Dear listfolk,

Oh well. The coda about "condescending" in my last mail was not too serious, as the preceding sentence ought to make clear. But I guess it was no time for jest given the debating context and the sizable amounts of hostility. Yes, hostility, for calling it "kindness" or "human fellow-feeling" would now count as unacceptable satire. OK, point taken.

I should have known, for earlier in the mail I mentioned my own prediction, based on past experiences, that attacks on me typically start a pattern where they get completely ignored and accepted, even explicitly supported, though obviously in violation of list rules. They are not at all weighed by the criterion whether they are acceptable in a conference hall, face to face; whereas anything I then say in defence is put under the microscope to find some pretext for bending or changing list rules to oust or at any rate silence me. And that is exactly what is playing out now.

When signing that petition in favour of freedom of speech, back in Zürich in 2014, then particularly for Wendy Doniger, I couldn't help thinking: many of these signatories are only in favour of free speech in the same way as Hitler and Stalin were, viz. in favour of free speech for their own, and to hell with it for the Other. I would very much like to be proven wrong about that.

Best regards,

Dr. Koenraad Elst

On Sun, 30 Jun 2019, 09:52 Valerie Roebuck via INDOLOGY, <indology@list.indology.info> wrote:

Dear Chris

Certainly not. We should behave on a list like this as (I hope) we would when face to face with our colleagues in a conference room. Anyone indulging in name-calling or withering sarcasm, or trying to label colleagues as ’trespassing youngsters’, has already lost whatever argument they had. In my view we are all equal members on here. The fact that some of us have been knocking around longer than others does not necessarily make us wiser, as the Dhammapada points out.

Valerie J Roebuck
Manchester, UK
On 30 Jun 2019, at 15:35, Christian P. Haskett via INDOLOGY <indology@list.indology.info> wrote:
Recently, a member posted that he has: 
 
“a right to talk
"condescendingly" to trespassing youngsters.”

Holding in abeyance the questions of ‘trespass’ and ‘youngsters,’ and entirely bracketing any questions about the rectitude of various positions in the debate, does the list and its committee affirm this right?

Does the list committee affirm the right of this or any other scholar to conduct him or herself in such fashion, including belittling name-calling, withering sarcasm, and plainly disparaging ad hominem attacks—and a concomitant obligation on the part of myself and other youngsters to endure such treatment—by allowing him or her continued membership without censure?

I don't believe such a right exists, or should, but it’s not my place to decide. On the other hand, rights and obligations are contingent and limited to the domains in which they are granted, and so I’ll quietly show myself out if that’s the way things are going to be. That’s really not meant as a threat. I am an utterly inconsequential and passive participant in Indology. However, I suspect that others feel the same way, and are not so free as I am to say so, and that perhaps the management of Indology would benefit from knowing that.

best
cpbh
--
Chris Haskett
Assistant Professor, Religion
Centre College

स्वप्नोपमत्वाद्धर्मणां भवशान्त्योरकल्पना
--स्फुटार्थ ४।६०
Because they are dreamlike, the arising and ceasing of things are inconceivable. Sphuṭārtha 4.60
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