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Friday, May 6, 2005 - 12:37amSanction this postReply
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A sizzler, Tibor ... & horrifying in what it reveals. Thank you for fighting the battle so bravely, my valiant friend.

Linz

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Post 1

Friday, May 6, 2005 - 10:50amSanction this postReply
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Hello Dr. Machan,

They don't simply suggest such policies but demand them, as if they were entitled to have their will imposed on the dissidents.  (emphasis added)

There it is. We live in the age of entitlement. This reminds me a great deal of the implications outlined in Ayn Rand's article "Global Balkanization" (The Voice of Reason.) Everyone is out to get what they can from the government and anyone else based on membership in a group, rather than effort. Anyone who dares speak out against such crap, as you have done, is quickly categorised as the worst sort of bigot in the world. The hypocrisy if the whole thing is amazing. I wish you the best in your situation and hope that the University has the balls to stick up for your freedom of speech.

Regards,

Ethan


 


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Post 2

Friday, May 6, 2005 - 12:40pmSanction this postReply
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What is ironic about the disabilities act is that the very fact of reality, disabled people are largely dependant on others for their very survival, is the reason why people have charitable feelings for them in the first place. Giving disabled people "rights" to the productivity of others erases those feelings. In fact those charitable feelings are replaced with resentment and anger. Another liberal social engineering misfire that hopefully will be corrected soon.

Best wishes to you Dr. Machan.

Post 3

Friday, May 6, 2005 - 1:36pmSanction this postReply
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Your story is sobering and disturbing. I'm happy that the attempt to muzzle and punish you failed. Thank you for your writing.

I once showed a property as a broker to a prospect who was raising money for some "socially responsible" local cause.  She asked, not tactfully, as we were driving to see this property that I donate to her pet cause. When I refused, not tactfully, she became sullen.  The next day she contacted the seller with a fabrication about my shoddy business practices.

More recently, a bumper sticker on my SUV "Global Warming? Show me the Science!" offended some granola-enviro who affixed to the side of my vehicle a sticker that proclaimed: "Ask Me What I Do to Insure A Cleaner Environment".

These days one's right to free speech becomes questionable the moment it criticizes a left-wing cause.


Post 4

Friday, May 6, 2005 - 2:57pmSanction this postReply
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Tibor, I became outraged when I read this.  Thank you for opening the shade on this horrific attempt at intimidation, and good for your University administration for not succumbing to it.

I am amazed that such forms of harrassment are permitted to continue.  It reminds me of the restaurant owners who are threatened to remove foie gras from their menus or face a horde of protesters shrieking at their customers on their way to dine.

This madness has got to end.


Post 5

Friday, May 6, 2005 - 5:08pmSanction this postReply
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"It'll only end when you start shooting the fuckers!!!!!! KILL THE MADS!!!!!"
[Now, now, Clyde - temper, temper - back to the cell..... folk might think you got the right idea here.....  they're not mad dogs, even if they are mads]
"You sure?"


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Post 6

Friday, May 6, 2005 - 7:34pmSanction this postReply
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Tibor,

You have my admiration for standing up to the twerps. So does your university. That said, it remains a fact that if one stands up to coercion from the Left, then - as your story demonstrates - the practical consequences end right there, even on a university campus, where the Left is still more influential than anywhere else. But to think that the same is true anywhere else is to be caught in a long-term time warp. How true is it - outside the rarified environment of a university campus - that things are as you write below?
Today, thinking it's the Right that's a threat to civil liberties is clearly wrong, what with political correctness guiding universities and other institutions in their hiring and promotion policies.
When was the last time that an American radio or television broadcast was censored from the Left? Is it within living memory? Yet hundreds of fines have been levied by the FCC for speech that the Right considers "indecent." Is there a single broadcaster on the Right whom censorship from the Left has driven off the air, as Howard Stern was censored off the air by the Right? If you count the total number of Americans in prison today for "hate" and other "crimes" that would not be illegal except for legislation from the Left, you come up with a big fat ZERO. On the other hand, the number of Americans in prison for drugs and other "offenses" criminalized from the "Right" is somewhere in the HUNDREDS OF THOUSANDS.

Outside the Ivory Walls, Tibor, there is a world in which people's lives are censored, not by bile in nasty letters but by force. Let's keep a sense of proportion.
(Edited by Adam Reed
on 5/06, 7:57pm)


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Post 7

Saturday, May 7, 2005 - 3:53pmSanction this postReply
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I can’t think of a greater threat to free speech today than the atmosphere in our universities. Most young people today will go on to college. The four years spent in these institutions will have a significant influence on them during their most formidable years. Thus, the fight for intellectual freedom and freedom of speech is more important than many political fights (although don’t forget most colleges are funded by the gov’t in part if not completely).

 

We mustn’t trivialize the repressive atmosphere in colleges as something apart from the so-called real world. Would we trivialize the church’s treatment of Galileo because most people didn’t find themselves as persecuted advocates of new science?

 

Tibor, if there’s anything we can do, don’t hesitate to ask.


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Post 8

Thursday, May 12, 2005 - 8:45pmSanction this postReply
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Tibor,

   Your discussion on the disabilities act and its proponents is right on and I couldn't have said it better myself.

   I find that those who oppose ANY critical discussion of the ADA to be vicious. They are control freaks who do not want to lose their petty control positions (such as the lawyers and psychologists and social workers who make their living... off the BACKS THEY BREAK... due to the Americans with Disabilities Act), or their income, and just because you have valid arguments against the ADA, they choose to attack you personally for one reason - they cannot attack your position. You have truth on your side and the left hates the truth in any form.

   Truly handicapped people are morally and financially far worse off now that the ADA has become so rampant. And normal people are the ones secretly harmed - by the draconian laws and money they are out for every single service and item they buy due to the requirements that the ADA imposes on every business in Amerika (sic).

   My Disabling America book was completely unwelcome by the legal profession and it's a thorn in their side. They would love to silence me. I pray that I don't end up in a coma in Florida, they will murder me just like Terri Shiavo whose only crime for her capital punishment was that she was disabled. Yet - if the wheelchair parking spaces in that hospice were one inch too narrow, they would have shut that place down.

   See, life and death really isn't important to these people - just the rules that they impose. They worship rules.

   Tibor, I urge you NEVER to back down, the ADA is evil and should be abolished immediately.

Sincerely,

Greg Perry, born with a grand total of 3 deformed fingers and one leg


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