There is one definite claim that seems to drive Edis’ posts, though, stated in the first post:

So, from the perspective of someone trying to keep public order, or someone devising a political philosophy that can smooth interactions between different groups, secular liberalism is hardly the only option. Keeping the peace requires that communities defined by religion and ethnicity have tolerably equal access to resources—not just economic opportunity but also public respect and the means to cultural reproduction. In this context, protection from insult becomes particularly important: whether others can get away with publicly disrespecting a group is an accurate, easily available public signal of the status of a group.

In spite of Edis’ later clarification, the anti-free speech implications of this are obvious, and in spite of Blackford’s attempt to talk Edis down from this kind of thinking by saying it “detracts from what he actually wants to discuss,” it seems fairly central to Edis’ position (indeed, it’s the one part I have a clear grasp on).

Unfortunately, Edis’ statement here seems just obviously false. Yes, humans are naturally status-obsessed and may resort to violence to protect their status or in retaliation for perceived attacks on their status, and yes, part of the motivation for some of the violence done in the name of religion may be the erosion of certain cultural values. But it’s just silly to say that maintaining public order is impossible unless all communities are respected and can keep their culture going. Not every low status individual or group becomes violent. Part of what it means to have law and order is convincing people not to automatically resort to violence over insults, and when they do, the reasonable response is to try to minimize the harm done and punish the perpetrators to discourage others from imitating them in the future. The “cultural replication” stuff is even sillier, since cultures change all the time without breakdowns in public order.

Some of the consequences Edis draws from this aren’t crazy; he gives an example of a Muslim neighborhood banning the sale of alcohol within it. I personally think that allowing such local vice-bans would make small towns less pleasant places to live and amplify the tendency of people who don’t fit in in small towns to move to big cities. But the effects wouldn’t be terrible. On the other hand, at one point he does take it in a really pernicious direction: Ophelia Benson suggests the example of a teenage girl being forced into a marriage she doesn’t want as a potential bad consequence of “community autonomy.” Edis’ reply is just to say that “You’re again arguing as if liberal, individualist assumptions are shared by everybody in the broader political debate”–which is, I’m sorry, idiotic. Her point wasn’t that everyone agrees that forced marriages are bad, her point was that they are bad. Just because some people disagree doesn’t mean we have to seriously consider adjusting our political order to accommodate them. Edis is displaying a very deep confusion that validates the worst stereotypes of multiculturalism, and he should be embarrassed to be doing so.

I’m sure this horrible and troubling film will do well enough with the frat boy types it has been engineered to appeal to, and date-rape culture will continue to thrive on college campuses.

My first response was to approve the comment, and then make a quick post saying “Gee, I knew idiocy like this existed, but it’s funny seeing it on posted straight to my blog. Doesn’t this person realize that the ‘all sex is rape’ line trivializes actual rape, and misogynistically implies that women can’t make decisions for themselves?” But then I noticed that both the e-mail and the URL given in the comment contained the words “thai” and “ads.” Clicked the link and indeed, it was a strange website probably trying to sell me something, though I’m not sure about that because it was written in a script I don’t recognize.

Has anybody heard of this happening before? Is this the new thing in internet spam–to post a seemingly legitimate comment with a link to whatever you’re trying to sell? It makes sense–I assume most spam filters focus on cutting out the stuff that has “buy cialis” typed fifty times, rather than focusing on URLs. It may be that one day, spam filters will simply have to block links to entire URLs.

BTW, the movie is out on limited release. It may not be in a theater near you, but if it is, go see it ASAP.