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You're answering the question "Is it okay to censor stuff that's super-duper bad", which no one is asking. The question at hand is who gets to distinguish bad-
by ineptech 9y ago
You're answering the question "Is it okay to censor stuff that's super-duper bad", which no one is asking. The question at hand is who gets to distinguish bad-enough-to-ban from the not-bad-enough-to-ban. That you've replied twice without answering suggests, I think, that there's not an easy answer. Not that there's any shame in that! The founders couldn't come up with a good answer either. The first amendment essentially says, "Restricting speech is so difficult to get right that we don't trust Congress to do it."
Meanwhile, the point this article is making is that (in practice, if not in law) the current answer to the question of who decides what to censor is "middle managers at network infrastructure companies, based on what their social media departments suspect might hurt their brand." If you think that's an acceptable answer, great, but I don't think you can go on thinking of yourself as a "slippery slope fanatic when it comes to free speech" in that case.
- anigbrowl 9y agoBut you're saying that we should just ignore the examples of super-duper-bad speech because of the difficulty of deciding where the line is. And that is a really hard problem, but it doesn't take away from the fact that people are engaging in super-duper bad stuff like calling for genocide and plotting and committing political murders.
- teddyh 9y agoYes, and maybe allowing that would be less bad than allowing censorship to creep its way into acceptability.
- anigbrowl 9y agoI'd like you to expand on this. I'm sure you're familiar with the idea of a chilling effect, and can understand how accepting the open advocacy of genocide, ethnic cleansing, or terrorism would negatively impact the freedom of those who are intended to be on the receiving end of such policies. How many or how detailed must threats against others' wellbeing become before you consider them unacceptable? https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chilling_effect https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chilling_effect
- weberc2 9y agoThreats of violence are already illegal. If speech crosses into threat/violence, we should punish that vigorously so as to deter further violence and to assure would-be victims. In fact, this is already policy and it's working out pretty well; Nazism lags even Islamic terrorism (at least in the US) in deaths. Surely if we tell people not to worry about Islamic terrorism, no one should be chilled by Nazism. The fear isn't rational; it's only propped up by leftist FUD (as fear of terrorists was largely propped up by the right in the aughts).
- anigbrowl 9y agoStrange, I haven't heard of anyone being arrested for promoting genocide yet, why not? Your comparison with Islamic terrorism is a red herring since we don't have Islamists holding public rallies demanding we impose Sharia law.
- weberc2 9y ago> Strange, I haven't heard of anyone being arrested for promoting genocide yet, why not? We weren't talking about promoting genocide, but about threatening and committing violence. If you can't debate with integrity, I'm not interested.
- anigbrowl 9y agoYes we were, as anyone can confirm by reading back up the thread. Impugning my integrity because the topic of conversation makes you uncomfortable seems like a you problem. You chose to answer a question that had been addressed to someone else, which you're welcome to do, but it doesn't give you ownership of the conversation as you seem to imagine.
- weberc2 9y ago> as anyone can confirm by reading back up the thread I said "Threats of violence are already illegal.", to which you responded, "Strange, I haven't heard of anyone being arrested for promoting genocide yet". > Impugning my integrity because the topic of conversation makes you uncomfortable seems like a you problem. Ha! If I had any doubt about your integrity, I certainly don't now. Feel free to keep trolling, but you'll just be shouting into the void; I'm blocking this thread.
- weberc2 9y agoPlotting and committing political murders are already crimes, let's not conflate these with abhorrent speech.
- anigbrowl 9y agoNo, let's. Organizing for the murder of a large number of people is as bad as or even even worse than calling for the deaths of individuals.
- weberc2 9y agoI don't know how you do that moral calculus, but it doesn't matter because it's still not a reason to constrain speech. At best, it's a reason to apply a hate crime magnifier to the murder/conspiracy charge.
- JumpCrisscross 9y ago> That you've replied twice without answering suggests, I think, that there's not an easy answer There isn't. But we don't need an answer, not yet. The justice system is a lazy evaluator. This case has an easy answer--they are Nazis. If someone sued, the ruling would be quick. If the next case is more complex, reality will illuminate the nuances. Common law systems are complex. They're also de-centralised and empirical. You don't always need a standard ex ante. We have a cultural standard regarding genocide, its advocacy, and Nazis. Existing norms and laws suffice. (Philosophically, your question is interesting. It's practically irrelevant, though, until a matching case threatens to arise.)