Cognitive ability is related to supporting freedom of speech (2020)

I want to tread a bit lightly on any disagreement with a living legend like Walter Bright who was navigating the complexities of public/private sector trade-offs via his aerospace work when I was knee-high to a grasshopper: experience and demonstrated ability like that deserve more consideration than they get around here.

With that said, my personal politics (I did self-identify as a “coastal leftie”) are such that I tend to agree with you that equitable surges in human welfare seem highly correlated with a deep partnership between the public and private sectors, strong labor organization, thoughtful and deliberate restraints on monopoly actors, and the Powers That Be taking a very long view on their own welfare by viewing it as a partnership with the working class.

I have also had to divert significant funds to family members both older and younger than me because people in both groups faced exceedingly bleak economic situations of comparatively new vintage: the older because of a collapse in traditional safety nets for retired persons (both public sector and community oriented) and the latter because of starting their working lives during the Great Recession, neither of which is anything to them but really bad luck.

I can’t speak for Walter, but in my lifetime I’ve observed a marked decline in what used to be called noblesse oblige among the asset-holding class, and given his greater experience it seems at a minimum plausible that my dissenting opinions are a product of a deviation from more typical conditions.

I sure hope so!

Correct, that is an accurate characterization of my belief. Compare to your original comment:

> I think what you mean is that people are calling for internet platforms to kick out certain groups. This is in no way a call against freedom of speech.

The problem is that the causal factor causing e.g. twitter to evict people is not that "people are calling" for this action. The widespread coverage of certain people clamoring for censorship is only part of the legitimation process, not the actual reason twitter is performing the censorship. The actual reason twitter is performing the censorship is due to govt/elite pressure to do so.

So when you say "people are calling" for censorship, that's just what it looks like today when the US government censors people. They launder their actions through NGOs, civil rights lawsuits, selective prosecution, etc. so that people can diffuse any accusations of malfeasance with "well it's not the government doing it, so who cares"? It's untrue, and at some level it's irrelevant, but rhetorically it works.

I appreciate the effort to analysis my comment, but it seems you misinterpreted, so I'll explain my comment.

One could argue that a democracy by definition must have free speech. Otherwise, it's more of a "vote on the options provided by the ruling class". My question was meant as an actual question, is the illusion of democracy better than democracy for survival?

I use the word survival because it's the first law of life.

I use "right wing extremists" to make fun of people who think free speech is a right wing idea, or that opposing low-iq immigration is extreme.

I didn't mention political parties, nor mean to imply anything.

> Something to ask yourself: Did the Nazis just magically fade? Or did people perhaps do things to counter them? And did that Nazis do any harm while people were waiting for them to fade on their own?

We're talking about whether taking actions against speech is warranted, not whether actions against people taking actions like ethnic cleansing are warranted.

> How did the ethnic cleansing happen? A lot of verbal abuse and threats on the part of white people, with occasional outbursts of violence.

And the violence is the key part. If you had no possibility of violence against you, any threats are empty. The actions are the important part not the speech.

So my last response here, with all due respect, is:

>You want to frame mockery of and complaints about men as hate speech. It may be many things, but it's not hate speech.

The United Nations defines it as: "In common language, “hate speech” loosely refer to offensive discourse targeting a group or an individual based on inherent characteristics - such as race, religion or gender - and that may threaten social peace."

So...hate speech is offensive discourse targeting based on inherent characteristics, such as gender/sex.

Speech is violence, and this type of speech is violence against men, who are a class of people. And for sure the speech against men is offensive at the least.

If I were to say similar things to any group, except for men, I would be universally condemned.

Donald Trump was all about mockery and complaints and he has whipped up a whirlwind of scary stuff. It was all based on mockery and complaints. From that, he did bring it to the next level, but it started at the beginning as mockery - like when he mocked the man in a wheelchair, or mocked John McCain for being captured in Vietnam, and a hundred other examples.

>Pointing out the foibles, follies, and fuckups of men is not fostering violence.

That is your opinion. And furthermore, I compare that against why the same thing does not happen against women. Why not "woman-nagging" and "toxic femininity" and "women's-purse-and-other-junk-they-carry-spreading"? If the media and men started labeling women like this with diparaging terms, the world would screech to a halt and there would be weeks of articles and the entire media would have to go into a self-flagellating penance for years.

>This is has been a man's world, after all.

This has nothing to do with anything. You are changing the subject. If you want to argue that point, I will do that, but let's finish up with the point at hand first.

>Dressing up hostility itself as "just a joke" doesn't count, but I'm not seeing that in the modern culture you deplore.

Yes, the people who are the perpetrators often don't see things that the victims see.

Men are dropping out of society because of social disparagement of men. Men are dropping out. 60% of university graduates are women and I've read that is supposed to to to 70-75% in 15 years or so. Women have earned 10,000,000 more degrees than men.

Anyways, I just wanted to point out all these things. I'm sure you understand what I'm saying. No disrespect or being argumentative intended, it is just my viewpoint, and I'm going to stop here. If you don't agree, we'll just have to agree to disagree. And maybe some time in the future what I say might "click in" and you will gain some understanding for the other side.

Good luck you you and best wishes.