> I’m generally pretty respectful of the idea that people are entitled to make their views public. This is healthy. I don’t think this means that everybody is entitled to have their views broadcast on every platform. Presumably we could agree there’s a line somewhere, at which point it’s acceptable for me, as a company, to refuse to allow views which I consider to be over that line to be broadcast on my platform?
"Acceptable" is a pretty vague word. What actions are we talking about here? Lobbying and petitioning companies? Boycotting them? Demanding governments regulate speech on their platforms?
It's my opinion that forcing people to propagate ideas they disagree with is just as bad as preventing people from propagating ideas they do agree with: these are two sides of the same coin: free speech. So at the level of government, I would never support laws that forced platforms to allow any sort of speech on their platform.
However, Reddit/Facebook/etc. respond to the demands of their users, so the question I'm trying to answer is: what should we, as users, be demanding?
I think the correct response to hatred isn't to shut them out: that's just responding to hatred with hatred. I think the correct response to hatred is to respond with love: assuage fears, correct ignorance, and help the hateful person to find a better way.
> I’d probably refuse to be friends with people who had certain other views I find particularly offensive too. Is that strange or unhealthy?
This certainly isn't going to be a popular opinion, but yes, I would say this is unhealthy.
Communication is a two way street. If you want to communicate your ideas into the world, you have to be willing to hear the ideas of others. In this sense, connection is power: people who disconnect themselves from people give up the ability to change those people. And the people who you can change the most are those the most unlike you.
You have to realize that people come to the beliefs they have due, at least partly, to circumstance and education. Maybe there's some degree of nature in it--maybe some people are inherently hateful. But if that is the case, I haven't met any of those people. When I talk to bigoted people at length, I often discover that they have led difficult lives, and based on their experience, blame some other group they don't understand for the difficulties they have experienced. They aren't doing this out of malice: on the contrary, they are usually doing it because they care about their own families and communities. The problem isn't that they are naturally bigoted, it's that they're afraid and ignorant, and both of those things are fixable.
By choosing to cut someone out of your life, you're choosing to treat them not as a normal person with fears and gaps in their experience, but as an inherently bad person. I don't think that is a healthy position to take.