8 ms·

On one hand I'm all for free speech and I believe it's important to be able to civilly disagree with things. On the other hand, how do we avoid nazi-at-the-bar

On one hand I'm all for free speech and I believe it's important to be able to civilly disagree with things. On the other hand, how do we avoid nazi-at-the-bar problems?

tacitusarc 4y ago
I think there are two fundamental approaches to the highly objectionable views questions. Either: ensure the space is free of nazis by removing the Nazis from the space, or: ensure the space is free of Nazis by convincing people not to be Nazis. The first requires no engagement, the second requires engagement. The first has guaranteed results, the second is uncertain.
- jacquesm 4y ago
  If there are enough of them the Nazis may end up removing you. The idea is to reduce the spread of Nazism not only by convincing those that have already been corrupted but also to limit their ability to do the same to others. Without that second component it's a losing battle, new converts will be made faster than you can convince existing ones to drop their mental garbage.
  - ironmagma 4y ago
    There's no law that says Nazism will spread until it is stopped any more than there is a law that says Anti-nazism will spread until it is stopped. There is probably a maximum mass that can sustain such a dumb ideology.
    - ggm 4y ago
      Yes, probably a continental landmass the size of Russia, or the USA represents its physical limit. Philip Dick presented a couple of dystopia visions of it, not all of which have been filmed yet. Yevgeny Zamyatin another. Although more correctly a totalitarian police state, than Lindbergh's or Henry Ford's vision of judenrein.
    - jacquesm 4y ago
      > There is probably a maximum mass that can sustain such a dumb ideology. I've read my grandmothers' diary, she had quite a bit to say about the previous time people underestimated the size of that maximum mass. There are very large numbers of people that will be happy to sustain such a dumb ideology if it is presented to them in such a way that it presses the right buttons. Fear is a very powerful motivator, as are frustration and jealousy and clever people will be more than happy to take advantage of these facts to push their revolting ideologies.
      - ironmagma 4y ago
        There’s no evidence anything can stop Nazism. Trying to stop it through enforced speech could very well accelerate it. More effective than fear of government punishment is shame. Few care about pissing off the government in this country so that seems like a non-starter.
        jacquesm 4y ago
        > There’s no evidence anything can stop Nazism. Oh, we have plenty of evidence that some things can stop Nazism. The question is if you want to dedicate another couple of 10's of thousands of acres to war graves.
        ironmagma 4y ago
        War can stop anything. That much is trivial.
        int_19h 4y ago
        It certainly didn't work in Europe, where most countries have anti-extremist speech laws, and many specifically persecute open manifestations of Nazi ideology and symbolism. But, well, there's still a neo-Nazi march in Berlin pretty much every year. And it's larger than Charlottesville one was.
    - epicureanideal 4y ago
      I wonder, why is the focus always on Nazis and not on say, Communists who also have a history of creating violence, death, and destruction? Why do we not equally focus on shutting down voices calling for enforcing absolute economic equality, or dividing people up into classes? Why is free speech less important in only one of these cases?
      - jacquesm 4y ago
        Usually because the participants in these debates are not from countries where communism is right now a major issue. Though if that were the case I'm pretty sure they'd be worried about that too. And the two are not necessarily mutually exclusive either.
        epicureanideal 4y ago
        There seem to be more people calling themselves communists and supporting communist ideas in the USA, than there are who promote violence toward minorities. And I do mean actual or very-near communists, not people who want a social safety net and health care. Although of course, attempts are made to associate broader and broader statements with extremism, such that even having an immigration policy at all is interpreted as racism, so the number of supposed racists is dramatically inflated. If the right similarly broadened it’s interpretation of statements, 80-90% of the country could be claimed to be communists, for supporting the most minimal state assistance of the poor, which almost everyone does support at some level.
        jacquesm 4y ago
        > There seem to be more people calling themselves communists and supporting communist ideas in the USA, than there are who promote violence toward minorities. Citation badly needed. Really.
      - learnhistoryyo 4y ago
        Because there are no modern Nazis, so they're a perfect straw man / boogeyman. But most Western countries still have actual, real communist parties so you can't paint completely crazy pictures of them, because their members will simply raise their hand and say "no we're not like that at all".
- igravious 4y ago
  > The first requires no engagement, the second requires engagement (1) people are innocent until proven guilty (2) if one group is judge, jury, and executioner that's a problem (3) authoritarians seek to quell dissent by censoring (4) removal/ejection/ostracism from group is censorship (5) contrary to your assertion removal/ejection/ostracism is a form of engagement (6) in fact within the realm of free speech r/e/o is the most extreme form of engagement (7) this is because it is the quashing of that ejected person's ability to freely express themselves > The first has guaranteed results, the second is uncertain. (8) hard disagree, the first is guaranteed to generate all sorts of backlash (perhaps not the results wished for) (9) the second is guaranteed to generate debate, exactly what authoritarians and the censorious dislike (10) ps: (quibble) the “Nazis” were terminated with extreme prejudice in 1945, any variants thereof nowadays are neo-Nazis === All the above is transparently obvious to me. It concerns me that in a so-called liberal society many clearly are either unwilling or are unable to see that everything I have outline is true in all cases. The fruits of this ignorance are all around us.
  - blackqueeriroh 4y ago
    This comment is exactly an example of why “free speech at all costs” is unlikely to work.
    - igravious 4y ago
      show me the point in my chain of reasoning where i defended "free speech at all costs" to my mind i made a very reasonable defense of "free speech even for speech i find objectionable and disagree with but ultimately must tolerate in the interests of the inviolable principle of freedom of expression for all not just for my bubble" – that's the position i'm arguing for and nothing more. "at all costs" != "free speech even for speech i find objectionable […]" "at all costs" goes far further and is not something i am arguing for > is unlikely to work. i'll go one stronger – “free speech at all costs” cannot work. but that's fine because that's not what i'm arguing for. what i'm arguing for ("free speech even for speech i find objectionable […]") must work because that's the foundation a free society is built on. otherwise, all bets are off and the spoils go to those most willing to use covert and/or draconian measures to achieve their ends
EEMac 4y ago
You don't. But you also don't have to listen to them.That's freedom.
- thebooktocome 4y ago
  You do kinda have to reckon with them, somehow, when they start vandalizing electrical substations, forming armed militias, and the like.
  - option 4y ago
    that is clearly not speech.
    - jacquesm 4y ago
      It never ends with 'just speech'.
      - eikenberry 4y ago
        Sure... but that has nothing to do with free speech. They've moved past it into the realm of illegal acts. Which are illegal.
      - happyopossum 4y ago
        But Free Speech does end with speech - vandalism and terrorism are already illegal, do we really need to prohibit everything that could potentially be a step on the path to illegal acts? That’s getting darned close to precognitive law enforcement…
        epicureanideal 4y ago
        Also, a person with crazy ideas with no one to talk to but other similar people due to restrictions on speech and debate is not likely to become MORE sane or LESS resentful.
remarkEon 4y ago
Generally, you let them get drunk and then throw them out. This “Nazis are everywhere” thing is a manifestation of busybody administrators and isn’t a real problem. Even if it were, it doesn’t require Byzantine declarations about approved speech. People need to grow up and not get offended so easily.
- azertykeys 4y ago
  At my university there was a "Free Speech Club" that put on a panel of eugenicists and alt-right people who advocate for fascist actions. While the amount of noise Nazis make is disproportionate to their population, it doesn't take that many people to create a social change, for better or worse.
  - Kamq 4y ago
    > it doesn't take that many people to create a social change, for better or worse. It doesn't, but this brings up an interesting question. Is it legitimate to limit speech to prevent social change? I'm sure there were a lot of pro-segregationists that would have loved to prevent the social changes of the 60s and 70s. Would you legitimize their attempts, in exchange for having more tools to fight nazis?
fein 4y ago
I have never understood this type of statement. If you view some speech as a problem then you're just not for free speech. If you're all for free speech, the "nazi at the bar" problem isn't a problem because free speech would allow you to battle it out in a propaganda (the neutral definition) war. I don't think a whole lot of people are actually pro free speech, but I think a lot of people are afraid to admit that.
- diffeomorphism 4y ago
  Ironically the US explicitly noted this problem when the German constitution (in the part occupied by the allies) was drawn up. So they basically introduced free* *no nazis or similar. Seems entirely reasonable and this whole "it isn't free if there isn't anarchy" sounds very naive.
- ajross 4y ago
  > battle it out in a propaganda (the neutral definition) war How would that be distinguished from "cancellation", exactly?
  - fein 4y ago
    Because no one gets cancelled? The war of ideas is a game where the goal is to get the most amount of people to adopt that idea. No part of this is removing someone's ability to speak, but they may not be listened to by the masses that don't like their ideas.
- ohbtvz 4y ago
  Supporting free speech doesn't mean that you support absolute free speech without any limitation. We all have a lot of rights, and exercising those rights can impinge on the rights of others. Why would freedom of speech be somehow special and trump every single other right? I don't know in English, but in French we have a saying: the freedom of some begins where the freedom of others ends.
  - happyopossum 4y ago
walterbell 4y ago
> how do we avoid nazi-at-the-bar problems? If they can build rockets—Paperclip, https://www.history.com/news/what-was-operation-paperclip https://www.history.com/news/what-was-operation-paperclip > 1,600 of these German scientists (along with their families) were brought to the United States to work on America’s behalf ... Von Braun later became director of NASA’s Marshall Space Flight Center and the chief architect of the Saturn V launch vehicle, which eventually propelled two dozen American astronauts to the Moon.
aeneasmackenzie 4y ago
Why do you believe this problem is inevitable?
herostratus101 4y ago
That's simple, we only burn the bad books!
bruce511 4y ago
Free speech at a university is important. Sure it opens the door to regressive ideas, but it also opens the door to progressive ideas, which may be equally counter-establishment. A university is a place where these all ideas can, and should, be discussed and debated. Free speech in a bar, or any other business environment, though is out of place. Because the primary goal of a business is to make money, and creating disharmony and antagonism seldome leads to better business. In other words free speech is useful, but there's a time and a place. Bars for example like to attack a hermogenous crowd. Happy people drink more, break less. If 10% of the patrons start spouting off racism, or mysogeny, or whatever, then the rest won't fight it, they'll just leave. If it happens a couple more times they'll stop coming back. So bars are typically quick to remove people, or ban people, with a history of strife. You don't have to go as far as Nazis, all you need is a few guys being obnoxious about, say, eating meat. Free speech is not "saying whatever I want, wherever I want, to whomever I want." there's a time and a place. A university campus is a great place, and also (for typical college age people) a good time.
- doctorwho42 4y ago
  Devil's advocate; MIT and many other universities are technically businesses. And they have become more and more like businesses with each passing year. So in this case, would complete free speech be out of place by your metrics? In the case of MIT, which is a 501(c)(3), but also sits on a multi-billion 'endowment'.
  - Kamq 4y ago
    There are very few universities that hit this mark. That being said, MIT might actually be one of them. My understanding of the situation is that most universities accept federal funds, which have a bunch of strings attached. One of these strings is allowing freedom of speech. This is why communists couldn't be banned from campuses back in the 50s and 60s, or the speech codes of the 80s and 90s failed. This doesn't apply to universities like Harvard or Brigham Young that take zero federal funds, but the vast majority of them aren't going to pass up the money.
  - bruce511 4y ago
mrshadowgoose 4y ago
"I'm all for free speech except for opinions that I find abhorrent." That's called "not actually being for free speech".
Andrew_nenakhov 4y ago
Free speech isn't about protecting the speech we agree with. It's about protecting the speech we don't agree with. Yes, it does protect nazis. It is also our best bet against nazis, and a great many Minister-of-Truth-wannabes have a hard time understanding it.
orangesite 4y ago
Generally you'll want to head them off at Normandy before they make it down to the pub. To put it another way, the problem of Nazis is not a problem of free speech. It's a problem of people who are actively violating other people's boundaries. Nazis love it when you make it about speech because then everyone starts arguing tautologies instead of investigating and prosecuting criminal behavior.
xwolfi 4y ago
But the definition of Nazi is fleeting, since there is no more National Socialist party in Germany and american problems are different. In France we do limit free speech legally, especially around anti semitism and walk a fine line. For instance a man said "Islam is the stupidest religion on Earth" and was found innocent in court: he can insult a religion or a God, as long as he didnt call for people to be hung. But another said "Heil Israel" in a comedy piece to mock, in his view, how Israel was behaving like its former oppressor. He was censored and it started a long list of sentences in court as he persevered on that line of thought. He's considered by his supporters as a victim of political correctness. It's hard to decide what to do: on one hand, it's interesting to express views that challenge common acceptance, on the other, it's not a big cost to shut up and move on when society decides the cost of letting you speak is too great a threat considering our history. To avoid that Nazi at the bar "problem", first decide what the problem is: that people speak or that people listen. If you cant accept they speak, you must define limits to speech (that s the French model and we are clear some things simply cant be said, period, so shut up and move on). If you can, then you must educate your population so that merely listening to hate speech doesnt trigger hate. That's been the american model, and we never believed it can actually work: after all, you elected a man who was against elections, for instance.
ShredKazoo 4y ago
The statement says "MIT does not protect direct threats, harassment, plagiarism, or other speech that falls outside the boundaries of the First Amendment." So if the nazi at the bar starts threatening or harassing people, they're out. If I were writing the statement, I probably would've added "intimidation" in that sentence. Then I'd kick the nazi out if they're using slurs, or if they self-identify as a nazi (e.g. wearing a swastika). It gets tricky though, because if you add "intimidation" then someone can say "people who disagree with me are intimidating me". (I suppose they can also say "people who disagree with me are harassing me" with the current policy.) My basic approach for dealing with this problem would be to utilize the fact/value distinction. Free expression of fact statements is much more important than free expression of value statements, because knowing the truth is important. The threshold for censoring a value statement, like "The lives of <X people> don't matter" or "<X people> should be enslaved", should generally be lower. If someone claims that such a statement intimidates or harasses them, their claim will often be credible. But for a fact statement, if someone's notion of "harassment" is so broad as to make it impossible to express a particular factual claim without engaging in "harassment", I'd say they're not complaining in good faith. It's OK to argue that a particular delivery of a factual claim constitutes harassment (e.g. if the delivery is peppered with slurs). But the complainer should always be able to re-express the factual claim in a way that makes it no longer "harassment" to them.

On one hand I'm all for free speech and I believe it's important to be able to civilly disagree with things. On the other hand, how do we avoid nazi-at-the-bar problems?

tacitusarc 4y ago

I think there are two fundamental approaches to the highly objectionable views questions. Either: ensure the space is free of nazis by removing the Nazis from the space, or: ensure the space is free of Nazis by convincing people not to be Nazis. The first requires no engagement, the second requires engagement. The first has guaranteed results, the second is uncertain.

jacquesm 4y ago
If there are enough of them the Nazis may end up removing you. The idea is to reduce the spread of Nazism not only by convincing those that have already been corrupted but also to limit their ability to do the same to others. Without that second component it's a losing battle, new converts will be made faster than you can convince existing ones to drop their mental garbage.
- ironmagma 4y ago
  There's no law that says Nazism will spread until it is stopped any more than there is a law that says Anti-nazism will spread until it is stopped. There is probably a maximum mass that can sustain such a dumb ideology.
  - ggm 4y ago
    Yes, probably a continental landmass the size of Russia, or the USA represents its physical limit. Philip Dick presented a couple of dystopia visions of it, not all of which have been filmed yet. Yevgeny Zamyatin another. Although more correctly a totalitarian police state, than Lindbergh's or Henry Ford's vision of judenrein.
  - jacquesm 4y ago
    > There is probably a maximum mass that can sustain such a dumb ideology. I've read my grandmothers' diary, she had quite a bit to say about the previous time people underestimated the size of that maximum mass. There are very large numbers of people that will be happy to sustain such a dumb ideology if it is presented to them in such a way that it presses the right buttons. Fear is a very powerful motivator, as are frustration and jealousy and clever people will be more than happy to take advantage of these facts to push their revolting ideologies.
    - ironmagma 4y ago
      There’s no evidence anything can stop Nazism. Trying to stop it through enforced speech could very well accelerate it. More effective than fear of government punishment is shame. Few care about pissing off the government in this country so that seems like a non-starter.
      - jacquesm 4y ago
        > There’s no evidence anything can stop Nazism. Oh, we have plenty of evidence that some things can stop Nazism. The question is if you want to dedicate another couple of 10's of thousands of acres to war graves.
        ironmagma 4y ago
        War can stop anything. That much is trivial.
      - int_19h 4y ago
        It certainly didn't work in Europe, where most countries have anti-extremist speech laws, and many specifically persecute open manifestations of Nazi ideology and symbolism. But, well, there's still a neo-Nazi march in Berlin pretty much every year. And it's larger than Charlottesville one was.
  - epicureanideal 4y ago
    I wonder, why is the focus always on Nazis and not on say, Communists who also have a history of creating violence, death, and destruction? Why do we not equally focus on shutting down voices calling for enforcing absolute economic equality, or dividing people up into classes? Why is free speech less important in only one of these cases?
    - jacquesm 4y ago
      Usually because the participants in these debates are not from countries where communism is right now a major issue. Though if that were the case I'm pretty sure they'd be worried about that too. And the two are not necessarily mutually exclusive either.
      - epicureanideal 4y ago
        There seem to be more people calling themselves communists and supporting communist ideas in the USA, than there are who promote violence toward minorities. And I do mean actual or very-near communists, not people who want a social safety net and health care. Although of course, attempts are made to associate broader and broader statements with extremism, such that even having an immigration policy at all is interpreted as racism, so the number of supposed racists is dramatically inflated. If the right similarly broadened it’s interpretation of statements, 80-90% of the country could be claimed to be communists, for supporting the most minimal state assistance of the poor, which almost everyone does support at some level.
        jacquesm 4y ago
        > There seem to be more people calling themselves communists and supporting communist ideas in the USA, than there are who promote violence toward minorities. Citation badly needed. Really.
    - learnhistoryyo 4y ago
      Because there are no modern Nazis, so they're a perfect straw man / boogeyman. But most Western countries still have actual, real communist parties so you can't paint completely crazy pictures of them, because their members will simply raise their hand and say "no we're not like that at all".
igravious 4y ago
> The first requires no engagement, the second requires engagement (1) people are innocent until proven guilty (2) if one group is judge, jury, and executioner that's a problem (3) authoritarians seek to quell dissent by censoring (4) removal/ejection/ostracism from group is censorship (5) contrary to your assertion removal/ejection/ostracism is a form of engagement (6) in fact within the realm of free speech r/e/o is the most extreme form of engagement (7) this is because it is the quashing of that ejected person's ability to freely express themselves > The first has guaranteed results, the second is uncertain. (8) hard disagree, the first is guaranteed to generate all sorts of backlash (perhaps not the results wished for) (9) the second is guaranteed to generate debate, exactly what authoritarians and the censorious dislike (10) ps: (quibble) the “Nazis” were terminated with extreme prejudice in 1945, any variants thereof nowadays are neo-Nazis === All the above is transparently obvious to me. It concerns me that in a so-called liberal society many clearly are either unwilling or are unable to see that everything I have outline is true in all cases. The fruits of this ignorance are all around us.
- blackqueeriroh 4y ago
  This comment is exactly an example of why “free speech at all costs” is unlikely to work.
  - igravious 4y ago
    show me the point in my chain of reasoning where i defended "free speech at all costs" to my mind i made a very reasonable defense of "free speech even for speech i find objectionable and disagree with but ultimately must tolerate in the interests of the inviolable principle of freedom of expression for all not just for my bubble" – that's the position i'm arguing for and nothing more. "at all costs" != "free speech even for speech i find objectionable […]" "at all costs" goes far further and is not something i am arguing for > is unlikely to work. i'll go one stronger – “free speech at all costs” cannot work. but that's fine because that's not what i'm arguing for. what i'm arguing for ("free speech even for speech i find objectionable […]") must work because that's the foundation a free society is built on. otherwise, all bets are off and the spoils go to those most willing to use covert and/or draconian measures to achieve their ends

EEMac 4y ago

You don't. But you also don't have to listen to them.That's freedom.

thebooktocome 4y ago
You do kinda have to reckon with them, somehow, when they start vandalizing electrical substations, forming armed militias, and the like.
- option 4y ago
  that is clearly not speech.
  - jacquesm 4y ago
    It never ends with 'just speech'.
    - eikenberry 4y ago
      Sure... but that has nothing to do with free speech. They've moved past it into the realm of illegal acts. Which are illegal.
    - happyopossum 4y ago
      But Free Speech does end with speech - vandalism and terrorism are already illegal, do we really need to prohibit everything that could potentially be a step on the path to illegal acts? That’s getting darned close to precognitive law enforcement…
      - epicureanideal 4y ago
        Also, a person with crazy ideas with no one to talk to but other similar people due to restrictions on speech and debate is not likely to become MORE sane or LESS resentful.

remarkEon 4y ago

Generally, you let them get drunk and then throw them out. This “Nazis are everywhere” thing is a manifestation of busybody administrators and isn’t a real problem. Even if it were, it doesn’t require Byzantine declarations about approved speech. People need to grow up and not get offended so easily.

azertykeys 4y ago
At my university there was a "Free Speech Club" that put on a panel of eugenicists and alt-right people who advocate for fascist actions. While the amount of noise Nazis make is disproportionate to their population, it doesn't take that many people to create a social change, for better or worse.
- Kamq 4y ago
  > it doesn't take that many people to create a social change, for better or worse. It doesn't, but this brings up an interesting question. Is it legitimate to limit speech to prevent social change? I'm sure there were a lot of pro-segregationists that would have loved to prevent the social changes of the 60s and 70s. Would you legitimize their attempts, in exchange for having more tools to fight nazis?

fein 4y ago

I have never understood this type of statement. If you view some speech as a problem then you're just not for free speech. If you're all for free speech, the "nazi at the bar" problem isn't a problem because free speech would allow you to battle it out in a propaganda (the neutral definition) war. I don't think a whole lot of people are actually pro free speech, but I think a lot of people are afraid to admit that.

diffeomorphism 4y ago
Ironically the US explicitly noted this problem when the German constitution (in the part occupied by the allies) was drawn up. So they basically introduced free* *no nazis or similar. Seems entirely reasonable and this whole "it isn't free if there isn't anarchy" sounds very naive.
ajross 4y ago
> battle it out in a propaganda (the neutral definition) war How would that be distinguished from "cancellation", exactly?
- fein 4y ago
  Because no one gets cancelled? The war of ideas is a game where the goal is to get the most amount of people to adopt that idea. No part of this is removing someone's ability to speak, but they may not be listened to by the masses that don't like their ideas.
ohbtvz 4y ago
Supporting free speech doesn't mean that you support absolute free speech without any limitation. We all have a lot of rights, and exercising those rights can impinge on the rights of others. Why would freedom of speech be somehow special and trump every single other right? I don't know in English, but in French we have a saying: the freedom of some begins where the freedom of others ends.
- happyopossum 4y ago

walterbell 4y ago

> how do we avoid nazi-at-the-bar problems? If they can build rockets—Paperclip, https://www.history.com/news/what-was-operation-paperclip https://www.history.com/news/what-was-operation-paperclip > 1,600 of these German scientists (along with their families) were brought to the United States to work on America’s behalf ... Von Braun later became director of NASA’s Marshall Space Flight Center and the chief architect of the Saturn V launch vehicle, which eventually propelled two dozen American astronauts to the Moon.

aeneasmackenzie 4y ago

Why do you believe this problem is inevitable?

herostratus101 4y ago

That's simple, we only burn the bad books!

bruce511 4y ago

Free speech at a university is important. Sure it opens the door to regressive ideas, but it also opens the door to progressive ideas, which may be equally counter-establishment. A university is a place where these all ideas can, and should, be discussed and debated. Free speech in a bar, or any other business environment, though is out of place. Because the primary goal of a business is to make money, and creating disharmony and antagonism seldome leads to better business. In other words free speech is useful, but there's a time and a place. Bars for example like to attack a hermogenous crowd. Happy people drink more, break less. If 10% of the patrons start spouting off racism, or mysogeny, or whatever, then the rest won't fight it, they'll just leave. If it happens a couple more times they'll stop coming back. So bars are typically quick to remove people, or ban people, with a history of strife. You don't have to go as far as Nazis, all you need is a few guys being obnoxious about, say, eating meat. Free speech is not "saying whatever I want, wherever I want, to whomever I want." there's a time and a place. A university campus is a great place, and also (for typical college age people) a good time.

doctorwho42 4y ago
Devil's advocate; MIT and many other universities are technically businesses. And they have become more and more like businesses with each passing year. So in this case, would complete free speech be out of place by your metrics? In the case of MIT, which is a 501(c)(3), but also sits on a multi-billion 'endowment'.
- Kamq 4y ago
  There are very few universities that hit this mark. That being said, MIT might actually be one of them. My understanding of the situation is that most universities accept federal funds, which have a bunch of strings attached. One of these strings is allowing freedom of speech. This is why communists couldn't be banned from campuses back in the 50s and 60s, or the speech codes of the 80s and 90s failed. This doesn't apply to universities like Harvard or Brigham Young that take zero federal funds, but the vast majority of them aren't going to pass up the money.
- bruce511 4y ago

mrshadowgoose 4y ago

"I'm all for free speech except for opinions that I find abhorrent." That's called "not actually being for free speech".

Andrew_nenakhov 4y ago

Free speech isn't about protecting the speech we agree with. It's about protecting the speech we don't agree with. Yes, it does protect nazis. It is also our best bet against nazis, and a great many Minister-of-Truth-wannabes have a hard time understanding it.

orangesite 4y ago

Generally you'll want to head them off at Normandy before they make it down to the pub. To put it another way, the problem of Nazis is not a problem of free speech. It's a problem of people who are actively violating other people's boundaries. Nazis love it when you make it about speech because then everyone starts arguing tautologies instead of investigating and prosecuting criminal behavior.

xwolfi 4y ago

But the definition of Nazi is fleeting, since there is no more National Socialist party in Germany and american problems are different. In France we do limit free speech legally, especially around anti semitism and walk a fine line. For instance a man said "Islam is the stupidest religion on Earth" and was found innocent in court: he can insult a religion or a God, as long as he didnt call for people to be hung. But another said "Heil Israel" in a comedy piece to mock, in his view, how Israel was behaving like its former oppressor. He was censored and it started a long list of sentences in court as he persevered on that line of thought. He's considered by his supporters as a victim of political correctness. It's hard to decide what to do: on one hand, it's interesting to express views that challenge common acceptance, on the other, it's not a big cost to shut up and move on when society decides the cost of letting you speak is too great a threat considering our history. To avoid that Nazi at the bar "problem", first decide what the problem is: that people speak or that people listen. If you cant accept they speak, you must define limits to speech (that s the French model and we are clear some things simply cant be said, period, so shut up and move on). If you can, then you must educate your population so that merely listening to hate speech doesnt trigger hate. That's been the american model, and we never believed it can actually work: after all, you elected a man who was against elections, for instance.

ShredKazoo 4y ago

The statement says "MIT does not protect direct threats, harassment, plagiarism, or other speech that falls outside the boundaries of the First Amendment." So if the nazi at the bar starts threatening or harassing people, they're out. If I were writing the statement, I probably would've added "intimidation" in that sentence. Then I'd kick the nazi out if they're using slurs, or if they self-identify as a nazi (e.g. wearing a swastika). It gets tricky though, because if you add "intimidation" then someone can say "people who disagree with me are intimidating me". (I suppose they can also say "people who disagree with me are harassing me" with the current policy.) My basic approach for dealing with this problem would be to utilize the fact/value distinction. Free expression of fact statements is much more important than free expression of value statements, because knowing the truth is important. The threshold for censoring a value statement, like "The lives of <X people> don't matter" or "<X people> should be enslaved", should generally be lower. If someone claims that such a statement intimidates or harasses them, their claim will often be credible. But for a fact statement, if someone's notion of "harassment" is so broad as to make it impossible to express a particular factual claim without engaging in "harassment", I'd say they're not complaining in good faith. It's OK to argue that a particular delivery of a factual claim constitutes harassment (e.g. if the delivery is peppered with slurs). But the complainer should always be able to re-express the factual claim in a way that makes it no longer "harassment" to them.