The Right To Hate
I was astounded and outraged by the recent story from Nigeria, where 200 girls have been kidnapped and sold as wives or into slavery by a radical group of thugs, calling themselveshttp://www.usnews.com/news/world/articles/2014/04/30/reports-abducted-girls-forced-to-marry-extremists. The girls were attending a Physics test along with boys when the group surrounded the school and carried out the kidnapping. It was reported the group is against school for women, not unlike other religious sects in the Middle East, including areas of Pakistan and Iran. The legal protection of the rights of women in most third world countries are almost non-existent, due primarily to the practice of Islam. and other radical religions. The situation in that region of Nigeria was described by one spokeswoman as " "life has become nasty, short and brutish. We are living in a state of anarchy." This of course echoing Thomas Hobbes, the english philosopher, who said in his book Levithian (1651),
"No arts; no letters; no society; and which is worst of all, continual fear, and danger of violent death: and the life of man, solitary, poor, nasty, brutish and short."
Hobbes was a firm believer in a strong, central authority of governance created on moral foundations. This comment was in part an explanation regarding Men living in a constant state of Nature, where Man sees all property his. There are no rights in a State of Nature, but complete freedom.
On the same day, I read Eudaimonia/s post of Yale's current push to curb racist and bigoted comments which are popularly used. I was struck dumb that the push made headlines and I seriously wondered at the use of scarce resources for such a program. The justification included sentiments such as empowerment of women. People have a good understanding of what is basic politeness and what is not. So it begs the question, why the need to keep pushing at some cost programs or plans on words and phrases which are permissible/not permissible in the name of political correctness? There are so many things wrong in the world today-You can't travel and feel safe, You are stopped and searched by your own police, The NSA is spying on private citizens, the IRS is targeting certain groups, the EPA is regulating your private property and business right out from under you. 200 girls are kidnapped and made slaves because they wanted to learn....The irony of a major and important US university focusing on and elevating the hurt feelings of the few and being alarmed enough to "educate" their students about it compared to the alarm regarding real rights-being kidnapped! is staggering. I find it equally ironic that the former Dean of Yale Law School, now legal adviser to the State Department, Harold Koh, was very outspoken for the US to adopt a "transnational" approach to law, in response to the now famous video "smoking gun" for the Benghazi cover-up. We should revise our laws to include broader interpretation of Hate Speech, including denouncing of Islamic practices, which sees women as property and of little worth. Protect the rights of the group who do not acknowledge natural rights of women and denounce and pass hate laws against people who point that out! http://www.volokh.com/2012/09/13/former-.... This is referred to as the "abuse of free speech."
IF we get to a place where people's outrageous comments are considered so important that they may lose their business, their income, perhaps face jail, the influence of such programs like Yale's serves to not only indoctrinate but define the very terms for which a free citizen may be bound-in speech. The fact that the owner of a basketball team can lose his business and pay outrageous fines for words spoken in the privacy of his home- or a man lose his job because of a political donation is getting ever closer to the same tactics used by the villains in Nigeria. "I don't like what you are doing and I will control you." Why are free citizens of the once greatest country on Earth standing for that?
If racism and bigotry have become the MOST important issue Americans are facing today-we are in serious trouble. Because they are not. People are going to hate you for the color of your skin, for your political orientation, etc. You cannot legislate that away. Protecting natural rights and property rights is the single most effective way to address racism issues.
If we continue to raise false flags, eventually, when real problems need to be dealt with, like the team owner's privacy being violated by not one person but by multiple organizations through publishing of recordings, and no one is held accountable, you'd better strap on your skiis-the slope is a black.
"No arts; no letters; no society; and which is worst of all, continual fear, and danger of violent death: and the life of man, solitary, poor, nasty, brutish and short."
Hobbes was a firm believer in a strong, central authority of governance created on moral foundations. This comment was in part an explanation regarding Men living in a constant state of Nature, where Man sees all property his. There are no rights in a State of Nature, but complete freedom.
On the same day, I read Eudaimonia/s post of Yale's current push to curb racist and bigoted comments which are popularly used. I was struck dumb that the push made headlines and I seriously wondered at the use of scarce resources for such a program. The justification included sentiments such as empowerment of women. People have a good understanding of what is basic politeness and what is not. So it begs the question, why the need to keep pushing at some cost programs or plans on words and phrases which are permissible/not permissible in the name of political correctness? There are so many things wrong in the world today-You can't travel and feel safe, You are stopped and searched by your own police, The NSA is spying on private citizens, the IRS is targeting certain groups, the EPA is regulating your private property and business right out from under you. 200 girls are kidnapped and made slaves because they wanted to learn....The irony of a major and important US university focusing on and elevating the hurt feelings of the few and being alarmed enough to "educate" their students about it compared to the alarm regarding real rights-being kidnapped! is staggering. I find it equally ironic that the former Dean of Yale Law School, now legal adviser to the State Department, Harold Koh, was very outspoken for the US to adopt a "transnational" approach to law, in response to the now famous video "smoking gun" for the Benghazi cover-up. We should revise our laws to include broader interpretation of Hate Speech, including denouncing of Islamic practices, which sees women as property and of little worth. Protect the rights of the group who do not acknowledge natural rights of women and denounce and pass hate laws against people who point that out! http://www.volokh.com/2012/09/13/former-.... This is referred to as the "abuse of free speech."
IF we get to a place where people's outrageous comments are considered so important that they may lose their business, their income, perhaps face jail, the influence of such programs like Yale's serves to not only indoctrinate but define the very terms for which a free citizen may be bound-in speech. The fact that the owner of a basketball team can lose his business and pay outrageous fines for words spoken in the privacy of his home- or a man lose his job because of a political donation is getting ever closer to the same tactics used by the villains in Nigeria. "I don't like what you are doing and I will control you." Why are free citizens of the once greatest country on Earth standing for that?
If racism and bigotry have become the MOST important issue Americans are facing today-we are in serious trouble. Because they are not. People are going to hate you for the color of your skin, for your political orientation, etc. You cannot legislate that away. Protecting natural rights and property rights is the single most effective way to address racism issues.
If we continue to raise false flags, eventually, when real problems need to be dealt with, like the team owner's privacy being violated by not one person but by multiple organizations through publishing of recordings, and no one is held accountable, you'd better strap on your skiis-the slope is a black.
