Welcome to one of the greatest long-term debates in Western history, Mr Ben Atar. I’ve taken part myself both in books and in my high-school classes for more than forty years. My own view could be capsuled as somewhat to the Left of my mentor RR Palmer, but to the Right of Albert Mathiez, who showed some sympathy for the September Massacres—even for their indiscriminate brutality—though less for their illegality.
And yes, my own opinion of US students today is that they are unfortunately seriously neglecting the importance of nonviolence in civil disobedience that we should have learned from Gandhi. The French Revolutionaries were not in a position to learn this from any but the Anabaptist Protestants of the 16th century and there were none of those in French History.
As a US historian of the early republic, and as someone who wrote a long time ago a book about Jefferson, I was obviously aware of Jefferson's Stalinist response to the massacre: "My own affections have been deeply wounded by some of the martyrs to this cause, but rather than it should have failed, I would have seen half the earth desolated. Were there but an Adam & an Eve left in every country, & left free, it would be better than as it now is." I sort of expected that this revolutionary totalitarianism reflected momentary passion and that historians' reflections would find it hard to embrace killing defenseless prisoners. I was obviously wrong.
Except the "mob" or "crowd" of Harvard Yard have every opportunity to express their views and work towards the goals they seek through an open, democratic political system. That seems to me a distinction that cannot be slided in any attempt at serious political analysis of their actions and renders the comparison to early modern collective action inapt.
You're misreading me. The comparison is not between early modern collective action and the student protests, but between the ways that both have been interpreted.
Fair point but insofar as there has been any historically informed analysis of these "protests," and I have not read any such analysis, it seems to me a dispositive factor.
I'm stupefied that tenured faculty at Princeton would participate as a "faculty observer" without engaging the students to consider their objectives in relation to the means at their disposal. If such a faculty member had thought about 1789 or 1792, in relation to 2024, they might have considered raising with the students that history as a way to consider the much stronger likelihood of a desirable outcome and much less risk and social detriment by pursuing other means available to them.
I think David was simply discouraging binary interpretations of the protests. But more importantly, I appreciate your public expressions against extreme anti-Zionism on campus. Not many people are speaking up. It's a "spiral of silence."
I might have students read this in the last class session of my "Comparative Revolutions" course.
thank you!
You’ve never seen a mob.
This is purely academic.
It’s the difference between talking and the “crowd” killing, beating, robbing you and burning down Princeton Hall.
As for “Filastina” - when HAMAS made the porn videos, they were appealing to human nature.
HAMAS knew what it was doing; competency.
The author is academic, and past his competency.
There are historians who viewed the 1792 September massacres in a positive light. Wow
Welcome to one of the greatest long-term debates in Western history, Mr Ben Atar. I’ve taken part myself both in books and in my high-school classes for more than forty years. My own view could be capsuled as somewhat to the Left of my mentor RR Palmer, but to the Right of Albert Mathiez, who showed some sympathy for the September Massacres—even for their indiscriminate brutality—though less for their illegality.
And yes, my own opinion of US students today is that they are unfortunately seriously neglecting the importance of nonviolence in civil disobedience that we should have learned from Gandhi. The French Revolutionaries were not in a position to learn this from any but the Anabaptist Protestants of the 16th century and there were none of those in French History.
As a US historian of the early republic, and as someone who wrote a long time ago a book about Jefferson, I was obviously aware of Jefferson's Stalinist response to the massacre: "My own affections have been deeply wounded by some of the martyrs to this cause, but rather than it should have failed, I would have seen half the earth desolated. Were there but an Adam & an Eve left in every country, & left free, it would be better than as it now is." I sort of expected that this revolutionary totalitarianism reflected momentary passion and that historians' reflections would find it hard to embrace killing defenseless prisoners. I was obviously wrong.
Except the "mob" or "crowd" of Harvard Yard have every opportunity to express their views and work towards the goals they seek through an open, democratic political system. That seems to me a distinction that cannot be slided in any attempt at serious political analysis of their actions and renders the comparison to early modern collective action inapt.
You're misreading me. The comparison is not between early modern collective action and the student protests, but between the ways that both have been interpreted.
Fair point but insofar as there has been any historically informed analysis of these "protests," and I have not read any such analysis, it seems to me a dispositive factor.
I'm stupefied that tenured faculty at Princeton would participate as a "faculty observer" without engaging the students to consider their objectives in relation to the means at their disposal. If such a faculty member had thought about 1789 or 1792, in relation to 2024, they might have considered raising with the students that history as a way to consider the much stronger likelihood of a desirable outcome and much less risk and social detriment by pursuing other means available to them.
I think David was simply discouraging binary interpretations of the protests. But more importantly, I appreciate your public expressions against extreme anti-Zionism on campus. Not many people are speaking up. It's a "spiral of silence."