This is a little late in coming, but it's absolutely necessary. Last week, I was perusing Arianna Huffington's new blog portal and ran across an entry from David Prager entitled
Campus Barbarians. I have republished the post in its entirety here, because the full passage needs to be appreciated before reading my own comments (which will follow):
Check out the accompanying article by Ajai Raj, a sophomore at the University of Texas who publicly kept yelling obscenities during Ann Coulter’s speech and then publicly asked her, “You say that you believe in the sanctity of marriage, how do you feel about marriages where the man does nothing but f--- his wife up the ass?”
Just about a week earlier a leftist publicly asked Justice Antonin Scalia if he engaged in anal sex with his wife (who was present).
These symbolize to me one of the most profound differences between the Left and the Right. I do not believe the Left recognizes how thin the line between civilization and chaos/evil is. As a Jew born shortly after the Holocaust, Nazi Germany and the gas chambers play a great role in my thinking. I recognize that the most cultured European country built Auschwitz; that Nazism was a secular, not a Christian ideology; that Ph.D.’s and intellectuals led the way to the death camps just as they did to the Gulag and other Communist holocausts.
Universities and museums were morally worthless in Weimar and Nazi Germany as they are now in America and Europe. So I have a primal fear of the moral chaos that follows the breaking down of America’s real moral foundations, such as Judeo-Christian values, public decency, freedom of speech, and the military.
I see in this student who screams obscenities at a conservative speaker and all the students who joined or supported him, our version of the Hitler Youth, our barbarians. To me screaming down speakers at colleges (as I saw the Left do at Columbia University when I was a graduate student during the Vietnam War) and screaming obscenities represent barbarity. To most of those on the Left, these students are at worst, a bit over the top, and at best fighters against what they most fear – conservatives – not barbarity.
I find Mr. Prager's thoughts quite disturbing. Has he ever attended an Ann Coulter speech? Has he seen her interviewed? Read her books? Her articles? Ann does not engage in reasoned debate nor does she suport her diatribes with objective fact. Her rants are not an example of "freedom of speech" as much as they are of "hate speech". Go back and read the accounts of what took place during her speech that night -- whenever a "leftist" would ask her a question, they would merit insults and contempt from Ms. Coulter. Exactly who is the one creating an atmosphere of hostility toward rational dialog? It is impossible to engage her in a rational debate because she views anyone who disagrees with her as evil or stupid. Even most conservatives recognize that she is merely an "attack dog" of the radical right -- useful for rousing the crowd on game day, but suited for little else. She long ago discarded even the pretext of objectivity. It seems to me that Mr. Raj did what most dog owners do to an unruly pet ... he rubbed her nose in it.
That Ms. Coulter is being held up by Mr. Prager as a bold warrior holding the gates against the barbarian hordes is ironic to say the least, laughable and dishonest at worst. I invite Mr. Prager to pick up any one of Coulter's books, look for a passage where she excoriates liberals and the left for anything and everything that ills our country (it won't be that hard to find), and every time she uses the word "liberal", substitute in the word "Jew". You will quickly recognize whose playbook she's using (hint: it's not the one used by the founding fathers).
As for the question put to Justice Scalia, sure it could have been asked more politely, but the underlying question is valid, seeing how Justice Scalia would uphold the right of states to outlaw such behavior. It is sad that the media has chosen to focus on the language that was used, rather than the content of the question.
As someone who has studied German history and the rise of Nazism, it's facinating to me that Prager uses the term "Hitler Youth" to describe the two young men who created a scene at Justice Scalia's and Coulter's speeches. The Nazis began their rise to power by using the intimidation and thuggery typical of a crime syndicate. They were notorious for intimidating opposition parties, government officials, and voters through brute force and street violence. But as much as the bullying tactics they employed, the Nazis also armed themselves with hatred, blame, and fear in their quest for power -- quantities in vast supply at a Coulter pep rally. The "Hitler Youth" was formed to indoctrinate Germany's youth with these ideas.
Once the Nazis gained power, they turned the mechanisms of the state against any who opposed them. Even then it was not too late. Many politicians, intellectuals, clergy, and military officials opposed the regime, but they were too few in number or too afraid to violate the law or break oaths of loyalty to state and church. Hitler successfully consolidated his power because there were too few willing to stand up and break decorum.
Here's an idea ... if conservative speakers don't want to address questions from those opposing their viewpoints in a respectful and engaging manner, then drop the Q&A altogether. Drop the pretense and conduct these events as the propaganda rallies which they are intended to be. It is fundamentally dishonest to have a "town hall meeting" or a Q&A session after a speech where only party supporters are chosen to ask questions. That's not debate, it's a pep rally.
Is the line Prager describes between civilization and chaos as thin as he fears? News flash, it's not. The lessons of history, the forces of progress, and the protections of an independent judiciary certanly bolster that line. But from whence come the forces who would breach that line? Let's see -- scripted events masquerading as open debate, partisan propaganda produced by the government, requiring loyalty oaths from supporters, attempts to seed the courts with radicals and restrict the independence of the judiciary, torture (I almost forgot that one!) ... still wondering which side of the line Prager's friends are on? If his article is truly his honest opinion, and not just a thoughtless incendiary tossed over the wall, well, I hate to break it to him, but he's not in the camp that he thinks he's in.
