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Stanford student may need to ‘acknowledge harm’ for reading ‘Mein Kampf’

thefire.org

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Re: Stanford student may need to ‘acknowledge harm’ for reading ‘Mein Kampf’

#91

Post by meany »

sequoia wrote: post #57

In cases like these, details and context are important, and unfortunately they are very scant here. Specifically, one may draw a distinction between someone reading Mein Kampf and posting a selfie on social media with the book (it's not clear whether a selfie was involved but social media posting was). There's no issue with reading mein kampf, but if it's being used as a prop on social media for the purpose of Jew-ba…

Stanford Review link supporting OP

https://stanforddaily.com/2023/01/22/protected-identity-harm...

Re: Stanford student may need to ‘acknowledge harm’ for reading ‘Mein Kampf’

#92

Post by gptgpp »

I hate this type of story, mostly because nobody has any clue as to what is actually happening, leading people to draw a divisive conclusion about either "cancel culture being out of control" or "soft liberal snowflakes acting like fascists." It's like it's tailor made to stoke these stupid culture wars.

The linked article at "thefire.org" has a statement by the Rabbi about the incident which makes it seem like they're condemning reading Mein Kampf.

But then according to this article:

https://www.thecollegefix.com/stanford-student-reported-for-...

That same Rabbi clarifies that they don't want anything banned and people should obviously be allowed to read whatever books they like. End of controversy, lol.

OR IS IT?

Because then we have a tweet of a post by an anonymous source (not exactly a primary source lol) on another platform (fizz?) claiming the photo of the girls reading the book was part of a costume, and the controversy comes from that -- not merely reading a book.

https://twitter.com/barrydeutsch/status/1618697230382399488

It's just a quagmire of stupid and people jumping to conclusions. We can't see the photo, or even a good description of what it is, and nobody seems to want to ban books like other people are claiming.

OBVIOUSLY reading fascist and overall terrible publications "Protocols of the Elders of Zion", "Mein Kampf", etc. are important for understanding how the holocaust occurred and propaganda in general. I even read them as a curious teenager and came away with the impression that Hitler was a boring, weird, hateful little man. They don't just radicalize people on their own.

We don't know what is happening here. If it ends up being a snapchat with a super offensive title like "learning how to exterminate the jews with my girlies!" then mystery solved. And if not, then it should get followed and picked up by the ACLU and other civil liberties orgs. But for fucks sake lets not start picking culture war sides before we've even seen the photo or a complete description of it lol.

Re: Stanford student may need to ‘acknowledge harm’ for reading ‘Mein Kampf’

#93

Post by sequoia »

mc32 wrote: post #75
sequoia wrote: post #57

In cases like these, details and context are important, and unfortunately they are very scant here. Specifically, one may draw a distinction between someone reading Mein Kampf and posting a selfie on social media with the book (it's not clear whether a selfie was involved but social media posting was). There's no issue with reading mein kampf, but if it's being used as a prop on social media for the purpose of Jew-ba…

I can imagine with things like this there come a day when sitting in a library someone spies upon another reader reading something they claim is triggering them. Let's say religious vs non religious people or ultra conservative vs ultra progressives. Or any high voltage topic with extreme opinions.

One can imagine many things, but that's not what happened here.

Your comment is confirmation (to me) that FIRE's headline & article are misleading. The article is making you think of someone "minding their own business" reading a book and getting in trouble. In fact, we don't know whether any reading occurred.

Someone's in trouble for (seeming too, details are unclear) using Mein Kampf as a prop in a social media post.

I'm disappointed in FIRE for going the misleading clickbait route here, I generally support their work.

Re: Stanford student may need to ‘acknowledge harm’ for reading ‘Mein Kampf’

#94

Post by dwaltrip »

prvc wrote: post #52
wilg wrote: post #48

Some rando on Twitter reposting an screenshot of an anonymous person claims the following: https://twitter.com/barrydeutsch/status/1618697230382399488 > This article hasn't framed the incident accurately at all. the incident was two theta girls posted a Snapchat story of them reading Mein Kampf as part of their costumes at a pregame and laughing, clearly in a joking way, not at all in a historical way. The joke was i…

> laughing, clearly in a joking way, not at all in a historical way What should the penalty be for laughing in a non-"historical way"?

The book is a symbol for the immense suffering inflicted by the Nazi regime. I can sympathize with not wanting students brazenly laughing at that in front of a large audience. It’s not a good look - they aren’t representing the university well.

That being said, I’m not sure what general rule I would want to set if I was in charge of this policy at a university. It’s certainly a thorny issue.

Re: Stanford student may need to ‘acknowledge harm’ for reading ‘Mein Kampf’

#95

Post by kelseyfrog »

chongli wrote: post #26
kelseyfrog wrote: post #12

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You would have to ask the individual(s) who profess to have been harmed. Claiming "it must be X" and then dismissing X is approaching a straw man. Restorative justice practices are notoriously antithetical to the adversarial justice system we're used to dealing with. Assumptions we make in adversarial justice systems like open observation to ensure a public check on proceedings are not part of restorative practices.…

Just a minor nitpick: et al is only used when listing people. When listing things we use etc.

Thank you! You made it click for me :)

Re: Stanford student may need to ‘acknowledge harm’ for reading ‘Mein Kampf’

#96

Post by nhchris »

bitwize wrote: post #78
endominus wrote: post #45

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The Atlantic[0][1] has run a number of articles about the ACLU's changing values, and refusal to grapple critically with more authoritarian voices in the halls of power. There was also a New Republic article[2] discussing strife within the ACLU itself; "Finally, there are those within the ACLU who scoff at the First Amendment completely, arguing that it is “disproportionately enjoyed by people of power and privilege”…

> Finally, there are those within the ACLU who scoff at the First Amendment completely, arguing that it is “disproportionately enjoyed by people of power and privilege” and therefore, presumably, of little or no value to others. The thing about the First Amendment, as it is now interpreted, is that it's a bit like how the law bars rich and poor alike from sleeping on park benches and under bridges. The speech of the…

For example, as an immigrant to France, speech against immigrants in France is not simply an abstract topic to me. It means that my existence does not have the same value as someone that was born there. [..] now more than ever, when it comes to future collaborators, in any context, it is important for anyone for whom justice matters to probe candidates deeply for fascist tendencies. If they show a sign, pass.

Yes, the problem with free speech is people might advocate immigration policies other than "open borders for all". That cannot be permitted - France belongs to everyone.

Fortunately we have heroes such as Andy Wingo, that immigrate to France, then exclude the natives from employment if they suspect those natives don't want to share their homeland with even more immigrants.

Thus a virtuous cycle is born - the more immigrants that come, the more marginalized the closed-borders fascists become.

Re: Stanford student may need to ‘acknowledge harm’ for reading ‘Mein Kampf’

#98

Post by [deleted] »

woooooo wrote: post #67
abakker wrote: post #27

Just a reminder that a .org does not mean "trustworthy". https://www.sourcewatch.org/index.php/Foundation_for_Individ... In this case, the discussion and the tenor of the conversation is almost certainly cherry picked to serve a particular agenda. On its face, the actions by Stanford in this article seem...not good. But I also suspect that this is making a mountain out of a molehill for political gain.

If academia is overwhelmingly biased in one direction, and a free speech org is documenting cases of suppression.. then of course most of the cases they document will exhibit that bias. It doesn't necessarily follow that they're playing for a team or using "free speech" in a bad faith manner. Academia created the discrepancy, FIRE is just documenting it.

[deleted]

Re: Stanford student may need to ‘acknowledge harm’ for reading ‘Mein Kampf’

#99

Post by Ancapistani »

zozbot234 wrote: post #73
prvc wrote: post #52

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> laughing, clearly in a joking way, not at all in a historical way What should the penalty be for laughing in a non-"historical way"?

Mein Kampf is reportedly and famously an extremely boring book, so if you can laugh at it you can laugh at anything.

I’ve read it. I’m not sure I’d call it boring, as I was making parallels to what actually happened after it was written the entire time, but it’s definitely monotonous.

The author was a better artist than writer, and you might remember how that career turned out for him.

Re: Stanford student may need to ‘acknowledge harm’ for reading ‘Mein Kampf’

#100

Post by taylodl »

mywittyname wrote: post #64
mxkopy wrote: post #18

Devils advocate - it may be that Stanford is punishing the act of taking a picture and distributing it, rather than reading the book. I was thinking of reading Mein Kampf (I've never read it), but I'd never think to pose in front of it.

That makes sense actually. Given the issue is not that the student read the book (as noted, it's required reading in certain classes). The complaint appears to be, a student was photographed reading the book, and the nature of the photograph caused a group of people to feel adversely targeted by it. The article omits the photograph, or even any real description of it, so we can't exactly judge for ourselves. The PIH…

> The article omits the photograph, or even any real description of it, so we can't exactly judge for ourselves.

In other words the article hides critical information in order to create flame bait. This is what passes for "journalism" today.

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