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Imagine you have free speech. Yay! Now what? Why was this so important again? Free speech is not an end goal. It's a tool that serves a purpose. In the relatio

• logicchains 5y ago
  >Is the goal to give all the power to the individual? No, that's not the goal. The goal is to have some sort of equilibrium between the powers of the government and the powers of individuals. The government is "individuals"! Every bit of power you take from the individuals in society, you give to the individuals in government. And historically the vast majority of these people have been corrupt and self-serving, because such kinds of people are attracted to positions of power, and most voters can't tell the difference between a good person and a skilled liar. Government attracts narcissists, as it requires a certain kind of narcisissm to go about telling people that they should live their lives how you want, not how they want.
  • epgui 5y ago
    In the context of my post, the meaning of "government" is basically Hobbes' Leviathan, or a more modern version of it: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Leviathan_(Hobbes_book)#Part_II:_Of_Commonwealth https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Leviathan_(Hobbes_book)#Part_I...
• jimkleiber 5y ago
  I really appreciated reading your post. So much of what I read online and then come to even believe myself pushes me towards one extreme or the other. I almost argue I need to do A or B. Again and again, something nudges me back to realizing it's a balance, an oscillation between the two sides, never fully settled, always with a little bounce and overshooting. Reading your post helped me feel calm and at ease, nudging me back towards this realization. So thank you.
• colordrops 5y ago
  Free speech by our definition in the US is a sacred and mostly irreducible "holy" thing, as being the very first amendment of the constitution. There is no true democracy without free speech. Free speech is a fundamental atom of a healthy and fair democracy. There is almost never a case where restriction of speech isn't abused to give one individual or group political advantage over another.
  • jrimbault 5y ago
    > very first amendment So, it's not, it's just the first change to an already existing document. The first article of your constitution describes the legislatives institutions. I (vaguely) know that, I'm not even American.
    • bogantech 5y ago
    • amendenment 5y ago
      It is precisely because it is the first amendment in the bill of rights, that demonstrates how highly the value is held. Any other "change" could have been first, but freedom of speech was chosen. The founders were not going to otherwise ratify the constitution without the bill of rights. I find it a bit pointless to say you are not American and vaguely know something in order to demonstrate that you understand the constitution better despite not being so, if you vaguely don't know that the constitution was not ratified without the bill of rights.
      • thephyber 5y ago
        Both you and the parent comment are correct. Some states (Delaware, Pennsylvania, New Jersey, Georgia, and Connecticut) ratified the Constitution before the Bill of Rights was formally drafted[1] and initially without requiring the Bill of Rights. The Massachusetts Compromise was an agreement that the Bill of Rights would be packaged with the new Constitution (with the BoR being active at ratification, before the Constitution) and was required before some of the remaining states would ratify the Constitution. It's worth pointing out that the Bill of Rights was ratified 2.0 years after the first elections for national office and 1.5 years after the constitution was finally ratified. [1] [1] https://constitutioncenter.org/interactive-constitution/blog/the-day-the-constitution-was-ratified https://constitutioncenter.org/interactive-constitution/blog...
• cjfd 5y ago
  Actually, free speech is an end goal. It is a human right. As such only grave reasons are valid to infringe upon it.
  • epgui 5y ago
    So if I ask you "why do we have or need human rights", would you say "there is no reason, the analysis stops there"?
    • cjfd 5y ago
      After that one gets into philosophical ethics rather quickly. In practice people not having human rights degrades into much suffering quickly. You said something not-so-nice about the government? Now we throw you in jail! So, why is that wrong? I am sure one can talk pretty endlessly in a philosophy course but in practice there does not seem to be much point. Also, we should keep history in mind. In fact, there is reason for severe trauma surrounding this area. Horrible events in history like nazism and communism, both with a body count in the 100 millions are a reason to hold some principles sacred to the point of refusing to discuss them.
      • epgui 5y ago
        I may not have all the answers, but personally, I think the question is rather important. I am really uncomfortable with the idea of certain things being sacred for no reason. Sometimes I get the impression that a lot of people are fighting for the right things, but by accident. My worry is that I don’t know what then prevents people from fighting for the wrong things by similar accident (eg.: nazism).
        • cjfd 5y ago
          Another thing one might ask is what is the goal of having a society in the first place or what should be the goal of having a society. I would say that providing its members with their human rights is pretty high up there as the goal. But maybe we can do a bit better. What about every person being able to strive for what they themselves consider valuable? I think that as such already presupposes human rights. Another thing to think about in this context is economic prosperity. When talking about nazism, I don't think you can see this as separate from the economic situation at the time it came up. If there is enough economic hardship people will follow the great leader who promises better and they will be vulnerable to the suggestion that some outgroup or etnicity is harming them.
• bondarchuk 5y ago
  Free speech is a tool that serves a purpose. The purpose is a stable society. To have a stable society requires censorship. Very clever lmao.
  • epgui 5y ago
    That's... Not at all what I'm saying.
    • bondarchuk 5y ago
      Where did I go wrong in my analysis? You say free speech is a tool that serves a purpose. Then you imply that the purpose of the tool is to push the balance of power toward the individual. The goal in pushing the balance of power to the individual is to have an equilibrium between the individuals' and the government's power. This equilibrium is characterized by an increase in stability. It seems fair to summarize this as "free speech is a tool that serves the purpose of increasing stability". You conclude: "It's possible for something in a given situation to be more important than free speech." I think it's implied here that this "something" is (an increase in) stability. If stability is more important than free speech, it implies free speech should be restricted in order to achieve stability. In other words, censorship should be applied in order to achieve more stability.
      • epgui 5y ago
        The “something” in question was not referring to the increase in stability, though it might lead to it. Also, and most crucially, I did not say, or intend to suggest, that “censorship improves stability”. Free speech and stability are not in competition with each other. They’re different categories of things. Please help me out a little and try really hard to not interpret what I said in the worst possible way.
        • bondarchuk 5y ago
          Well, you said one of the things that could be more important than free speech is stability. You did not directly say "censorship improves stability", but if you say that stability is one of the things that can be more important than free speech, it strongly implies free speech can sometimes be restricted (i.e. censorship) to reach the goal of stability. I don't feel like I'm interpreting your posts in a particularly negative way. I'm just trying to be explicit about the kind of tradeoff you're proposing. If you find yourself flipping your stance once the flowery rhetoric is translated into basic, actionable language, someone is getting fooled and it's not me.
• inglor_cz 5y ago
  This is a very utilitarian point of view. I cannot say that I disagree hard, but free speech is more than just a tool. It is part of human dignity, at least for some people: not to be muzzled by somebody else on the account that (s)he is of a) nobler birth, b) dominant religion, gender or race, c) physically stronger, d) elected to decorate some office etc. This is an intangible, but very important human asset. So many people live in countries where they would like to walk free and criticize what they do not like, but must cast down their eyes in fear of every uniform. The feeling of liberation when such a regime falls down is indescribable. I saw the Czechoslovak Velvet Revolution unfolding. It wasn't just a technical adjustment; for the first time in years people could (verbally or literally) spit on their former tyrants and walk free.
  • epgui 5y ago
    I fully agree that the utilitarian dimension is probably not the full picture. I really just find it a useful (ha!) idea, and I hope it’s given someone some difficult questions to think about. shrug
  • goblin89 5y ago
    Free speech is never unconditional free speech. The reality is more along the lines “allowed speech = everything except set X” construct, where X tends to grow indefinitely as more and more unacceptable things come in focus. As an example, in both Czech Republic and Slovakia denying Holocaust is a crime. I’m sure new examples will come in future, though I hope we will not have to endure another mass horror and/or loss of life for that. So, how about as a thought experiment we invert the aforementioned construct “allowed = everything except set X” and think of it as “allowed = one giant set Y”. Looks like we believe we must allow only certain things for humanity to exist and progress—so what is the criteria shared by speech in set Y? Random idea; what if it has less to do with what is said but the intent of it? However, the intent can never be communicated perfectly or proven, so it doesn’t seem feasible to restrict based on it, and we have to resort to substance banning instead. Another thought, if we eliminate all mental issues and insecurities that cause people to attack (and agitate others to join) a group or generally behave in a way that is detrimental to others for personal gain, would we still need to restrict freedom of speech? Or is that an unrealistic scenario generally?
• deleted 5y ago
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• raxxorrax 5y ago
  I disagree that it is a tool. A silenced individual becomes a slave at some point. Not the individual challenges government power, other state institutions do that, so there is no compromise needed at all. Many people believe those control mechanisms are failing as they get more and more politicized. It is normal by now that government breaks the law. It is not allowed to put people under surveillance. Yet it does constantly. People responsible for that should be in prison. For a very long time. The problem would be solved since the next one would think hard of repeating the mistake. Yet many states are dysfunctional here. So people are wise to insist on their right to make live hard for government. Until it repents this will not change.
• loughnane 5y ago
  I rank free speech very highly, certainly more than just a tool. My reasoning is this: 1. Some things are good in themselves, some for the sake of other things, some both. 2. Thus there must be an ultimate good that is good only in itself 3. “Happiness” seems to be to be that ultimate good. 4. “What is happiness” takes more than a sentence, but my money is that it’s closely related to things that are unique to humans. 5. That rules out much, but “reasoning”, particularly to the degree that we do it, is clearly unique. 6. I therefore identify the ability to reason as a core aspect of the happiness. 7. Given that we are naturally social creatures, it’s a short step to say that communicating our reasoning to others is a necessary consequence of the reasoning itself. The result is that I see free speech as one of the top goods in a society. One in the neighborhood of the ultimate good and so indispensable in living a complete life. To enshrine it in law for everyone rather than let individual power dictate who gets de facto FOS is to state that everyone deserves a full human life. It’s not a mere tool or means to some other minor end.
  • epgui 5y ago
    Why do you think something serving as a tool, or having a utility, makes something less important? You could see lungs as a tool to breathe, it doesn’t mean they aren’t essential.
  • Sykander 5y ago
    > 1. Some things are good in themselves, some for the sake of other things, some both. Some people may agree or disagree with this sentiment, that an action can be inherently right or wrong. Afterall, context makes all the difference. > 3 “Happiness” seems to be to be that ultimate good. Unfortunately, we know that this isn't the case. Even is an absolute morality exists (meaning that a thing could inherently right without relying on some other authority), we know that happiness is not it's ideal, because then Utilitarianism would be fundamentally right in all scenarios, and it just isn't. Furthermore, if we characterise happiness as an absolute goal, then why not just hook your brain directly up to a Seratonin IV for the rest of your life? ===== Free Speech is important because just having someone tell you something is true isn't enough. There needs to ALWAYS be an open forum for disagreement, of anything. Even if you think something is right, it shouldn't be free from criticism. If an idea isn't strong enough to stand in a free speech debate then it isn't worth holding onto.
• naasking 5y ago
  > Imagine you have free speech. Yay! Now what? Why was this so important again? It's important because it's a human right. > Free speech is not an end goal. It's a tool that serves a purpose. No, it's a human right. Thinking that "human rights" are tools to serve a purpose is authoritarian thinking, where we grant people fictitious "rights" only if they serve some greater social purpose, but if that social purpose is threatened by those rights, we reserve the right to oppress them. That said, I agree that recognizing free speech is a right doesn't mean it must be unrestricted. Other rights exist too after all.
  • thephyber 5y ago
    "because it's a human right" isn't exactly a useful argument. Someone decided to add it to the list of human rights. They did it because it is a useful tool (and likely because humans without it are somehow less than humans with it). I don't think your answer is as useful as perhaps an explanation of why it is a human right.
• jlokier 5y ago
  (For context, I'm not from the US and I'm not coming from a background of belief in the US system particularly.) > Free speech is not an end goal. It's a tool that serves a purpose. You seem to hold that view that each legal right granted to people is a tool for a purpose. But some things are held, by some, to be worthwhile for their own sake. They are regarded as intrinsically worthwhile. Consider: "We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness. That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed [...]" That famous text talks about noble ideas such as life, freedom and justice as intrinsically worthwhile. They are not being granted as tools to provide some other social utility. They are the goals themselves. It doesn't say life is protected because it makes society better, or that freedom is granted because it makes society more efficient or something. It's the other way around. Within that framework for thinking about values, society and government are the tools; and life, freedom and happiness are the worthy goals. Is it such a stretch to consider that free speech is part of personal freedom itself, therefore free speech is an intrinsically worthwhile goal to protect in and of itself? If you do believe free speech is intrinsically worth protecting as part of life, freedom and happiness, you will surely butt up against the hard reality that it causes injustice and misery in some contexts by its effects. Speech has effects which deprive other people of these same intrinsically worthwhile things, including depriving other people of meaningful free speech. Ethical dilemmas do exist around free speech. Nonetheless, if you believe that it's intrinsically worthwhile because freedom is, you will surely make every effort to resolve ethical dilemmas in a way that keeps free speech as an elevated, worthwhile goal in and of itself, without it needing to be justified as a tool for any other purpose.