From: cmk@athena.mit.edu (Charles M Kozierok)
Subject: Re: Anti-Nazi Rally
Organization: Massachusetts Institute of Technology
Date: Sun, 24 Jan 1993 16:20:28 GMT

In article <1993Jan24.045308.23714@julian.uwo.ca> larocqu@gaul.csd.uwo.ca (JOHN LAROCQUE) writes:
>In article <1993Jan23.225015.25940@athena.mit.edu> cmk@athena.mit.edu (Charles M Kozierok) writes:
>>your implication is that this group is somehow being persecuted or something.
>>do you have information on the matter? if so, would you please
>>share it with the rest of the class?
>
>No. My impliciation is that neo-nazis LIKE being a persecuted class. Really.
>The one thing they fear is an open society. When we specifically legislate
>against their ilk we are LEGITIMIZING their contention that
>society is against them (true but....) and that they are being persecuted.
>In a certain sense WE are turning the tables. Instead of them persecuting
>us (and minorities etc), they contend we are persecuting them, and that
>promotes their cause as martyrs instead of relegating them to the fringe
>which is where they will dry up and blow away.

well, *pro*secution is not the same as *per*secution. i agree that the
turning of tables is a problem. but i was simply trying to find out
what they did. and if you know no more about it than i, then "parking
tickets" is not a reasonable assumption.

>>then don't go. but i can't possibly see anything wrong with those
>>who value peace and freedom expressing such to whomever will listen.
>
>People who believe in freedom don't need to cower behind laws to
>spread their message, which is what many of our laws do pertaining
>to hate literature, treason, drug infomation etc. How often do you
>see these people saying "If only there were a law against them...",
>spoken just like a National Socialist. First they went after the
>Neo Nazis, then they went after the pornographers, then they went
>after the prostitutes and the drug dealers and the drug users. Then
>they went after those with "wrong values" and all those who didn't 
>fit their mold. And I stood by. And then they went after me.
>An open society permits people to be themselves, no matter how 
>repulsive they may be.

i don't disagree. but even then there is a difference between hate
literature and the rest of your "persecuted classes": the former
encourage violence against others; the latter do not (for the most
part). and demonstration is not persecution.

>>spoken like a true ostrich. scary how even Hitler couldn't change
>>this idiotic sentiment.

[deleting your phrase which prompted my comment makes both my reaction
 and your follow-up rather difficult to understand. for the
 record, it was: "leave them alone. they will disappear"]

>Hitler was a LEADER which people wanted (or were forced) to follow,
>with ONE IDEA to impose in the PEOPLE. And ethnic hatred was just
>one of many ideas in their bag. Don't forget the many legitimate
>grievances of which Hitler was the only one to address (re Versailles
>treaty). He was a "man of the people", just like all the phony populists
>today (Ross Perot or Preston Manning).

*this* is an argument in favor of "leave them alone, they will disappear"?
the Germans "left them alone". did they disappear?

>It was Arthur C Clarke who said that the 
>philosophy of mass obedience leads to Auschwitz. We are either sheep
>to be led to the slaughter at the whim of a leader or philosophy,
>or we are free men and women. There is NO in between and NO compromise.

right. and what better way to show that one is not a sheep than
by protesting openly against those who would be shepherds?
you want to "drive nails" into them, but others shouldn't peacefully march?

>>this happened recently in the states, where a KKK rally was outnumbered
>>100-to-1. the grand dragon was shouted down by 5,000 anti-KKK protestors.
>>the news story ended up being more about the huge turn-out of the counter-
>>rally than about the rally itself. damn effective, i'd say.
>
>And I will say this. Shouting them down will not shut them up. Let them
>be forced out into the open so we can see their faces and their placards
>and their slogans. Let us know them and laugh at them, instead of forcing
>them back underground where we are more likely to fear them in the future.

you are wrong. *nothing* will shut them up. and it is *much* easier to
laugh at them as crackpots when it is clear that they are by far the
minority. you ignore the effects of having these people appear unchecked
on the national media. i made that point in my previous post, which you
deleted.

>A good example of this is some City Hall who set up a Jewish religious 
>symbol in the public square. The KKK asked for and got a cross set up
>in the square, thanks to the court system. What happened... people tore
>down the cross and they kept putting back new crosses. What can , for example,
>an honest Christian conclude when they see that the only people willing
>to hoist a cross is the KKK and that the people who oppose the cross also
>oppose the KKK. Some people will (falsely) conclude that it is the KKK
>which is being unjustifiably persecuted and that the KKK stands up for
>Christian values (which they do not), just because of that incident.

this is bull. i am not familiar with this case, but if i saw that
happening, i would conclude that real Christians did not want their
symbol to represent the KKK. having it stay unprotested sends exactly
the same message you don't like: that the KKK represents Christian values.
at least this way people know that there are many who disagree.
isn't knowledge worth *something*?

>>i might be incorrect, but i can't seem to remember even one reasonable
>>thing ever coming from this account. i see lots of attacks, vitriol
>>and bitterness, and little which balances it. so are you just angry
>>with the whole world?
>
>Gee. That's a nice thing to say. I remember really violent debates with
>you and several of your friends here about objectivism. I suppose they were
>perfectly reasonable and that justified having 90% of this purely
>theoretical discourse being dumped in can.politics. Yeah, that's 
>reasonable. Yeah that's OK. But when I post once or twice, that's
>perfectly UNREASONABLE. How "objective" of you. (Randroid!)

well, i was just trying to draw you out -- sorry if i was insulting.
i *do* post about a lot of other subjects, and most of them are
not angry. i couldn't remember this balance on your part.
and i have made my *positions* clear, not just my anger.

this post of yours has gone a long way to at least letting me and
others understand what you are about, unlike the sniping which communicates
very little. and with that .sig of yours, you should have expected
someone to call you on one of your posts eventually.

>>what is this "marshall law" and why do you want it?
>[interesting comic book descriptions deleted]
>
>Makes you think about grade school all over again. How many assemblies
>were wasted on government propaganda or causes? They bring in the police
>to tell us about law and order or drugs. Or they would show us a film about the
>evils of South Africa or the benefits of Third World Aid. Or the
>1982 Patriation where we were supposed to glory now that the constituion
>came home. That's called brainwashing.

agreed. so should we just "leave it alone. it will go away?"

>Or all the Remembrance Day 
>ceremonies where the Elders would come up to you and claim that
>ALL of Canada's war dead gave you the freedom you have today. What
>an atrocious claim. Especially after the so-called Gulf war showed
>our real intentions. Hey, the enemy is still around. Nice job guys.
>Turns out our war dead wasted eachother with FRIENDLY FIRE. Real
>heroes. Or all the ex-Nazis we used to fight communism or send
>people into space. Nice job guys. Real Heroes. Or the generals who
>sent our troops into Dieppe knowing they would die. Real Heroes. Or
>Bomber Harris bombing civilian targes (a la Dresden) instead of 
>military targets (the Rheinland). Real Heroes. People who wage wars
>are WAR CRIMINALS not WAR HEROES. And the soldiers
>are just pawns in their deadly game. 

confusing the pawns with the generals is unfair.
the soldiers did their best, and *did* give their lives so we
could be free. they did not choose their fate.
and we did not start WWII. remember?

your analysis is too simplistic.

>Every remembrance day I remember the hundreds of thousands of young
>men who were sent to die in the trenches to die - for nothing. No,
>war is not for heroes. Only for fools forced to fight for causes that
>were never ours to begin with. And the only people who benefit are
>those who sent us into battle. Remeber the crippled soldier brought
>home from Vietnam - spat upon by the citizens, forgotton by the
>generals and ignored by the politicians. Be all you that can be.

different wars have different meanings. some are just; some are not;
some, it is hard to tell. to lump them all together and say that
they are all wrong is to say that liberty means nothing.

>>and why do you want to drive nails into messiahs?
>
>Why not? Who led the people like sheep to the slaughter? The martyrs,
>the saviours, the leaders of history. The problem with people is they
>will nominate someone else to solve their problems instead of getting
>down to work on it by themselves. They FEAR the consequences of true
>liberty. Thus the need for politicians and laws. And any Hitler-wannabe
>who stands up and says - "Look, I can help" deserves to be taken down
>from his soap box and safely dealt with so he never does that again.

why should we take him down from his soap-box?
won't that just be giving him "attention he doesn't deserve"?
shouldn't we just "leave him alone. he will disappear"?
and aren't you being a "Neo Nazi" by "persecuting" this person?

you object to rallies, but you appear to have no problem with persecution.
you claim to respect freedom, but you would "drive nails" into someone
purely for speaking his mind.
maybe your positions aren't as clear on the matter as you thought, eh?

P.S. you sound like you have more objectivist in your blood than you might
care to admit.

--
charles