When hate and righteousness trump reason

CATHY SEIPP writes in the New York Post:

A friend of mine took his daughter to visit the famous City Lights in San Francisco, explaining that this store is important because years ago it sold books no other store would - even, perhaps especially, books whose ideas many people found offensive.

So, though my friend is no Ward Churchill fan, he didn't really mind the prominent display of books by the guy who famously called 9/11 victims "little Eichmanns."

But it did occur to him that perhaps the long-delayed English translation of Oriana Fallaci's new book, "The Force of Reason," might finally be available, and that, because Fallaci's militant stance against Islamic militants offends so many people a store committed to selling banned books would be the perfect place to buy it.

So he asked a clerk if the new Fallaci book was in yet.

"No," snapped the clerk. "We don't carry books by fascists."

Just savor the absurd details of this for a minute. City Lights has a long and proud history of supporting banned authors.
....

Yet the store won't carry Fallaci - who is being sued in Italy for insulting religion because of her latest book, and also continues to fight the good fight against those who think that the appropriate response to offensive books and cartoons is violent rioting.
...

It's particularly repugnant that someone who fought against actual fascism in World War II should be deemed a fascist by a snotty San Francisco clerk.

Cathy has plenty more to say before closing with a response to the clerk:

"You're welcome to buy her book elsewhere, though," my friend was told helpfully when he visited. "Let's just say we don't have room for her here."

OK, let's just say that. But let's also say that one of the great paradoxes of our time is that two groups most endangered by political Islam, gays and women, somehow still find ways to defend it.

A part of the fight for civilization is against the Islamists and anti-Americans overseas. Another part is with some liberals and leftists right here at home.

And by the way, why are so many liberals and leftists so "sensitive and understanding" of Islamists who routinely brutalize women and gays?

Cathy's column is here.