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> Yes, you are accountable for the communications you make, whether via keybord, orally, or any other way. Just for the purpose of debating let me bring up my

> Yes, you are accountable for the communications you make, whether via keybord, orally, or any other way. Just for the purpose of debating let me bring up my (very unpopular) point of view. I have always thought that anyone should be able to say anything and not have legal consequences (ex: go to prison, pay a fine). Notice that this statement covers all scenarios as long as the person involved "only speaks" (or publishes). In other words, the moment he does something illegal, then he should (in my opinion) be judged according to the rules of the society he lives in. Now... I have never in my live encountered one single person that agrees 100% with me in that regard. They always come up with exceptions, such as these ones: 1) An author writes a book about having sex with minors. 2) A general tells one of his soldiers to shoot a prisoner. 3) My neighbor starts publishing ads on the local newspaper falsely accusing me of being a drug dealer. These are my responses: 1) As long as we don't catch him having sex with minors, that's ok with me. We should encourage all types of debates, even those (specially those!) we are not comfortable with. In the worst case, each one will walk home thinking the other side is wrong; in the best case, maybe we will learn something from each other (maybe we can better understand how the brain of that author works and how we can help him). Simply banning a taboo topic won't make it disappear from society... openly discussing the topic will (in my opinion) be a better long term solution for all. 2) In this case the general is not just "saying" something. Due to the chain of command, the soldier can end up imprisoned or dead if he doesn't comply. I would still defend the right for some random person to publicly state that "we should kill all xxx", not because I agree with him, but because we should be able to discuss the reasons and try to convince him to do otherwise. 3) This is the most tricky one. I still think my neighbor should be able to do that because I expect others who read the newspaper ad to fact check his claims instead of blindly believe them. No one I have ever met agrees with me on this one... and I think that is because people always consider others to be "dumber" than themselves and thus need to be protected from non curated news in case they end up believing them. I really think this is not the case: I never believe anything I read on the newspaper (or online) until I get confirmation from several places and I know most people do the same, no matter how others like to "look down" at "average Joe". I enjoy discussing the limits of "freedom of speech/ideas". Let me know what you (or any other) think :)

YarickR2 6y ago
I agree with you on all points. Freedom of speech is the same as freedom of thought. Actions should be punishable, words shouldn't
- astorgard 6y ago
  You are literally the first person I find who agrees with me. Hi there! :) Just for the shake of discussion, let me put on the table some other extreme examples people bring up: A) Apology of "something bad" (for example, "apology of terrorism"). Is it OK for someone to appear on TV and say that he is happy about all the people killed in 11-S and that others should repeat the attack? B) Targeted attack. Back to the neighbor example: would it be OK if he not only published a newspaper ad against me every day but also appeared on TV shows, sent propaganda to other neighbors, hired a plane to draw my name on the sky, etc...? C) Dangerous information. Example: someone discovers that by mixing two very easy to find (and accessible to everyone) chemicals, the whole atmosphere of the earth would be modified in hours in a way that all people from ethnicity X would immediately die. Is it OK for him to publish this information? I still think all these cases are covered... but I would like to know how others reason about them :)
  - shaan7 6y ago
    > You are literally the first person I find who agrees with me. Hi there! :) And I'd like to say the same to both of you! I wonder why the idea is not more popular though :(
sofixa 6y ago
> would still defend the right for some random person to publicly state that "we should kill all xxx", not because I agree with him, but because we should be able to discuss the reasons and try to convince him to do otherwise I think that's incredibly naive and doesn't actually work in the world we live in. Take a look at any of the genocides of the last century, with people on one side saying "we should kill all X", people saying "no, X are fine people", and sometimes the first type of people winning and going full genocide. FFS it happened as recently as last year in Myanmar about mass misinformation against Rohingyas, which escalated to a genocide. What then? When the "explaining" doesn't work, do you wait for the actions to start ( taking in mind that usually when a mass amount of people start genociding another people, you can't just easily stop it)? Then, in a way, aren't you complicit in that genocide because you could have acted before but chose to just talk? That's what the Germans settled on post-WWII, that they were all complicit for allowing the Nazis to get so far ( and talking obviously got them nowhere).

YarickR2 6y ago

I agree with you on all points. Freedom of speech is the same as freedom of thought. Actions should be punishable, words shouldn't

astorgard 6y ago
You are literally the first person I find who agrees with me. Hi there! :) Just for the shake of discussion, let me put on the table some other extreme examples people bring up: A) Apology of "something bad" (for example, "apology of terrorism"). Is it OK for someone to appear on TV and say that he is happy about all the people killed in 11-S and that others should repeat the attack? B) Targeted attack. Back to the neighbor example: would it be OK if he not only published a newspaper ad against me every day but also appeared on TV shows, sent propaganda to other neighbors, hired a plane to draw my name on the sky, etc...? C) Dangerous information. Example: someone discovers that by mixing two very easy to find (and accessible to everyone) chemicals, the whole atmosphere of the earth would be modified in hours in a way that all people from ethnicity X would immediately die. Is it OK for him to publish this information? I still think all these cases are covered... but I would like to know how others reason about them :)
- shaan7 6y ago
  > You are literally the first person I find who agrees with me. Hi there! :) And I'd like to say the same to both of you! I wonder why the idea is not more popular though :(

sofixa 6y ago

> would still defend the right for some random person to publicly state that "we should kill all xxx", not because I agree with him, but because we should be able to discuss the reasons and try to convince him to do otherwise I think that's incredibly naive and doesn't actually work in the world we live in. Take a look at any of the genocides of the last century, with people on one side saying "we should kill all X", people saying "no, X are fine people", and sometimes the first type of people winning and going full genocide. FFS it happened as recently as last year in Myanmar about mass misinformation against Rohingyas, which escalated to a genocide. What then? When the "explaining" doesn't work, do you wait for the actions to start ( taking in mind that usually when a mass amount of people start genociding another people, you can't just easily stop it)? Then, in a way, aren't you complicit in that genocide because you could have acted before but chose to just talk? That's what the Germans settled on post-WWII, that they were all complicit for allowing the Nazis to get so far ( and talking obviously got them nowhere).