Moral Maze - Freedom of Speech (tonight, 24 Feb 2021)

[nauticant]

Tonight's Moral Maze is about freedom of speech and the trailer I heard earlier was built around the latest Kathleen Stock "outrage".

Could be worth a listen. However, MM usually disappoints on important issues by missing the point and tonight Ask Sarkar is on the panel:

twitter.com/AyoCaesar/status/1364534623448010752

For something less idiotic see: twitter.com/monasiddiqui7/status/1364479379368214530

I bet someone says "free speech does not mean freedom from consequences" at some point in the discussion.

😁 I might listen in

Thanks OP - any GC voices on there?

My bet is on "Since we're discussing Kathleen Stock, and indeed she was awarded an OBE, then how is it possible to say she's been cancelled?"

The argument is that unless everyone who is cancelled immediately becomes a nonperson from whom and about whom nothing is ever heard of again, then cancelling is clearly a myth.

Yes, I saw that. However I looked at the lineup and couldn't see any silenced academics on the panel, but they might be called as experts though I guess. I cannot bear to listen to Ash Sarkar. I don't know why this silly brat is taken seriously by any media.

No information yet on experts giving evidence FindTheTruth. The panel is Anne McElvoy, Ash Sarkar, Mona Siddiqui and Tim Stanley so an even conservative:progressive split.

I'm a regular listener to MM and quite often find myself agreeing with the daftie that is Ash Sarkar when she's on...it's hugely disconcerting and upsets me greatly when it happens

Aaah thanks nauticant , I wasn't familiar with the format. so does this mean the panel won't know who the experts will be? and do you know how many experts typically give evidence?

Should be interesting though I find Ash Sarkar very immature.

As far as I'm aware the panel don't know who the experts are beforehand. Maybe 4 experts per programme. If I've got this right, you'll have the pair of progressive panel members asking questions of an expert with an "opposing view" and then the next expert will be exposed to the pair of conservative panel members for a similarly opposing engagement.

Oh gosh I should listen but I think I will find it too annoying and will want to throw things.

I've heard it before but can't remember how it works. Is it 4 experts & all the panel ask questions? Then I seem to remember they discuss what they've heard, and it makes it sound like they are bitching behind someone's back, because they've literally just been there, and when they've gone everyone says 'when she said xxxx I found that so unconvincing....'

I wonder if the way the panel question the experts will change depending on who they're asking, like FPFW forensic analysis of how the WESC women's equalities committee questions the TRAs and then the GCs. very revealing

The discussion on MM is at a superficial level and the questions asked are usually driven by the panellists' hobby horses rather than in getting to the fundamentals of the issue.

In a trailer for the programme just now Michael Buerk described Kathleen Stock's view about "the immutability of biological sex" as being "unfashionable". You do have to laugh.

@Sunkisses

Yes, I saw that. However I looked at the lineup and couldn't see any silenced academics on the panel, but they might be called as experts though I guess. I cannot bear to listen to Ash Sarkar. I don't know why this silly brat is taken seriously by any media.

Box ticking, innit....

Let's see whether for a change there'll be some proper engagement with the issues.

Mona Siddiqui has a peculiar definition of free specch: words have consequences and can be weaponised

I’m not sure how much longer I can listen to Sarkar.

Well, I did enjoy listening to Professor Eric Kaufmann who had a clear sense of what's been going on:

www.bbk.ac.uk/our-staff/profile/8004549/eric-kaufmann

Next expert is Zamzam Ibrahim: it's all false, hidden agendas, Student Unions are democratic so their decision making is fine. The problem is actually something else, it's demonisation of People of Colour.

[quote nauticant]Tonight's Moral Maze is about freedom of speech and the trailer I heard earlier was built around the latest Kathleen Stock "outrage".

Could be worth a listen. However, MM usually disappoints on important issues by missing the point and tonight Ask Sarkar is on the panel:

twitter.com/AyoCaesar/status/1364534623448010752[/quote]
And they further disappoint by not even asking Kathleen Stock.

twitter.com/Docstockk/status/1364644836591165443

Oooh, now it's Professor Jonathan Haidt!

Ash Sarkar just said that in academia we should be free to make value judgements about certain ideas and so it follows that we shouldn't have to hear them. She really is witless.

Ash Sarkar 🙄 That is all.

The last witness is a professor from SOAS who seems to have little to say beyond #bekind.