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The American Illusion of Freedom

21 points by mdhb 3y ago

deleted 3y ago
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fmajid 3y ago
I find it remarkable (in the British meaning of "certifiably insane") that a Brit would berate America for free speech when monarchist police thugs arrested peaceful anti-monarchist protesters at Chuck the Third's coronation and all British media supinely gave Buckingham Palace not just rights of veto and censorship over coverage of the taxpayer-paid event, but even the right to retroactively purge videos they didn't like. https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2023/sep/12/anti-monarchy-protester-suing-met-chief-over-coronation-day-arrest https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2023/sep/12/anti-monarch... https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2023/sep/14/british-tv-allowed-monarchy-to-censor-king-charles-coronation-coverage https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2023/sep/14/british-tv-a... Not to mention egregious British libel laws, where in a mockery of presumption of innocence it's the recipient of a lawsuit who has to prove their innocence, and libel tourism is routinely used by oligarchs and rich malefactors like Trafigura to silence the press and their critics, and shield themselves from accountability over their crimes. The United States is far from perfect, but the neo-feudal state that is England is hardly in a position to complain.
- glimshe 3y ago
  If you read HN comments, or the European press, you'd be forgiven to think that the US is at the developmental level of a sub-Saharan African country...
- Amezarak 3y ago
  Yes, this article is so bad it's hard to believe it's not deliberately disingenuous. It completely elides some of the many egregious examples of abuse such as those you mention, and pretends the sole issue at hand is "hate speech." It then declares that there is no "slippery slope" to hate speech, that it is a black and white issue...while then going on to give perfect examples of the slippery slope. (Boomer feelings about kneeling are transformed into "leveraging racial hatred.") You can find quite similar examples in the UK, where people were arrested for "hate speech" that wasn't. The US needs to do much better with freedom of speech, but this is essentially an article about how the US needs more censorship, not less. The regulation of speech for public order and morality is the justification used by every censor in history, but we increasingly live in societies where people no longer care. Instead, they want the government to shut up their ideological opponents, using the most extreme and evil examples as justification. One final comment: speech alone cannot cause violence and extremism. No amount of speech is going to convert me or you into a violent extremist. Violent extremism is possible only when democracy is already failing, when the bonds of civil society are already dissolving, because its custodians are failing abjectly. It happens when social conditions lead to atomization, when there's no rootedness and no trust, whne there's mental illness and poverty. Then, one ideology or another becomes the excuse for the violent impulses. No amount of censorship in Weimar Germany would have stopped bloodshed. Before the Nazis numbered more than a few hundred, assassinations and political violence in Germany were already common. If the Nazis had not taken power and killed people, it would have been another party, maybe other nationalist, maybe communists. That's why the censorship that was employed against the Nazis and others was ineffectual. The end result would have been the same. The Nazis rose to power because of the total failure of the existing social structures, not because they had magic words that convinced people to do evil things. Governments lashing out with speech restrictions are doing so out of weakness, and it bodes nothing well. People want to keep fighting the battles of the 1930s without learning anything from them.
  - fmajid 3y ago
    And then you have this travesty announced today: https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2023/sep/19/protester-who-held-sign-outside-london-climate-trial-prosecuted https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2023/sep/19/protester-wh... Judicial abuse of power compounded by shameful government persecution of peaceful protesters.
- polotics 3y ago
  I totally agree with your statement about the state of things in the UK! I also bookmark your post as one perfect example of whataboutism!
  - shapenamer 3y ago
    Pointing out hypocrisy is always whataboutism to people that don't like it being pointed out.
    - polotics 3y ago
      There I disagree: the article is not saying the UK is better, it's pointing out a notable blind spot in US thinking.
      - shapenamer 3y ago
        >One common misconception among some Americans is that other western nations lack freedom of speech. ... >When people say X or Y nation lacks free speech, what they’re usually referring to is the lack of protections for hate-speech. The US stands entirely alone in its consideration of hate as a form of protected speech. OP explicitly refutes specific claims made in the article and your response is "whataboutism". You either didn't read the article or I'm correct that you simply don't like the hypocrisy being pointed out. Perhaps both?
        polotics 3y ago
        the whataboutism is in your post spelling out an opinion that I do think is best described with this neologism, you stated that the UK author is not in a position to describe an US situation because things ain't rosy on the other side of the pond either...
        shapenamer 3y ago
        I didn't state anything like that, actually.
deleted 3y ago
[deleted]

21 points by mdhb 3y ago

deleted 3y ago

[deleted]

I find it remarkable (in the British meaning of "certifiably insane") that a Brit would berate America for free speech when monarchist police thugs arrested peaceful anti-monarchist protesters at Chuck the Third's coronation and all British media supinely gave Buckingham Palace not just rights of veto and censorship over coverage of the taxpayer-paid event, but even the right to retroactively purge videos they didn't like. https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2023/sep/12/anti-monarchy-protester-suing-met-chief-over-coronation-day-arrest https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2023/sep/12/anti-monarch... https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2023/sep/14/british-tv-allowed-monarchy-to-censor-king-charles-coronation-coverage https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2023/sep/14/british-tv-a... Not to mention egregious British libel laws, where in a mockery of presumption of innocence it's the recipient of a lawsuit who has to prove their innocence, and libel tourism is routinely used by oligarchs and rich malefactors like Trafigura to silence the press and their critics, and shield themselves from accountability over their crimes. The United States is far from perfect, but the neo-feudal state that is England is hardly in a position to complain.

glimshe 3y ago
If you read HN comments, or the European press, you'd be forgiven to think that the US is at the developmental level of a sub-Saharan African country...
Amezarak 3y ago
Yes, this article is so bad it's hard to believe it's not deliberately disingenuous. It completely elides some of the many egregious examples of abuse such as those you mention, and pretends the sole issue at hand is "hate speech." It then declares that there is no "slippery slope" to hate speech, that it is a black and white issue...while then going on to give perfect examples of the slippery slope. (Boomer feelings about kneeling are transformed into "leveraging racial hatred.") You can find quite similar examples in the UK, where people were arrested for "hate speech" that wasn't. The US needs to do much better with freedom of speech, but this is essentially an article about how the US needs more censorship, not less. The regulation of speech for public order and morality is the justification used by every censor in history, but we increasingly live in societies where people no longer care. Instead, they want the government to shut up their ideological opponents, using the most extreme and evil examples as justification. One final comment: speech alone cannot cause violence and extremism. No amount of speech is going to convert me or you into a violent extremist. Violent extremism is possible only when democracy is already failing, when the bonds of civil society are already dissolving, because its custodians are failing abjectly. It happens when social conditions lead to atomization, when there's no rootedness and no trust, whne there's mental illness and poverty. Then, one ideology or another becomes the excuse for the violent impulses. No amount of censorship in Weimar Germany would have stopped bloodshed. Before the Nazis numbered more than a few hundred, assassinations and political violence in Germany were already common. If the Nazis had not taken power and killed people, it would have been another party, maybe other nationalist, maybe communists. That's why the censorship that was employed against the Nazis and others was ineffectual. The end result would have been the same. The Nazis rose to power because of the total failure of the existing social structures, not because they had magic words that convinced people to do evil things. Governments lashing out with speech restrictions are doing so out of weakness, and it bodes nothing well. People want to keep fighting the battles of the 1930s without learning anything from them.
- fmajid 3y ago
  And then you have this travesty announced today: https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2023/sep/19/protester-who-held-sign-outside-london-climate-trial-prosecuted https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2023/sep/19/protester-wh... Judicial abuse of power compounded by shameful government persecution of peaceful protesters.
polotics 3y ago
I totally agree with your statement about the state of things in the UK! I also bookmark your post as one perfect example of whataboutism!
- shapenamer 3y ago
  Pointing out hypocrisy is always whataboutism to people that don't like it being pointed out.
  - polotics 3y ago
    There I disagree: the article is not saying the UK is better, it's pointing out a notable blind spot in US thinking.
    - shapenamer 3y ago
      >One common misconception among some Americans is that other western nations lack freedom of speech. ... >When people say X or Y nation lacks free speech, what they’re usually referring to is the lack of protections for hate-speech. The US stands entirely alone in its consideration of hate as a form of protected speech. OP explicitly refutes specific claims made in the article and your response is "whataboutism". You either didn't read the article or I'm correct that you simply don't like the hypocrisy being pointed out. Perhaps both?
      - polotics 3y ago
        the whataboutism is in your post spelling out an opinion that I do think is best described with this neologism, you stated that the UK author is not in a position to describe an US situation because things ain't rosy on the other side of the pond either...
        shapenamer 3y ago
        I didn't state anything like that, actually.

deleted 3y ago

[deleted]