Should Speech Deemd Offensive Be Supressed And Punished?

[steve_bank]

The problem with democratic delf rule is who sets the boundaries. Speech has always been given a wide latitude. Supression of speech is now shifting to the left who is becoming a 'Moral Majority' of sorrts, borrowing from the Christian Moral Majority.

The ruling by COTUS in Larry Flint-Hustler Magazine vs Moral Majority-Larry Falwell is important. Hustler Magazine did some really crude parodies of political figures. COTUS ruled for Flint.

As Flint put it the 1st Amendment is not for the status quo, it is for people like him.

You can't limit speech simply because it offend someone. Personalty I find some of the music today offensive across all genres, as do others.

Killing cops, drugs, sexual abuse. Why not limit that? You can argue it harms society.

China hs no privacy laws. The state surreys social media, lifestyle, purchases and financial transactions and develops a loyalty political score for citizens..

For us it is not govt, it is the media acting as a political speech moral police, judge and jury. If you are called out there is no probable cause, right to face accusers, or defense. It is a throwback to the Macrthy communist witch hunts. It destroyed peoples lives and careers.

It is not an academic debate.

Global Freedom of Expression | Hustler Magazine, Inc. v. Falwell - Global Freedom of Expression (columbia.edu)

Reversing the Court of Appeals ruling, the Supreme Court held that “public figures and public officials may not recover for the tort of intentional infliction of emotional distress by reason of publications such as the one here at issue without showing in addition that the publication contains a false statement of fact which was made with ‘actual malice,’ i.e., with knowledge that the statement was false or with reckless disregard as to whether or not it was true.” [p. 56] ….

The main issue for the Court was whether the award for the intentional infliction of emotional distress in this case was consistent with the First and Fourteenth Amendments of the U.S. Constitution. More specifically, the Court addressed whether “a public figure may recover damages for emotional harm caused by the publication of an ad parody offensive to him, and doubtless gross and repugnant in the eyes of most.” [p. 49] ….

 

[Metaphor]

When you get right down to the nitty gritty, even regulations and governments are part of the free market.

Now, while it is true that governments themselves are usually chosen, and that, even with non-democratic governments, the people always have the option of revolution, governments are unique in their monopoly on legitimised violence.

If I have a shop that sells something that is distasteful or offensive to some segment of the population, there will nevertheless be a market for it, because people have specialised tastes. But the government can say 'no, we won't let you sell that', which is something a free market cannot forbid.

 

[KeepTalking]

The problem with democratic delf rule is who sets the boundaries. Speech has always been given a wide latitude. Supression of speech is now shifting to the left who is becoming a 'Moral Majority' of sorrts, borrowing from the Christian Moral Majority.

How do you not understand that the Moral Majority was trying to enact laws to allow them to set those boundaries, while your current boogeyman, "the left", is only saying "shame on you for saying that", or "you can't say that on my platform", or "let's see what your employer thinks about you saying that". In other words, "the left" is combating speech with speech. There is really no comparison between someone trying to use the full force of government to suppress speech, and another person using their own speech to somehow "suppress" speech.

The ruling by COTUS in Larry Flint-Hustler Magazine vs Moral Majority-Larry Falwell is important. Hustler Magazine did some really crude parodies of political figures. COTUS ruled for Flint.

As Flint put it the 1st Amendment is not for the status quo, it is for people like him.

That was a lawsuit. That was attempting to use the government to suppress the speech of another person using their own media outlet. Who on the left is doing that? Please be specific.

You can't limit speech simply because it offend someone.

Tell that to the PMRC. Only you would be a couple of decades too late for that.

Personalty I find some of the music today offensive across all genres, as do others.

Killing cops, drugs, sexual abuse. Why not limit that? You can argue it harms society.

You sound just like the PMRC. I bet you would have gotten along great with Tipper Gore.

China hs no privacy laws. The state surreys social media, lifestyle, purchases and financial transactions and develops a loyalty political score for citizens..

For us it is not govt,

Then it's nothing like China, is it?

it is the media acting as a political speech moral police, judge and jury. If you are called out there is no probable cause, right to face accusers, or defense. It is a throwback to the Macrthy communist witch hunts. It destroyed peoples lives and careers.

You are wrong. Anyone who is willing to claim they have had their speech suppressed by CNN will have a ready outlet for their grievance on Fox News, and vice versa. People like Marjorie Taylor Greene certainly are not having their lives and careers destroyed, they are making entire new careers out of their reprehensible speech.

It is not an academic debate.

So the only two possible things it could be are an academic debate, and suppression of speech? I smell a false dichotomy.

 

[Metaphor]

How do you not understand that the Moral Majority was trying to enact laws to allow them to set those boundaries, while your current boogeyman, "the left", is only saying "shame on you for saying that", or "you can't say that on my platform", or "let's see what your employer thinks about you saying that". In other words, "the left" is combating speech with speech. There is really no comparison between someone trying to use the full force of government to suppress speech, and another person using their own speech to somehow "suppress" speech.

That was a lawsuit. That was attempting to use the government to suppress the speech of another person using their own media outlet. Who on the left is doing that? Please be specific.

How else to describe hate speech laws, if not as the left using the force of the State to quash speech it does not like?

 

[prideandfall]

How else to describe hate speech laws, if not as the left using the force of the State to quash speech it does not like?

the state having a vested interest in curbing the use of rhetoric which historically leads to violence against the targeted group nearly 100% of the time?

 

[Metaphor]

How else to describe hate speech laws, if not as the left using the force of the State to quash speech it does not like?

the state having a vested interest in curbing the use of rhetoric which historically leads to violence against the targeted group nearly 100% of the time?

Whether your claim is true or false, you have evaded the point. Is it the left or the right introducing and arguing for these hate speech* laws?

*I refer to contemporary Western countries. Some countries have lèse-majesté laws that can only fairly be described as conservative.

 

[Rhea]

Letting it play out in the free market means it is being supressed or punished.

 

[Patooka]

How else to describe hate speech laws, if not as the left using the force of the State to quash speech it does not like?

The right, maybe? You're Australian; take a quick look at Phillip Ruddock and "Religious Freedom". Does his ideas of "hate speech" sound left fucking wing?

 

[Metaphor]

How else to describe hate speech laws, if not as the left using the force of the State to quash speech it does not like?

The right, maybe? You're Australian; take a quick look at Phillip Ruddock and "Religious Freedom". Does his ideas of "hate speech" sound left fucking wing?

You'll have to be more specific, I'm afraid. What about Phillip Ruddock and religious freedom?

 

[Jimmy Higgins]

The problem with democratic delf rule is who sets the boundaries. Speech has always been given a wide latitude. Supression of speech is now shifting to the left who is becoming a 'Moral Majority' of sorrts, borrowing from the Christian Moral Majority.

The ruling by COTUS in Larry Flint-Hustler Magazine vs Moral Majority-Larry Falwell is important. Hustler Magazine did some really crude parodies of political figures. COTUS ruled for Flint.

Was any hate speech used by Hustler? Did Hustler target individuals or entire groups of ethnic people?

You can't limit speech simply because it offend someone. Personalty I find some of the music today offensive across all genres, as do others.

And that is almost relevant.

For us it is not govt, it is the media acting as a political speech moral police, judge and jury. If you are called out there is no probable cause, right to face accusers, or defense. It is a throwback to the Macrthy communist witch hunts. It destroyed peoples lives and careers.

McCarthy was a witch hunt. Calling people out on hate speech isn't a witch hunt, because there are no witches, but actual people that said actual hate speech.

It is not an academic debate.

That much is agreed. The Venn Diagram of people defending the use of hate speech has a near complete overlap on people that wanted NFL players fired for kneeling.

 

[KeepTalking]

How do you not understand that the Moral Majority was trying to enact laws to allow them to set those boundaries, while your current boogeyman, "the left", is only saying "shame on you for saying that", or "you can't say that on my platform", or "let's see what your employer thinks about you saying that". In other words, "the left" is combating speech with speech. There is really no comparison between someone trying to use the full force of government to suppress speech, and another person using their own speech to somehow "suppress" speech.

That was a lawsuit. That was attempting to use the government to suppress the speech of another person using their own media outlet. Who on the left is doing that? Please be specific.

How else to describe hate speech laws, if not as the left using the force of the State to quash speech it does not like?

I would describe them as they are, non-existent in the US. Given that we were discussing the Moral Majority, a distinctly US movement, I think that is a very relevant description. I would also note that both the ACLU and the Heritage Foundation are against hate speech laws in the US.

 

[Jarhyn]

The question is bad, because it has no discussion of what shape these consequences take and who they come from.

It is fucking stupid.

The obvious answer is that YES, offensive speech must be suppressed. But it must be suppressed by individuals, for the reasons individuals suppress, in the avenues for which individual suppression is already commonly allowed (through verbal and personal decision making, rather than enforced collective action).

How is this even a question. This is so fucking dumb.

 

[laughing dog]

How else to describe hate speech laws, if not as the left using the force of the State to quash speech it does not like?

There is no need to assign a political ideology to hate speech laws, other than to reveal one's biases or lack of rational thought. For example, it is hardly "leftist" to approve of hate speech laws that include Holocaust denial or promotion of genocide.

 

[Metaphor]

I would describe them as they are, non-existent in the US. Given that we were discussing the Moral Majority, a distinctly US movement, I think that is a very relevant description.

"We" were not discussing the moral majority; I pointed out that hate speech laws are a product of the left.

The US is very fortunate to have had a Constitutional barrier to legislatures enacting hate speech laws, because the evidence from Canada, from Australia, from Europe is that the left is ready, willing, and able to use the force of State to criminalise certain speech it dislikes.

I would also note that both the ACLU and the Heritage Foundation are against hate speech laws in the US.

The ACLU may well officially still hold a free speech position. After all, if it did not, it might not be able to publish lies, full time and continuously, on its Twitter feed.

 

[KeepTalking]

I would describe them as they are, non-existent in the US. Given that we were discussing the Moral Majority, a distinctly US movement, I think that is a very relevant description.

"We" were not discussing the moral majority; I pointed out that hate speech laws are a product of the left.

"We" were very much discussing the Moral Majority. That "we" being Steve and I, who both referred directly to the Moral Majority in our posts. I can't help it if you popped up mid-discussion and thought you would derail things with irrelevancies.

The US is very fortunate to have had a Constitutional barrier to legislatures enacting hate speech laws, because the evidence from Canada, from Australia, from Europe is that the left is ready, willing, and able to use the force of State to criminalise certain speech it dislikes.

Sorry, but I'm not sorry that the right is now reaping what they have sown.

I would also note that both the ACLU and the Heritage Foundation are against hate speech laws in the US.

The ACLU may well officially still hold a free speech position. After all, if it did not, it might not be able to publish lies, full time and continuously, on its Twitter feed.

The point is that both the left and the right are against hate speech laws in the US, just like there are those on the left and the right who would limit speech in the US for one reason or the other. Neither side has a lock on it, but the right has traditionally been more supportive of restricting speech (as well as everything else they don't like) in the US.

 

[Metaphor]

I can't help it if you popped up mid-discussion and thought you would derail things with irrelevancies.

That the push to make 'hate speech' illegal is coming from the left is not irrelevant to a discussion about the politics of speech suppression.

Sorry, but I'm not sorry that the right is now reaping what they have sown.

I'm not asking you to be sorry. I'm asking you to acknowledge simple facts about the world.

The point is that both the left and the right are against hate speech laws in the US, just like there are those on the left and the right who would limit speech in the US for one reason or the other. Neither side has a lock on it, but the right has traditionally been more supportive of restricting speech (as well as everything else they don't like) in the US.

No. The left is not typified by its allergy to hate speech. It cannot do much in the US where the Constitution stops them, but everywhere in the Anglosphere that it can do something, it has.

 

[KeepTalking]

That the push to make 'hate speech' illegal is coming from the left is not irrelevant to a discussion about the politics of speech suppression.

It was irrelevant to the portion of the discussion that was about the Moral Majority, and which you engaged in with no apparent realization that the Moral Majority was being discussed.

I'm not asking you to be sorry. I'm asking you to acknowledge simple facts about the world.

Oh, well that's good. I acknowledge that the right is now reaping what they have sown.

The point is that both the left and the right are against hate speech laws in the US, just like there are those on the left and the right who would limit speech in the US for one reason or the other. Neither side has a lock on it, but the right has traditionally been more supportive of restricting speech (as well as everything else they don't like) in the US.

No. The left is not typified by its allergy to hate speech.

I'm not sure what your point is here. Neither the left nor the right is typified by their allergy to hate speech.

It cannot do much in the US where the Constitution stops them, but everywhere in the Anglosphere that it can do something, it has.

And of course the Anglosphere never fought a global war that was precipitated by unfettered hate speech coming from the right, who sure as hell took it a lot farther than speech, and would do so again with no memory of how that worked out in the past. Maybe everywhere else in the Anglosphere thinks that it is time to try something different, more power to them, I hope it works out for them. I'm glad I live in a country that had the forethought to make the law of the land respective of free speech, but it damn near cost us our Democracy earlier this year.

 

[Metaphor]

It was irrelevant to the portion of the discussion that was about the Moral Majority, and which you engaged in with no apparent realization that the Moral Majority was being discussed.

You said:

That was a lawsuit. That was attempting to use the government to suppress the speech of another person using their own media outlet. Who on the left is doing that? Please be specific.

I answered your question. The left in multiple countries has used the government to suppress speech.

I'm not sure what your point is here. Neither the left nor the right is typified by their allergy to hate speech.

My point is exactly what I said. "Hate speech" laws are driven by the left.

I'm glad I live in a country that had the forethought to make the law of the land respective of free speech, but it damn near cost us our Democracy earlier this year.

I wish Australia had the protections of speech that the United States does.

 

[KeepTalking]

You said:

That was a lawsuit. That was attempting to use the government to suppress the speech of another person using their own media outlet. Who on the left is doing that? Please be specific.

I answered your question. The left in multiple countries has used the government to suppress speech.

The lawsuit in question was filed against Larry Flint by Jerry Fallwell, Jerry Fallwell was one of the co-founders of the Moral Majority. Thank you for proving that you chose to engage in a discussion with no awareness of what was actually being discussed. I was obviously asking that question of another person, but sure, it's ok for you to answer as well. Unfortunately you failed, as I asked that the respondent be specific, and you threw out a generality.

I'm not sure what your point is here. Neither the left nor the right is typified by their allergy to hate speech.

My point is exactly what I said. "Hate speech" laws are driven by the left.

You may have thought you said that, but here is what you actually said:

"The left is not typified by its allergy to hate speech."

A more simple way to phrase that would be "The left has no problem with hate speech." In that case, I have no idea why they would want to enact hate speech laws.

I'm glad I live in a country that had the forethought to make the law of the land respective of free speech, but it damn near cost us our Democracy earlier this year.

I wish Australia had the protections of speech that the United States does.

Why do you hate democracy? J/K

 

[Metaphor]

A more simple way to phrase that would be "The left has no problem with hate speech." In that case, I have no idea why they would want to enact hate speech laws.

Yes, I agree my statement was poorly worded. The left is not typified by its allergy to using the State to proscribe speech it does not like.