will stop it if the other does as well? It originated on the left. Who on the left is willing to stop it and have a truce? Is it even possible at this point for the left to backtrack given the left's widespread belief that suppressing speech against leftist ideas is justified?
“It originated on the left.”
The Red Scare would like a word.
I'm talking about cultural leftism, and since the 1960s.
Woke activists have brought this on themselves.
They made sure open debate and pluralism was impossible, and made it clear for conservatives that the choice was between imposing or being imposed upon.
Woke ideology took advantage of liberal tolerance to infiltrate every establishment institution, and discredited liberalism in the process. Our tolerance was seen as weakness.
It's about time the cultural left got a taste of its own medicine. I have no sympathy whatsoever. I hope they are cancelled, ostracized, shunned, and humiliated like they do to those that oppose them all the time.
It’s always someone else’s fault for authoritarians doing authoritarianism.
They started it.
We gave them an inch, and now they ruin our lives whilst mocking and taunting about how we're powerless to stop them because they're on the 'right side of history'.
We were far too tolerant of all the various 'rights' groups. Society needs to reject completely the paradigm of group civil rights.
Conservatives clinging onto ideas like 'small government' and 'individual liberty' is just taken advantage of by the hegemonic cultural left to impose its own moral vision.
Every time I see a smug LGBT activist laughing about how they'll always win and there's nothing we can do, I curse those conservatives and liberals that gave these civilization destroyers the freedom they now deny to us. They should have nipped it in the bud.
That's against 'American values' you say? Well maybe those values were a mistake. The 'we hold these truths' part of the Declaration is utopian, Jacobin nonsense that has corrupted the soul of the United States.
Ok. Well, I’m going to continue to be anti-authoritarian but I hope your life gets better without our country having to become Hungary.
Hungary is a moderate and liberal country.
They're able to be because they stopped the rot before it became unstoppable. Even so, they are under siege by globalists left right and centre, with the EU wanting to impose LGBT ideology under the utterly corrupted name of 'human rights'.
In a country like the US, woke is so hegemonic that more drastic solutions may have to be taken. It must be ruthlessly suppressed and attacked by the state, and be treated like the civilizational cancer it is.
The 'Progress Pride' flag should be as stigmatized as the swastika is today.
Not while I can help it. Bye now.
Group Civil Rights is an abomination regardless of which side is proposing it.