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Please read the other part of my comment, wherein I claim that he does not have a right to suppress rights. The context is extremely important: totally uncritic

by rpearl 12y ago

Please read the other part of my comment, wherein I claim that he does not have a right to suppress rights. The context is extremely important: totally uncritical tolerance is not useful to society, and erodes tolerance. We need to be able to defend society against intolerance in order to maintain tolerance. You cannot divorce the actual issue he is expressing his opinion on from the fact that he is expressing an opinion. The context matters. You can't consider a different particular instance and expect the same conclusion, because the context changes.

downandout 12y ago
You cannot divorce the actual issue he is expressing his opinion on from the fact that he is expressing an opinion. Of course you can. In fact this is one of the fundamental tenets of our entire political system. There are no carved out exceptions suspending constitutional protections for really bad opinions. We have a framework through which people with strong conflicting opinions can air them without fear of certain kinds of retaliation. That broke down here, and it's disgusting and scary.
- rpearl 12y ago
  It is not at all one of the fundamental tenets of our political system. You have to take social context into consideration when generating social laws. People in oppressed and minority groups need more help because they are starting from a position of less privilege. And this is what we do: Laws like the Civil Rights Act of 1964 exist solely to protect the rights of people who are being oppressed and to restrict the rights of people doing the oppressing. Society acted to defend against intolerance, by being more intolerant of intolerant people. The basic slippery slope you envision is "if we restrict rights, from what principle do we decide where to stop doing that?" The fault in the argument is that it is totally reasonable to not tolerate intolerance, and again, uncritical tolerance is not what we desire here, but rather tolerance of viewpoints which are not intolerant.
- icebraining 12y ago
  There are no carved out exceptions suspending constitutional protections for really bad opinions. No, but there's a reason why those constitutional protections don't apply here, and it's not because the people writing them couldn't imagine this situation.

by rpearl 12y ago

downandout 12y ago

You cannot divorce the actual issue he is expressing his opinion on from the fact that he is expressing an opinion. Of course you can. In fact this is one of the fundamental tenets of our entire political system. There are no carved out exceptions suspending constitutional protections for really bad opinions. We have a framework through which people with strong conflicting opinions can air them without fear of certain kinds of retaliation. That broke down here, and it's disgusting and scary.

rpearl 12y ago
It is not at all one of the fundamental tenets of our political system. You have to take social context into consideration when generating social laws. People in oppressed and minority groups need more help because they are starting from a position of less privilege. And this is what we do: Laws like the Civil Rights Act of 1964 exist solely to protect the rights of people who are being oppressed and to restrict the rights of people doing the oppressing. Society acted to defend against intolerance, by being more intolerant of intolerant people. The basic slippery slope you envision is "if we restrict rights, from what principle do we decide where to stop doing that?" The fault in the argument is that it is totally reasonable to not tolerate intolerance, and again, uncritical tolerance is not what we desire here, but rather tolerance of viewpoints which are not intolerant.
icebraining 12y ago
There are no carved out exceptions suspending constitutional protections for really bad opinions. No, but there's a reason why those constitutional protections don't apply here, and it's not because the people writing them couldn't imagine this situation.