It's not something that's welcoming for trans people, or queer people of colour, or even some gay men and women. For many of them police are not just a historical problem but also a current one.

tuco wrote:Innocence until guilt is a legal concept.

Paul1 says it's "an essential philosophical ideal".

Rachel Bronwyn wrote:I still can't wrap my head around how verbal harassment and incitement of violence being punishable is harmful to me.

Go ahead, pass a law making it punishable, because I've no objection either. Now, make that law enforceable. Then fund enforcement of it. That conversation is not for theoreticians who won't even mention how much broader 'harassment' is than 'incitement of violence'.

Spinozasgalt wrote:

tuco wrote:Innocence until guilt is a legal concept.

Paul1 says it's "an essential philosophical ideal".

Perhaps Paul1 is a theoretician.

Matthew Shute, I guess I assume everyone is intellectually honest, but you're right.


Spinozasgalt, I admit I was being humerous. You're right about me, up to the point where they're authoritarians because I don't know where they're coming from. They're authoritarians in my mind because of the tone and ideas about speech that they push. For example, that they respond with mass intimidation on social media to those who oppose them. That they promote the idea of hate speech to mean any utterance of anything racist (because hate speech, how ever it's defined, is legally punishable). That they threaten the safety of professors who happen not to agree with their narrative. etc. If they were to use more peaceful forms of activism with the exact same messages, I would not consider them authoritarian idealists.

Why do I push the idea of free speech with them? I don't usually do it directly, I usually suggest their tone and style doesn't help their cause, particularly for sceptics like me. But I do strongly believe that acts of intimidation of individuals has no legitimacy and can effectively silence people, and create a social environment where free speech is being impinged. Just because people are being oppressed doesn't give them the right to trump other people's rights. You don't mend racism by silencing racists anyway. I don't want to live in that society so I am happy to speak out and be the unpopular one.


Rachel Bronwyn, again it's this notion that we have to sacrifice freedom of speech to get other protections. There are different levels of sacrifice, instead I think we should focus on the context with which people express themselves and not what they say. Are people inciting death? Are people repeatedly harassing? etc.

Also, everyone should be concerned about free speech. Today it doesn't affect you, but tomorrow it might do. You may not agree with your opponents, but if you promote the idea of silencing them and then they gain power, you can expect them to afford you the same conclusion. Moreover, those who you thought were friends might decide to silence you (which is what I experience now with their outright aggression towards my ideas).


Nicko, I agree, but some people claim that they are being attacked by the police and do not feel safe around them. Ejecting police in uniform at Pride is meant to both help black people feel more safe and send a message to the police that the police need to change.

However I question both the premise that the Toronto police are rife with officers who pick deliberately on black people and the conclusion that banning uniformed police officers from Pride will do anything to fix that.

At a higher level, I also question the style in which Black Lives Matter conducted their protest. They were invited to lead Pride in 2016, but sat down and halted the Pride until the then-leader agreed to sign 10 demands (most were reasonable IMO). Given they were invited, it felt a bit insulting that they did that rather than just spoke up. Later when a general meeting was held to establish when a specific meeting would be held on the demands BLM had made, instead BLM and supporters attending the general meeting demanded a snap vote on the demands immediately. However the Pride "resolution process" dictates that enough time be given so that the community can learn about a vote and have an opportunity to respond. In this sense I felt they had circumvented the democratic process.

All of this has made me pretty sceptical of BLM as a group, because of the way they have behaved and the lack of willingness to provide evidence for their claims against the police (usually under the guise that they shouldn't need to because they're the ones being hurt by the police - a bit of a logical fallacy IMO). Others here will have different outlooks on the issue I'm sure.

Paul1 wrote:For example, that they respond with mass intimidation on social media to those who oppose them. That they promote the idea of hate speech to mean any utterance of anything racist (because hate speech, how ever it's defined, is legally punishable).

Whatever is the case with what's really going on, you cannot provide documentation for these vague generalities. Someone's going to have to explain how the domination of social media traffic by the people with the thickest skins is not easily explainable in other terms. One might guess that stupid (or merely ignorant) people tend to develop thicker skins in order to cope with their handicaps.

I've already pointed out to you that if the owners of a social media outlet do not enforce their rules against hate speech, the rules might as well not exist. The rules exist on paper to give legal cover to the corporation that runs the social media outlet.

Spinozasgalt wrote:

tuco wrote:Innocence until guilt is a legal concept.

Paul1 says it's "an essential philosophical ideal".

I stand corrected then as so is justice.

Rachel Bronwyn wrote:I still can't wrap my head around how verbal harassment and incitement of violence being punishable is harmful to me. I can't wrap my head around the fetishization of freedom of speech either though. There are rights of way more importance to me than being able to say whatever I want whenever I want.

What you call/perceive as fetishization others see as fundamental right/freedom. There are books about it, we've had several debates on it here but let me note following:

- the only way to prioritize various freedoms is through individuals
- once freedom of speech and expression is taken away, all other rights/freedoms can be threatened because its not possible to defend them through speech and expression
- its been suggested that societies valuing freedom of speech and expression highly are more resistant to totalitarianism because totalitarian regimes always curb freedom of speech and expression as first

I am not sure which human right is more important over another as human rights are a set, and as a set they provide framework or standards of human behavior.

Now if we get into details, the said fetishization respectively, you could surely make sound arguments against it but where will you stop?

tuco wrote:
- the only way to prioritize various freedoms is through individuals

Is this doable? Yes, if we simply process freedom pairwise between individuals, but then it's not practical. The one with the biggest stick wins. I don't think many individuals will want to bet on the success of this approach. So, this approach is for theoreticians.

tuco wrote:- once freedom of speech and expression is taken away, all other rights/freedoms can be threatened because its not possible to defend them through speech and expression

Do you think speech and expression are the way rights and freedoms are defended? Theoretically, they are, but you probably allow for other means as well, diminishing the significance of freedom of speech and expression. In fact, rights and freedoms that are recognized are defended not just by florid speeches, but by the threat of violence on those who would abridge the ones that have been recognized. This is civics for fourteen year olds, tuco. The SJW is not about defending freedom but about extending it. How much it can be extended is a theoretical matter.

Open societies are vulnerable to concentration of power in the wealthy until freedom's just another word for nothin' left to lose. Totalitarian societes are vulnerable to concentration of wealth among the powerful, which is a lot like the way open societies work.

Individuals get together, and except for having few laughs, they demonstrate their priorities at the ballot .. oh wait, you are right, theoretically.

And yes, first line of defense is through freedom of speech and expression. Perhaps you have couple of practical examples?

tuco wrote:Individuals get together, and except for having few laughs, they demonstrate their priorities at the ballot .. oh wait, you are right, theoretically.

And yes, first line of defense is through freedom of speech and expression. Perhaps you have couple of practical examples?

I'm not the one claiming that progress to freedom is through individuals, a statement which was idiotically unqualified, and fits the pattern of many of your statements. Now that someone's reminded you of additional considerations, you consider them. How rational of you.

tuco wrote:I am not sure which human right is more important over another as human rights are a set, and as a set they provide framework or standards of human behavior.

Shocking, but true. You really aren't sure, but that's a step in the right direction.

Well, we are not making any progress here so maybe later.

tuco wrote:Well, we are not making any progress here so maybe later.

Progress is something to believe in, not something to expect. Unless, uh, you're in engineering, and even then, it's rare, and still depends on what your goals were. If you don't name the target before you release the arrow, it's not an archery competition.

tuco wrote:

Rachel Bronwyn wrote:I still can't wrap my head around how verbal harassment and incitement of violence being punishable is harmful to me. I can't wrap my head around the fetishization of freedom of speech either though. There are rights of way more importance to me than being able to say whatever I want whenever I want.

What you call/perceive as fetishization others see as fundamental right/freedom. There are books about it, we've had several debates on it here but let me note following:

- the only way to prioritize various freedoms is through individuals
- once freedom of speech and expression is taken away, all other rights/freedoms can be threatened because its not possible to defend them through speech and expression
- its been suggested that societies valuing freedom of speech and expression highly are more resistant to totalitarianism because totalitarian regimes always curb freedom of speech and expression as first

I am not sure which human right is more important over another as human rights are a set, and as a set they provide framework or standards of human behavior.

Now if we get into details, the said fetishization respectively, you could surely make sound arguments against it but where will you stop?

Agree. Put simply: "The smallest minority on earth is the individual. Those who deny individual rights cannot claim to be defenders of minorities."

Paul1 wrote:Put simply: "The smallest minority on earth is the individual. Those who deny individual rights cannot claim to be defenders of minorities."

There's a terrifying rhetorical fail in there somewhere, Paul. I'll leave it to the taxonomists to name it. Suffice it to say that you're just making an excuse for individual histrionics just as much as you are for principled individual expressions or identities, because you haven't said what encompasses individual rights. You're talking out of your ass.

You could also stand to devote some thought to how glib your conception of 'minorities' might be. I'm not saying that the people who defend (nominally) the rights of minorities are not working with glib conceptions as well. Lie down with dogs, wake up with fleas.

Cito di Pense wrote:

Paul1 wrote:Put simply: "The smallest minority on earth is the individual. Those who deny individual rights cannot claim to be defenders of minorities."

There's a terrifying rhetorical fail in there somewhere, Paul. I'll leave it to the taxonomists to name it. Suffice it to say that you're just making an excuse for individual histrionics just as much as you are for principled individual expressions or identities, because you haven't said what encompasses individual rights. You're talking out of your ass.

A terrifying fail you don't care to explain? And I'm the one talking out of my ass?

Perhaps you should devote some thought to questioning your own ideals as much as you demand others do the same.

Paul1 wrote:

Cito di Pense wrote:

Paul1 wrote:Put simply: "The smallest minority on earth is the individual. Those who deny individual rights cannot claim to be defenders of minorities."

There's a terrifying rhetorical fail in there somewhere, Paul. I'll leave it to the taxonomists to name it. Suffice it to say that you're just making an excuse for individual histrionics just as much as you are for principled individual expressions or identities, because you haven't said what encompasses individual rights. You're talking out of your ass.

A terrifying fail you don't care to explain? And I'm the one talking out of my ass?

Perhaps you should devote some thought to questioning your own ideals as much as you demand others do the same.

In brief, Paul, you're dressing up the way people talk to each other in social media or face to face as a social justice issue based in individual rights. Defend your individual rights to those folks, attack their defenses of minorities, but do it with them. If you were hoping to have ammunition handed to you, I'm sure you can find some in this thread. If your attack on their position is that those who deny individual rights cannot claim to be defenders of minorities, how do you think that's going to stop them from claiming to be defenders of minorities? What you've stated is a premise, or possibly your conclusion, or both, and not an argument at all. If you claim to have ideals, do a better job of questioning or defending them. Me, I'm neither defending minorities nor attacking your right to express yourself, least of all on the basis that your voice infringes on the rights of minorities.

Nicko wrote:

Paul1 wrote:... what do you think about the concept of dangerous opinions?

That they need to be refuted.

The solution is left as an exercise for the diligent reader.

Spinozasgalt wrote:Why would you push freedom of speech in conversation with "SJWs"? I just...I wouldn't recommend doing that. You'll find liberals on the left, sure. And plenty of these shallow activists that pretty much just repeat popular rhetoric and slogans will go along to some degree. But...it's like a mainstay of the thought that underlies large chunks of activism on the left, that the state and its structures and legalisms are complicit in marginalisation of minority groups; that liberal notions like neutrality and individualism maintain and enforce certain power dynamics and so on and so forth. It's pretty much a standard criticism of liberal individualism: the state doesn't protect minorities because the abstract and supposedly universal individual in the liberal state, for whom that state functions, is actually a particularly-situated white upper-middle class male with all the typical privileges.

I really wouldn't expect people on the left to be impressed by your liberalism.

Forgive me, I feel quite out of my depth in this sort of discussion, but I get nervous about laws getting on the books about speech, because I fear that the state will use those laws in their own interest and not in the interests of the public good.

If we're talking about free-speech not in the context of legislation, then I find it hard to give a shit. If this is about youtube, or twitter or facebook, then I'll keep reminding people that these are not public spaces, and that these companies are pretty universally detested by groups pushing for digital freedom.

Paul1 wrote:

Cito di Pense wrote:

Paul1 wrote:Put simply: "The smallest minority on earth is the individual. Those who deny individual rights cannot claim to be defenders of minorities."

There's a terrifying rhetorical fail in there somewhere, Paul. I'll leave it to the taxonomists to name it. Suffice it to say that you're just making an excuse for individual histrionics just as much as you are for principled individual expressions or identities, because you haven't said what encompasses individual rights. You're talking out of your ass.

A terrifying fail you don't care to explain? And I'm the one talking out of my ass?

Perhaps you should devote some thought to questioning your own ideals as much as you demand others do the same. :P

Perhaps s/he does question them elsewhere but here never presents them directly. We are left to guess based on posting pattern. To criticise is easier than to stand up for or come up with something.

What I find interesting is that we rightly accept limits on free speech with respect to libel and defamation. The litmus test for this is harm done to reputation by speech. This includes the protection of corporations.
Why, then, is it so hard to imagine limits on speech, legal or social, that might do harm to a minority?