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This is correct. You can't have democracy without free speech. If you don't trust your fellow citizens to be able to deduce the truth, you shouldn't trust them

This is correct. You can't have democracy without free speech. If you don't trust your fellow citizens to be able to deduce the truth, you shouldn't trust them to cast their own vote.

mlyle 6y ago
You need free speech, but you don't need free coordination of violence by those rejecting discourse.
- offby37years 6y ago
  In attempt to curtail the latter you forgo the former.
dagw 6y ago
You can't have democracy without free speech. So are countries that have more limits on free speech than what the US has, less democratic than the US?
- adrian_b 6y ago
  There are no single criteria that can be used to judge how democratic a country is. Many European countries have more restrictions on free speech than USA, so yes, they are less democratic by this criterion. By other criteria, e.g. by evaluating how many abusive laws they have that favor a few rich individuals that own some large companies against the majority of the citizens, most European countries are more democratic than USA. The same conclusion comes from other criteria, like how easy is for most citizens to access education or health services.
modriano 6y ago
> If you don't trust your fellow citizens to be able to deduce the truth... Do you trust people who live in an echo chamber overrun with disinformation to deduce the truth about the outcome of the US election? If so, can you speak to the mechanism by which such people can determine the truth? And could you speak to the empirical failure of this population to discover the truth?
- offby37years 6y ago
  With almost every technological advance, destructive power arrives long before the protective powers. It's much easier to destroy something with a nuclear weapon than it is to build a nuclear power plant. Likewise, we arrived at muskets before the combustion engine. Disinformation is much cheaper (and profitable for media companies surviving on outrage driven clicks) than delivering self-verifiable empirical information. This will change in time.
adrian_b 6y ago
Yes, you are right. This is the most unfortunate consequence of the idea that free speech must be limited. If it is accepted that a part of the people cannot be trusted to not do wrong things when others tell them to do so, then an unavoidable consequence is that to that part of the people the right to vote must also be denied, because if they may be convinced by lies to do very wrong things, like violence, then it is even more certain that they will be easily convinced by lies to do a minor mistake, like casting a wrong vote. Any proposal to deny the right of voting to stupid people, or to give different weight to the votes, depending on the "intelligence" of the voters, would rightly generate huge protests. However, any proposal to restrict the free speech without also restricting the right to vote is logically inconsistent, even if many seem to not notice this.

This is correct. You can't have democracy without free speech. If you don't trust your fellow citizens to be able to deduce the truth, you shouldn't trust them to cast their own vote.

mlyle 6y ago

You need free speech, but you don't need free coordination of violence by those rejecting discourse.

offby37years 6y ago
In attempt to curtail the latter you forgo the former.

dagw 6y ago

You can't have democracy without free speech. So are countries that have more limits on free speech than what the US has, less democratic than the US?

adrian_b 6y ago
There are no single criteria that can be used to judge how democratic a country is. Many European countries have more restrictions on free speech than USA, so yes, they are less democratic by this criterion. By other criteria, e.g. by evaluating how many abusive laws they have that favor a few rich individuals that own some large companies against the majority of the citizens, most European countries are more democratic than USA. The same conclusion comes from other criteria, like how easy is for most citizens to access education or health services.

modriano 6y ago

> If you don't trust your fellow citizens to be able to deduce the truth... Do you trust people who live in an echo chamber overrun with disinformation to deduce the truth about the outcome of the US election? If so, can you speak to the mechanism by which such people can determine the truth? And could you speak to the empirical failure of this population to discover the truth?

offby37years 6y ago
With almost every technological advance, destructive power arrives long before the protective powers. It's much easier to destroy something with a nuclear weapon than it is to build a nuclear power plant. Likewise, we arrived at muskets before the combustion engine. Disinformation is much cheaper (and profitable for media companies surviving on outrage driven clicks) than delivering self-verifiable empirical information. This will change in time.

adrian_b 6y ago

Yes, you are right. This is the most unfortunate consequence of the idea that free speech must be limited. If it is accepted that a part of the people cannot be trusted to not do wrong things when others tell them to do so, then an unavoidable consequence is that to that part of the people the right to vote must also be denied, because if they may be convinced by lies to do very wrong things, like violence, then it is even more certain that they will be easily convinced by lies to do a minor mistake, like casting a wrong vote. Any proposal to deny the right of voting to stupid people, or to give different weight to the votes, depending on the "intelligence" of the voters, would rightly generate huge protests. However, any proposal to restrict the free speech without also restricting the right to vote is logically inconsistent, even if many seem to not notice this.