Freedom of thought and speech vs morality

[Marshmallow Marshall]

I'm sure that everyone here will agree that freedom of thought and speech is very important. I'm also sure that eve... well, most people here will agree that there are ideologies that caused an enormous amount of harm (nazism being the most commonly accepted example, communism and especially stalinism being another). Isn't there a contradiction here? How relative is freedom of thought and speech? Do ideologies that directly threaten freedom of thought and speech have to be censored to ensure survival of said freedom, or does that, on the contrary, directly lead to its destruction?

Also, as always in political-ish threads, keep things civil and realistic, please. No illuminati, no insults.

[Sen]

Do ideologies that directly threaten freedom of thought and speech have to be censored to ensure survival of said freedom, or does that, on the contrary, directly lead to its destruction?

The paradox of tolerance is what you're looking for:

Unlimited tolerance must lead to the disappearance of tolerance. If we extend unlimited tolerance even to those who are intolerant, if we are not prepared to defend a tolerant society against the onslaught of the intolerant, then the tolerant will be destroyed, and tolerance with them. — In this formulation, I do not imply, for instance, that we should always suppress the utterance of intolerant philosophies; as long as we can counter them by rational argument and keep them in check by public opinion, suppression would certainly be unwise. But we should claim the right to suppress them if necessary even by force; for it may easily turn out that they are not prepared to meet us on the level of rational argument, but begin by denouncing all argument; they may forbid their followers to listen to rational argument, because it is deceptive, and teach them to answer arguments by the use of their fists or pistols. We should therefore claim, in the name of tolerance, the right not to tolerate the intolerant.

[secondpassing]

I don't know how to answer your question. I'll think more on it but I think it's beyond me to find that balance.
Free rational discourse is ideal, but who determines what is rational?

[Marshmallow Marshall]

The paradox of tolerance is what you're looking for:

Nice, thank you! I had never seen that, but came to that conclusion myself.
It makes a lot of sense, but leads to another question, this one being more touchy: where's the limit, the "balance" secondpassing refers to? Someone certainly can manipulate whoever is necessary to manipulate in order to change the definition of "intolerants", and make a tolerant society become overly intolerant. Therefore, such societies are bound to fall and evolve* into intolerance, and a strong intolerance of ideas leads to authoritarianism in all cases (lack of opposition to governing power), creating an eternal cycle of democracy-authoritarianism for as long as a specific society exists, assuming that authoritarianism also always evolves* to a form of democracy. Consequently, the aforementioned balance would be necessary to find in order to maintain any form of "real" democracy**.


*The word evolve here is not positive or negative, but only refers to a change in a society's system.
**Real democracies being systems where the people in general have a voice that can and will be heard in a pacific manner, and where that voice is able to cause changes.

[Sen]

It makes a lot of sense, but leads to another question, this one being more touchy: where's the limit, the "balance" secondpassing refers to? ]

I think it's rather simple; I don't like pineapple pizza, so I can choose to never eat it, and to avoid gathering with those who eat it all day long, but I can't go from house to house shouting at people's faces so they stop eating it, invading pizza places and spitting on clients who are eating pineapple pizzas, demanding that people who like them can't live here, hiring some unskilled idiot instead of a way better candidate just because the latter eats pineapple pizza, suggesting that their houses should be taken and given to those who like "better" pizzas, or rallying others to attack them...

As long as you aren't hurting anyone nor inciting others to do it, you should be free to say and do whatever you want. Once you start messing with other people, that's when you don't get to be tolerated anymore as you are clearly unfit to live in a tolerant society.

[Ganelon]

I'm sure that everyone here will agree that freedom of thought and speech is very important. I'm also sure that eve... well, most people here will agree that there are ideologies that caused an enormous amount of harm (nazism being the most commonly accepted example, communism and especially stalinism being another). Isn't there a contradiction here? How relative is freedom of thought and speech? Do ideologies that directly threaten freedom of thought and speech have to be censored to ensure survival of said freedom, or does that, on the contrary, directly lead to its destruction?

Also, as always in political-ish threads, keep things civil and realistic, please. No illuminati, no insults.

Hypothetically, if you don’t allow at least some limited discourse on those themes, someone, in the future, is bound to make the same mistakes that led to the rise of those ideologies. The issue, I think, is that these ideologies will always be attractive to some people, to certain degrees. It may be that to some degree, these ideologies are only bad when taken to their logical extremes - against all moral feelings and respect for other people. So you could argue that it might make sense to outlaw such ideologies. As long as you teach people why they’re wrong. And you need to offer a bloody well detailed story of their rise and the mistakes they made, lest someone be tempted to repeat them again.

[Ganelon]

I think it depends on the degree to which you ‘censor’ such ideologies: does that mean you’ll find it very difficult to find a job if you’re the proponent of such an ideology? Does it mean you’ll end up in jail?

i suspect that the people who would support such an ideology are exactly the kind of people who would not be deterred by such threats. So, perhaps it might be better to outlaw them. You just need it crystal clear of what you’re outlawing. For instance, hypothetically, maybe from some certain perspective communism and nazism weren’t completely wrong (I’m not saying this is the case, I’m just saying it’s possible). You don’t want to ban healthy conservatism or a healthy left wing just because Hitler and Stalin were nut jobs (if you consider Hitler to be a conservative).

[Ganelon]

It’s also the case that people who support such ideologies might be very well tempted to window dress them and present them in a seemingly respectable manner (or perhaps to switch to an equally perverse one that hasn’t been outlawed yet). So by outlawing them, maybe all you’re really doing is forcing their proponents to find a different murderous idea to uphold.

[Ganelon]

It’s also the case that people who support such ideologies might be very well tempted to window dress them and present them in a seemingly respectable manner (or perhaps to switch to an equally perverse one that hasn’t been outlawed yet). So by outlawing them, maybe all you’re really doing is forcing their proponents to find a different murderous idea to uphold.

I think this literally happened to Hitler. Very early articles on Nazism described it as ‘similar to Leninism’. Communism, I suspect - though feel free to correct me if I’m wrong - was unpopular (illegal?) in post-war Germany. He quickly rebranded it as ‘national socialism’.

[Ganelon]

I did find something. According to Wikipedia, Hitler changed his tactics after he was thrown in jail - he turned the Nazi party into a reactionary movement because the army and the government were anti-communist (but conservative).

[Ganelon]

Ugh why am I always so incoherent
Ill try again.
What does outlawing them really do? The leaders of an extremist movement are not deterred by punishment -these people are determined, at all costs, to seize power. Their ideology is simply a somewhat-respectable front for their profound hatred of humanity and complete disregard for human existence. By outlawing their ideology, all you’re doing is forcing them to find a new, equally murderous idea to rally behind. So clearly you're not outlawing them to stop the leaders - the leaders will stop at nothing to seize power. You’re concerned about the populace - who might be tempted to support the regime, however, according to the Wikipedia article on the iranian revolution, in most revolutions, less than 1% of the population rallies behind the revolutionaries.

So what does outlawing it really do? Whoever forgets the past is bound to repeat the same mistakes in the future. I think that on the contrary, they should never be outlawed. And I think schools should teach exactly what was wrong with those ideologies, and exactly why they weren’t ‘imperfect’ applications of a grand idea (like people often say of communism). All ideas taken to their extremes become murderous beyond comprehension. What you need to teach people ismkoderation. These movements would never succeed if people understood why they were wrong, and how colossally catastrophic they were going to be. As apathetic as I think the average person is - think about it, were all staying our homes right now just because the government is telling us to- very few people are actually rebelling against the government to lessen the restrictions, or even attempting discourse to see if the lockdown is really still necessary. However, hypothetically let’s say the government randomly decided to start killing everyone over the age of 80. Nobody would support this.

A less contrived example would be the following: imagine that someone suggests Jews are responsible for all the evils that have been wrought in the world. Of course nobody in their right mind would support such a politician - in the West, anyways. However - communism is far less controversial than fascism, even though it has been profoundly more murderous than fascism (not that fascism wasn’t murderous or that they wouldn’t have murdered people - they just didn’t have enough time or the resources to do so. And I’d say Hitler was probably significantly more intelligent than Stalin and knew he couldn’t just kill everyone who disagreed with him in Germany - he was at war. You cannot kill your officers in a time of war and expect to win the war easily). I find that this is baffling. ‘True’ communism has been tried. It sucked. Maybe a mild center-left ideology would work or some extent, but most certainly not communism.

[Ganelon]

Unrelated but if anyone is familiar with Jordan Peterson, when writing that wall
of text I was mostly thinking about his views on totalitarianism. When I finished I promptly cleaned my room. 😂

[rumox]

What. "Do ideologies that directly threaten freedom of thought and speech have to be censored to ensure survival of said freedom". How does one ensure the freedom of something they seek to destroy? There was no free speech in your examples. If you dissented from the status quo you were shot, they weren't covert about their intentions. If you mean an ideologue leader(s) being covert about their censorship of freedom of speech, I don't see how that is attainable without being obvious. A government recently tried to be coy about slipping in a law compelling speech and people lost their shit.

[rumox]

Freedom of speech is provocative by nature. Someone will always be offended. It's up to us on an individual basis to be adults about it. Governments have no place in compelling speech outside obvious caveats like incitement to violence, slander, etc.

[Ganelon]

Agree 100%. This happened in Canada and there was massive backlash against the government over it.

[Marshmallow Marshall]

I think it's rather simple; I don't like pineapple pizza, so I can choose to never eat it, and to avoid gathering with those who eat it all day long, but I can't go from house to house shouting at people's faces so they stop eating it, invading pizza places and spitting on clients who are eating pineapple pizzas, demanding that people who like them can't live here, hiring some unskilled idiot instead of a way better candidate just because the latter eats pineapple pizza, suggesting that their houses should be taken and given to those who like "better" pizzas, or rallying others to attack them...

As long as you aren't hurting anyone nor inciting others to do it, you should be free to say and do whatever you want. Once you start messing with other people, that's when you don't get to be tolerated anymore as you are clearly unfit to live in a tolerant society.

100 % agreed. There's just one thing I'd like to point out: while this is rather simple, reality is not. The notion of "hurting others" can have multiple definitions and interpretations; a good example of this would be religious questions (e.g., can sikh people wear a knife all day everyday because it's part of their religion, or is that a threat to other people's security?).
Oh and. I like your example xD

Hypothetically, if you don’t allow at least some limited discourse on those themes, someone, in the future, is bound to make the same mistakes that led to the rise of those ideologies. The issue, I think, is that these ideologies will always be attractive to some people, to certain degrees. It may be that to some degree, these ideologies are only bad when taken to their logical extremes - against all moral feelings and respect for other people. So you could argue that it might make sense to outlaw such ideologies. As long as you teach people why they’re wrong. And you need to offer a bloody well detailed story of their rise and the mistakes they made, lest someone be tempted to repeat them again.

Exactly, and that is one of the reasons why history is of great importance. However, I was talking about people who already support ideologies that could be qualified as "dangerous", ideologies that promote intolerance and/or authoritarianism, who are already "converted", so to speak.
Hitler raised to power by convincing the masses because not many people realized what he could lead to, so you are right that schools should teach this better.

Rumox, I was talking about tolerant societies, not about those who promote intolerant ideologies lol, there would be no debate whatsoever, it's either jail or executon in those cases. And again, what is "obviously unacceptable" is subject to interpretation; see my reply to Sen.

[rumox]

The current exemptions to freedom of speech are pretty good I'd like to hear an argument for why they should be overturned.

[Ganelon]

I think you should read my last post. The one you quoted above has basically nothing to do with what I just said.
I don't think there's any reason to restrict speech about crazy ideologies. Nobody in their right mind today would support a fascist, for instance.
e.
In Canada, it's illegal to refuse to refer to a transgender person by their pronoun. Not immortal, not "not" fad, ILLEGAL. As in, you can be fined or go to jail for doing that.
There was a very huge controversy over that law - the professor I mentioned (Jordan Peterson) was basically reprimanded by faculty members for attacking the bill. A TA at a different university was also heavily criticised for showing a video of Peterson - because the faculty members in question were afraid they could be affected if someone broke the law. It's really fucking bad.

I recently watched a video a girl made about this. She basically legally changed her gender to Male (even though she was most clearly a woman) within a day by just intimidating the people responsible for that, lol.

Lastly, the best defence against this sort of thing is to properly cover it, not censor it. I have absolutely no doubts that nobody in Russia would've followed Lenin if they'd known what was to come.

I'll give you another example. The French Revolution. After Robespierre, literally nobody wanted to hear about that bit ever again. France has only had one totalitarian uprising since then (the Paris Commune). I don't think people forget this sort of thing. And I think the real problem with revolutions isn't that people believe in the new leaders' ideology or whatever; its that people are complacent. They either believe that nobody is that insane, that its not really that dangerous, or they just simply don't give a crap. There's no antidote for the latter; for the former two, education. It's why I find the idea that communism isn't as vilified as it should be detestable and incredibly dangerous.

At the risk of going full 1984, compelled speech leads to compelled thinking. It should be avoided at all costs.

[Ganelon]

Also, if you censor dangerous ideologies, the ideologues will just find a different ideology to latch onto.

[oops_ur_dead]

In Canada, it's illegal to refuse to refer to a transgender person by their pronoun. Not immortal, not "not" fad, ILLEGAL. As in, you can be fined or go to jail for doing that.

Bro, you're either a straight up liar or extremely gullible. This isn't true in the slightest, and you won't find a single example of someone being fined or going to jail for that. Even fucking Fox News says this is wrong: https://www.foxnews.com/world/not-re...gender-pronoun

You need to learn to think for yourself and stop listening to biased media and right-wing demagogues.

I recently watched a video a girl made about this. She basically legally changed her gender to Male (even though she was most clearly a woman) within a day by just intimidating the people responsible for that, lol.

I don't see your point with this; lying to doctors that you have ADHD to get adderall doesn't mean you have ADHD. It doesn't remove the legitimacy of people with ADHD.

Also if you want to keep your alt-right views as hidden as possible you probably shouldn't admit to supporting Lauren Southern, who's been banned from the UK for stirring up hatred, supports white supremacy and creating an ethnostate, and supports the theory of there being an organized replacement of white people (probably by (((them))) of course, since she's a good friend of Richard Spencer).

Before you accuse me of having a rude tone or whatever, keep in mind that as a Canadian I have to say I'm tired of people spreading right-wing lies and bullshit about my country and listening to proto-fascists who completely make things up about a place they hate just to stir up shit. Feel free to criticize your own country but don't slander mine if you don't have the decency and critical thinking skills to verify whatever you say, and don't champion the beliefs of our own disgraced and widely hated neo-Nazis if you don't know the first thing about the place they're trying to destroy.

[rumox]

I don't think some guy in the street refusing to call people by their prefered pronouns will get fined or arrested, but what about in the workforce or anywhere academic? Now that gender is a protected identifier in regards to discrimination in the human rights act and added to the criminal code in regards to hate speech and hate crimes I can see a refusal of using prefered pronouns being a contentious issue in the future. Time will tell.

[oops_ur_dead]

I don't think some guy in the street refusing to call people by their prefered pronouns will get fined or arrested, but what about in the workforce or anywhere academic? Now that gender is a protected identifier in regards to discrimination in the human rights act and added to the criminal code in regards to hate speech and hate crimes I can see a refusal of using prefered pronouns being a contentious issue in the future. Time will tell.

It's been about 3 years since the bill passed, and there hasn't been a single case of anyone being arrested or charged under it. The only effect is that it extends existing protections to gender identity. So, for example, you can't refuse to serve someone because they're trans, and you can't go around saying that trans people should be exterminated. Misgendering isn't an issue, I agree that would be quite absurd and overreaching, though I also think people who go around intentionally misgendering others are assholes.

[rumox]

I do agree people should not be discriminated against for their gender identity, just want that to be clear.

Personally I wouldn't use those pronouns like zim/zhe/ver. I think that's getting a bit carried away, I'd personally just use them/they. I also do think it's a fair statement that ideologues have or are trying to weaponize this law to compel speech to fit their narrative of how society should interact with each other.

[oops_ur_dead]

I think this literally happened to Hitler. Very early articles on Nazism described it as ‘similar to Leninism’. Communism, I suspect - though feel free to correct me if I’m wrong - was unpopular (illegal?) in post-war Germany. He quickly rebranded it as ‘national socialism’.

Oh my fucking god I didn't even read this post. If you're so blatantly uninformed about the world that you think communism was unpopular in Germany after the war (leftist parties got about 40% of the vote in Germany in the 1933 election, in 1932 their combined support was greater than the Nazi party) or that Hitler rebranded the Nazi party as 'socialist' because communism was banned (Hitler banned the Communist Party of Germany after he won in 1933) then I please ask you to read and learn more about what you're talking about before you continue posting nonsense.

[Ganelon]

Oh my fucking god I didn't even read this post. If you're so blatantly uninformed about the world that you think communism was unpopular in Germany after the war (leftist parties got about 40% of the vote in Germany in the 1933 election, in 1932 their combined support was greater than the Nazi party) or that Hitler rebranded the Nazi party as 'socialist' because communism was banned (Hitler banned the Communist Party of Germany after he won in 1933) then I please ask you to read and learn more about what you're talking about before you continue posting nonsense.

Bro, you're either a straight up liar or extremely gullible. This isn't true in the slightest, and you won't find a single example of someone being fined or going to jail for that. Even fucking Fox News says this is wrong: https://www.foxnews.com/world/not-re...gender-pronoun

You need to learn to think for yourself and stop listening to biased media and right-wing demagogues.



I don't see your point with this; lying to doctors that you have ADHD to get adderall doesn't mean you have ADHD. It doesn't remove the legitimacy of people with ADHD.

Also if you want to keep your alt-right views as hidden as possible you probably shouldn't admit to supporting Lauren Southern, who's been banned from the UK for stirring up hatred, supports white supremacy and creating an ethnostate, and supports the theory of there being an organized replacement of white people (probably by (((them))) of course, since she's a good friend of Richard Spencer).

Before you accuse me of having a rude tone or whatever, keep in mind that as a Canadian I have to say I'm tired of people spreading right-wing lies and bullshit about my country and listening to proto-fascists who completely make things up about a place they hate just to stir up shit. Feel free to criticize your own country but don't slander mine if you don't have the decency and critical thinking skills to verify whatever you say, and don't champion the beliefs of our own disgraced and widely hated neo-Nazis if you don't know the first thing about the place they're trying to destroy.

The German army was conservative. Hitler already tried the revolutionary tactic once and it failed. He very promptly changed his worldview to appeal to the nationalists and the conservative government, who were distrustful of left-wingers in general.

Communism hadn’t been banned, but the government was NOT in love with it by any means.

You can can find examples; it is illegal in Canada to refuse to refer to someone by the pronoun they request. We’re at the point where a professor was persuaded by faculty members to do something about what he said vis-a-vis Bill C-16. This is not normal. I don’t think it’s okay to discriminate either, and personally if asked to, as long as the person didn’t have an ideological reason to ask me to refer to them by non-standard pronouns, I would probably do as they wished.

Lastly, I haven’t watched much of Lauren Southern videos but as far as I can tell, she is not alt-right. She seemed to be a relatively normal person to me. But the main point was, the fact that you can intimidate doctors and clerks to legally change your gender is not ok...

You seem to be having a purely emotional response to these facts.

[Ganelon]

It doesn’t remove the legitimacy of ADHD, but I wasn’t arguing for or against the legitimacy of transgenderism. That’s beside the point. My problem is that you shouldn’t be FORCED to say something. As I’ve said, I’ve no problem with transgender people... putting myself in a transgender pwrson’s shoes I would personally be quite disgusted by the legislation they attempted to enforce because it:
a) implies transgender people are snowflakes who get triggered if someone ‘misgenders’ them
b) implies that transgender people should feel bad about being misgendered, which is only the case if the ‘gender’ identity they had was fake.

[Ganelon]

For example, I have severe social issues in real life. Does that mean we should pass legislation to force others to be nice to me? Of course not. That’s absurd. I would be the first to protest if that happened.

[Ganelon]

Oh my fucking god I didn't even read this post. If you're so blatantly uninformed about the world that you think communism was unpopular in Germany after the war (leftist parties got about 40% of the vote in Germany in the 1933 election, in 1932 their combined support was greater than the Nazi party) or that Hitler rebranded the Nazi party as 'socialist' because communism was banned (Hitler banned the Communist Party of Germany after he won in 1933) then I please ask you to read and learn more about what you're talking about before you continue posting nonsense.

Also, not sure why you’re characterizing me as alt-right. I’m actually rather centre-right and somewhat liberal in my social (but not economic) views

[rumox]

The criminal code doesn't mention pronouns so not using/misusing them should not result in any arrests by itself. Discrimination is where it would get murky. Like oops said you can't refuse service to someone because they identify as a certain gender, but in the work and academic landscapes where everyone knows shit gets twisted and contorted simply refusing to use pronouns can very well lead to a defamation case imo. Basically any professional, leader, whatever that doesn't want to risk trouble now should alter their speech.

[Ganelon]

The criminal code doesn't mention pronouns so not using/misusing them should not result in any arrests by itself. Discrimination is where it would get murky. Like oops said you can't refuse service to someone because they identify as a certain gender, but in the work and academic landscapes where everyone knows shit gets twisted and contorted simply refusing to use pronouns can very well lead to a defamation case imo. Basically any professional, leader, whatever that doesn't want to risk trouble now should alter their speech.

Really? It doesnt? I assumed it did. But you’re right the average person probably won’t be arrested or fines for refusing to use pronouns.

[oops_ur_dead]

You can can find examples; it is illegal in Canada to refuse to refer to someone by the pronoun they request.

This is entirely false. It's based on a misinterpretation of the law which has been debunked by all sorts of people including constitutional lawyers. It isn't even a grey area, it's a complete falsehood.

But the main point was, the fact that you can intimidate doctors and clerks to legally change your gender is not ok...

No it isn't. The problem lies on the individuals intimidating doctors and clerks, not on the laws or otherwise. I bring you back to the example of any person being able to lie about medical/mental conditions to manipulate doctors into getting specific diagnoses. That is not okay either. Otherwise, I don't understand your greater point you were trying to make with that.

Lastly, I haven’t watched much of Lauren Southern videos but as far as I can tell, she is not alt-right. She seemed to be a relatively normal person to me.

Oh no.

https://www.splcenter.org/hatewatch/...n-dog-whistler
https://www.vice.com/en_uk/article/q...-genocide-meme
https://www.rnz.co.nz/news/national/...nues-phil-goff
https://nationalpost.com/news/canada...d-from-britain
https://www.smh.com.au/world/europe/...19-p515cc.html
https://www.theaustralian.com.au/bus...9cc568e51523e0
https://www.smh.com.au/national/it-s...14-p4zrgq.html

Also, not sure why you’re characterizing me as alt-right. I’m actually rather centre-right and somewhat liberal in my social (but not economic) views

If you aren't alt-right then you're fairly deep down the path of becoming full blown alt-right. It's better to stop that in its tracks, and why I'm responding to you in the first place.

Try watching this series: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4xGawJIseNY

[rumox]

Lmao I just googled Lauren Southern.

Shortly before a planned speaking tour of Australia in July 2018, Australia's Department of Home Affairs denied Lauren Southern an Electronic Travel Authority visa, saying it was "not a working visa". She intended to charge $79 for a basic ticket and up to $749 for an "intimate dinner". The Australian government allowed her to enter the country once she had the correct visa.

[Ganelon]

Lmao

[Sen]

100 % agreed. There's just one thing I'd like to point out: while this is rather simple, reality is not. The notion of "hurting others" can have multiple definitions and interpretations; a good example of this would be religious questions (e.g., can sikh people wear a knife all day everyday because it's part of their religion, or is that a threat to other people's security?).
Oh and. I like your example xD

I could swear I replied to this, but I guess I didn't.

I was saying that it's not a matter of figuring out where to draw the line to reach that balance; the line draws itself when you tackle the causes of bigotry; lack of education, poverty, disenfranchisement, violence, social exclusion, a media and politics apparatus that does nothing but throw half of the population against the other half all day long... you can't have a society that breeds intolerance and then try to force some arbitrary line that people must conform with against their entire upbringing. It's never going to work.

As for this very specific example, I'd feel safer in a room full of Sikhs with kirpans (the "knife") which are all about compassion, mercy, and protecting those who can't defend themselves from the intolerant, than in a room with a couple of unarmed bigots unable to engage in rational argument.

[Marshmallow Marshall]

I just want to point out that the conversation above is off-topic and that Ganelon is not alt-right lol, I'm a leftist myself and what he said that was wrong factually was just due to misinformation about other countries' politics or history, not to some extreme-right ideology bias. Also, politics are a hot topic for sure, but please try to limit your posts to rational arguments and not ad hominems, since that brings nothing useful in a debate where people only seek truth and not to convince others.

I could swear I replied to this, but I guess I didn't.

I was saying that it's not a matter of figuring out where to draw the line to reach that balance; the line draws itself when you tackle the causes of bigotry; lack of education, poverty, disenfranchisement, violence, social exclusion, a media and politics apparatus that does nothing but throw half of the population against the other half all day long... you can't have a society that breeds intolerance and then try to force some arbitrary line that people must conform with against their entire upbringing. It's never going to work.

As for this very specific example, I'd feel safer in a room full of Sikhs with kirpans (the "knife") which are all about compassion, mercy, and protecting those who can't defend themselves from the intolerant, than in a room with a couple of unarmed bigots unable to engage in rational argument.

This implies that everyone is able, with the proper conditions external to themselves, to think logically and to think the same way on topics that are subject to bigotry... and that is doubtful, although you could argue it is true. It is however not provable, because removing all causes of bigotry in a society is purely utopic; the results of such an action can therefore not be proved. Because bigotry cannot be completely eradicated, it has to be handled, notably via laws and, arguably, censorship (the latter being the thread's point).

As for the Sikh knife, it was just an example of something that is subject to debate concerning tolerance. I don't mind it personally, but I find it understandable and reasonable that a kippa and a kirpan aren't treated the same way legally (for strict security purposes), for example.

[Sen]

This implies that everyone is able, with the proper conditions external to themselves, to think logically

Unless there's brain damage or some condition that affects that capacity, yes, everyone should be able to think logically, as it's a part of being human. People incapable of logical thought aren't fit to live in any sort of society, tolerant or not.

But that's not the issue at hand; the vast majority of intolerant people are very capable of logical thought, but the logical process of different people will vary wildly depending on their circumstances. After all, we haven't changed much since the days when people would see lightning in the skies thousands of years ago and think that some god was punishing or rewarding them for something; it's not that they were idiots or unable of thinking logically; they didn't have access to factual information that showed the real cause for it and were just repeating the same thing that everyone around them had been saying since the moment they were born.

and to think the same way on topics that are subject to bigotry...

Not at all. It's the pizza example all over again. I can't stand pineapple pizza, but I'm not going to go to the pineapple pizza place and shoot everyone to death because of it. That's the whole point of tolerance; having the basic ability of holding different opinions and wanting different things without trying to impose them onto others by force. In fact, one could argue that one of the key components of a tolerant society would be that anyone is free to challenge its ideas, just not with guns and bombs. If everyone thought and wanted the same, there would be nothing to tolerate.

and that is doubtful, although you could argue it is true. It is however not provable, because removing all causes of bigotry in a society is purely utopic; the results of such an action can therefore not be proved. Because bigotry cannot be completely eradicated, it has to be handled, notably via laws and, arguably, censorship (the latter being the thread's point).

Yes, of course. A fully tolerant society is utopian by definition and we'll never live to see anything remotely close to one outside of small communes of like-minded individuals. And yes, it is handled, but then again, unless its causes are addressed, any laws and censorship will be nothing but band-aids.

[Marshmallow Marshall]

This is subject to debate. One could argue that only a few people are able to use original logical thinking, and that the rest of the people are only able to sheep the thoughts of the "thinking minority"; the voice of the majority would then be an expression of the "common voice", and not of the individuals themselves, for the most part.
As for the lightning example, what you said is true, but it doesn't mean everyone back then used what seemed logical at that time to explain the phenomena. Just like in modern days, a few people (namely people who had some mystic role at that time, probably) would have thought about it. They would then have concluded that gods must have been doing something for such an impressive and loud event to happen.

My bad, that was unclear. I meant "to think the same way about the reality of bigotry", not that everyone would think the same about everything; I completely agree with the second paragraph (not that there's much to disagree on lol, that's the basis of the need for tolerance).

Indeed, such measures will merely be patches, and addressing the causes of intolerance is optimal. However, it's not always possible to do so; most modern western countries have been trying to do that to different extents for reasons that go beyond simple tolerance (for example, education has a lot of purposes), yet not many, if any, have succeeded. That's why the "band-aids" are needed, as long as they actually help and do not destroy what they seek to protect.

[Helz]

Lmao I just googled Lauren Southern.

I mean.. She is cute.
I am not into transactional sex but if I was......

[Helz]

I feel like this topic has covered the issue from the wrong angle.

The purpose of freedom of speech is just a pre-requisite for cultivating free throught and allowing for those ideas to propagate through a society. Its not the objective but rather just something necessary to achieve the objective that is 'freedom of the mind.'

I feel that this objective is critically threatened by large scale efforts to control perspective. In a model of realism objective reality exists and we interact with it through our perception. With this in mind our perception of reality defines our reality. We live in a sociological meta-cognitive age where for the first time in human history we are able to understand how we make decisions as a society and influence that process. Sure as societies we still have 'freedom of speech' but we have lost our ability to correlate our beliefs to create action.

Consider the term 'Grass-Roots.' It was just how things worked forever but then it became a term to represent a society getting together to push for needed change. The fact this even became a definition is telling but what came later was astro-turfing. Social campaigns that were tailored to generate movement for change by a society for private profit. This not only acts directly against public interest but also simultaneously devalues potential pushes we can make to influence changes in our society (hurting our real ability to influence the structure that frames our society) while also creating a method to circumvent the protections offered by a free society with the facade of progress.

I feel that this is true evil.

On the micro level anyone can justify whatever action but on the macro level morals show through. I could very literally make ethical arguments for Nazi ideology under utilitarianism that would be irrefutable but any moral person could not call such an argument anything other than immoral.

In politics all you hear is the 'Right vs the Left' which forces people into a mode of thought that is a false dichotomy. We keep fighting ourselves while the true evil progressively encompasses us. We debate sources of ideas without looking at the methods of propagation that actually establish our freedom as living entities within our society.

I feel that our freedom of speech is nothing without the propagation that gives it value. Its harrowing for me to ruminate about the limited scope people even consider on this subject.

Sometimes I regret the sacrifices I made in my life for a society that is so hellbent on anti intellectualism.

[SCP]

Bro, you're either a straight up liar or extremely gullible. This isn't true in the slightest, and you won't find a single example of someone being fined or going to jail for that. Even fucking Fox News says this is wrong: https://www.foxnews.com/world/not-re...gender-pronoun

This is flawed logic in a lot of ways, and indicative of very little life experience; considering you're more or less arguing with a slippery-slope fallacy.
What's the point of a law if it's not to be used?
The whole premise of the law is to incite a type of self-censorship, and to intimidate those via force to use said pronouns.

Answer me this: What's the point of said law, if it's not intended to be used eventually?

Sure no one may have been arrested over it yet, but if the whole point is it's not meant to be used to arrest anyone anyway, then it shouldn't exist in the first place.
An example demonstrating my point is 'The Patriot Act'.
No one was against the idea initially because they didn't think it would actually be used against those domestically; however after it existed for some time, no one was arrested under it, and people forgot that it was something passed relatively recently, that they resigned it as being a new reality.

The whole point I'm making here is that humans are very susceptible to normalization of new horrific realities, given enough exposure, repetition, and conditioning.
Hence what underlines the whole concept of the 'Stockholm Syndrome'.

Also if you want to keep your alt-right views as hidden as possible you probably shouldn't admit to supporting Lauren Southern, who's been banned from the UK for stirring up hatred, supports white supremacy and creating an ethnostate, and supports the theory of there being an organized replacement of white people (probably by (((them))) of course, since she's a good friend of Richard Spencer).

Because there literally is an organized effort to shame europeans out of a culture, and heritage.
See the statues of famous Europeans being torn down, the revision of history, and current guilt-complex being thrusted unto current-day "white" people, shaming them for "colonizing" and "slavery" that they had no part or benefit from in current day.
Even the concept of "white privilege" is indicative of this very fact, that "white" people are being shamed for a contrived 'original sin' to otherwise erode cohesion, and promote race-mixing agendas.

I'm curious (((shill))), how many shekels were you paid for this post?

Before you accuse me of having a rude tone or whatever, keep in mind that as a Canadian I have to say I'm tired of people spreading right-wing lies and bullshit about my country and listening to proto-fascists who completely make things up about a place they hate just to stir up shit. Feel free to criticize your own country but don't slander mine if you don't have the decency and critical thinking skills to verify whatever you say, and don't champion the beliefs of our own disgraced and widely hated neo-Nazis if you don't know the first thing about the place they're trying to destroy.

Oh it's "your" country now?
It's ironic and hypocritical that you take this stance.
You seem to imply disdain those that claim ownership of something, yet do the same yourself.

Furthermore; stop acting like such a victim, and misrepresenting the state of affairs in the grand scheme of things.
Objectively speaking: Canada is considered (as a whole) a very leftist country, with laws pertaining to taxation, gun control, social issues, etc...
You know this just as well as anyone else, but you're attempting to gaslight, and make a mountain over a mole-hole because you KNOW you don't have a leg to stand on to make such a haphazard argument.

With all due respect, you're a disgrace; you claim to morally grand-stand about "muh objectivity" or "muh critical thinking skills" yet you then betray your emotional stake, and confirmation bias by the hostile connotations therein.
The cognitive dissonance is so real within your post, if only you took a second to re-read the nonsense you're spewing, you would see you contradict yourself in the very same paragraph.

I could continue to list the rife hypocrisies within your crude attempt at a point, however I believe I've already made it rather clear how you come off as a triggered, bleeding-heart leftist; as it's already rather apparent without my comments detailing such.

./thread

[SCP]

I feel like this topic has covered the issue from the wrong angle.

The purpose of freedom of speech is just a pre-requisite for cultivating free throught and allowing for those ideas to propagate through a society. Its not the objective but rather just something necessary to achieve the objective that is 'freedom of the mind.'

I feel that this objective is critically threatened by large scale efforts to control perspective. In a model of realism objective reality exists and we interact with it through our perception. With this in mind our perception of reality defines our reality. We live in a sociological meta-cognitive age where for the first time in human history we are able to understand how we make decisions as a society and influence that process. Sure as societies we still have 'freedom of speech' but we have lost our ability to correlate our beliefs to create action.

Consider the term 'Grass-Roots.' It was just how things worked forever but then it became a term to represent a society getting together to push for needed change. The fact this even became a definition is telling but what came later was astro-turfing. Social campaigns that were tailored to generate movement for change by a society for private profit. This not only acts directly against public interest but also simultaneously devalues potential pushes we can make to influence changes in our society (hurting our real ability to influence the structure that frames our society) while also creating a method to circumvent the protections offered by a free society with the facade of progress.

I feel that this is true evil.

On the micro level anyone can justify whatever action but on the macro level morals show through. I could very literally make ethical arguments for Nazi ideology under utilitarianism that would be irrefutable but any moral person could not call such an argument anything other than immoral.

In politics all you hear is the 'Right vs the Left' which forces people into a mode of thought that is a false dichotomy. We keep fighting ourselves while the true evil progressively encompasses us. We debate sources of ideas without looking at the methods of propagation that actually establish our freedom as living entities within our society.

I feel that our freedom of speech is nothing without the propagation that gives it value. Its harrowing for me to ruminate about the limited scope people even consider on this subject.

Sometimes I regret the sacrifices I made in my life for a society that is so hellbent on anti intellectualism.

+1
This man knows what's up.
Couldn't have said it better myself.

Many people that have sacrificed so much for western society, would be rolling in their graves if they were aware of how bastardized and contorted the idea of "freedom" has been stretched, by those that are either grasping at straws, or intentionally, and maliciously attempting to subvert said freedoms afforded to them, by those they condemn as "racists/bigots".

[SuperJack]

ThinkLiveLife

[Ganelon]

I feel like this topic has covered the issue from the wrong angle.

The purpose of freedom of speech is just a pre-requisite for cultivating free throught and allowing for those ideas to propagate through a society. Its not the objective but rather just something necessary to achieve the objective that is 'freedom of the mind.'

I feel that this objective is critically threatened by large scale efforts to control perspective. In a model of realism objective reality exists and we interact with it through our perception. With this in mind our perception of reality defines our reality. We live in a sociological meta-cognitive age where for the first time in human history we are able to understand how we make decisions as a society and influence that process. Sure as societies we still have 'freedom of speech' but we have lost our ability to correlate our beliefs to create action.

Consider the term 'Grass-Roots.' It was just how things worked forever but then it became a term to represent a society getting together to push for needed change. The fact this even became a definition is telling but what came later was astro-turfing. Social campaigns that were tailored to generate movement for change by a society for private profit. This not only acts directly against public interest but also simultaneously devalues potential pushes we can make to influence changes in our society (hurting our real ability to influence the structure that frames our society) while also creating a method to circumvent the protections offered by a free society with the facade of progress.

I feel that this is true evil.

On the micro level anyone can justify whatever action but on the macro level morals show through. I could very literally make ethical arguments for Nazi ideology under utilitarianism that would be irrefutable but any moral person could not call such an argument anything other than immoral.

In politics all you hear is the 'Right vs the Left' which forces people into a mode of thought that is a false dichotomy. We keep fighting ourselves while the true evil progressively encompasses us. We debate sources of ideas without looking at the methods of propagation that actually establish our freedom as living entities within our society.

I feel that our freedom of speech is nothing without the propagation that gives it value. Its harrowing for me to ruminate about the limited scope people even consider on this subject.

Sometimes I regret the sacrifices I made in my life for a society that is so hellbent on anti intellectualism.

I’ve heard many of those arguments before. I think the use of language is a good indicator of this as well; euphemisms adoptee because the proper term was (unpleasant?). And I agree it’s pretty deplorable how objective reality is being undermined as of now (your comment about the nazis for instance).

One other thing I find completely detestable is the idea that morality is subjective - and taking this idea to mean that e.g. murder may be moral in some cultures. I think this is a very dangerous idea and yet it doesn’t seem to be very unpopular (do correct me if I’m wrong).

Do you have some examples of attempts to control perspective btw? And what do you mean by that exactly?

I could cite things like, for instance, Women’s studies or gender studies as some efforts to control perspective, and I feel this is what you had in mind, but I am not certain.

[Ganelon]

I mean.. She is cute.
I am not into transactional sex but if I was......

I’m happy I’m not the only one

[secondpassing]

I feel that this objective [freedom of the mind] is critically threatened by large scale efforts to control perspective.

he fact this even became a definition is telling but what came later was astro-turfing. Social campaigns that were tailored to generate movement for change by a society for private profit. This not only acts directly against public interest but also simultaneously devalues potential pushes we can make to influence changes in our society (hurting our real ability to influence the structure that frames our society) while also creating a method to circumvent the protections offered by a free society with the facade of progress.

I feel that this is true evil.

On the micro level anyone can justify whatever action but on the macro level morals show through. I could very literally make ethical arguments for Nazi ideology under utilitarianism that would be irrefutable but any moral person could not call such an argument anything other than immoral.

I agree that our freedom in the mind is being hurt by such large scale efforts to control perspective. I'm thinking that you're referring to political groups, companies, activists, and major religions as those behind those efforts. If that is the case, then the solutions would be to either get a stronger or bigger organization to control the bad ones (macro level?), or to run another grass-roots campaign or education system to convince the followers to not support the major groups (micro level?). I think this makes the solution kind of circular.

In the end, it's one thing to open your own mind, but inviting others to do the same is quite a bit harder.
::

Could you really make an ethical argument for Nazis under utilitarianism? I thought utilitarianism is about saying the moral thing to do is to maximize benefit for the greatest amount of people. Perhaps you could make one is limited in consideration. For example, a movement of the greatest benefit to Germans, but I don't think the Nazi movement benefited mankind.

[Ganelon]

secondpassing, I’m not helz, but thinking about it eugenics used to be fairly popular around that period. I believe it was seen as moral because it ensured that future generations would be stronger (and thus less troubled) if one would force the ‘infit’ not to procreate. I can only imagine something along those lines could be said of the nazis.

[BananaCucho]

[Ganelon]

@SJ when are you hosting smiths 2.0

[secondpassing]

I basically posted the same thing Ganelon did. My bad.
It's also kinda funny how similar words come out of someone right-center and someone politically non-involved.

For reference though, I guess I'm an politically neutral utilitarian divine command theorist, that believes morals are universal and absolute.

[oops_ur_dead]

This is flawed logic in a lot of ways, and indicative of very little life experience; considering you're more or less arguing with a slippery-slope fallacy.
What's the point of a law if it's not to be used?
The whole premise of the law is to incite a type of self-censorship, and to intimidate those via force to use said pronouns.

Answer me this: What's the point of said law, if it's not intended to be used eventually?

Sure no one may have been arrested over it yet, but if the whole point is it's not meant to be used to arrest anyone anyway, then it shouldn't exist in the first place.
An example demonstrating my point is 'The Patriot Act'.
No one was against the idea initially because they didn't think it would actually be used against those domestically; however after it existed for some time, no one was arrested under it, and people forgot that it was something passed relatively recently, that they resigned it as being a new reality.

The whole point I'm making here is that humans are very susceptible to normalization of new horrific realities, given enough exposure, repetition, and conditioning.
Hence what underlines the whole concept of the 'Stockholm Syndrome'.



Because there literally is an organized effort to shame europeans out of a culture, and heritage.
See the statues of famous Europeans being torn down, the revision of history, and current guilt-complex being thrusted unto current-day "white" people, shaming them for "colonizing" and "slavery" that they had no part or benefit from in current day.
Even the concept of "white privilege" is indicative of this very fact, that "white" people are being shamed for a contrived 'original sin' to otherwise erode cohesion, and promote race-mixing agendas.

I'm curious (((shill))), how many shekels were you paid for this post?



Oh it's "your" country now?
It's ironic and hypocritical that you take this stance.
You seem to imply disdain those that claim ownership of something, yet do the same yourself.

Furthermore; stop acting like such a victim, and misrepresenting the state of affairs in the grand scheme of things.
Objectively speaking: Canada is considered (as a whole) a very leftist country, with laws pertaining to taxation, gun control, social issues, etc...
You know this just as well as anyone else, but you're attempting to gaslight, and make a mountain over a mole-hole because you KNOW you don't have a leg to stand on to make such a haphazard argument.

With all due respect, you're a disgrace; you claim to morally grand-stand about "muh objectivity" or "muh critical thinking skills" yet you then betray your emotional stake, and confirmation bias by the hostile connotations therein.
The cognitive dissonance is so real within your post, if only you took a second to re-read the nonsense you're spewing, you would see you contradict yourself in the very same paragraph.

I could continue to list the rife hypocrisies within your crude attempt at a point, however I believe I've already made it rather clear how you come off as a triggered, bleeding-heart leftist; as it's already rather apparent without my comments detailing such.

./thread

lmao ok