Christopher Hitchens - Free Speech

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arminiusreturns · 2021-01 · Strong recommendation

My point is that you are then deigning someone to have the power to decide what is tolerant and what is not, when that is not nearly as acceptable or uncontroversial as you seem to be assuming. For example: > If progressives are pushing for more freedom, more tolerance, then to oppose it you have to, by definition, advocate for less of those. The framing of this is not correct. The problem is that not all "progressives" are pushing for that, which then undermines the assumption that opposition is therefor automatically intolerant and therefor automatically bannable/deplatformable. Some of the real progressives I follow such as Graham Elwood and Jimmy Dore have frequently had issues with their platforms giving them a hard time (demonteizing, etc) just because their positions or even topics of conversation are controversial, and many of them frequently mention they wouldn't be surprised to be deplatformed for said reason. To me, the real crux of your position, is that by completely bucking the standard of free speech in which we have legal definitions for speech that isn't tolerable, positions like yours seem to want to expand those definitions (libel, defamation, imminent incitement to violence, etc) to a point that you must now designate some non-legal entitiy as the moral arbiter of what is intolerant/tolerable, and that is indeed a most slippery slope. I think I have rewatched these two videos of Christopher Hitchens on the topic a good half dozen times each in the last yea

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arminiusreturns · 2020-10 · Strong recommendation

I've said it before and I'll say it again; it's the same justification that has been used to justify moves away from democracy. "Those poor dumb plebs, they just don't know any better, we, the elites, know whats best, so we should reduce the amount of democracy!" [1] 1. [LINK] You say "some moderation is required to prevent the apparent acceptance of some pretty hateful views along with conspiracy theories", but the entire point is that then you are giving over to some other person or entity the power and ability to decide what you get to read. I think this should be rejected as a slippery slope made of ky-jelly. "Don't take security in the false refuge of consensus and the feeling that whatever you think you're bound to be okay because you're in the safely moral majority." "It is not just the right of the person who speaks to be heard, it is the right of everyone in the audience to listen, and to hear, and every time you silence somebody, you make yourself a prisoner of your own action, because you deny yourself the right to hear something." - Christopher Hitchens [2] 2. [VIDEO] bonus (the whole speech is quotable): "Dr. Johnson was waited upon by various delegations of people, to congratulate him of the nobility of the quality; of the Commons; the Lords; and also by a delegation of respectable ladies of London, who tended on him in his Fleet Street lodgings and congratulated him: "Dr. Johnson," they said, "We are delighted to find that you have not included any indecent or

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dlivingston · 2020-05 · Strong recommendation

There is a brilliant speech by the late Christopher Hitchens [0] on free speech that I must have seen a dozen times. An excerpt: “The freedom of speech is meaningless unless it means the freedom of the person who thinks differently... Don't take refuge in the false security of consensus, and the feeling that whatever you think you're bound to be okay because you're in the safely moral majority. ...Bear in mind, ladies and gentlemen, that every time you violate or propose to violate the free speech of someone else, you, in potentia, are making a rod for your own back.” [0]: [VIDEO]

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