Free speech derail from The Rise of Christian Nationalism

[Metaphor]

Even as a near-absolutist on free speech, there are certain situations that where I think the government has a right to restrict speech (e.g. credible threats of violence).

But just because I would generally allow private corporations a lot of latitude in what they allow on their platform (e.g. I would not want the government to force Twitter to reinstate the Babylon Bee's account), that doesn't mean it is not worth discussing the censoring instinct in tech oligopolies. Twitter's hugely ironic stated values versus its status as the most toxic social media platform ever devised is a case in point.

What you are missing is that those aren't public utilities, but private companies.

Oy ge fucking valt. I'm not missing anything. You literally just quoted me differentiating between public utilities and private companies.

I think Twitter's community guidelines are idiotic, its policies and practices in 'protecting' its users are perverse, and its stated values are an absurdity given the platform it has fostered and profited from. But Twitter's gonna Twitter and I do not support the government forcing it to do anything.

 

[Metaphor]

And note that most on the left don't support banning hate speech.

Of course they do. Everywhere in the Western world (except some places where strong Constitutional barriers exist), governments have proscribed speech. All kinds of speech is banned in Australia.

 

[prideandfall]

Would I support a teacher lying to her captive students, you mean?

is that a yes or a no?

If it were a publically funded school, no I would not support it. Free speech does not mean the government has to provide a platform and a salary to the person making the speech.

a statement directly contradicted by many of your posts, so again we're back to "it's free speech unless metaphor disagrees with it"

If it was a university, I'd let the university decide whether professors preaching nonsense to the gullible is something they want to encourage.

well thank god you don't have a posting history of freaking out about things like gender equality and "CRT" in universities, or else that would look all kinds of hypocritical.

 

[Metaphor]

Would I support a teacher lying to her captive students, you mean?

is that a yes or a no?

I explained what I meant. I don't "support" teachers lying to their students. But whether I want the government to punish teachers lying to their students is a different story, and whether I think the government must provide a captive audience and pay a salary to liars is again a different kettle of fish.

If it was a private school, I would tell the school "I don't support this, and if you don't do something about it, I will probably withdraw my child from this school".

If it were a public school, I would say "teaching that a man uttering the words "I am female" makes them female is a religious belief and teachers should not be teaching religion as fact to students".

If it were a publically funded school, no I would not support it. Free speech does not mean the government has to provide a platform and a salary to the person making the speech.

a statement directly contradicted by many of your posts, so again we're back to "it's free speech unless metaphor disagrees with it"

If you aren't going to listen to my answers, stop asking me questions.

If it was a university, I'd let the university decide whether professors preaching nonsense to the gullible is something they want to encourage.

well thank god you don't have a posting history of freaking out about things like gender equality and "CRT" in universities, or else that would look all kinds of hypocritical.

There is nothing hypocritical about criticising nonsense and believing in the value of free speech. Criticising nonsense is my exercise of free speech.

 

[Metaphor]

Another exercise of free speech:

I disagree with some of the moderation rules on this message board, and if I controlled the message board, I would get rid of the ones I disagree with.

But I don't control the message board rules. By my reckoning, I get a net positive value from the platform despite my disagreement with some of the rules, so I will continue to use the board as is.

 

[Tigers!]

You have the facts wrong. White people were not banned from campus, but asked not to come to campus.

If a white person were to turn up to campus when asked not come what would happen to them?

 

[Tigers!]

For the record I am an independent centrist.

you are a completely boring run-of-the-mill paranoid reactionary regressive right-wing ditto who parrots whatever idiocy on FOX news that week, and you always have been for all the many years you've been posting here.
(well to be more specific, the content of your posts here are that. what you are, i have no idea as i'm not a telepath)

I am so pleased that you managed to get all your prejudices into a grammatically correct sentence.
I do not know to which steve_bank you are referrring but it does not sound like the steve_bank we know and love.

 

[Bomb#20]

For the record I am an independent centrist.

you are a completely boring run-of-the-mill paranoid reactionary regressive right-wing ditto who parrots whatever idiocy on FOX news that week, and you always have been for all the many years you've been posting here.
(well to be more specific, the content of your posts here are that. what you are, i have no idea as i'm not a telepath)

I am so pleased that you managed to get all your prejudices into a grammatically correct sentence.
I do not know to which steve_bank you are referrring but it does not sound like the steve_bank we know and love.

I do not know to which prideandfall you are referring but it does not sound like the prideandfall we know and love. The sentence the prideandfall we know and love managed to get all his prejudices into was not grammatically correct.

Spoiler

That should have been "you are a completely boring run-of-the-mill paranoid reactionary regressive right-wing ditto who parrots whatever idiocy was on FOX news that week, and you always have been for all the many years you've been posting here."

 

[Tigers!]

For the record I am an independent centrist.

you are a completely boring run-of-the-mill paranoid reactionary regressive right-wing ditto who parrots whatever idiocy on FOX news that week, and you always have been for all the many years you've been posting here.
(well to be more specific, the content of your posts here are that. what you are, i have no idea as i'm not a telepath)

I am so pleased that you managed to get all your prejudices into a grammatically correct sentence.
I do not know to which steve_bank you are referrring but it does not sound like the steve_bank we know and love.

I do not know to which prideandfall you are referring but it does not sound like the prideandfall we know and love. The sentence the prideandfall we know and love managed to get all his prejudices into was not grammatically correct.

Spoiler

That should have been "you are a completely boring run-of-the-mill paranoid reactionary regressive right-wing ditto who parrots whatever idiocy was on FOX news that week, and you always have been for all the many years you've been posting here."

And it needed some commas, Oxford or otherwise.

 

[Hermit]

And, secondly, and quite radically compared to leftists, I do not believe there should be government proscriptions on actual speech that is actually "hateful".

There we disagree. Hate speech has been a causal contributor to millions of deaths and untold suffering by those who were not actually killed. I am not only thinking of the obvious example. Martin Luther has a lot to answer for. Then there were the Russian pogroms of the 1880s and dozens, maybe hundreds of other instances we neither hear about nor cared if we did, because they happened to ethnic populations in geographic areas we westerners simply choose to ignore. It is because of those tragedies hate speech has no right to the protection of free speech.

The hate speech of he who must not be named, and Martin Luther, and the instigators of pogroms, and the hundreds of other instances, did not contribute to vast death and suffering only by being hate speech per se. Their speech contributed to vast death and suffering by being hate speech from the powerful.

Your attempt to shift agency from hate speech to the powerful does not work. No matter where hate speech originates or how it is propagated, it has been a causal contributor to millions of deaths and untold suffering by those who were not actually killed. That is an undeniable historical fact.

 

[Metaphor]

Seems Will Smith doesn't believe in free speech, either.

 

[scombrid]

How so? Rock freely said what he said and Smith freely responded.

 

[Jarhyn]

Some things we recognize look like jokes but have the edge of a social attack.

Some people rightly take issue with the fact of vocal recognition of race, in contexts where such recognition can easily be construed to imply disrepute.

Some people rightly take issue with the fact of vocal recognition of someone's health issues in context where recognition can easily be construed to imply disrepute.

Unreasonable statements which violate the privacy of someone that publicly are not warranted.

As if I wanted to know someone has some thing going on that they don't want aired by anyone but themselves and their trusted agents, as if it was Chris Rock's right to inform me of it.

 

[Bomb#20]

The hate speech of he who must not be named, and Martin Luther, and the instigators of pogroms, and the hundreds of other instances, did not contribute to vast death and suffering only by being hate speech per se. Their speech contributed to vast death and suffering by being hate speech from the powerful.

Your attempt to shift agency from hate speech to the powerful does not work. No matter where hate speech originates or how it is propagated, it has been a causal contributor to millions of deaths and untold suffering by those who were not actually killed. That is an undeniable historical fact.

Your premise does not imply your conclusion. Yes, it's an undeniable historical fact that hate speech has been a causal contributor to millions of deaths and untold suffering. So can you show us historical examples in which adding a censorship law would have prevented the millions of deaths and untold suffering?

 

[laughing dog]

The hate speech of he who must not be named, and Martin Luther, and the instigators of pogroms, and the hundreds of other instances, did not contribute to vast death and suffering only by being hate speech per se. Their speech contributed to vast death and suffering by being hate speech from the powerful.

Your attempt to shift agency from hate speech to the powerful does not work. No matter where hate speech originates or how it is propagated, it has been a causal contributor to millions of deaths and untold suffering by those who were not actually killed. That is an undeniable historical fact.

Your premise does not imply your conclusion. Yes, it's an undeniable historical fact that hate speech has been a causal contributor to millions of deaths and untold suffering. So can you show us historical examples in which adding a censorship law would have prevented the millions of deaths and untold suffering?

You are literally asking for the impossible - a counterfactual example.

 

[Metaphor]

How so? Rock freely said what he said and Smith freely responded.

Are you serious?

You believe free speech exists in an environment where thugs can assault you with no consequences to them, for what you say?

 

[Metaphor]

Some things we recognize look like jokes but have the edge of a social attack.

So?

Some people rightly take issue with the fact of vocal recognition of race, in contexts where such recognition can easily be construed to imply disrepute.

So?

Some people rightly take issue with the fact of vocal recognition of someone's health issues in context where recognition can easily be construed to imply disrepute.

So?

Unreasonable statements which violate the privacy of someone that publicly are not warranted.

I don't know if you are talking about Will Smith's violent response to Chris Rock's joke, but Rock did not reveal any 'private' information about Jada Pinkett Smith.

As if I wanted to know someone has some thing going on that they don't want aired by anyone but themselves and their trusted agents, as if it was Chris Rock's right to inform me of it.

What on earth are you talking about?

Chris Rock said Jada Pinkett Smith looked like she was getting ready for GI Jane 2. It was a reference to her lack of hair. It did not reveal any private information whatsoever, since Jada Pinkett Smith is known for her baldness, for being Will Smith's +1, her open marriage, and for producing talent-free children. None of these things are secrets.

Evidently you believe Will Smith was justified in his violent assault on Chris Rock.

 

[Toni]

How so? Rock freely said what he said and Smith freely responded.

Are you serious?

You believe free speech exists in an environment where thugs can assault you with no consequences to them, for what you say?

Chris Rock made a minor verbal assault on Jada Smith. It was couched as a joke but in fact was a graver insult than most White people realize. There is an extremely long and ugly history of black women in the US being insulted and penalized by others’ impressions of their hair. In fact, she has a medical condition leading to hair loss.

Will Smith responded by striking Rock and uttering his own profanity. For this he is being soundly and very widely criticized. I did not watch but I read that Smith issued an apology before his acceptance speech.

Rock has declined to press charges.

Obviously none of this should have happened. This should be an end to the matter as far as the public is concerned.

 

[Metaphor]

How so? Rock freely said what he said and Smith freely responded.

Are you serious?

You believe free speech exists in an environment where thugs can assault you with no consequences to them, for what you say?

Chris Rock made a minor verbal assault on Jada Smith. It was couched as a joke but in fact was a graver insult than most White people realize. There is an extremely long and ugly history of black women in the US being insulted and penalized by others’ impressions of their hair. In fact, she has a medical condition leading to hair loss.

Yes, it's not a secret. She told the world.

Will Smith responded by striking Rock and uttering his own profanity. For this he is being soundly and very widely criticized.

What? Not by everyone he isn't. There are people on this thread giving him a pass.

I did not watch but I read that Smith issued an apology before his acceptance speech.

No. He did not apologise to the man he assaulted.

Rock has declined to press charges.

Obviously none of this should have happened. This should be an end to the matter as far as the public is concerned.

The public is allowed to discuss what celebrities do in public.

 

[Metaphor]

Looks like Ayanna Pressley endorses black-on-black assault too:

Rep. Ayanna Pressley explains deleted tweet tied to confrontation between Will Smith & Chris Rock

Massachusetts Congresswoman Ayanna Pressley posted again to Twitter on Monday as she attempted to explain a tweet that was met with controversy, soon after a violent outburst on the Academy Awards show broadcast.

www.boston25news.com

Soon after the confrontation, Rep. Pressley took to Twitter, to support Will Smith and his actions calling for the alopecia nation to “stand up.”

Pressley also has alopecia.

She went on to say “Thank you #WillSmith Shout out to all the husbands who defend their wives with alopecia in the face of daily ignorance & insults.”

The tweet was criticized for condoning the on-stage violence and eventually deleted.

I'd have thought "husband defends his wife's honour with physical assault" was something the left would generally disapprove of, but I'll confess it's hard to get the lay of the land up in cloud cuckoo land.