Perhaps, but misspelling the name of the author who instigated much of what Glenn writes about here is not a typo I can overlook. And it feels disrespectful to the author, Abigail Shrier, not Spier. I believe most of us would object if we read an article about Glenn, that referred to him as Glenn Greenstein (for example).
Well he misspelled the name of the author of the book about which most of this article is about. I don't care about typos here and there, but this is disrespectful to Abigail Shrier. I honestly don't get your rather nasty objection!
I get this, but I reckon he gets the benefit of a crowd source editor. Small price to pay for getting a uncensorable platform. Honestly appreciate the ideas and the nits can be ironed out through iterative reading
My view — writing for 15 years without editors except in very limited circumstances — is that it’s better to publish after careful proofreading and let one’s readers crowd-source typos (which they do very fast!) than delay publication by hours and risk editorial suppression just to get rid of them before publication with copy editors and other layers of editorial review. Moreover, check how often heavily edited articles have all sorts of errors, including with names and dates: very frequently. I agree that misspelling an author’s name — twice, no less — is on the bad side of the errors I make, and I’ll apologize to Abigail for that, but it was very quickly corrected (thanks to numerous reader alerts, both here and by email), and as I said, edited pieces often have more errors than those produced by this much faster and more natural method of mine.
Spent 25 years in both daily and weekly newsrooms, including time as a copy editor and proofreader. Still do both part-time for a national Catholic magazine. Yeah, Glenn's got typos in here, but if that's what's catching your eye then I have to think that you are not a very disciplined reader.
In fact, when I'm doing a "first read" edit on an article, I purposely DO NOT edit typos or grammar. The first read is to see if the article makes sense; does it hold together logically?
Only then do I got back and check for grammar, spelling, etc.
And, no, Glenn, I am most certainly not looking to add more work to my plate. ;-) Great article as-is, imho.
Ha, 30 years here as a corporate editor (now retired) and I love this style of writing - so much more meat in this way of writing, instead of just reading a carved out slice of perfection, that says nothing of significance. I feel that Glenn is doing in his writing what Joe Rogan does in his podcast - loose long form articles that flow from his hip, and not someone's copy desk.
For many years, I wrote the lead op-ed column in the local daily. I tend to write in short, clipped sentence fragments - intentionally so, to achieve a conversational tone. The copy desk kept turning them into sentences - then I would have to change them back with the managing editor looking over my shoulder. Finally, one day I turned it in with the byline of "By Jim Trageser - as translated by the copy desk." They left my sentence fragments alone after that.
ha, that showed them! I never worked for a newspaper after college, but I found the corporate tyrants to be insidious when it comes to free speech, internally and externally. However, from what I remember about IBM, we never discussed politics openly, nor dare share writings about politics openly within the org. Limiting yes, but that limit preserved some sense of sanity I suppose, as compared to what's going on these days.
Personally, I'm so compulsive I have to correct typos and errors BEFORE I can read it for sense - but I grant that your order of priorities is more appropriate.
I also agree that typos are unimportant compared to the work Glenn is doing, and has done. Correcting them does improve presentation, though, so if someone wants to do the copyediting for him, go for it.
Good to see you here. Remaining typos I see currently: "a protesters" (a protester), "that was is" (that what is), "possible choose" (possibly choose), "socialised" (socialized, in American English), "Spier's book" (Shrier's book), "into the becoming" (into becoming), "Spier herself has" (Shrier herself has), "are leftist journalists are fanatically" (are leftist journalists who are fanatically, OR leftist journalists are fanatically), "but once which" (but one which), "ones disagrees" (one disagrees), "will inevitably falls" (will inevitably fall), "constitution and legal" (constitutional and legal). Won't nitpick about issues of punctuation, capitalization, etc., except that in "signed the Harper's Letter" you should not merely italicize "Harper" but should italicize the apostrophe-and-s as well.
If nothing else, having all these typos distracts from the conversation at hand. Note the many comments and people bickering about the typos. And instead of focusing more deeply on the subject matter the people who are paying Glenn to write are doing labor for him.
please discuss the possibility of having an admin/moderator delete the bickering as well as the trolling by right wing cargo cultists
I would double my monthly subscription to crowdsource a fund to hire you or someone else that is competent at deleting crap comments and doing light moderating. thnx
Hey Glenn, please don't sweat the small stuff. You're providing valuable, balanced information. Anyone focusing on minor grammatical errors are missing the larger point. Please, just keep doing what you are doing. Please.
That's how you feel (and I'll treat your third sentence the way you want it to be treated), but Greenwald happens to feel differently, and as others' comments show, he has decent reasons for his approach too.
Having read GG for many years, and commented on typos many times: even minor typos can break the flow of the text. If one reader points out even small issues (and not all of them are small--some can be quite significant) that means the next reader gets a better product. Greenwald has always taken crowd-editing well and I believe it always improves the piece in question.
You once replied to me when I corrected you on a Salon piece, that you meant "The 21st century" not the "20th century"; it was something in regard to the Cheney-Bush regime.
Don't sweat it. Typos on publications like the New York Times and the Washington Post, which are frequently found now, are inexcusable. You're beginning anew, taking up the journalistic banner those dropped years ago, so slack must be cut.
People have complained about typos in my reporting but I’m an Indy journalist who has lived in a van and been homeless at times. If I had the money and resources of Glenn I’d hire a copy editor and pay them $50 to edit a story. Glenn is not new to this or broke, thus I was surprised to see Abigail Shrier’s name wrong twice and the other typos. It hurts the credibility of the reporting when a certain level and quantity of typos exist. Not a huge deal in the bigger scheme of things but I wish I had the resources to hire a copy editor like Glenn does.
Yes, but keep in mind the one kind of Nazism that is always good is Grammar Nazism.
If you want to be paid for what you write, you should fix typos ASAP and ideally before you publish. But I have plenty of Amazon Kindle books that have obvious typos in them also, so it's not like I haven't seen that sloppiness before.
I have no idea what you deleted, and I don’t care, but it’s very nice to see people feel free to make mistakes and correct themselves. On Twitter, apparently no one makes mistakes.
When do you hear conservatives organizing to stop books from being published? When do you hear of them preventing leftists from speaking at events ? When do you hear of them showing up in restaurants demanding people kneel or raise a fist ?
You don’t. The democrat party is now the Socialist non- worker Party of America. Voting for democrats is voting for fascism.
Public education is the opium of the people. Producing drones for the democrat socialists who control half of America’s people and most all of it’s institutions.
The ACLU are the Democrat’s bitches. They haven’t had any credibility in ages. They exist to collect donations from idiots and attack freedom.
Mr. Greenwald—why not follow up with the Southern Poverty LLC 😂😁
Not recently anyway. There were plenty of anti-speech proponents in the 80s and 90s targeting pornography, LGBT causes, and “vulgar lyrics” in rock and rap albums. The only reason we don’t see a broad coalition of anti-speech conservatives is because they’ve lost control of American culture at large. If given the chance I suspect plenty of conservative mouthpieces would advocate some form of censorship (especially around research into gun violence and climate science). There’s fascism on both sides: we just happen to live in the leftists’ world right now.
Even climate science has become infected. This professor lost her job for pointing out that polar bears are still doing fine. The very thing she is an expert in.
with the exception of the move to ban abortion in certain states, I don't feel the political right is attempting to assert too much control over others.
I didn't follow your link but if he is that pastor that insisted on burning Korans, what's he got to do with this? If he paid for them, he is free to burn them. This is still America. For now. haha
And even that issue is a bit of a sticky wicket, just as easily and logically characterized as protection of the most vulnerable members or society - demonstrably more vulnerable than any LGBTQ member.
Well, if the right really wants less abortions they should make birth control easily accessible and free. Then the party of science would have no excuse outside a lack of personal responsibility and the true medical crisis could be treated at the hospital.
Agreed. It has been very disappointing to me that, approximately 15 minutes after gaining the upper hand in the Culture War, liberals started screaming "shut up!" at people. I guess the war is won and marginalized populations can never be marginalized again, right?
"Socialist non-worker" is an oxymoron. You cannot have it both ways! I would say that the Dem establishment is both decidedly ANTI-socialist and ANTI-worker (which is pretty much synonymous). The Dem establishment folks have abandoned the Working Class and have sided with the capitalist oligarchy.
Nobody is a socialist. The term should be retired. There are simply fans of generous welfare states and less generous welfare states. No serious person believes in government ownership of either producers of goods or services (at least traditionally non-governmental services), with the possible exception of health care (which I think is an interesting exception).
Indeed. And this is a very good reason why we should all start using the word "fascist" to refer to political movements whose program is actually similar in content to that of Mussolini's Partito Nazionale Fascista, rather than as a contentless pejorative for someone to our political right whose views we dislike.
The conflict between market economics and socialism (or communism) is over, and the market won. Not by force of arms, though that was needed during the Cold War to keep the conflict going long enough to prevail, but because socialim does not work for precisely the reasons Hayek and vonMises predicted as the conflict was getting underway.
What remains is the conflict between liberal democratic capitalism and fascism, which keeps private ownership but has the state meddle in and use as a means of social control the running of private enterprises. The Democrats have actually become a fascist party, with the black-shirted "Antifa" functioning as their, well....Blackshirts. Our greatest current foreign policy challenge is a great fascist power -- thought they call themselves "Communists" and their system "Socialism with Chinese Charateristics" -- the CCP is actually fascist: freeish market economics with state meddling mostly for the sake of social control. In way, they are the ultimate fascist power: they are engaged in a grand experiment to determine just how little freedom is necessary to keep a market economy fully functional.
He's serious, it's just the wrong word. He's a social democrat that favors a more generous welfare state. How many bills has he pushed to nationalize the oil industry or seize farmland to promote worker collectives? Even his healthcare proposal, medicare for all, doesn't nationalize the health industry, it just distributes the payment mechanism as a welfare benefit. the doctors won't become government employees, the hospitals aren't nationalized. As an aside, and to make this post topical, medicare for all is a truly disingenuous political slogan. It rightful name is medicaid for all. Absolutely no European government spends anything resembling per person what we spend on medicare. Their expenditures are highly similar to what we spend on medicaid and use the same method of controlling costs - arbitrary price lists and caps that cause real rationing and results in actual changes in doctor behavior. How the left would howl if if ever Democrat's tweet mentioning medicare for all were tagged by Twitter as potentially misleading and said experts believe this program should be likened to medicaid for all.
Bernie calls himself a democratic socialist, which I'm sure you know is very different to a social democrat. Perhaps you could try to argue that he doesn't understand what the term means, but I think that would be very condescending and we really need to take him at his word.
Political labels are often misleading. Are conservatives conservative? Are liberals liberal? Let's assess Sanders based on his actual legislative history and proposals of the last 20 years. Medicare (Medicaid) for all is a welfare/redistributionist state proposal, not a socialist proposal. Wealth taxes are a welfare/redistributionist state proposal, not a socialist proposal. Non-competitive corporate tax rates out of all proportion to the cost of gov services provided to corporations are a welfare/redistributionist state proposal, not a socialist proposal. Resurrection of Glass Steagall is a "I-learn-the-wrong-lessons-from-past-experience-and-like-to-sound-tough-on-financials" proposal, not a socialist proposal. Free college is welfare state proposal, not a socialist proposal. Look, I'm not arguing that Bernie Sanders isn't a fellow traveler of actual socialists. He is. But there's a description for people who believe in rent control and stabilization, but don't actually want to nationalize apartment buildings to be run by public housing authorities. It's not socialist. It's arrogant bureaucrat. Why does Bernie call himself a socialist and endorse symbolic and shambolic anachronisms like his worker collective and USEO Bank bills? I don't know. My theory is nostalgia for the 40 years he spent as an actual socialist. The dream failed, snuffed out all over the world, consigned to the dustbin of history, to be resuscitated only in laughable episodes like Venezuela, which always end predictably by re-teaching the same lesson. Some men's self identity can't tolerate the clean break from the past. Their actual choices show you they don't believe the same things they used to, but they still like to hoist the old flags, put on the old tie-dyed shirt and they'll still feel nostalgia when the next Latin American strongman makes their country a laughingstock.
I didn't. It was a law school joke going back 20+ years. I've used this handle since Yahoo! Clubs was a thing and Jr. was alive, with only 1...err...minor change.
you do know that there have already been several attacks that have discredited SPLC?
I saw one report from an alt right type source a few years ago that stated the black employees of SPLC had sued SPLC management for racial discrimination.
yes, you read that right, the report said that SPLC executives are racists
Easy to answer Frank Laureano's question "When do you hear of conservatives preventing leftists from speaking at events?" There's a whole section on "Cancellations and Alterations of Academic and Cultural Events" in this report (the whole report is worth reading): https://ccrjustice.org/the-palestine-exception
In addition, Canary Mission is a classic attack on free speech. And (since it's worth citing The Intercept in this forum) see this Intercept article from yesterday:
Clearly you can't read. If you had bothered to look at the report I linked to, you would have seen how a right-wing group threatened to sue a hotel for hosting an upcoming conference ("The right-wing American Center for Law and Justice also threatened to sue the ASA and the hotel that hosted its 2014 conference"). You pretended to be serious about your question, but after I answered it, you quickly showed you were too uncomfortable to face an accurate answer. Your question was "When do you hear of conservatives preventing leftists from speaking at events?", and when I pointed you to an example, you showed that you are the one who isn't willing to "hear" it. Instead of facing how you were wrong about the existence of conservative attacks on speech, you quickly dance away to say "Look, there's a Democrat in that report", as if that was the issue. You're the classic example of a Straw Man fallacy: a person who, instead of having the integrity to admit when he's wrong, turns aside to beat up an imaginary straw man so as to make himself feel he's stronger.
In fact, Napolitano did not try to prevent anyone from speaking; she simply put out a statement describing what she thinks "civil discourse" is, as the report says. How dumb do you have to be to think that this excuses anti-free-speech attacks by conservatives, or by anyone?
Sane people that you can find some Republicans and some Democrats among the enemies of free speech. And it takes integrity to avoid joining those closed-minded people who rage in many parts of the political spectrum. But integrity is what you don't have. Instead of facing the fact that many conservatives have their own tendencies to stifle speech, you just want to turn the excellent principle of free speech into another crude excuse for blaming Democrats. A person who actually cared about free speech would be troubled by conservative attacks on free speech too, which you clearly aren't. It is clear that groups which attack the rights of Palestinians and of supporters of Palestinians tend to be either neutral between Democrats and Republicans, or tend to actually prefer the Republican side over the Democratic side; so these free speech violations are something that would concern a conscientious conservative. Clearly, you're not one.
"Nearly 600 books spanning a variety of genres and reading levels were the target of censorship attempts at libraries, schools and universities last year, and 8 out of the 10 that made the American Library Association’s “Most Challenged Books” of 2019 list shared a common denominator: LGBTQ content."
Indeed. But as pendulums do, it has swung far past the centre. More, it has reached the point of maximal divergence from the centre and has reversed direction. But, as yet the reverse is tentative, slow, barely perceptible in some areas. As it accelerates towards the centre the screams of the left are going to be dramatic and pitiful. As it rushes at maximum speed past the centre and up to the same right-ward position as it is now at, left speech is going to become as verboten as right speech is now. That means, banned from public media platforms, suppressed by tech giants, punishable by law in some cases. This is what happens when you push the pendulum off the centre. This is what happens when you adopt the name "progressives" and you think that politics and history are linear so any resistance you might meet is simply an occasion to push harder, and any softening of resistance an occasion to push farther. All you're doing is ensuring that the backswing is going to extract from you and your interests the same blood and tears currently being extracted from your opponents.
This is true of all warfare. Peaceful coexistence is always better for everyone, but historically our last resort.
If the pendulum ever swings to the right as you're predicting, I will _TRY_ to resist the temptation to smirk at a leftist and tell them their speech is "literally endangering my life."
Glenn: Progressives have made transgenderism their proverbial Alamo for the simplest of reasons: When reality itself can be defined solely on the basis of self-identification (I say I'm a woman, therefore I am, genitalia and chromosomes be damned), then by the same "logic," one can also assert 2+2=5--and the seamless transition to totalitarian governance is virtually assured.
as a homo, I feel the promotion of trannie reality to a larger non-gender conforming group of teenagers has to do with the discomfort much of society has for gender non-conforming homos.
Nothing could be less "fluid" than changing the gender identity of children to conform with societies long standing expectations for members of that sex.
For Gawd's sakes, it's the official policy of Iran and sharia: you get three chances to quit being a homo and then you can either be executed or get your weinie whacked. Women have the lovely option of being raped straight.
When your wokie woke bullshit pleases the Ayatollah ... it's time to re-examine.
Stop the insanity and leave those homo kids alone.
Exactly. Medical intervention into children and teens with gender dysphoria is not only Gay Reparative Therapy it is also a Dr. Mengele Auschwitz horror.
Yes. It's been tiresome as an old homo that so many try to figure us out and "cure" us of what is only problematical because they make it so, but this is some crazy playing Gawd sh*t giving puberty blockers and changing birth certificates.
I mean, as usual, it was founded in a real problem. When trannies "lived as the other sex" preparing for or in the aftermath of surgery, their birth certificates and the states unwillingness to let them legally change their documents made discretion impossible and they were then targeted in employment, etc.
Again, as usual, the "remedy" has gone so far into the realm of the absurd, allowing children to change their birth sex, that one wonders if the remedies aren't advanced by those opposing social acceptance of homos and trannies.
Who else would be pursuing such crazy societal accommodations for such trivial assertions of being a trannie?
Just so you know Abigail Shrier fully supports the medical intervention of trans children and despite being a critic she still supports trans children taking hormones.
I am not comfortable with that either. Back when it was not cool, trannies were few and far between but there were real cases. They deserve rights and protection.
I think the ridiculousness of this current ideation (wth is up with spellcheck? ideation is a word) is going to provoke a backlash, at which time homos and real trannies will be moved back to the margins.
At that time, when it will be dangerous to be non-conforming again, the attention seeking "bisexuals" and " faux trannies" with the whole bunch of whatever the hell they have added on to the end of LGBT under the +, well, those folks will quit playing around publicly, find Gawd or whatever and retreat to safe heterosexuality.
it's really not simple. Trannies need to be safe and probably are the most vulnerable in a prison population, for instance.
On the other hand, I believe our children and particularly girls need to be protected from predators with simple, logical laws and they deserve to have sports leagues which do not allow male musculatory competitors to come in and dominate easily. Sorry if that is too ... obscure of language. Men. biologically born males should not be in women's sports. period.
But for sure I know the "mental health" profession is populated by idiots that find a popular diagnosis and apply it, irresponsibly and indiscriminately like a fashion trend until the next one comes along.
The ACLU is preparing to continue its challenge to a bill that passed the Idaho state legislature earlier this year and was signed into law by the Governor (Fairness in Women’s Sports Bill HB500a) which seeks to preserve the level playing field for women in sports, but blocked with a temporary injunction by a federal judge on the grounds of discrimination.
I agree. The post-modern assault on objective truth is the basis of modern leftist ideology. Their constant delusion and redefinition of words makes any attempt to reason with them fruitless.
The assault is on leftists as well and involves no leftist ideology whatsoever. Maybe we don't have a world for identity politics radicals that are mated with corporate centrism and authoritarian tendencies, but this definitely not anything like Marxism which is focused on breaking down class inequality and improving material conditions for common people.
I should clarify: these days when I refer to the left, I usually mean the authoritarian identitatarians you correctly point out. You are right that they can be different from “classical” left wingers (with whom I may disagree, but “have no problem with”). I cannot stand the race and sex hustling, CRT spouting, incredibly poisonous and divisive identitarians so en vogue recently.
The problem here is what constitutes "the Left" and what constitutes "the Right".
I have proposed that "the Left" at any given historical moment, from the time it got that name from the seating arrangement in the French National Assembly down to the present has always been the dominant political tendency of the day that seeks to establish an omnicompetent state under its control on the plea that doing so, and only doing so, will vindicate the interests of the downtrodden.
Who the downtrodden are has changed over time from the French peasantry, to the "workers of the world" when the Comintern defined the normative Left, to a grab bag of identity groups at the turn of the 21st century. I feel sure that in a hundred years, there will be some new conception of the downtrodden and those who propose statist solutions to their plight will call themselves and be called by others "the Left".
The "Right" is simply the name for those who oppose the Left, so for instance, during the days of the Comintern, free marketeers of every political stripe, Tories, ultramontane clericalists, liberal Cold Warriors, monarchists, fascists, and Nazis were all "Right wing", even though their only commonality was opposing the Comintern. (The last is actually slightly peculiar, as the main difference between Hitler and Stalin was over who the downtrodden were -- if Stalin hadn't died, most likely poisoned by Beria, there is evidence he, too, planned to get around to slaughtering Jews -- Hitler was only "Right wing" because his downtrodden were post-Versailles Germans and Austrians, rather than "the workers of the world".)
So, a lot of you who like to feel you are part of the Left because you have genuine concerns for the working class and advocate policies you think will vindicate their interests, but haven't gone in for identity politics, are now, like it or not, part of "the Right" (and I for one welcome you to our ranks -- someone needs to look out for the interests of the working class).
Never works because nearly the entire world is little "greedy capitalists" who drain and consume the entire economy. Capitalism works only because most of the elite "greedy capitalists" plow much of what they skim back into the economy instead of consuming it all like the socialist/communist systems do.
"Capitalism works only because most of the elite "greedy capitalists" plow much of what they skim back into the economy instead of consuming it all like the socialist/communist systems do."
In fact, the money is hoarded, which is the key reason we don't have runaway inflation; that money never hits main-street.
Jesus, Art, where did you get that? Nobody hoards money. The Fed, at the behest of the federal government, constantly inflates the currency. The only arguments they have regularly is how much.
Any significant amount of money must be invested or it loses value continuously.
We now have "walk away" inflation. It could start running if the left's economic shutdown crunches the economy too much, the government panics, and the Fed opens the spigots.
What you are describing is a structure of social control that can be used be any group regardless of ideology. The ideology that is most closely tied to this today uses the template of "Class Struggle" and applies it to identity. The main difference is that Marxism is universalist, deals in solid and material things, and structures like economic systems that can actually be changed by policy.
Class struggle purely between sexual orientations or ethnic groups is a dead end because there are not universal principles and nobody can win without some kind of new oppressive and unequal balance. Trying to forcefully change culture, or masses of people with different ideas than your own, is a fools errand. Not that culture can't and doesn't change, but change through coercion and control, rather than truth and integration, is destructive and unsustainable.
That seems like an odd response, most of what Glenn, Matt Taibbi and a bunch of other people (including current or former liberals, progressives and so forth) have been saying about censorship is indeed about the far left's drift toward totalitarian postmodern deconstructive nihilism (which is clearly and openly an assault on objectivity).
Please, Glenn, her name is Shrier, not Spier. Please fix.
Regarding the book, you really must read it. It is as far from a screed as can be. Shrier is a seasoned, well educated journalist with degrees from Columbia and Oxford, and a J.D. from Yale. She did her due diligence for this book. It’s thoroughly referenced and she interviewed experts in every relevant field on both sides of the issue. Trans activism has spread on a strategy of suppressing fifty hears of decent research that if you leave a gender-confused child alone, at puberty they will figure themselves out and come out as gay, the overwhelming majority of the time. The small remainder may, in fact, be trans.
Shrier does not deny the existence of transgender people, but she makes the crucial point that the astronomical rise in demand for mastectomies in adolescent girls is not normal. It is entirely socially constructed. Are these girls in distress? Absolutely. Are they trans? Almost always, no. But according to the established standard of care, psychotherapy is not allowed. It’s viewed as a form of conversion therapy. So it’s not until after they’ve lost their breasts, and maybe their uteruses, do their brains mature and they realize they were never trans in the first place.
The title of the book, I agree, is a bit hyperbolic, but on the other hand, there actually is irreversible damage. Buyer’s remorse after mutilating surgeries is a tragedy, and when it happens to children who went to professionals for help, it’s also medical malpractice. The use of the term “craze” in the title refers to any form of social contagion, so it’s not as out there as you might think. (the Satanic Panic was a craze; multiple personality disorder was a craze.)
Glenn, I am thrilled that you’re jumping into the fray on this. We need more voices that are gender critical, in order to balance and counter the extreme assertions of trans ideology. This doesn’t mean transgenderism itself is spurious, just that it’s been politicized and promulgated by canceling anyone with a different view and creating fake narratives to justify it and make it appear more common than it actually is. But with all respect to you, and I have a lot, which is why I’m a subscriber: please educate yourself by talking to the gender critical individuals from around the world who have dug deep into this topic and can give you a lot of perspective. Meghan Murphy, of the Feminist Current newspaper in Canada, who was permanently kicked off Twitter for saying that men aren’t women, is a good one. Endocrinologist William Malone, MD, founder of SEGM (Society for Evidence Based Gender Medicine) is another one. Talk to Dr. James Cantor in Canada. Talk to Dr. Lisa Littman, whom Shrier interviews in her book. Go across the pond and look at what’s happening in the U.K., Australia and Sweden. And definitely read Shrier’s book. And talk to her.
Thank you for this platform and the chance to respond.
I would think that trans would want to support someone who takes their gender position(s) seriously enough to do the research on it, rather than hoist the LGBT banner reflexively.
Orgs like Human Rights Campaign and GLAAD, which collect huge donations from deep-pocketed liberal donors that help finance the campaigns of progressive candidates? Pharmaceutical companies, health care corporations and university hospitals that make huge profits off the bodies of children and adolescents? I don’t know...I’m just riffing here. What’s your view?
dunno. I saw an article a few years ago that reported/claimed that some ultrawealthy asshole was funding the anti-TERF insanity in the UK out of some weird political motive. don't recall the details, sorry.
No need to apologize. It’s a very good question. It needs an investigative journalist with no dog in the fight and a strong b.s. detector to go after it.
Think of gender dysphoria on a spectrum like depression. In some cases you have severe cases of clear clinical depression. For many trans people this is what gender dysphoria feels like. And then there are others who have mild depression or who are less clear about how to know if they have depression. Some trans people experience gender dysphoria like this as well. Just as there will be misdiagnoses by psychiatrists when evaluating depression there will be misdiagnoses when evaluating gender dysphoria. The answer is better trained healthcare workers.
Thank you for pointing this out. It's an unfortunate and lazy position for her to take. It shows that even people as well-educated as she is can be seduced by the notion of "charity." Given what we know about young children and their eventual desistance at puberty, and given what we DON'T know about the long-term effects of puberty blockers on the bodies and brains of children, we should always err on the side of caution where puberty blockers are concerned.
She implies in this clip that it's reasonable to risk harming ten children if just one of them turns out to be "truly trans" (whatever that means). Since there's no test that can be done to distinguish a transperson, and since we have to wait until puberty at the very earliest for them to tell us, anything other than watchful waiting is medical malpractice.
So, for all the points you agree with her on she is a well researched and accomplished journalist but not this one? Doesn’t it give you any pause that even Shrier, who is one of the most prominent critics, still see’s justification for the use of hormones for trans children? She’s investigated and researched this issue deeply and remains intellectually honest about a position that seemingly goes against her views. Having a critic like her reach this conclusion should open your eyes to why she might be saying this.
I'll respectfully disagree. I won't repeat everything I wrote above, but pay attention to what we know about the outcomes for gender-nonconforming children once they reach puberty. I'll add that the National Health Service in the U.K. recently updated its language on the use of puberty blockers in response to a lawsuit against them by a former transman. The NHS was forced to admit that they actually do not have any data to show that puberty blockers are safe. They also do not know what the long-term effects of puberty blockers are on the bodies of young children. If I were a parent, my child would not be given puberty blockers on such shoddy medicine.
The head of the Karolinska Institute in Sweden has also admitted that "we don't know what we're doing" where hormones for children are concerned. They are experimenting on children.
There's nothing wrong with Shrier's quoting the views of people on both sides of the discussion. But on this particular issue, if she supports giving puberty blockers to a seven year old who in all likelihood will grow out of their confusion, that's unjustified. Once a kid reaches puberty, if they are still feeling dysphoric, that's the time to consider puberty blockers.
By the way, this is not just my personal position.
It's not just Cantor, and it's not just one study from the 1970s. And the number of people who detransition grows every day. I have no problem with adults transitioning. I understand the rationale for giving an 11 year old puberty blockers, but I don't agree with it. The brain is not mature until the age of 25 and people's identity forms over time.
Remove the proscription against therapy -- stop referring to psychotherapy as "conversion therapy." The detransitioners I follow on Reddit and elsewhere make the same complaint over and over: why did nobody allow me to talk about my issues? Why did nobody tell me that autism and a history of sexual abuse could lead to gender dysphoria? Why was I given a prescription for T at the end of the first visit? Why was I not able to discuss my burgeoning feelings for members of the same sex? I was riddled with shame about my sexuality and my developing female body. Why was I not allowed to discuss these issues? The affirmative model is malpractice.
That's really all I have to say on this subject, Be. I wish you well.
Do you agree with Joe Rogan in what he said on the podcast with Adam Conover?
“There’s no reason to give kids hormones…If they think that they are a girl why do you have to give them hormones to make them more of a girl? If a child thinks they’re a girl, let them live as a girl, but you don’t have to hormonally engage in their bodies with chemicals.”
I don't understand why you can't just expand the definition of being a boy to include the feminine feeling boy?
I mean, "he" can't feel he is a "she" unless "he" is made to understand they are differently defined and that "he" is no good at being a "he". If being a "he" is just being defined by having a penis... poof, you win, you a he.
as a gender non-conforming child, I was just me. I had no problem with me, even when I learned that other people thought me being me was odd.
Sort of. I agree absolutely that there's no reason to give kids hormones. But what does it mean to "let them live as a girl"?
Again, fifty years' of research discusses this, and it's very clear. If a boy thinks he's a girl, do not shame him or censor him. If he wants to wear a dress or play with dolls or whatever, allow him to do that at home, while gently reminding him that he is in fact a boy and that when he leaves the house and goes to school he has to put on his big boy pants. This approach works. And by works, I mean that it gives a child the opportunity to try on an identity without having to make a commitment to it or deal with the outside world. And when he reaches puberty, he will tell us where he wants to land.
The main thing is to give a child time. Most of the time (65-90% of the time) they're going to turn out to be gay. Of course, this raises the issue of homophobia, which we thought we were done with. Sadly, it's still with us. There are still parents who would prefer to have a heterosexual daughter to a gay son.
Surely I am not the only one tired of the trite wisdom mining of the Holocaust.
Much of the Democratic Party allowed AOC and her friends to equate the United States Border, trying to deal with an overwhelming influx of economic refugees showing up in violation of international law having traversed at least one safe haven country they skipped over in order to petition the US with concentration camps the inhabitants would have done anything to avoid being detained within.
Your intellectual use of the Holocaust for democratic votes and demonization of republicans is revolting. That American Jews let you do it and in some instances join in is even more revolting.
That the ACLU is not about Civil Liberties anymore is not news. It's a positively established fact.
Wow did you misread her quote. The quote, today, clearly applies to conservatives - who are the ones being targeted - as Glenn points out. Niemoller's point remains valid - the process is unchanged; the particular players have changed roles.
Weirdly I hear a bunch of liberal-left Jews constantly complain about anyone, left or right or none-of-the-above, that dares to criticize Israel (which is ruled by far right lunatics).
So now Martin Niemoller is Jewish? I'm not Jewish either but I fully agree with him and with the appropriateness of Pam quoting him in this context. This discussion is not about the Holocaust nor the correctness/incorrectness of Nazi policy, it's about humans looking the other way as evil is being done and then being surprised when they themselves fall victim to the very evil they've been ignoring. That's the point Niemoller was making. It is a universal theme, not tied to only one specific incident, period of time, or situation. The topic here is not religion, not Nazis or Jews, not the left-right political spectrum, not Hollywood vs America, but CENSORSHIP versus FREEDOM OF EXPRESSION.
It is interesting that Niemoller failed to mention the actual german communists (and their USSR sponsors who were genocidal maniacs) that had been engaged in heavily armed street battles with the Freikorp for years.
But maybe Niemoller had seen how badly the western left treated Emma Goldman when she dared to challenge the establishment left's excuse making over the enormous sins of the USSR (mass exterminations for instance)
Don't question your fate, it is the decree of all the smart and funny Jews. Just poll Hollywood and you'll see. You are doomed to burn in hell for all eternity by the wokie woke.
It actually started in academia. The "blank slate" leftists (predecessors of the PC left) viciously attacked E.O. Wilson (sociobiology) in the late 1970s. Shortly after that the culture wars began to rage, but it took decades for the current form of "woke" cancel culture left-totalitarianism to get entrenched.
This is a well reasoned old-fashioned example of real journalism. Not all with agree, of course, but that's not the intension. Keep up the fight, Glenn.
It's always troubling when our belief in free speech comes into conflict with what we perceive to be the expression of dangerous views. But whenever I feel such an internal conflict bubbling up through my consciousness, I still always try to redouble my commitment to freedom of expression and empower it to win the argument. If we ever yield to censorship -- whether government, corporate, religious, or social (e.g., "cancel culture") -- we will risk losing everything. Literally EVERY damned thing.
Glenn: "But why would someone with such censorious attitudes, with a goal of suppressing ideas with which they disagree, choose to go to work for the ACLU of all places?"
Indeed, my thought upon reading that was they should fire him.
In the next paragraph (or so) we then read he deleted the tweet and said one of the reasons was the ACLU was being pressured to fire him - as well they should if he really holds those views. But then we also read he withdrew his support, after saying it was something he would 100% die for.
The guy has lost all credibility with me. Frankly, I don't believe his latter-day change of heart; he's pro-suppression of ideas he disagrees with. ...He's a "the ends justify the means" kind of guy, which they never do.
I STRONGLY support the free-speech rights of everyone, especially the ones I disagree with and the ones that are unpopular with the public; popular opinions don't generally need any support!
In an adult society, full expression of ideas, full expression of dissent, full expression of any critique, is essential. I'd say it is one of the defining characteristics of an adult society. Seems clear to me that we don't have one of those in the US. The "smart" people don't trust the "dumb" people with critical capabilities. The worst kind of elitism. Many thanks, Mr Greenwald, for your clarity and attention. You model adult discourse. (If only I could get my dumb friends to read your stuff.)
"prioritize its civil liberties principles over liberal politics and liberal political causes"
How can you have free speech when speech itself has become so tortured?
How can liberals be opposed to liberties?
Only if (at least) one of these words no longer means what once did.
Has the word "liberty" lost its classical meaning? Certainly some of the attendant responsibilities are absent from most modern uses to the term but nonetheless they universally include the core concept of being unbound, free to act in any manner not harmful to others.
Has the word "liberal" lost its classical meaning? Huh! The question answers itself. Modern liberals are ideological authoritarians whose only distinction from other tyrants and thugs is that their laundry list of mandatory shibboleths is slightly different, while their rhetoric pretends to oppose all manner of totalitarian ideologies.
The very name ACLU is now merely a marketing slogan concealing a political agenda wholly inimical to any and every kind of freedom.
The adoption of liberal as a political position rather than an adjective has so polluted the term that it now represents what its adoptees set out to oppose. The letters ACLU are treading the same path.
I know people who believe that "free speech" was only ever a weapon to get rid of religious blasphemy laws and that, now these are gone, to replace them with political blasphemy laws (like the gender pronoun wars now raging). Given the "evolution" of the ACLU it gets harder to dissuade of them of this view every day.
There is a story from decades ago about one European explaining the American usage of "liberal" to another. His explanation was simple, "In American 'liberal' means socialist." It is probably a good thing that the illiberal faction of the Left in American now prefers "progressive" or the neologism "woke" as a self-descriptor. Perhaps the media will eventually catch up to them and we can eventually reclaim the word "liberal" and get it to mean what it means in the rest of the Anglosphere.
Take the entire premise of this article regarding the ACLU's current embrace of corporate censorship and consider it against the backdrop of their full-throated defense of the Citizen's United ruling. You'll find that it has become clear that the ACLU has no idea what a fire in a crowded theatre looks like.
The ACLU's defense of Citizens United was in large part because they want to defend the speech of nonprofits, including nonprofits with anonymous membership and funding (like the Jim Crow-era NAACP needed to have anonymity in NAACP v. Alabama to protect itself against an oppressive state). I'm willing to believe the ACLU is wrong to defend Citizens United, but you need to have an answer to their concerns.
Actually, that's incorrect. I don't need to have an answer for their concerns. I just need to prioritize those concerns against the concerns of dark money financing almost every single political campaign since the ruling, and the damage that financial influence has done and is doing to the political fabric of our country. If unmasking donations to non-profits is the cost of keeping that financial influence illuminated by sunlight, it's a cost well worth it.
I was a freshman at Niles North HS in 1978 when the march happened. Being one of the few gentiles in an overwhelmingly Jewish school, the entire period of time gave me a far better appreciation and deeper insight of the Jewish experience than I would have, had Ira Glasser not had the courage of his convictions.
At the time, I thought Ira was the anti-Christ. But now that I’ve become a man, I’ve put away those childish things.
Fast forward to today, and I never cease to be as flabbergasted by the sheer willful obtuseness of those in control of the Megaphone as I am horrified by it all.
As you probably already know, the Diversity-Industrial-Complex exists because it is a very big business. All of its intellectual constructs (implicit bias, white fragility, etc,) have been debunked and demolished over and over, including by heterodox African American social scientists.
However, corporations and executives in the media, education and govt find such discredited constructs to be of no importance. When the "Diversity' grifters show up, it makes the job of the executives easier. They don't have to provide citizen workers (of whatever race) with better pay and benefits or better working conditions.
Instead they just hire more more low wage immigrant workers that work for 1/2 the pay of citizens at 80 hours/week.
And call it "diversity".
Anyone that dares to object is "sexist", "racist", etc.
Until the ruling elites stop paying for "White Fragility" and similar fraudulent nonsense, it will live on, unfortunately.
Free speech is not a cultural norm or societal value. It just is. Or it should be. The ACLU lost its balls and credibility when it failed to speak out in the post 9-11 era. There is much that’s disturbing about your piece, but the most is that you fail to hammer down the twisted thinking of an aberrant human being. Anyone who advocates banning of any book is an aberrant human being, and just one thought away from a final solution.
Free speech is certainly a cultural norm relatively unique to the West. Just like the concepts of private property, equality before the law, and the primacy of individual rights (and related responsibilities) over the collective. All of these values made us who we are and are worth protecting against the socialist scourge.
Just because rights have been whittled away for generations doesn't mean they aren't important and worth fighting for. And fwiw, I agree with you that many of anti-2A laws were originally targeted at blacks, as were the drug laws.
You guys whining about typos—you are getting good journalism got off the press—ON A SUNDAY !!!!
Greenwald is probably trying to have some time with the dogs and his family. Some dang slack—please!!! 😂
Perhaps, but misspelling the name of the author who instigated much of what Glenn writes about here is not a typo I can overlook. And it feels disrespectful to the author, Abigail Shrier, not Spier. I believe most of us would object if we read an article about Glenn, that referred to him as Glenn Greenstein (for example).
Who appointed you Pope of typos?
Well he misspelled the name of the author of the book about which most of this article is about. I don't care about typos here and there, but this is disrespectful to Abigail Shrier. I honestly don't get your rather nasty objection!
Who appointed you Pope of typos?
I did. The white smoke went out of the substack last Tuesday.
Apparently Glenn has no objections to crowd sourcing the typos. See his comments below.
Nobody asshole. But I think it is important that Glenn correct this as it cuts into the credibility of the article.
I get this, but I reckon he gets the benefit of a crowd source editor. Small price to pay for getting a uncensorable platform. Honestly appreciate the ideas and the nits can be ironed out through iterative reading
My view — writing for 15 years without editors except in very limited circumstances — is that it’s better to publish after careful proofreading and let one’s readers crowd-source typos (which they do very fast!) than delay publication by hours and risk editorial suppression just to get rid of them before publication with copy editors and other layers of editorial review. Moreover, check how often heavily edited articles have all sorts of errors, including with names and dates: very frequently. I agree that misspelling an author’s name — twice, no less — is on the bad side of the errors I make, and I’ll apologize to Abigail for that, but it was very quickly corrected (thanks to numerous reader alerts, both here and by email), and as I said, edited pieces often have more errors than those produced by this much faster and more natural method of mine.
Spent 25 years in both daily and weekly newsrooms, including time as a copy editor and proofreader. Still do both part-time for a national Catholic magazine. Yeah, Glenn's got typos in here, but if that's what's catching your eye then I have to think that you are not a very disciplined reader.
In fact, when I'm doing a "first read" edit on an article, I purposely DO NOT edit typos or grammar. The first read is to see if the article makes sense; does it hold together logically?
Only then do I got back and check for grammar, spelling, etc.
And, no, Glenn, I am most certainly not looking to add more work to my plate. ;-) Great article as-is, imho.
Ha, 30 years here as a corporate editor (now retired) and I love this style of writing - so much more meat in this way of writing, instead of just reading a carved out slice of perfection, that says nothing of significance. I feel that Glenn is doing in his writing what Joe Rogan does in his podcast - loose long form articles that flow from his hip, and not someone's copy desk.
For many years, I wrote the lead op-ed column in the local daily. I tend to write in short, clipped sentence fragments - intentionally so, to achieve a conversational tone. The copy desk kept turning them into sentences - then I would have to change them back with the managing editor looking over my shoulder. Finally, one day I turned it in with the byline of "By Jim Trageser - as translated by the copy desk." They left my sentence fragments alone after that.
ha, that showed them! I never worked for a newspaper after college, but I found the corporate tyrants to be insidious when it comes to free speech, internally and externally. However, from what I remember about IBM, we never discussed politics openly, nor dare share writings about politics openly within the org. Limiting yes, but that limit preserved some sense of sanity I suppose, as compared to what's going on these days.
Personally, I'm so compulsive I have to correct typos and errors BEFORE I can read it for sense - but I grant that your order of priorities is more appropriate.
I also agree that typos are unimportant compared to the work Glenn is doing, and has done. Correcting them does improve presentation, though, so if someone wants to do the copyediting for him, go for it.
Good to see you here. Remaining typos I see currently: "a protesters" (a protester), "that was is" (that what is), "possible choose" (possibly choose), "socialised" (socialized, in American English), "Spier's book" (Shrier's book), "into the becoming" (into becoming), "Spier herself has" (Shrier herself has), "are leftist journalists are fanatically" (are leftist journalists who are fanatically, OR leftist journalists are fanatically), "but once which" (but one which), "ones disagrees" (one disagrees), "will inevitably falls" (will inevitably fall), "constitution and legal" (constitutional and legal). Won't nitpick about issues of punctuation, capitalization, etc., except that in "signed the Harper's Letter" you should not merely italicize "Harper" but should italicize the apostrophe-and-s as well.
Thank you! That’s what I mean. Very appreciated
If nothing else, having all these typos distracts from the conversation at hand. Note the many comments and people bickering about the typos. And instead of focusing more deeply on the subject matter the people who are paying Glenn to write are doing labor for him.
please discuss the possibility of having an admin/moderator delete the bickering as well as the trolling by right wing cargo cultists
I would double my monthly subscription to crowdsource a fund to hire you or someone else that is competent at deleting crap comments and doing light moderating. thnx
Shh!
(both sides of the customer labor/public embarrassment trade need to be kept quiet :-)
Also “nunanced” (nuanced) in the 3rd paragraph.
Also, one occurrence of "that that"
Agree with everything. Thanks for all your efforts and all the best, Mr. Greenwald.
Real time editing!
Hey Glenn, please don't sweat the small stuff. You're providing valuable, balanced information. Anyone focusing on minor grammatical errors are missing the larger point. Please, just keep doing what you are doing. Please.
That's how you feel (and I'll treat your third sentence the way you want it to be treated), but Greenwald happens to feel differently, and as others' comments show, he has decent reasons for his approach too.
BTW, I'm guessing you meant my typo, are instead of is.
Please don't let them edit your typos, they're reassuring.
Having read GG for many years, and commented on typos many times: even minor typos can break the flow of the text. If one reader points out even small issues (and not all of them are small--some can be quite significant) that means the next reader gets a better product. Greenwald has always taken crowd-editing well and I believe it always improves the piece in question.
You once replied to me when I corrected you on a Salon piece, that you meant "The 21st century" not the "20th century"; it was something in regard to the Cheney-Bush regime.
I've never disagreed with your outlook.
Don't sweat it. Typos on publications like the New York Times and the Washington Post, which are frequently found now, are inexcusable. You're beginning anew, taking up the journalistic banner those dropped years ago, so slack must be cut.
People have complained about typos in my reporting but I’m an Indy journalist who has lived in a van and been homeless at times. If I had the money and resources of Glenn I’d hire a copy editor and pay them $50 to edit a story. Glenn is not new to this or broke, thus I was surprised to see Abigail Shrier’s name wrong twice and the other typos. It hurts the credibility of the reporting when a certain level and quantity of typos exist. Not a huge deal in the bigger scheme of things but I wish I had the resources to hire a copy editor like Glenn does.
Be, as you still doing guru bashing stuff (no one in the heterodox integral community posts your stuff anymore, not sure why)?
Do you have a patreon creator account?
Yes, still exposing gurus: www.gurumag.com / Don't use Patreon much. I have donate tab on my site.
Ha ha we are happy to help! Have a great day!
I didn't even notice. I feel like a moron.
Yes, but keep in mind the one kind of Nazism that is always good is Grammar Nazism.
If you want to be paid for what you write, you should fix typos ASAP and ideally before you publish. But I have plenty of Amazon Kindle books that have obvious typos in them also, so it's not like I haven't seen that sloppiness before.
This is too aggressive, deleting. My bad.
I have no idea what you deleted, and I don’t care, but it’s very nice to see people feel free to make mistakes and correct themselves. On Twitter, apparently no one makes mistakes.
When do you hear conservatives organizing to stop books from being published? When do you hear of them preventing leftists from speaking at events ? When do you hear of them showing up in restaurants demanding people kneel or raise a fist ?
You don’t. The democrat party is now the Socialist non- worker Party of America. Voting for democrats is voting for fascism.
Public education is the opium of the people. Producing drones for the democrat socialists who control half of America’s people and most all of it’s institutions.
The ACLU are the Democrat’s bitches. They haven’t had any credibility in ages. They exist to collect donations from idiots and attack freedom.
Mr. Greenwald—why not follow up with the Southern Poverty LLC 😂😁
Not recently anyway. There were plenty of anti-speech proponents in the 80s and 90s targeting pornography, LGBT causes, and “vulgar lyrics” in rock and rap albums. The only reason we don’t see a broad coalition of anti-speech conservatives is because they’ve lost control of American culture at large. If given the chance I suspect plenty of conservative mouthpieces would advocate some form of censorship (especially around research into gun violence and climate science). There’s fascism on both sides: we just happen to live in the leftists’ world right now.
Even climate science has become infected. This professor lost her job for pointing out that polar bears are still doing fine. The very thing she is an expert in.
https://financialpost.com/opinion/was-this-zoologist-punished-for-telling-school-kids-politically-incorrect-facts-about-polar-bears
with the exception of the move to ban abortion in certain states, I don't feel the political right is attempting to assert too much control over others.
I feel like the battle is no longer conservative/liberal. Its become more like authoritarian/liberty
consensus / disruption
Truth/Lies
Terry Jones...Koran burner.
never heard of him
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Terry_Jones_(pastor)
I didn't follow your link but if he is that pastor that insisted on burning Korans, what's he got to do with this? If he paid for them, he is free to burn them. This is still America. For now. haha
And even that issue is a bit of a sticky wicket, just as easily and logically characterized as protection of the most vulnerable members or society - demonstrably more vulnerable than any LGBTQ member.
Well, if the right really wants less abortions they should make birth control easily accessible and free. Then the party of science would have no excuse outside a lack of personal responsibility and the true medical crisis could be treated at the hospital.
Agreed. It has been very disappointing to me that, approximately 15 minutes after gaining the upper hand in the Culture War, liberals started screaming "shut up!" at people. I guess the war is won and marginalized populations can never be marginalized again, right?
Liberals, like right wing bozo brushcuts, have been yelling “shut up” at folks for decades,
"Socialist non-worker" is an oxymoron. You cannot have it both ways! I would say that the Dem establishment is both decidedly ANTI-socialist and ANTI-worker (which is pretty much synonymous). The Dem establishment folks have abandoned the Working Class and have sided with the capitalist oligarchy.
Nobody is a socialist. The term should be retired. There are simply fans of generous welfare states and less generous welfare states. No serious person believes in government ownership of either producers of goods or services (at least traditionally non-governmental services), with the possible exception of health care (which I think is an interesting exception).
Indeed. And this is a very good reason why we should all start using the word "fascist" to refer to political movements whose program is actually similar in content to that of Mussolini's Partito Nazionale Fascista, rather than as a contentless pejorative for someone to our political right whose views we dislike.
The conflict between market economics and socialism (or communism) is over, and the market won. Not by force of arms, though that was needed during the Cold War to keep the conflict going long enough to prevail, but because socialim does not work for precisely the reasons Hayek and vonMises predicted as the conflict was getting underway.
What remains is the conflict between liberal democratic capitalism and fascism, which keeps private ownership but has the state meddle in and use as a means of social control the running of private enterprises. The Democrats have actually become a fascist party, with the black-shirted "Antifa" functioning as their, well....Blackshirts. Our greatest current foreign policy challenge is a great fascist power -- thought they call themselves "Communists" and their system "Socialism with Chinese Charateristics" -- the CCP is actually fascist: freeish market economics with state meddling mostly for the sake of social control. In way, they are the ultimate fascist power: they are engaged in a grand experiment to determine just how little freedom is necessary to keep a market economy fully functional.
If you push Sanders, and others like him, and he isn't afraid of political consequences, I suspect he would.
So Bernie isn't serious?
He's serious, it's just the wrong word. He's a social democrat that favors a more generous welfare state. How many bills has he pushed to nationalize the oil industry or seize farmland to promote worker collectives? Even his healthcare proposal, medicare for all, doesn't nationalize the health industry, it just distributes the payment mechanism as a welfare benefit. the doctors won't become government employees, the hospitals aren't nationalized. As an aside, and to make this post topical, medicare for all is a truly disingenuous political slogan. It rightful name is medicaid for all. Absolutely no European government spends anything resembling per person what we spend on medicare. Their expenditures are highly similar to what we spend on medicaid and use the same method of controlling costs - arbitrary price lists and caps that cause real rationing and results in actual changes in doctor behavior. How the left would howl if if ever Democrat's tweet mentioning medicare for all were tagged by Twitter as potentially misleading and said experts believe this program should be likened to medicaid for all.
Bernie calls himself a democratic socialist, which I'm sure you know is very different to a social democrat. Perhaps you could try to argue that he doesn't understand what the term means, but I think that would be very condescending and we really need to take him at his word.
Political labels are often misleading. Are conservatives conservative? Are liberals liberal? Let's assess Sanders based on his actual legislative history and proposals of the last 20 years. Medicare (Medicaid) for all is a welfare/redistributionist state proposal, not a socialist proposal. Wealth taxes are a welfare/redistributionist state proposal, not a socialist proposal. Non-competitive corporate tax rates out of all proportion to the cost of gov services provided to corporations are a welfare/redistributionist state proposal, not a socialist proposal. Resurrection of Glass Steagall is a "I-learn-the-wrong-lessons-from-past-experience-and-like-to-sound-tough-on-financials" proposal, not a socialist proposal. Free college is welfare state proposal, not a socialist proposal. Look, I'm not arguing that Bernie Sanders isn't a fellow traveler of actual socialists. He is. But there's a description for people who believe in rent control and stabilization, but don't actually want to nationalize apartment buildings to be run by public housing authorities. It's not socialist. It's arrogant bureaucrat. Why does Bernie call himself a socialist and endorse symbolic and shambolic anachronisms like his worker collective and USEO Bank bills? I don't know. My theory is nostalgia for the 40 years he spent as an actual socialist. The dream failed, snuffed out all over the world, consigned to the dustbin of history, to be resuscitated only in laughable episodes like Venezuela, which always end predictably by re-teaching the same lesson. Some men's self identity can't tolerate the clean break from the past. Their actual choices show you they don't believe the same things they used to, but they still like to hoist the old flags, put on the old tie-dyed shirt and they'll still feel nostalgia when the next Latin American strongman makes their country a laughingstock.
why did you hate JFK, Jr?
I didn't. It was a law school joke going back 20+ years. I've used this handle since Yahoo! Clubs was a thing and Jr. was alive, with only 1...err...minor change.
I am more than ready for an assault led by Glenn on the fraudulent SPLC!
Most Klansmen are.
Lol
you do know that there have already been several attacks that have discredited SPLC?
I saw one report from an alt right type source a few years ago that stated the black employees of SPLC had sued SPLC management for racial discrimination.
yes, you read that right, the report said that SPLC executives are racists
Easy to answer Frank Laureano's question "When do you hear of conservatives preventing leftists from speaking at events?" There's a whole section on "Cancellations and Alterations of Academic and Cultural Events" in this report (the whole report is worth reading): https://ccrjustice.org/the-palestine-exception
In addition, Canary Mission is a classic attack on free speech. And (since it's worth citing The Intercept in this forum) see this Intercept article from yesterday:
https://theintercept.com/2020/11/14/zoom-censorship-leila-khaled-palestine/
LoL
The first person mentioned as oppressing the Palestinian free speech in that report is Janet Napolitano—A DEMOCRAT—
Try again 😂
Clearly you can't read. If you had bothered to look at the report I linked to, you would have seen how a right-wing group threatened to sue a hotel for hosting an upcoming conference ("The right-wing American Center for Law and Justice also threatened to sue the ASA and the hotel that hosted its 2014 conference"). You pretended to be serious about your question, but after I answered it, you quickly showed you were too uncomfortable to face an accurate answer. Your question was "When do you hear of conservatives preventing leftists from speaking at events?", and when I pointed you to an example, you showed that you are the one who isn't willing to "hear" it. Instead of facing how you were wrong about the existence of conservative attacks on speech, you quickly dance away to say "Look, there's a Democrat in that report", as if that was the issue. You're the classic example of a Straw Man fallacy: a person who, instead of having the integrity to admit when he's wrong, turns aside to beat up an imaginary straw man so as to make himself feel he's stronger.
In fact, Napolitano did not try to prevent anyone from speaking; she simply put out a statement describing what she thinks "civil discourse" is, as the report says. How dumb do you have to be to think that this excuses anti-free-speech attacks by conservatives, or by anyone?
Sane people that you can find some Republicans and some Democrats among the enemies of free speech. And it takes integrity to avoid joining those closed-minded people who rage in many parts of the political spectrum. But integrity is what you don't have. Instead of facing the fact that many conservatives have their own tendencies to stifle speech, you just want to turn the excellent principle of free speech into another crude excuse for blaming Democrats. A person who actually cared about free speech would be troubled by conservative attacks on free speech too, which you clearly aren't. It is clear that groups which attack the rights of Palestinians and of supporters of Palestinians tend to be either neutral between Democrats and Republicans, or tend to actually prefer the Republican side over the Democratic side; so these free speech violations are something that would concern a conscientious conservative. Clearly, you're not one.
You're confused. Democrats are not the Left; the majority, including Napolitano, are on the Right.
That's one reason I'm a Green, not a Dem.
Napolitano was so dumb that she parroted the Bush/Cheney claim that the 9/11 perpetrators came in via Canada.
maine... canada... wuts the diff?
"Nearly 600 books spanning a variety of genres and reading levels were the target of censorship attempts at libraries, schools and universities last year, and 8 out of the 10 that made the American Library Association’s “Most Challenged Books” of 2019 list shared a common denominator: LGBTQ content."
https://www.nbcnews.com/feature/nbc-out/eight-10-most-banned-books-challenged-lgbtq-content-n1188041
The pendulum has swung
Indeed. But as pendulums do, it has swung far past the centre. More, it has reached the point of maximal divergence from the centre and has reversed direction. But, as yet the reverse is tentative, slow, barely perceptible in some areas. As it accelerates towards the centre the screams of the left are going to be dramatic and pitiful. As it rushes at maximum speed past the centre and up to the same right-ward position as it is now at, left speech is going to become as verboten as right speech is now. That means, banned from public media platforms, suppressed by tech giants, punishable by law in some cases. This is what happens when you push the pendulum off the centre. This is what happens when you adopt the name "progressives" and you think that politics and history are linear so any resistance you might meet is simply an occasion to push harder, and any softening of resistance an occasion to push farther. All you're doing is ensuring that the backswing is going to extract from you and your interests the same blood and tears currently being extracted from your opponents.
This is true of all warfare. Peaceful coexistence is always better for everyone, but historically our last resort.
If the pendulum ever swings to the right as you're predicting, I will _TRY_ to resist the temptation to smirk at a leftist and tell them their speech is "literally endangering my life."
Lots of examples(here’s one), but you have to be willing to look. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2012_Afghanistan_Quran_burning_protests
Glenn: Progressives have made transgenderism their proverbial Alamo for the simplest of reasons: When reality itself can be defined solely on the basis of self-identification (I say I'm a woman, therefore I am, genitalia and chromosomes be damned), then by the same "logic," one can also assert 2+2=5--and the seamless transition to totalitarian governance is virtually assured.
as a homo, I feel the promotion of trannie reality to a larger non-gender conforming group of teenagers has to do with the discomfort much of society has for gender non-conforming homos.
Nothing could be less "fluid" than changing the gender identity of children to conform with societies long standing expectations for members of that sex.
For Gawd's sakes, it's the official policy of Iran and sharia: you get three chances to quit being a homo and then you can either be executed or get your weinie whacked. Women have the lovely option of being raped straight.
When your wokie woke bullshit pleases the Ayatollah ... it's time to re-examine.
Stop the insanity and leave those homo kids alone.
Exactly. Medical intervention into children and teens with gender dysphoria is not only Gay Reparative Therapy it is also a Dr. Mengele Auschwitz horror.
Yes. It's been tiresome as an old homo that so many try to figure us out and "cure" us of what is only problematical because they make it so, but this is some crazy playing Gawd sh*t giving puberty blockers and changing birth certificates.
I mean, as usual, it was founded in a real problem. When trannies "lived as the other sex" preparing for or in the aftermath of surgery, their birth certificates and the states unwillingness to let them legally change their documents made discretion impossible and they were then targeted in employment, etc.
Again, as usual, the "remedy" has gone so far into the realm of the absurd, allowing children to change their birth sex, that one wonders if the remedies aren't advanced by those opposing social acceptance of homos and trannies.
Who else would be pursuing such crazy societal accommodations for such trivial assertions of being a trannie?
Just so you know Abigail Shrier fully supports the medical intervention of trans children and despite being a critic she still supports trans children taking hormones.
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=RS6_p9QW94A
Good point.
The LGBTQ movement needs to eject the the T.
I am not comfortable with that either. Back when it was not cool, trannies were few and far between but there were real cases. They deserve rights and protection.
I think the ridiculousness of this current ideation (wth is up with spellcheck? ideation is a word) is going to provoke a backlash, at which time homos and real trannies will be moved back to the margins.
At that time, when it will be dangerous to be non-conforming again, the attention seeking "bisexuals" and " faux trannies" with the whole bunch of whatever the hell they have added on to the end of LGBT under the +, well, those folks will quit playing around publicly, find Gawd or whatever and retreat to safe heterosexuality.
it's really not simple. Trannies need to be safe and probably are the most vulnerable in a prison population, for instance.
On the other hand, I believe our children and particularly girls need to be protected from predators with simple, logical laws and they deserve to have sports leagues which do not allow male musculatory competitors to come in and dominate easily. Sorry if that is too ... obscure of language. Men. biologically born males should not be in women's sports. period.
But for sure I know the "mental health" profession is populated by idiots that find a popular diagnosis and apply it, irresponsibly and indiscriminately like a fashion trend until the next one comes along.
The ACLU is preparing to continue its challenge to a bill that passed the Idaho state legislature earlier this year and was signed into law by the Governor (Fairness in Women’s Sports Bill HB500a) which seeks to preserve the level playing field for women in sports, but blocked with a temporary injunction by a federal judge on the grounds of discrimination.
https://www.womensdeclaration.com/en/country-info/united-states-america/whrc-usa/news/
those trannies are just dickwads wanting to invade women's space.
Someone oughta cut their dicks off for em... at the root.
"Musculatory," lol. Not a word but full of appropriosity.
haha... I find your criticism to signify the problematical nature of open forums utilized for conversating wit strangers.
Been saying that for a long time. The Ts have driven lesbians out of their own movement!
Galleta, that's the best comment of yours I've yet read; bravo.
Not surprised you preferred it to the "who da good Jews is" thread.
hahahaha who da good Jews is... hahahahahahaha
OMG...
Clearly you are a discerning connoisseur of internet comment boards.
I agree. The post-modern assault on objective truth is the basis of modern leftist ideology. Their constant delusion and redefinition of words makes any attempt to reason with them fruitless.
You're confused; it's the liberals / neoliberals who are doing that, not the left. Liberals and neoliberals are NOT left.
Might be worth considering whether this exemplifies the well-known "No true Scotsman" fallacy. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/No_true_Scotsman
Not this time; there's a real definition for some things, and this is one of those times.
stop posting this brain damaged nonsense.
the far left is drifting into neomarxist totalitarianism
neoMaoism
neoStalinism
See Orwell, old story
See my reply to Ian B. upthread.
The assault is on leftists as well and involves no leftist ideology whatsoever. Maybe we don't have a world for identity politics radicals that are mated with corporate centrism and authoritarian tendencies, but this definitely not anything like Marxism which is focused on breaking down class inequality and improving material conditions for common people.
I should clarify: these days when I refer to the left, I usually mean the authoritarian identitatarians you correctly point out. You are right that they can be different from “classical” left wingers (with whom I may disagree, but “have no problem with”). I cannot stand the race and sex hustling, CRT spouting, incredibly poisonous and divisive identitarians so en vogue recently.
The problem here is what constitutes "the Left" and what constitutes "the Right".
I have proposed that "the Left" at any given historical moment, from the time it got that name from the seating arrangement in the French National Assembly down to the present has always been the dominant political tendency of the day that seeks to establish an omnicompetent state under its control on the plea that doing so, and only doing so, will vindicate the interests of the downtrodden.
Who the downtrodden are has changed over time from the French peasantry, to the "workers of the world" when the Comintern defined the normative Left, to a grab bag of identity groups at the turn of the 21st century. I feel sure that in a hundred years, there will be some new conception of the downtrodden and those who propose statist solutions to their plight will call themselves and be called by others "the Left".
The "Right" is simply the name for those who oppose the Left, so for instance, during the days of the Comintern, free marketeers of every political stripe, Tories, ultramontane clericalists, liberal Cold Warriors, monarchists, fascists, and Nazis were all "Right wing", even though their only commonality was opposing the Comintern. (The last is actually slightly peculiar, as the main difference between Hitler and Stalin was over who the downtrodden were -- if Stalin hadn't died, most likely poisoned by Beria, there is evidence he, too, planned to get around to slaughtering Jews -- Hitler was only "Right wing" because his downtrodden were post-Versailles Germans and Austrians, rather than "the workers of the world".)
So, a lot of you who like to feel you are part of the Left because you have genuine concerns for the working class and advocate policies you think will vindicate their interests, but haven't gone in for identity politics, are now, like it or not, part of "the Right" (and I for one welcome you to our ranks -- someone needs to look out for the interests of the working class).
Never works because nearly the entire world is little "greedy capitalists" who drain and consume the entire economy. Capitalism works only because most of the elite "greedy capitalists" plow much of what they skim back into the economy instead of consuming it all like the socialist/communist systems do.
This is quite false:
"Capitalism works only because most of the elite "greedy capitalists" plow much of what they skim back into the economy instead of consuming it all like the socialist/communist systems do."
In fact, the money is hoarded, which is the key reason we don't have runaway inflation; that money never hits main-street.
Jesus, Art, where did you get that? Nobody hoards money. The Fed, at the behest of the federal government, constantly inflates the currency. The only arguments they have regularly is how much.
Any significant amount of money must be invested or it loses value continuously.
We now have "walk away" inflation. It could start running if the left's economic shutdown crunches the economy too much, the government panics, and the Fed opens the spigots.
it is actually similar in a lot of ways to Mao's cultural revolution, only minus the mass murder, torture and imprisonment.
"woke" neomarxism(s) explained by one of the best:
https://newdiscourses.com/2020/07/complex-relationship-between-marxism-wokeness/
What you are describing is a structure of social control that can be used be any group regardless of ideology. The ideology that is most closely tied to this today uses the template of "Class Struggle" and applies it to identity. The main difference is that Marxism is universalist, deals in solid and material things, and structures like economic systems that can actually be changed by policy.
Class struggle purely between sexual orientations or ethnic groups is a dead end because there are not universal principles and nobody can win without some kind of new oppressive and unequal balance. Trying to forcefully change culture, or masses of people with different ideas than your own, is a fools errand. Not that culture can't and doesn't change, but change through coercion and control, rather than truth and integration, is destructive and unsustainable.
Hilarious. The “War on Christmas” gang talking about objective truth.
That seems like an odd response, most of what Glenn, Matt Taibbi and a bunch of other people (including current or former liberals, progressives and so forth) have been saying about censorship is indeed about the far left's drift toward totalitarian postmodern deconstructive nihilism (which is clearly and openly an assault on objectivity).
https://newdiscourses.com/2020/07/complex-relationship-between-marxism-wokeness/
Oh. they have a gang?
Fox News Consumers.
hahahaha sure. tough gang.
Precisely
Please, Glenn, her name is Shrier, not Spier. Please fix.
Regarding the book, you really must read it. It is as far from a screed as can be. Shrier is a seasoned, well educated journalist with degrees from Columbia and Oxford, and a J.D. from Yale. She did her due diligence for this book. It’s thoroughly referenced and she interviewed experts in every relevant field on both sides of the issue. Trans activism has spread on a strategy of suppressing fifty hears of decent research that if you leave a gender-confused child alone, at puberty they will figure themselves out and come out as gay, the overwhelming majority of the time. The small remainder may, in fact, be trans.
Shrier does not deny the existence of transgender people, but she makes the crucial point that the astronomical rise in demand for mastectomies in adolescent girls is not normal. It is entirely socially constructed. Are these girls in distress? Absolutely. Are they trans? Almost always, no. But according to the established standard of care, psychotherapy is not allowed. It’s viewed as a form of conversion therapy. So it’s not until after they’ve lost their breasts, and maybe their uteruses, do their brains mature and they realize they were never trans in the first place.
The title of the book, I agree, is a bit hyperbolic, but on the other hand, there actually is irreversible damage. Buyer’s remorse after mutilating surgeries is a tragedy, and when it happens to children who went to professionals for help, it’s also medical malpractice. The use of the term “craze” in the title refers to any form of social contagion, so it’s not as out there as you might think. (the Satanic Panic was a craze; multiple personality disorder was a craze.)
Glenn, I am thrilled that you’re jumping into the fray on this. We need more voices that are gender critical, in order to balance and counter the extreme assertions of trans ideology. This doesn’t mean transgenderism itself is spurious, just that it’s been politicized and promulgated by canceling anyone with a different view and creating fake narratives to justify it and make it appear more common than it actually is. But with all respect to you, and I have a lot, which is why I’m a subscriber: please educate yourself by talking to the gender critical individuals from around the world who have dug deep into this topic and can give you a lot of perspective. Meghan Murphy, of the Feminist Current newspaper in Canada, who was permanently kicked off Twitter for saying that men aren’t women, is a good one. Endocrinologist William Malone, MD, founder of SEGM (Society for Evidence Based Gender Medicine) is another one. Talk to Dr. James Cantor in Canada. Talk to Dr. Lisa Littman, whom Shrier interviews in her book. Go across the pond and look at what’s happening in the U.K., Australia and Sweden. And definitely read Shrier’s book. And talk to her.
Thank you for this platform and the chance to respond.
I would think that trans would want to support someone who takes their gender position(s) seriously enough to do the research on it, rather than hoist the LGBT banner reflexively.
You would think. But that's because you're thinking. The same can't be said for people who are, as you say, hoisting a banner reflexively.
follow the money. who is promoting the anti-TERF censorship campaigns? why?
Orgs like Human Rights Campaign and GLAAD, which collect huge donations from deep-pocketed liberal donors that help finance the campaigns of progressive candidates? Pharmaceutical companies, health care corporations and university hospitals that make huge profits off the bodies of children and adolescents? I don’t know...I’m just riffing here. What’s your view?
dunno. I saw an article a few years ago that reported/claimed that some ultrawealthy asshole was funding the anti-TERF insanity in the UK out of some weird political motive. don't recall the details, sorry.
No need to apologize. It’s a very good question. It needs an investigative journalist with no dog in the fight and a strong b.s. detector to go after it.
Think of gender dysphoria on a spectrum like depression. In some cases you have severe cases of clear clinical depression. For many trans people this is what gender dysphoria feels like. And then there are others who have mild depression or who are less clear about how to know if they have depression. Some trans people experience gender dysphoria like this as well. Just as there will be misdiagnoses by psychiatrists when evaluating depression there will be misdiagnoses when evaluating gender dysphoria. The answer is better trained healthcare workers.
This is a chart depicting the rise of left-handedness in society as it became less stigmatized: https://ibb.co/5M0znQk
I wonder if Abigail Shrier's next book will be called “The Left-Handed Craze.”
Very sinister.
FYI: Abigail Shrier still supports trans children taking hormones: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RS6_p9QW94A
Thank you for pointing this out. It's an unfortunate and lazy position for her to take. It shows that even people as well-educated as she is can be seduced by the notion of "charity." Given what we know about young children and their eventual desistance at puberty, and given what we DON'T know about the long-term effects of puberty blockers on the bodies and brains of children, we should always err on the side of caution where puberty blockers are concerned.
She implies in this clip that it's reasonable to risk harming ten children if just one of them turns out to be "truly trans" (whatever that means). Since there's no test that can be done to distinguish a transperson, and since we have to wait until puberty at the very earliest for them to tell us, anything other than watchful waiting is medical malpractice.
So, for all the points you agree with her on she is a well researched and accomplished journalist but not this one? Doesn’t it give you any pause that even Shrier, who is one of the most prominent critics, still see’s justification for the use of hormones for trans children? She’s investigated and researched this issue deeply and remains intellectually honest about a position that seemingly goes against her views. Having a critic like her reach this conclusion should open your eyes to why she might be saying this.
I'll respectfully disagree. I won't repeat everything I wrote above, but pay attention to what we know about the outcomes for gender-nonconforming children once they reach puberty. I'll add that the National Health Service in the U.K. recently updated its language on the use of puberty blockers in response to a lawsuit against them by a former transman. The NHS was forced to admit that they actually do not have any data to show that puberty blockers are safe. They also do not know what the long-term effects of puberty blockers are on the bodies of young children. If I were a parent, my child would not be given puberty blockers on such shoddy medicine.
The head of the Karolinska Institute in Sweden has also admitted that "we don't know what we're doing" where hormones for children are concerned. They are experimenting on children.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=73-mLwWIgwU
There's nothing wrong with Shrier's quoting the views of people on both sides of the discussion. But on this particular issue, if she supports giving puberty blockers to a seven year old who in all likelihood will grow out of their confusion, that's unjustified. Once a kid reaches puberty, if they are still feeling dysphoric, that's the time to consider puberty blockers.
By the way, this is not just my personal position.
https://quillette.com/2019/12/24/podcast-68-clinical-psychologist-dr-james-cantor-criticises-the-american-academy-of-pediatrics-guidelines-for-treating-trans-children/
See this piece I wrote that debunks Cantor's study and addresses Joe Rogan's flawed statements: https://www.reddit.com/user/BeScofield/comments/bg8irh/joe_rogan_destroyed_in_transchildren_hormone/
It's not just Cantor, and it's not just one study from the 1970s. And the number of people who detransition grows every day. I have no problem with adults transitioning. I understand the rationale for giving an 11 year old puberty blockers, but I don't agree with it. The brain is not mature until the age of 25 and people's identity forms over time.
Remove the proscription against therapy -- stop referring to psychotherapy as "conversion therapy." The detransitioners I follow on Reddit and elsewhere make the same complaint over and over: why did nobody allow me to talk about my issues? Why did nobody tell me that autism and a history of sexual abuse could lead to gender dysphoria? Why was I given a prescription for T at the end of the first visit? Why was I not able to discuss my burgeoning feelings for members of the same sex? I was riddled with shame about my sexuality and my developing female body. Why was I not allowed to discuss these issues? The affirmative model is malpractice.
That's really all I have to say on this subject, Be. I wish you well.
Do you agree with Joe Rogan in what he said on the podcast with Adam Conover?
“There’s no reason to give kids hormones…If they think that they are a girl why do you have to give them hormones to make them more of a girl? If a child thinks they’re a girl, let them live as a girl, but you don’t have to hormonally engage in their bodies with chemicals.”
I don't understand why you can't just expand the definition of being a boy to include the feminine feeling boy?
I mean, "he" can't feel he is a "she" unless "he" is made to understand they are differently defined and that "he" is no good at being a "he". If being a "he" is just being defined by having a penis... poof, you win, you a he.
as a gender non-conforming child, I was just me. I had no problem with me, even when I learned that other people thought me being me was odd.
Sort of. I agree absolutely that there's no reason to give kids hormones. But what does it mean to "let them live as a girl"?
Again, fifty years' of research discusses this, and it's very clear. If a boy thinks he's a girl, do not shame him or censor him. If he wants to wear a dress or play with dolls or whatever, allow him to do that at home, while gently reminding him that he is in fact a boy and that when he leaves the house and goes to school he has to put on his big boy pants. This approach works. And by works, I mean that it gives a child the opportunity to try on an identity without having to make a commitment to it or deal with the outside world. And when he reaches puberty, he will tell us where he wants to land.
The main thing is to give a child time. Most of the time (65-90% of the time) they're going to turn out to be gay. Of course, this raises the issue of homophobia, which we thought we were done with. Sadly, it's still with us. There are still parents who would prefer to have a heterosexual daughter to a gay son.
Why do you think trans people even take hormones in your estimation? Is there any reason?
You'd have to ask them. Trans people are people. There's a lot of variety of purpose and thought once you get past the ideology. It's not monolithic.
First they came for the socialists, and I did not speak out—
Because I was not a socialist.
Then they came for the trade unionists, and I did not speak out—
Because I was not a trade unionist.
Then they came for the Jews, and I did not speak out—
Because I was not a Jew.
Then they came for me—and there was no one left to speak for me.
by Martin Niemoller
Surely I am not the only one tired of the trite wisdom mining of the Holocaust.
Much of the Democratic Party allowed AOC and her friends to equate the United States Border, trying to deal with an overwhelming influx of economic refugees showing up in violation of international law having traversed at least one safe haven country they skipped over in order to petition the US with concentration camps the inhabitants would have done anything to avoid being detained within.
Your intellectual use of the Holocaust for democratic votes and demonization of republicans is revolting. That American Jews let you do it and in some instances join in is even more revolting.
That the ACLU is not about Civil Liberties anymore is not news. It's a positively established fact.
Wow did you misread her quote. The quote, today, clearly applies to conservatives - who are the ones being targeted - as Glenn points out. Niemoller's point remains valid - the process is unchanged; the particular players have changed roles.
Sure. never heard that quote before :::eyeroll::: and am so sure the references to Nazi Germany aren't done.
Nor should they be done. We forget about that sordid chapter at our own peril and at that of our descendants.
why don't you read about what the Japanese did in their prisoner of war camps and at least change up the characters a bit?
Don't worry. Equally, if not more, barbaric for the tragedy porn.
The Holocaust is a convenient banner for the religious right.
Weirdly I hear a bunch of liberal-left Jews constantly complain about anyone, left or right or none-of-the-above, that dares to criticize Israel (which is ruled by far right lunatics).
Liberals are nothing but kinder, gentler, conservatives.
Not trite wisdom mining to the wise, eh?
overplayed. without a doubt. the Holocaust has been overplayed.
Since George W. was the antichrist and Donald J. was Hitler reincarnate, I guess the next republican President will be the devil incarnate.
Such demons the secular world conjurs.
Read "The Holocaust Industry" by Norman Finkelstein.
Again, I guess ole Yaweh has some favorites even amongst the chosen... we all knows who da good Jews is and who Yaweh has turned his face from.
Bad, bad Jewish grandchildren and child of Donald J. Trump. America's Jews have labelled you unchosen.
So now Martin Niemoller is Jewish? I'm not Jewish either but I fully agree with him and with the appropriateness of Pam quoting him in this context. This discussion is not about the Holocaust nor the correctness/incorrectness of Nazi policy, it's about humans looking the other way as evil is being done and then being surprised when they themselves fall victim to the very evil they've been ignoring. That's the point Niemoller was making. It is a universal theme, not tied to only one specific incident, period of time, or situation. The topic here is not religion, not Nazis or Jews, not the left-right political spectrum, not Hollywood vs America, but CENSORSHIP versus FREEDOM OF EXPRESSION.
I get that freedom of expression. I don't think it's censorship so much as an elitism exclusion and an organized intimidation.
So yeah, I agree with you I am just saying for myself, the Nazi references are overwrought and trite.
But I'm glad Greenwald has a place for you and I to express our opinions.
I'm glad too. Thank you, Glenn, for opening this up to discussion.
It is interesting that Niemoller failed to mention the actual german communists (and their USSR sponsors who were genocidal maniacs) that had been engaged in heavily armed street battles with the Freikorp for years.
But maybe Niemoller had seen how badly the western left treated Emma Goldman when she dared to challenge the establishment left's excuse making over the enormous sins of the USSR (mass exterminations for instance)
Burn in hell you apostate Jews! America has deemed you human trash that must be punished.
Don't question your fate, it is the decree of all the smart and funny Jews. Just poll Hollywood and you'll see. You are doomed to burn in hell for all eternity by the wokie woke.
I also like the version that starts off with "First they came for the journalists, and I do not know what happened after that"
It actually started in academia. The "blank slate" leftists (predecessors of the PC left) viciously attacked E.O. Wilson (sociobiology) in the late 1970s. Shortly after that the culture wars began to rage, but it took decades for the current form of "woke" cancel culture left-totalitarianism to get entrenched.
The Catholic Church...The Index.
This is a well reasoned old-fashioned example of real journalism. Not all with agree, of course, but that's not the intension. Keep up the fight, Glenn.
It's always troubling when our belief in free speech comes into conflict with what we perceive to be the expression of dangerous views. But whenever I feel such an internal conflict bubbling up through my consciousness, I still always try to redouble my commitment to freedom of expression and empower it to win the argument. If we ever yield to censorship -- whether government, corporate, religious, or social (e.g., "cancel culture") -- we will risk losing everything. Literally EVERY damned thing.
Glenn: "But why would someone with such censorious attitudes, with a goal of suppressing ideas with which they disagree, choose to go to work for the ACLU of all places?"
Indeed, my thought upon reading that was they should fire him.
In the next paragraph (or so) we then read he deleted the tweet and said one of the reasons was the ACLU was being pressured to fire him - as well they should if he really holds those views. But then we also read he withdrew his support, after saying it was something he would 100% die for.
The guy has lost all credibility with me. Frankly, I don't believe his latter-day change of heart; he's pro-suppression of ideas he disagrees with. ...He's a "the ends justify the means" kind of guy, which they never do.
I STRONGLY support the free-speech rights of everyone, especially the ones I disagree with and the ones that are unpopular with the public; popular opinions don't generally need any support!
In an adult society, full expression of ideas, full expression of dissent, full expression of any critique, is essential. I'd say it is one of the defining characteristics of an adult society. Seems clear to me that we don't have one of those in the US. The "smart" people don't trust the "dumb" people with critical capabilities. The worst kind of elitism. Many thanks, Mr Greenwald, for your clarity and attention. You model adult discourse. (If only I could get my dumb friends to read your stuff.)
Can folks please just note typos (FYI Glenn...) and not shame, whine or guilt trip the writer about them?
Yes! Particularly as Substack does not provide even a short time window in which to edit one's posts as some other online fora do.
"prioritize its civil liberties principles over liberal politics and liberal political causes"
How can you have free speech when speech itself has become so tortured?
How can liberals be opposed to liberties?
Only if (at least) one of these words no longer means what once did.
Has the word "liberty" lost its classical meaning? Certainly some of the attendant responsibilities are absent from most modern uses to the term but nonetheless they universally include the core concept of being unbound, free to act in any manner not harmful to others.
Has the word "liberal" lost its classical meaning? Huh! The question answers itself. Modern liberals are ideological authoritarians whose only distinction from other tyrants and thugs is that their laundry list of mandatory shibboleths is slightly different, while their rhetoric pretends to oppose all manner of totalitarian ideologies.
The very name ACLU is now merely a marketing slogan concealing a political agenda wholly inimical to any and every kind of freedom.
The adoption of liberal as a political position rather than an adjective has so polluted the term that it now represents what its adoptees set out to oppose. The letters ACLU are treading the same path.
I know people who believe that "free speech" was only ever a weapon to get rid of religious blasphemy laws and that, now these are gone, to replace them with political blasphemy laws (like the gender pronoun wars now raging). Given the "evolution" of the ACLU it gets harder to dissuade of them of this view every day.
There is a story from decades ago about one European explaining the American usage of "liberal" to another. His explanation was simple, "In American 'liberal' means socialist." It is probably a good thing that the illiberal faction of the Left in American now prefers "progressive" or the neologism "woke" as a self-descriptor. Perhaps the media will eventually catch up to them and we can eventually reclaim the word "liberal" and get it to mean what it means in the rest of the Anglosphere.
Take the entire premise of this article regarding the ACLU's current embrace of corporate censorship and consider it against the backdrop of their full-throated defense of the Citizen's United ruling. You'll find that it has become clear that the ACLU has no idea what a fire in a crowded theatre looks like.
The ACLU's defense of Citizens United was in large part because they want to defend the speech of nonprofits, including nonprofits with anonymous membership and funding (like the Jim Crow-era NAACP needed to have anonymity in NAACP v. Alabama to protect itself against an oppressive state). I'm willing to believe the ACLU is wrong to defend Citizens United, but you need to have an answer to their concerns.
Actually, that's incorrect. I don't need to have an answer for their concerns. I just need to prioritize those concerns against the concerns of dark money financing almost every single political campaign since the ruling, and the damage that financial influence has done and is doing to the political fabric of our country. If unmasking donations to non-profits is the cost of keeping that financial influence illuminated by sunlight, it's a cost well worth it.
That *is* an answer, in its own way. But I'm not totally sure you're right, since I haven't heard the ACLU's full reasoning.
I was a freshman at Niles North HS in 1978 when the march happened. Being one of the few gentiles in an overwhelmingly Jewish school, the entire period of time gave me a far better appreciation and deeper insight of the Jewish experience than I would have, had Ira Glasser not had the courage of his convictions.
At the time, I thought Ira was the anti-Christ. But now that I’ve become a man, I’ve put away those childish things.
Fast forward to today, and I never cease to be as flabbergasted by the sheer willful obtuseness of those in control of the Megaphone as I am horrified by it all.
I don’t agree with “White Fragility.” I would never think to ban it.
As you probably already know, the Diversity-Industrial-Complex exists because it is a very big business. All of its intellectual constructs (implicit bias, white fragility, etc,) have been debunked and demolished over and over, including by heterodox African American social scientists.
However, corporations and executives in the media, education and govt find such discredited constructs to be of no importance. When the "Diversity' grifters show up, it makes the job of the executives easier. They don't have to provide citizen workers (of whatever race) with better pay and benefits or better working conditions.
Instead they just hire more more low wage immigrant workers that work for 1/2 the pay of citizens at 80 hours/week.
And call it "diversity".
Anyone that dares to object is "sexist", "racist", etc.
Until the ruling elites stop paying for "White Fragility" and similar fraudulent nonsense, it will live on, unfortunately.
Free speech is not a cultural norm or societal value. It just is. Or it should be. The ACLU lost its balls and credibility when it failed to speak out in the post 9-11 era. There is much that’s disturbing about your piece, but the most is that you fail to hammer down the twisted thinking of an aberrant human being. Anyone who advocates banning of any book is an aberrant human being, and just one thought away from a final solution.
As Heinrich Heine noted; where they burn books they will soon burn people, too.
We could add "opinions".
Free speech is certainly a cultural norm relatively unique to the West. Just like the concepts of private property, equality before the law, and the primacy of individual rights (and related responsibilities) over the collective. All of these values made us who we are and are worth protecting against the socialist scourge.
All the stuff you pine away for was originally for white men only. Now, 2nd amendment?
Look up Mulford Act, which Ronnie Raygun brought in in California after Black Panthers exercised their 2nd amendment rights.
Just because rights have been whittled away for generations doesn't mean they aren't important and worth fighting for. And fwiw, I agree with you that many of anti-2A laws were originally targeted at blacks, as were the drug laws.
And the minimum wage laws.
They're all still working as intended.
Glenn, with all due respect — someone needs to proofread the articles you put out here. This one is great content but is full of typos…
One of the most glaring is the misspelling of Abigail Shrier's name. It's *Shrier* not Spier. Please fix this!