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Our nation cannot censor its way back to cultural health

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Re: Our nation cannot censor its way back to cultural health

#251

Post by arc-in-space »

PaulDavisThe1st wrote: post #179
arc-in-space wrote: post #168

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I believe in freedom of speech. > (...) we simply cannot give every lunatic a megaphone. It appears that you do not, in fact, believe in freedom of speech. Being heard is the point of speech.

You may or may not have noticed that you can be heard without a megaphone. The purpose of a megaphone is not just "to be heard", but to increase your audibility in specific situations. Just as "freedom of speech" does not include the "right to cry "Fire!" in a crowded theater", it isn't terribly obvious that it includes the right to be heard in situations where you can only be heard with a megaphone.

Nobody here is suggesting handing out literal megaphones, the analogy is not very apt in the first place. I was responding to the primary argument made in that comment, which is that speech performed by people with larger followings should be subject to more scrutiny and control, which basically amounts to no free speech.

Re: Our nation cannot censor its way back to cultural health

#252

Post by jacquesm »

YEwSdObPQT wrote: post #247
jacquesm wrote: post #242

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Quoted post unavailable.

The argument you have presented is a classic tactic that the state uses to justify censorship and its abuse of power. Present scary group of people and then use it to justify taking away everyone's rights. it is a nonsense because. Firstly There simply isn't enough for these people to be politically relevant. The number of KKK members in the US IIRC is approximately 10,000 in a country of ~350 million. That is 0.002%…

No post body was provided.

Re: Our nation cannot censor its way back to cultural health

#253

Post by YEwSdObPQT »

jacquesm wrote: post #252
YEwSdObPQT wrote: post #247

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The argument you have presented is a classic tactic that the state uses to justify censorship and its abuse of power. Present scary group of people and then use it to justify taking away everyone's rights. it is a nonsense because. Firstly There simply isn't enough for these people to be politically relevant. The number of KKK members in the US IIRC is approximately 10,000 in a country of ~350 million. That is 0.002%…

Quoted post unavailable.

How disingenuous. All this tells me is that you don't have an argument against my position.

If you are have an rebuttal, I am quite willing to hear it.

Re: Our nation cannot censor its way back to cultural health

#254

Post by zozbot234 »

scotty79 wrote: post #248
zozbot234 wrote: post #245

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> "When the Nazis came to power in 1933, the German constitution guaranteed freedom of speech and freedom of the press." Note that these rights were not at all guaranteed pre-1919. Censorship of speech and of the press was practically institutionalized in the German Empire. It makes no sense to argue that the rabid anti-Semitism of late-19th c. and early-20th c. Germany was a result of too much freedom; on the contra…

What was too little too late was not the freedom of speech, but laws against anti-Semitic expressions. They were too limited and mellow. Goebbels was sentenced for anti-Semitic expressions which didn't stop him at all.

The fact that those laws were even on the books is in itself notable given that, again, anti-Semitism had largely been endorsed by previous governments.

And it wasn't just Germany either. Remember the Dreyfus Affair? That was in France pre-WWI. Dreyfus was framed by the authorities for a crime he did not commit, and initially got a life sentence before widespread public opposition led to a reopening of the case and ultimately to his exoneration. This whole ruckus shows that the very idea that anti-Semitism was something that should be opposed could be considered radical and anti-authoritarian at the time even in "civilized, developed" La Belle Époque France, never mind Germany! The mindset was wildly different from what we'd expect today.

Re: Our nation cannot censor its way back to cultural health

#255

Post by FpUser »

encryptluks2 wrote: post #221
FpUser wrote: post #41

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>"As soon as a business takes a political stand, then they paint a huge target on their back" Well it does not seem to scare big gorillas of companies. Their type of censorship screams "political stand"

It does to an extent, but the majority of users complaining about it are like the Twitter users complaining about it on Twitter and the YouTubers complaining about censorship on YouTube. In order for those companies to change their strategy they would have to see a mass exodus of users due to their actions. With the number one priority of large corporations being profit, they will continue to justify the censorship o…

>"It does to an extent, but ..."

"but" part does not matter. There is always an explanation why they do it. Does not make it any better.

Re: Our nation cannot censor its way back to cultural health

#256

Post by throwaway0a5e »

noiseman wrote: post #235
keithnz wrote: post #198

Earlier quoted context omitted.

liberty and free speech tends to overly concern Americans when they have more pressing and bigger problems. The big mistake with the title is "way back to cultural health", stop looking backwards. If you do want to look back to the idea that founded your republic, look back and see a whole bunch of people trying to look forward. Do that. Fix your system of government, a two party system is bad for you, you've become…

When the constitution was written, less than 25% of the US population had the right to vote. Basically only White male property owners could vote. That was a very different political culture to how it is today. It’s also interesting to see how the reading scores of presidential speeches have changed over time.

Everyone always harps on the whole white male property owners thing but it misses the entire point.

It's probably more productive to think about it in terms of "the usual people who were given a voice back then, but only the subset of them who couldn't f-off without leaving behind a ton of their wealth if things went bad."

In effect they limited voting to people who had settled down and had substantial skin in the game.

Why did they do this?

Re: Our nation cannot censor its way back to cultural health

#257

Post by rayiner »

bp0017 wrote: post #141
rayiner wrote: post #111

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Public education is a service provided by the government. What material the government chooses to teach or not teach using parents’ is entirely up to the government and the parents. Free speech is irrelevant to curricular choices because teachers aren’t there to engage students in a marketplace of ideas. They’re being paid to provide a service. Organizations that provide content make such curation choices about what…

This is stated like it is an absolute fact, not a reflection of our hyper-capitalist society. I would argue that reducing education to a content curator is harmful to what it aims to be, although the analogy is not entirely inaccurate, unfortunately. Is education an infotainment service or a search for the truth? The latter requires a free exchange of ideas and informed debate, although this is rarely encouraged in o…

K-12 education is not a “search for truth” or about “free exchange of ideas and informed debate.” These aren’t college kids. These schools are to socialize kids into the morals and values of their society and to teach them the basic foundational knowledge their society believes to be true. That has nothing to do with “capitalism” and indeed is what pre-capitalist societies long understood education of children to entail.

Re: Our nation cannot censor its way back to cultural health

#258

Post by bavell »

scotty79 wrote: post #248
zozbot234 wrote: post #245

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> "When the Nazis came to power in 1933, the German constitution guaranteed freedom of speech and freedom of the press." Note that these rights were not at all guaranteed pre-1919. Censorship of speech and of the press was practically institutionalized in the German Empire. It makes no sense to argue that the rabid anti-Semitism of late-19th c. and early-20th c. Germany was a result of too much freedom; on the contra…

What was too little too late was not the freedom of speech, but laws against anti-Semitic expressions. They were too limited and mellow. Goebbels was sentenced for anti-Semitic expressions which didn't stop him at all.

You're ignoring entirely the devastating economic impact of the treaty of Versailles and claiming it was all about free speech. Totally off the Mark ;)

Re: Our nation cannot censor its way back to cultural health

#259

Post by kgwxd »

YEwSdObPQT wrote: post #247
jacquesm wrote: post #242

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Quoted post unavailable.

The argument you have presented is a classic tactic that the state uses to justify censorship and its abuse of power. Present scary group of people and then use it to justify taking away everyone's rights. it is a nonsense because. Firstly There simply isn't enough for these people to be politically relevant. The number of KKK members in the US IIRC is approximately 10,000 in a country of ~350 million. That is 0.002%…

That might be the number of card carrying members, the number of people who are cool with their general ideas but smart enough to not go around advertising it to everyone is far greater.

Re: Our nation cannot censor its way back to cultural health

#260

Post by honkdaddy »

YEwSdObPQT wrote: post #247
jacquesm wrote: post #242

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Quoted post unavailable.

The argument you have presented is a classic tactic that the state uses to justify censorship and its abuse of power. Present scary group of people and then use it to justify taking away everyone's rights. it is a nonsense because. Firstly There simply isn't enough for these people to be politically relevant. The number of KKK members in the US IIRC is approximately 10,000 in a country of ~350 million. That is 0.002%…

You make an excellent case. It's a shame that /u/jacquesm realizes they've been proven wrong but doesn't have the decency to admit it.
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