• pixxelkick@lemmy.world
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    9 months ago

    Far too often people forget that Right to Free Speech is not your first right, and it is superseded by other human rights above it.

    Your right to Free Speech only applies as long as it doesn’t interfere with other people’s rights to safety and freedom from prejudice, hate, harm, etc…

    It’s not that complicated and yet countless people always fuck something so straightforward up.

    • iByteABit [he/him]@lemm.ee
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      9 months ago

      It begins with free speech, then you skip a few years and suddenly trans kids are scared for their lives. Speech affects people and has consequence, it is not something to take lightly.

    • random65837@lemmy.world
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      9 months ago

      That’s all fine and dandy until people change the definition of those words to suit their needs. Then all speech they disagree with is hate speech. Which has already happened.

      • dangblingus@lemmy.dbzer0.com
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        9 months ago

        I’m sorry to have to tell you this, but you’ve been had. No one is coming to take your precious heteronormativity and matching pronouns away from you.

          • pinkdrunkenelephants@sopuli.xyz
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            9 months ago

            Dude, you’re gonna have to accept you can’t say hate speech or express hate toward other people based on superficial characteristics at some point. You’re only making it harder on yourself quibbling over semantics.

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                9 months ago

                If your ability to label someone as a bigot relies on your own poor understanding of language, then you aren’t fighting hate speech, you’re just a manipulative asshole.

                That’s what you ought to be telling the bigots, but here you are defending them.

      • KaiReeve@lemmy.world
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        9 months ago

        So what you’re saying is that it’s important to instill strong morals and encourage critical thinking in the general populous so that we can recognize the difference between actual hate speech and what is being spun as hate speech in order to further the agendas of those who would oppress us and therefore any action made to suppress public education must be the precursor to a larger scheme to gain control by manipulating the ignorant?

        • Iceblade@lemmy.world
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          9 months ago

          Not OP but in my country there have been pushes to label criticism of Islam as hate speech against muslims. Partucularly troublesome given how Islamic views of women and LGBT individuals have become more prevalent.

      • pixxelkick@lemmy.world
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        9 months ago

        Thats not how Hate Speech works, its explicitly about intent and not the actual words used, at least in Canada.

        Canada doesn’t specify any specific words that are “banned” or whatever, and the law is explicitly setup to handle that no matter what you do or dont say, all it cares is about the intent behind your words and whether they intended to incite violence/hate.

  • Chenzo@lemmy.world
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    9 months ago

    the tolerance paradox

    If everyone is tolerant of every idea, then intolerant ideas will emerge. Tolerant people will tolerate this intolerance, and the intolerant people will not tolerate the tolerant people.

    • cynar@lemmy.world
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      9 months ago

      The solution is that it’s a social contract. I agree to tolerate your weirdness and quirks. You agree to do the same to myself and others.

      By being intolerant (without a good reason), they break the social contract. Therefore they are no longer protected by it either.

        • player2@lemmy.dbzer0.com
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          9 months ago

          The side acting in bad faith can use the broken systems in place to indirectly enforce their beliefs. For example, jerry-mandering voting maps to ensure that people of your race and party win, allowing more control over policy making and the lives of the people.

          The US is set up to protect capitalism at the cost of fair treatment of all people. It’s not as obvious as the comic makes it look.

        • assassin_aragorn@lemmy.world
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          9 months ago

          This doesn’t seem so much of a liberal thing but a social centrist thing. There’s plenty of people on the left that are socialist/communist but don’t care as much about social issues. I recall someone arguing that the people who wanted to kidnap Gov Whitmer were experiencing “economic anxiety”. You see it too with leftists who float the idea of working with MAGA hats for economic populism.

          It’s like when people say there’s basically only one party or there’s no difference between Democrats and Republicans. From a purely economic perspective, sure, the differences are rather small. Pretty much just comes down to taxes. But the two parties are polar opposites when it comes to social issues. To say there’s no difference is basically ignoring the social aspect.

          Enlightened centrist or liberal or apologist, it’s just cringe.

        • A_Random_Idiot@lemmy.world
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          9 months ago

          anyone telling you to defend nazi’s isnt a lib.

          You’d think that’d be obvious and you wouldnt have to be told that, yet here we are, having to tell you the blatant fuckin obvious.

          • cynar@lemmy.world
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            9 months ago

            The problem is it’s not a simplistic line. I strongly disagree with the nazi viewpoint. They also break the social contract so often they’ve voided all rights to be covered by it. At the same time, some people want to take it too far. There are still later lines we shouldn’t cross. (E.g. A mob beating Nazis with baseball bats is never acceptable).

            Unfortunately, Nazis like playing games, and trying to mess with the scale of problems. Some people try and step in and “help” without realising that they are dealing with untrustworthy information. This can tie people’s minds into an impressive knot, just as they intended.

            • A_Random_Idiot@lemmy.world
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              9 months ago

              (E.g. A mob beating Nazis with baseball bats is never acceptable).

              real heavy “Then they came for me—and there was no one left to speak for me.” vibes from this.

              Endgame for fascists, nazis, authoritarians, etc is violence. Violence against you, me, and anyone else they declare “undesirable”

              The only way to defeat them is violence. To protect a civil society and a way of life that allows humanity to blossom in all its various shades and shapes.

              You hide behind betters, pretending to have a moral highground because you didnt get the blood on your hands, while benefiting from the blood on everyone elses.

              • assassin_aragorn@lemmy.world
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                9 months ago

                I don’t think it’s so much violence itself but the threat of violence. Nazis and fascists need to know that if they get violent, we’ll return it a hundredfold in kind.

                It’s kind of like the phrase that a sheathed sword is sometimes enough to keep the peace. The threat of it being used is what keeps people in line. What we need are more visible sheathed swords – unless of course we need to draw the weapon.

              • cynar@lemmy.world
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                9 months ago

                I never said I’m not willing to get blood on my hands. Violence can be required. It’s an unfortunate sign though that we have already failed badly. However, if violence is required, it should be controlled, and focused. A mob beating with fists is spontaneous, a mob using baseball bats is a lynching.

                The difference between a mob and a militia is in the organisation and responsibilities. A militia has a chain of command, and so someone who can stop things going too far. They can also make sure the actual job is done, rather than straying into mindless violence.

                If violence is required, we are morally required to apply it. However, we are also morally required to apply it precisely in controlled amounts, towards the required goal. Otherwise we can easily degenerate into the exact thing we claim to fight.

                The other thing to remember is that we can be baited. Mindless violence might feel good, but if it doesn’t advance the cause, it’s worthless. Even worse, it can justify the actions of the other side, even if the balance is still disproportionate.

                • A_Random_Idiot@lemmy.world
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                  9 months ago

                  The amount of people trying to middleground this shit to advance nazi causes shows you just how fucking good they are at infiltrating discussions to try and shift their bullshit to a more normalized position with this soft hands shit.

                  Its blatantly black and white. If you arent against it, you are enabling it. Not a lot of things in life are black and white, but this particular instance is. There is no middle ground, no concessions, nothing. Only absolute rejection. Anything less is just is just letting them win and advance.

      • PsychedSy@sh.itjust.works
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        9 months ago

        Someone else being a twat won’t make me violate my principles. I’m not good to others because they’re good to me. I’m good to others because they’re an end themselves, not a means to my ends.

        • cynar@lemmy.world
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          9 months ago

          And that’s completely your right to do. However, that is not what the tolerance contract covers. It goes beyond what most people would tolerate normally. Also, people cannot both break the social contract, and then insist you hold up the other end.

          By example, I’ve previously had long debates over nazi Germany and Hitler’s economic recovery. I would even tolerate Nazis, if they followed the social contract from their side. Unfortunately, the various Nazis groups regularly break that contract. They then try and hide behind it, when others take offence.

          Conversely, I also disagree with the “tankies”. They tend not to break the social contract however. This gives them the right to reasonable tolerance of them, and their views. They respect others, despite disagreeing with them. They, in turn, gain a level of respect in discussions.

          Don’t get me wrong, I am tolerant of a lot, from purely moralistic reasoning. The social contract is a larger entity however. It formalises what many of us feel. It also shows us where the lines are, beyond which people are abusing our tolerance. It’s the larger social version of our internal morals.

          • PsychedSy@sh.itjust.works
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            9 months ago

            I don’t find social contract arguments all that convincing, but we can just pretend my social contract is “no violence or you get fucked” and ignore that. Tankies are way easier to talk to than Nazis, though I don’t really find myself talking to nazis often - just run of the mill bigots. Anyone with consistent standards or ethics is fairly easy to talk to, even if we disagree.

            In my personal life I tend to take on more than half of the social costs in some friendships and I probably do the same when arguing with certain types of people. I’m more tolerant than I strictly need to be, but I feel like treating people like that is necessary for me.

            • nybble41@programming.dev
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              9 months ago

              The social contract concept is over-used by people who try to make it cover too much. It becomes a one-sided contract of adhesion which you’re assumed to have agreed to simply by existing. This, however, is simple reciprocation—it’s more like a truce than a contract. It would be unreasonable to expect tolerance from others while refusing to grant the same tolerance to them.

              Of course there is no obligation to be intolerant just because the other person is; you are free to make a better choice.

        • A_Random_Idiot@lemmy.world
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          9 months ago

          If you are good to nazi’s because they are good to you, regardless of what they do to others, Then your principles, and you as a person, are shit, and you should be treated as nothing but an infiltrator for their cause, because that is what you are.

      • Calavera@lemm.ee
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        9 months ago

        Honestly these days if you say you tolerate someones ideas, but you don’t agree with them, then you are just called a ist word

        • cynar@lemmy.world
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          9 months ago

          There are levels of tolerance in there. E.g. I’m not gay. I have no interest in men. The idea of being sexual with a man is mildly repulsive to me.

          With this, the bare minimum of tolerance is not actively working against the existence and legality of being gay.

          Next is the “none of my business” level of tolerance. What happens between 2 consenting adults is down to them.

          Above that is acceptance. Gay people have developed their own culture and community. While it’s not for me, I recognise that its existence and celebration makes our overall culture more dynamic and interesting. It also provides a lot of happiness to others. Accepting and rolling with that provides a lot of positivity to others, without significant cost to me.

          However, if I was approached by a gay guy and propositioned, there is no issue with me turning them down. I try and be polite about it, but being firm isn’t being intolerant. (Luckily, most gay guys take being rejected a LOT better than some straight guys do).

          Going back to your example. Going up to a black guy and expressing that, while you tolerate them not being a slave, you don’t agree with it. This is intolerant, it is an incredibly strong dog whistle of your tolerance is forced.

          Conversely, if, during a debate on religion and it’s effects, you express your view that you accept people are religious, but don’t agree with it, that is better. The context is a debate, and you can explain your reasoning better. It also lacks the dog whistle element that makes it bigoted.

          Basically, context matters, A LOT.

            • cynar@lemmy.world
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              9 months ago

              I’ve found crystallising my morals into words and logic is useful. It both makes it easier to explain, as well as finding holes in my views. My moral framework has advanced significantly over my life. At no point did I think I was immoral, however, I have found significant flaws in my viewpoints. I’ve also found a lot of biases, which I’m mildly horrified that I ever held.

              I’m still far from perfect, but aiming that way, as best I can.

  • A_Random_Idiot@lemmy.world
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    9 months ago

    Tolerance is a social contract.

    Those who dont abide by it, try to use it as a weapon against those who do, to enable their intolerance to grow and spread.

    Those who don’t abide by the social contract are a threat to society as a whole, and should not receive its protection.

    Because you end up empowering them, and weakening society against them.

    Intolerance must be put down, with force. It is not hypocritical. It is not paradoxical. For the garden of tolerance to thrive, the intolerant weeds must be ripped out of the soil and disposed of in such a way that they can not spread their seeds further, because if you don’t… nothing will thrive but the weeds.

    • Maggoty@lemmy.world
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      9 months ago

      That’s a very heavy responsibility though. And the abuse of it is the exact reason our founders gave us such an extreme right. Alas we were also supposed to maintain a healthy public dialogue and rewrite the Constitution every 20 years. Doing half the job doesn’t end well.

    • MrCharles@lemmy.world
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      9 months ago

      Intolerance must be put down, with force. It is not hypocritical. It is not paradoxical.

      The human capacity for cognitive dissonance will never cease to amaze me.

  • Bytemeister@lemmy.world
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    9 months ago

    Lotta talk in here about free speech that seems to be missing the point.

    The right for someone to spew hateful rhetoric freely does not supercede my right not to tolerate it. The first amendment does not give the hate monger, nor the englightened centrist immunity from the social consequences of their public opinions.

    • migo@lemmy.dbzer0.com
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      9 months ago

      Exactly: in order to promote tolerance we must be intolerant to intolerance. It’s a paradox described by Popper.

      • pinkdrunkenelephants@sopuli.xyz
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        9 months ago

        Why do people think there’s a paradox? Tolerance is a bad policy anyway; the point is to make society accept different races, genders and sexual orientations within reason (i.e. no pedos or whackos) so why even bother with tolerance if you have to dance around it to protect yourself and not be a hypocrite?

        • migo@lemmy.dbzer0.com
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          9 months ago

          You’re taking an authoritarian perspective. Fair, but I disagree. Tolerance is important because we as a society grow and evolve due to the discussion of ideas, simple or complex as they may be.

          The paradox is that to achieve a tolerant society we must be absolutely intolerant to intolerant ideas otherwise intolerance “wins” and becomes the norm.

        • thonofpy@lemmy.world
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          9 months ago

          I don’t quite understand what you mean, could you perhaps rephrase in another couple of sentences? Edit: I’d still be genuinely interested in an explanation of your initial comment. It might help clear things up.

    • dx1@lemmy.world
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      9 months ago

      Nor does it magically make their ideas into law. For a democracy to do this it has to actually accept the totalitarian ideas. Widespread ignorance is therefore a precondition for the “paradox” to hold true.

      Ironically, ignoring that is a classic appeal to totalitarian principles - claiming that, without totalitarian controls on some aspect of human behavior, people must necessary produce some bad outcome, therefore, banning bad behavior is necessary. It ignores really the entire moral evolution and capability for reasoning of individuals in favor of a simplistic mechanical explanation of people. The simplistic language of “tolerance” in the paradox obfuscates key details - what we advocate with “free speech” is that the government may not criminally punish forms of speech, not that we must respect every idea equally on conceptual grounds, or especially not put every idea, flawed or not, into practice, or law. The entire idea behind a free democracy is that we diligently compare and evaluate concepts and put only the best ideas into practice.

      • orrk@lemmy.world
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        9 months ago

        The entire idea behind a free democracy is that we diligently compare and evaluate concepts and put only the best ideas into practice.

        No, the idea of Democracy is surprisingly not to put the best idea into practice, but instead to create a societal framework that the majority of members can live under. It’s not about creating good results but the legitimization of the government.

        I highly suggest you look into the philosophical background of the democratic movement and liberalism before you continue to repeat the fruits of American Slavers arguing that “states rights”.

        • dx1@lemmy.world
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          9 months ago

          No, the idea of Democracy is surprisingly not to put the best idea into practice, but instead to create a societal framework that the majority of members can live under. It’s not about creating good results but the legitimization of the government.

          That IS the best idea, the societal framework that gives the best outcome for the population. Come on, with this reply, seriously.

          • orrk@lemmy.world
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            9 months ago

            No, Democracy brings about not the best idea, but the most commonly accepted one, and there is often stark difference. There is a reason the democratic philosophers never actually mentioned “the ability for democracy to find the best idea” and many instead outright warned of the potential for bad ideas, going all the way back to Plato’s accounting of Socrates, in the works of enlightenment and revolutionary philosophers such as John Lock, or the governmental structure of the United States its self.

            The governmental philosophy that does promise the best results on the other hand is a technocracy.

            But do, please keep going about the platitude you heard.

            • dx1@lemmy.world
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              9 months ago

              That is the formula for the best outcome in a democracy. Nobody is talking about how Greek philosophers described it. Pipe down.

              This is one of those really nasty reddit patterns I was enjoying not encountering here. You leave a thoughtful/well-reasoned message one morning, the next day you wake up and some guy is still hounding you about his bad-faith reading of your comment. I write “the entire idea behind a free democracy”, in context clearly I’m talking about how you actually make a society work best with a democratic model, and he starts replying with a “correction” about early Greek philosophers’ takes on democracy, like this is in any way what I was talking about.

              • orrk@lemmy.world
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                9 months ago

                but your message is not as thought out and well reasoned as you think it is. You are literally just repeating stuff you have heard somewhere, without knowing the context or the entire surrounding school of thought, and then of course you double down on your dunning Kruger interpretation of what a democracy does.

                And I wouldn’t call John Lock or Alexander Hamilton a “Greek philosopher”, but you do need to understand that their idea of democracy stems from the Renaissance and Enlightenment era’s rediscovery of Greco-Roman philosophy, so if you are referring to democracy as a governmental structure, you are talking about these Greek philosophers.

                • dx1@lemmy.world
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                  I am not “just repeating stuff I have heard somewhere”, I have reasoned out myself the basic truth that a society where the will of the public dictates its structure benefits immensely from the population being educated. Regardless of what Socrates or Plato said, regardless of what the American “founding fathers” said. Done with this conversation, blocking.

    • MrCharles@lemmy.world
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      9 months ago

      There should never be legal consequences for it. I am absolutely for everyone and anyone to be able to say as much racist, sexist, homophobic or what-have-you crap as they want. BUT I agree that the social consequences should be allowed to thrive. Act like a jerk; people are jerks right back. Act like an absolute piece of shit; guess how people treat you? I think that all this sabre rattling about censoring hate speech is just driving the attention-removed into the public forum, not because they actually hate the people they say they do, but because they’re attention removed.

  • Maggoty@lemmy.world
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    9 months ago

    When I was growing up it was never about tolerating intolerance. It was about dragging it out into the sunlight so you could kill it. They have a right to say anything they want so we can make an example of them and they don’t go into hiding and do dumb shit.

    Of course that depended on the mainstream leadership believing in democracy and not leaning into extremism. Because the GOP has switched sides on democracy it’s a liability now instead of a strength. A swing too far from the laws of England our founders meant to forestall.

    • JackbyDev@programming.dev
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      What are you on about, mate? This is the same sort of rhetoric you see form the GOP, “Make America great again.”

      • Maggoty@lemmy.world
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        Dude, they literally took the Capitol building in an attempt to prevent the election results from being certified. If the GOP didn’t want to back Trump after that I’d respect that. But they fell in line. They’re okay with that. Which means they are not okay with democracy. There’s no democracy without free elections.

    • MrCharles@lemmy.world
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      They have a right to say anything they want so we can make an example of them and they don’t go into hiding and do dumb shit.

      Well… that’s not very freedom of you.

      • Syndic@feddit.de
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        9 months ago

        Of course that is freedom. It’s the freedom of association and freedom of speech of the people appealed by the words of these bigots.

        No one is free of the consequences of their words.

  • IninewCrow@lemmy.ca
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    9 months ago

    No one ever gets the point until people start getting beaten, threatened, wounded, maimed or killed. They’ll keep arguing the details until there is an authoritarian government telling you what you can or can’t do or say.

    Then everyone stands around wondering how it all happened.

    Most regular people I know just want to live life and not really bother with anyone else in a negative way … in fact most people I’ve ever known would do something good for the other person if it meant it would help. Most people are just good and have a very good nature.

    It’s the psychotic few billionaires and millionaires out there that want a world with authoritarian fascist government in power because it means those wealthy few get to keep all their money and if they do get their way, they can exponentially grow the wealth they already have. It’s all about money and power.

    It’s all about a handful of morons who aren’t aware of their finite life that believe they can become temporary rulers of the world.

    • Match!!@pawb.social
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      9 months ago

      Some number of people are getting maimed, wounded, or killed. Do people have a threshold number at which point they decide it’s too much?

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        I like to explain it as such:

        The Mediterranean is full of dead bodies from asylum seekers, but people still bath there. People will not bathe in a pool, if that pool has a single cadaver in it. Some might say that it doesn’t count because you can’t see the bodies in the Mediterranean, but you can in the pool. but even if the pool has an angle and the corpse obscured behind said angle, people won’t swim in it if they are told this in advance. so clearly there must be some ratio of dead people to water that society sees as acceptable.

        so to answer your question, yes, and we haven’t reached that point yet, and the right is doing it’s best to keep that bar as high as possible.

      • IninewCrow@lemmy.ca
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        9 months ago

        Usually hunger … if you look through history, change doesn’t happen in societies because people are poor, abused, imprisoned, impoverished or have a lack of luxuries … change often happens when people go hungry because at that point they all realize that if they have no food, they will die … and when they can see death, especially their own death, they no longer have anything to lose and will fight for some kind of change …

        And even that want for change is dangerous because it can come in many forms … good change, bad change, fascist change, socialist change, democratic change, authoritarian change.

    • rodolfo@lemmy.world
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      9 months ago

      in your post the thing I liked the most, the most significant in my opinion, it’s

      They’ll keep arguing the details

      this is the sum of all the thread. there’s so much on this few words. in my understanding,vsums up perfectly what I’d describe as the paranoia feeding the knitpicking and the extenuating effort to manage the malice. thank you

  • Smoogs@lemmy.world
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    9 months ago

    Hate speech is not the same as free speech. Free speech was for reporters to keep them from being jailed so it’s not even applicable for what this guy thinks he’s defending with that phrase.

    • Trantarius@programming.dev
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      9 months ago

      That’s not entirely accurate. The first amendment mentions both freedom of speech and freedom of press. Freedom of speech is for individuals sharing ideas, not just reporters. That applies both conceptually and legally. Hate speech is seen as a necessary exemption by many, because of the potential ramifications (see comic). That isn’t the same thing as saying free speech wouldn’t apply even without said exemption; even though it may lead you to the same conclusion.

      • Smoogs@lemmy.world
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        9 months ago

        If you don’t like the reprocussions and losing your job for yelling sexist or racist comments at people out in the world, that’s not what freedom of speech protects.

    • RedditRefugee69@lemmy.world
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      9 months ago

      It’s also worth noting that the government can’t limit free speech. We as citizens can boycott, bully, and harass hateful speech and should

      • Syndic@feddit.de
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        9 months ago

        It’s also worth noting that the government can’t limit free speech.

        But it can and does! Go on Facebook and detail how you will storm and overthrow your state government next Monday at noon and see how long it takes for your speech to land you in jail. Or incite a stampede in a cinema by yelling “Fire!”. And that’s just two examples. Libel and slander are other examples where “just words” can get you in trouble with the government.

        The idea of complete unlimited speech in the US is a fantasy. They clearly can and do draw lines at what you can and can’t say in public. The only question is where this lines are.

        • RedditRefugee69@lemmy.world
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          9 months ago

          Yeah, fair. That’s a whole nother can of worms to this discussion where physical harm results from words rather than simply expressing abhorrent beliefs

          • Syndic@feddit.de
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            9 months ago

            Well, WW2 in Europe and it’s resulting horrors was basically the result of Hitler and Mussolini “simply expressing abhorrent beliefs”. That’s how they got into power in the first place and also how they got the better part of their population behind their insane dreams.

      • Smoogs@lemmy.world
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        9 months ago

        I’m with you on boycotting. Not with you on the abuse. Boycotting is not abuse. Though the bros with the cancel culture shirts seem to think so.

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        Citizens have their own limitations when their response strays outside the realm of speech. Boycotts are fine—you have no obligation to buy what they’re selling. However, harassment is not okay, and bullying is not okay. These things are wrong (and coincidentally illegal) on their own merits, and not a justified response to someone else’s speech.

        • RedditRefugee69@lemmy.world
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          9 months ago

          I wouldn’t go so far as saying bullying hateful and racist actors is illegal, but I think it’s a fair point that you have to use judgment and empathy when dealing with differing opinions

    • MrCharles@lemmy.world
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      9 months ago

      And what is hate speech? When we start telling people what is and is not allowable to say, we set a highly dangerous precedent and move the game from black and white lines into shades of gray. Another shade darker is far easier to slip into than black from white.

      • stevedidwhat_infosec@infosec.pub
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        9 months ago

        Oh cool! Muddy waters!

        I’ll just go ahead and stick this filter in here.

        Hate speech: abusive or threatening speech or writing used to express prejudice on the basis of ethnicity, religion, sexual orientation, or similar grounds.

        Pretty simple, you don’t get to threaten, scare or abuse people with your words. That infringes on their right to life liberty and the pursuit of happiness.

        Shall we of course discuss the one grey area “or similar grounds” or was there another direction you’d like to take this?

        • MrCharles@lemmy.world
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          lol No, I’ll take it another direction (mostly).

          The definition you gave is already broad enough that I do not have to appeal to the “or similar grounds.” I, personally, find it dishonest to call another by their preferred pronouns (I perceive that they are not the sex they wish me to refer to them as, therefore to deny my perception would be to lie. Their preferences or gender do not change that.) Under your definition, that would likely be called hate speech; but I am not trying to hate anyone. I don’t think they should be treated differently from others, nor am I trying to make them feel unloved or hated in any way; rather, I am simply trying to be honest about what I see.

          Here’s another example: Say I conduct a study that compares the IQ of different ethnicities within a country. If I get results that slant one direction or another, publishing such a study might be deemed hate speech.

          Here’s another from the post we are talking about: On the second panel, you see the hateful man holding a book with a cross on it and saying that LGBT people in the background are affronts to God. Later, he is seen become an obvious totalitarian authority of some sort. A Christian might find such a comparison offensive. They may truly believe that homosexuality is wrong because that is what their religion teaches. Would preaching that topic become hate speech? Would preaching that RELIGION be considered hate speech?

          A good rule of thumb I found is this: When advocating for any increase in power, especially in government, imagine that power in the hands of your worst enemy. Would you still want it to be used? I wouldn’t.

          • stevedidwhat_infosec@infosec.pub
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            9 months ago

            I’ve read enough you’re a douche and you refuse to accept reality because you think your perception is law.

            Purposefully and knowingly causing someone true anguish and denying them of their identity is next to nazi shit imo. You’re a sack of human waste and no amount of water muddying you can possibly produce will stop us from identifying and calling people like you out.

            Your perception of reality is subjective full stop. It is not objective. Therefor by stomping on others subjectives with your own you imply superiority.

            Rot.

            • MrCharles@lemmy.world
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              Hold up. The above comment called for literal violence, and I’m the one who gets this level of hate? I truly do not understand.

              I agree that my perception is subjective, but since I don’t have any other that I can experience, I rely on my own first and foremost when mine conflicts with someone else’s. That seems logical to me.

              EDIT: Hold up x2. “Causing them true anguish?” “Denying them of their identity?” WTF? How is that what I am doing? I think we’re losing perspective on what true anguish actually looks like here.

          • Kras Mazov
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            I, personally, find it dishonest to call another by their preferred pronouns (I perceive that they are not the sex they wish me to refer to them as, therefore to deny my perception would be to lie.

            Oh wow, who would have guessed that a free speech absolutist is a transphobe? Shocking!!!

            but I am not trying to hate anyone. I don’t think they should be treated differently from others, nor am I trying to make them feel unloved or hated in any way; rather, I am simply trying to be honest about what I see.

            By denying them their gender you are denying their identity, hating them and treating them differently just because they are trans/nb and making them feel unwelcomed, unloved and hated, something you doesn’t do to cis people.

            And all that is assuming you can even “tell” when someone is trans.

            You’re not being honest, you’re being a self-centered bigot that clearly doesnt understand gender, neither trans nor non-binary people.

            Here’s another example: Say I conduct a study that compares the IQ of different ethnicities within a country. If I get results that slant one direction or another, publishing such a study might be deemed hate speech.

            Ugh, here we go.

            IQ is only ONE measure of skill/“inteligence” that is very limited and doesn’t mean much.

            Also your example just shows you wouldn’t understand the meaning of the results of such study. If the data represent that a given ethnicity got lower scores that’s only the start of the study, you then have to go deeper to understand why. Is it because they are “less inteligent”, or is it because they are a marginalized group that receive less and poorer education? Is their education on par with the other tested ethnicity? How do another group of the same ethnicity on another conditions/country/whatever fare in the study? Etc, etc, etc.

            This have already been done and research suggests the difference encountered is directly correlated with the environment differences, that is, the material conditions of the different groups of people tested.

            On the second panel, you see the hateful man holding a book with a cross on it and saying that LGBT people in the background are affronts to God. Later, he is seen become an obvious totalitarian authority of some sort. A Christian might find such a comparison offensive.

            So what? Atrocities have been commited in the name of their religion throughout history, why should we care if the christian find it “offensive” that they are depicted in the wrong for the wrong thst they are still doing? They literally brought this upon themselves by allowing this hateful anti-LGBT behavior to still exist within them.

            They may truly believe that homosexuality is wrong because that is what their religion teaches.

            Then they need to adapt to the times and start seeing LGBT as people like we are. Or they can go fuck themselves. One side is just trying to exist, the other is spewing hateful views and lies about them. There is no space for intolerance in society.

            Would preaching that topic become hate speech? Would preaching that RELIGION be considered hate speech?

            Yes. Either change your views and adapt or fuck off. If they don’t respect people they should not expect to be respected, no matter how much they convinced themselves they are right.

      • Smoogs@lemmy.world
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        Oh go cry in your racist pillow that you can’t scream racisms at people on the street.

        • MrCharles@lemmy.world
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          Hmm… Can’t tell if you’re agreeing or sarcastically and incorrectly pointing out a logical fallacy. If you agree, cool. If not:

          The Slippery Slope fallacy is only a fallacy if one posits that the future events MUST happen as a result, not that they are likely to. If I take a step further down a literal slippery slope, I am more likely to fall but not guaranteed. If you start using hardcore drugs, you are likely to get addicted and lose a lot of money but again, not guaranteed.

          That this would set a dangerous precedent is not a slippery slope argument in the slightest. Courts frequently have to bear in mind the legal precedent of their actions because once you do something, its easier the next time. That is fact, not conjecture. It is easier to ratchet down on a freedom that is already jeopardized. No conjecture involved there. No slippery slopes involved. If we allow some speech to be censored, it becomes easier to censor other types of speech.

  • Transcriptionist@lemmy.world
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    Image Transcription:

    A comic by Jennie Breeden and Obby from site TheDevilsPanties.com.

    The first panel shows a mustached person with short hair wearing a t-shirt and sitting at a laptop. A speech bubble rising from the laptop reads “I just don’t think you people belong in our society!”

    The second panel shows a different short-haired person wearing a t-shirt, long pants, and sneakers, sitting on a park bench and looking at a mobile phone. A speech bubble from the mobile phone reads “Well, I don’t agree with what you’re saying, but I’ll fight for your right to say it.”

    The third panel shows both people standing on the side of a street. The first person is holding a Bible and pointing across the road at a group of shadowed people carrying signs with hearts and pride flags. He is speaking to a crowd of people and saying “Your kind is a betrayal to God! You’re a drag on the whole country!” To which the second person is shrugging and responding “That’s appalling, but we can’t have free speech without the free marketplace of ideas!”

    The fourth panel shows the first person standing at a lectern and wearing a suit with an American flag behind them and a shadowed crowd in front of them. They are saying “We will stop the woke ideology that’s destroying America!”. The second person is standing close to the foreground and shrugging, saying “Democracy needs this discourse, so let’s agree to disagree.”

    The fifth panel shows the second person being dragged away by people in uniform while saying “Wait! Where are you taking me? You can’t just get rid of me!”. The first person is standing between the first person and an open paddy wagon, wearing a black uniform and looking smug as they reply “Let’s just agree to disagree.”

    [I am a human, if I’ve made a mistake please let me know. Please consider providing alt-text for ease of use. Thank you. 💜]

  • InternetTubes@lemmy.world
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    9 months ago

    Sort of the same for multiculturalism. Only cultures that accept multiple cultures should be part of a multicultural society.

    • DarthBueller@lemmy.world
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      Yes. And “accepting” doesn’t mean love bombing for purposes of conversion, like evangelism/da’wah (only to reveal the nasty tenets after initiation into the group). And acceptance with the fundamental belief that women are subservient to men in some fucked up sense of divine order is not acceptance. If someone wants to call this an Islamophobic dog whistle, they need to get their hearing fixed.

    • trashgirlfriend@lemmy.world
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      I think this is a very bad idea and leads to bad places.

      The culture in China is extremely insular and the Chinese state is very focused on homogenising the country into a single culture.

      Should Chinese people be not allowed to move out of China?

      I think discriminating on immigration based on ethnicity is an appalling idea, even if it means that sometimes a person from a bad country immigrates to where I live.

      • InternetTubes@lemmy.world
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        That’s a good point, many countries have their own insular China towns as a result and their presence in those societies is very one sided. You even have China setting up extralegal police stations overseas, which shows the lack of respect it is fostering. I think discriminating immigration policiy based on ethnicities that would discriminate against you is quite reasonable, but that doesn’t mean someone from a bad country shouldn’t be allowed to immigrate to where you live, but that you have to make their ability to accept multiple cultures as the deciding factor, specially if you know they are coming from a society specially against it.

        Ask Mongolia, Hong Kong, Tiber, or Taiwan how much they like you white knighting their homogenizing the country (and even that which really isn’t) into a single culture.

        • nybble41@programming.dev
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          A person can see a dog whistle and know it for what it is without being able to hear it. Also it’s not only dogs who can hear dog whistles; some people just have exceptionally good hearing.

        • DarthBueller@lemmy.world
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          Or a former dog. I can remember the days of Bush Jr. regularly dog whistling to Evangelicals in his addresses, and unless you were a fundie or a former fundie, you would have no idea that his speeches had built-in supersonic Jesus whistles that only the evangelicals and evangelical survivors could hear.

      • InternetTubes@lemmy.world
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        There are plenty of Muslims and mosques that are multicultural. Religions are divided into different branches, and there’s no shortage of those that are multicultural. There’s also no shortage of those that are radicalized into bigotry and hatred. Take the US for example, there’s a fair number of Evangelical Christians who want to make the US into something that isn’t multicultural.

        Faith is like baseless accusations. If you can’t fathom anything but a projection of your own insecurities, you probably aren’t going to contribute so much as you are going to create friction.

        But if you really think I am an intolerant islamophobe by claiming that only cultures that accept multiple cultures should be part of a multicultural society, then if you are being consistent to any reasonable degree, just tolerate my intolerance by your own logic. You clearly want to be stepped on, regardless of how little my comment comparatively has to do with Islam. I think OP made a comic for you that you seem to have missed.

  • U de Recife@literature.cafe
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    9 months ago

    In the Republic, book VIII, Socrates identifies as democracy’s leading cause of corruption precisely that thing makes it seemingly so beautiful. In a democracy, citizens become inebriated with freedom (Euleteria). By making it the highest goal, people in a democracy end up leading democracy to its downfall.

    True ca. 2400 years ago; still true today.

    • MrCharles@lemmy.world
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      A democracy can only exist until the voters discover that they can vote themselves largess from the public treasury.

      • Alexis de Tocqueville
    • le pouffre bleu@lemmy.world
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      Our boy Socrates was 2200 years too early, he might have learnt from ours boys Charles Fourier, Bakunin, Marx and others that democracy is never an accomplished regime, it needs to be defended at all time in a ceaseless battle against the worst parts of mankind, against our own turpitude and weakness, it’s an everlasting revolution that dies as soon as it starts to be content with itself.

    • Lvxferre@lemmy.ml
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      I wish that people made a better version of that picture, since it heavily distorts what Popper said (PDF page 232), that is far more nuanced and situational. I’ll quote it inside spoilers as it’s long-ish:

      the paradox

      Less well known is the paradox of tolerance: 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 most unwise. But we should claim the right even to suppress them, 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 anything as deceptive as rational argument, and teach them to answer arguments by the use of their fists. We should therefore claim, in the name of tolerance, the right not to tolerate the intolerant. We should claim that any movement preaching intolerance places itself outside the law, and we should consider incitement to intolerance and persecution as criminal, exactly as we should consider incitement to murder, or to kidnapping; or as we should consider incitement to the revival of the slave trade.

      A TL;DR of that would be “an open society needs to claim the right to suppress intolerant discourses and, under certain conditions, suppress them”. In no moment the picture makes reference to those conditions.

      That’s important here because mechanisms used to curb down intolerant discourses can be also misused to curb down legitimate but otherwise inconvenient ones, so they need to be used with extreme caution, only as much as necessary; Popper was likely aware of that.

    • balls_expert@lemmy.blahaj.zone
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      There’s nothing to disagree with

      The problem tolerating intolerance is it only works if the intolerants, in turn, also let you express yourself after they gain power, which they won’t, because they are intolerant. You need to be lucky every time and they only need to be lucky once. And the only thing preventing the disaster is that there isn’t an infinite amount of time ahead of you

    • janus2@lemmy.sdf.org
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      honest to fuck why can’t we have the future where the last panel isn’t someone being dragged away by nazi fascists OR some kinda tankie government

      and im a fuckin commie saying this…

      silence a bigot and he’ll take to the streets. give a bigot an echo chamber and with any luck he’ll do more online circlejerking than IRL marching, at least

      • orrk@lemmy.world
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        tankies are just red fascist, literally have nothing in common with communist ideology other than a vague esthetic

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        Actually studies have found that deplatforming works really well at combating hate speech. Online it can radicalize people. IRL at least they learn very quickly that there is no silent majority at their back.