12 ms·

I'm sorry, but how can anyone say "what kind" of free speech...? Don't you see that labeling or discriminating between "free speech of type A, allowed" and "fr

by rlonn 7y ago

I'm sorry, but how can anyone say "what kind" of free speech...? Don't you see that labeling or discriminating between "free speech of type A, allowed" and "free speech of type B, disallowed" defeats the whole notion of "free"? Somehow people tend to think that their own discrimination isn't, while others is.

ketzo 7y ago
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paradox_of_tolerance https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paradox_of_tolerance
- nextmemorandum 7y ago
  That does not change the fact that people have the natural right of freedom of speech.
  - AlphaGeekZulu 7y ago
    That is your personal OPINION, not a fact! There is no such thing as a "natural right of freedom of speech". If one sovereign in the history of mankind decides to allow unrestricted freedom of speech in its constitution, it is just that: an episode in the history of legal systems established by humans. It can turn out as a bad idea, or a milestone for better societies. We will see. In no way is it a "natural right". Not even would it be a natural right, if it was mentioned in the bible as one of the 10 commandments from god (disregarding the FACT, that there are some serious restrictions of freedom of speech in that: "Thou shalt not bear false witness against thy neighbour").
    - majewsky 7y ago
      > There is no such thing as a "natural right of freedom of speech". In fact, there is no such thing as a natural right at all. Rights are derived from value systems, and the choice of value system is mostly based on aesthetics. There is no way to say whether the Western Christianity-based value system is "better" than, say, the Confucian value system, because the word "better" cannot be defined from first principles (without invoking a particular value system).
      - repolfx 7y ago
        Yes, it can be done, but lots of people don't like that because it invariably concludes that some societies are better than others and the best ones are the western capitalist democracies. The most obvious first principle is that a better value system should keep you alive. Being alive is foundational. From that you can derive other principles, like value systems should result in the production of food, clean water, protection against wild animals and invaders, disease, etc. From that you can derive yet more principles, like the value of efficient resource allocation, stable governance and so on. And judged by basic things like "is this set of cultural values good at keeping people alive and healthy" you can quickly conclude that some are better than others, objectively so. To deny this is to argue that wishing to be alive rather than dead is merely an aesthetic preference - an absurd starting point, lacking any intellectual merit.
        AlphaGeekZulu 7y ago
        [...]The most obvious first principle is that a better value system should keep you alive. Being alive is foundational.[...] Is it? There are plenty of people that sacrify their lives for all sorts of principles. There exist quite some value systems that explicitely do not hold "being alive" for their foundational first principle! What about immortality, if it becomes a medical reality one day? A better value system by definition, just because we are staying alive for longer? I won't go into your derived principles, because it is not even possible to reach mutual consent about your axiomatic first principle.
        repolfx 7y ago
        Very very few people sacrifice their own life for any kind of principle unless forced to. That's why those who do are often lionised! But anyway, do you have a better first principle? If you don't care about staying alive why get out of bed at all, why not just starve to death? It's more work for sure.
        majewsky 7y ago
        Your fallacy is assuming that if the first principle is not protection of life, it must be its opposite, extreme disregard of life. There are potentially infinite choices of first principles. Furthermore, you present no argument for your particular first principle beyond aesthetics (aka "I prefer this one"). You build on the implicit assumption that human life is valuable (and apparently more so than other forms of life) for which you don't provide justification. Well, you do argue that it keeps people alive. But again, that's a circular argument. "My value system is the best one because it fulfills the goals of my value system."
    - nextmemorandum 7y ago
      It is not my opinion. It is a fact that the United States recognizes freedom of speech as a natural right.
      - antientropic 7y ago
        The possibility that the US shares your opinion that something is a "natural right" does not change the fact that it is just an opinion. You're perfectly entitled to feel that certain rights should be universal and inalienable. It's also clear that nobody agrees on what those rights are, and that they get violated all the time.
    - ta582501 7y ago
      Natural rights are an emergent aspect of human existence. Your failure to recognize that doesn't mean that they aren't part of the underlying substrate of objective reality. Recognition of rights does depend on a value system, but their existence does not. Your notions of 'bad ideas' and 'good ideas' and 'useful' and so forth, on the other hand, do entirely depend on a value system. If you think that suppressing natural rights is a good idea, you're entitled to that opinion, but don't act surprised when the people whose rights you're repressing decide to organize and wield violence to secure them. Being a censorious asshole only pays for so long as you can out-coerce the people you're censoring.
- acqq 7y ago
  But also: https://medium.com/incerto/the-most-intolerant-wins-the-dictatorship-of-the-small-minority-3f1f83ce4e15 https://medium.com/incerto/the-most-intolerant-wins-the-dict...
iamnotacrook 7y ago
"Don't you see that labeling or discriminating between "free speech of type A, allowed" and "free speech of type B, disallowed" defeats the whole notion of "free"?" Yeah, why are you allowed to play tennis but you aren't allowed to kill people? Why can you say John's a good person but you can't say he molests children? Why can you shout "fore" on a golf course but not "fire" in a movie theatre? There's always a limit. Choosing to stop your for-profit web service from enabling bigotry and murder seems a pretty low bar here. Let me know when it's being used to prevent the discussion of ideas such as Marxism or veganism or solar power or whatever which might upset the current power structure.
- nextmemorandum 7y ago
  >Let me know when it's being used to prevent the discussion of ideas such as Marxism or veganism or solar power or whatever which might upset the current power structure. Discussion of all of those topics has taken place on cripplechan which MITMflare just terminated business with.
AlphaGeekZulu 7y ago
There is a clear (and working) distinction between free speech of type A and of type B in other countries. In Germany, just as an example, you are free to express your OPINION (type A), but not to express false facts (type B). If you express false facts, knowingly, and those false facts have damaging effects you are fully liable for compensation. Simple example: if a person wrongly claims, that some local artisan's business is insolvent, and the artisan can prove that a potential customer withdrew an order for that reason, the person who spread the fake news has to pay for the artisan's loss. Entirely. Talking someone into commiting a crime is never treated as free speech, either. So, this is the legal construct in Germany: - you are free to have any opinion you like ("Meinungsfreiheit") and - you are free to express those opinions to the public ("Redefreiheit") Free speech, here, is limited to opinion. There is no such thing as "i am free to lie, blame, insult, taunt, threaten, defame, verbally harass, berate, incite etc..." with the excuse of free speech. In Germany, if you say: "The president of the United States suffers from narcissistic personality disorder", AND you cannot prove this as a fact, and the POTUS goes after you for that statement, you will have to compensate for the damages of that claim (this will become very expensive, if the POTUS can prove that he lost reelections because of that statement). If you say: "To my conviction (in my opinion/I believe), the president of the United States suffers from narcissistic personality disorder", this would be completely legal in Germany. And yes, the distinction matters!
- dangxiaopin 7y ago
  This reminds me of an actual Soviet joke: "Pres. Reagan: Mr. Brezhnev, in the USA we have free speech- anybody can say in public: President Reagan is a fool!" "Secretary Brezhnev: Pres. Reagan, in the USSR, we also have free speech- anybody can say in public: President Reagan is a fool!"
- Chris_Chambers 7y ago
  Germany isn't America. They are also a vassal state conquered by globalist bankers hellbent on punishing them for eternity for something barely any of the current living population had any part in. Odd choice for an example of "freedom".
- fvdessen 7y ago
ticktocktack 7y ago
It is my understanding that, currently, the following speech is of "type B, disallowed" in the US: * Shouting fire in a crowded theatre * False advertisement * Medical or legal advice (allowed, heavily regulated by the Government) * Advocacy of force or criminal activity And I assume, many others that I do not know of. Unless you are arguing that there is no such thing as free speech in the US, then it must be that you can have "free speech" while still having some limitations.
- drenvuk 7y ago
  The shouting fire in a crowded theater example for precedent was overturned. Stop using it.
  - ticktocktack2 7y ago
    I did not know. Still, the other cases apply.
- mcv 7y ago
  Some other ones: * threats of violence * blackmail These may be entirely verbal, and yet are considered serious crimes.
  - Biganon 7y ago
    There is a cardinal difference in the US between speech related to public interest, such as anything that has to do with politics, religion, military actions, and speech that's only about private matters, such as whether or not your neighbor has a perverted sexuality. The second category is not nearly as protected as people usually think it is.

by rlonn 7y ago

ketzo 7y ago

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paradox_of_tolerance https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paradox_of_tolerance

nextmemorandum 7y ago
That does not change the fact that people have the natural right of freedom of speech.
- AlphaGeekZulu 7y ago
  That is your personal OPINION, not a fact! There is no such thing as a "natural right of freedom of speech". If one sovereign in the history of mankind decides to allow unrestricted freedom of speech in its constitution, it is just that: an episode in the history of legal systems established by humans. It can turn out as a bad idea, or a milestone for better societies. We will see. In no way is it a "natural right". Not even would it be a natural right, if it was mentioned in the bible as one of the 10 commandments from god (disregarding the FACT, that there are some serious restrictions of freedom of speech in that: "Thou shalt not bear false witness against thy neighbour").
  - majewsky 7y ago
    > There is no such thing as a "natural right of freedom of speech". In fact, there is no such thing as a natural right at all. Rights are derived from value systems, and the choice of value system is mostly based on aesthetics. There is no way to say whether the Western Christianity-based value system is "better" than, say, the Confucian value system, because the word "better" cannot be defined from first principles (without invoking a particular value system).
    - repolfx 7y ago
      Yes, it can be done, but lots of people don't like that because it invariably concludes that some societies are better than others and the best ones are the western capitalist democracies. The most obvious first principle is that a better value system should keep you alive. Being alive is foundational. From that you can derive other principles, like value systems should result in the production of food, clean water, protection against wild animals and invaders, disease, etc. From that you can derive yet more principles, like the value of efficient resource allocation, stable governance and so on. And judged by basic things like "is this set of cultural values good at keeping people alive and healthy" you can quickly conclude that some are better than others, objectively so. To deny this is to argue that wishing to be alive rather than dead is merely an aesthetic preference - an absurd starting point, lacking any intellectual merit.
      - AlphaGeekZulu 7y ago
        [...]The most obvious first principle is that a better value system should keep you alive. Being alive is foundational.[...] Is it? There are plenty of people that sacrify their lives for all sorts of principles. There exist quite some value systems that explicitely do not hold "being alive" for their foundational first principle! What about immortality, if it becomes a medical reality one day? A better value system by definition, just because we are staying alive for longer? I won't go into your derived principles, because it is not even possible to reach mutual consent about your axiomatic first principle.
        repolfx 7y ago
        Very very few people sacrifice their own life for any kind of principle unless forced to. That's why those who do are often lionised! But anyway, do you have a better first principle? If you don't care about staying alive why get out of bed at all, why not just starve to death? It's more work for sure.
        majewsky 7y ago
        Your fallacy is assuming that if the first principle is not protection of life, it must be its opposite, extreme disregard of life. There are potentially infinite choices of first principles. Furthermore, you present no argument for your particular first principle beyond aesthetics (aka "I prefer this one"). You build on the implicit assumption that human life is valuable (and apparently more so than other forms of life) for which you don't provide justification. Well, you do argue that it keeps people alive. But again, that's a circular argument. "My value system is the best one because it fulfills the goals of my value system."
  - nextmemorandum 7y ago
    It is not my opinion. It is a fact that the United States recognizes freedom of speech as a natural right.
    - antientropic 7y ago
      The possibility that the US shares your opinion that something is a "natural right" does not change the fact that it is just an opinion. You're perfectly entitled to feel that certain rights should be universal and inalienable. It's also clear that nobody agrees on what those rights are, and that they get violated all the time.
  - ta582501 7y ago
    Natural rights are an emergent aspect of human existence. Your failure to recognize that doesn't mean that they aren't part of the underlying substrate of objective reality. Recognition of rights does depend on a value system, but their existence does not. Your notions of 'bad ideas' and 'good ideas' and 'useful' and so forth, on the other hand, do entirely depend on a value system. If you think that suppressing natural rights is a good idea, you're entitled to that opinion, but don't act surprised when the people whose rights you're repressing decide to organize and wield violence to secure them. Being a censorious asshole only pays for so long as you can out-coerce the people you're censoring.
acqq 7y ago
But also: https://medium.com/incerto/the-most-intolerant-wins-the-dictatorship-of-the-small-minority-3f1f83ce4e15 https://medium.com/incerto/the-most-intolerant-wins-the-dict...

iamnotacrook 7y ago

"Don't you see that labeling or discriminating between "free speech of type A, allowed" and "free speech of type B, disallowed" defeats the whole notion of "free"?" Yeah, why are you allowed to play tennis but you aren't allowed to kill people? Why can you say John's a good person but you can't say he molests children? Why can you shout "fore" on a golf course but not "fire" in a movie theatre? There's always a limit. Choosing to stop your for-profit web service from enabling bigotry and murder seems a pretty low bar here. Let me know when it's being used to prevent the discussion of ideas such as Marxism or veganism or solar power or whatever which might upset the current power structure.

nextmemorandum 7y ago
>Let me know when it's being used to prevent the discussion of ideas such as Marxism or veganism or solar power or whatever which might upset the current power structure. Discussion of all of those topics has taken place on cripplechan which MITMflare just terminated business with.

AlphaGeekZulu 7y ago

There is a clear (and working) distinction between free speech of type A and of type B in other countries. In Germany, just as an example, you are free to express your OPINION (type A), but not to express false facts (type B). If you express false facts, knowingly, and those false facts have damaging effects you are fully liable for compensation. Simple example: if a person wrongly claims, that some local artisan's business is insolvent, and the artisan can prove that a potential customer withdrew an order for that reason, the person who spread the fake news has to pay for the artisan's loss. Entirely. Talking someone into commiting a crime is never treated as free speech, either. So, this is the legal construct in Germany: - you are free to have any opinion you like ("Meinungsfreiheit") and - you are free to express those opinions to the public ("Redefreiheit") Free speech, here, is limited to opinion. There is no such thing as "i am free to lie, blame, insult, taunt, threaten, defame, verbally harass, berate, incite etc..." with the excuse of free speech. In Germany, if you say: "The president of the United States suffers from narcissistic personality disorder", AND you cannot prove this as a fact, and the POTUS goes after you for that statement, you will have to compensate for the damages of that claim (this will become very expensive, if the POTUS can prove that he lost reelections because of that statement). If you say: "To my conviction (in my opinion/I believe), the president of the United States suffers from narcissistic personality disorder", this would be completely legal in Germany. And yes, the distinction matters!

dangxiaopin 7y ago
This reminds me of an actual Soviet joke: "Pres. Reagan: Mr. Brezhnev, in the USA we have free speech- anybody can say in public: President Reagan is a fool!" "Secretary Brezhnev: Pres. Reagan, in the USSR, we also have free speech- anybody can say in public: President Reagan is a fool!"
Chris_Chambers 7y ago
Germany isn't America. They are also a vassal state conquered by globalist bankers hellbent on punishing them for eternity for something barely any of the current living population had any part in. Odd choice for an example of "freedom".
fvdessen 7y ago

ticktocktack 7y ago

It is my understanding that, currently, the following speech is of "type B, disallowed" in the US: * Shouting fire in a crowded theatre * False advertisement * Medical or legal advice (allowed, heavily regulated by the Government) * Advocacy of force or criminal activity And I assume, many others that I do not know of. Unless you are arguing that there is no such thing as free speech in the US, then it must be that you can have "free speech" while still having some limitations.

drenvuk 7y ago
The shouting fire in a crowded theater example for precedent was overturned. Stop using it.
- ticktocktack2 7y ago
  I did not know. Still, the other cases apply.
mcv 7y ago
Some other ones: * threats of violence * blackmail These may be entirely verbal, and yet are considered serious crimes.
- Biganon 7y ago
  There is a cardinal difference in the US between speech related to public interest, such as anything that has to do with politics, religion, military actions, and speech that's only about private matters, such as whether or not your neighbor has a perverted sexuality. The second category is not nearly as protected as people usually think it is.