133 Replies to “The Tolerant Left”

  1. Reminding someone that our laws are different is not a terrible indictment. For one thing the University Provost has no power to prosecute such a matter.
    But that’s besides the point, if you want to claim you were muzzled you can’t cancel your own event. Levant and Coulter effectively self-censored themselves and then act as if there free speech was denied.
    It’s not that no one was shot or killed, it’s that everyone was peaceful, no one was arrested, or assaulted. Yes the two people in that picture are having a heated argument, how scary, and one of them’s black! run!!!
    Whoever pulled the fire alarm is a loser, but at worst that’s mischief. People pull the fire alarm all the time at University’s, all the time, in residence, during exams. It’s not unusual.

  2. It seems to me that there are two issues going on here. One of them is obvious – the issue of free speech. The second thing is the double standard of Houle of the University of Ottawa and the University’s Student Union.
    If we were to look at this event in isolation – as the opponents of Coulter and the MSM would have us do – we would be constrained to treat this only as a free speech question. The debate would then centre around what is an acceptable line for free speech, has someone (Coulter) crossed said line, and what to do in the event of the crossing of said line?
    However, if we were reasonable people, we would not let the MSM (or John or Scott) set the terms of the discussion. Undoubtedly, we would ask the free speech related questions but we would also ask one other question. How does Houle and the SU deal with other controversial speakers? As has been pointed out, the UofO has hosted the Iranian President and Israel Apatheid Week.
    A reasonable person would probably conclude that the UofO is advancing the idea of free speech by hosting all three venues. A reasonable person might also conclude free speech was being valued if Coulter and the IAW were hosted and the Iranian President were banned because of his financial support of genocide against a people through known terrorist groups and also because of the effectiveness of these terrorist groups in carrying out his agenda of murder and genocide; free speech does have limits and reasonable people would not need this boundary explained to them. Perhaps a third (theoretical) possibility would be to set the free speech bar so low that all controversial speakers would not be hosted – a choice that would be viewed as austere for a university but possible if applied consistently.
    Therefore any discussion of Coulter needs to placed within a framework of at least the other two events hosted at the UofO. Any discussion that is based upon a decoupling of Coulter from the other two must lead to the obvious question. Why would someone like commenters John or Scott consider Coulter to be more dangerous than someone who financially supports active terrorist groups who are trained and successful murderers?
    Unfortunately, we know the reason.

  3. John
    Are you for real???
    I was there as an eyewitness. There were lots of muscle there. Scary muscle. Some were NOT U of Zero or Carleton students. They did not move when the police asked them politely. Some had backpacks which they did not take off even though that was a condition of entering the lobby. I did not see what was outside on the steps so I cannot comment in that regard.
    The threat was real. My guess is that they would have shouted down Ann Coulter, and stomped their feet and the event would not have occurred in any case. The same treatment Daniel Pipes.
    I am glad I did not send my daughter to this pathetic excuse of a university.

  4. Brent,
    Where have I ever insinuated, that I thought Coulter was dangerous, or somehow more dangerous then Amadenijhad.?
    Where have I ever suggested Coulter should not of been allowed to speak?
    The only point I’m making is that I think it’s ridiculous that Levant and Coulter would cancel their own event and then grandstand and claim they were muzzled.
    That is what I object to.
    Coulter is no more dangerous then any other bigot with a microphone.
    It’s best to let them speak freely lest they claim they’ve been victimized.

  5. scott – who said that Levant and Coulter cancelled the event? This is as much false rumour as the original tale of ‘2,000 protesters’. According to people on site, there were only about 30 protesters; the rest were people who wanted to get into the hall. And the hall only held about one quarter of that.
    To my understanding, after the fire alarm was pulled, campus security and Ottawa police told the organizers that they felt they could not guarantee security and the police were the ones who recommended cancellation. If police tell you that they are concerned and recommend cancellation, you normally do as they ask. Coulter herself had not even arrived on site. OK?
    The emails and blogs to get protesters on site were apparently telling people to bring ‘things to throw’.
    Actually, scott, people don’t pull fire alarms all the time, even during exams.
    john – you are a rather typical ‘leftist’ not only in your perspective, which is one-sided and rejects debate, but in your mode of ‘argumentation’. That is, you don’t ‘argue’; you don’t make a case for yourself; all you do is repeat your opinions.
    Who cares? They are your opinions. What is objectionable about your opinions is not their content..again, who cares..but the fact that you are firmly opposed to other people making up their own minds about issues. You have decided on Coulter. You then insist that other people have no right to listen to her and make up their own mind. Hmmm. Sounds pretty elitist and arrogant to me. Why are you so domineering?

  6. John, since when is it anybody’s right not to be offended? I’m a Christian – I hear and read insults to my religion all the time. Sometimes they make me angry. Then I get over it. I know I don’t have the right to silence those people, by violence if necessary.
    Leftists think it’s offensive when Christians threaten boycotts of Actor X or Company Z for offending them and boycotts aren’t violent. They’re just trying to put their money where their mouth is. When Christians boycott a product, the Left screams “It’s the Inquisition!” When a leftist comedian makes a joke about Palin’s handicapped son and conservatives complain, the left cries, “it’s censorship!”
    But when a Muslim gets hot under the burka because Ann Coulter made a camel joke, the lefties weep tears of sympathy for the poor little “oppressed” Muslim. The Muslim isn’t told, “Oh, big deal, shrug it off like a big girl and develop a thicker skin like the rest of us adults.” Oh, no, according to John, it’s asking too much to expect that Muslims behave like civilized adults.
    Who’s the real racist here, John? Look in the mirror.
    The left wants everyone to become post-racial, but they’re the ones who can’t leave race alone. (Even when, as numerous posters have pointed out, Islam is not a race, but a religion. I don’t like blue-eyed “Taliban Johnny” Lindh anymore than I like bin Laden.) Just keep picking at that scab, you self-hating, brainwashed fool.

  7. ET,
    Both the UofA and the Ottawa Police are on record today saying they did not cancel the event, and that it was the organizers decision to do so.
    If you cancel your own event you can’t claim you were muzzled, that’s not how censorship works.
    Having been out of school for 5 years I can safely remember at least 5 occasions where people pulled the fire alarm falsely at university. Twice in first year res, once in second year res and twice during exams. Drunk students and those looking to avoid an exam are usually the culprits. It’s common, hell I can remember it happening many times in middle and high school. It’s not a violent act, it’s mischief and a misdemeanor, not a crime. I don’t condone it, but it’s hardly unusual.

  8. “She could be dressed like the Grand Dragon and you guys would still defend her and should out that liberals are with the t’rrists.”
    First John, you and Scott are likely the only Democrats here.
    Second, do you even know any black people? Are you even remotely familiar with black culture? Black people celebrate their (soul) food, and fried chicken is definitely one of the favourites. Recognizing this is not racism you fool, it’s common sense.
    If I sing/rap lyrics from one of my favourite songs “a crazy mother fcuker named Ice Cube, from a gang call Nigga’s With Attitudes” does that make me a racist?
    The bottom-line is, it’s self-loathing crackers like you, in your righteous indignation, that feel compelled to what… protect the poor minorities from big old mean white people. It’s the same as crackers like yourself demanding that Muslim women have the right to vote veiled in Quebec(a year or two ago). The fact was, not a single Muslim woman complained, nor asked for such an accommodation. Once again it was useless self-loathing liberals with nothing better to do than claim to advocate for people who didn’t ask to be advocated for in the first place!
    BTW, NEWS FLASH: Asian people like rice!
    Flame away John.

  9. Meh, it’s the U of O – hardly a school anyone takes seriously… their grads outside actual, real classes (you know, like engineering, science, accounting, etc) can only get jobs flipping burgers, becoming brain-dead government drones or PhDs pouring marxist BS into the next generation. Read some of the media accounts where they interview anti-Coulter twits: geniuses like feminazi studies, human rights studies, etc – future leeches on the productive segment of humanity.
    All last night’s events proved is that Canada is still a land of frightened twits unwilling to debate. Sucking at the teat of entitlement does that.
    Oh, and in case anyone is wondering seeing one of the earlier comments talked about nuking Mecca, the first nuke to drop on Israel, no matter where it comes from, will cause Mecca to turn into a large, radioactive crater. With that pillar of Islam gone, the whole cult will collapse… see, it’s built on animistic superstition, not the brother-sisterhood of humanity. The nuts like I’madinnerjacket may wish to annihilate the Jewish state – the Israelis will take the nutbar’s religion away for ever in return.

  10. O means O.
    UZero eats crow: cawcawcacwcwcwacaw …..
    Note the scare quotes: ‘welcome’ by CBC leftists.
    Get this from Liberal Rock, he of the Liberal Gun Registry and the Clinton tainted blood crime:
    Rock: “the university is a “safe and democratic environment for the expression of views, and we will keep it that way.”
    Did Rock speak ex cathedra? From the Marion Hill? Hall? Hell?
    …-
    “Coulter ‘welcome’ at University of Ottawa”
    http://www.cbc.ca/canada/ottawa/story/2010/03/24/ottawa-ann-coulter-university.html
    http://www.bluelikeyou.com/2010/03/24/coulter-vs-u-of-o-who-really-won/#comment-78327

  11. scott – of course the police didn’t cancel the event; they didn’t organize it and therefore had no authority to either set it up or cancel it. What they did was to tell the organizers that they, the police, could not provide security for the event and suggested that the organizers ought therefore to cancel it. OK?
    You are trying to trivialize a false alarm by a false comparison with residence events. But those situations were completely different from an attempt in a large lecture hall to disrupt a scheduled event.

  12. Donna,
    If there’s one thing I think we can all agree on it’s that people love dismissive stereotypical ethnic, religious and racial comedy. Especially those we are laughing at. The cruder and lazier the stereotype the better, am I right?
    Muslims love camel jokes.
    Jews love money jokes.
    Ann Coulter is a shining example that to truly move forward as a society we need to regress to early twentieth century levels of casual bigotry in everyday life.

  13. Horny Toad’s comment @6:56 is disgusting.
    ET – eloquent as usual, but you might as well be explaining String Theory to an ant (or me, for that matter). “Even people John doesn’t like have the right to say stuff” is not a difficult concept to grasp, but evidently he is among the Unteachable.

  14. “Having been out of school for 5 years”
    One thing is for certain, in 10 or 15 years you’ll be embarrassed and ashamed of the nonsense you spew. Unless of course you have an Arts degree.

  15. ET,
    Please show me one quote where the Ottawa police are on the record saying they couldn’t provide a safe environment. I”ve only seen them say they suggested the event be moved to a bigger venue to accommodate all the people. I’ve seen nothing to suggest they were worried about unruly mobs.
    All I’m saying is that a false fire alarm at a university is no more a crime during an event then it is during an exam. It’s mischief, it’s a misdemeanor, it’s stupid, but it’s also not terribly unusual on campus.

  16. What Donna said.
    And oh to be a fly on the wall at the HRC when they have to deal with a hate crime complaint by a Christian conservative…
    “Oh dear..I thought we were protecting people FROM those Christians…however will we deal with this one?”

  17. Indiana Homez,
    Oh I know, I can’t wait until I’m 40 so I can complete my conservative metamorphosis.
    Who wouldn’t want to rail at modern society and liberals day and night, those will be the days.
    I only hope this Civil engineering degree can get me there sooner, the day can’t come soon enough.
    Conservative victim complex here I come!

  18. bluetech: Well said, this is my imaginations creation-
    HRC chairman “We’ve never had to weigh in on a complaint with out overtly supporting Muslim interest…what do we do so we can look unbiased?”
    HRC reps *shrug & blink stupidly*
    HRC chairman “Maybe the UN can help us decide”
    HRC reps *nod in agreement (stupidly)*

  21. Well, I guess it has given U. of O. a much higher international presence. Canada’s university, indeed!
    http://www.annualfund.uottawa.ca/home.html
    … As a result and through the groundbreaking work of our community members, we are uniquely positioned among Canada’s research-intensive institutions to give students a remarkable education, to enrich the intellectual and cultural life of Canada and to help the country achieve greater international prominence….

  22. From the National Post story, Wednesday.
    “It’s a public safety issue”, said Sergeant Dan Beauchamp.
    This is an enormous cop-out (no pun intended). The issue here is freedom of speech versus intimidation, not “public safety” (which gets added to the list of anti-concepts).
    If the cops get to shut down any congregation of people for reasons of “public safety”, then any gang of thugs (like the anti-Coulter protesters in Ottawa) can shut down anything they like. What if a gang shows up at a political debate during an election campaign? Is the debate cancelled? That would be a serious assault on democracy. Which leftists only pretend to favour anyway, of course.

  23. John: “in this country, freedom of religion is guaranteed under the Charter of Rights and freedoms … This means that it’s against the law to discriminate against individuals based on their religion”
    That’s not what it means. Freedom of religion means you can believe whatever you want and say so, worship in your church or synagogue or mosque or whatever, without interference from the state.
    Tanker: “Meh, it’s the U of O – hardly a school anyone takes seriously… their grads outside actual, real classes (you know, like engineering, science, accounting, etc) can only get jobs flipping burgers, becoming brain-dead government drones or PhDs pouring marxist BS into the next generation. Read some of the media accounts where they interview anti-Coulter twits: geniuses like feminazi studies, human rights studies, etc – future leeches on the productive segment of humanity.”
    That’s the problem: the false philosophy of Marxism is being spread far and wide. It goes back to Plato but especially Kant and Hegel, who somehow were able to pass off fantasy about as coherent as L. Ron Hubbard’s Dianetics as serious thought.

  25. Indiana:
    Hey, I watch South Park with my two daughters often. (They’re 13 and 16 now, but we’ve been doing it for years.) Our favourites are the Mormon show (dumb-dee-dumb-dumb-dumb), and the Scientology show. It’s not like they don’t hear the cursing on their school playgrounds, and the way Parker and Stone skewer everything is just hilarious.
    I consider it a learning experience.

  26. Scott – this is in the National Post:
    “Event organizers say police warned them anti-Coulter demonstrators were “dangerous” and that, as a result, they could not guarantee her safety.”
    OK? If the police tell the organizers of an event that they cannot guarantee the safety, not only of the speaker, but of the people who are there, this means that the organizers MUST cancel the event. Why?
    Because if anything happens, even a minor scuffle, this means that the onus is on the organizers. The Police can say ‘we told them we couldn’t provide a secure environment and yet they insisted on going ahead with the talk’…

  27. bleetymouth – have you ever read one of Coulter’s books? Some articles, maybe?
    She’s not Howard Stern, she’s a lawyer who does a very impressive amount of research and uses facts to make arguments. I have never heard a half-way decent refutation of anything she’s said or written; only sneering vitriol and name-calling.

  28. of course there was the time she told a canadian interviewer that canada sent troops to the vietnam war.

  29. ET,
    That’s not a direct quote from the Police, that’s hearsay. The Ottawa Police are on the record saying they didn’t shut down the event and their was no threat of violence. They only suggested it be moved to a bigger venue to accommodate everyone.

  30. One problem with small dead animals is that it has a mindset – conservative. What if one changed its view in the future to be more center wing? If one already has a mind set then this won’t happen – and that is dangerous – it becomes a conservative “religion”.
    If something is stupid in history, should we conserve it? What do we change? only the good things? For example if there was a tradition for muslims to wear turbans, is this a good tradition necessarily, or a stupid one that encourages worms? should it be conserved just for the sake of conserving?
    The word “conservative” is vague and meaningless. Surely it doesn’t apply to conserving the environment either. Does it mean conserving the old testament in the bible too?
    Personally I am not a left or right wing nutcase, I see both sides as having advantages in different areas – I’m a bit more leaning to the right on many issues… I just wanted to bring up the problem with “conservative” word. I couldn’t post this reply to the place I wanted because you had shut off the comments – so I’m posting it here in your “left” attack.

  31. Scott
    Time will tell; and, I’m 35.
    Remember: If you are 20 and you are not a socialist you have no heart. If you are 40 and you are a socialist you have no brain.- Churchhill
    That said, I commend you for participating in rational and respect conversation on this and other threads. This isn’t the typical behaviour of those that share your views.

  33. Indiana Homez,
    Well I appreciate the words, but I cannot see my future self voting conservative. Maybe a modern libertarian party, but conservatives have little that appeals to me.
    I can’t speak for others on this site, but let me be the first to say not all “liberals/democrats/dumbocrats/loons” are as crazy as people may make them out to be.
    It’s good to know there are people on differing sides of the spectrum who can still debate the facts rationally.

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