[WikiEN-l] WHEELER's anti-Semitism

[Ray Saintonge]

I appreciate your eloquent and measured approach to a topic where the 
latter is often absent.  I will withhold comment about the specific 
situation with WHEELER because I have not read through the material, nor 
applied the due dilligence that would be required before a valid comment 
could be made.  The important points do indeed go beyond this specific 
person's claims.

steven l. rubenstein wrote:

> Reading various people's response to my charge of anti-Semitism (on my 
> talk page and here) I realize that some people either do not 
> understand my basic assumptions about hate-speech.  Since this matter 
> extends beyond WHEELER or the early National Socialism talk page to a 
> matter of general policy, I want to clarify my assumptions here.  

It's in that spirit that I would respond.

> 1) hate speech is categorically different from offensive or uncivil 
> remarks.  Many people have pointed out that there is often a certain 
> level of incivility at Wikipedia; sometimes people make unfortunately 
> offensive remarks in the heat of an argument, and sometimes remarks 
> are offensive because they are controversial and play a constructive 
> role in an argument.  I agree with these points in principle, but do 
> not think they apply to hate speech.  ...  Anti-Semitism is not wrong 
> because it is hurtful on an individual or personal level; 
> anti-Semitism attacks a whole group.  Anti-Semitism is impersonal by 
> nature.  ....  You do not have to feel personally injured to oppose 
> something that is wrong.

It is important to look at many of these incidents in context.  A person 
who has made remarks that may be interpreted as anti-semitic needs to 
have opportunities to recognize his errors, particularly if those 
comments come in the heat of editorial battle.  Last year here in Canada 
an important leader in the First Nations community made some obviously 
anti-semitic remarks in the course of a single speech.  The outcry was 
immediate.  As a result he lost his job, and his credibility in the 
community was shot.  He soon after publicly apologized for his remarks.  
That should have been the end of it, but militant Jewish organizations 
continue to insist that the matter be continued in the criminal justice 
system.  These very vocal and very public organizations manage to 
promote a public image of Jews as completely insensitive and 
unforgiving.  The same can be said of the Nazi hunters who continue to 
seek punishment on old men 60 years after the fact, often at great 
expense.  There comes a time when these events need to be put behind us 
so that everyone can go on with life.  Anti-semitism was pandemic before 
WWII, and not just in Germany.  The shock of the Nazi crimes resulted in 
a lot of good will toward Jews, but I'm afraid that that good will has 
been rapidly eroding.

> 2) hate speech is never about factual accuracy.  This is because facts 
> are contingent, but racism is based on essentialism.  ...  To then 
> talk about "Jewish concentration camps" is simply not about a factual 
> claim we can research or question.  There is no point in even 
> questioning it as a factual claim.  It is absurd on its face and the 
> only point of the claim is to lump all Jews together, to treat them 
> not as individuals but as members of a class.  By the way, sometimes 
> such correlations may be valid.  Criminologists often look for 
> correlations between behavior and race, class, or gender.  ...

When I read the reference to "Jewish concentration camps" on the 
previous message, it was unclear whether the writer meant camps "for" 
Jews or "by" Jews.  Your last comment above looks almost like support of 
racial profiling.  (Blacks commit more common crimes; all Arabs are 
potential terrorists, even after the mistaken early claims in connection 
with the Oklahoma City bombing, etc.)

Hate speech can be based on transplanted facts.  There is adequate 
reason to be critical of the activities of the Israeli state, but there 
is no basis for extrapolating those facts into a basis for criticising 
all Jewry.   Unfortunately, those Jews who are quick to condemn 
anti-Israeli claims as implicitly anti-semitic do a disservice to their 
cause.   The true anti-semites feel that their position is bolstered.

> 3) There is a difference between what one feels or thinks, and how one 
> expresses it publicly.  Regulating hate speech (through a ban, or an 
> apology or retraction) is not about regulating how someone feels.  I 
> don't think it is possible to control someone else's feelings -- hell, 
> I am not sure it is possible to control one's own feelings.  And if it 
> were possible, I don't think it would be desirable.  But we (not just 
> government, but society or community) regulates how people express 
> there feelings all the time.  We can think what we like, but we know 
> that in some contexts it is inappropriate or even dangerous to say 
> what we think; we regulate ourselves, personally, as well.  ...

Of course it's up to the members of a community to regulate these 
things.  When governments and other bureaucracies get involved, the 
people lose that control.  On the other hand I get worried when people 
cry out that they want to see justice done.  I am concerned that the 
philosophy that underlies their sense of justice may be somewhat less 
than scholarly.

> 4) Wikipedia should not tolerate hate speech.  I think an open society 
> should limit such regulation as much as possible. Some people have 
> pointed out that even WHEELER has a right to free speech.  I agree.  
> But that does not mean that someone can say whatever they like, here.  
> We should tolerate a certain level of offensive remarks as unavoidable 
> byproducts of heated exchanges, just as we should tolerate a high 
> level of ultimately empty chatter on talk pages as necessary 
> byproducts of the editing process.  We should certainly encourage 
> controversy.  But there is simply no benefit to Wikipedia from hate 
> speech, and there is no need for us to provide people with an outlet 
> for hate speech. ....  Wikipedia policy is not nor should be the same 
> thing as state or federal law.

Intolerance has its extremes, and we do have one other well-known Jewish 
Wikipedian whose cries of anti-semitism have become legendary.  Not all 
such cases are as clear as he would have us believe.  Some otherwise 
well-respected Wikipedians can easily wander into forbidden areas, but 
that is not enough to brand them as bigots.  The person's entire pattern 
of behavious is far more instructive.

Ec