4 ms·

I'm not aware of laws being passed--or any leftists pushing for them--that prevent you from saying anything. I am aware of law being made around not refusing s

by Frondo 10y ago

I'm not aware of laws being passed--or any leftists pushing for them--that prevent you from saying anything. I am aware of law being made around not refusing service to various groups of people when you open and operate a business, but hey, business is something we as a society regulate, and saying "you have to serve everyone" has been working pretty well for a long time already. But please, if you know of any leftist actually trying to ban speech with laws--and not just make it unfashionable or socially unacceptable--then please let me know.

Tiksi 10y ago
Saying "But it's not a law" is a weak argument. If someone is holding a gun to my head and threatening to shoot if I say X, telling me "But there's no law that says you can't say X, see, no censorship" isn't going to be very comforting and if I follow that advice, probably won't end too well for me. Just because it's not the government pulling the trigger doesn't mean there's no gun.
- Frondo 10y ago
  I'm curious if you can point to leftists using weapons to threaten people. Again, what I see from leftists is the desire to make a wide swath of speech (like casually sexist or racist stuff) unfashionable or unacceptable to use--and I see them using the only tool they have, which is their own speech. Not guns, not laws, but speech.
  - CM30 10y ago
    Is this close enough? http://www.vox.com/2016/6/3/11853096/statement-on-emmett-rensin http://www.vox.com/2016/6/3/11853096/statement-on-emmett-ren... Or maybe: http://archive.is/HpiQb http://archive.is/HpiQb Both refer to removed posts, but one has someone encouraging riots if a Trump rally comes to town, and one wants violent left wing extremism.
  - Tiksi 10y ago
    I never said or implied anyone was using weapons to threaten people. Maybe they are, I have no idea. But that's irrelevant as my point was that appealing to the lack of a law is a weak argument if your intent is to show a lack of censorship. I intentionally left my own views out of the last comment as I try to stay away from these kinds of discussions since they're rarely productive and my views are pretty all over the place and change frequently(other than free speech, it's pretty much the only thing I'm an absolutist on), but I've seen your last point stated more and more frequently lately and it rubs me the wrong way. One group is saying "You can't say X/you shouldn't be able to say X", while the other group is saying "Stop telling me what I can and can't say". The first group is trying to suppress opposing views directly, while the second is trying to suppress the attempted suppression of speech, not the opposing views themselves. They are not equivalent.
    - unprepare 10y ago
      there is no censorship without government involvment - you are using the word incorrectly. calling someone a racist for saying something isnt censoring them. calling someone a bigot for their opinion isnt censoring them if there is no official representative of the government deciding what is and is not acceptable, there is no censorship. if you want to make an argument that tumblr users are immature and that using supression debate tactics is something you are uncomfortable with, then make that argument. you will likely find much greater support. if you want to make an argument that censorship is happening, you need to provide evidence of a governmental authority classifying certain types of speech as unacceptable or illegal, since that is what the word you are using means. here you have provided an argument that boils down to "well censorship should mean something different than what it means."
      - Tiksi 10y ago
        censor : to examine in order to suppress or delete anything considered objectionable <censor the news>; also : to suppress or delete as objectionable <censor out indecent passages> censor: to examine books, movies, letters, etc., in order to remove things that are considered to be offensive, immoral, harmful to society, etc. - http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/censor http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/censor censor verb [T] us /ˈsen·sər/ › to remove parts of something, such as a book, movie, or letter, that you do not want someone to see or hear: She opposes efforts to censor the Internet. http://dictionary.cambridge.org/us/dictionary/english/censor http://dictionary.cambridge.org/us/dictionary/english/censor No, government involvement is absolutely not necessary for censorship. If your argument is that you're comfortable with this type of censorship, make that argument, but don't try to redefine the English language to suit your narrative. > calling someone a racist for saying something isnt censoring them. > calling someone a bigot for their opinion isnt censoring them On this we can agree, since that's kinda the point of free speech. The idea isn't to make being a racist or being a bigot acceptable. The idea is to allow people to express any opinion, thought, view they may have without fear of adverse retribution so views that are based on falsehoods or ignorance can be argued against in the open. If a racist knows they'll lose their livelihood for expressing racist views in public, they'll only express them to people who they know will agree with those views. So you end up with a bunch of racists strengthening and confirming each others racist opinions. You suppressed their speech, but in doing so strengthen their views. On the other hand, if the worst you get for expressing a racist view is being told "You idiot. No, that's not actually true, and here's why" you actually stand a chance of getting them, or someone else that may be listening to the conversation to reexamine those views. You don't cover a festering wound and hope it goes away, you open it up and remove or treat the infection. Pretending it's not there because you don't like it won't fix a thing. The whole concept behind freedom of speech is so shitty views can come out into the open and get rightly destroyed.
  - ams6110 10y ago
    Leftist assaulted and threw eggs, etc. at Trump supporters leaving a rally recently.
gwright 10y ago
Not so fast. Businesses come in all shapes and sizes. Lots of businesses consist of a single person or just a few people or all family members. It isn't clear at all that the government should prevent an independent contractor from deciding who they want to work with. Your comment, as written, is an example of a trivial dismissal of a legitimate concern regarding freedom of association and contract. There are indeed attempts to force small businesses to conform. This one: http://aclu-co.org/court-rules-bakery-illegally-discriminated-against-gay-couple/ http://aclu-co.org/court-rules-bakery-illegally-discriminate... comes to mind.
- Frondo 10y ago
  I think it's clear; if you're running a business, you shouldn't be allowed to turn would-be customers away and say "it's because you're black" or whatever. That's not good for society, to permit that kind of casual discrimination. We've been down that road, and things weren't getting better until laws started being passed. I mean, come on, if you're such an asshole that you really, really need to discriminate against people for whatever reason, then say "sorry, we're booked up". Otherwise, make the stupid cake, whether the couple is gay, or mixed-race, or whatever. And if you can't do that, don't start your own business.
  - ams6110 10y ago
    "Sorry, no vacancy" was the standard line for hotels who didn't want to rent a room to blacks. But I think there is some kind of persepective that has to be maintained. For something that isn't an essential public accomodation, let the money talk. If your baker won't bake you a cake, give your money to one who will. I think there is room to tolerate different points of view on who a person should be forced to accept as a customer. If you run a web development business and were approached by a customer to build a (legal) porn site, but pornography is against your personal values, should you be obligated to accept the job, when there are countless other web developers who will gladly take the work? Or be forced to choose between earning a living at your craft vs. compromising your values?
    - 10y ago
mattchew 10y ago
I see "free speech" with scare quotes around it from left leaning people fairly often. Much of the left is pretty happy with the idea of blacklisting and no platforming people now. (They weren't so happy about it in the McCarthy days.) I think quite a lot of leftists/progressives would be happy to see hate speech laws passed in the U.S. They don't yell for those laws directly because they know they wouldn't get any traction (yet). Instead they chip away at the edges where they can get more support. I've seen free speech leftists complain about the anti free speech left too. Support for free speech used to be almost the defining value of liberals/progressives. Not any more.

by Frondo 10y ago

Tiksi 10y ago

Saying "But it's not a law" is a weak argument. If someone is holding a gun to my head and threatening to shoot if I say X, telling me "But there's no law that says you can't say X, see, no censorship" isn't going to be very comforting and if I follow that advice, probably won't end too well for me. Just because it's not the government pulling the trigger doesn't mean there's no gun.

Frondo 10y ago
I'm curious if you can point to leftists using weapons to threaten people. Again, what I see from leftists is the desire to make a wide swath of speech (like casually sexist or racist stuff) unfashionable or unacceptable to use--and I see them using the only tool they have, which is their own speech. Not guns, not laws, but speech.
- CM30 10y ago
  Is this close enough? http://www.vox.com/2016/6/3/11853096/statement-on-emmett-rensin http://www.vox.com/2016/6/3/11853096/statement-on-emmett-ren... Or maybe: http://archive.is/HpiQb http://archive.is/HpiQb Both refer to removed posts, but one has someone encouraging riots if a Trump rally comes to town, and one wants violent left wing extremism.
- Tiksi 10y ago
  I never said or implied anyone was using weapons to threaten people. Maybe they are, I have no idea. But that's irrelevant as my point was that appealing to the lack of a law is a weak argument if your intent is to show a lack of censorship. I intentionally left my own views out of the last comment as I try to stay away from these kinds of discussions since they're rarely productive and my views are pretty all over the place and change frequently(other than free speech, it's pretty much the only thing I'm an absolutist on), but I've seen your last point stated more and more frequently lately and it rubs me the wrong way. One group is saying "You can't say X/you shouldn't be able to say X", while the other group is saying "Stop telling me what I can and can't say". The first group is trying to suppress opposing views directly, while the second is trying to suppress the attempted suppression of speech, not the opposing views themselves. They are not equivalent.
  - unprepare 10y ago
    there is no censorship without government involvment - you are using the word incorrectly. calling someone a racist for saying something isnt censoring them. calling someone a bigot for their opinion isnt censoring them if there is no official representative of the government deciding what is and is not acceptable, there is no censorship. if you want to make an argument that tumblr users are immature and that using supression debate tactics is something you are uncomfortable with, then make that argument. you will likely find much greater support. if you want to make an argument that censorship is happening, you need to provide evidence of a governmental authority classifying certain types of speech as unacceptable or illegal, since that is what the word you are using means. here you have provided an argument that boils down to "well censorship should mean something different than what it means."
    - Tiksi 10y ago
      censor : to examine in order to suppress or delete anything considered objectionable <censor the news>; also : to suppress or delete as objectionable <censor out indecent passages> censor: to examine books, movies, letters, etc., in order to remove things that are considered to be offensive, immoral, harmful to society, etc. - http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/censor http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/censor censor verb [T] us /ˈsen·sər/ › to remove parts of something, such as a book, movie, or letter, that you do not want someone to see or hear: She opposes efforts to censor the Internet. http://dictionary.cambridge.org/us/dictionary/english/censor http://dictionary.cambridge.org/us/dictionary/english/censor No, government involvement is absolutely not necessary for censorship. If your argument is that you're comfortable with this type of censorship, make that argument, but don't try to redefine the English language to suit your narrative. > calling someone a racist for saying something isnt censoring them. > calling someone a bigot for their opinion isnt censoring them On this we can agree, since that's kinda the point of free speech. The idea isn't to make being a racist or being a bigot acceptable. The idea is to allow people to express any opinion, thought, view they may have without fear of adverse retribution so views that are based on falsehoods or ignorance can be argued against in the open. If a racist knows they'll lose their livelihood for expressing racist views in public, they'll only express them to people who they know will agree with those views. So you end up with a bunch of racists strengthening and confirming each others racist opinions. You suppressed their speech, but in doing so strengthen their views. On the other hand, if the worst you get for expressing a racist view is being told "You idiot. No, that's not actually true, and here's why" you actually stand a chance of getting them, or someone else that may be listening to the conversation to reexamine those views. You don't cover a festering wound and hope it goes away, you open it up and remove or treat the infection. Pretending it's not there because you don't like it won't fix a thing. The whole concept behind freedom of speech is so shitty views can come out into the open and get rightly destroyed.
- ams6110 10y ago
  Leftist assaulted and threw eggs, etc. at Trump supporters leaving a rally recently.

gwright 10y ago

Not so fast. Businesses come in all shapes and sizes. Lots of businesses consist of a single person or just a few people or all family members. It isn't clear at all that the government should prevent an independent contractor from deciding who they want to work with. Your comment, as written, is an example of a trivial dismissal of a legitimate concern regarding freedom of association and contract. There are indeed attempts to force small businesses to conform. This one: http://aclu-co.org/court-rules-bakery-illegally-discriminated-against-gay-couple/ http://aclu-co.org/court-rules-bakery-illegally-discriminate... comes to mind.

Frondo 10y ago
I think it's clear; if you're running a business, you shouldn't be allowed to turn would-be customers away and say "it's because you're black" or whatever. That's not good for society, to permit that kind of casual discrimination. We've been down that road, and things weren't getting better until laws started being passed. I mean, come on, if you're such an asshole that you really, really need to discriminate against people for whatever reason, then say "sorry, we're booked up". Otherwise, make the stupid cake, whether the couple is gay, or mixed-race, or whatever. And if you can't do that, don't start your own business.
- ams6110 10y ago
  "Sorry, no vacancy" was the standard line for hotels who didn't want to rent a room to blacks. But I think there is some kind of persepective that has to be maintained. For something that isn't an essential public accomodation, let the money talk. If your baker won't bake you a cake, give your money to one who will. I think there is room to tolerate different points of view on who a person should be forced to accept as a customer. If you run a web development business and were approached by a customer to build a (legal) porn site, but pornography is against your personal values, should you be obligated to accept the job, when there are countless other web developers who will gladly take the work? Or be forced to choose between earning a living at your craft vs. compromising your values?
  - 10y ago

mattchew 10y ago

I see "free speech" with scare quotes around it from left leaning people fairly often. Much of the left is pretty happy with the idea of blacklisting and no platforming people now. (They weren't so happy about it in the McCarthy days.) I think quite a lot of leftists/progressives would be happy to see hate speech laws passed in the U.S. They don't yell for those laws directly because they know they wouldn't get any traction (yet). Instead they chip away at the edges where they can get more support. I've seen free speech leftists complain about the anti free speech left too. Support for free speech used to be almost the defining value of liberals/progressives. Not any more.