# Today's Lesson: Context matters (Canadian edition) **URL:** \ **Category:** The BBQ Pit\ **Created:** [September 15, 2011, 4:04am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/todays-lesson-context-matters-canadian-edition/596370 "2011-09-15T04:04:22Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 3
**Author:** ![Cat\_Whisperer](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/cat_whisperer/32/4839_2.png) [@Cat\_Whisperer](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Cat_Whisperer)\ **Post date:** [September 15, 2011, 5:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/todays-lesson-context-matters-canadian-edition/596370/41 "2011-09-15T17:52:19Z")
> [@Capitaine\_Zombie](#): > > Just say that you want to sterilize her, you fucking [Hitler](http://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Adolf_Hitler)! Assuming she hasn’t bred yet, that would be a super idea! 🙂 > [@Euphonious\_Polemic](#): > > Dear York University Jewish Advocacy Group: > > I recently read an article somewhere, I don’t remember where, because I wasn’t paying much attention. Anyway, I didn’t read the whole thing, but in there somewhere it quoted a York University Student, one Sarah Grunfeld, as saying: 'Jews should be sterilized’ > > Now I don’t know if she was quoting someone, or what the context was (because I didn’t read the whole article, and I was looking out the window at the time), but I think her comments were offensive. She said these words. > > I think you should issue a press release trying to get her thrown out of the University. Of course, you don’t need to look into this further - just take my word for it, since I think I saw this quote somewhere. Anyway, she’s probably not even really Jewish. > > Thank you. Perfect. > [@Hentor\_the\_Barbarian](#): > > Okay, I took some solace in reading Twitter comments on the matter. Some are suggesting that Grunfeld should be turned into a verb, meaning something like “to dramatically over-react to one’s own stupid misunderstanding.” > > For instance, Emily Littella was a character on SNL who, when confronted with the fact that she had once again grunfelded, would simply say, “Never mind.” I try not to grunfeld myself here on the Dope - I ask for clarification before I get totally worked up about stuff. ---
**Author:** ![mhendo](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mhendo/32/3159_2.png) [@mhendo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/mhendo)\ **Post date:** [September 15, 2011, 6:02pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/todays-lesson-context-matters-canadian-edition/596370/42 "2011-09-15T18:02:43Z")
> [@Dingbang](#): > > This idiocy reminds me of the 2008 case in which an employee of Indiana University was accused of racial harassment because he was reading a book about how Notre Dame students successfully overcame the local KKK in 1924. > > Summary of the case here: [Newsdesk | The Foundation for Individual Rights and Expression](http://thefire.org/index.php/article/9017.html) > > \ > > A racial harassment charge was filed and the university reprimanded Sampson. Yeah, that was pretty awful, although it’s worth noting that the reprimand was removed and Sampson was [cleared of all charges](http://thefire.org/article/9255.html). Still, it never should have gone that far in the first place, and it shouldn’t have taken the intervention of nationally-recognized organizations (ACLU, FIRE, etc.) to get the university to change its tune. ---
**Author:** ![Capitaine\_Zombie](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/e95f7d/32.png) [@Capitaine\_Zombie](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Capitaine_Zombie)\ **Post date:** [September 15, 2011, 6:08pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/todays-lesson-context-matters-canadian-edition/596370/43 "2011-09-15T18:08:43Z")
> [@Hentor\_the\_Barbarian](#): > > what makes you for a moment think that it’s safe to trust this girl’s characterization of her conversation with third parties? Lack of fortitude in an administrative body seems to fit reality more than anything she has ever said. But, you’re right, a person that clearly has a problem getting the point (or, more precisely, tends to understand exactly the contrary of what has been said) and stays adamant to her own unfounded indignation would probably also misinterpret anything the University officials may tell her. (One thing that cracks me up is when she questions the professor’s own Jewishness and then adds, even though; it’s not because he’s Jewish that he has the right to say those things against Jewish people. She sounds like a Conservative parody of a minority activist. Hapless and looking for a good indignation buzz). ---
**Author:** ![Hentor\_the\_Barbarian](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/8edcca/32.png) [@Hentor\_the\_Barbarian](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Hentor_the_Barbarian)\ **Post date:** [September 15, 2011, 6:29pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/todays-lesson-context-matters-canadian-edition/596370/44 "2011-09-15T18:29:38Z")
> [@Capitaine\_Zombie](#): > > (One thing that cracks me up is when she questions the professor’s own Jewishness and then adds, even though; it’s not because he’s Jewish that he has the right to say those things against Jewish people. She sounds like a Conservative parody of a minority activist. Hapless and looking for a good indignation buzz). I love that she frames the issue as to whether he’s actually Jewish or not as one of those mysteries that will remain unsolved: “Whether he is or is not, no one will know…” That’s what makes her sound like a not-so-much-parody of a conservative to me; she’s a birther, only on a small scale. ---
**Author:** ![Whack-a-Mole](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/whack-a-mole/32/141_2.png) [@Whack-a-Mole](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Whack-a-Mole)\ **Post date:** [September 15, 2011, 6:35pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/todays-lesson-context-matters-canadian-edition/596370/45 "2011-09-15T18:35:13Z")
> [@thirdwarning](#): > > Lesson 1: When you’re wrong and you’ve been publicly proven wrong, shut up immediately. Then admit it and go away. This will cause people to: 1. Think you made a mistake, not that you’re stupid and 2. Forget what an idiot you did look like, briefly. > > If you have to look like an idiot, the shorter the duration, the better. “It is better to remain silent and be thought a fool than to speak and remove all doubt.” (Not sure who said that…seems to be some question of its origin but wise words nonetheless.) ---
**Author:** ![Capitaine\_Zombie](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/e95f7d/32.png) [@Capitaine\_Zombie](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Capitaine_Zombie)\ **Post date:** [September 15, 2011, 6:48pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/todays-lesson-context-matters-canadian-edition/596370/46 "2011-09-15T18:48:08Z")
> [@Hentor\_the\_Barbarian](#): > > I love that she frames the issue as to whether he’s actually Jewish or not as one of those mysteries that will remain unsolved: “Whether he is or is not, no one will know…” > > That’s what makes her sound like a not-so-much-parody of a conservative to me; she’s a birther, only on a small scale. When I said Conservative parody, I meant how a Conservative might caricature a minority activist, always looking for an excuse to act outraged for no valid reason. ---
**Author:** ![Gedd](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/gedd/32/4938_2.png) [@Gedd](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Gedd)\ **Post date:** [September 15, 2011, 7:02pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/todays-lesson-context-matters-canadian-edition/596370/47 "2011-09-15T19:02:49Z")
If I ever need an example like “social group X” for a negative opinion I’ll just use white people. That way only neo-nazi will get pissed. ---
**Author:** ![Malthus](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/85f322/32.png) [@Malthus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Malthus)\ **Post date:** [September 15, 2011, 7:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/todays-lesson-context-matters-canadian-edition/596370/48 "2011-09-15T19:32:03Z")
> [@Spoons](#): > > As a lawyer who practices human rights law (in addition to a few other areas), I am occasionally asked to be a guest lecturer on these topics. Among other places I’ve spoken are at a community college and a university. These speaking engagements at educational institutions present challenges for precisely this reason. > > While I can describe actual human rights decisions and court decisions using their original facts–let’s face it, these decisions are public–hypotheticals, such as the professor in the OP tried, present the same problem he encountered. My solution to this problem is to simply use “Martians” as the target group: “All Martians should be sterilized,” to apply my solution to the professor’s statement. So far, no Martians have complained. 🙂 Heh, as a young student, I worked on a case which turned in part on the fact that Martians have no standing to sue in Ontario courts. 😃 [For the curious, Joly v. Pelletier, [1999] O.J. No. 1728 (Ont. S.C.)] > [@](#): > > In my opinion there are at lease two reasons why the two Statements of Claim in question ought to be struck and the actions dismissed. > > 1. Neither pleading discloses a cause of action. While conspiracy to do harm to someone is the basis of many actions in this Court there is a fundamental flaw in the position of Mr. Joly. Rule 1.03 defines plaintiff as “a person who commences an action”. The New Shorter Oxford English Dictionary defines person as “an individual human being”. Section 29 of the Interpretation Act provides that a person includes a corporation. It follows that if the plaintiff is not a person in that he is neither a human being nor a corporation, he cannot be a plaintiff as contemplated by the Rules of Civil Procedure. The entire basis of Mr. Joly’s actions is that he is a martian, not a human being. There is certainly no suggestion that he is a corporation. I conclude therefore, that Mr. Joly, on his pleading as drafted, has no status before the Court. ---
**Author:** ![Typo\_Negative](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/typo_negative/32/484_2.png) [@Typo\_Negative](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Typo_Negative)\ **Post date:** [September 15, 2011, 7:38pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/todays-lesson-context-matters-canadian-edition/596370/49 "2011-09-15T19:38:18Z")
Several years ago I was taking a Law class at a CC. One day, I fell asleep during the professors lecture. I was in the front row. I woke up to the sound of him saying very foul things including expletives and pointing at me. Seemed really mad. Turned out he was illustrating the Fighting Words Doctrine and pointing in my general direction. I shoulda sued him, saying such vile things to me. ---
**Author:** ![vivalostwages](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/v/d07c76/32.png) [@vivalostwages](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/vivalostwages)\ **Post date:** [September 23, 2011, 10:02pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/todays-lesson-context-matters-canadian-edition/596370/50 "2011-09-23T22:02:49Z")
One of my colleagues once told a student that her essay was filled with barbarisms. She ran to the dean and complained that her professor had called her a barbarian. ---
**Author:** ![aruvqan](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/aruvqan/32/2891_2.png) [@aruvqan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/aruvqan)\ **Post date:** [September 23, 2011, 10:29pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/todays-lesson-context-matters-canadian-edition/596370/51 "2011-09-23T22:29:57Z")
I have to wonder at how fast we are turning Idiocracy into a documentary. Granted, back in the day when I was in a 100 level poli sci class [1981] we had a black guy that was a militant panther type and tried to turn every discussion into how the white man oppressed the black man … no matter what country or political system we were discussing. [My poli sci prof, who was the head of the department was also oddly enough my faculty adviser, he and I used to make bets before class on how long it would take before the guy started up his rants. I shudder at what he must be like online now!:eek:] I can not believe she made it all that way up the educational ladder without being exposed to a class that included something on the Holocaust. I know for a fact that in the US there were 3 movies about the holocaust and concentration camps that were required watching in something like 9th grade, I would be amazed if it was not taught at some point in Canada as well. You can not have a class on Nazi and holocaust without mentioning all sorts of phrases like sterilization of Jews, gassing of Jews, working Jews to death and so forth. ---
**Author:** ![Really\_Not\_All\_That\_Bright](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/e8c25b/32.png) [@Really\_Not\_All\_That\_Bright](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Really_Not_All_That_Bright)\ **Post date:** [September 24, 2011, 8:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/todays-lesson-context-matters-canadian-edition/596370/52 "2011-09-24T20:52:03Z")
> [@aruvqan](#): > > I can not believe she made it all that way up the educational ladder without being exposed to a class that included something on the Holocaust. I know for a fact that in the US there were 3 movies about the holocaust and concentration camps that were required watching in something like 9th grade, I would be amazed if it was not taught at some point in Canada as well. What 3 Holocaust flicks are “required watching” in the US around the 9th grade? :dubious: ---
**Author:** ![Polycarp](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/82dd89/32.png) [@Polycarp](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Polycarp)\ **Post date:** [September 24, 2011, 9:38pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/todays-lesson-context-matters-canadian-edition/596370/53 "2011-09-24T21:38:50Z")
> [@Spoons](#): > > As a lawyer who practices human rights law (in addition to a few other areas), I am occasionally asked to be a guest lecturer on these topics. Among other places I’ve spoken are at a community college and a university. These speaking engagements at educational institutions present challenges for precisely this reason. > > While I can describe actual human rights decisions and court decisions using their original facts–let’s face it, these decisions are public–hypotheticals, such as the professor in the OP tried, present the same problem he encountered. My solution to this problem is to simply use “Martians” as the target group: “All Martians should be sterilized,” to apply my solution to the professor’s statement. So far, no Martians have complained. 🙂 One of **Skald** ’s continua craft, apparently malfunctiong (There’s a surprise!), left the missive quoted below for you, **Spoons** : > [@](#): > > Pocono Heights, PA > > **SPOONS** , Esq. > [[Address Redacted]] > > Sir: > > My client, Mr. V.M. Smith, has instructed me to notify you that your remarks have given him great personal offense. He asks me to suggest to you that voluntary discorporation would sufficiently restore your honor. Otherwise, he feels we will be forced to act as we see best. > > I remain, sir, > Yr. obedient svt. > J. Harshaw, M.D., LL.B. ---
**Author:** ![lavenderviolet](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/cdc98d/32.png) [@lavenderviolet](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/lavenderviolet)\ **Post date:** [September 25, 2011, 3:33am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/todays-lesson-context-matters-canadian-edition/596370/54 "2011-09-25T03:33:46Z")
> [@Hentor\_the\_Barbarian](#): > > I’m seriously caught up in this story, especially reading the follow up statements that she and some Jewish organizations have put out. I have this terrible need to find out that this girl has suffered some real consequences for her actions, especially after doubling and tripling down as she has. > > I guess I really abhor aggressive stupidity, the kind of stupid that not only starts out stupid, but attacks the non-stupid, is incapable of monitoring or checking the stupid when red flags should be going up, and which runs the very real risk of causing havoc and doing harm. That’s how I feel too. If someone started a petition calling for her to be expelled from the university or if the professor decides to sue her for damaging his reputation, I’d be 100% behind it. It wouldn’t be so bad if she had just backed down after the apology. Aggressive stupidity is a good way to describe this refusal to admit she made a mistake. ---
**Author:** ![SnakesCatLady](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/4af34b/32.png) [@SnakesCatLady](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/SnakesCatLady)\ **Post date:** [September 25, 2011, 4:33am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/todays-lesson-context-matters-canadian-edition/596370/55 "2011-09-25T04:33:50Z")
Sometime I think about going back to school - not for a degree; I have enough of those. Just for classes and interesting discussion. It’s been 23 years since I got my J.D. Then I read something like this … I’ll just stay home and read the Dope. ---
**Author:** ![aruvqan](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/aruvqan/32/2891_2.png) [@aruvqan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/aruvqan)\ **Post date:** [September 25, 2011, 8:44am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/todays-lesson-context-matters-canadian-edition/596370/56 "2011-09-25T08:44:40Z")
> [@Really\_Not\_All\_That\_Bright](#): > > What 3 Holocaust flicks are “required watching” in the US around the 9th grade? :dubious: Hm, can’t remember the titles, but one was literally the footage taken and shown during the Nuremburg trials where the army walked through [I think] Bergen-Belsen filming the barracks, piles of bodies, and the remnants of the prison population in striped pyjamas. Anther one was similar, but with added footage of the trials themselves, identifying the men on trial and also showed footage of surviving medical experimentation victims, and the third was footage of warehouses piled with stuff like clothing, luggage, shoes, piles of hair, teeth and so forth with narration. I had already seen pictures of whichever camp my dad was in on the liberation of so it wasn’t actually as startling to me. And I knew one Polish Jew and the remnants of his family, my Dad sponsored them to come over to the US and went to work for my family in one of our mills as he had no way to get back to Poland at that point. I was well aware of the holocaust as a child. ---
**Author:** ![aruvqan](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/aruvqan/32/2891_2.png) [@aruvqan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/aruvqan)\ **Post date:** [September 25, 2011, 8:47am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/todays-lesson-context-matters-canadian-edition/596370/57 "2011-09-25T08:47:09Z")
> [@SnakesCatLady](#): > > Sometime I think about going back to school - not for a degree; I have enough of those. Just for classes and interesting discussion. It’s been 23 years since I got my J.D. > > Then I read something like this … I’ll just stay home and read the Dope. Hm, I always liked listening to other input in class, I think you might reconsider. Maybe it might help expose people to some intelligent conversation instead of them depending on America’s Hottest Bullshit Artist on the TV. [Honestly, I used to dread going into the upstairs break room at my last job. Stupid women couldn’t seem to discuss anything other than those bogus talent programs. I swear, every time I had to go up there my IQ would drop and I lost brain cells.] ---
**Author:** ![mhendo](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mhendo/32/3159_2.png) [@mhendo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/mhendo)\ **Post date:** [February 7, 2012, 6:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/todays-lesson-context-matters-canadian-edition/596370/58 "2012-02-07T18:39:32Z")
Update: The student in question has made a [video](http://gawker.com/5882737/student-who-accused-jewish-professor-of-anti+semitism-still-working-to-expose-the-conspiracy-against-her) giving her side of the story. The whole thing is apparently a big anti-Jewish conspiracy, with at least two Jewish groups in on the cover-up. ---
**Author:** ![RickJay](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/bb73d2/32.png) [@RickJay](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RickJay)\ **Post date:** [February 7, 2012, 7:21pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/todays-lesson-context-matters-canadian-edition/596370/59 "2012-02-07T19:21:34Z")
I think it pretty obvious Ms. Grunfeld has problems that go way beyond some comment made in class. The funny thing about the video is not how stupid it is, but that she’s put forth so much effort into defending a position that nobody in the entire world even cares about. “The Truth Behind The Sarah Grunfeld Story” implies, just by its title, that there is anyone, anywhere, outside of her family, who knows who Sarah Grunfeld is or cares about her story beyiond it being an amusing anecdote. Just making a video like that, giving it a TITLE like that, suggests a woman who has a sense of paranoia that goes way beyond normal and well into full blown mental illness. At 3:50: “What ever happened to a fair investigation”? The problem is that this isn’t a fucking murder. You aren’t entitled to a full blown CSI-style investigation; you’re entitled to the Dean looking into it, finding out the professor didn’t literally mean it, and telling you the case is closed. A smart and/or sane person would have been really embarassed but would have let this blow over, and within a year even her closest friends wouldn’t have remembered it. Instead she’s publically setting fire to her own reputation. If she applied for a job at my company and they did a routine internet search she’d be turned down for the position just out of fear that she’s nuts. ---
**Author:** ![mhendo](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mhendo/32/3159_2.png) [@mhendo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/mhendo)\ **Post date:** [February 7, 2012, 7:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/todays-lesson-context-matters-canadian-edition/596370/60 "2012-02-07T19:31:02Z")
I agree. It’s an exercise in sheer narcissism, or a sign of mental illness. ETA: Possibly both. Are there some levels of narcissism that quality as a mental health problem? [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/todays-lesson-context-matters-canadian-edition/596370.md?page=2) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/todays-lesson-context-matters-canadian-edition/596370.md?page=4)