Criticize all you want.
Prevention, intimidation, assault, arson, heckler’s vetoing, etc. are not acceptable.
And it’s really sad this is even a debate.
Who says they’re acceptable, aside from a few assholes? Most of the protesters, in that protest or any other, are peaceful. Unfortunately, it’s very easy for a very small number of assholes to disrupt peaceful protesting and to cause havoc.
As for the “war on free speech… being waged violently by a subset of the left” – this is conveniently selective. There are anti-free-speech assholes on all sides, and liberal writers and politicians (and others) receive as many or more threats of violence, along with the sort of violent invasions of privacy (taking private photos with electronic forms of burglary is just another form of the kind of violence that breaks into homes to steal licentious photos) like the ones Yiannopolous egged-on for comedian Leslie Jones.
All these sorts of assaults on free speech are bad, and they all deserve condemnation. And they’re not unique to either side.
What does “thought policing every bigot out of town” even mean? If you mean opposing and criticizing bigotry, then there’s no conflict whatsoever between the two.
It’s not a debate, since there’s nothing in the posts you’re responding to that you appear to disagree with.
You just quoted a post by BigT in the pit that does advocate violence. So I’m not addressing a straw man as implied.
Intimidation, assault, or arson, I will agree with entirely, they are not acceptable.
Prevention, you’d have to define. If you mean refusing to give a platform to hate speech, then I would agree with it. If you mean duct taping people’s mouths (literally or metaphorically) to prevent them from expressing their views, then I am against it.
Heckler’s veto, eh, once again, it is a competition of speech. If you are in a public area, and you want to express yourself, then I have the right to overshout you and drown you out. That may not be nice, but without abridging my right to free speech, you can’t really stop me. Now, private venues are different, and you can require that the audience be on better behavior. (Of course, I don’t know, with you not giving context, if you are talking about the legal or the common use of the phrase, I am answering the common use, as the legal use isn’t relevant to any of the situations, as none of these speakers have been arrested. Obviously, the legal use falls under your violence categories, as threatening a riot do to a speaker is not acceptable.)
So, it is a bit sad that you keep bringing up things that we have agreed are unacceptable, and insisting that they are still part of the debate.
Could we move on to points that we disagree on?
Like how much criticism is too much?
You obviously think that there is a line, well before it gets to violence (which we have agreed is an unacceptable line to cross) that it is unacceptable to cross. Where is that line? What forms of counter speech are you saying is unacceptable?
Could you link that please? I spent a few seconds looking for it, but as you did not provide any context, I was not able to easily find it.
As right now, while you claim to not be addressing a strawman, you have just admitted that you are not addressing the posts that are actually in this thread.
Where is the proof that Rohm was gay? I googled it and can’t find anything beyond, “everybody knows.”
So respond to him there – what does that have to do with this thread? Why argue with straw men if there are real live violence-advocates somewhere around here?
Because it’s relevant in this thread. Threads aren’t hermetically sealed conversations. Look, you aren’t for violence in response to free speech are you? The right to scold is not a right in jeopardy now is it? But the right to offend and the right to freedom of unpopular and even repulsive ideas is under violent attack. Well, if it’s justified to use violence in this case who is to decide that violence is NOT the answer for what you consider appropriate speech and beliefs.
Charlie Hebdo shooting - Wikipedia come to mind?
Sure, let’s let the ones who are most willing and able to use violence dictate what’s acceptable in every sphere of life.
So we all oppose violence in this thread. Let’s have a long discussion in this thread about how we all oppose violence. Violence is bad.
Let me know if you have any response to my thoughts, like my post #122. If you just want agreement about how it’s wrong to use violence to disrupt speech, including hateful speech, then you can just assume it’s already there.
Look, I know I’m going to catch a lot of flack from the “PC police” for saying this, but I think violence is bad.
I can find links which cite papers and books, which make claims as to Hitler’s knowledge a long ways prior to his death, and to general German and Nazi hostility towards him because of it, but sadly, nothing I have access to or own myself.
Isn’t “microaggressions” just a newfangled term for rudeness? And avoiding them would be what we used to call “politeness”? I grew up in a conservative community and conservatives there were pretty against rudeness, intentional or otherwise. Politeness was kinda their thing (and they could be pretty aggressive with it when necessary, bless their hearts).
I’m surprised conservatives are opposed to politeness now (but then they did elect Trump, who the conservatives I remember from my youth would have called a “piece of shit,” because even civilized people have a limit on politeness).
I am not sure where you are getting this idea that the conservatives who stood behind Trump are opposed to politeness.
They demand that people be polite to them.
Errr, you were talking about them being polite to others, nvm.
Then I’d say despite your dating experience, you really don’t know many transgender persons. Because this issue is constantly debated within our community.
What you, and others, apparently do not get is that threatening people for speaking freely is very chilling. So the tactic is to label someone racist, bigot, sexist or some nonsense like that in an attempt to demonize the person so that the common rabble won’t listen to the message.
Look, I don’t care if Hitler himself, reincarnated as a zombie was giving a speech. If what zombie Hitler has to say is accurate it’s accurate. If people want to go to zombie Hitler’s speech that’s their choice and they shouldn’t be physically beat for it. That’s how free speech remains free.
Being weak in defense of fundamental liberties means they will be chipped away through intimidation. Currently, the left is weak on freedom of speech.
Even President Obama took to task the regressive nature of many in academia. President Obama: Student Protests Should Embrace Free Speech | The Foundation for Individual Rights and Expression Perhaps Obama was clueless when he made these remarks. Or maybe he knows and understands concepts a bit better than you.
None of this conflicts with anything I have said.
Let me know if you want to respond to something that I have posted.
Why are you so opposed to expressions of bigotry? Because it has lead to bad things historically.
Why am I so opposed to threats, intimidation, and violence directed at those who exercise freedom of speech and press? Because those are bad things now.
Between this and your latter post bringing up “tranny” dismissively, I really doubt you picked up much from dating a transgender person (which you earlier said you had). I mean they must have been completely cut off from their own community, or never talked to you about our people, because this stuff is like “transgender 101.”
I’m not saying that there isn’t a fair amount of people looking for offense no matter what. I myself have been told I was a “transphobe” in front of an audience for calling myself “transgender” by non-binary/non-conforming people, because the word “transgender” means somehow that you MUST transition. :rolleyes: But there are asshole outliers in every community, and unfortunately most people only remember those.
Sounds good to me. Did you get the impression that I disagreed with any of this? I don’t. I’ve tried to make that very clear – here I will again. I am opposed to threats, intimidation, and violence directed at those who exercise freedom of speech and press.
And I oppose bigotry because of history and the present. Bigotry didn’t just exist in the past, and didn’t just lead to bad things in the past.