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I think it's rather odd to take a stand for "everyone's right to speak" when many speakers openly hate liberal institutions and really don't seem to have any re

I think it's rather odd to take a stand for "everyone's right to speak" when many speakers openly hate liberal institutions and really don't seem to have any regard for facts or knowledge. Platforms to speech is what gives these people power, and if teachers and students say they don't want to condone those views, tied with racism and sexism, I think that should be respected. What happens when we give these people (alt right, bigots, etc) platforms is they get followers. Look at the British National Party, they were piratically nothing until the BBC decided to massively increase their coverage. Was the BBC's coverage fair and impartial? Probably, but just giving them the attention causes people to look into their platform and realize blaming everyone else is a pretty comforting thing to do rather than take responsibility. The deep question is who should be the gatekeepers, and I guess John Etchemendy is saying it shouldn't be universities. Perhaps he's right in a way, the board shouldn't be making those decisions. I do think the faculty and students do have a right and duty to though as giving platforms for hate speech empowers it.

deleted 10y ago
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norikki 10y ago
"We will write off those with opposing views as evil or ignorant or stupid, rather than as interlocutors worthy of consideration. We succumb to the all-purpose ad hominem because it is easier and more comforting than rational argument. But when we do, we abandon what is great about this institution we serve." What a bigot right?
matt_wulfeck 10y ago
> What happens when we give these people (alt right, bigots, etc) platforms is they get followers. Who are you to draw that line? This argument hinges on the belief that people attending these universities are not capable of critical and rational thought and should therefore be treated like children via a curated and censored list of speakers. If you do believe that, then I hope you see that censorship does nothing but perpetuate a cycle of intellectual infantilism. Have some faith in the truth. If it is true, then it will stand on its own, and if it is false it will eventually be exposed. For that to happen there must be debate.
- marricks 10y ago
  I took his article as a statement against university protests against speakers, Milo most recently comes to mind. Many faculty and students were against him speaking and protested. While my opinion on it certainly does not matter, I think those staff and students do have a say and should matter. We cannot and should not say voices of protest should be ignored so hateful speakers get a platform. You may have faith in "rationality" winning out but I really don't. People really fall victim easily to blaming outside groups and get stirred up by hate speech.
  - striking 10y ago
    Falling prey to hateful speech is not an affliction, it's a symptom of one. Rationality is postponed when people are unhappy.
    - marricks 10y ago
      That sounds like even more of a reason for universities to take the lead in protest and standing up against bigots, other wise that anger and desire for change can get eaten up by bigots.
hackinthebochs 10y ago
>Platforms to speech is what gives these people power This just isn't true: these people already have power. When bad ideas already have a following, attempting to silence them isn't denying them power but reenforcing it as silencing becomes a rallying cry. Bad ideas fall to reasoned debate. Bad ideas thrive when they inherently have a subconscious or emotional appeal and are allowed to spread in isolated communities and are never challenged in open forums. Denying them platforms isn't going to stop the spread of these ideas (the internet is still a thing). It just passes up on another opportunity to challenge those ideas head on and gives the charlatans another instance of suppression to use as a rallying cry. Perhaps what students should insist on is instead of giving them an open platform to speak, invite them to a debate. Force them to defend their ideas under harsh scrutiny.
- chetanahuja 10y ago
  "Bad ideas fall to reasoned debate" Clearly not. Haven't we learnt anything from the recent victory of bad, horrible hateful ideas on the platform of media manipulation and louder-than-thou debating techniques?
  - hackinthebochs 10y ago
    But what's the mechanism that allows bad ideas to spread? It's not that they're winning the debate, it's that they're avoiding the debate altogether. The mediums that spread these bad ideas tend to be bad at debate but good at spreading ideas with an inherently viral quality.
    - chetanahuja 10y ago
      Exactly. They're not on campus (or a CPAC meeting, or a TV show or whatever) for "reasoned debate". They're there to raise their profile and signal to others like them that these ideas are now acceptable to air in respectable forums. It's foolish for any of these organizations to be used in this manner.
- vkou 10y ago
  > Bad ideas fall to reasoned debate. No, they don't. For that to work, this requires the proponents of bad ideas to respond to logic, and for the acolytes of reprehensible ideas to be ashamed of what they are doing. The skinhead shouting "Hitler did nothing wrong" isn't going to back down when you call him out for what he is, and he isn't going to be convinced by logic, facts, or rationality. If he were, the second world war would have been called "World Rational Debate Competition, Part II." Likewise, the religious fundamentalist isn't going to back down, or stop preaching hate, just because you point out the absurdities and inconsistencies in his holy book, or the hypocrisy in his prattle. For some reason, though, liberals are falling head-over-heels to defend the right of the former to amplify his message. Freedom of political discourse is not fundamentally incompatible with zero tolerance of fascism - just like freedom of religion is not fundamentally incompatible with zero tolerance of violent fanaticism. What is fundamentally incompatible in a tolerant society, is toleration of intolerance.

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norikki 10y ago

"We will write off those with opposing views as evil or ignorant or stupid, rather than as interlocutors worthy of consideration. We succumb to the all-purpose ad hominem because it is easier and more comforting than rational argument. But when we do, we abandon what is great about this institution we serve." What a bigot right?

matt_wulfeck 10y ago

> What happens when we give these people (alt right, bigots, etc) platforms is they get followers. Who are you to draw that line? This argument hinges on the belief that people attending these universities are not capable of critical and rational thought and should therefore be treated like children via a curated and censored list of speakers. If you do believe that, then I hope you see that censorship does nothing but perpetuate a cycle of intellectual infantilism. Have some faith in the truth. If it is true, then it will stand on its own, and if it is false it will eventually be exposed. For that to happen there must be debate.

marricks 10y ago
I took his article as a statement against university protests against speakers, Milo most recently comes to mind. Many faculty and students were against him speaking and protested. While my opinion on it certainly does not matter, I think those staff and students do have a say and should matter. We cannot and should not say voices of protest should be ignored so hateful speakers get a platform. You may have faith in "rationality" winning out but I really don't. People really fall victim easily to blaming outside groups and get stirred up by hate speech.
- striking 10y ago
  Falling prey to hateful speech is not an affliction, it's a symptom of one. Rationality is postponed when people are unhappy.
  - marricks 10y ago
    That sounds like even more of a reason for universities to take the lead in protest and standing up against bigots, other wise that anger and desire for change can get eaten up by bigots.

hackinthebochs 10y ago

>Platforms to speech is what gives these people power This just isn't true: these people already have power. When bad ideas already have a following, attempting to silence them isn't denying them power but reenforcing it as silencing becomes a rallying cry. Bad ideas fall to reasoned debate. Bad ideas thrive when they inherently have a subconscious or emotional appeal and are allowed to spread in isolated communities and are never challenged in open forums. Denying them platforms isn't going to stop the spread of these ideas (the internet is still a thing). It just passes up on another opportunity to challenge those ideas head on and gives the charlatans another instance of suppression to use as a rallying cry. Perhaps what students should insist on is instead of giving them an open platform to speak, invite them to a debate. Force them to defend their ideas under harsh scrutiny.

chetanahuja 10y ago
"Bad ideas fall to reasoned debate" Clearly not. Haven't we learnt anything from the recent victory of bad, horrible hateful ideas on the platform of media manipulation and louder-than-thou debating techniques?
- hackinthebochs 10y ago
  But what's the mechanism that allows bad ideas to spread? It's not that they're winning the debate, it's that they're avoiding the debate altogether. The mediums that spread these bad ideas tend to be bad at debate but good at spreading ideas with an inherently viral quality.
  - chetanahuja 10y ago
    Exactly. They're not on campus (or a CPAC meeting, or a TV show or whatever) for "reasoned debate". They're there to raise their profile and signal to others like them that these ideas are now acceptable to air in respectable forums. It's foolish for any of these organizations to be used in this manner.
vkou 10y ago
> Bad ideas fall to reasoned debate. No, they don't. For that to work, this requires the proponents of bad ideas to respond to logic, and for the acolytes of reprehensible ideas to be ashamed of what they are doing. The skinhead shouting "Hitler did nothing wrong" isn't going to back down when you call him out for what he is, and he isn't going to be convinced by logic, facts, or rationality. If he were, the second world war would have been called "World Rational Debate Competition, Part II." Likewise, the religious fundamentalist isn't going to back down, or stop preaching hate, just because you point out the absurdities and inconsistencies in his holy book, or the hypocrisy in his prattle. For some reason, though, liberals are falling head-over-heels to defend the right of the former to amplify his message. Freedom of political discourse is not fundamentally incompatible with zero tolerance of fascism - just like freedom of religion is not fundamentally incompatible with zero tolerance of violent fanaticism. What is fundamentally incompatible in a tolerant society, is toleration of intolerance.