Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Rowan Atkinson on free speech (2012) [video]

youtube.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

131–140 of 165 posts

Re: Rowan Atkinson on free speech (2012) [video]

#131

Post by kaba0 »

karaterobot wrote: post #63

A couple years ago, somebody remarked to me, "oh, you're one of those free speech guys, aren't you?" and I realized it was meant as an insult. Yes, I guess so! I'm not sure what changed, but I doubt that would ever have happened a few decades ago. You might have argued about the practical limits of free speech (shouting fire in a theater, Potter Stewart's obscenity test, etc.) but you would never hear someone say tha…

I think the nuance of those practical limits are very important — we have a terrible case of misinformation going on and unfortunately that noble goal is easily weaponized. Also, paradox of tolerance.

So the negative echoes you might here is more of a reaction to those who weaponize it.

Re: Rowan Atkinson on free speech (2012) [video]

#132

Post by djur »

satisfice wrote: post #128
djur wrote: post #66

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How is "deadnaming" an attack on free speech? It's always been considered discourteous to refer to people by a name they don't go by.

I’ve been alive a long time and I never went to a meeting where this was discussed or decided. I’ve never heard of such a meeting. And it doesn’t make sense. If you spend part of your life in a certain identity, and you interact with people under that identity, and they know you that way, banning people from talking about you in that identity is discourteous to THEM. You are laying a claim on other people’s minds tha…

OK, so if someone got married and changed their last name, you would feel OK continuing to refer to them by their maiden name? Even if they no longer used that name and asked you to use their new name? You wouldn't expect any kind of social consequences for that?

Re: Rowan Atkinson on free speech (2012) [video]

#133

Post by kaba0 »

didntcheck wrote: post #16
indy wrote: post #8

There seems to be a generational divide on this topic. A lot of younger people seem to be fine with restrictions on free speech, often under the guise of various progressive causes

It feels to me that the Overton window shifted rapidly (and arguably inverted) in the late 2010s. I remember this speech being posted and praised in forums and among people who would now consider it a harmful "dogwhistle". And I concur with the generational divide. As a mid-90s birth I've often found myself defending these principles towards younger people, and have done so by pointing out how the left used to suppor…

I don’t think that generations would be the important difference here — free speech in a pre-modern media world was entirely different than what we have in the modern, chaotic disinformation-y one.

Re: Rowan Atkinson on free speech (2012) [video]

#134

Post by kaba0 »

jl6 wrote: post #22
fugalfervor wrote: post #10

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The book banning and restrictions on content in classrooms in Florida are further examples of people being fine with restrictions on speech. At this point it's pretty disingenuous to lay the blame entirely on the left, or the young.

Different debate. Those authors were not restricted from publishing their books. The Florida issue is about what kind of material is suitable for children to access.

“That book talks about sex, it’s bad, but please don’t notice that the Bible is full of rape”

Re: Rowan Atkinson on free speech (2012) [video]

#135

Post by kaba0 »

mansion7 wrote: post #96
spondylosaurus wrote: post #68

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'd even argue that the wave of anti-drag legislation hitting the US right now is an attack on free expression akin to free speech. (What gives state legislature the right to ban me from putting on too much makeup and lip syncing to Madonna?)

It's the very peculiar, very strenuous insistence that children watch, and participate, as men cavort in women's clothes in a sexually charged manner. Followed by the vilification of people with quite reasonable concerns as "transphobes" (a fireable, deplatformable, censorable offense) and "Nazis" (who have been deemed acceptable targets of unprovoked violence). But for that, most Americans would go back to not carin…

Nazis should be deemed acceptable targets of unprovoked violence — but the least they should go to prison for that. It’s not a free speech violation when the whole ideology is incompatible with society.

Re: Rowan Atkinson on free speech (2012) [video]

#136

Post by kaba0 »

satisfice wrote: post #128
djur wrote: post #66

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How is "deadnaming" an attack on free speech? It's always been considered discourteous to refer to people by a name they don't go by.

I’ve been alive a long time and I never went to a meeting where this was discussed or decided. I’ve never heard of such a meeting. And it doesn’t make sense. If you spend part of your life in a certain identity, and you interact with people under that identity, and they know you that way, banning people from talking about you in that identity is discourteous to THEM. You are laying a claim on other people’s minds tha…

So if you tell people that you prefer John to Johnny, and they continue calling you Johnny, they are not scumbags?

That’s such a trivial, no effort courtesy on another human being’s part that I fail to see all this talk about it. Just.. fucking call people by the name they ask you to.

Also, no sane person would get angry at the occasional fuck up in naming them if your intentions are good.

Just be a decent person.

Re: Rowan Atkinson on free speech (2012) [video]

#137

Post by kaba0 »

indy wrote: post #62
nsajko wrote: post #57

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I agree that "dead naming" and other LGBT-related concepts are anti-intellectual, but it's not clear that any of your examples are at all related to free speech. A part of the problem is that "free speech" is mostly a buzzword, having no clear definition or meaning, except through case law.

I think my examples are very clearly related to free speech. They are all examples of excuses or intimidation used to prevent people from speaking.

You can speak, but attacking that other person by deliberately using something they don’t prefer is just inhumane.

It’s not a difficult concept.

Re: Rowan Atkinson on free speech (2012) [video]

#138

Post by kaba0 »

ggreer wrote: post #113
awesome_dude wrote: post #50

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There's also the shutting down of protests that are loud because they are against one thing being heard. It is hard to determine whose free speech prevail there.

If you read the original arguments in favor of freedom of speech, it's actually quite easy to determine who should prevail. Back in 1644, John Milton argued in favor of allowing bad ideas to be published for the following reason[1]: > Bad meats will scarce breed good nourishment in the healthiest concoction; but herein the difference is of bad books, that they to a discreet and judicious Reader serve in many respects…

> Bad meats will scarce breed good nourishment in the healthiest concoction

Funnily enough, this might not hold true in this current era of media. Bad information (disinformation) cause real harm, see antivaxxers, political radicalism, etc. So this topic is a bit more nuanced with platforms in place that can echo speech based on potentially malicious intent.

Re: Rowan Atkinson on free speech (2012) [video]

#139

Post by kaba0 »

mock-possum wrote: post #124
mcv wrote: post #120

Although I agree with much of what he says, it seems like Rowan Atkinson is unfamiliar with Popper's Paradox of Intolerance. He easily brushes it away as if it can't stand up to 5 seconds of thought, but I'm pretty sure Karl Popper (undeniably a smart guy) put more than 5 minutes of thought into it.

yeah I thought the subject deserved more consideration on his part - I mean Popper's got a point. For him to just be like "oh that's obviously wrong moving right along" really doesn't deal with it seriously. Because the real underlying question here, at least as far as I'm concerned, is - is Free Speech good to a fault ? Like you can easily think of ways to use free speech to harass, and to hurt, and to threaten, to…

> Is free speech really so important that abusers and trolls are given a free pass to continue their work, so long as they constrain it to the realm of speech?

Especially when said speech is often followed up by action by someone else.

Re: Rowan Atkinson on free speech (2012) [video]

#140

Post by karmakurtisaani »

Ygg2 wrote: post #122
karmakurtisaani wrote: post #90

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think you might have missed the next sentence in my text that you quoted. Alt right people are not persecuted for their opinions, so they still have their freedom of speech. They just like to pretend that they don't.

No. I just don't consider it true. Sure, government doesn't silence anymore. They just ask Facebook/Twitter/[insert social media] nicely to do that instead of them. In same way a mobster just asks you to help him out with that problematic person. Or else.

But that's not the same as not having freedom of speech. FoS comes up when you get in trouble for expressing s point of view. For the type of suppression you talk about, check out Manufacturing Consent by Noam Chomsky.
Post reply on HN