On 21-12-2010 11:07, Warp wrote:
> andrel<byt### [at] gmailcom>  wrote:
>> On 20-12-2010 21:48, Warp wrote:
>>> andrel<byt### [at] gmailcom>   wrote:
>>>> He was consistently trying to provoke violence towards groups of
>>>> people by selective portrayal of individual actions as that of a whole
>>>> group (while trying to keep within the boundaries of what is just not
>>>> racism). He was also trying to anger a lot of Dutch people that happened
>>>> to have immigrant forefathers, apparently hoping that one of them would
>>>> be so angry that he would misbehave. Or so at least is one view on what
>>>> he does.
>>>> The case against him was therefore on provoking violence and not on
>>>> freedom of speech, just as Assange's case is on rape and not freedom of
>>>> speech.
>>>
>>>     Good to see you are not prejudiced in the least.
>
>> I try not to be, indeed. (unless you meant it cynical, in which case I
>> would be interested to know on which side my prejudices are)
>
>    I was referring to your *assertion* that he was "trying to provoke
> violence" etc, as if it was a given and something clear to everybody, in
> the same vein as if someone had broken a window with twenty eyewitnesses
> and five security cameras clearly testifying about it without any possible
> doubt. It sounded like you were saying "he did that, and the only remaining
> question is if he should be punished and how much".
>
>    There are many other reasons why someone would publish a critique of
> a phenomenon (regardless of whether that critique is accurate or not, or
> whether it's presented in a misleading way or not, either intentionally
> or not). Outright claiming "it was made to provoke violence" is prejudice.

When I read your remark I realized that I did something that I should 
not do in a conversation with you. I deliberately overstated and added 
'just as Assange's case is on rape and not freedom of speech'. Which was 
intended as a signal that I also don't believe what I wrote in the 
preceding paragraph. From previous experience I should have known that 
you are likely to miss that, so I should not have done that, my 
apologies for that.

To be clear: what I wrote is what some people believe, e.g. the ones 
that wanted to prosecute Wilders. It does not reflect what I think.

>> In general the majority in a country has to be able to get more
>> criticism than a minority.
>
>    That's an interesting assertion, and something I don't necessarily fully
> agree with. The main reason why I don't fully agree with it is because it
> is contradictory with the basic tenet of equal rights: Everybody should have
> the same rights and duties regardless of background, ethnicity, sexual
> orientation, and so on. Everybody should be judged equally before the law.
> This is one of the fundamental principles of human rights and constitutional
> freedom and equality.
>
>    A country which claims in its constitution (or otherwise) that everybody
> is equal before the law, but at the same time applies law differently on
> different groups of people based eg. on background, has a double standard.
>
>    Being more lenient of criticism of the "majority" and stricter of criticism
> of a "minority" is a double standard and, as said, contradictory with the
> fundamental principle of equality.

I am just describing what happens in practice. If you don't like it for 
philosophical reasons, try to find another planet to live on.

>> If that minority is more vulnerable.
>
>    More vulnerable to what? To getting offended?

physical violence, economic exclusion, that sort of thing.

>    Why is it more permissible to offend the majority but less permissible
> to offend a minority? What difference does it make? How is offending a
> minority a worse crime than offending the majority? That *is* a double
> standard.
>
>    (How do you even *define* the "majority" that needs less protection?

In a democracy a majority needs no special protection, a minority does. 
Only if there is no democracy and the ruling class is a minority a 
majority needs protection. A situation that happens in various places in 
this world an in such a context people might refer to the larger group 
as a minority, which would confuse nobody except the nerd.

> There was once an article, I think it was on a major British newspaper
> website, that over 50% of the population of the UK belongs to a protected
> minority. Ironically this means that less than 50% of the population
> belongs to the sector that gets no special protection from the law,
> making them effectively a minority themselves.)

Women as a group have less access to resources than men. That is why 
they are generally considered a 'minority' that might need special 
protection. So even without immigrants and homosexuals, and with no 
other religion than the state religion, male chauvinist pigs are always 
a numerical minority even though they are the sociological majority.

I think you are also assuming that being a minority is a property of a 
person and not of the context.

If you read something like what you refer to from that paper, be 
careful. It might be a convert attempt to justify current discriminatory 
practices.

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