2 ms·

I would argue the fact that the rules were first created 230+ years ago is an argument in favor of reevaluating them not an argument in favor of them being infa

by slg 6y ago

I would argue the fact that the rules were first created 230+ years ago is an argument in favor of reevaluating them not an argument in favor of them being infallible. The laws were written before social media, the internet, and the foundations go back to before any real form of mass media. What is the harm in questioning if our laws are setup in the best possible way?

chrisco255 6y ago
I would argue that the founders were students of Greek and Roman history which preceded them by almost 2000 years. The lessons encoded in the bill of rights were in fact, timeless and speak to the innate nature of human beings. As a species we haven't evolved much in 200K years. Freedom of speech is an important check against a monopoly on ideas. Propaganda is one of the most powerful and dangerous forces and the only way to fight it is with opposing propaganda or debate. Freedom of speech guarantees the right to have that debate. The printing press was a form of mass media. The problem is not the speech on social media. The problem is the platform. Who knows if social media will even be a thing in 10 years? It could just be a temporary fad in history, like disco, that just fades away. It already is starting to wane. More people are tuning out and gen Z is just not as into Facebook or Twitter as my gen was. The need to protect speech and debate will always be essential, however.
- slg 6y ago
  >I would argue that the founders were students of Greek and Roman history which preceded them by almost 2000 years. The lessons encoded in the bill of rights were in fact, timeless and speak to the innate nature of human beings. As a species we haven't evolved much in 200K years. Which is why it took until just within the last century to guarantee voting rights to people besides white men? It is bizarre how we want to pretend that those who came before us had some magical foresight to setup rules to govern a world they could never imagine while we ignore so many clear mistakes they made such as calling rights inalienable while simultaneously disenfranchising a majority of the population.
  - chrisco255 6y ago
    Voting rights as a whole are about 2 centuries old. The United States, as young as it is, is the oldest continuous democracy in existence. The United States came out of a world of empires and war and conquering, which is how the world was for almost all of human history. Not a square mile of it hasn't had blood spilt over it several times over. At any rate, it was Thomas Jefferson who encoded the bold words "all men are created equal and endowed by their creator with certain inalienable rights." in our founding documents. That the world wasn't ready for its eventual conclusion didn't matter. A seed was sown. And that same language was used by MLK (himself taking full advantage of the first amendment to effect change). Lot of powerful and timeless ideas there.

by slg 6y ago

chrisco255 6y ago

I would argue that the founders were students of Greek and Roman history which preceded them by almost 2000 years. The lessons encoded in the bill of rights were in fact, timeless and speak to the innate nature of human beings. As a species we haven't evolved much in 200K years. Freedom of speech is an important check against a monopoly on ideas. Propaganda is one of the most powerful and dangerous forces and the only way to fight it is with opposing propaganda or debate. Freedom of speech guarantees the right to have that debate. The printing press was a form of mass media. The problem is not the speech on social media. The problem is the platform. Who knows if social media will even be a thing in 10 years? It could just be a temporary fad in history, like disco, that just fades away. It already is starting to wane. More people are tuning out and gen Z is just not as into Facebook or Twitter as my gen was. The need to protect speech and debate will always be essential, however.

slg 6y ago
>I would argue that the founders were students of Greek and Roman history which preceded them by almost 2000 years. The lessons encoded in the bill of rights were in fact, timeless and speak to the innate nature of human beings. As a species we haven't evolved much in 200K years. Which is why it took until just within the last century to guarantee voting rights to people besides white men? It is bizarre how we want to pretend that those who came before us had some magical foresight to setup rules to govern a world they could never imagine while we ignore so many clear mistakes they made such as calling rights inalienable while simultaneously disenfranchising a majority of the population.
- chrisco255 6y ago
  Voting rights as a whole are about 2 centuries old. The United States, as young as it is, is the oldest continuous democracy in existence. The United States came out of a world of empires and war and conquering, which is how the world was for almost all of human history. Not a square mile of it hasn't had blood spilt over it several times over. At any rate, it was Thomas Jefferson who encoded the bold words "all men are created equal and endowed by their creator with certain inalienable rights." in our founding documents. That the world wasn't ready for its eventual conclusion didn't matter. A seed was sown. And that same language was used by MLK (himself taking full advantage of the first amendment to effect change). Lot of powerful and timeless ideas there.