From: sethb@fid.morgan.com (Seth Breidbart)
Subject: Re: Question for Charles Perez and Ted Frank
Organization: my opinions only
Date: Tue, 1 Sep 1992 04:04:13 GMT

In article <1992Aug31.145731.5839@Princeton.EDU>
egnilges@phoenix.Princeton.EDU (Ed Nilges) writes:
>In article <1992Aug29.185035.9624@fid.morgan.com> sethb@fid.morgan.com (Seth Breidbart) writes:
>>In article <1992Aug29.180929.27116@Princeton.EDU>
>>egnilges@phoenix.Princeton.EDU (Ed Nilges) writes:

>>Furthermore, in what way is knowledge of turn-of-the-century comedians
>>racist?  The fact that those comedians were of specific races?  The
>>knowledge of those races?  Is a similar knowledge of, say, turn-of-
>>the-century politicians equally racist?
>
>Thanks for this word game: it is a display of your historical illiteracy.
>It is also racist because much vaudeville at the turn of the century 
       ^^^^

You never gave the first reason.  Do you have trouble counting up to one?

>poked fun at immigrants.  You don't need to memorize its content 
>to know this; would you force African-American Studies students to 
>watch Amos 'n Andy?

I see. So knowing about racism makes you racist.  Well, Ed, you claim
to be an expert on racism (at least enough to tell everyone else here
that they're wrong about it); what does that make you?

>Each one of these facts is more important that the Tedster's trivia, and
>by your logic if you don't get one hundred percent on my pop quiz
>(answers at the end of this post) you are disqualified from posting on
>this thread.

No, my logic (and I've studied formal logic, and know something about
it; you clearly don't, or at least I've never seen you use any) says
that if you don't know whether a specific statement is true, you
shouldn't post that statement.  It doesn't matter whether you know
about all possible other statements on a topic, only about the one you
post.

>>evidence or reasoning to support it.
>
>I'm certain that not enough evidence exists to convince bozos like you,
>Ted Frank, Charles Perez, Jackanapes Schaffer or Knucklehead Morton.

Any would be a better start than you've made before.

>Of course, I was met by the usual shitstorm, to which I have become
>accustomed from many years of experience with boysnet.  Typical of the
>shitstorm was the display of the low priority freedom of speech really
>has in the minds of its friends, for those who defend the behavior of
>Viktora as "speech" are quick to try to silence real, written speech
>when it departs from the basket of mindless (and subtly racist)
>"libertarianism" that predominates on the net.

Do you have any examples of people trying to silence real, written
speech?  Arguing against something isn't silencing it.  I wouldn't try
to silence you; I couldn't create a strawman that good if I tried.

>  Also typical was the
>attempt to make all forms of speech equivalent,

Nobody said that all forms of speech are equivalent, just that they
are all equally entitled to protection.

>This shows clearly that these fearless defenders of freedom of speech
>know very little about speech and dialogue, indeed that they confuse it
>with a physical confrontation.  That is, these bozos operate on a sort
>of "point system", derived probably from sports, such that ANY
>rhetorical point (such as "aha, you don't own the tape of Ghallegher and
>Shabeen!  gotcha!")

No, the rhetorical point was that you post about things you know
nothing about, making up "facts" in order to further your arguments.
By destroying your credibility, that lowers the value of anything else
you might say.

>Such weighting as exists only derives from the point-maker having some
>sort of power over the weighter, such that statements made by those with
>authority are the only ones weighted.

I choose to weight points according to their inherent logic and
validity, and according to the credibility of their maker.  Nobody on
USENET (at least, nobody in this discussion) has any authority over
me, so that argument is worthless.

>  But it is clear to me that you want NEITHER a
>physical nor an intellectual confrontation, only to vent deep
>frustration and a sense of impotence.

Squeak for yourself.  I'd like an intellectual confrontation, but I
refuse to have a battle of wits with an unarmed man.

>  As such, I recommend a men's
>group or an Outward Bound expedition as a way of garnering some
>self-respect and some compassion for people like Sherheryar.

I have plenty of self-respect (some would say, arrogance), and I have
as little compassion for racists as you do.  Of course, I recognize
that people of any race can be bigoted.

>  All of
>these variously-named threads are closed as far as I am concerned.  I
>will, however, reply to electronic mail.

Why should we believe you this time?

Seth		sethb@fid.morgan.com
Newsgroups: misc.legal,alt.censorship