Those who exercise free speech should also defend it even when it’s offensive • Hacker News Board

Re: Those who exercise free speech should also defend it even when it’s offensive

#231

Post by shrubble » Thu, Jun 25, 2020, 10:59 AM UTC

jmchuster wrote: post #201

AHappyCamper wrote: post #78

I understand that there are a lot of people who are hurting right now, and I empathize with their pain, but how can we share out most wonderful and beautiful ideas with each other or convey important information to the public if we believe there might be serious reprisals against us if we "say the wrong thing". For example, I personally helped work against slavery on the Black Market in the Middle East, and I wanted…

You can definitely choose to go down a route of "these people get offended and it's completely irrational and unjustified, and they are wrong to do so, so to teach them a lesson i'm going to shut my mouth and complain to everyone about how they are bad people that are forcing me to self-restrict my freedom of speech and as a result they are actively helping the slave trade". Or you might also consider the route of "t…

Is there ever a case where, after the first round of understanding and concession is done, that then, another discussion requires more concessions? Or, is there some objective way to determine a boundary line?

Re: Those who exercise free speech should also defend it even when it’s offensive

#232

Post by cglace » Thu, Jun 25, 2020, 10:59 AM UTC

jmchuster wrote: post #201

AHappyCamper wrote: post #78

I understand that there are a lot of people who are hurting right now, and I empathize with their pain, but how can we share out most wonderful and beautiful ideas with each other or convey important information to the public if we believe there might be serious reprisals against us if we "say the wrong thing". For example, I personally helped work against slavery on the Black Market in the Middle East, and I wanted…

You can definitely choose to go down a route of "these people get offended and it's completely irrational and unjustified, and they are wrong to do so, so to teach them a lesson i'm going to shut my mouth and complain to everyone about how they are bad people that are forcing me to self-restrict my freedom of speech and as a result they are actively helping the slave trade". Or you might also consider the route of "t…

I think the point is that it’s very expensive to do the former. There are 195 counties, 4,300 religions, n different cultures, languages, m different races, to figure out the right permutation of words that offends the least seems like a daunting challenge. It’s easier to just not speak.

Re: Those who exercise free speech should also defend it even when it’s offensive

#233

Post by Mangalor » Thu, Jun 25, 2020, 10:59 AM UTC

zarkov99 wrote: post #227

Mangalor wrote: post #215

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I often find that the usual so-called defenders of free speech do not hesitate for one moment with that libel charge whenever they encounter an opinion they happen to disagree with.

I often find that those whose favorite rethorical tool is lying much prefer to slander their opponents rather than attempt to refute their points.

ditto.

Re: Those who exercise free speech should also defend it even when it’s offensive

#234

Post by notahacker » Thu, Jun 25, 2020, 11:01 AM UTC

DanBC wrote: post #190

Aengeuad wrote: post #150

Earlier quoted context omitted.

With all the talk of people doing Nazi salutes it seemed like you could open any news story about the counter-protests and you'd see clear evidence of Neo-Nazis but it was anything but, even when people point to videos [0] that are supposed to demonstrate the Nazi salute it's a struggle to even figure out who is supposed to be doing it. Another video [1] of that same scene is even less supportive of the claim of Nazi…

> this is literally the first time I'm hearing that the leader of Britain First showed up It's somewhat frustrating that people who do not know who attended the demonstration are telling me that I'm wrong when I say it was mostly comprised of recognised far right groups. The protests were organised by far right groups such as FLA / DLFA, with calls from people like Stephen Yaxley-Lennon and Paul Golding for people to…

It was extremely well publicised at the time too: Golding even gave the PA a quote in advance about why he was going, every mainstream media outlet mentioned him in their reports and Twitter throbbed with speculation about whether he was breaching his bail conditions.

Re: Those who exercise free speech should also defend it even when it’s offensive

#235

Post by textgel » Thu, Jun 25, 2020, 11:01 AM UTC

nonsince wrote: post #191

ngngngng wrote: post #177

I argued with a family member about this just the other day. She was trying to get a faculty member at a local university fired for saying something offensive on Twitter. I asked her what happens after we get him fired? Can he earn back the worthiness to again feed his family? Will he need to denounce his views or just stop spewing them publicly? Will he just need to collect unemployment for the rest of his life now…

People with racist or otherwise regressive views know that these views will (rightly) get them criticised by the majority, and so they won't couch them in those terms precisely, but it's often very clear when you take context into account. I can't speak for this exact case, because we don't know what his exact words were, but it's telling that even your defence of him describes him criticising protesters at a time wh…

> People with racist or otherwise regressive views know that these views will (rightly) get them criticised by the majority, and so they won't couch them in those terms precisely, but it's often very clear when you take context into account.

When the word racist is being attributed to everything and anything including opposition to complete open borders by bullys and funnily enough, racists it is understandable that people may want to take cover.

> because we don't know what his exact words were, but it's telling that even your defence of him describes him criticising protesters at a time when protesters are being shot and having chemical weapons used on them by the police, a state militia who can kill pretty much anyone without threat of consequence.

It is also quite telling that "When those protesters are also burning down cities and attacking people" is strangely absent from your description.

> If your stance in this case is to support that militia, their murders and their use of chemical weapons, then I think that it's not remotely unfair to say that you not only do not support the black lives matter movement, but that you support the continuation of black people in the states being murdered without recompense.

Very few are in full support of everything the police do but binarizing the support to all or nothing is ridiculous.

Re: Those who exercise free speech should also defend it even when it’s offensive

#236

Post by marcus_holmes » Thu, Jun 25, 2020, 11:01 AM UTC

high_derivative wrote: post #152

TuringTest wrote: post #104

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> how can we share out most wonderful and beautiful ideas with each other The trick is to create channels with limited audiences, where you can set an expectation of which ideas are acceptable and which are not.* It always has been, but the the arrival of new communication methods has disrupted the traditional channels, and now every idea is propagated to a much larger and looser audience, which aren't aware or don't…

I find codes of conduct meaningless. They will go on in very general terms about 'hate speech' which is just synonymous with 'anything that anyone feels offended by' now. I would argue that code of conducts were a symptom of the start of the problem. The strategy of the grievance class: - Propose a code of conduct which surely nobody can disagree with, it's great to have rules and be nice to each other. - Design the…

That was always implicit in group discussions. As others have said, Codes of Conduct aren't creating new rules, they're just making them explicit instead of implicit.

Let me give you an example: you have a group of friends. Two of your friends have recently experienced a miscarriage. The implicit rules in your group have now expanded to include "no dead baby jokes" (depending on how dark your group's humour was, this might always have been a rule). The reason for this expansion is that two members of the group will now be hurt, upset and offended by those jokes. Making a "dead baby joke" is now a good reason to think the offender is an insensitive idiot, who probably isn't someone you want to be friends with.

This is no different from "no jokes about fags" when your group includes gay people. But sometimes, some people insist on being able to make "fag jokes" because "snowflakes are over-sensitive". Of course, they may not know the group includes gay people, and the gay people in question may not want anyone else to know their sexual orientation (none of anyone else's business). So it's better to spell it out explicitly that "fag jokes" are not allowed, even though there are apparently no gay people in the group. This is what a Code of Conduct does.

Yes, there are Purity Spirals that end up pushing this to extremes. But that's a separate issue. Codes of Conduct are still a really good idea.

Re: Those who exercise free speech should also defend it even when it’s offensive

#237

Post by paulgb » Thu, Jun 25, 2020, 11:01 AM UTC

PopeDotNinja wrote: post #121

TuringTest wrote: post #104

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> how can we share out most wonderful and beautiful ideas with each other The trick is to create channels with limited audiences, where you can set an expectation of which ideas are acceptable and which are not.* It always has been, but the the arrival of new communication methods has disrupted the traditional channels, and now every idea is propagated to a much larger and looser audience, which aren't aware or don't…

How do you manage reading every code of conduct and honoring it? The trouble I'm having with social changes, expectations, per person pronouns, and other things is that managing all of these interactions can be a crushing amount of cognitive load. Now that I think about it, it's the same challenge I have with microservices. Formerly simple interactions are now hellza complicated. I'm not fighting the trend. I'm just…

> The trouble I'm having with social changes, expectations, per person pronouns, and other things is that managing all of these interactions can be a crushing amount of cognitive load.

Are per-person pronouns really such a big deal to manage? I've known more people who have changed their name in marriage than changed their pronouns.

Re: Those who exercise free speech should also defend it even when it’s offensive

#238

Post by marcus_holmes » Thu, Jun 25, 2020, 11:04 AM UTC

AHappyCamper wrote: post #160

TuringTest wrote: post #104

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> how can we share out most wonderful and beautiful ideas with each other The trick is to create channels with limited audiences, where you can set an expectation of which ideas are acceptable and which are not.* It always has been, but the the arrival of new communication methods has disrupted the traditional channels, and now every idea is propagated to a much larger and looser audience, which aren't aware or don't…

You bring up some really interesting ideas, but there are certain times where communication is mission critical - and deeply considering complex communicational structures before posting/conveying information can eventuate in serious injury or loss of life. During those times, you simply need to be able to "get the message out" without worrying about the potential offense that you words may cause to a certain individ…

Can you give me an example of an urgent, mission critical communication that could be offensive to people?

Re: Those who exercise free speech should also defend it even when it’s offensive

#239

Post by belorn » Thu, Jun 25, 2020, 11:05 AM UTC

TuringTest wrote: post #104

AHappyCamper wrote: post #78

I understand that there are a lot of people who are hurting right now, and I empathize with their pain, but how can we share out most wonderful and beautiful ideas with each other or convey important information to the public if we believe there might be serious reprisals against us if we "say the wrong thing". For example, I personally helped work against slavery on the Black Market in the Middle East, and I wanted…

> how can we share out most wonderful and beautiful ideas with each other The trick is to create channels with limited audiences, where you can set an expectation of which ideas are acceptable and which are not.* It always has been, but the the arrival of new communication methods has disrupted the traditional channels, and now every idea is propagated to a much larger and looser audience, which aren't aware or don't…

The problem with explicit code of conduct is that there is always a implicit interpretation of what the code of conduct say and how it should get enforced.

If we could get an explicit code of conduct with explicit interpretation with explicit enforcement then yes, they work quite well. Sadly most communities leave interpretation and enforcement up to the dominant group with an often explicit desire to not have those parts visible.

Re: Those who exercise free speech should also defend it even when it’s offensive

#240

Post by jstanley » Thu, Jun 25, 2020, 11:08 AM UTC

sam_goody wrote: post #222

imgabe wrote: post #82

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Part of the issue is that some people consider any speech they disagree with as a threat of violence or "endangering my safety".

On HN, if you disagree with a comment, you downvote it and punish the author. (Or, at least, that is the common way to respond, and for good reason - the only "disagree" button is the one that hurts the credit of the OP) This especially hurts new commenters, whose credit is fragile (and who don't know the cap on down-votes). Which keeps the conversation "safe", and the lurkers quiet. Cynical me thinks this is a refle…

> (Or, at least, that is the common way to respond, and for good reason - the only "disagree" button is the one that hurts the credit of the OP)

I don't think that's a good reason. You should downvote if you think someone is arguing disingenuously or otherwise writing nonsense that doesn't belong on HN. If you merely disagree, you should upvote instead, and articulate your disagreement in a reply.