Words
Boy, that was fast!
Twelve minutes after the post below went up - twelve minutes! - an editor at the venerable old Canadian magazine was in touch with me, insisting they still wanted to publish a letter from me, but, er, they needed "sources."
Okay, fine. After toasting declining birth rates in Christian nations, and cheering multiculturalism's hegemony - and kneeling before the framed photos of Pierre Trudeau and Osama bin Laden in the middle of our living room, natch, done up like a Bedouin tent - we bundled the little Socialists off to bed. Then I got to work, eager to satisfy the editors at Maclean's - who require rather more factual rigour of letter-writers than their columnists, but no matter - because, like all Godless One-Worlders, I am eager to please.
Here is the letter, with footnotes now. Anyone willing to make a wager on whether it will ever be published?
...
March 2, 2008
Editor,
Macleans’s
One Mount Pleasant Road
11th floor
Toronto, ON
M4Y 2Y5
Dear Sir:
Here, with yet more citations, is the letter that your Mark Stevenson requested for publication.
**
Being slandered by Mark Steyn, for quite a few of us, is actually something to be proud of.
After all, this is the man who calls Chinese people “Chinks” and Japanese people “Japs.”1 He calls Indians “wogs.” 2 He’s the pundit who reminds the “Injuns” that they were beaten by “the white man.”3
In his writings, Steyn also goes on about “the Yellow Peril”4 and “gooks.”5 He says it’s “correct” to refer to Muslims as “beturbanned prophet-monkeys”6 who have a “disproportionate” share of “the rape market.”7 Steyn insists that none of this garbage means that he is a racist, only that he is a “culturist.”8 (Tell that to the “Chinks.”)
Like I say: getting smeared by Mark Steyn is not necessarily a bad thing. Recently, I saw Steyn wrote this about me: “Why [Warren] Kinsella is photographing public toilets on his knees I don't know, but every guy needs a hobby.”
Ho ho ho! Typical Steyn: a cheap smear, wrapped up in a risible line. But it’s more garbage.
I support reasonable limits on expression. I’m against hate propaganda and violent pornography (I don’t support the human rights complaint brought against Steyn, ironically). On my web site, www.warrenkinsella.com, I have written about limits on speech, to Steyn’s apparent irritation.
So, I recently posted a cell phone photo taken at a local hockey rink – of swastikas and “WHITE POWER” on a wall – to question whether those things are “speech” worth protecting. My six-year-old son spotted the swastikas, and asked me what they meant. I took the photo to show the rink staff, so they could erase it. Later, I put the photo on my site to argue that hate propaganda always deserves erasing.
Mark Steyn thinks hate speech shouldn’t be erased, evidently. He seemingly thinks it adds value.
But falsely stating one of his critics is “on his knees,” taking pictures in a toilet, says quite a bit about who is the hater, here, and who is the hated.
Sincerely,
Warren Kinsella
FOOTNOTES
1. The Spectator, March 24, 2001
2. National Post, August 19, 2002
3. Maclean’s, October 20, 2006
4. National Post, April 16, 2001
5. National Post, May 11, 2000
6. The Telegraph, November 8, 2005
7. National Post, August 19, 2002
8. Jewish World Review, August 23, 2002
Twelve minutes after the post below went up - twelve minutes! - an editor at the venerable old Canadian magazine was in touch with me, insisting they still wanted to publish a letter from me, but, er, they needed "sources."
Okay, fine. After toasting declining birth rates in Christian nations, and cheering multiculturalism's hegemony - and kneeling before the framed photos of Pierre Trudeau and Osama bin Laden in the middle of our living room, natch, done up like a Bedouin tent - we bundled the little Socialists off to bed. Then I got to work, eager to satisfy the editors at Maclean's - who require rather more factual rigour of letter-writers than their columnists, but no matter - because, like all Godless One-Worlders, I am eager to please.
Here is the letter, with footnotes now. Anyone willing to make a wager on whether it will ever be published?
March 2, 2008
Editor,
Macleans’s
One Mount Pleasant Road
11th floor
Toronto, ON
M4Y 2Y5
Dear Sir:
Here, with yet more citations, is the letter that your Mark Stevenson requested for publication.
Being slandered by Mark Steyn, for quite a few of us, is actually something to be proud of.
After all, this is the man who calls Chinese people “Chinks” and Japanese people “Japs.”1 He calls Indians “wogs.” 2 He’s the pundit who reminds the “Injuns” that they were beaten by “the white man.”3
In his writings, Steyn also goes on about “the Yellow Peril”4 and “gooks.”5 He says it’s “correct” to refer to Muslims as “beturbanned prophet-monkeys”6 who have a “disproportionate” share of “the rape market.”7 Steyn insists that none of this garbage means that he is a racist, only that he is a “culturist.”8 (Tell that to the “Chinks.”)
Like I say: getting smeared by Mark Steyn is not necessarily a bad thing. Recently, I saw Steyn wrote this about me: “Why [Warren] Kinsella is photographing public toilets on his knees I don't know, but every guy needs a hobby.”
Ho ho ho! Typical Steyn: a cheap smear, wrapped up in a risible line. But it’s more garbage.
I support reasonable limits on expression. I’m against hate propaganda and violent pornography (I don’t support the human rights complaint brought against Steyn, ironically). On my web site, www.warrenkinsella.com, I have written about limits on speech, to Steyn’s apparent irritation.
So, I recently posted a cell phone photo taken at a local hockey rink – of swastikas and “WHITE POWER” on a wall – to question whether those things are “speech” worth protecting. My six-year-old son spotted the swastikas, and asked me what they meant. I took the photo to show the rink staff, so they could erase it. Later, I put the photo on my site to argue that hate propaganda always deserves erasing.
Mark Steyn thinks hate speech shouldn’t be erased, evidently. He seemingly thinks it adds value.
But falsely stating one of his critics is “on his knees,” taking pictures in a toilet, says quite a bit about who is the hater, here, and who is the hated.
Sincerely,
Warren Kinsella
FOOTNOTES
1. The Spectator, March 24, 2001
2. National Post, August 19, 2002
3. Maclean’s, October 20, 2006
4. National Post, April 16, 2001
5. National Post, May 11, 2000
6. The Telegraph, November 8, 2005
7. National Post, August 19, 2002
8. Jewish World Review, August 23, 2002