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Left-fascists at University of Arkansas cancel speaker because she cowrote pamphlet with Robert Spencer 10 years ago

May 7, 2017 10:26 am By Robert Spencer

“In expressing concerns with Chesler, faculty cited her writings on ‘the ultra-right Breitbart forum’ and her role as co-author of a pamphlet, The Violent Oppression of Women in Islam, with Robert Spencer, ‘considered by the Southern Poverty Law Center to be ‘one of America’s most prolific and vociferous anti-Muslim propagandists,’ the email stated.”

Chesler is defending UA prof Tom Paradise, who was responsible for getting her canceled. She is apparently unaware that he wrote to colleagues that he was “delighted” that she had been cancelled. Paradise has now been suspended, which is unusual in light of the fact that his delight was no doubt shared by the overwhelming majority of his colleagues. Now he should be fired, as should all of his colleagues who supported this cancellation, especially Joel Gordon, Mohja Kohf and Ted Swedenburg, who called upon UA’s King Fahd Center for Middle East Studies to withdraw its support for Chesler’s appearance, which led directly to her being cancelled.

The stigmatization and silencing of dissenting voices on campuses nationwide is inconsistent with the very idea of a university, which is supposed to be a place where ideas are accepted or dismissed on their merits alone. Chesler was canceled because, among other things, she cowrote a pamphlet with me ten years ago. That’s a very remote association, and is akin to the Nazi Brownshirts getting professors fired because it was discovered that they had a Jewish great-grandmother. Apparently now everyone who has ever said a kind word to me or stood in a room with me is to be deprived of all professional opportunities and stigmatized as a “bigot” and an “Islamophobe.” This is reminiscent of the Stalinist purges, and all the more shameful for taking place at a university.

Meanwhile, did Gordon, Kohf, and Swedenburg present any evidence that what we said in that pamphlet was false? No. Apparently all they said about it was this: “The pamphlet was published by David Horowitz’ Freedom Center, which frequently targets students and scholars for speaking out about justice for Palestinians.” More guilt by association: now Chesler is being tarred not only with my supposed enormities, but with those of David Horowitz as well.

The professors went on: “The pamphlet is a catalogue of horrors inflicted on women that are said to be the outcome of Islam’s essential nature. ‘Islamic gender apartheid,’ Chesler and Spencer write, ‘is not caused by western imperialism, colonialism, or racism. It is indigenous to Islam both theologically and historically.’” Do they present any evidence to show this is false? Apparently not: after the manner of Leftist academics and spokesmen everywhere, they present their perspective as if its truth were self-evident. They don’t have to refute dissenting views. They just have to show that they’re right-wing. What’s more, do they present any evidence that the Southern Poverty Law Center is a neutral and impartial arbiter of what constitutes “hate” and what doesn’t? Of course not. Leftists never consider it incumbent upon them to demonstrate the truth of what they claim.

This authoritarian demonization and suppression of opposing perspectives is quintessentially fascist, and contrary to the core purpose of a university. Enough is enough. The University of Arkansas has done well to suspend Paradise. Now he, Gordon, Kohf, Swedenburg and all the other fascist professors at UA should be fired. UA should follow through on its suspension by reaffirming the lost idea that a university should allow for and protect the freedom of speech. No Stalinists should be allowed to terrorize their opponents. Because I believe in the freedom of speech and the importance of free discourse, I hereby challenge any or all of these professors — Paradise, Gordon, Kohf, and/or Swedenburg — to a debate on the status of women under Sharia. I am willing to debate all four of them at once. I will travel to UA at my own expense. But will they accept? Of course they won’t.

“UA professor suspended after speech cancellation a scapegoat, author says,” by Jaime Adame, Arkansas Online, May 5, 2017:

FAYETTEVILLE — A longtime University of Arkansas, Fayetteville professor suspended from administrative duties is “being scapegoated,” said Phyllis Chesler, the author whose cancelled Skype presentation led UA to take action against the director of the university’s Middle East studies center.

The university on Wednesday suspended Tom Paradise pending an internal review of the decision to cancel Chesler’s scheduled talk at an academic symposium last month on honor-based violence.

Chesler, known for remarks critical of Islam, has written that academics wrongly ignore the role of Islam when discussing honor killings and similar violence taking place in Western countries.

“I think that Tom Paradise is being scapegoated for those who bullied, intimidated, terrified, and forced him to dis-invite me,” Chesler said in an email. “He did nothing wrong. He actually apologized to me rather profusely and humanely.”…

UA spokesman Mark Rushing, in a statement Wednesday, said Paradise canceled Chesler’s appearance “without informing leadership.” His faculty pay and status are not affected by the suspension, only his pay and responsibilities as director of UA’s King Fahd Center for Middle East Studies….

An email dated April 7 to Paradise — a week before the symposium — from UA professor Joel Gordon also lists professors Mohja Kohf and Ted Swedenburg as authors.

It states that faculty ask the center to “publicly withdraw its sponsorship from this symposium.”

The message states that faculty members earlier had asked the center to “provide, via Skype, a qualified speaker to follow Chesler’s remarks,” with the request “deemed not feasible.”

In expressing concerns with Chesler, faculty cited her writings on “the ultra-right Breitbart forum” and her role as co-author of a pamphlet, The Violent Oppression of Women in Islam, with Robert Spencer, “considered by the Southern Poverty Law Center to be ‘one of America’s most prolific and vociferous anti-Muslim propagandists,'” the email stated.

Additional records show Paradise responding to faculty in Middle East studies, sometimes referred to with the acronym MEST.

“Hello MEST faculty and staff, we’ve been successful in removing Dr. Chesler from the schedule of the upcoming symposium on honor-based violence,” Paradise said in an April 9 email sent to 12 people. Records released by UA show a draft from Paradise, not sent to all faculty and staff, that used the phrase “I’m delighted that we’ve been successful.”

Swedenburg, in a Thursday phone interview, disputed the idea that he, Kohf and Gordon worked to get Chesler kicked off the program.

“We did not call for her to be disinvited and how that happened, I don’t really know, because none of the three of us were a party to that discussion,” Swedenburg said….

Come now, Swedenburg. Take some responsibility for your own actions, and own up to your fascism.

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Filed Under: academia, Featured, free speech, Robert Spencer, Sharia, women's rights in Islam Tagged With: Joel Gordon, Mohja Kohf, Ted Swedenburg, Tom Paradise, University of Arkansas Fayetteville


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Comments

  1. billybob says

    May 7, 2017 at 10:34 am

    A little off topic, but a fascinating video pasted below. Now I’ll actually read the article and comment on that.
    https://youtu.be/xoNYmJ5gwLA

  2. billybob says

    May 7, 2017 at 10:47 am

    The Wikipedia entry for Ms. Chesler shows that she would have made a very valuable contribution to the symposium…

    Phyllis Chesler (born October 1, 1940) is an American writer, psychotherapist, and professor emerita of psychology and women’s studies at the College of Staten Island (CUNY). She is known as a feminist psychologist, and is the author of 16 books, including the best-seller Women and Madness (1972). Chesler has written on topics such as gender, mental illness, divorce and child custody, surrogacy, second-wave feminism, pornography, prostitution, incest, and violence against women.
    In more recent years, Chesler has written several works on such subjects as antisemitism, Islam, and honor killings.

    Chesler argues that many western intellectuals, including leftists and feminists, have abandoned Western values in the name of multicultural relativism, and that this has led to an alliance with Islamists, an increase in antisemitism, and to the abandonment of Muslim women and religious minorities in Muslim-majority countries.

  3. billybob says

    May 7, 2017 at 10:56 am

    Reading further on that same Wikipedia page reveals a fascinating story of the experiences that shaped Phyllis Chesler’s views…

    Chesler was the eldest of three children raised in a working class Orthodox Jewish family in Brooklyn, New York. As a youth she joined the Socialist-Zionist, anti-religious youth movement, HaShomer Hatzair, and later the even more radical left-wing Zionist youth movement, Ein Harod. Despite her parents’ disapproval, she continued to rebel against her religious upbringing.

    She won a full scholarship to Bard College, where she met Ali, a Westernized Muslim man from Afghanistan, the son of devout Muslim parents. They married in a civil ceremony in 1961 in New York State and settled in Kabul, in the large, polygamous household of her father-in-law. She credits this experience with inspiring her to become an ardent feminist.

    According to Chesler, her problems began on arrival in Afghanistan. The authorities forced her to surrender her U.S. passport, and she ended up a virtual prisoner in her in-laws’ house. Chesler describes this as how foreign wives were treated. This phenomenon has been documented by others. She reports that the U.S. embassy refused to help her leave the country. After several months, she contracted hepatitis and became gravely ill. At that point, her father-in-law made it possible for her return to the U.S. on a temporary visa.

    Upon her return, she completed her final semester and graduated from Bard, embarked on a doctoral program, worked in a brain research laboratory for Dr. E. Roy John, published studies in Science magazine and received a fellowship in neurophysiology at the New York Medical College at Flower Fifth Avenue Hospital. Thereafter, in 1969, she earned a Ph.D. in psychology at the New School for Social Research and embarked on careers as a professor, author, and psychotherapist in private practice.

    Chesler divorced her Muslim husband and remarried an Israeli, whom she also later divorced. She has one son. She describes their relationship, pregnancy, childbirth, and her first year as a newborn mother in With Child: A Diary of Motherhood. In the 1998 edition, her son wrote the Preface to the book.

    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Phyllis_Chesler

  4. davej says

    May 7, 2017 at 11:31 am

    No one is anti-Islam until they learn about the ideology of misogyny, deceit, violence and anti-democratic suppression of free speech.

    Once they have learned the unfortunate details of Islamic theology any sane person would be anti-Islam and anti-Sharia, feeling it to be their patriotic duty to oppose and repel this wholesale assault on our Republic and it’s basic rights and liberties.

    This does not make them “ultra right”, a “bigot” or an “Islamophobe”. Those who casually and inaccurately use such terms are the true bigots and fascists.

  5. mortimer says

    May 7, 2017 at 11:49 am

    Phyllis Chesler is one of the foremost American experts on women in Islam. Her credentials in this are impeccable and therefore her voice is commanding.

    Phyllis Chesler wrote “An American Bride in Kabul: A Memoir” (2013). It is an account of her 1961 marriage to an Afghani man, her brief married life in a harem in Afghanistan, and the lifelong lessons she learned.

    I do not understand the motives of Chesler, but I agree with Robert Spencer professors who do not evaluate ideas SOLELY ON THEIR MERITS are not worthy of their tenure. They should not be at a university but in a SUPREMACIST POLITICAL party somewhere writing slogans.

    The university boards of directors should stop receiving monies from Gulf oil, because Islam does NOT promote critical thought, but AUTHORITARIAN THOUGHT.

    AUTHORITARIAN THOUGHT has no place at a university.

    • carol says

      May 9, 2017 at 12:43 am

      Canada Free Press sent out a good article today on this theme:

      http://canadafreepress.com/article/connecting-the-dots-islamism…socialism-globalism

      • carol says

        May 9, 2017 at 9:41 am

        http://canadafreepress.com/article/connecting-the-dots-islamism…socialism-globalism

  6. Emilie Green says

    May 7, 2017 at 12:38 pm

    Of course not. Leftists never consider it incumbent upon them to demonstrate the truth of what they claim.”

    Well, the picture certainly demonstrates the existence of Gordon’s sizeable muffin top.

    • Jayke says

      May 7, 2017 at 1:53 pm

      It’s the age-old fascist “because I say so” argument that is so often used by weak minds and the left but I repeat myself.

  7. overman says

    May 7, 2017 at 12:38 pm

    “Apparently now everyone who has ever said a kind word to me or stood in a room with me is to be deprived of all professional opportunities and stigmatized as a “bigot” and an “Islamophobe”

    Yeah, l saw the same biased crap on Al Jazeera today. They had a clip of Robert and a short interview with Pam Geller [then showed financial statements about her funding – as if that matters lol]. The interviewer actually went to Roberts office but was denied an interview – understandable considering the political doublespeak of Al Jazeera. lf you watch this documentary, you’ll see how they twisted everything.

    Islamophobia in the USA – Al Jazeera World:

    • billybob says

      May 7, 2017 at 11:27 pm

      That was a fascinating report. I believe the reporters involved in the story told it as they see it, and of course we see it much differently than they do. For example, they made such a big deal about the money flowing to “Islamophobic organizations”, but I would guess the would represent not even one percent of the money flowing to organizations like CAIR combined with funding for mosques and imams, etc. ie: there is nothing wrong with it. The other big thing is that in the mind of Al Jazeera, the report is about “Islamophobia”, in other words, fear of Islam in not rational; to them. Duh – of course they wouldn’t understand why anybody would be afraid of Islam – they embrace it! There were many key moments during that film I wish I could shout out to them… wait a minute, what about this… They never explain, for example, why we shouldn’t be afraid of terrorists. They don’t seem the least concerned about that. It’s too bad Robert wouldn’t give them an interview, but of course he must have known they would just try to smear him, as they certainly did. However, the bits they did report on Robert I thought were helpful to our perspective even though included from their perspective to condemn Robert. In other words, they couldn’t smear Robert in my mind even if they tried.

  8. overman says

    May 7, 2017 at 12:40 pm

    There’s a short advert before the main feature.

    • overman says

      May 7, 2017 at 1:12 pm

      l was mistaken about this guy going to Robert’s office. He actually went to the Trust Fund office [who distribute funds anonymously].

  9. mgoldberg says

    May 7, 2017 at 12:45 pm

    I wonder if Robert is considering offering to debate the issues with the King Fraud scholars, and join Prof Chesler on a panel there for all to consider the evidence, rather than the fascist dismissal of Prof Chesler to simply appear on a panel. The same kind of offer he made to the Gettsburg prof who defamed his appearance without any evidence, might be interesting to see if it is responded too.

    • Robert Spencer says

      May 7, 2017 at 1:35 pm

      mgoldberg:

      Please read what I wrote above.

      • mgoldberg says

        May 7, 2017 at 2:59 pm

        Yes… I must have missed the last statment. And of course, you are correct- they will not invite you, or her, or anyone else. The door will be shut.
        I took a view over at Ms Chesler’s website at her post dismissal article and she wrote this:
        “https://phyllis-chesler.com/articles/what-the-bystanders-do-or-fail-to-do-is-more-important-than-what-the-evil-doers-have-done

        “…What matters: No lawyer has stepped forward who is willing and able to represent me and all the other academics and scholars who have been dis-invited. No group of academics have launched a petition or a campaign of any kind on behalf of those academics whose reputations have been sullied, who have not been paid for their preparation. No group has, as yet, undertaken lawsuits, not only on behalf of free speech, but also on behalf of the rights of students to learn the truth of a matter instead of only junk knowledge; to be educated as opposed to indoctrinated; to learn how to tolerate, value, and handle intellectual diversity without resorting to insults and mob violence.”

  10. isntlam says

    May 7, 2017 at 3:11 pm

    Can someone please explain for me what a “left-fascist” is?

    Wikipedia says “Fascism /ˈfæʃɪzəm/ is a form of radical authoritarian nationalism,[1][2] characterized by dictatorial power, forcible suppression of opposition, and control of industry and commerce,[3] that came to prominence in early 20th-century Europe.”

    And that makes sense because the Nazis were radical authoritarian nationalists.

    Other sources also include nationalism as a defining feature of fascism.

    But these leftists Robert is talking about aren’t nationalistic, so I don’t understand what a “left-fascist” would be.

    • billybob says

      May 7, 2017 at 8:03 pm

      The left are the new fascists, with groups like ANTIFA supplying the forcible suppression of opposition,.

      • isntlam says

        May 8, 2017 at 11:48 am

        Yes, they want to use force to suppress their opposition. But they’re not trying to control industry and commerce. And they are not nationalists, so I don’t see how they can be fascists.

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