30 May 2017
Fighting words in Portland
Over the weekend, two men were killed in Portland OR, and a third man was injured, when they tried to quiet a fellow train passenger who had started ranting loudly at another passenger who happened to be wearing a hijab. Resenting their intrusion on his speech rights, the ranter stabbed them. The killings have been universally deplored, from the White House on down, but leave it to someone to overplay their hand. Drawing a link between the killer's opinions and his violent outburst, the mayor of Portland has asked for federal intervention to prevent two upcoming marches in his city, one a generic "alt-right" event, the other an anti-sharia protest. The mayor embarrassed himself by making the spurious claim that "hate speech" was not protected by the U.S. Constitution -- the charter recognizes no such category -- and the ACLU quickly joined right-wingers in defending the rights of the two sets of demonstrators. It seems fallacious to blame the killer's opinions for the killings, since the victims were not killed for who they were, all three being white. Whatever the killer's opinion of the Muslim girl, it was most likely a superficial symptom of the madness that led him to attack the other guys. It's very unlikely that Islamophobia or whatever form of white supremacy he allegedly avowed effectively made him a killer, and it should not be assumed that anyone concerned about Islamic violence is a potential killer, a trigger waiting to be pulled by some provocative orator. The law, as I understand it, is that protesters of the sort the Portland mayor wishes to ban are within their rights so long as they don't explicitly incite violence. Meanwhile, it wouldn't surprise me if violence against those protesters is already being incited in Portland -- not by Muslims but by the same "antifa" elements who've been attacking "hate speech" across the country. If anything, should the demonstration organizers not stand down, the mayor's comments have made that sort of attack more likely. I'll make this simple for liberals: if you don't think people should blame the religion of Islam for Islamist violence, then in all fairness you can't blame anti-Islamic opinion in general for an act of violence that was only tangentially anti-Islamic. We probably have millions of people in this country who are sincerely concerned about any number of threats Islam may pose, yet would never think of physically attacking a Muslim. That should be self-evident enough to dismiss the idea that any (or every) utterance against Islam is an incitement to violence. As for "antifa," every attack they make on free speech brings closer the day when someone fights back against them the way American reactionaries might be expected to fight, and when it happens they'll have no one but themselves to blame -- though they'll certainly try to blame everything else.
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
4 comments:
And yet these same enemies of "hate speech" support the 'right' of certain imams in the USA to preach violence against non-muslims and to preach the overthrow of the legitimate government of the United States and installing sharia courts instead.
Given their support of the violence committed by the antifa fascists; their support of hate speech by blacks, hispanics, gays and muslims against mainstream white people; their continued attempts to stymie the freedom of speech guaranteed by the Constitution of the alt-right (and whomever else they don't want to listen to), then the left has only itself to blame for any violence committed against their people. This violence has been building and will continue to build until 1) the left either accepts the rights' right to free speech, 2) the left acknowledges the danger posed by illegal entrants into this country against legal citizens of this country, and 3) the legitimacy of tRump's Presidency, like him or not. What the left doesn't seem to understand is just how violent things are likely to get AND just how badly they are likely to be stomped on, once the 'war' begins.
To my knowledge, there is no evidence that the perpetrator was a 'right-winger'. However, apparently he did have a history of mental illness and run-ins with law enforcement officials. I'm guessing the guy is pretty much apolitical. Ironically, this sort of thing wouldn't happen if these mentally ill people were still allowed to be institutionalized where they are a threat to neither themselves nor the public. However, such treatment is considered too inhumane by the left. So these people are left alone to wallow in whatever mental/emotional hell they live in, while offering only a constant, low-level threat to the public at large.
It's all too true that not all "hate" is equal in many people's eyes. Seems like some have a right to hate, or at least be angry, while others (e.g. "white working class") don't. Meanwhile, the suspect, who is said to be an active white supremacist, made a spectacle of himself in court the other day by saying such things as "You call it terrorism, I call it patriotism!" and "Death to antifa!"
Well, I can well understand someone wishing death on the antifa fascists. Insofar as terrorism/patriotism, I can well understand being angry and frustrated at a government that refuses to protect its own citizens against a 'peaceful' invasion by a religion that does NOT hold freedom at the same level of respect, especially when many, many, many of those people either openly despise the United States and want to see our Constitution replaced by shari'a law... I would question the patriotism of those who DON'T want to eliminate this very real threat to our culture, traditions and way of life.
Post a Comment