Britain Bars the Door to Michael Savage »
Posted By JamesMarcus 6 months ago in NewsEarlier today, the British government published a list of people barred from setting foot in the country. According to Home Secretary Jacqui Smith, the list identifies 16 purveyors of hate speech and extremism (there are another six that the government declined to make public). This rogue's gallery includes Muslim extremists, Russian gang members, an Israeli militant, a father-and-daughter team devoted to anti-gay agitation--and American talk-radio host Michael Savage.
Savage, who is based in San Francisco, has enraged multiple constituencies. He has called the Koran a "book of hate," and accused autistic children of faking it: "In 99 percent of the cases, it's a brat who hasn't been told to cut the act out. That's what autism is." His high profile as a shock jock notwithstanding, it's a little surprising to see Savage singled out in this way--he's hardly the only vituperative voice in our polarized political landscape. Nor does he rise to the squalid level of, say, Samir Al Quntar, a serial killer whose victims include a four-year-old girl. The real question here is how Britain has chosen to balance the opposing demands of civility and free speech.
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JamesMarcus
James Marcus is a writer, translator, critic, and editor. He is the author of Amazonia: Five Years at the Epicenter of the Dot-Com Juggernaut and ...
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JamesMarcus6 months ago
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hyperbola6 months ago
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When the UK adds Avigdor Lieberman to its list, or puts tony blair on trial for war crimes, then they might have some credibility.
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Frankly Michael Savage is a distraction. The real people to identify and ostracize are the billionaire oligarchs who finance this kind of hatred to keep americans divided.
The peasant mentality lives on in America
.... This must be a terrible time to be a right-winger. A vicious paradox has been thrust upon the once-ascendant conservatives. On the one hand they are out of power, and so must necessarily rail against the Obama administration. On the other hand they have to vilify, as dangerous anticapitalist activity, the grass-roots protests against the Geithner bailouts and the excess of companies like AIG. That leaves them with no recourse but to dream up wholesale lunacies along the lines of Glenn Beck’s recent “Fascism With a Happy Face” rants, which link the protesting “populists” and the Obama adminstration somehow and imagine them as one single nefarious, connected, ongoing effort to install a totalitarian regime.
This is not a simple rhetorical accomplishment. It requires serious mental gymnastics to describe the Obama administration — particularly the Obama administration of recent weeks, which has given away billions to Wall Street and bent over backwards to avoid nationalization and pursue a policy that preserves the private for-profit status of the bailed-out banks — as a militaristic dictatorship of anti-wealth, anti-private property forces. You have to somehow explain the Geithner/Paulson decisions to hand over trillions of taxpayer dollars to the rich bankers as the formal policy expression of progressive rage against the rich. Not easy. In order to pull off this argument, in fact, you have to grease the wheels with a lot of apocalyptic language and imagery, invoking as Beck did massive pictures of Stalin and Orwell and Mussolini (side by side with shots of Geithner, Obama and Bernanke), scenes of workers storming the Winter Palace interspersed with anti-AIG protests, etc. — and then maybe you have to add a crazy new twist, like switching from complaints of “socialism” to warnings of “fascism.” Rhetorically, this is the equivalent of trying to paint a picture by hurling huge handfuls of paint at the canvas. It’s desperate, last-ditch-ish behavior. -
PsychoHosebeastComment removed: Spammer, Abusive4 Replies
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Eagle_Eye6 months ago
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Mutainia6 months ago
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Britain will ban a guy for speaking his mind on a radio station, yet, it won't ban those who call Jews apes and swine and that the government of England needs to be over-thrown and Shariah imposed. What ever happened to "I may not agree with what you say, but, will defend to the death your right to say it?" I wonder.
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smithichie6 months ago
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I wonder how long that list of barred folks will be when Britain gets around to criminilizing thought, along with speech?
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I don't agree with Savage one bit other than he has the right to speak his mind-no matter how ugly. Words and speech are countered with words and speech. Outlawing such things only empowers them. IMHO-
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PsychoHosebeastComment removed: Spammer, Abusive2 Replies
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libsRfunnyComment removed: Hard Banned25 Replies
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Bkumm6 months ago
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Several things should be noted here.
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1. The United Kingdom does not have the same Constitution as the United States AND even in the U.S. you can't say anything you want whenever you want without consequences. If the United Kingdom (or England as one of the constituent states) wants to keep that filth slinging douchebag Michael Savage out of their country they have every right to do so.
2. Free speech is just that, free speech. It does not mean, as so many would have you believe, that speech is without consequences. If an atheist were to talk smack about Jews all day long, ranting about their "evil book" the Torah and how they promote a "religion of violence" without encouraging violence, he would be protected under the Constitution for his speech. However, people that were slandered by his comments would then have the right to take other actions against him because he violated THEIR rights to not have hateful, untrue things said about them (hateful TRUE things are a different matter).
3. Michael Savage is not worth listening to. He's a demagogue and a race baiting, religious baiting POS in it for the money and the money alone. Sorry, James that probably violates the TOU, but the truth is the truth.-
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alakazam6 months ago
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I agree...I have actually listened to Micheal Savage.
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He sounds like he went to a propaganda school.
It's ugly.
Though I really have to say that I think the British Government is working towards a police state ...dissent is unwelcome?
That's kinda scary...so is rabble-rousing I guess...tough call but it's their Country.
Would we have let Hess in?
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Spadecaller6 months ago
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Weill done James! This is an article that challenges me to think more deeply about a subject that is not easily understood. I am skeptical about the comments from those that profess to have the answers.
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I am not sure what hate speech should or should not be censored. Those that think they know the truth are too often quite deluded.
The bigotry of some posters on Propeller that use this forum to promote their racism and antiSemitism (both covertly and overtly)can often border on the edge of what the Terms of Use claim to prohibit.
The difficulty comes when people with clay feet, who are also affected by their politics, religions, likes, and dislikes are entrusted with the job of invoking and enacting these guidelines.
Oh yes, each of us wittingly or ignorantly agreed to these guidelines when we became members of Propeller. Does that mean that management will enforce these rules? (Maybe and sometimes.)
Does it mean that when management chooses to enact these guidelines, that it will always be purely objective? And when members are penalized for conduct that is clearly over the line, will it not illicit opposition by offended members?
In essence, nations and governments have their distinct sets of laws - some of which prohibit speech that can be defined as sedition including hate speech that clearly can be viewed as provocation for violence against minorities or others.
Again, I am at a loss of knowing how, as mortal beings with clay feet, people vulnerable to prejudices and favoritism can be trusted to enforce these laws.
It certainly is a puzzling issue. Those that try to simplify this quandary and frame it by espousing black and white dogma or even historical precedents are blind to the risks involved in acting or not acting against hate speech. -
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ranchhasawhiteass6 months ago
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Different country than the one I live in so they can do what they want.
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In my country people should be able to say they thoughts but that WAS my country. Now if'n you don't goose the step and hollow the hole you are considered racist , sexist, homophobic.
I yearn for the days when man was only considered hot by women. sigh-
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Charlson6 months ago
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TimALoftis6 months ago
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Just last week, Mr. Savage said this about illegal aliens;
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“No contact anywhere with an illegal alien!, And that starts in the restaurants" where he said, you “don’t know if they wipe their behinds with their hands!”
This while another conservative talk show host was suspended last week because of his hate filled rants toward Mexicans.
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/30467300/
and people wonder why talk radio is often referred to as 'Hate Radio'-
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Bkumm6 months ago
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I'm not supporting Michael Savage here, but I'm not sure that the quote above is hate speech. It does suggest that we shouldn't have "contact" with illegal aliens, but it doesn't promote treating them more poorly than any other group. It tells us not to have contact with them and not support the businesses that hire them, but it doesn't say that we should treat them differently.
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The whole behind wiping thing is sophistry.
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Bkumm6 months ago
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Hate speech, like hate crime, is difficult to identify. Most people recognize overt hate speech when they hear it. When someone refers to some group in a way that promotes treating that group in a worse way than other members of the society simply for being members of that group, that is overt hate speech. By that definition Michael Savage says hate speech.
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What is more difficult to identify, at least in my opinion, is questioning whether or not something is hate speech just because a member or a group of members of a group find it offensive. It may be offensive to that group, but does it promote treating that group differently than other members of the society? I personally do not like to be referred to as a "White person". I'm a person, period, full stop. But, some people do refer to me that way. Should I accuse them of hate speech because I'm offended? Probably not, depending on how they mean it. But, that's the problem in a nutshell, isn't it? Who decides what is and isn't hate speech? Is intent the litmus test? Obviously, England has chosen to say that what Michael Savage propounds is hate speech. And that's their right.-
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Jeboba6 months ago
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The problem I have with the right wing hatemongers is that they 'validate' the absolute crazies out there who will act out on that hate.
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Some day, somebody is going to kill someone and they will say it was because Limbaugh, Savage, O'Reilly, Hannity, etc. made him feel like it was OK.
Oh, weight, the guy that killed the cops a couple of weeks back was an avid listener to Glen Beck. That explains it all.
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sonofreasonComment removed: Hard Banned2 Replies
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aceofspades16 months ago
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Savage is a manipulative opportunist who knows where the money is. but he is not really what this thread is about - this thread is about the consequences of using our right of free speech - what many of you seem to be missing is that that right exists WITHIN the U.S. , we have barred people from entering our country for what they have said elsewhere and that is exactly what the UK is doing.
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The right of free speech as practiced here is not to be found anywhere else in the world, but there are some quirks too - the recent Supreme Court decision pertaining to the use of just one word is countered in the UK where profanities are to be heard on the airwaves all the time. Yet here a cartoonist can represent our president as a chimp but in the UK it is against the law for news outlets to say anything derogatory of the royal family. -
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zaph226 months ago
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So not only should free speech, no matter how stupid, be done anywith, but anyone that disagrrees with a comment you made, but doesn't tell you why, so you can attack them (although in this case you didn't need a response to attack) and that attack, and calling someone a coward because you don't agree with how they do something says a great deal abouit youi and not so much about Stalemate. Attcking someone that did no more than disagree with you and let you know it seems cowardly to me, but that is just MY opinionn. And I am beginnning to regret my decision to reply to your comment after I gave it the neg it deserved for attacking someone for no good reason.
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aceofspades16 months ago
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Whoa hold on there Zaph- I never advocated doing away with free speech, in fact I believe it is one of the cornerstones of our great country & must be defended against all attacks upon it.
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What you need is some help in reading comprehension. I never called Stalemate a coward because he disagreed with me, but shooting & running is a cowardly thing to do & that is what negging a statement without a counter argument constantly as Stalemate does is a cowardly act - disagreeing is NOT
If you can't see it ,so be it -- but at least you replied-
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zaph226 months ago
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Never said anything about your view on free speech, just said I can't see how youi can ASSUME someone is a coward just because of their way of letting you know they disagree with you, we can give a pos or neg on any comments here right? Where does it say in the
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TOU that you must reply to a comment before voting on it one way or the other, and I still say attacking someone for doing that says more about you than it does about them, Stalemate, as far as I know from this thread, didn't start name calling and childish attacks on you because of a comment, or lack of one, here. Anyway, this is just MY own personal opinion, and I have no idea if you're the bravest, or most cowardly person on earth because of your votes on any comment. But it dose, imho, point to things aboiut youi, but I'm not going to assume my opinions abouit you right now are right, or wrong, because from comments and votes I have no real way to know, just like you don't really know if someone is a coward or not over a vote on a comment. OK, I'm done ranting now. -
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zaph226 months ago
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And I see now I was wrong, I see where you got that I was saying you avdocate doing away with free speech, I can admit when I make a mistake, and I did, I see what you meant, and you were right to think I was saying that because I worded the first part of my response so poorly it was the only thing you could think I was saying. But to clarify, what I was really trying to get across was that (and I see this a lot here from both sides of the aisle) your comment aboiut Stalemate had nothing to do with the subject, the story, at hand.
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Mutainia6 months ago
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Not only did they ban Michael Savage, but, they also banned Geert Wilders, the creator of "Fitna". "Fitna" was considered hateful, yet, all it did was expose the true Islam Muhammadans don't want you to see, using Quranic scriptures to back up his points. Let's face it, EVERYone will soon submit to Islam through it's intimidation whether you like it or not. Believe it or not, a Muhammadan actually shut ME up on a certain website by letting all on my account know my real name and what city I'm writing out of. He or she couldn't defend Islam AT all, but, he COULD shut me up by letting all know my true identity so they could come and carve my head off if I continue to expose Islam. That's how Islam works, folks. THAT is how it grows. Through threat and intimidation. I have been SILENCED on that website. It will probably happen here as well.
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carenxx6 months ago
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I do think they have a right to bar him if they think he will foment discontent. We would probably do the same. Look, how many people were angered when Iran's president was asked to come speak at the college in NY? Plenty! Hate speech is often in the eye of the beholder. Perhaps the Brits are just sensitive to outspoken Americans, considering they lost the colonies due to some pretty outspoken politicians with some fairly radical ideals.
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Mutainia6 months ago
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I think they feared an Islamic back-lash if they didn't start attacking American talk radio. Savage is the best at his craft, the most honest in his thoughts when it comes to Islam, so, he became the chosen lightning rod to help appease Islam in Britain. It's Savage now, it will be others, later.
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strauss8876 months ago
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Michael Savage may be abrasive but if you listen to him for more than a minute you know he loves this country, the people in it, and the culture we have created. He stands for free speech not hate speech. He believes in the laws we have created for ourselves and when those laws are obviously ignored he gets upset. We should all be getting upset right now.
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scott42616 months ago
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Michael (Weiner) Savage is really a nutball of the highest order, but is he a threat? Oh he's stupid, alright...his comments about autism recently show that. And I don't have to mention the outright venomous lies he rants about gay people. And his mantra, "liberalism is a mental disorder"? Well, I just have to laugh at that because he is about as deranged and unhinged a conservative as there is...but is he a threat? I hate to defend someone whom I cannot stand to listen to for more than a few seconds, but I think this is a little extreme...
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lloydm656 months ago
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I like that,go back to your own country to say nasty things.Truth of the matter is people like the Dixie Chicks
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( chickens)don't have the courage of their conviction.They spew their hatred in the U K,but come home to a sellout crowd at American airline center,and don't utter a sound about it.-
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Natureboy6 months ago
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U R Sutcha Tard.
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They wrote, performed and recorded a song about it - "Not Ready to Make Nice."
The album on which it appears debuted at the top of both the pop and country and western charts. It was the ninth best-selling album of 2006.
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Calypso5616 months ago
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Michael Savage probably couldn't care less about all of this. The Brits are panty-waist wusses anyway. I KNOW most of us are decendants of the English, but that was then, this is now. I like Mike, he says what he means, and means what he says, besides, he's too smart for the Brits, he has more degress than a thermometer.
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BB646 months ago
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What the hell happened to the gene pool in the UK. For 500 years the sun never set on the British Empire. They were the envy of the world. Best sciences, great industrial leader, best military, good government, bringing civilization to some of the most dangerous parts of the world. The Empire acted as the police force for the world, because more than 25% of the planet was part of the Empire.
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Now, with the Empire gone, their military, while very good, is tiny. Their industrial base is gone. Their economy is in a shambles because of social programs. High taxes, poor health care. Violent crime is a major problem. This is what their ancestors fought for? I can see why they wouldn't want someone like Savage to visit. No one likes to be told the truth. Look at them. They went from the biggest to one of the smallest. They went from a nation of tradition to a bunch of scat queen wankers. It pains me to talk like this but my family is from Portsmouth. They would be very disappointed to see what's left of their Empire.
So banning Savage, he should send a thank you note. -
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Goppy6 months ago
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I understand where you are coming from BB....
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You are really pushing that "Gotta be a world power and intimidator" concept ... no matter how much money it costs.
Because, after all, you ARE a military contractor ... this is your mindset.
The more money the Government spends on the Military ... the better it is for you ... personally.
And by the way ... the profile you have given of the British is highly xenophobic. The economy of England is pretty darn good - their health care ranks higher than the United States - and London is one of the world's largest banking centers.
But keep pushing for taxpayers to spend ever more money on our Military Industrial Complex ... even though it already roughly equals what THE ENTIRE WORLD spends on 'defense' ... if you can call that kind of spending 'defensive'.
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One thing about Modern Republicans ... they LOVE to spend money. The more they spend ... the happier they are.
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jakesguile6 months ago
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You're right about that he certainly has a lot of degrees
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Antibackwards Child psychology
A Doctorate in Hate
Two Masters in Blame the Victim
an ASS degree in Dey Tuk Errr Juubbbs
Twelve Counts...um sorry, MDs in Christian Revisionism
Three Phd's in Homophobia from Phelps Watchmen U
And that angry face has to account for about 120 degrees right there. How his brain doesn't melt is beyond me -
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BB646 months ago
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Savage hate speech? The UK has finally hit bottom. My goodness. When did the mullahs take over the Home Secretary's office. I'm not a fan of Savage but to claim he's a purveyor of hate speech is a joke. I've been to the UK. I've heard the hate spewed from some of the Islamic groups. If you're using Savage as the base line, when will the UK export most of their Islamic residents from Pakistan? Many came here as students but stayed. Some are productive members of society but many more are not. If you ban Savage, you must also ban them.
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