Andrew Bolt, Race and Identity Politics

WARNING: VERY LONG POST

In a recent court decision, conservative commentator Andrew Bolt was found guilty of breaching the Racial Vilification Act (Eatock vs. Bolt, see http://www.austlii.edu.au/au/cases/cth/FCA/2011/1103.html ).

From the classical liberal perspective, the good intentions behind the Racial Vilification Act do not justify the existence of the Act; Free Speech is an absolute right which is only bounded by fraud (for example, in the case of actual defamation) and coercion (i.e. making threats of violence or similar forms of extortion).

I am not a viewer of Andrew Bolt, although in full disclosure I did once send him an email which corrected a philosophical mistake of his; he accused Postmodernism of being Metaphysically Subjectivist (i.e. people’s minds literally remake reality). I believe that to be mistaken since Postmodernism is Epistemologically Subjectivist, typically on philosophical grounds derived from German Idealist thought. This has been my only interaction with his work in the past, and I know little about him. Although I was pleasantly surprised when reading his Wikipedia page that he’s an Agnostic rather than a religionist.

But the reason for this post is that I found a specific comment about the Bolt case interesting from the perspective of political philosophy.

Commentator Brian F. McCoy argued that the ultimate issue in the Bolt case wasn’t freedom of speech. He identified the core issue as “freedom of identity” (see http://www.eurekastreet.com.au/article.aspx?aeid=28512).

What a fascinating concept.

“Identity” in the context of the case was referring to social identity or the groups with which one identifies.

The following article is not so much a deliberate argumentative essay per se. Rather, it is a set of commentary on a series of interconnected issues raised by the Bolt affair. In it, I will cover epistemological and philosophical considerations relating to the concept of “social identity” and I will also discuss the various analytical frameworks and assumptions that are used when dealing with the concept. Ultimately I will launch into a discussion of Brian McCoy’s “freedom of identity.”

Johnson campaign faltering; GOP deserves censure.

Media bias and bastardry and Republican cowardice deny the US a great candidate.

Any avid reader of the Ruidoso News is by now aware that the former two term New Mexico Governor, Gary Johnson is standing for the Republican Presidential nomination. Unfortunately, apart from a couple of passing references in the Adderville Examiner and a fairly positive Op-Ed in the Galts Gulch Gazette there has been little media coverage of his candidacy. The media has in the main staged a lockout.

While it is unreasonable to expect candidacy to automatically entitle anyone to inclusion in media coverage and a place in the debates, a candidate who meets the requirements should not be excluded. This is what has been done to Johnson. In May CNN blocked him from a debate in New Hampshire, although he qualified as an announced candidate with 2 percent support in three national polls during the month.

Despite being even in polls with Herman Cain and ahead of Jon Huntsman and Rick Santorum he was excluded from other debates, which included them. Since then it has been standard practice to omit him from the polls that decide places in the debates. With his campaign now faltering, it seems that media bias and bastardry has denied America a candidate who has the track record and principles to revitalize the nation. 

The Horror File Gets Bigger And Bigger

Submitted for your consideration: “Ayn Rand is not a supporter of free markets”

That agonized screaming you hear inside your head after reading the linked paragraph is a trillion neurons shrieking in pain.

Video Game Review – Deus Ex: Human Revolution

I recently wrote a long philosophical review of Deus Ex: Human Revolution. Libertarians may want to read the review because the game actually is remarkably sophisticated (and very libertarian-compatible) in its critique of Corporatism and regulation. Also, it clearly distinguishes these from an actual free market. Honestly, I’ve never seen such a sophisticated analysis of Corporatism in a video game before.

I didn’t post the full review here because it is both rather lengthy and analyzes/discusses a lot of philosophical issues raised by the plot. Since most readers here are not Objectivists, my philosophical commentary is probably less interesting in aggregate to this blog’s general readership than the political-economic commentary I made.

Full review can be found at Objectivist Living, here: http://www.objectivistliving.com/forums/index.php?showtopic=11126

All comments welcomed!

“There Outta Be A Law!” – Toddlers And Tiaras Edition

“There Outta Be A Law!” – Toddlers And Tiaras Edition
By Andrew Russell

Ever since the announcement that Universal Royalty Beauty Pageant was planning to hold a children’s beauty pageant in Melbourne, plenty of Australian parents flocked to the latest and greatest Moral Panic. The pageant is now over, but the Moral Panic makes for interesting analysis.

As is depressingly typical in Australian politics, said parents (mostly affiliated with the group Pull The Pin) were not happy with merely privately boycotting the event or protesting it; they aim to make children’s beauty pageants illegal in Australia (see: http://www.pullthepin.com.au/). In other words, “I don’t like it, so There Outta Be A Law against it!”

The Pageant was going to feature Eden Wood; child Beauty Queen who was extensively featured, gyrating around in a pink sequinned Stripper Cowgirl outfit, on several Current Affairs shows. Eden cancelled; conflicts between Today Tonight and A Current Affair prevented her from attending.

As per usual, the Moral Panic over Universal Royalty’s event included every libertarian’s most loathed four-word logical fallacy; “think of the children!”

According to both Pull The Pin and Australians Against Child Beauty Pageants, these events harm the stars of the show. They harm the children they claim to be celebrating.

Pull The Pin’s petition for laws against child pageants (http://www.gopetition.com/petitions/pull-the-pin-on-beauty-pageants-for-children.html) reads as follows;

“We believe that child beauty pageants instil harmful messages in children (girls in particular as they make up the majority of participants), including that their looks are their currency.

We feel that child beauty pageants are exploitative and not in the best interests of the child, but the commercial interests of pageant promoters and parents living vicariously through their children.

We would like to see age restrictions applied (16+) so that the decision to compete against their peers in a beauty contest is made with full consent, and when their emotional maturity better enables them to fully comprehend and handle any negative self esteem impacts. We oppose the narrow gender messages child beauty pageants help perpetuate, doing nothing to improve the status of women in general, and encouraging ever younger games of ‘compare and despair’.”

In this article, I will make four basic arguments;
1) Fears of ‘child sexualization’ are clearly overblown,
2) Some anti-Pageant forces may be acting out of wounded pride rather than the interests of the children,
3) The Pageant critics make some very legitimate identifications of problems with child beauty pageants, but these problems are also found in children’s sports and no one is trying to ban them,
4) Finally, there seems to be a troubling undertone of xenophobia amongst anti-Pageant forces.

Laurie Oaks’ sob post.

Some time ago, I had this to say of Laurie Oaks:

“Laurie Oaks is one of the most respected and feared political journalists in Australia today. He is relatively bipartisan in his approach, and gives me the impression that he detests hypocrisy and loves exposing it. …”

Now he has turned around and written a rather lazy, mealy mouthed, diatribe on the strong opinions being expressed in the current row over the carbon tax.

Laurie, on one hand deplores what he refers to as politics with an unsavory feel with insults from both sides getting nastier and more personal, while on the other hand using the term “Teabagger” to describe Tea Party members. This expression is used by the left as a disparaging reference to these people. Laurie may be a bit old and staid to understand the meaning of the term and has been too lazy to look it up.

It’s a little difficult to be even handed while referring to the right, or elements of it with a term that is, shall we say, somewhat ‘vulgar and biological’ in origin. 🙂

Starting off with poor old Tony Windsor getting hate mail for putting Gillard in power and supporting a carbon tax, he fails to mention Tony’s claim to have received death threats which were widely publicized until they turned out to be some guy saying, “I hope you die, you bastard.” This may be intemperate and uncalled for, even a bad thing to wish for, but it is not a threat.

Windsor really needs to harden up a bit.