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https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paradox_of_tolerance https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paradox_of_tolerance The paradox of tolerance states that if a society is tole

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paradox_of_tolerance https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paradox_of_tolerance The paradox of tolerance states that if a society is tolerant without limit, its ability to be tolerant is eventually seized or destroyed by the intolerant. Karl Popper described it as the seemingly paradoxical idea that in order to maintain a tolerant society, the society must be intolerant of intolerance.

bitlax 6y ago
Yeah I've seen people throwing that around for the last few years and obviously it's going really well.
- johndevor 6y ago
  I will not tolerate your sarcasm... Out of tolerance.
- ramraj07 6y ago
  You're being sarcastic because you're implying it isn't going well. It's true, the situation is not going well at all, but the consensus seems to be that it's mainly -because- Facebook and Twitter never banned these voices for a long time as they should have (and ostensibly they didn't ban mainly because of bottom line)
  - s__s 6y ago
    Do Amazon, Facebook, or Google get held accountable for what random users post on their platforms / services / servers? No. Why are they holding Parler to a different standard?
    - diveanon 6y ago
      It's because they see that they will be held accountable if they don't start policing themselves. They should have started doing this 4 years ago, then maybe we wouldn't have witnessed the first coup attempt in our history and 350k people wouldn't have died from a preventable illness.
      - rightbyte 6y ago
        In Jan-Feb you had tinfoil hat if you were "fearmongering" about Covid. One month later the roles were switched. Mask went from offical "meaningless" to "mandatory" in like no time. Social media is not to blame for the confusion. The institutions are. "Fact checking" in Jan would have been no human to human transmission and no risk of spread out of China. Having free speech was important back then. Concerning the Capitol I agree.
        diveanon 6y ago
        I am an American expat who has been living in Thailand since Trump was elected. I can forgive uncertainty about covid until March, despite my part of the world taking it very seriously. After that point I think America as a whole, and the Trump administration in particular really shit the bed. We have been wearing masks here on a mandatory basis since February, and have arguably handled covid better than any nation besides New Zealand.
    - esoterica 6y ago
      They are not being held to a different standards. The government isn’t forcing Parker to shut down; their business partners are merely boycotting them. People boycott Facebook/Amazon/Google all the time (users, customers, potential employees, advertisers, etc.) because they disagree with those companies’ business practices.
  - bitlax 6y ago
    > consensus Yeah it's shocking people wouldn't blame themselves.
- anchpop 6y ago
  I'm not sure it even means what people think it means. Quoting the page: > I do not imply, for instance, that we should always suppress the utterance of intolerant philosophies; as long as we can counter them by rational argument and keep them in check by public opinion, suppression would certainly be most unwise. But we should claim the right to suppress them if necessary even by force; for it may easily turn out that they are not prepared to meet us on the level of rational argument, but begin by denouncing all argument; they may forbid their followers to listen to rational argument, because it is deceptive, and teach them to answer arguments by the use of their fists or pistols. We should therefore claim, in the name of tolerance, the right not to tolerate the intolerant. This seems like it's clearly saying that, as a society, we should reserve the right to silence any group by force if we consider them to be intolerant. It's often said that the government has a monopoly on force, so this is pretty much saying the government should reserve the right to quiet any speech it deems intolerant. Is this really what the people quoting it want? I'm worried about the government using "intolerance" as a cover for suppressing speech it dislikes for other reasons. Some governments like manage to Germany ban certain types of speech without becoming authoritarian states, but others don't. Particularly in the US, I have a feeling we'll get Trump 2.0 at some point, and he'll be smarter and more capable and more charismatic and more populist and more popular, and I don't know if it's a good idea to give him the right to say "free speech is cancelled and if I think you're not being tolerant enough [to groups I like], you're going to jail bucko". Do people arguing on Popper's side have a reason to be confident that this won't ever happen?
oliv__ 6y ago
Thanks for sharing, this is really interesting (not being sarcastic)
systemvoltage 6y ago
I don't see anything profound or deeply insightful about this. In order for the fish tank to be empty, it must try to remain empty of fish. Replace tolerance with "free[dom]" and intolerance with "censorship" without losing its meaning and getting rid of the word play. "In order for society to be free, it must censor censorship." even simpler: "In order for society to be free, it must be free from censorship." Freedom and censorship are antonyms of each other (mutually exclusive). So obviously, its a paradox.
- three_seagrass 6y ago
  Fish and Freedom are completely different concepts from tolerance. They're not as substitutable here as you think.
  - systemvoltage 6y ago
    > In order to maintain a tolerant society, the society must be intolerant of intolerance. Even as it is with the word - tolerance, it is not particularly insightful in any profound way to me. Can you explain? It just says that in order for the society to remain tolerant, it must get rid of intolerance. To which my brain goes "No shit!", would love to get more insight.
- MajorBee 6y ago
  > ... it must not censor censorship. Doesn't this imply that censorship must be allowed for a free society? Coming to the main point, I think the meaning behind the phrase is that absolute tolerance is not sustainable; a line must be drawn somewhere and yes, we can argue till end of time where that line needs to be drawn as long it is drawn somewhere.
  - systemvoltage 6y ago
    Thank you, I now see the central point "absolute tolerance is not sustainable". That reads far better than the original paradox. Discussing the point itself: Yea it makes sense though and I had arguments with a liberatarian friend who wants 100% anarchy. No police, no laws, no anything, no FDA, no Fire department and no medical laws, no lawyers, etc. My argument was that such a society is impossible and would crumble upon itself. One bad actor and the entire society falls apart.
nsoonhui 6y ago
>>the society must be intolerant of intolerance. Yes but where to draw a line?
- three_seagrass 6y ago
  Invading and occupying the U.S. capitol with a fatal anti-democratic insurrection seems like a good place to start.
  - WindyLakeReturn 6y ago
    Given that the attempted assassination of congress members at a base/softball game was not a good place to start, I don't see how one could justify starting at the invasion of a federal building except in considering the teams involved.
    - three_seagrass 6y ago
      Help me understand how a lone gunman at a softball game is the equivalent of a fatal anti-democratic insurrection invading and occupying the nations capitol.
      - WindyLakeReturn 6y ago
        Well for starters, realizing it isn't just a lone political assassin. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_United_States_presidential_assassination_attempts_and_plots#Donald_Trump https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_United_States_presiden... Second, if you look at only those with the intention to kill or gravely wound, the numbers are quite comparable. Third, one of these is an attack on a much softer target and done without any warning, making it a more dangerous threat.
        three_seagrass 6y ago
        I don't get what you're trying to say. You think that platforms don't attempt to stop calls to assassination? Because it seems like you're whatabouting presidential assassination attempts to do what exactly?
btmiller 6y ago
In a fit of irony, a comment I posted on a previous day referencing this paradox was removed as baiting and cliché. And I must say, I do support the removal of Parler, but here on HN having my thoughtful (at least to my perception) comment removed does serve as a chilling effect.
Aunche 6y ago
Don't shoot unless if you can score. We aren't talking about a fringe belief here. A third of Americans believe that the election was rigged. 21% supported the storming of the Capitol. That's not something that you can just "cancel" by deleting an app. You're just handing them more ammunition.
rocqua 6y ago
We can refuse to tolerate many ideas spread on parlor without banning parlor.

bitlax 6y ago

Yeah I've seen people throwing that around for the last few years and obviously it's going really well.

johndevor 6y ago
I will not tolerate your sarcasm... Out of tolerance.
ramraj07 6y ago
You're being sarcastic because you're implying it isn't going well. It's true, the situation is not going well at all, but the consensus seems to be that it's mainly -because- Facebook and Twitter never banned these voices for a long time as they should have (and ostensibly they didn't ban mainly because of bottom line)
- s__s 6y ago
  Do Amazon, Facebook, or Google get held accountable for what random users post on their platforms / services / servers? No. Why are they holding Parler to a different standard?
  - diveanon 6y ago
    It's because they see that they will be held accountable if they don't start policing themselves. They should have started doing this 4 years ago, then maybe we wouldn't have witnessed the first coup attempt in our history and 350k people wouldn't have died from a preventable illness.
    - rightbyte 6y ago
      In Jan-Feb you had tinfoil hat if you were "fearmongering" about Covid. One month later the roles were switched. Mask went from offical "meaningless" to "mandatory" in like no time. Social media is not to blame for the confusion. The institutions are. "Fact checking" in Jan would have been no human to human transmission and no risk of spread out of China. Having free speech was important back then. Concerning the Capitol I agree.
      - diveanon 6y ago
        I am an American expat who has been living in Thailand since Trump was elected. I can forgive uncertainty about covid until March, despite my part of the world taking it very seriously. After that point I think America as a whole, and the Trump administration in particular really shit the bed. We have been wearing masks here on a mandatory basis since February, and have arguably handled covid better than any nation besides New Zealand.
  - esoterica 6y ago
    They are not being held to a different standards. The government isn’t forcing Parker to shut down; their business partners are merely boycotting them. People boycott Facebook/Amazon/Google all the time (users, customers, potential employees, advertisers, etc.) because they disagree with those companies’ business practices.
- bitlax 6y ago
  > consensus Yeah it's shocking people wouldn't blame themselves.
anchpop 6y ago
I'm not sure it even means what people think it means. Quoting the page: > I do not imply, for instance, that we should always suppress the utterance of intolerant philosophies; as long as we can counter them by rational argument and keep them in check by public opinion, suppression would certainly be most unwise. But we should claim the right to suppress them if necessary even by force; for it may easily turn out that they are not prepared to meet us on the level of rational argument, but begin by denouncing all argument; they may forbid their followers to listen to rational argument, because it is deceptive, and teach them to answer arguments by the use of their fists or pistols. We should therefore claim, in the name of tolerance, the right not to tolerate the intolerant. This seems like it's clearly saying that, as a society, we should reserve the right to silence any group by force if we consider them to be intolerant. It's often said that the government has a monopoly on force, so this is pretty much saying the government should reserve the right to quiet any speech it deems intolerant. Is this really what the people quoting it want? I'm worried about the government using "intolerance" as a cover for suppressing speech it dislikes for other reasons. Some governments like manage to Germany ban certain types of speech without becoming authoritarian states, but others don't. Particularly in the US, I have a feeling we'll get Trump 2.0 at some point, and he'll be smarter and more capable and more charismatic and more populist and more popular, and I don't know if it's a good idea to give him the right to say "free speech is cancelled and if I think you're not being tolerant enough [to groups I like], you're going to jail bucko". Do people arguing on Popper's side have a reason to be confident that this won't ever happen?

oliv__ 6y ago

Thanks for sharing, this is really interesting (not being sarcastic)

systemvoltage 6y ago

I don't see anything profound or deeply insightful about this. In order for the fish tank to be empty, it must try to remain empty of fish. Replace tolerance with "free[dom]" and intolerance with "censorship" without losing its meaning and getting rid of the word play. "In order for society to be free, it must censor censorship." even simpler: "In order for society to be free, it must be free from censorship." Freedom and censorship are antonyms of each other (mutually exclusive). So obviously, its a paradox.

three_seagrass 6y ago
Fish and Freedom are completely different concepts from tolerance. They're not as substitutable here as you think.
- systemvoltage 6y ago
  > In order to maintain a tolerant society, the society must be intolerant of intolerance. Even as it is with the word - tolerance, it is not particularly insightful in any profound way to me. Can you explain? It just says that in order for the society to remain tolerant, it must get rid of intolerance. To which my brain goes "No shit!", would love to get more insight.
MajorBee 6y ago
> ... it must not censor censorship. Doesn't this imply that censorship must be allowed for a free society? Coming to the main point, I think the meaning behind the phrase is that absolute tolerance is not sustainable; a line must be drawn somewhere and yes, we can argue till end of time where that line needs to be drawn as long it is drawn somewhere.
- systemvoltage 6y ago
  Thank you, I now see the central point "absolute tolerance is not sustainable". That reads far better than the original paradox. Discussing the point itself: Yea it makes sense though and I had arguments with a liberatarian friend who wants 100% anarchy. No police, no laws, no anything, no FDA, no Fire department and no medical laws, no lawyers, etc. My argument was that such a society is impossible and would crumble upon itself. One bad actor and the entire society falls apart.

nsoonhui 6y ago

>>the society must be intolerant of intolerance. Yes but where to draw a line?

three_seagrass 6y ago
Invading and occupying the U.S. capitol with a fatal anti-democratic insurrection seems like a good place to start.
- WindyLakeReturn 6y ago
  Given that the attempted assassination of congress members at a base/softball game was not a good place to start, I don't see how one could justify starting at the invasion of a federal building except in considering the teams involved.
  - three_seagrass 6y ago
    Help me understand how a lone gunman at a softball game is the equivalent of a fatal anti-democratic insurrection invading and occupying the nations capitol.
    - WindyLakeReturn 6y ago
      Well for starters, realizing it isn't just a lone political assassin. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_United_States_presidential_assassination_attempts_and_plots#Donald_Trump https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_United_States_presiden... Second, if you look at only those with the intention to kill or gravely wound, the numbers are quite comparable. Third, one of these is an attack on a much softer target and done without any warning, making it a more dangerous threat.
      - three_seagrass 6y ago
        I don't get what you're trying to say. You think that platforms don't attempt to stop calls to assassination? Because it seems like you're whatabouting presidential assassination attempts to do what exactly?

btmiller 6y ago

In a fit of irony, a comment I posted on a previous day referencing this paradox was removed as baiting and cliché. And I must say, I do support the removal of Parler, but here on HN having my thoughtful (at least to my perception) comment removed does serve as a chilling effect.

Aunche 6y ago

Don't shoot unless if you can score. We aren't talking about a fringe belief here. A third of Americans believe that the election was rigged. 21% supported the storming of the Capitol. That's not something that you can just "cancel" by deleting an app. You're just handing them more ammunition.

rocqua 6y ago

We can refuse to tolerate many ideas spread on parlor without banning parlor.