My own observation, based on having and expressing offensive opinions, is that the conversation is more like:
A: “Man, I think dying your hair blonde is a dumb thing to do. Makes you seem fake”
B: “So you’re saying that all bondes are insincere idiots?”
Looking closer i see that ben already said it, only I’d modify to simply say that anyone that someone is pissed off at is:
or even reading the whole thread carefully, for that matter.
As for the OP, no big shock that I’m all for expressing oneself. I do think that it is best to trya nd refrain from being offensive towards an individual if you can. I also think it is entirely possible, among adults, to deeply disagree about a topic, express those disagreements forcefully, and come away at the end not feeling you have been in a barfight.
And I think screwtape has it right:
I look at this whole debate business as a fencing match. Some of us are looking to score points, others are looking to draw blood. I try to only play with those who are into scoring points.
stoid
PS: One final thought: If you are secure in who you are, what you believe, how you behave and the choices you make, and someone else finds any one of those things objectionable…why the hell should you care? Do you really expect to go through life having everyone like/respect/agree with everything about you? Are you really that much at the mercy of other people’s opinions? Especially people you know nothing about except words on a screen? Get some perspective! Go ahead and argue with that person, but if you find yourself really getting upset…stop. You don’t belong here. Go to MPSIMS or shut off your computer and get back to your real life.
I will use public debate boards as the place to express the things I am more careful about expressing in real life because it would involve possible hostilities with people I care about. Example: the hunting thing. I am the one who thinks the legal activity of hunting is disgusting and repulsive. I’ll say it here, because I expect you guys not only not to give a flying fuck what I think of what you do, and maybe to argue me out of it, but because I can’t really say it to whom I want to say it: my future father in law, who does it. It would be unnecessarily unpleasant for me to express myself to him because we have a relationship that doesn’t need that in it.
When I think of Nazi and Klan rallies, I think of the incidents they encourage like that fellow Ben Smith, who went on a two-day racist shooting spree. Like I said, the expression of opinions has consequences.
The expression of opinion does have consequences. However, it’s not reasonable to expect a group to take responsibility for those who are influenced by their speech. They may be pleased that the person took action, but it’s really on the head of the individual.
I’m all for allowing fringe hate groups like this the freedom to say whatever they want in any public venue they like. I think msrobyn is correct, that speech should be judged differently from action. Incitement is a completely separate matter, though; there’s a big difference between someone at a Klan rally saying, “The white race is superior and I’d be happier in a world with no mud people,” and the same person saying, “I want everyone listening to me right now to go find a mud person and drag him behind a truck until he’s dead.”
I go farther than that, though. Some people say that tolerating this kind of expression is necessary to protect the general freedom. They say restricting speech puts us on a slippery slope, and protecting the right to make unpopular statements is the “price” we pay to live in a free society.
I don’t buy this. I don’t think unpopular speech is a “price” to be paid. I think unpopular speech should be encouraged. I think the Klan should not just be allowed to march, I think they should be supported. Why? Because when these people are allowed to advertise their beliefs in the marketplace of ideas, with no restriction, their bankrupt morality becomes blindingly obvious, and generation after generation those groups will dwindle to obscurity. If you put a lid on them, they will exploit the cachet of being “forbidden” and will thrive in the secret darkness, like cockroaches or fungus.
All ideas should be expressed, as long as they remain, simply, expressions of ideas. Yes, this means some crackpots will irresponsibly act on those ideas, but over time, the system will self-correct. It takes a while, but it’s far more effective than trying to ban it outright. Do you think the Falun Gong movement would have spread as quickly as it did in China if it weren’t illegal? Of course not. If allowed free and unfettered expression, it might have earned a few adherents, but probably little more.
Let 'em all live in the light, I say. The toads among them will dehydrate and die.
I try not to get bent out of shape, but it really irks me when people try to tell me why I am what I am, argue with me about my motivations, and such.
i.e
-You hunt because you like to kill helpless animals.
-You’re a Republican because you’re selfish.
There’s an inherent claim to special knowledge in those kind of arguments which the proponent simply can’t have.
They’re potentially harmful genralization, insults, and accusations.
If, like in the Op, if one wanted to propose them or something like “black people are less intelligent,” one had better be careful how they phrase it, and they had better be very sure of themselves, and prepared to back it up.
If they do not behave this way and just sling these “opinions” about, they’re just ignorant jerks, and deserve the slamming they get.
Isn’t that just a statement of opinion? You are assuming some knowledge of the motivation and thoughts of the person who made the statements. What if the person made the statements entirely because that was genuinely what they believed, and was stating them because it was psychotherapeutic, or because they were trying to let someone get to know them better? Isn’t that possible, and if so doesn’t that mean that you have no right to express your opinion about their opinion?
And at what stage does this get silly? Do I really have to be able to back up every opinion, like “The weather sucks” or “I don’t like trucks driving down me street”?
Expressions of ideas never remain just that. They always entail practical consequences. The Klan doesn’t just spout racist filth; they march in minority areas and places like Skokie, IL, which has a heavy population of Holocaust survivors. Why? To terrorize and shut people up.
This self-correction idea is ludicrous as well. When was the Klan founded? 1866. It hasn’t self-corrected out; in fact it’s eperienced at least one rebirth during its existence. The ideas of racism are a century older than that, at least. How long should we wait for “the system” to self-correct? Another 200 years? No, thank you.
The marketplace of ideas should be subject to the same limitations as the marketplace of goods. You don’t see toy companies selling teddy bears stuffed with fiberglass or asbestos because such products are dangerous and harmful. The same applies to such ideas as racism, homophobia, and anti-Semitism.
This is not to say that I think the solution to fighting these ideas can be found in today’s society. There need to be some radical changes in this world before we can address these questions. But that’s another subject entirely.
Sounds like you want revolution. Why shouldn’t that speech be banned, since you obviously want your ideas put into action? It’s all a matter of degree. You want to stop “bad” speech, assuming there can be a definition. You think racist and anti-Semitic speech is bad. I agree. But others think communist propaganda is bad. If they are in power, they can ban it if we allow censorship.
You can talk about changing the system all you want, but this is the one we have right now. Give me a definition of “bad” speech that can’t be abused by whatever interest group has the balance of power. It can’t be done.
As for the Klan, their membership is in steady decline. Those remaining are loud in order to create the illusion of numbers. As for the Skokie march, I think the consequences were very harmful to the Klan. They were exposed for the bastards they are since it was clear they were trying to taunt Holocaust survivors. Show me an account that shows the Skokie march didn’t hurt the KKK. So introducing ideas to the light of day has worked.
Um, try thousands. Plato’s Republic doesn’t specifically mention actual racial groups by name, but the whole division-by-metal thing is a rather thinly veiled version of the same thing, don’t you think?
If a natural correction means the culture permanently evolves beyond it, then yes, absolutely. I know it’s a pain in the ass to realize that some social problems won’t be solved within our lifetimes so we can enjoy the benefits, but that’s unfortunately the way it is. I’m not thinking about myself, and my desires. I’m not so self-centered that I imagine history will somehow hinge on the brief span of years I occupy it. Instead, I’m thinking about the world we’re creating for my grandchildren and great-grandchildren, and beyond.
Look: I fully expect the Klan to have at least a tiny, last-ditch membership when my bones are white in my grave. That irritates me to no end. But knowing what I know about social dynamics and basic human behavior, I have to admit the overwhelming probability of that scenario. I also strongly believe that trying to artifically crush those belief systems will have the opposite of the intended effect, because, in the long run, it will add to their lifespan, as compared to letting them just peter out in full view of everyone.
First off, I’m not arguing that any speech should be banned. That means, to me, depending on people in the government whose class positions and views fundamentally conflict with mine. Nor am I saying that the desire to put ideas into action should be the criterion for “bad” speech. The question is, what are the practical consequences of the actions taken by the people supporting the ideas?
There can be no universal definition, no. For a monarch, advocating a republican form of government is “bad” speech. For an industrialist, advocating unions or the forcible seizure of his factories is “bad” speech. For me, “bad” speech is the ideas that prevent working people from organizing and unifying to fight back.
Which is why I don’t advocate censorship of the Klan and the Nazis. What I do advocate is active, head-on grassroots opposition to their demonstrations and rallies.
True, and there are things people can do within this system to fight racism and other hate speech. Doesn’t mean it’s pointless to advocate radical change at the same time.
The more the general populace is involved in the daily political life of the society in which they live, the less chance there is of any “interest group” monopolizing a hold on power and abusing definitions of “bad” speech.
The KKK got hurt by the Skokie march because there were people organizing to oppose it on the ground. The mayor of Skokie granted the Klan a permit to march, as she and her predecessors have done before, police escorts were arranged - in short, there was official support from the town of Skokie for this march. If there had been no actual opposition on the ground, they would have been able to attract people curious about the ideas and probably have recruited.
Cockroaches are pest insects. We all know they’re nasty, but they don’t go away forever when you turn on the light and make “eeew” faces when you see them. You gotta lay down poison and keep your kitchen clean. In other words, make it an unpleasant environment for them and they won’t come back.
Klansmen and Nazis are human cockroaches.
The ideas of race are millennia old. The fact that different people from different areas of the world share distinct phyisiological characteristics has been recognized probably since before Plato. These ideas developed out of direct observation of contact with foreigners.
The ideas of racism, that is the ideas that these physiological characteristics are somehow translatable into social characteristics and used to justify classifying other people as naturally ‘inferior’, ‘barbaric’, and in some views worthy of elimination, are only a couple centuries old. They developed to justify European colonialism and the development of the slave trade.
I am, and I have the same concerns for my grandchildren and great-grandchildren and their descendants.
If society as a whole makes the effort to crush these ideas and rid themselves of them forever, how is that artificial?
…yeah, and the line after that one. The problem with saying, “This speech is all right, but the coneheads should be shut up,” is that is interferes with the natural dying-out process of bad ideas.
Let’s have 'em all out in the open. They’re just words. If they can’t stand up to being in the open, they’ll die. If they can, maybe we can all learn something.
I don’t recall who said “The Devil cannot abide to be mocked,” but it’s a whole lot easier to mock someone if you first give them an assembly permit.
It occurs to me that we might be arguing about completely different things, but are caught in semantics. When I say “crush,” I’m talking about outlawing certain forms of expression. I didn’t make that clear. I agree with you that Klansmen and their ilk are cockroaches; see my earlier post. When I say “Let 'em live in the light,” I don’t intend a literal comparison with cockroach biology. I know if you just leave the lights on in the kitchen, they’ll just go hide; you have to do a lot more to eradicate them. (Few things are more satisfying than referencing a classic Cecil column.) I’m totally in agreement with you that the best way to defuse and diffuse Klan beliefs is to let them have their say in public, and then organize counterdemonstrations and distribute one’s own refutation of their nonsense.
So I stand by my original assertions, now clarified. And upon carefully considering our terminology, I suspect we’re closer together than we might have originally assumed. Sound good?
Marches are public demonstrations, not recruiting efforts. St. Patrick’s Day marches aren’t to recruit new Irish, the 60s demonstrations weren’t to recruit more black people, gay and lesbian marches aren’t organized for the purpose of improving their numbers… They march to show pride in their existence, possibly to influence future enrollment, but not to enroll people on the spot. The police are as much for the protection of the citizens as they are for the marchers.
If a town wishes to allow any of the above, they must allow all of the above or they are being prejudicial. I don’t believe government’s support marches, however, they do facilitate the First Amendment as provided by local legislation.
Probably not to their mothers.
Sounds as though you might be advocating poisoning the Klansmen or starving them to death or both. All men die, it is only a matter of time, so why waste yours worrying about a small, nonrepresentative portion of the population of the U.S.?
No. They’re not just words, they are people behind those words willing to back them up with action. Cross burnings and night riding and lynching are the actions taken by such people. I’m not saying you or anyone else is explicitly condoning such actions by supporting the KKK’s and the Nazis’ right to speech, but I am saying that these are potential consequences for allowing them that right.
Actually, the best way to defuse the Klan is to fight like hell to make sure they don’t rally in the first place. That includes protesting any public official who grants them a permit in the first place and organizing public pressure to have it revoked. So I wouldn’t say we’re in total agreement with each other.
Um… no. Where is it written that it’s legally, morally, or logistically impossible to recruit during a march or rally?
snort I’m sorry, I can’t resist. What freakin’ history books have you been reading?! The civil rights movement was based on involving more Blacks and whites in the fight and every action they took had that goal in mind.
People don’t need human action to die. Ideas do. I’m concerned about these kind of things because I’d like to keep the statistical possibility of 1933 ever occuring in the United States to nil.
There is nothing that will ensure a book’s popularity more than putting it on a “forbidden books” list.
Groups like the KKK are sort-of like message board trolls. “Cracking down” on them just turns them into martyrs among like-minded fringies, but indifference kills them.
Something has been troubling me about this for awhile, and I finally realized what it is.
What is the nature of the thing about which the offensive opinion is being expressed?
In the examples you use, Gaspode, there is an ocean of difference between “opinions that people who enjoy certain lawful activities are sick and repulsive” and “black people lack self-control”.
That difference is choice. In the first example, we are talking about someone choosing to do something. They don’t have to. They took a look at it, thought about it, and made their own judgment of the thing, deciding, we can only assume, that it was good, since they decided to do it. Others are not permitted to make the same assessment and judgment, only come to a different conclusion about it? Both parties in this are acting/speaking from a point of judgement, they just came to different conclusions after judging.
In example 2, one is coming to a conclusion and an opinion about another person’s nature based on a biological fact. The person being judged has not had the same opportunity to act or be based on having assessed the thing. They simply are, beyond their control, and are being judged negatively for it.
In other words, Example one is: I disagree with your judgment.
Example two is: I disagree with YOU.
Scylla has used my offensive opinions as examples that he finds objectionable:
Well, Scylla, first of all, don’t distort what I actually said, pleeeeeeze. It’s so irritating have to correct and correct. Let’s operate from an accurate statement: item one is relatively correct: you go out to kill helpless animals, I assume you like killing helpless animals [sub] not really such an outrageous leap, is it? If you went out to eat choccolate ice cream all the time, I’d assume you like chocolate ice cream, not that you enjoy driving[/sub], item 2 was actually: I don’t trust Republicans because the Republican ideology is fundamentally selfish. That is not the same “you became a Republican because you are a selfish person”. Maybe you became a Republican because it makes your father happy, I have no clue. I only know what I have judged Republican philosophy to be. You may not think of it as selfish, and surely don’t, since you picked it for yourself.
In any case, in both instances, you were not born to be either thing. You are both a hunter and a Republican because you took a look at both things, thought about them, evaluated them, and decided that both were good. You liked them, you embraced them, you felt and and feel that they are right.
I get to make the same independent evaluations of these two things, don’t I? I could choose to be or not be either thing, could I not? And I have the same right to judge them as good or bad, do I not? And I have judged them to be bad things. You have embraced them as good things. My judgment of these things which I believe are bad will, of necessity, slop over on to you who has embraced them.
Now… why would you be insulted by my independent and differing evaluation of things which neither one of us has to own? If you have embraced them, it must mean you believe in them. You believe they are right, and good, and proper. So why would my differing belief be in any way insulting to you? You have to expect that not everyone will believe as you do and will come to completely different conclusions than you have about these things. You have to be secure in your belief about it…I don’t have to tread softly about MY conclusions because you are insecure about YOURS.
I’ll turn it back on myself. I am a pornographer, an extremely controversial thing. It is a certainty that, just as with hunting and Republicanism, there will be people who believe that what I do is completely awful. They are free to tell me so. I am not insulted by it or offended by it. I took a look at selling sex for a living, evaluated whether I thought it was a good thing or a bad thing, and concluded that it was a perfectly good thing about which I felt nothing negative at all. Now, there are people around here and everywhere who have expressed their disapproval of what I do in no uncertain terms. So? Doesn’t bother me. They have a right to their opinion about it. I’m secure and comfortable with my * choice *, knowing it would not be everyones.
Some people think porn is evil. They have a right to that belief. Knowing they believed that, I still chose to align myself with porn. Others think hunting is evil. Knowing they believe that, you still chose to align yourself with hunting. Some people think Republicanism is selfish. Knowing that others think this way, you still chose to align yourself with Republicans.
All this to say: either get secure with your beliefs or pick new ones.
Yes. They ARE just words. Actions are different. Actions are, well, to use the legal term, “actionable.” Is a stripper responsible if an audience member rapes her? **
Thanks. It’s nice to disagree on a board without getting accused of all sorts of unsanitary things. **
Of course they are. I just feel that the consequences of denyning them that right could well be worse. Additionally, I’d like to focus on your use of the word “potential.” Not “actual.” We’re all potential criminals. When we shift to “actual” criminals, do we become prosecutable.
I maintain that any official effort to stamp out, say, the Nazi Party or the KKK would have the reverse effect, which, I believe, is why the government makes no such attempt.
Olentzero, on your website, you have at least three links to organizations that certain groups would just as soon not have you use. Their justification for not wanting you to use them is the same as your justification for wanting to restrict the Klan; that is, that such speech incites violence and hurtful behavior (and if I’m wrong, please tell me). The Palmer raids of the 20s and McCarthyism of the 50s come to mind. The actual threat caused by any of these organizations to our republic: Zero.
Look, no one wants the KKK marching through their neighborhood. I don’t. They’re loud, annoying, lower property values and they litter the streets with their propaganda. However, this is the United States of America, and the First Amendment says they have the right to express themselves freely, and to peaceably assemble. On the other hand, if they get out of control and riot, or burn a cross on someone’s lawn, I say arrest 'em and send 'em to jail. It shouldn’t matter if they’re socialists, Klansmen, or the Reba Wadel chapter of B’nai B’rith Girls. As long as they behave themselves, they should have the right to disseminate propaganda, no matter how obnoxious that propaganda might be.
