Hacker News Reader

Comment by Shanea93 | Hacker News Reader

Yes! Lets silence the opinions of everyone we disagree with! Lets take away their places to talk so they have to skulk in the shadows! Lets pretend there's no merit to listening to the thoughts of millions of people!

Why stop with removing their access to Reddit? Why not make it downright illegal to talk about it? Why don't we make it illegal to think about it, too?

I'm exceptionally left-leaning and I don't agree with removing these people from Reddit, it's censorship of views we don't like, plain and simple. Are we really so childish that we believe that if we stop these people talking about it then the problem will go away? They'll just move elsewhere and common discourse will be more difficult, people will be more entombed in their own biased beliefs.

View on HN

I don't think you're familiar with /r/the_Donald's rules. The number one rule is no dissenting. Not even polite discussion is allowed. They've already entombed themselves.

See, the problem with all of this is that they get the 'left-wing' people to fight for them. These people have not lost anything but an outlet to abuse people, and spread their sexist, racist philosophies (If you disagree with this, try reading through Breitbart without being disgusted at the contents).

Do not worry. These people still have their freedom of speech, they are free to spray paint swastikas in bathrooms and put threatening letters through the doors of American citizens, but they will no longer be able to preach their philosophies on Reddit.

But why should we not fight for them? I am just as angry about the thought of us being censored as I am of the thought of them being censored.

It doesn't matter whether what they say disgusts me or not, I don't have the right to not be offended. People often use Reddit to find news, I believe that Reddit should have a duty to provide that service in an unbiased way without inflicting their own views on the people who use their service. All they should care about it is "is this illegal?"

Yes, I understand that they're a company and not a government agency, it's of course just my opinion that they have such a duty.

> All they should care about it is "is this illegal?"

In many countries, the UK included, many of the posts on the fascist subreddits are illegal.

> But why should we not fight for them?

Because the value of life should be held to higher value than the 'destruction of free speech' (Except Reddit isn't doing anything to their free speech, they're denying them a platform. Which is objectively different). These people quite literally stand for genocide.

> I don't have the right to not be offended

Yes, yes you do. That's part of free speech, isn't it?

I live in the UK and wholly agree, the Public Order Act 1986 makes it very clear where it stands on hate speech, and yet I disagree with it, the same as I feel about the Snoopers Charter and other such laws. Freedom of speech should be granted regardless of who is offended by your speech, you should have the right to say exactly what you want, I have the right to think you're a dick head for saying it, but you should still be able to say it.

I'm not condoning threatening behaviour or violence, I'm just saying that I believe that if someone wants to call be a ginger bellend, they should have the right to do that.

Freedom of speech should be defined as such: Free speech and the right to freedom of expression applies to ideas of all kinds including those that may be deeply offensive.

The trick behind it is that your speech here may be offensive to the far-right, does that mean that you would be okay if they passed a law saying it was illegal?

> The trick behind it is that your speech here may be offensive to the far-right, does that mean that you would be okay if they passed a law saying it was illegal?

The fundamental difference is that I am not calling for the extermination or genocide of a group of people.

Speech like that isn't simply 'offensive', in the same way that one person wanting to kill someone else isn't a simple 'disagreement'.

Death threats are illegal in the UK, for the simple reason that it causes severe trauma to receive a large amount of them. Calling for the death of a group of people is just as bad. I honestly suspect you would live differently knowing that a large vocal group wants to exterminate people with a trait you carry.

I don't believe the problem will go away, but I do believe that if enough of us stand up against it, then the bullies won't be so brazen.

If I see a bully insult someone, I'm not going to sit around and tell the victim to just accept it as "free speech."

And if a bully does that in my house, I'm going to kick him out of my house.

> Why not make it downright illegal to talk about it?

To have any kind of discussion, you need to agree on a premise, a set of axioms, a base on which to talk.

In most countries, you take the constitution for that. Or the Universal Declaration of Human Rights.

That’s the minimal base on which you plan your society, and discuss politics and laws.

Usually, you add more, but it’s the required minimum.

What do you do with people who disagree with that? With people who disagree with the inalienable right to live? With people who disagree with the concept of "innocent until proven guilty" for some races or religious groups?

How can you form a society if you can’t even agree on the most basic ideas?

Maybe, you should actually separate society, split it, if there are people unwilling to make compromises, and holding immutable ideas that are incompatible with the rest of society.

Reply on news.ycombinator.com