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Benjamin Franklin’s alter egos gave him the most freedom

smithsonianmag.com

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Re: Benjamin Franklin’s alter egos gave him the most freedom

#31

Post by yywwbbn »

hdgvhicv wrote: post #21
embedding-shape wrote: post #20

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> That's a US perspective, stemming from US history. EU rights as to anonymous speech are weaker, It's interesting that on one hand you're right, in the US, anonymous speech receives near-absolute protection. In the EU, it's more of a "qualified right" than so absolute. But, on the other hand, in our modern age, EU seems better at defending against mandating backdoors or weakening end-to-end encryption violates the r…

US free speech is qualified too - just in different ways. And even when free speech is protected, it doesn’t stop you receiving the consequences log being arrested or losing your job and home.

[dead]

Re: Benjamin Franklin’s alter egos gave him the most freedom

#32

Post by Thanemate »

rootsudo wrote: post #16
huijzer wrote: post #11

What most biographies forget to mention is that Franklin was also member of the Hellfire club, which is described as [1], > Members would drink vast quantities of alcohol and gorge themselves on food. Drunkenness was a prerequisite of The Hellfire Club. They’d dabble in most of the seven deadly sins to be honest – with gluttony, greed and lust being regular activities. Add in a smattering of gambling, fornicating and…

Yes, and? These activities are still around today with all members of society.

But not all members of society are treated like a symbol whose behavior and manners we ought to revere and draw inspiration from. In such scenarios, pointing out that they were flawed is to humanize them.

It's clear that there was something that compelled you to write "yeah, so what?" as a rebuttal. But I can't tell if that came from a need to protect Franklin's public image, and to what end.

Throughout human history, there has been sparse evidence of historical figures which we draw (correctly) inspiration and admiration. I'll never forget reading Marcus Aurelius' Meditations where he was writing down in his journal how he was struggling to keep his sexual attraction to young boys at bay, who were also probably slaves. And he's still considered one of the five good emperors of Rome.

I'm not writing this to say whether any of them deserve it. I'm just pointing out that abuse of power isn't something new, and its expression isn't always known. For those people, the difference wasn't in their desires but that they had the power to act on them with no one batting an eye, and if they noticed they'd just walked it off.

Not that far from what we have today.

Re: Benjamin Franklin’s alter egos gave him the most freedom

#33

Post by shakna »

dannyobrien wrote: post #26
embedding-shape wrote: post #20

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> That's a US perspective, stemming from US history. EU rights as to anonymous speech are weaker, It's interesting that on one hand you're right, in the US, anonymous speech receives near-absolute protection. In the EU, it's more of a "qualified right" than so absolute. But, on the other hand, in our modern age, EU seems better at defending against mandating backdoors or weakening end-to-end encryption violates the r…

Could you give examples of the US adding backdoors and weakening end-to-end encryption? I'll give you the almost-certain weakening of proposed crypto standards, and Clinton-era export controls, but I don't think I've seen any movement in that direction recently. The most successful attempts statutorily seem to be in the UK and the US. Also: the European Court of Human Rights, as a non-EU institution, doesn't have an…

Don't worry. They're still weakening crypto standards today, hand in hand with the UK. [0]

[0] https://blog.cr.yp.to/20251004-weakened.html

Re: Benjamin Franklin’s alter egos gave him the most freedom

#34

Post by smolder »

kodoman wrote: post #27
watwut wrote: post #15

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Thiel has completely different philosophy and believes. So, no, absolutely not.

I feel like everything I have seen of Thiel is not as well thought out as people claim, I feel he came to lots of his positions from a sort of contrarian attitude and simply the limited things he has been exposed to (that of course is true of everyone but to me it seems striking how little the things actually fit together are are sort of all just mushed together), Take for example The Straussian Moment, though quotes…

I agree that Thiels ideas are on weak foundations. The idea of "the antichrist" is especially silly when you go back to historical sources. Scholars have said it's not a person, but a category. "The antichrist" is just people against Christ. At some point it got misinterpreted into some kind of reverse-Jesus.

Re: Benjamin Franklin’s alter egos gave him the most freedom

#35

Post by mentalgear »

SadErn wrote: post #3

When Benjamin Franklin launched Poor Richard’s Almanack in 1733 under the fake identity of “Richard Saunders,” he needed a way to get attention in Philadelphia’s crowded almanac market. So he decided to kill off one of his established competitors. Franklin announced that Titan Leeds would soon die: “He dies, by my Calculation... on Oct. 17. 1733. 3 ho. 29 m. P.M.” Leeds, inconveniently, did not die. Instead, he publi…

Credible Source or it didn’t happen .

Re: Benjamin Franklin’s alter egos gave him the most freedom

#36

Post by krapp »

smolder wrote: post #34
kodoman wrote: post #27

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I feel like everything I have seen of Thiel is not as well thought out as people claim, I feel he came to lots of his positions from a sort of contrarian attitude and simply the limited things he has been exposed to (that of course is true of everyone but to me it seems striking how little the things actually fit together are are sort of all just mushed together), Take for example The Straussian Moment, though quotes…

I agree that Thiels ideas are on weak foundations. The idea of "the antichrist" is especially silly when you go back to historical sources. Scholars have said it's not a person, but a category. "The antichrist" is just people against Christ. At some point it got misinterpreted into some kind of reverse-Jesus.

>At some point it got misinterpreted into some kind of reverse-Jesus.

That's from the Book of Revelations, which is probably talking about Nero Caesar anyway.

Re: Benjamin Franklin’s alter egos gave him the most freedom

#37

Post by rcxdude »

Animats wrote: post #18

Most of the Founders published under pseudonyms, even after the Revolution. Hamilton, Madison, Jay, Franklin - all had pseudonyms for their political writings. The Federalist papers were signed "Publius". What Franklin did was in no way unusual for that group. In the US, anonymous speech is considered a core part of free expression, and is treated as a First Amendment right. That's a US perspective, stemming from US…

In the UK you do have certain 'moral rights' with respect to a piece of writing you've made, and one of them is essentially a right to anonymity/pseudonymity for that work. Somewhat notably JK Rowling won a case about it when the books she released under a pen name were revealed to be hers.

Re: Benjamin Franklin’s alter egos gave him the most freedom

#38

Post by [deleted] »

huijzer wrote: post #11

What most biographies forget to mention is that Franklin was also member of the Hellfire club, which is described as [1], > Members would drink vast quantities of alcohol and gorge themselves on food. Drunkenness was a prerequisite of The Hellfire Club. They’d dabble in most of the seven deadly sins to be honest – with gluttony, greed and lust being regular activities. Add in a smattering of gambling, fornicating and…

[deleted]

Re: Benjamin Franklin’s alter egos gave him the most freedom

#39

Post by hdgvhicv »

embedding-shape wrote: post #29
hdgvhicv wrote: post #21

Earlier quoted context omitted.

US free speech is qualified too - just in different ways. And even when free speech is protected, it doesn’t stop you receiving the consequences log being arrested or losing your job and home.

I feel like we're talking about different things here. I understand "free speech does not mean free of consequence", so if your employer doesn't like your opinions, you can get fired, that's all fine and dandy. But why you add that someone could be arrested for free speech? The whole point of free speech, at least for me, is that the government cannot arrest you for that, even if all the people around you see you as…

People get arrested and fined for speech quite a lot in the US. I guess that’s just a consequence

https://eu.usatoday.com/story/news/politics/2026/03/23/supre...

https://english.elpais.com/usa/2025-03-17/arrest-of-pro-pale...

https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/ng-interactive/2026/feb/...

Re: Benjamin Franklin’s alter egos gave him the most freedom

#40

Post by Gravityloss »

IsaacL wrote: post #12

Benajamin Franklin is a rather fascinating fellow. Most of us know him from the image that appears on biographies and in textbooks: Franklin with bald pate, round spectacles, and a grandfatherly expression on his face, dispensing homespun wisdom like "early to bed, early to rise", etc, etc. I.e., he is known as basically the ideal early American pioneer; humble, hard-working, virtuous, and a fount of practical worldl…

Thank you for this comment. It is interesting and also beautifully written with no fluff.

For some reason few web pages, blogs or even tweets are written in this style.

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