The anti-liberty p.c. left

[ronburgundy]

See my post directly above. Even "it is bad" in the context means that its bad to pretty much say anything about religion that isn't of it.

No, it means the respondents found those particular cartoons inappropriate.

Odds are that very very few of the respondents saw any the cartoons. The question asked about "cartoons depicting Mohammed", so that is the only aspect of the content relevant to their responses.

It does not mean that they oppose any and all badmouthing of religion,

The #1 reason they gave was that religion should be respected, not that those particular cartoons were too extremely distasteful. So yes, it does mean they oppose badmouthing of religion in general.

and it certainly does not mean that they support "censorship,"

Yes it does. Government censorship is only one type of censorship. Saying that it is not okay to publish things that offend religion (which is what they said in their justifications) is to support the suppression of ideas and expression at least at the level of the publishing industry.

I don't see anything anywhere in the report about censorship, or the legality of the cartoons. Many Americans would say it's "not okay" for the New York Times to run an op-ed by David Duke, but that doesn't mean they think it should be illegal.

Invalid analogy. This was not about a particular outlet known for certain content publishing something counter to the content expected by their audience. This is about objection to anyone anywhere publishing the content. Americans have no clue about who was publishing these cartoons. Thus, their objection can only be a general one to them being published at all.
No one with any respect for free speech would say that it is not okay for someone else to publish something that some religious people find offensive. Such a response shows, at minimum, giving more thought to not offending religious sensibilities than to protecting free speech.

 

[Crazy Eddie]

I more concerned that 1/3 of Dems, and even college grads fail to support free speech when it disrespects or offends religion.

It doesn't concern you that a third of WOMEN fail to support free speech disrespecting religion?

Because last time I checked, there are ALOT more women in America than there are democrats and college students.

 

[fromderinside]

I more concerned that 1/3 of Dems, and even college grads fail to support free speech when it disrespects or offends religion.

It doesn't concern you that a third of WOMEN fail to support free speech disrespecting religion?

Because last time I checked, there are ALOT more women in America than there are democrats and college students.

Nonstarters. One-third of anything is not going to sway anything so let them flail.

Blame education, politics, sex, or wait until Wednesday and blame hump day.

 

[PyramidHead]

A minor logical quibble.

X is not okay AND X is not okay because Y

is not the same as

Y is not okay

Keep this in mind, and carry on.

 

[ronburgundy]

I more concerned that 1/3 of Dems, and even college grads fail to support free speech when it disrespects or offends religion.

It doesn't concern you that a third of WOMEN fail to support free speech disrespecting religion?

Because last time I checked, there are ALOT more women in America than there are democrats and college students.

I don't understand your point? Sure it concerns me that women are less supportive of protecting offensive speech.
Also, there are actually close to the same number of people who "lean Democrat" as their are women. My point in what concerns me is that the right wing is defined by authoritarianism, religiosity, and anti-liberty values. I expect them to oppose speech critical of religion. Women are among these right-wingers, and while they skew Dem, they also skew religious.
Thus, my real concern is with my fellow Dems and college graduates who ought to have more respect for the value of free and open critique of ideas, including if not especially religious ideas that advocate authoritarianism and unreason. IF we can't count on Dems and college grads to stand up for intellectual liberty, then we are truly fucked.

 

[ronburgundy]

A minor logical quibble.

X is not okay AND X is not okay because Y

is not the same as

Y is not okay

Keep this in mind, and carry on.

First, decontextualized deductive logic has near zero relevance in understanding any real world phenomena. Second, if a person objects to X because it has property Y, then it does in fact mean that they would generally object to similar things (in this case speech) that have property Y.

 

[arkirk]

You can count me firmly in your corner on this issue but the real problem actually is not whether or not cartoons like Charlie Hebdo's are published. The magazine is clearly within its rights to put out its cartoons. The problem as I see it is that there is nowhere any effort made by media overall to increase empathy, cooperation and hope in that "brown fascist" world you speak of. Charlie addresses the problem with clearly humorous approach aimed to amuse non-believers. The radical Muslim ideas need to be utterly devastated with true intercultural messages designed not to amuse non believers, but to influence the psyches of believers. There is enough room in this world for both Charlie and the kind of intercultural medicine required.

Surely you understand that ridicule does not foster cooperation and understanding across cultural divides. We actually need to talk to each other in Charlie's language and in doing so, we do not offend each other. Atheists worldwide are faced with the same problem however...deconstructing fundamental arguments for action without becoming targets of that action.

So BOTH humor and serious dialogue is required. Charlie did his part, but I ask, just like Henrietta Hen...."Who will help me grow the grain?" That's where we are if we were to parallel bread making with intercultural relations. We are in a very primitive place indeed in the world of "Muslim fascism" Surely there are some posters here who once were devoted Christians. Something in their lives convinced them that fundamentalist Christian ideas were wrong for them. It is almost certain to me that it was not the heartless ridicule of atheists. We need to be that something. To each other we can be Charlie. To faithful Muslims, we have to be engaged differently. In my estimation, they are sorely troubled by false ideas.

It is clear to me that Charlie is going to reach Muslims. In some fundamentalist circles, seeing a Charlie cartoon is a call to Jihad. There is no question of that. We saw these Jihadis murder a dozen people over it. Obviously the Jihadis had no right to murder for their belief system. They have paid or will be paid for their violence with more violence or prison. To my way of thinking they are already imprisoned in an ideology of violence and I want to remind Axulus that I fully understand this. Charlie and other publishers of similar satire need to be better protected and also owe it to themselves to be aware there is a threat to their lives in the form of these fundamentalists. At the same time I defend Charlie, I also have to say that Charlie is not doing any of the HEAVY LIFTING necessary for conflict resolution with the Muslim world, and some of those people who are doing that work will definitely have some reservations about the magazine.

The poll was interesting but it was about what I would expect.

Wow. All tis responsibility and all I have is a blogspot pulpit. Surely we needn't concern ourselves with the prejudices of others when we speak for humorous purposes to our group. Racist nigger is something leftist black comedians spout to get a black audience laugh.

My only hope is we are sentient enough to understand each of us is different, reacts differently to whatever, and has one's own group. If the scale is that if you say something I don't like I'm going to declare war then you, IMHO, are the one who ultimately needs to adjust. I see no reason for Charley Hebdo to attune itself with a culture that fosters hatred for disrespectful speech as a norm. It is upon those who get so inflamed to get with the program of being civilized enough to endure the foibles of others. If you don't want to be a punchline don't act like you are one. Its not, as they say, to soon to do so.

Your rant sounds a lot like what I would expect from Alexander the Great. His view...civilization (in the form of me and my ideas) is sweeping across this flat earth, and anything contrary to me will be crushed. I don't think you have any idea how great the differences are between cultures in different parts of the world...and how trapped by their cultures all people are. When I was younger, I was impatient like you. I was a atheist rabidly seeking a world where my world view utterly conquered that of the theists. The world is much bigger than the culture in which I grew up and I could not even change THAT. If our culture is so static, what right do I or even the society in which I live have to demand other cultures rapidly change?

We recently had a President (the honorable Dubbiya) who spouted "new world order." Now there is a Jihad in contemporary clothing if ever I saw one! That little crusade easily killed more than a million people. I remind you, we have troops in countries these terrorists come from and we piecemeal assassinate their leaders and such "colaterals" as happen to get in the way. We are perceived as our culture, which has its own sins. This is the structure and the starting point in which we live. When you contact a primitive culture, it really does no good to ridicule the chief and the medicine man the first thing you do. This problem Europe has with assassins in its realms is a product of inappropriate communications which have occurred because the technology of communications itself is exploding all over the world and even in places that are very backward. This does lead to diplomatic miss matches which give us Boston Marathon bombers, subway gas attacks, envelopes full of anthrax, and other crude expressions of pure intercultural hatred. You don't think I am accepting of this kind of violence do you?

The question is what do we do about it? I think people like Jimmy Carter are a better approach to cultural differences than Dubbiya...and you. His programs in Africa are almost completely wiping out River Blindness in some African countries...and that builds a residue not of resentment, but of gratitude. This kind of feeling is incredibly lacking in our international relations and more of that is needed. It is clearly non sectarian and humanistic. Our government, and those European governments need to clean up their acts world wide. Our media needs to clean its act. And we need a lot more understanding of the difficulties in backward locations. It is really about that simple. When you see a brash attack on a magazine, there clearly is something wrong and it is not that we do not have enough police.

 

[fromderinside]

Wow. All tis responsibility and all I have is a blogspot pulpit. Surely we needn't concern ourselves with the prejudices of others when we speak for humorous purposes to our group. Racist nigger is something leftist black comedians spout to get a black audience laugh.

My only hope is we are sentient enough to understand each of us is different, reacts differently to whatever, and has one's own group. If the scale is that if you say something I don't like I'm going to declare war then you, IMHO, are the one who ultimately needs to adjust. I see no reason for Charley Hebdo to attune itself with a culture that fosters hatred for disrespectful speech as a norm. It is upon those who get so inflamed to get with the program of being civilized enough to endure the foibles of others. If you don't want to be a punchline don't act like you are one. Its not, as they say, to soon to do so.

Your rant sounds a lot like what I would expect from Alexander the Great. His view...civilization (in the form of me and my ideas) is sweeping across this flat earth, and anything contrary to me will be crushed. I don't think you have any idea how great the differences are between cultures in different parts of the world...and how trapped by their cultures all people are. When I was younger, I was impatient like you. I was a atheist rabidly seeking a world where my world view utterly conquered that of the theists. The world is much bigger than the culture in which I grew up and I could not even change THAT. If our culture is so static, what right do I or even the society in which I live have to demand other cultures rapidly change?

We recently had a President (the honorable Dubbiya) who spouted "new world order." Now there is a Jihad in contemporary clothing if ever I saw one! That little crusade easily killed more than a million people. I remind you, we have troops in countries these terrorists come from and we piecemeal assassinate their leaders and such "colaterals" as happen to get in the way. We are perceived as our culture, which has its own sins. This is the structure and the starting point in which we live. When you contact a primitive culture, it really does no good to ridicule the chief and the medicine man the first thing you do. This problem Europe has with assassins in its realms is a product of inappropriate communications which have occurred because the technology of communications itself is exploding all over the world and even in places that are very backward. This does lead to diplomatic miss matches which give us Boston Marathon bombers, subway gas attacks, envelopes full of anthrax, and other crude expressions of pure intercultural hatred. You don't think I am accepting of this kind of violence do you?

The question is what do we do about it? I think people like Jimmy Carter are a better approach to cultural differences than Dubbiya...and you. His programs in Africa are almost completely wiping out River Blindness in some African countries...and that builds a residue not of resentment, but of gratitude. This kind of feeling is incredibly lacking in our international relations and more of that is needed. It is clearly non sectarian and humanistic. Our government, and those European governments need to clean up their acts world wide. Our media needs to clean its act. And we need a lot more understanding of the difficulties in backward locations. It is really about that simple. When you see a brash attack on a magazine, there clearly is something wrong and it is not that we do not have enough police.

Reality check. I'm 73, served, still humanist, consistent supporter of Habitat, and rock solid retiree democratic party precinct person on the left coast who has a dim view of any form of correctness whether of the don't or must type ..... otherwise keep it up.

Late add. Backward is used to indicate superiority, yet you use it with respect to those places that don't accept our level or respect for using our mouths instead of our fists. Somebody has to get off the trolley here. Getting rid of asshole theology and asshole leaders is a tough do, but, do they gotta or a lot of them will die. They'll die primarily because they don't get it that one hundred percent of brain capacity and one hundred percent of a social union being employed kills fifty percent doing so all the time. Its a do or die time and somebody is still pointing fingers as people suffer unreasonably.

 

[dismal]

Also, i'm told they love Dubbiya in Africa.

 

[fromderinside]

Even a piss ant has fans.

 

[Warpoet]

Odds are that very very few of the respondents saw any the cartoons. The question asked about "cartoons depicting Mohammed", so that is the only aspect of the content relevant to their responses.

A) "Odds are" is nothing more than your own speculation, when you are trying to build a case on empirical evidence;
B) You are deliberately misrepresenting your own source to make it sounds like it says something it doesn't. The question specifically asked about "these cartoons," not "all cartoons depicting Muhammad;"
C) Muhammad cartoons are not the only form of speech that might be offensive to theists, which is what you are claiming this survey addresses even though it does not.

The #1 reason they gave was that religion should be respected, not that those particular cartoons were too extremely distasteful. So yes, it does mean they oppose badmouthing of religion in general.

Rational people do not take "religion should be respected" to mean "anything religious people might be offended by should be banned." And even if it did mean that, only about 10 percent of total respondents said so.

There is another response, "there are limits to what should be published," that is more in line with the concept of censorship. But only 2 percent of respondents answered that way.

Yes it does. Government censorship is only one type of censorship. Saying that it is not okay to publish things that offend religion (which is what they said in their justifications) is to support the suppression of ideas and expression at least at the level of the publishing industry.

Ridiculous. Opposition to a certain action is not censorship. Someone might think that the publication of the cartoons was "not OK" in the sense that it's simply counterproductive and harms relations with Muslims. Under no logical understanding of the word does this constitute "censorship."

And it certainly does not show, as your OP claims, that liberals are "anti-liberty," think newspapers should have to respect religion, or that people "cannot be allowed to offend the religion of ethnic minorities." It could simply mean they thought it was a bad idea.

You are playing disingenuous word games to inflate the meaning of the survey so you can rant about liberal/PC intolerance of free speech.

Invalid analogy. This was not about a particular outlet known for certain content publishing something counter to the content expected by their audience. This is about objection to anyone anywhere publishing the content.

The analogy is perfectly valid. There are plenty of people who would consider the publication of racist, anti-Semitic or homophobic content anywhere to be "not okay." That doesn't constitute censorship. "Okay" is too subjective and generalized a term, and your case falls apart for this reason.

Americans have no clue about who was publishing these cartoons. Thus, their objection can only be a general one to them being published at all.
No one with any respect for free speech would say that it is not okay for someone else to publish something that some religious people find offensive. Such a response shows, at minimum, giving more thought to not offending religious sensibilities than to protecting free speech.

Once again, you are waving your hand and making things up as you go along. The survey does not tell us any of this. It simply says that a minority of Americans -- barely one-fifth if you actually do the math -- think the publication of the cartoons was "not okay." And again, "okay" is a very vague and subjective term, and so the case you are trying to build, and the outrage you are trying to manufacture, don't stand up to scrutiny.

When you are ready to examine the evidence and draw conclusions based on said evidence, instead of taking evidence and misrepresenting it to support conclusions you've already arrived at, please let us know.

 

[AthenaAwakened]

Political correctness says to respect religion?
All my fundy relatives forward emails that INSIST that PC is directly aimed at, hell, was invented just FOR attacking the religious...

The political correct have no problem disrespecting Christianity. Its the religions of brown people they feel should be respected and not criticized.

there are no brown Christians?

 

[fromderinside]

The political correct have no problem disrespecting Christianity. Its the religions of brown people they feel should be respected and not criticized.

there are no brown Christians?

What'cu talking about Louise?

 

[arkirk]

Your rant sounds a lot like what I would expect from Alexander the Great. His view...civilization (in the form of me and my ideas) is sweeping across this flat earth, and anything contrary to me will be crushed. I don't think you have any idea how great the differences are between cultures in different parts of the world...and how trapped by their cultures all people are. When I was younger, I was impatient like you. I was a atheist rabidly seeking a world where my world view utterly conquered that of the theists. The world is much bigger than the culture in which I grew up and I could not even change THAT. If our culture is so static, what right do I or even the society in which I live have to demand other cultures rapidly change?

We recently had a President (the honorable Dubbiya) who spouted "new world order." Now there is a Jihad in contemporary clothing if ever I saw one! That little crusade easily killed more than a million people. I remind you, we have troops in countries these terrorists come from and we piecemeal assassinate their leaders and such "colaterals" as happen to get in the way. We are perceived as our culture, which has its own sins. This is the structure and the starting point in which we live. When you contact a primitive culture, it really does no good to ridicule the chief and the medicine man the first thing you do. This problem Europe has with assassins in its realms is a product of inappropriate communications which have occurred because the technology of communications itself is exploding all over the world and even in places that are very backward. This does lead to diplomatic miss matches which give us Boston Marathon bombers, subway gas attacks, envelopes full of anthrax, and other crude expressions of pure intercultural hatred. You don't think I am accepting of this kind of violence do you?

The question is what do we do about it? I think people like Jimmy Carter are a better approach to cultural differences than Dubbiya...and you. His programs in Africa are almost completely wiping out River Blindness in some African countries...and that builds a residue not of resentment, but of gratitude. This kind of feeling is incredibly lacking in our international relations and more of that is needed. It is clearly non sectarian and humanistic. Our government, and those European governments need to clean up their acts world wide. Our media needs to clean its act. And we need a lot more understanding of the difficulties in backward locations. It is really about that simple. When you see a brash attack on a magazine, there clearly is something wrong and it is not that we do not have enough police.

Reality check. I'm 73, served, still humanist, consistent supporter of Habitat, and rock solid retiree democratic party precinct person on the left coast who has a dim view of any form of correctness whether of the don't or must type ..... otherwise keep it up.

Late add. Backward is used to indicate superiority, yet you use it with respect to those places that don't accept our level or respect for using our mouths instead of our fists. Somebody has to get off the trolley here. Getting rid of asshole theology and asshole leaders is a tough do, but, do they gotta or a lot of them will die. They'll die primarily because they don't get it that one hundred percent of brain capacity and one hundred percent of a social union being employed kills fifty percent doing so all the time. Its a do or die time and somebody is still pointing fingers as people suffer unreasonably.

I have tried to make sense of this post. There may be something I am missing. Perhaps you could explain it a bit more? I just think something didn't get completely typed.

 

[Nexus]

The political correct have no problem disrespecting Christianity. Its the religions of brown people they feel should be respected and not criticized.

there are no brown Christians?

There are of course just not the vast majority like Islam which the PC bend over backwards to appease.

 

[Jarhyn]

As a liberal, I am intelligent enough to identify a difference bet2een people using free speech to speak negatively about those who use free speech to say stupid shit, and using police with guns and black bags to hurt people who say stupid things. One is SAYING, the other is DOING. I have seen plenty of SJWs who speak about wanting to use the guns. I then speak about how they are jackass idiots as much as the Islamist cunts.

The point is, I guess, that conservatives of all stripes (Islamic, christian, etc) need to suck it up and get used to a good, sound taunting. Our dark lord Jesus, god of undeath and general of the zombie legions of the hereafter will tolerate no less. And woe to any who dares disagree.

 

[ronburgundy]

A) "Odds are" is nothing more than your own speculation, when you are trying to build a case on empirical evidence;

I am making reasonable assumptions. All evidence-based ideas require interpretation via a set of assumptions. Everything you have every said is based upon layers of assumptions, no matter how much evidence you think you have. The fact that you think knowledge is dividend into certain empirical fact and baseless speculation just means you have the epistemology of an 8 year old. You are making the assumption that most Americans had seen, accurately recalled, and were responding to the specific cartoons Hedbo published, and responding only to features unique to those cartoons that do not apply to religious critique more generally. If and only if every one of these assumptions are valid, would their responses reflect only their view of those specific cartoon. Based upon a great deal of data about American's ignorance of world events and literature, most of these are implausible assumptions, and nearly impossible that all of them are true.

B) You are deliberately misrepresenting your own source to make it sounds like it says something it doesn't. The question specifically asked about "these cartoons," not "all cartoons depicting Muhammad;"

I have misrepresented nothing. You are playing dishonest semantic games. "These cartoons" would only mean specific cartoons, if respondents were shown the specific cartoons during the survey. However, in the context of the actual question, "these cartoons" refers not nothing other than "cartoons depicting the Prophet Muhammad, which some people found offensive to their religious beliefs". That is the only thing they were told about the cartoons, and there is no reasonable basis to assume they knew anything about the cartoons beyond that.

C) Muhammad cartoons are not the only form of speech that might be offensive to theists, which is what you are claiming this survey addresses even though it does not.

I never claim nor in any way imply that Muhammad cartoons are the only form of speech offensive to theists. In fact, the "not okay" responders do not specify such cartoons in their justification, but rather refer generally to the requirement to "respect religion".

The #1 reason they gave was that religion should be respected, not that those particular cartoons were too extremely distasteful. So yes, it does mean they oppose badmouthing of religion in general.

Rational people do not take "religion should be respected" to mean "anything religious people might be offended by should be banned."

They did not just say that. They said it is not okay for cartoons that offend believers to be published because religion should be respected. The "respect religion" comment was tied to suppressing speech that offends believers.

And even if it did mean that, only about 10 percent of total respondents said so.

35% of the people who said it was "not okay to publish", gave this as their reason, and another 31% gave "Offensive/politically incorrect/not
appropriate" as their reason. Thus, 76% of them gave a general comment about offending/disrespecting the views of believers as their reason why it is not okay to publish something that offends them. Note, they counted the people who mention offending Muslims specifically, and only 3% mention this, contradicting your notion that these responses are isolated to these cartoons in particular, and supports my claim that it is about religious speech more broadly.

There is another response, "there are limits to what should be published," that is more in line with the concept of censorship. But only 2 percent of respondents answered that way.

That response is redundant and circular with what they already said by saying "it is not okay to publish". It is not a justification of their position, but just a restatement of the same thing.

Yes it does. Government censorship is only one type of censorship. Saying that it is not okay to publish things that offend religion (which is what they said in their justifications) is to support the suppression of ideas and expression at least at the level of the publishing industry.

Ridiculous. Opposition to a certain action is not censorship. Someone might think that the publication of the cartoons was "not OK" in the sense that it's simply counterproductive and harms relations with Muslims. Under no logical understanding of the word does this constitute "censorship."

Opposition to anyone publishing an idea (which is is what they are opposing) is censorship by any sane meaning of the term.

And it certainly does not show, as your OP claims, that liberals are "anti-liberty," think newspapers should have to respect religion, or that people "cannot be allowed to offend the religion of ethnic minorities." It could simply mean they thought it was a bad idea.

Thinking that it is not a good idea to criticize authoritarian worldviews that advocate inequality because it might offend the authoritarians, is extremely anti-liberty.

You are playing disingenuous word games to inflate the meaning of the survey so you can rant about liberal/PC intolerance of free speech.

No, you are dishonestly denying the obvious implications of the survey that you'd gladly accept if conservatives came out looking more anti-liberty.
I am a liberal, meaning I put liberty of thought and speech at the foundation of my politics. I am not attacking liberals in general. I am criticizing left-wing authoritarians and the danger they pose. Despite being a Democrat and a liberal, I am (unlike you) not blinded by a faith that the right-wingers are always more wrong on every issue. I am willing to accept the most plausible implications of the data and not invent excuses to waive it away.

Invalid analogy. This was not about a particular outlet known for certain content publishing something counter to the content expected by their audience. This is about objection to anyone anywhere publishing the content.

The analogy is perfectly valid. There are plenty of people who would consider the publication of racist, anti-Semitic or homophobic content anywhere to be "not okay."

Islam itself is hateful, authoritarian, homophobic, anti-semitic, racist, and sexist propaganda (no more so than Christianity, but that is still a lot). Critiques of Islam of thus not something that anyone who values liberty, equality, and decency would say is "not okay". Only anti-liberty authoritarians think it is not okay to offend anti-liberty authoritarians.

That doesn't constitute censorship. "Okay" is too subjective and generalized a term, and your case falls apart for this reason.

In the specific context of jounalists getting murdered for publishing, saying it is "not okay" to publish such things is not ambiguous. It reveals a clear lack of support for free speech. To say that it is "okay" it the most minimal amount of allowance one could grant. To say it is not okay is to say that it fails to meet the most minimal level of what people should be allowed to do without coercive restrictions.

Americans have no clue about who was publishing these cartoons. Thus, their objection can only be a general one to them being published at all.
No one with any respect for free speech would say that it is not okay for someone else to publish something that some religious people find offensive. Such a response shows, at minimum, giving more thought to not offending religious sensibilities than to protecting free speech.

Once again, you are waving your hand and making things up as you go along.

No, I am engaging reasonable interpretation, while you are inventing absurd excuses to protect your faith that no Democrats ever take the wrong position on an issue. Your interpretations include more assumptions than mine, and those assumptions are ignorant of almost every relevant fact about Americans and human psychology in general.

It simply says that a minority of Americans -- barely one-fifth if you actually do the math.

Did you fail math, as well as science, and logic? 28% is over 1-fourth and closer to 1-third than `1-fifth. In addition, among the Dems on whom my posts have focused, it is over 1-third, and among non-white Dems it is 1/2.

 

[Warpoet]

I am making reasonable assumptions. All evidence-based ideas require interpretation via a set of assumptions. Everything you have every said is based upon layers of assumptions, no matter how much evidence you think you have. The fact that you think knowledge is dividend into certain empirical fact and baseless speculation just means you have the epistemology of an 8 year old. You are making the assumption that most Americans had seen, accurately recalled, and were responding to the specific cartoons Hedbo published, and responding only to features unique to those cartoons that do not apply to religious critique more generally. If and only if every one of these assumptions are valid, would their responses reflect only their view of those specific cartoon. Based upon a great deal of data about American's ignorance of world events and literature, most of these are implausible assumptions, and nearly impossible that all of them are true.

What are you even blathering on about?

You're the one who started this thread using empirical evidence (the survey) to get on your soapbox about PC liberal intolerance. And when it's pointed out to you that your evidence doesn't support your rant, you start adding in more and more assumptions and expecting people to accept them at face value. That's not going to happen. It's your job to validate your own assumptions, because you're the one trying to prop up an argument not supported by your own evidence.

So are you going to get off your ass and actually start doing that? Or just follow the same modus operandi I noted in the other thread, which is to bloviate in a long-winded, verbose and self-important manner and not actually say anything?

I have misrepresented nothing. You are playing dishonest semantic games. "These cartoons" would only mean specific cartoons, if respondents were shown the specific cartoons during the survey. However, in the context of the actual question, "these cartoons" refers not nothing other than "cartoons depicting the Prophet Muhammad, which some people found offensive to their religious beliefs". That is the only thing they were told about the cartoons, and there is no reasonable basis to assume they knew anything about the cartoons beyond that.

No, the question specifically referenced the Charlie Hebdo attacks, and was only asked of people who had heard of the Charlie Hebdo attacks, and is thus clearly addressing the cartoons published by Charlie Hebdo, not all depictions of Muhammad. So stop bullshitting. How the respondents feel about depictions of Muhammad in general, or what perceptions they have of them, is not addressed.

They did not just say that. They said it is not okay for cartoons that offend believers to be published because religion should be respected. The "respect religion" comment was tied to suppressing speech that offends believers.

Except the survey says nothing about "suppression" of anyone's speech, which is why your entire case falls on its ass.

35% of the people who said it was "not okay to publish", gave this as their reason, and another 31% gave "Offensive/politically incorrect/not
appropriate" as their reason. Thus, 76% of them gave a general comment about offending/disrespecting the views of believers as their reason why it is not okay to publish something that offends them. Note, they counted the people who mention offending Muslims specifically, and only 3% mention this, contradicting your notion that these responses are isolated to these cartoons in particular, and supports my claim that it is about religious speech more broadly.

It doesn't do that at all, because that's not what the question is asking about. And the responses do not indicate that the respondents were talking about all speech that could offend believers, and certainly does not indicate that they think it ought to be censored.

Opposition to anyone publishing an idea (which is is what they are opposing) is censorship by any sane meaning of the term.

No. You're making shit up and redefining words to make the evidence fit your agenda.

http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/censor

censor
verb

: to examine books, movies, letters, etc., in order to remove things that are considered to be offensive, immoral, harmful to society, etc.

transitive verb
: to examine in order to suppress or delete anything considered objectionable <censor the news>; also : to suppress or delete as objectionable <censor out indecent passages>

http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/suppress

suppress
transitive verb

: to end or stop (something) by force

The data you have presented about a minority of Americans thinking the publication of the cartoons was "not okay" does not match any of these definitions.

Your case fails.

Thinking that it is not a good idea to criticize authoritarian worldviews that advocate inequality because it might offend the authoritarians, is extremely anti-liberty.

Hyperbole and bullshit. Nobody is taking about trampling anyone else's rights, and the data you've shown us doesn't say anything about that.

And as I said, it is entirely possible that people don't view the cartoons as helpful or productive and think publishing them is a bad idea. But of course, anyone who disagrees with you must be a freedom-hating zealot.

No, you are dishonestly denying the obvious implications of the survey that you'd gladly accept if conservatives came out looking more anti-liberty. I am a liberal, meaning I put liberty of thought and speech at the foundation of my politics. I am not attacking liberals in general. I am criticizing left-wing authoritarians and the danger they pose.

Your data says nothing about liberal authoritarianism. That is a boogeyman that exists in your mind, and that you are projecting onto the data.

And this nonsense about what I would or would not accept about conservatives is something you pulled out of your ass, like most of what you've posted.

Despite being a Democrat and a liberal, I am (unlike you) not blinded by a faith that the right-wingers are always more wrong on every issue.

Seriously, what the fuck are you talking about?

Islam itself is hateful, authoritarian, homophobic, anti-semitic, racist, and sexist propaganda (no more so than Christianity, but that is still a lot).

And yet, by your asinine logic, anyone who describes the dissemination of such ideas as "not okay" must be an authoritarian and enemy of liberty and free speech.

In the specific context of jounalists getting murdered for publishing, saying it is "not okay" to publish such things is not ambiguous. It reveals a clear lack of support for free speech. To say that it is "okay" it the most minimal amount of allowance one could grant. To say it is not okay is to say that it fails to meet the most minimal level of what people should be allowed to do without coercive restrictions.

None of this is supported by the data. It is entirely possible that the respondents simply oppose the cartoons while supporting free speech, even if you can't get that concept through your skull.

No, I am engaging reasonable interpretation, while you are inventing absurd excuses to protect your faith that no Democrats ever take the wrong position on an issue. Your interpretations include more assumptions than mine, and those assumptions are ignorant of almost every relevant fact about Americans and human psychology in general.

No, not really. I'm comparing your bombastic claims in the OP to what your evidence actually says. And if you think anyone bothering to read this is going to believe that I'm the one making unreasonable assumptions about the respondents because the data doesn't support my agenda, you'll probably be disappointed.

Did you fail math, as well as science, and logic? 28% is over 1-fourth and closer to 1-third than `1-fifth.

No, I just read the source that you came here with, ranting on your soapbox like a jackass. The 28% is not 28% of all Americans, just those who had actually heard of the attacks. So, the overall number is closer to 20 percent, like I just said.

But by all means, keep tossing out every demeaning, insulting and condescending remark you can conjure up. It just makes you look even more ridiculous, since you're the one who came roaring in here with a blatant agenda, didn't read your own fucking source to begin with, continue to distort the actual findings to suit said agenda, and then prattle on incessantly about how you're the one interpreting the data rationally even though nobody seems to agree with you.

 

[Togo]

No, not really. I'm comparing your bombastic claims in the OP to what your evidence actually says. And if you think anyone bothering to read this is going to believe that I'm the one making unreasonable assumptions about the respondents because the data doesn't support my agenda, you'll probably be disappointed.

He will, yes. It seems clear that the data does not support Ron's conclusions, because he's conflating disapproval of cartoons insulting Islam, with a desire to ban such cartoons.