51–60 of 118 posts
"It’s commonly assumed that freedom of speech is about the right of the speaker to express their ideas" ... without government interference. However, it is fully within the rights of the audience to condone, chastise, avoid, and laugh at the speaker. To prohibit the audience from that reaction would be to suppress their free speech. Freedom of association also requires that a group be able to prevent speech in the co…
However, certain subs such as T_D and LSC allow no challenge of their ideas, because they don't merit correctness and know that a debate of their ideologies is a contest that they will lose.
To paraphrase Dawkins, you cannot reason with people who don't value reason.
the constitution is a construct of white supremacy. abolish now. impeach now. flag this post now. all republicans and conservatives are nazis. everyone who disagrees with me is hitler and must be silenced before people hear them, because I am the sole arbiter of virtue.
This comment deserves more upvotes, because even if you don't agree with it, it accurately distills the perspective of those who are aghast that liberals increasingly seem to be unable to tolerate the idea of a jewish dude who is married to a black dude being allowed to speak (and worse, calling him a Nazi. If a gay, "race traitor" jew is a Nazi then who isn't?) I'm a liberal, who years ago really worked to champion…
Earlier quoted context omitted.
Oh the other hand what about, Milo pushing his followers to send Leslie Jones racist imagery and slurs on Twitter? Is that an idea, or inciting a mob?
Yup, exactly. To be clear about my position, I believe that "free speech" is an impractical ideal, and we as a society need to be clear about what sorts of speech we value and what we don't, and if we don't do that, we're left with one of two bad options: either we have to err so hard on the side of free speech that we can't ban threats or incitement to violence or anything at all, or we let the government define "th…
Earlier quoted context omitted.
You are operating/arguing from the neutral reality perspective-- that is to say, that "we as a society" exists as a concrete entity that can pass laws. But that's not the case. We are not the government, far from it. The government is a collection of people who have power over us. Many of them are corrupt and will do evil-- just imagine the worse member of the political party you disagree with as a dictator. Every ti…
> Any limitations, as we have seen, on human rights become the camel nose under the tent, and then you eventually end up with government violating the right wholesale. (eg: secret courts and secret rulings, National Security Letters an the like, illegal surveillance and wiretapping.) Free speech in Canada does not allow for hate speech or inciting violence, and we're at least no worse than the USA for whatever violat…
http://www.torontosun.com/2017/09/20/m-103-weaponizes-what-a...
https://www.catholicregister.org/item/26111-m-103-could-brin...
Free speech is part of the natural right of individuals to live and think without being oppressed by society.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
You misunderstand me. I thought it was clear that I was talking about ideas, not threats or inciting mobs. You'll have a hard time finding any self-described free speech absolutist who thinks those should be permitted.
I understood you, but I think that you conflated freedom of conscience with freedom of speech. Freedom of conscience seems pretty uncontroversial, and it's what Paine is talking about in the quote you gave (on my interpretation). I think everybody agrees that freedom of conscience is both good and necessary in an open society. However, it's incorrect to think that absolute freedom of speech necessarily follows. > You…
I'm sorry but you don't. (Also, don't I get to decide that, not you?)
> Freedom of conscience seems pretty uncontroversial, and it's what Paine is talking about in the quote you gave (on my interpretation).
Paine and Mill weren't just talking about freedom of conscience or thought. Paine thought it crucial to hear others' ideas so that he could avoid being wrong. That requires the ideas be expressed. Likewise with Mill. Chapter 2 of On Liberty is titled "Of the Liberty of Thought and Discussion"[1]. Throughout the text, Mill defends expression as well as thought, and condemns the silencing of any expression of opinion:
> But I deny the right of the people to exercise such coercion, either by themselves or by their government. The power itself is illegitimate. The best government has no more title to it than the worst. It is as noxious, or more noxious, when exerted in accordance with public opinion, than when in opposition to it.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
You are operating/arguing from the neutral reality perspective-- that is to say, that "we as a society" exists as a concrete entity that can pass laws. But that's not the case. We are not the government, far from it. The government is a collection of people who have power over us. Many of them are corrupt and will do evil-- just imagine the worse member of the political party you disagree with as a dictator. Every ti…
> Any limitations, as we have seen, on human rights become the camel nose under the tent, and then you eventually end up with government violating the right wholesale. (eg: secret courts and secret rulings, National Security Letters an the like, illegal surveillance and wiretapping.) Free speech in Canada does not allow for hate speech or inciting violence, and we're at least no worse than the USA for whatever violat…
Earlier quoted context omitted.
I understood you, but I think that you conflated freedom of conscience with freedom of speech. Freedom of conscience seems pretty uncontroversial, and it's what Paine is talking about in the quote you gave (on my interpretation). I think everybody agrees that freedom of conscience is both good and necessary in an open society. However, it's incorrect to think that absolute freedom of speech necessarily follows. > You…
How can anyone be said to have freedom of conscience when the range of thought they may encounter is circumscribed by censors?
Second, how can anybody discover facts about the world if they haven't been discovered yet? Truth and thought are not contingent upon prior art; at best, they just speed it up a bit.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
You misunderstand me. I thought it was clear that I was talking about ideas, not threats or inciting mobs. You'll have a hard time finding any self-described free speech absolutist who thinks those should be permitted.
I understood you, but I think that you conflated freedom of conscience with freedom of speech. Freedom of conscience seems pretty uncontroversial, and it's what Paine is talking about in the quote you gave (on my interpretation). I think everybody agrees that freedom of conscience is both good and necessary in an open society. However, it's incorrect to think that absolute freedom of speech necessarily follows. > You…
I don't see how you can limit that quote to freedom of conscience. He is clearly talking about the spread of opinions and debate on them i.e. speech.
> I think everybody agrees that freedom of conscience is both good and necessary in an open society.
No, everybody doesn't This is why we have a supreme court cases about forcing businesses to make wedding cakes for gay marriage. We have pretty uncontroversial laws preventing people who have racist believes from discriminating based on those beliefs.
Freedom of Conscience and Speech both need limitations. This article isn't really about that at all anyway. This article is about talking about the reasons why we should value Free Speech.