Re: Article: Books Banned in the U.S.A.

On Oct 2, 4:53 pm, Banty <Banty_mem...@xxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:
In article <1191355375.105530.49...@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>, Beliavsky
says...

I think Larry Summers, former president of Harvard University, is one
example of a victim of left-wing McCarthyism. He lost his reputation
and job. No, the Federal government had no role in this episode, but
many intolerant leftists outside government today are powerful enough.
Below is an essay from an excellent columnist (IMO) explaining how
"political correctness is the new McCarthyism".

I actually had some sympathy with Dr. Summers, and those who have 'known' me
here a long time can attest that I can get pretty irritated at leftist
correctness.

Dr. Summers is a liberal who worked in the Clinton admin. During the
controversy he allocated $50,000,000 to "improve the climate for women
on Harvard's campus" (which means flushed $50M down the toilet in
order to pay his penance). Despite all this he was run out of town
AND, in a nice bit of McCarthyism:

http://chronicle.com/news/article/3034/u-of-california-regents-disinvite-lawrence-summers-as-dinner-speaker

"The University of California's Board of Regents has withdrawn an
invitation to Lawrence H. Summers, the controversial former president
of Harvard University, to speak at a board dinner next week in
Sacramento, The Davis Enterprise reported today. The move followed a
petition drive by female faculty members on the university's nearby
Davis campus, where the board is meeting."

So if a liberal with $50M donated to a BS PC cause can't get a
speaking gig at Cal, what are the odds of a conservative ever being
president of any major university?

But my point is *not* that excesses don't occur due to ideology (on both
sides!), it's about hyperbole.

Excesses do occur on both sides, however, when it comes to the media
(publishing, TV etc.) and academia the excesses are completely on the
side of the left.

I think it's way excessive to try to make Harry Potty books less accessible to
elementary school children by trying to pull them from school libraries, for
example. But that's *not* the same as banning them "from the USA".

By the same token the excesses sometimes applied by those who want to see
left-progressive ideas predominate is *not* the same as bringing the force of a
body of the U.S. Government investigating bringing a charge of treason against
individuals. It's hyperbole.

I'm not sure I understand this statement.

Maybe we need a new "Godwinizing" - call it "Breitbarting" (but that's the
perpetrator - maybe call it "Bantyizing" :) - to accuse any meagar to vigorous,
even overly vigorous, action to promote the voice of one's ideology, and to
suppress the voice of those opposing one's ideology, by comparison of being akin
to McCarthy, means that the conversation is out of hand and the thread should be
ended.

You are mistaken. The Hollywood Blacklist was not created by the
government, it was created by Hollywood. One write who was
blacklisted during the 50s has said that the de facto blacklist that
exists today against conservatives is more harsh.

Movies and TV progams being produced by Hollywood are almost
exclusively anti-American. Any movie about Iraq portrays American
soldiers as either victims or monsters. Storylines are routinely
changed, from the original work, to show Christians or conservatives
are the real threat. American soldiers are either murdering, raping
monsters or victims of right-wing politics. Look at the movies. The
bad guys are either Christians, conservatives or soldiers.

On campus right-wing groups are constantly attacked. Their newspapers
stolen and destroyed, groups defunded, speakers attack, denied a
platfrom or defunded. Speech laws are used as a cover to silence
them. And professors and the admin? Forget it. No conservatives
need apply

Furthermore...all communists, like all Nazis are, in fact, traitors.
Perhaps not in the Constitutionally-defined way, but in the fact that
they wish to overthrow the government and institute a dictatorship, so
communsts, Nazis, Klansman and their fellows having a hard time
finding a job won't upset me. But we are talking about merely being a
conservative, not a communist.

-Tom Enright

Cheers,
Banty the Godwinizer

.

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