Read the two statements below and ask yourself which is hate-speech and which is a policy proposal, a proposal that is perfectly consistent with most members of the group being unproblematical:
1). Someone is described as a: "racist, anti-Semitic boor, a drink-sodden, self-hating reviler of women, gays and liberals"
2). "The Muslim community will have to suffer until it gets its house in order. What sort of suffering? Not let them travel. Deportation - further down the road. Curtailing of freedoms. Strip-searching people who look like they're from the Middle East or from Pakistan... Discriminatory stuff, until it hurts the whole community and they start getting tough with their children..."
It will be not be the slightest surprise to hear that the kneejerk response to the second utterance above was to label it as "hate speech" -- but it in fact says nothing at all about any characteristic of the Muslim community or any member of that community. It is simply a harsh proposal about how to deal with the aggression that emanates from some members of that community. One may disagree with the proposal as unlikely to be fruitful (etc.) but that is another matter.
The first statement above, however, could not be more derogatory and is as hateful as can be. That statement is undoubtedly the work of a hater. And you may not be surprised that the one undoubted hater out of the two mentioned above was a Marxist -- Terry Eagleton. Marx hated just about everyone and most of his followers do likewise. The man of the extreme policy proposal was Martin Amis and it is HE, not Eagleton, who has been accused of hate speech. It was, incidentally, Martin Amis's father whom Eagleton described so derogatorily.
The latest shot in the war of words is here. Hitchens defends Amis here and Amis puts it all into context here
The most important context however is that whether a thing is called "hate speech" or not depends on who said it. Leftists just CANNOT utter hate speech, by definition, apparently. Cindy Sheehan wrote in her book Peace Mom: "I fantasize about killing Bush when he was a baby." Hate speech? Of course not! Hate-filled speech need not be hate speech, in the wonderful fantasy world of the political Left. Who the REAL haters are is crystal-clear, however.
(For more postings from me, see TONGUE-TIED, EDUCATION WATCH INTERNATIONAL, GREENIE WATCH, POLITICAL CORRECTNESS WATCH, FOOD & HEALTH SKEPTIC, GUN WATCH, SOCIALIZED MEDICINE, AUSTRALIAN POLITICS, DISSECTING LEFTISM, IMMIGRATION WATCH INTERNATIONAL and EYE ON BRITAIN. My Home Pages are here or here or here. Email me (John Ray) here.)
1 comment:
to the Left
groups, classes, races
only exist in so far as they are vehicles for victimnhood and therefore largresse from a state run by the left.
a soon as the same "clumps" are used for a truly useful purpose, they raise their arms up and cri racism/fascism.
when blacks are described as having higher sickle cell rates - it's useful.
when described as having lower IQ - it's racism.
when muslims are described as victims of islamophobia (as if islamophobia was irrational - see dr. sanity!) then it is social justice.
when muslims are said to practice a creed which is essentially misogynistic and hegemonic, then it is racist.
the is the inconvenient truth about the left's use of race.
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