[53] in Discussion of MIT-community interests
Objectivisim or Facism?
daemon@ATHENA.MIT.EDU (Aimee L Smith)
Thu Apr 19 22:55:41 2001
Message-Id: <200104200253.WAA20020@gold.mit.edu>
To: Benjamin A Chambers <bac@MIT.EDU>
cc: Matthew J Craighead <craighea@MIT.EDU>, mit-talk@MIT.EDU, alsmith@MIT.EDU
In-Reply-To: Your message of "Thu, 19 Apr 2001 17:44:06 EDT."
<200104192144.RAA31942@benelli.MIT.EDU>
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Date: Thu, 19 Apr 2001 22:53:54 -0400
From: Aimee L Smith <alsmith@MIT.EDU>
My friend and I stopped by the objectivist lecture this evening.
The usual, lot's of "proof by rhetoric" in a long-winded speech.
The interesting part is that during the Q&A, the speaker got very defensive,
would cut off the questioners who disagreed, got upset when people
in the audience had to laugh (like myself-- some points were beyond
belief, s.a if we privatize all air, then pollution will end... has
this guy ever heard of the 2nd law of thermodynamics? The shit is going to
mix...) Nevertheless, things really got interesting when the organizers
called in the police. 3 mit police came, one in a helmet. The speaker
than seemed relieved and informed the officers that someone in the
audience was being disruptive. The officer in helmet asked which and the
speaker pointed to the woman whose question he kept interupting. And yet,
he claims the environmentalists, (That's right, that unified highly
organized body that includes occaisional recyclers and earth-firsters alike)
are the fascists. Several people in the audience defended the woman and the
officer then said, "How about we take a vote then?" Now, we all thought
we were in a university, but then the speaker informed us that he had
paid for the podium. What I don't get is why they didn't inform us
that is was an infomercial from the get-go. I mean, being a university
and all, we assumed it was an open exchange of ideas. Anyhow, after that the
officers left and the speaker was aghast that the police did not play the
role he expected-- defenders of the interests of the ruling class elites...
(I must admit, I was pleasantly surprised myself...)
I have to admit, I stopped trying to be respectful to the speaker after
he claimed that capitalism is what ended slavery and that English colonization
was a liberation for the Indian people... I guess I feel that the delicate
balance between free-speech and the espousing of racial hatred against which
could serve as an unfar barrier to inclusion to certain of the audience was
pushed a bit too far (I know Prez would disagree... but then, I only
quickly laughed and then voiced disgust at his racism... I didn't tell him
to shut up or leave.)
All the reasonable people left after the cop incident exposed what a wacko
the speaker was.
And the only person who actually yelled at anyone in a threatening manner
was this white skinhead looking guy... but naturally, he wasn't the
disruptive one as he supported the speakers views...
I am pretty disappointed. I can understand people having differing views,
but why is this guy so scared to yield the floor for a few minutes after he
had already used his "purchased" podium for well over an hour? Why did he
group all sorts of disparit things together to make his point, yet when others
did the same to make theirs, he called them irrational? Why did he say all
environmentalists think aids is a good thing? This one sure doesn't and
there is a whole section of Boston Global Action Network that works on this
particular issue... in fact, I never met such an environmentalist yet,
although anything is possible...
