4 ms·

There is almost no one who's actually for completely unchecked freedom of speech, so it's all a matter of deciding where along your sliding scale you draw the l

There is almost no one who's actually for completely unchecked freedom of speech, so it's all a matter of deciding where along your sliding scale you draw the line. Would you suggest that things like murder threats or libel should be legal? Otherwise you're advocating for conditional or contingent free expression too.

pgayed 4y ago
That depends. Would suggesting they be legal be legal?
- Niksko 4y ago
  > Would suggesting they be legal be legal? Have you encountered situations where ethicists and absolutist free speech advocates have encountered any legal problems for exploring concepts such as this? You can make slippery slope arguments if you like, but they're somewhat analogous to the very idea you're defending. You're allowed to make meta arguments about curtailing absolute free speech being dangerous, why would someone else not be able to make a meta argument about allowing death threats? They're both equally removed from reality.
  - pgayed 4y ago
    I have had discussions with individuals who maintain that entertaining (and giving airtime to) certain ideas itself constitutes harm.
    - _Algernon_ 4y ago
      That doesn't make it illegal? If they don't want to talk to you because you entertain those ideas, that's just them using the right to freedom of association. It doesn't make entertaining the ideas illegal.
      - pgayed 4y ago
        No, but they would want it to be. I asked, “Are you advocating a system where giving airtime to certain ideas, but not including incitement, would be punishable?” They answered in the affirmative. The justification being that entertaining certain ideas itself constitutes harm (because entertaining ideas may be proximate to harm or “increases the likelihood of harm”). We also got into definitions of “harm”, which, in my view, were expansive. (In the sense that nearly anything could be rationalized as resulting in harm.)
encryptluks2 4y ago
Libel is legal until a court declares that it isn't and I wouldn't want it to be legal for people to be charged with libel without a court proceeding. Death threats are considered to be an intent to act so there is probable harm and the person is usually charged criminally to prevent them from doing what they said they would. However, saying you hope someone dies is not a crime and as much as I think it incites some bad emotions is considered free speech. Hopefully we can live in a society where people just act like normal adults and the ones saying outlandish things are not given a lot of attention.
- Taniwha 4y ago
  Charging is what happens BEFORE a court proceeding, it's done by a prosecutor, not a judge Also I'm pretty sure that when a court finds that something is libellous it's deemed to have always been libellous from the moment it was done (may depend on what country you're in)
  - encryptluks2 4y ago
    While I generally agree, charge can have multiple meanings in a legal context. It just isn't limited to criminal charges. Usually when someone is found guilty of libel they are ordered to stop doing the action as well which means they can be held in contempt if they don't.
- P5fRxh5kUvp2th 4y ago
  And to be crystal clear here, at least in the US. threats of violence, up to and including death threats, are completely legal. What's not legal is threats of violence with both the intent and the means to follow through. If an 80 year old man walks up to and tells me they're going to kick the shit out of me, it's perfectly legal. Not only is it legal, no one is going to do anything about it until that man actually attacks me. If The Rock walks up to me and tells me he's going to kick the shit out of me, it's very clearly illegal (assuming we know intent, of course) and he will go to jail for it. This is why things like repeating can also be illegal. If you never have the intent or the means to follow through with a threat, but do it repeatedly to affect mental state, that too is illegal for a different reason. But the presumption that this speech is de facto not legal is absolutely incorrect, in the US at least. ---- Libel is not criminal in any way, shape, or form, and is a bad example as a result.

pgayed 4y ago

That depends. Would suggesting they be legal be legal?

Niksko 4y ago
> Would suggesting they be legal be legal? Have you encountered situations where ethicists and absolutist free speech advocates have encountered any legal problems for exploring concepts such as this? You can make slippery slope arguments if you like, but they're somewhat analogous to the very idea you're defending. You're allowed to make meta arguments about curtailing absolute free speech being dangerous, why would someone else not be able to make a meta argument about allowing death threats? They're both equally removed from reality.
- pgayed 4y ago
  I have had discussions with individuals who maintain that entertaining (and giving airtime to) certain ideas itself constitutes harm.
  - _Algernon_ 4y ago
    That doesn't make it illegal? If they don't want to talk to you because you entertain those ideas, that's just them using the right to freedom of association. It doesn't make entertaining the ideas illegal.
    - pgayed 4y ago
      No, but they would want it to be. I asked, “Are you advocating a system where giving airtime to certain ideas, but not including incitement, would be punishable?” They answered in the affirmative. The justification being that entertaining certain ideas itself constitutes harm (because entertaining ideas may be proximate to harm or “increases the likelihood of harm”). We also got into definitions of “harm”, which, in my view, were expansive. (In the sense that nearly anything could be rationalized as resulting in harm.)

encryptluks2 4y ago

Libel is legal until a court declares that it isn't and I wouldn't want it to be legal for people to be charged with libel without a court proceeding. Death threats are considered to be an intent to act so there is probable harm and the person is usually charged criminally to prevent them from doing what they said they would. However, saying you hope someone dies is not a crime and as much as I think it incites some bad emotions is considered free speech. Hopefully we can live in a society where people just act like normal adults and the ones saying outlandish things are not given a lot of attention.

Taniwha 4y ago
Charging is what happens BEFORE a court proceeding, it's done by a prosecutor, not a judge Also I'm pretty sure that when a court finds that something is libellous it's deemed to have always been libellous from the moment it was done (may depend on what country you're in)
- encryptluks2 4y ago
  While I generally agree, charge can have multiple meanings in a legal context. It just isn't limited to criminal charges. Usually when someone is found guilty of libel they are ordered to stop doing the action as well which means they can be held in contempt if they don't.
P5fRxh5kUvp2th 4y ago
And to be crystal clear here, at least in the US. threats of violence, up to and including death threats, are completely legal. What's not legal is threats of violence with both the intent and the means to follow through. If an 80 year old man walks up to and tells me they're going to kick the shit out of me, it's perfectly legal. Not only is it legal, no one is going to do anything about it until that man actually attacks me. If The Rock walks up to me and tells me he's going to kick the shit out of me, it's very clearly illegal (assuming we know intent, of course) and he will go to jail for it. This is why things like repeating can also be illegal. If you never have the intent or the means to follow through with a threat, but do it repeatedly to affect mental state, that too is illegal for a different reason. But the presumption that this speech is de facto not legal is absolutely incorrect, in the US at least. ---- Libel is not criminal in any way, shape, or form, and is a bad example as a result.