E Pur Si Muove

Earlier this year, I noticed something in China that really surprised me. I realized I felt more comfortable discussing controversial ideas in Beijing than in San Francisco. I didn’t feel completely comfortable—this was China, after all—just more comfortable than at home.

There are many more unsayable things in Beijing than San Francisco, and the penalties for saying them are much harsher (though of course not for Sam, as a very wealthy foreigner most rules simply don't apply). People are regularly beaten, harassed and murdered for reporting the truth about the government in China. Journalism is a very dangerous profession there in ways it is not in the US.

http://edition.cnn.com/2017/12/14/asia/chinese-beat-korean-j... https://cpj.org/2016/04/chinese-journalist-sentenced-to-near...

In contrast, the dangers Sam runs from being open are that people will be mean to him on the internet.

I am less worried that letting some people on the internet say things like “gay people are evil” is going to convince reasonable people that such a statement is true

This is a really odd statement of a non-problem which dismisses real world life-threatening problems a lot of marginalised people live with. First, reasonable people are not the problem, violent, irrational people who are influenced by bad ideas are. Second, this is not an academic debate over people with naughty ideas, real lives are ruined by the normalisation of bigotry and hatred (in ways that Sam in his privileged bubble has never and will never experience, and apparently can't even imagine). People are murdered, spat on and denigrated even at their funerals when hate like 'gay people are evil' is allowed to spread. Sometimes, to remain human, you have to choose a side.

This is uncomfortable, but it’s possible we have to allow people to say disparaging things about gay people if we want them to be able to say novel things about physics.

Why would those two things ever be related? Why can't we let people say novel things about physics, and call them out when they (for example) harass gay people, sexually assault people who work for them, or do other bad things. Why would we possibly want to excuse bad behaviour because someone comes up with novel physics ideas?

What sort of confusion of ideas could lead to linking these two topics?

Where are these 'mass' campaigns happening? I am sure there are some by fringe liberal groups, but 'mass' is probably an overstatement. Same with filtered and censored on social media; I see plenty of right wing posts on Facebook and Twitter.

> This was a big issue in the atheist community. A lot of atheist thinkers became massively successful for mocking and criticizing christians. But there was huge controversy when they started doing the same for Muslims.

Any examples? I have never seen any 'huge controversy' for mocking conservative Muslim beliefs.

Some of what you are observing probably also has to do with location and culture; the people posting things encounter a lot more conservative Christians in their day to day life than conservative Muslims. You don't have the same emotional response to something that isn't happening near you.

I am realizing as we are continuing this discussion how difficult it is to reach each other. A lot of this has to do with our own perceptions of the zeitgeist of society, and we clearly are not seeing the same things. I see the massive power social conservatives wield over our national discourse and politics, while you see the power liberals hold. I don't know how we can convince each other. We can both surely find countless examples of both conservatives and liberals making comments that prove our points, and countless examples to disprove the other person's.

I feel like so much of this is your own personal lens with which you see the world. I don't think we can show the other person our lens through an anonymous internet forumn.

While it is true that the RW statement doesn't imply that all Muslims are terrorists, it does imply that it is ok to ban ALL Muslims if some are terrorists. The liberal position is that this is NOT ok; we feel that the cost of blocking innocent people from entering the country is not worth the cost of allowing some possible terrorists in.

The RW position is that the cost of innocent people being blocked from entering is worth paying to block the possible terrorists.

This is somewhat ironic, because the positions become reversed when talking about gun control; conservatives believe you shouldn't punish law abiding gun owners because some people use guns to hurt people, while liberals believe it is a fair price to pay.

This is actually one place where I diverge from the traditional liberal position; while I think some gun control is reasonable, I think we shouldn't punish gun owners unreasonably because some people can't be trusted with guns.