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"Tolerate all speech..." ...the next word is "that", a qualifier. And that qualifier answers literally all your questions? There is no successful formulation

by rpearl 9y ago

"Tolerate all speech..." ...the next word is "that", a qualifier. And that qualifier answers literally all your questions? There is no successful formulation of absolute free speech, because then you must allow intolerance, which takes over. This isn't a new question. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paradox_of_tolerance https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paradox_of_tolerance https://extranewsfeed.com/tolerance-is-not-a-moral-precept-1af7007d6376 https://extranewsfeed.com/tolerance-is-not-a-moral-precept-1... Let's apply my test: What happens if someone's religion mandates intolerance? Then they are violating the social contract of tolerance--we should not allow that to be done. > a religious Christian/Muslim/Jew would advocate for the removal of you for denying their right to speak their minds. They can speak their minds about anything they'd like, so long as they don't advocate for the suppression of the rights of others. That is the thing that is not allowed. Their right includes that qualifier; it is not an absolute right to speak. This qualifier is the safety net that stops a tolerant society from being eaten by intolerance. (I am not saying that free speech as outlined in the US constitution, for instance, meets this formulation from a legal standpoint; I am saying that social mores do and should, and certainly private speech and private platforms should be formulated in this way.)

nv-vn 9y ago
>They can speak their minds about anything they'd like, so long as they don't advocate for the suppression of the rights of others. And one would posit that you could speak your mind about anything you'd like, so long as you don't advocate for suppressing their rights. From their perspective, what they are doing isn't even suppressing anyone's rights -- in their eyes, their God has mandated that doing so is _not_ a right. Everything is a matter of viewpoint, and in an alternate reality someone would be advocating for you to be silenced on the same basis.
- rpearl 9y ago
  Eh, fuck it. What's your solution? I gave a nice, uniform principle that allows as much as tolerance as is possible without eroding all of it. Many before me have offered it too. Again, it's not a new idea. You pick it apart, claiming that in some (specifically intolerant of others) religious person's point of view, their magical god favoritism allows them to stigmatize people, so therefore my principle just doesn't work. You're right: my principle excludes people. It excludes the intolerant, where intolerance is identified by the simple test I outlined. And that's it. That is all it excludes. It excludes people for their choices to harm others. But your hypothetical (again, specifically intolerant) person's magical god-favoritism instead excludes people for who they are. That's the difference. So, we as a society can choose one of these ways or the other. And I argue we continue to treat tolerance as a social contract for the simple reason that the other option, free speech absolutism ...breaks. It erodes down to an intolerant society, where a violent few pry away the rights of everyone else. But if you treat tolerance as a social contract, the result is stable.
  - mantas 9y ago
    So basically your idea is only people who accept each other and can circlejerk together in echo chamber is OK? Any kind of saying "hey guys, I think this thing is no longer OK" would be breaking your social contract by coming up with idea to not tolerate some kind of behaviour. Let's say a bunch of people are camping. All of them are having good time, littering a wee bit, breaking a bench of taking down a tree here and there. But everybody is OK with each other's actions social contracts is OK. Then somebody decides that this cannot go on anymore. Let's say they proclaim that littering is not OK. They'd end up breaking the social contract, since while litterers accept them being peacefully, those people don't accept the ones who are littering. That'd make the one who speaks against littering the intolerant and the one who needs to be kicked out. Naturally, after kicking him out, the community carries on in their echo chamber. The free speech is about letting anyone voice their opinions and reason about them. Sometimes not tolerating smth turns out beneficial for the community, sometimes don't. But perpetual echo chamber is worse than either.
  - KGIII 9y ago
    If I may? I hold a bit of a strong view, here. Criminalize actions. In all but the rarest if cases, speech should be protected. If somebody tells you to go punch a Nazi, they shouldn't get in trouble. You should, if you go punch a Nazi. Not that I like Nazis, but that you shouldn't assault them when they aren't being violent or an immediate threat to your physical safety. I only think speech should be punished when you can show demonstrable harm. Libel, slander, credible threats, and things like that. Some idiot yelling about gassing Jews isn't a credible threat, even if reprehensible. However, if they happen to have a gas chamber, and amassed a bunch of Jews, that's a credible threat - though I am going to guess their speech is the least of our concerns, if they got that far. I don't want speech to be illegal, in all but the rarest of circumstances.
    - gravy 9y ago
      Free speech doesn't apply to any of those examples because there was an action outside of "speech" or "thought". Speech, thought, etc. should never be illegal.

by rpearl 9y ago

nv-vn 9y ago

>They can speak their minds about anything they'd like, so long as they don't advocate for the suppression of the rights of others. And one would posit that you could speak your mind about anything you'd like, so long as you don't advocate for suppressing their rights. From their perspective, what they are doing isn't even suppressing anyone's rights -- in their eyes, their God has mandated that doing so is _not_ a right. Everything is a matter of viewpoint, and in an alternate reality someone would be advocating for you to be silenced on the same basis.

rpearl 9y ago
Eh, fuck it. What's your solution? I gave a nice, uniform principle that allows as much as tolerance as is possible without eroding all of it. Many before me have offered it too. Again, it's not a new idea. You pick it apart, claiming that in some (specifically intolerant of others) religious person's point of view, their magical god favoritism allows them to stigmatize people, so therefore my principle just doesn't work. You're right: my principle excludes people. It excludes the intolerant, where intolerance is identified by the simple test I outlined. And that's it. That is all it excludes. It excludes people for their choices to harm others. But your hypothetical (again, specifically intolerant) person's magical god-favoritism instead excludes people for who they are. That's the difference. So, we as a society can choose one of these ways or the other. And I argue we continue to treat tolerance as a social contract for the simple reason that the other option, free speech absolutism ...breaks. It erodes down to an intolerant society, where a violent few pry away the rights of everyone else. But if you treat tolerance as a social contract, the result is stable.
- mantas 9y ago
  So basically your idea is only people who accept each other and can circlejerk together in echo chamber is OK? Any kind of saying "hey guys, I think this thing is no longer OK" would be breaking your social contract by coming up with idea to not tolerate some kind of behaviour. Let's say a bunch of people are camping. All of them are having good time, littering a wee bit, breaking a bench of taking down a tree here and there. But everybody is OK with each other's actions social contracts is OK. Then somebody decides that this cannot go on anymore. Let's say they proclaim that littering is not OK. They'd end up breaking the social contract, since while litterers accept them being peacefully, those people don't accept the ones who are littering. That'd make the one who speaks against littering the intolerant and the one who needs to be kicked out. Naturally, after kicking him out, the community carries on in their echo chamber. The free speech is about letting anyone voice their opinions and reason about them. Sometimes not tolerating smth turns out beneficial for the community, sometimes don't. But perpetual echo chamber is worse than either.
- KGIII 9y ago
  If I may? I hold a bit of a strong view, here. Criminalize actions. In all but the rarest if cases, speech should be protected. If somebody tells you to go punch a Nazi, they shouldn't get in trouble. You should, if you go punch a Nazi. Not that I like Nazis, but that you shouldn't assault them when they aren't being violent or an immediate threat to your physical safety. I only think speech should be punished when you can show demonstrable harm. Libel, slander, credible threats, and things like that. Some idiot yelling about gassing Jews isn't a credible threat, even if reprehensible. However, if they happen to have a gas chamber, and amassed a bunch of Jews, that's a credible threat - though I am going to guess their speech is the least of our concerns, if they got that far. I don't want speech to be illegal, in all but the rarest of circumstances.
  - gravy 9y ago
    Free speech doesn't apply to any of those examples because there was an action outside of "speech" or "thought". Speech, thought, etc. should never be illegal.