In the debate between Chris Seaton and Mario Machado on the question of political correctness versus progress, there is a tacit tension that goes unmentioned. Well, until now, anyway.  Contrary to the assumptions of the unduly passionate, not everyone who rejects the accouterments of an ideology is in disagreement with certain of its goals or even methods.

As Mario argues, the imposition of authoritarian language and tone demands is not merely phony pretense, but dangerous in the ways Orwell warned us about long ago. But as Chris argues, greater civility would go a long way toward getting along. Continue reading →

Ed. Note: After two prominent intellectuals, a New York Times reporter and an award winning British media personality failed to debate the question ,“Be it Resolved: What You Call Political Correctness, I Call Progress,” former Fault Lines contributors Chris Seaton and Mario Machado attempted to succeed where four others failed. Bellow Chris’ argument.

Those who know me or read me work realize I’m no fan of political correctness. I abhor the idea of “trigger warnings” in academic syllabi. The notion that my children will be taught growing up there’s more than two genders is absurd to me. And I find it ridiculously infantile that at the start of each semester, college professors must ask students, “What is your preferred set of pronouns?”

Despite all this, today I write in defense of political correctness because it has brought us some degree of meaningful change, despite what the Perry Van Ness* polo-shirt-wearing crowd might think.

Political correctness leveled the playing field for the better when it came to groups like women, people of color and LGBTQIAAP2** individuals. It means that as much as we hate to admit it, men know it’s not okay to call a female colleague in the workplace “sugar tits” in passing. Heterosexual men and women march in the streets during Pride celebrations with people who love differently than them. Continue reading →

Ed. Note: After two prominent intellectuals, a New York Times reporter and an award winning British media personality failed to debate the question ,“Be it Resolved: What You Call Political Correctness, I Call Progress,” former Fault Lines contributors Mario Machado and Chris Seaton attempted to succeed where four others failed. Bellow Mario’s argument.

If liberty means anything at all, it means the right to tell people what they do not want to hear. 

–George Orwell, Animal Farm (Original Preface)

Let’s begin with stating the obvious: for some many of my fellow primates, there are some words that are just too much to bear. These words need to be diluted so that the chance of someone being hurt or “offended” becomes impossible.

Yes, these folks are fine with words either being banned outright or replaced with more antiseptic ones, at the expense of reason and the English language.  For those who have respect for language (especially those who make a living off of it, along with the First Amendment), and who don’t require they be treated like backward children, that state of affairs is something that must be addressed and corrected.  The stakes are high, amigos.

Those on the other side, who with a straight hysterical face will tell you that “words are violence,” will claim that no measure is too stiff, no punishment too severe so long as no feelings are hurt and everyone’s sensitivities remain one-hundred-percent intact.  Notice how another cherished concept of civilization – a sense of nuance and proportion – has now been thrown overboard as a result of this “movement”?

It’s not so bad that Hollywood, in part because of Trump Derangement Syndrome, has become a beacon for bullying gangs that will excoriate anyone that goes off the politically-correct script (no pun). Make one remark off-the-cuff that may offend one member of the tribe for one second, and it is off-with-your-fucking-head, amigos.  No matter how perfect or swift the contrition by the offender, their careers will go up in smoke.

Speaking of Trump, a lot of this censoring is done in the name of “things have never been so nasty, so uncivil.” Really? During the 1800 presidential campaign, John Adams referred to that fellow from Monticello, another founding father, as “a mean-spirited, low-lived fellow, the son of a half-breed Indian squaw, sired by a Virginia mulatto father.” In 1828, Andrew Jackson’s opponent called him a murderer, an adulterer, and a pimp.  So the current political climate of naughty words does not justify these cries for civility.

Raising the sights a bit, let’s talk about academia.  A majority of students think that words are violence. One would think that a basic academic (pardon the expression) explanation would put such a foolish position to rest: “Junior, violence is blunt force that can cause physical injury. By definition, words can’t do that.” But you may get called a white supremacist or a Nazi before Junior’s rusted brain wheels start spinning.

But it gets worse, much, much worse.  The professors and the administrators – yes! those who are supposed to be in charge – have become the proverbial hostages to the students. They’re terrified of putting these brats in place, lest they be reported and lose their jobs. This is in part because they know their spineless colleagues will not come to their defense.

So what are we left with at these universities? Trigger warnings, cry-ins, de-platforming of speakers, riots. The last two usually occur when the really bad speakers come to town.  Nothing says “I’m a smart, strident, dependable person who deserves a paycheck” like breaking a Starbucks window with a sledge hammer because someone was uttering politically incorrect stuff at an event where attendance was not compulsory.  These are the professionals of our future who will enter the workforce en masse without calloused sensitivities, all because of the campaign for political-correctness-for-all.

What happens when these political-correctness warriors get off the academic teat of appeasement and are lucky enough to get a job? What will they do when their boss is a ball-buster, who also happens to have the temerity to use “incorrect” gender pronouns? Will they curl up into a ball, toughen up, or simply report it to the higher-ups in the hopes of having a competent leader thrown out?

With regards to the last question, which involves someone snitching out another for using language that’s forbidden by the tribe, the American Bar Association has joined the party.  ABA’s Model Rule 4.8(g) is full of vague, meaningless tripe that forbids lawyers to:

engage in conduct that the lawyer knows or reasonably should know is harassment or discrimination on the basis of race, sex, religion, national origin, ethnicity, disability, age, sexual orientation, gender identity, marital status or socioeconomic status in conduct related to the practice of law

Let’s say you finally found the right lawyer who puts you first, and is in the best position to get you out of a serious jam. This rule can be used to take his license, should anyone perceive he said something considered “harassment,” and perhaps that leaves you with lawyers who will cower should a prosecutor threaten with putting you in a cage if she doesn’t capitulate.  There you have it ladies and gentlemen, how far the termites have spread.

I will come full circle, and finish with our beloved language, and how political correctness has been used to trivialize things that cause real pain and suffering.  Freaking out because you’re facing a lifetime of banishment from this country and don’t have the coin to pay for your defense? Well, you’re not entitled to a lawyer, because the deportation process is “administrative” and not punitive. In an immigration jail and hate the conditions? How bad can it possibly be, buttercup? They’re not jails, but rather “service processing” and “transitional” centers.

You’re in prison awaiting trial, and you got thrown in a filthy hole?  Calm down, drama queen. It’s not a hole, but a “secure housing unit,” or SHU.  Facing life in prison, so you want your lawyer to pulverize the government’s parade of rats? Understandable, but make sure he only addresses him as “cooperating witness” during cross and closing argument.  Is all this progress? Very far from it.

The notion of jurisdiction is both foreign and arcane to most people. Something wrong happened, and thus someone should be able to do something about it. In the case of Rensselaer County District Attorney Joel Abelove, the wrong he did in sabotaging the prosecution of Troy Police Sgt. Randall French for the killing of DWI suspect Edson Thevenin deserved scrutiny.

Before his downfall for kinky proclivities, feminist-ally, Trump-hater and then Democratic Attorney General Eric Schneiderman seized the opportunity to do that something. He indicted Abelove for first degree perjury based upon his testimony in a grand jury investigating his conduct. The case was set for trial on June 20, but Abelove moved to dismiss the indictment based upon the AG exceeding his (now hers, since Barbara Underwood has replaced the disgraced Schneiderman in the meantime) authority.

And Abelove, dirty as he may be, crushed the AG’s office and the indictment in a decision by Acting* Supreme Court Justice Jonathan Nichols. Continue reading →

A study conducted under the auspices of the National Academies of Science carries a great deal of weight, and for good reason. But then, that’s largely based on the “science” piece, not that it appears to have given rise to any sense of constraint this time.

The 311-page document is the national academies’ first report addressing sexual harassment, a problem that has long simmered in labs and classrooms, and some people predicted it could help spur meaningful change.

“Reports from the National Academy carry substantial weight,” said Dr. Carol Bates, associate dean for faculty affairs at Harvard Medical School and a co-author of a recent article calling for “zero tolerance for sexual harassment in academic medicine.”

Continue reading →

The victims of a multi-million dollar Ponzi scheme want their money back, and it was up to Judge Carlton Reeves of the Southern District of Mississippi to make that happen.

This case involves a multi-million dollar Ponzi scheme that defrauded hundreds of investors. The ill-gotten gains of that scheme now reside in Defendants’ estates. The Court has determined that a receivership over those estates is appropriate.

Great. So one would expect the balance of the order to appoint a receiver, since the only issue before the court is the appointment of a receiver. But Judge Reeves decided that the appointment of a receiver, the clawback of the ill-gotten gains to be returned to the victims of this multi-million dollar Ponzi scheme was less important, less exigent despite the possibility that the assets might dissipate, then was a very different concern. Continue reading →

Following the somewhat disingenuous revelations about former Ninth Circuit Judge Alex Kozinski, Chief Justice John Roberts convened a “working group” to formulate ways in which to address the “problem” of federal judges. The brilliantly titled “REPORT OF THE FEDERAL JUDICIARY WORKPLACE CONDUCT WORKING GROUP TO THE JUDICIAL CONFERENCE OF THE UNITED STATES” has now been revealed. It reads like an EEOC polemic on workplace whining.

The EEOC Study of harassment in the workplace provided the Working Group with a current and reliable empirical baseline to understand the problem and focus its inquiries. The EEOC Task Force conducted its study over 18 months from January 14, 2015, through June 2016. The 88-page report convincingly explains that workplace harassment is a persistent and pervasive problem in all economic sectors, in all socioeconomic classes, and at all organizational levels. The EEOC Study noted that almost one third of the 90,000 charges it received in 2015 included an allegation of workplace harassment. Those charges included harassment on the basisof sex (including sexual orientation, gender identity, and pregnancy), race, disability, age, ethnicity/national origin, color, and religion. The EEOC Study found that between 25 percent and 85 percent of women in the private sector and federal sector workplace experienced sexual harassment, depending on how that term is defined. The EEOC Study stated that three out of four individuals who experienced harassment never talked to a supervisor or manager about it. In short, the EEOC Study confirmed that the problem of workplace harassment is both widespread and underreported in workplaces throughout the nation, and—as the Chief Justice noted in his Year-End Report—there is no reason to believe that the Judiciary is immune.

Continue reading →

After ripping to shreds the New York Senate’s cyberbullying law for the omission of a definition, Eugene Volokh queried whether we missed something significant.

Eugene Volokh points out (via email) that there is a definition of cyberbullying on the books in New York state. The bill does not reference it, however. This bill appends Section 12a to Section 12, which is part of the state’s consolidated education law. Section 12 says “no student will be subjected to harassment or bullying by employees or students on school property or at a school function.” There’s still no definition here of bullying or cyberbullying, nor is there anything pointing to the state’s definition of these terms. To find a definition, readers must look to Section 11 (again, not mentioned anywhere in the new bill), which is another part of the state’s education laws.

And indeed, there is a section of the Education Law that provides what could generously be called a definition. Continue reading →

When Harris County created the Office of Public Defender, it did something remarkably rare: It found the right person to create it and lead it. Alex Bunin built the real deal in Harris County, which had been a swamp of private indigent defenders milking the system and too-often providing no more than a warm body. Alex put together an office of excellent lawyers dedicated to their clients and at less cost to Houston. What more could you want from the guy?

Loyalty. Precinct 3 Commissioner Steve Radack was outraged that Alex’s loyalty was to his clients, to the poor people of Houston rather than to the commissioners who paid him.

The county attorney’s office has asked for an executive session at Tuesday’s Commissioners Court meeting to discuss its investigation of the public defender’s office, which is led by Chief Public Defender Alex Bunin. Continue reading →

In a twit, Cathy Young reminded me of a New York Magazine article from an earlier, more innocent age. The writer was Jonathan Chait. The time was 2015. There was no President Trump, nor was such an absurd notion considered remotely possible. The article was “not a very PC thing to say.” The subtitle was “how the language police are perverting liberalism.”

It’s an exceptional article, and one that would be unlikely to see the light of day at New York Magazine today. Whether Chait would take the risk of writing such heresy, and suffering the outrage it would evoke, is unclear, but it appeared at a time when Godwin’s Law was still in effect, and so he was awful for having told the truth but at least not literally Hitler.

That the new political correctness has bludgeoned even many of its own supporters into despondent silence is a triumph, but one of limited use. Politics in a democracy is still based on getting people to agree with you, not making them afraid to disagree. The historical record of political movements that sought to expand freedom for the oppressed by eliminating it for their enemies is dismal. The historical record of American liberalism, which has extended social freedoms to blacks, Jews, gays, and women, is glorious. And that glory rests in its confidence in the ultimate power of reason, not coercion, to triumph.

Continue reading →