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Go Home The Oxford Union Stoops To A Prank

THE SPINE NOVEMBER 26, 2007

The Oxford Union Stoops To A Prank

BY JAMES KIRCHICK

In 1933, the Oxford Union debated and then voted by a tally of 275 to 153 that this House "will not fight for King and Country."  Well, as it happens, that House did fight for King and Country, valiantly and bloodily.  But 1933 was the year that Hitler came to power, and almost no one could see that war would be forced on England.  Or that the success of this resolution in an institution of the British social and intellectual elite might actually encourage Hitler in his political dementia.I've met a few individuals who actually voted for this resolution, and one of them -- in the 1980's -- was still regretting his action mournfully.The Oxford Union no longer carries its prestige with its votes, although when my friends Andrew Sullivan and Larry Grafstein were at the helm it still packed both prestige and power.  (In 1984, to the same house and in the very chambers, I debated Lord Mayhew, who had been Ernest Bevin's deputy in Britain's post-1945 war against Zionism and later a mere flak for the Palestine Liberation Organization, on the issue of Israel.  Frankly, I was traumatized by both the setting and the history.  But our side won...handily.)Anyway, the elite now stoops to pranks.  Today, Monday, according to the Associated Press, the Oxford Union will host as speakers David Irving, Holocaust denier, and Nick Griffin, leader of the fascist British National Party.  Is this an undergraduate prank?There's been much protest at the intellectual indignity of welcoming two vicious nut-cases to Oxford.  And the minister of defense has cancelled his own scheduled appearance at the Union.But the free speech loonies are also in the act.  Once you invite someone to address an audience, even Mahmoud Ahmadinejad or David Irving, he has some right, presumably going back to the Magna Carta, to talk whatever malicious falsehood he chooses. 

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44 comments

It is to the eternal shame of The New Republic that it continues to allow Martin Peretz to utter "whatever malicious falsehood he chooses." That has nothing whatsoever to do with the Magna Carta and everything to do with the moral and intellectual failure of the magazine's editor and owners.

- ndmackenzie

November 26, 2007 at 3:31am

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I really don't understand your post ndmackenzie. The man is quoting from The Associated Press, so I understood.

And if this is true than the academic and moral failure lies within Oxford University by inviting someone to a lecture with no academic credibility at all (his bombastic statements are everything by proved -- all the evidence is contrary, actually -- and can only be grimly ideologically determined, all things considered).

And a University, I thought is not there to champion "free speech". It is there to advance the cause of knowledge. If it confuses it's role with a narrow political one, then it is failling dramatically (in this case, also failling MORALY dramatically).

- luispc

November 26, 2007 at 9:14am

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The biggest loony posting here is the antisemite ndmackenzie as her post above shows.

As to the invitation this is how the Oxford Union is defending itself:

"The debating society's president, Luke Tryl, wrote a letter to members saying he invited the men to talk about the limits of free speech — not to expound their views."

ap.google.com/.../ALeqM5hB24ha-nlwYtYT8AFiBKnQiLW4swD8T10IS01

You would think that David Irving was an expert on "the limits" of free speech rather than a convicted nazi sympathizing lying historian.  I would have a modicum of respect for the OU if they admitted that they were inviting these fascists because they believed that they had something of intellectual substance to offer to their students rather than take refuge in the notion of “free speech.”

Irving and Griffin are there not to speak about free speech they are there to speak about their antisemitic and racist views.

- jacksondyer

November 26, 2007 at 9:33am

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Inviting Irving to discuss the "limits of free speech"? But the man has no theoretical knowledge on the subject. From this perspective, he can only be a case-study...

If one wants to discuss the limits of free speech, one doesn't invite a case study (only if one wants to put on a circus, inviting Irving or, perhaps, the new social-darwinists -- so called genetic scientists, but really delirious ultra-liberals -- Walton or Pinker).

If one is seriously interested in those limits, and focusing on the anglo-saxon academic world, one invites Dworkin or Walzer... but it seems, British and American Universities are more interested in putting up circus, than in really discussing things...

- luispc

November 26, 2007 at 10:27am

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"If one is seriously interested in those limits, and focusing on the anglo-saxon academic world, one invites Dworkin or Walzer... but it seems, British and American Universities are more interested in putting up circus, than in really discussing things..."

You really nailied it, Luis. It's about entertainment all day long.

There was a book published here a few years ago called "Amusing oursleves to death," by Postman and Postman which argued a similar thesis.

www.amazon.com/.../ref=pd_bbs_sr_1

- jacksondyer

November 26, 2007 at 11:21am

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No wonder ndmackenzie is upset when her Nazi idols Irving and Griffin are criticized.

- sleepyavl

November 26, 2007 at 11:23am

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Anyway, Jackson, even with all those counter-points, you still have the best Universities in the world, where there is some kind of creativity and freedom.

You can't imagine how terrible it is to be constantly stumbling on ignorant Catholics, frustrated Marxists, nihilist Foucaultians, etc., convinced that they know everything there is to know and scerolized within organizatorial structures inherited from the 18th and 19th centuries that give them absolute power...

And when one reads American academics (some, of course, not all), at least one thinks and is challenged. They're brave - which can only be explained by the atmosphere they inhabit -- and are offering the best there is.

- luispc

November 26, 2007 at 11:50am

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Irving and Griffin are scum, but they should be allowed to talk. It is a debating society, after all. I wasn't thrilled (in fact, quite incensed) about Ahmadinejad's visit, but what can you do? Free speech is free speech. Irving is well-known for lying in public about the Holocaust, but since when was this grounds for illegality? Europe's history of anti-Semitism barely passes as a reasonable reason for restricting comments on things like the Holocaust.

The true test to see if these people are interested in free debate is to invite Avigdor Lieberman and watch their reactions.

- rozenson

November 26, 2007 at 12:03pm

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Well said, luispc.

From what I am reading it seems to me that British academics are some of the worst offenders.

The problem sclerotic professors, like Tony Judt, have is that they are not sure if they are historians or advocates of a certain party line.

In any case, Professors like Noam Chomsky and Terry Eagleton, for example, have not had a new thought on any subject in forty years.

- jacksondyer

November 26, 2007 at 12:59pm

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Well said, luispc.

From what I am reading it seems to me that British academics are some of the worst offenders.

The problem sclerotic professors, like Tony Judt, have is that they are not sure if they are historians or advocates of a certain party line.

In any case, Professors like Noam Chomsky and Terry Eagleton, for example, have not had a new thought on any subject in forty years.

- jacksondyer

November 26, 2007 at 1:00pm

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Well said, luispc.

(I am having trouble posting again.)

- jacksondyer

November 26, 2007 at 1:04pm

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Luis:  You're the man.

Also, vis-a-vis Pinker--serious neuro-scientists do not take him at all seriously.  I know a couple of them who teach at a a prestigious university in a highly prestigious department who just laugh and say, "There he goes again."

- MOLLYSIMON

November 26, 2007 at 1:13pm

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If the issue is merely free speech let them invite some convicted murderer to speak at the Oxford  Union. That would truly be a limit test of "free speech."

- jacksondyer

November 26, 2007 at 1:21pm

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Luis--having trouble posting so apologize if this repeats.

Firstly, you are the man.

Secondly, serious neuroscientists (and I know a few) see Pinker as a joke.  He's so nature-nature-nature.  I always wish I could say to him, "So if I stuck my daughter in a closet for the next ten years, she'd come out the same way--that nothing I do can shape her morally, intellectually, emotionally?  

- MOLLYSIMON

November 26, 2007 at 1:27pm

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"Also, vis-a-vis Pinker--serious neuro-scientists do not take him at all seriously.  I know a couple of them who teach at a a prestigious university in a highly prestigious department who just laugh and say, "There he goes again.""

Professional jealousy, my dear.

- jacksondyer

November 26, 2007 at 1:51pm

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Molly - funny, a close friend who's a neuroscientist, and whose job requires him to constantly get feedback from scientists on who's who, doesn't share your view of Pinker. Says he's controversial but well respected.

Could you provide some links to articles by your anti-Pinkerites? thx, t

- teplukhin2you

November 26, 2007 at 2:44pm

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I copied this from another web site where it was posted by someone who calls himself or herself  "Fred."

"Here's Irving's "ditty" that's being used to shore up Professor Lipstadt's defence and prove that David Irving's chest contains a pitch black heart:

Irving’s doggerel:

I am a Baby Aryan

Not Jewish or Sectarian

I have no plans to marry

an Ape or Rastafarian."

- jacksondyer

November 26, 2007 at 3:32pm

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Here is a link to the above mentioned website:

www.engageonline.org.uk/.../comment.php

- jacksondyer

November 26, 2007 at 3:34pm

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I really find it a joke that these new neuro-scientists think of themselves as able to talk about morality and the human mind.

Since they know no philosophy at all what they say is either plainly wrong (Pinker) or common-place (Damasio).

There are very basic ideas that they simply do not represent. For instance, the simple idea that man is a cultural being. There is no way someone born within a hindu chaste system or in nazi Germany will have the same moral framework as someone born in an egalitarian society. Is this so hard to get? And, before this, one doesn't achieve immediately the conclusion that man without culture is a creature that only exists in the neuro-scientists minds? Of course, there are biological ties to every cultural possibility, but these are known... well... since the Greeks, were explored then by Cicero and later, by Thomas or Spinoza... in a profoundity that cannot be found, by far, in any neuroscientists.

I'm not even going to talk about their confusions on language. They are simply embarassing.

And sometimes, these new "summities" like to think of themselves as "desmistifiers" in the Freudian tradition... but it's still a joke. At least, Freud was a very cultivated man and one can even say that he represents the culmination of the platonic tradition... But these men never even read The Republic. It's embarassing, really...

- luispc

November 26, 2007 at 3:41pm

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And it's really sad that, sometimes, they present their delirious speculation as something with "scientific" credibility...

Of course, not all. Damasio, for instance, when presenting is many common places, usually is honest enough to confess that he is presenting unproven speculation. The same cannot be said of Pinker. Or of that ultimate joke, Dawkins.

One even wonders, how can this be possible...

- luispc

November 26, 2007 at 3:44pm

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Pinker is controversial within the cognitive psych community, but he certainly isn't considered a joke.  Even those academics who disagree with the strong nature position (a significant group) generally acknowledge that he's thoughtful and worth reading.  And for what it's worth, he's also well-liked on a personal level.

I know that some psych academics think he spends too much time on his general audience books and appearances, but he wouldn't have attained his current profile without the benefit of his earlier stuff, which was more technical and established him as a heavy hitter in the field.  And I personally don't see any problem with choosing the role of public intellectual over that of academic specialist.  His oeuvre still remains more academic than those of, e.g., Chomsky, Gould, Sagan, Dawkins, etc.

- Androscoggin

November 26, 2007 at 4:00pm

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Luispc:  Have you actually read The Blank Slate?  On what points, exactly, are you refuting Pinker?

- Androscoggin

November 26, 2007 at 4:04pm

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First, he says that his blank state is taken from Locke. Which is a joke. He simply does not see -- because he does not know Locke's moral and political philosophy -- that natural man, there, means cultural man or there is no man at all.

And, before cultural man, there sure are conditionings. But these are not relevant of blank state on that sense. There are permanent structural features in every mind and these can only be thought of if one studies cultural possibilities comparatively in order to find out what is permanent in every Dasein, no matter what. Pinker is far far away from these kinds of questions.

And then, what he says about language. This is very lenghty to discuss here. But how can one discuss language as related with the human mind, considering the infantile notions of anglo-saxon analitical philosophy, and without having a clue of what Heidegger and Gadamer said on the subject (these ones really related the concept of language with the structure of Dasein and achieved astonishing, and still unchallenged, conclusions).

I wouldn't have a problem if the man did not speak of himself as "finding out" about the human mind, morality or language. But talking about this -- and even quoting philosophers in an infantile, wrong way -- is a plain disservice. It is as if I started to discuss the structure of the phisical universe after reading some infantile sketches and presented my conclusions as having scientific credibility.

- luispc

November 26, 2007 at 4:35pm

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Tep:  I have no links, only opinions I hear from friends, two of whom I highly esteem.  I doubt anybody's going to publish, "Hey, the guy is an idiot."  But I did find at least one article critical of him.  www.bfsr.org/.../12_1schl.pdf.  I'm a lousy googler.  And my friends' opinions may be lousy.  I'll be honest:  I don't know enough to debate this point.  So until I know better, I'll concede.  

HOWEVER, here are my own thoughts:  Pinker is a psychologist.  Has he spent any time studying brain scans, which is the real future of neuroscience?  I myself don't believe in the blank slate.  I do believe in interplay between nature/nurture. Any parent will tell you that kids are born with definite temperaments.  They will tell you that there are ways to shape that temperament--and even to bypass it.  A shy toddler needn't stay shy for life.  But they will likely always have a more intense temperament than the outgoing kids.  That doesn't change.  And that's been confirmed by, yes, brain scans as well as old-fashioned research.   Brain scans will also tell you that the brains of depressed people, given some halfway decent therapy, will  show markedly different before/after images.

As Luis so aptly puts it, "The simple idea that man is a cultural being. There is no way someone born within a hindu chaste system or in nazi Germany will have the same moral framework as someone born in an egalitarian society."   I myself can't stand when someone comes out and purports to know the solution to a question we are  light years from answering.  It's like Tom Friedman with his flat world crap.  

Jackie:  "Professional jealousy"?  That's a great way to refute an opinion.    But because my mind--determined by my genes and my environment-- is kind of sluggish, such short cuts elude me.  

- MOLLYSIMON

November 26, 2007 at 5:28pm

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Oh, man, I just posted, and it's not showing up.  I'm sending this as a test.

- MOLLYSIMON

November 26, 2007 at 5:29pm

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""Professional jealousy"?  That's a great way to refute an opinion. "

It is a great way to refute an indeterminate opinion. Till I have more specifics about your friends views it'll do.

“HOWEVER, here are my own thoughts:  Pinker is a psychologist.  Has he spent any time studying brain scans, which is the real future of neuroscience?”

If you need to ask such a question that means that you haven’t read his work.

In any case, why did we start talking about Pinker instead of the Oxford Union and “free speech?”

Now, Heidegger and free speech, that is a topic worth pondering, Luis.

Did Heidegger believe in free speech? Is free speech part of the structure of Dasein? Would he as rector of Freiburg, dictator really have allowed have allowed, say Martin Buber to speak there or Walter Benjamin? I am sure he would have allowed David Irving to say zieg heil, but would he have even greeted Husserl.

In any case,

Martin Buber’s view of dialogue and language is more pertinent to a discussion of free speech than Heidegger’s hermeneutics of language.  

- jacksondyer

November 26, 2007 at 6:13pm

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Off topic I know, but this post is for Molly Simon:

"Brooke Astor’s Son and Lawyer Face Criminal Charges"

www.nytimes.com/.../27astor.html

Molly next time someone talks to you about "Jewish" financial misdeeds show them the above article from the NY Times.

- jacksondyer

November 26, 2007 at 7:17pm

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Thanks Jackson.  By the way, I'm going to read (not skim) Pinker so that I can or can't come back with some   informed arguments.  In the end, you got me.  

- MOLLYSIMON

November 26, 2007 at 8:25pm

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Heidegger is the best 20th century philosophy (as recognized from Strauss to Levinas, from Arendt to Löwith, from Charles Taylor to George Steiner, from Frankfurters to Sorbonners, etc., etc.)

Since him nothing really relevant has been said on the philosophical questions by excellence: "what is Man" and "what is a thing"

He commited himself grimly with nazism in 1933, yes. But he cuted with nazism as soon as 1934 and he made the most profound critique of nazism there is - European nihilism taken to it's utmost degree: the colapse of civilization in which philosophy is replaced with instinct and in which everyone is degraded to simple animality.

The contemporary "evolutionists" are the ones that read Nietzsche and understand man as nazis did! They are the ones that, by not understanding anything about man, are reducing him to a beast and, even worse, to a calculating beast, putting us on the way of a "liberal eugenics", as Habermas brilliantly understood. They are producing the kind of cultural desperation that turns "everything possible". As someone said: "the absence of being produces the fascination of the being able to do and within this desperation, to which since Nietzsche we call nihilism, no limit can be traced".

You are pointing your guns to the wrong target, Jackson.

- luispc

November 27, 2007 at 3:26am

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Perhaps I had a post censored... while discussing "freedom of speech". Hours ago I sent a post on authentic freedom being "freedom to be"...but it hasn't showed

- luispc

November 27, 2007 at 7:21am

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Though this isn’t the place to debate Heidegger, your comment gives short shrift to much excellent 20th century thought. I already mentioned Levinas, and I would add Wittgenstein. There are others. Neither of these thinkers, btw, can be thought of as “nihilists.”

As for evolutionist or more precisely thinkers who speculate on the issues of mind using the latest technological gadget, I believe their thinking to be incomplete, though not necessarily wrong headed. I agree, though, that Dawkins is out of his depth when writing about anything more profound that Darwinian science.

As for Heidegger the person he was a nasty piece of work, and the less said about him the better.

In any case, I noticed that you didn’t address the question of “freedom of speech” in relation to Heidegger. The concept is foreign to his thinking either in his early or late periods. You might say that Gadamer would have something to say about it, however, in as much as he would he would be thinking in non-Heideggerian terms.

Freedom of speech is an important notion which, from a philosphical point of view, originated in that most despised of philosophies empiricism. Prior to Locke Spinoza mentions it approvingly but only because he believed that only a society that allows freedom of speech would leave philosophers in peace to think, speak, write, and teach as they please.

- jacksondyer

November 27, 2007 at 12:51pm

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"Perhaps I had a post censored... while discussing "freedom of speech". Hours ago I sent a post on authentic freedom being "freedom to be"...but it hasn't showed"

It's been my experience, Luis, that post can show up hours after first posting them. I don't believe there is a live person censoring them. I could be wrong though.

It's a good idea to keep a copy of your postings till they show up. This way you can keep resposting them till they do.

I hope you repost your post on free speech.

- jacksondyer

November 27, 2007 at 12:53pm

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“Heidegger is the best 20th century philosophy (as recognized from Strauss to Levinas, from Arendt to Löwith, from Charles Taylor to George Steiner, from Frankfurters to Sorbonners, etc., etc.)”

Yes, Heidegger influenced most of the people you mentioned though his influence on the Frankfurt school, with the exception of Marcuse, was very slight.  Levinas  spurned his ontology and his mature philosophy has been a critique of Heidegger’s notion of the distinction between Being and being.

“Since him nothing really relevant has been said on the philosophical questions by excellence: "what is Man" and "what is a thing"”

Though this isn’t the place to debate Heidegger, your comment gives short shrift to much excellent 20th century thought. I already mentioned Levinas, and I would add Wittgenstein. There are others. Neither of these thinkers, btw, can be thought of as “nihilists.”

As for evolutionist or more precisely thinkers who speculate on the issues of mind using the latest technological gadget, I believe their thinking to be incomplete, though not necessarily wrong headed. I agree, though, that Dawkins is out of his depth when writing about anything more profound that Darwinian science.

As for Heidegger the person he was a nasty piece of work, and the less said about him the better.

In any case, I noticed that you didn’t address the question of “freedom of speech” in relation to Heidegger. The concept is foreign to his thinking either in his early or late periods. You might say that Gadamer would have something to say about it, however, in as much as he would he would be thinking in non-Heideggerian terms.

Freedom of speech is an important notion which originated in that most despised of philosophies empiricism. Prior to Locke Spinoza mentions it approvingly but only because he believed that only a society that allows freedom of speech would leave philosophers in peace to think, speak, write, and teach as they please.

- jacksondyer

November 27, 2007 at 12:55pm

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I wrote a rather long post answering you, Jackson. I hope this one will show.

- luispc

November 27, 2007 at 1:32pm

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It hasn't. I really don't have the time now to repeat everything I wrote. But I will. And thanks for your post!

- luispc

November 27, 2007 at 1:33pm

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Perhaps divided, it will show:

- There is no differentiation between Being and being (between Theology and Ontology) in Heidegger;

- luispc

November 27, 2007 at 1:44pm

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Just one small point, Luis.

Heidegger subsumes being in Being.  To me this is unacceptable.

- jacksondyer

November 27, 2007 at 2:19pm

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Why is it unacceptable?

What if it is SO? What if we are participants in the Spinozian sense?

I'm trying to send my post and I can't

Sent it 5 or 6 times

- luispc

November 27, 2007 at 2:23pm

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It's impossible to discuss. My posts do not show

- luispc

November 27, 2007 at 2:23pm

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If a TalkBacker hits "Submit" and the post does not appear on blogs.tnr.com, does the TalkBacker exist?

- teplukhin2you

November 27, 2007 at 6:42pm

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If luis is being prevented from posting I am going to drop this pub and site immediately.

- boxofrox

November 27, 2007 at 10:21pm

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This is getting on my nerves. Another effort to send a post. Another post that did not appear.

What is happening here?

- luispc

November 28, 2007 at 12:20pm

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And what's most absurd is that the posts in which I complain about other posts not showing appear!

Who's affraid of thoughts on freedom to be? They are quite unoffensive!

Thanks for the support Jack. But do not leave. At least for me to keep reading you

- luispc

November 28, 2007 at 12:22pm

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Another try, another failure. I'm trying to send this out of respect for Jackson that deserves an answer on his question about freedom of speech. But this stupid blog is preventing me

- luispc

November 28, 2007 at 3:29pm

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