> So now they have a whole reservoir of views and habits > and comments that are no longer appropriate. It's worth noting that pg considers[0] "inappropr

> So now they have a whole reservoir of views and habits > and comments that are no longer appropriate. It's worth noting that pg considers[0] "inappropriate" to be one of the central nodes of a graph of lazy labels. The main problem with a lazy label is that it is used by the listener to suppress ideas rather than deal with them directly[1]. [0] http://www.paulgraham.com/labels.html http://www.paulgraham.com/labels.html [1] http://www.paulgraham.com/say.html http://www.paulgraham.com/say.html I think this attitude is evident in your following statement: > Many surely feel uncomfortable enough that they just shut up in public. > ... > And I think that's fine. Their views and habits > and comments were part of the social structure > that oppressed gay people. You can't be oppressed by an idea, viewpoint, or comment. That's not oppression, that's disagreement in a free society. The article makes the point that the solution to hate is not hate in the opposite direction. Yet that's exactly what it seems like you advocate when you say that the Internet has drastically increased the ability of people with minority viewpoints to be heard, and then turn around and say you're glad that people who hold "old opinions" are not comfortable enough to share their viewpoints in public. Which is it, a more open or more closed marketplace of ideas? > they should [work through their opinions] privately The privatization of belief and the search for truth does nothing to help a secular, pluralistic society come together and live in harmony. Rather the opposite, when the only truth we agree on societally is the hivemind in search of the "arc of history", we'll end up with no basis on which to reject the totalitarian, authoritarian ideas which inevitably come in to fill the void. At the risk of offending Godwin, I'd just like to point out that Hitler did not take over Germany with "old opinions" held by the establishment[2], but by some of the most highly educated moral philosophers of his day. Smart, progressive, socially-minded people who are asking good questions can still come to drastically wrong answers. [2] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Nazi_ideologues http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Nazi_ideologues