instruction:
Your task is to extract the thesis of an opinionated news article by selecting some of its text segments. The thesis is a summarization of what the author wants to persuade the reader of. Your answer should consist of segments of the given text. Note that you are not allowed to combine different sentences.
question:
A bully in Harvard Yard: What professor's $4 food fight tells us. If you think bullies are teenagers lurking on schoolyard playgrounds , think again . At least one is a grown-up walking the hallowed halls of Harvard University . His name is Ben Edelman . He not only teaches there , but he earned several diplomas including a law degree at that storied institution of higher education . But Edelman seems to have adopted the word "higher" as his personal calling card . You see , he's higher than you and me . Or at least he seems anxious to let you know it . A hardworking Chinese immigrant family found that out when the professor ordered a takeout meal of shredded chicken with spicy garlic sauce and three other dishes . Edelman thought he was overcharged by $ 4 bucks ($ 1 dollar more for each dish) , so he launched a relentless war on Ran Duan , who works with his parents at their restaurant, Sichuan Garden in Brookline . You can read the sordid details in a story at Boston.com where the website also published the unbelievable litany of Edelman's intimidating and condescending emails to Duan . The prof's remarks ooze with arrogance and conceit . Edelman's exchange with Duan has become a viral sensation , as it should . A Harvard professor vowing legal action over the sum of $ 4 dollars . Come on . The professor has now apologized for his treatment of Duan and his family , but his emails will leave you shaking your head in disbelief that someone so supposedly "learned" could be so seemingly insufferable . Maybe that's what a Harvard education gets you these days -a degree in imperiousness . Arrogance aside, the professor's persistent threats of legal action constitute a shameful campaign of bullying . He uses his knowledge of the law --at least his tortured interpretation of it-- for a purpose that can only be described as abusive . It turns out , he has done this before to a different restaurant . Bullies tend to target the weak and vulnerable . For Edelman to use his advantage as a lawyer to berate the Duan family who have come from nothing as immigrants and are trying their best to make a living running a restaurant is, in a word, unconscionable . During one email exchange, Duan asked the professor,"you seem like a smart man... don't you have better things to do?" Bullies usually don't . For all I know, Edelman is a pretty good professor . That does not make him a good person . Clinical psychiatrists might find him to be an interesting case study in how living in the Harvard bubble can distort even the most agile of minds . Sometimes intellectuals take themselves too seriously . Sequestered from the experiences of the average man, they can lack common sense, kindness and decency . Edelman seems bereft of them all . There is a reason why places like Harvard are called"ivory towers" . All too often, they envelop an artificial atmosphere where intellectuals are disconnected from the practical concerns of everyday life . So, it should be no surprise when guys like Ben Edelman explode like a bomb on some poor immigrant family trying to make a buck with the sweat of their brow . Fortunately, academic elitism is not contagious . Teaching at Harvard may be a lofty achievement in the egg-head world . But professor Edelman seems to lack the one quality which elevates people above all other primates: compassion . He might gain a measure of humility and understanding by getting a real job . Might I suggest washing dishes in a Chinese restaurant? The next time I visit the Boston area, I'll skip Harvard Yard . Instead ,  I plan to drop by the Sichuan Garden to try their sauteed prawns with roasted chili and peanut sauce . And I won't check the bill .
answer:
At least one is a grown-up walking the hallowed halls of Harvard University


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Pope Francis, Salman Rushdie and Charlie Hebdo. There is some common ground, but not much . The killings in Paris last week were horrifying crimes that expose the vulnerability of democratic societies to lethal vigilante violence, whether facilitated from outside or as a spontaneous expression of homegrown psychopathic alienation . Beyond this morbid reality associated with the murder of the Charlie Hebdo cartoonists, police officers, and the supermarket hostages, there is nothing but darkness , and in that darkness some additional monsters lurk . We can be thankful once more for the moral clarity of Pope Francis who in the impromptu setting of a plane taking him from Sri Lanka to Manila shined some light on the darkness . Unlike those who so ardently wielded the slogan "Je Suis Charlie", the pope understood that free speech without limits is an invitation to indulge the worst negative impulses that will then operate as viruses destroying the vital organs of the body politic . What Pope Francis underscored was the impossibility of reconciling dignity with hurtful insults . He illustrated his view by saying that if his companion on the plane, Dr Alberto Gazparri, a Vatican official, were to insult Francis' mother, he could expect to be punched . He called such behaviour normal:"It's normal. It's normal. You cannot provoke. You cannot insult the faith of others." Perhaps, this is too strong an expression of limits , but it does indirectly raise the Derrida urgent question of learning to "live together" in peace and with respect within globalising social space . Response to provocation . Francis goes on to say that to kill in response to provocation, however severe, is not compatible with religion properly understood . It is behaviour of "deviant forms of religion" . He goes on to say"To kill in the name of God is an aberration" . At the same time , how lines are drawn with respect to acceptable and unacceptable forms of provocation is highly political and culturally influenced . In one respect, France and other governments understand both sides of this argument, but twist it for political purposes . The popular comedian Dieudonne is being currently prosecuted in France for"defending terrorism" because his humour deeply offends Jews, Zionists, and Israel . There are no less than 54 cases in the country associated with "condoning terrorism" . The Associated Press reports that just now "France ordered prosecutors around the country to crack down on hate speech, anti-Semitism, and glorifying terrorism" . But note no message by the French government is sent mentioning "hate cartooning" or addressing the surge of "Islamophobia" in the country in the days following the January 7 attack on the Charlie Hebdo editorial offices . A large number of mosques in France and elsewhere in Europe have been desecrated in the last week . This kind of double standards performs a variety of insidious functions for the French state . It uses the language of "terrorism" to demonise its political enemies and "free speech" to immunise its political friends . It merges the criminalisation of anti-Semitism with strong criticisms of Israel along with any advocacy of boycott, divestment, and sanctions (BDS) . And it makes it even clearer to Muslims that they are fair game for Islamophobes and xenophobes . In effect, a French political community is being upheld that seeks to include Jews as valued and protected members while reinforcing the Muslim understanding that their residences and social standing can be fully understood by reference to the no-go banilieus of the country . Salman Rushdie's ordeals . In the wake of these events, there is a new sympathetic look back at the ordeals of Salman Rushdie endured after the publication of his satirical novel "The Satanic Verses" in 1988 . Rushdie, appearing as a guest on Bill Maher's talk show and delivering a lecture at the University of Vermont, understandably defended freedom of expression as an absolute right . His words, deeply felt, are worth heeding as the counterpoint to the views expressed by Pope Francis : "And so artists who ... push outwards often find very powerful forces pushing back . They find the forces of silence opposing the forces of speech . The forces of censorship against the forces of utterance ... At that boundary is that push-and-pull between more and less . And that push and pull can be very dangerous to the artist . And many artists have suffered terribly for that." The context of Rushdie's recent remarks was the Charlie Hebdo incident , but his outlook was intended to be sweeping in its generality . And yet he did not, nor did Bill Maher, pause to take note of those powerful forces in the West that have tried to shut down critics of Israel by shouting "anti-Semite" at the top of their lungs . Without some degree of consistency it is difficult to consider clearly the societal choice at stake . What makes this confrontation so difficult to resolve is that it engages two truths, not one . The beginning of ethical credibility is to insist upon consistency . Either Rushdie and France have to abide by the unsavoury views of Dieudonne as well as those of Charlie Hebdo or it should suppress them both . If it allows both then it is opting for the Rushdie view that members of a modern society must learn to live with the extremes of cultural freedom even if hurtful . If it allows neither then it is choosing to protect the sensibilities of minorities and others whose dignity is under attack . Of course ,  there are many compromises that can be made to ensure maximum freedom of expression while acknowledging certain limits . The US Supreme Court long ago decided that free speech does entitle someone to yell "fire" in a crowded theatre . This is what courts are for , to draw these lines in specific cases, balancing opposing truths in the light of practicality and the evolving values of the community . What a judicial body had to say about race or homosexuality a century ago is different than what it says today . And as we in the US know too well , the prevailing ideology among the justices is often of greater importance to determining how such lines are drawn than are the legislative or constitutional enactments being interpreted . In some respects, then, such determinations are more part of the problem than of the solution . Abstract sentiments . I find myself siding with the abstract sentiments of Pope Francis, but with Rushdie's view of minimising the role of law and the state . In this respect , if we impose limits by way of government we are entering the domain of censorship . At the same time ,  we need to protect individuals and groups against malicious forms of defamation and hateful attacks on identities without confusing such protection with efforts to channel public awareness in certain prescribed directions . My own experience suggests that "freedom" of this sort has been used by some pro-Zionist and pro-Israeli organisations to discredit and deter and criticism of Israel, and especially of Israeli state crimes victimising the Palestinian people . In Rushdie's case we need to protect his right to publish "The Satanic Verses", while condemning the fatwa imposing a death sentence for blasphemy and apostasy, yet upholding the right of non-western political communities to prohibit distribution of such a book because of its provocative nature in certain civilisational settings . Obviously, there are no cookie cutter answers . The proper limits are a matter of history, ethics, cultural priorities, and circumstances . I feel that the central question is raised by Derrida's inquiry into how we can learn to live together . For me, living together, given the originality of our historical moment, involves the construction of overlapping political communities of destiny - from family to world, with a major focus on the national political community combined with a greater effort to establish a global political community so that challenges posed by climate change, nuclear weaponry, infectious disease, and world poverty can be addressed more effectively and humanely .
answer:
For me, living together, given the originality of our historical moment, involves the construction of overlapping political communities of destiny - from family to world, with a major focus on the national political community combined with a greater effort to establish a global political community so that challenges posed by climate change, nuclear weaponry, infectious disease, and world poverty can be addressed more effectively and humanely


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Connecticut Supreme Court saves teen's life. The Justices of the Connecticut Supreme Court took over parenting duties of a cancer-stricken teenager Thursday . In so doing, they surely saved her life . At the conclusion of oral arguments, the high court took just minutes to determined that state officials were right to take custody of the girl known in court documents only as "Cassandra C " and force her to undergo life-saving treatment . No thanks to her mother . Jackie Fortin had encouraged her 17-year-old daughter's desire to refuse chemotherapy . She naively pronounced,"my daughter is not going to die." As if wishing it could make it come true . Sadly, both mother and daughter were wrong . They were in denial . If they got their way , Cassandra would die . It was the equivalent of suicide . I wonder how her mother would feel then? Cassandra has advanced Hodgkin's lymphoma which attacks and consumes the body's immune system . Her doctors say chemotherapy treatment will give her an 85 percent chance of survival . Excellent odds . Yet, the teenager refused, saying she did not want to "poison" her body with chemo . How does that make sense to a rational mind? Let's employ Cassandra's own tortured terminology and logic . Does she not realize that her body is already being poisoned by the rapidly multiplying cancer in her lymph system? Untreated , it will quickly spread until it kills her . That is what her doctors predict . Reliable statistics from the National Cancer Institute prove they are right . Chemotherapy can save her . Chemicals are introduced into the diseased body to attack the cancer cells . You can call it a "poison" if you want , but a more accurate term is curative . Yes, the chemicals also harm other normal cells . To that extent they are a poison, of sorts, producing painful and unpleasant side effects . But once the body recovers and is free of the cancer cells, the chemicals are gone . Thus , if chemo is a poison , it is not normally a lethal one . The cancer which is ravaging Cassandra's body surely is . If , by using the term "poison," Cassandra means she does not want to endure the side effects of nausea, vomiting, hair loss and exhaustion cond , she is being myopic . The final stages of untreated lymphoma are far more extreme and painful . Cassandra's disdain for the treatment that will likely save her young life is, perhaps, the best evidence that she was not mature enough to make a wise and informed decision on her own . But then again, neither was her mother . Which is why the state of Connecticut stepped in . As an adult, Fortin, is presumed to be competent under the law to make decisions for her daughter, a minor . However ,  Fortin's aberrant judgment in rejecting the treatment that could save Cassandra's life and her concomitant belief that her daughter would somehow, miraculously, not succumb to an insidious, fatal illness... called that legal presumption into serious doubt . There is also evidence that Fortin ignored obvious signs of her daughter's malignant disease at an early stage, failed to seek prompt and continuing medical attention, and has been unduly influencing Cassandra's negative reaction to treatment . The court records suggest a domineering mother with an abiding distrust of medicine, and a daughter fearful of running afoul of her mother's wishes . To deny a child beneficial, life-sustaining treatment constitutes child neglect . States have a duty to protect children from abuse and neglect . Courts rarely hesitate to step in where a child's life is in danger . Thus , the state was correct to intervene and the lower court was equally correct to remove the mother as unfit . Fortunately, the Connecticut Supreme Court agreed and did the right thing . Time is on Cassandra's side . The fact that she is 9 months away from turning 18 years old may, in the end, have saved her life . It gave the high court an excuse to adhere strictly to the law as it relates to protecting minors . Those 9 months will also give doctors valuable time to complete her therapy and give her a new chance at a full and happy life . As for her mother, Jackie Fortin? She will have ample time to wrestle with her conscience .
answer:

The Justices of the Connecticut Supreme Court took over parenting duties of a cancer-stricken teenager Thursday In so doing, they surely saved her life