On the Road to Liberation: "Dave" Revealed To Be David Langlois

Someone informs me that "Dave" in my last post's "D-Day" transcript from the Abolitionist Approach Forum has a public profile on the forum in question which reveals to a certainty that he is none other than David Langlois, who is studying philosophy for a doctorate at Harvard. That was unknown to me, not being a part of that forum--thank goodness. It would also have been unknown to a great number of my readers. "Dave" the scholar tells us, to recount:

my [Sztybel's] arguments are "bad" [stunningly articulate!--DS; my comments appear below in square brackets; he said he would rebut my "Animal Rights Law" years ago but never did]
I only wrote handful of pieces in which I do not attack and mischaracterize Gary [no examples; plus I personally wrote to Langlois in 2006 to tell me if I misrepresent Gary in "AR Law" before it was published; he told me I got wrong Francione's absurd theory of property status and what it means but did not "enlighten" further; I corrected what I could given Langlois' single point, which he actually made well enough; he said any further comments should probably be post-publication; in other words, he thinks he can correct my interpretations further, but wants to grand-stand after the essay is out rather than help me get it right before it is published; that reveals something about Langlois: he is a poser, unhelpful in spirit to other animal rights scholars, not sincerely concerned to correct things at every turn, an opportunist, among other unflattering things; meanwhile, at that time, another Francionist, also with a Master's degree in philosophy, confirmed that I interpreted Francione correctly aside from the single correction Langlois made]
ignorantly says my arguments have been around for two decades [again, my dilemma arguments, and so on, no one has seen before; the argument that we cannot act for mere things but only sentient beings; my projections about suffering and death, and so on and on; there are other original arguments too, only some of which I catalogue in "D-Day," the last blog entry]
I am "not a serious entity in the debate" [although I have won over Francionists, had my paper published in a peer-reviewed journal, which was officially adopted by the Northwestern Animal Rights Network (a large and extremely active AR group); had another Oxford Centre for Animal Ethics member, Carlos Naconecy, publicly defend "Animal Rights Law" at a conference (I am no longer a Fellow with the Centre by choice as I discussed earlier); Bruce Friedrich who debates people over veganism nationwide at the top universities and beyond praised my historical essay on incrementalist animal law as "essential reading" for this debate; I had my short-form of "AR Law" translated into Spanish and Portugese by enthusiasts, the former by a former Francionist lawyer and scholar; of course none of this and much more is "serious" to Langlois, who is starting to sound exactly like a Harvard snob]
this is "much too personal for an academic blog" [which I never said I was doing; as though bloggers make no reference to themselves]
complains about my insulting and then says I act "like a putz" [how's that for hypocrisy?; speaking of which, you should have seen the emails Langlois wrote to me trying to court my friendship before he baselessly called me "creepy" in an internet forum; see my November 21, 2007 blog entry for a treatment of this]
"sad" only Yates put my "feet to the fire" [Langlois evidently loves viciousness, choosing a torture technique as a fond metaphor for what he prefers]
"one moment of near sanity" when Yates attacked me [this is obviously what Langlois goes in for: mud-slinging]
claims it was a "shame" I was not called on my misrepresentations [Langlois was free to do so and indeed was a member of AR Zone at the time; perhaps he was afraid to participate because Francione suggested his followers abstain from the discussion, and excommunicated Yates for daring to have a discussion with me? More hypocrisy: if it is a "shame" to allow misrepresentation then Langlois refusing to correct my alleged misrepresentations until after my essay was published is downright shameful, which in a way it is, and not how first-rate scholars conduct themselves; he may have much more potential than this, but his passing up the chance to lend learned commentary is something a hack out to score cheap points to impress people would do]
Gary didn't say I was "insane," only that I had done "insane things" [right--like the Red Carpet entry! A rigorous argument defeating Langlois' claims above]

I recall that right after my first appearance on AR Zone, Langlois joined the chat box under his full name, asking people how they liked the chat with me and whether it was their favorite? He was just trying to seem "chatty"? Funny he should go to the bother if I am not a serious entity in the debate. I guess he figured that Gary's "suggestion" of non-participation might not apply immediately after the chat. But then Langlois and Francione lamented what a "shame" it was that no one corrected my supposed misrepresentations. By the way, they were free to do so at any time, even now, after the chat. Instead they choose to contribute to this "shame." But then, maybe they see the regular AR Zone people as fit to communicate with me, but view themselves as "above" all that. After all, the intelligent people on the Zone largely agree with Francione, only they increasingly are rejecting his insulting and censorious tactics, among other things. Anyone who goes in for insulting would be psychologically liable to view themselves as "above" others, although they place themselves so close to the mud on the ground that they sling about. People such as Langlois are most probably insecure: they feel "up" when they put others down.

Harvard admitted this guy, and he states that I have no new arguments? May his ignorance be blissful... Meanwhile, if he does ever choose to rebut my arguments, I will show that his case is as poorly defended as when Langlois presented on the question of animal welfare laws at the Toronto Animal Rights Society in 2006 and parroted Francione in Rain without Thunder, p. 191, who said his own approach to animal rights and the law is "uncontroversial." Langlois actually repeated this declaration without specifically citing Francione's statement. It came across as nauseatingly smug. I mean: really sickening. Meanwhile, we get a good laugh because Francione himself has now recanted this "uncontroversial" reading of animal rights law that he provided in Rain. Has Langlois rushed to follow, renouncing what he once declared to be "uncontroversial" with such reasoning as Langlois himself had at the time? If he did not follow he might have been censored by Francione, as we have been learning for some time about the type of "forum" Francione runs. We need no more than the mere questioning by "Leanne" in the transcript I provided in the last blog entry.

"Hello, Dave! Nice to know ya. Well, maybe not so nice..."

FURTHER READING ON ANIMAL RIGHTS INCREMENTALISM

A Selection of Related Articles

Sztybel, David. "Animal Rights Law: Fundamentalism versus Pragmatism". Journal for Critical Animal Studies 5 (1) (2007): 1-37.

go there

Short version of "Animal Rights Law".

go there

Sztybel, David. "Incrementalist Animal Law: Welcome to the Real World".

go there

Sztybel, David. "Sztybelian Pragmatism versus Francionist Pseudo-Pragmatism".

go there

A Selection of Related Blog Entries