"I know of no country in which, speaking generally, there is less
independence of mind and true freedom of discussion than in America."

Alexis de Tocqueville

On Sat, 15 Sep 2001, Johanna Rubba wrote:

> I am going to call once again for a cessation of ideological debate on
> this list about this particular incident, the roots of terrorism, George
> Bush's honesty, the reasonableness of past US actions, etc., etc. This
> isn't a call for censorship or an attempt to silence anyone. Mr.
> Einarsson and all others are free to express their opinions in any
> number of venues. Every specialized list has limits on topics of debate,
> and moderated lists are outright censored, in that sense. List members
> accept this, or leave the list. We are a self-moderated list, so we must
> impose limits ourselves. If every list becomes a venue for discussion of
> every topic, there will not be progress on the topic the list is
> supposedly devoted to. Topics as hot as Tuesday's events could lead to
> endless, emotional debate. I sure have my own very strong opinions, that
> I would love to share, about every aspect of the terrorist attack, but
> I'm not broadcasting them on a grammar-teaching list.
> 
> I know that politics and ideology infuse academia, and where that is
> related to the discipline, it makes perfect sense. Marxist vs. other
> interpretations of literature are valid debates, _in literary venues_. I
> have trouble connecting terrorism and this incident with grammar
> pedagogy and even the ideology of education, which we have
> (appropriately, I think) discussed in the past.
> 
> We all have strong feelings about what happened this week, and we want
> to express those feelings, but there are more appropriate venues. There
> are lists where, perhaps, the rules of civil debate are more lax, and
> people not only openly disagree about interpretations of history and
> particular incidents like this, but even trade insults. Being told to
> shut up and mind my own business does not encourage me to paricipate in
> any kind of exchange, nor does it persuade me to the point of view being
> promoted by the issuer of these demands. In fact, it only encourages me
> to delete postings from such people unread.
> 
> Don't we have enough disagreement among us about grammar teaching
> without further muddling things with at best remotely related topics?
> 
> ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
> Johanna Rubba   Associate Professor, Linguistics
> English Department, California Polytechnic State University
> One Grand Avenue  • San Luis Obispo, CA 93407
> Tel. (805)-756-2184  •  Fax: (805)-756-6374 • Dept. Phone.  756-2596
> • E-mail: [log in to unmask] •  Home page: http://www.cla.calpoly.edu/~jrubba
> ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
> 
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