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The impact of speech is still not the same as that of sticks and stones, and guns, knives, or fists must still be wielded by people, not Youtube videos. That s
by ineedasername 5y ago
The impact of speech is still not the same as that of sticks and stones, and guns, knives, or fists must still be wielded by people, not Youtube videos.
That somewhat sidesteps the fact that it's speech that can get people riled up enough to invite violence. Acknowledging this fact is not advocacy for censorship. It's recognizing that there are plenty of things short of "yelling 'fire' in a crowded theatre" that can be the cause of quite a bit of harm, and we should try to avoid and discourage that.
How we go about that task is another matter. I don't like or want censorship, and similar to Muffet I don't see a whole lot of options on the table. But we certainly can't blind ourselves on the issue by not acknowledging that plenty of awful things are enabled & possible because of speech.
Otherwise his sentiment amounts to "guns don't kill people, people kill people". Which is trivially true while ignoring the significant role that both have in an act of violence. Not much different than saying "guns don't kill people, bullets kill people." It's all a single system and there are multiple essential components.