Hacker News Reader

Free speech has never been about protecting popular ideas. It's the ideas that those in power find obnoxious that get censored. Though the particular ideas vary between modern America, communist Russia and medieval Spain, it's the threatening views of outsiders that are met with suppression or violence.

View on HN

You appear to have been moved (triggered, even) to say something about "free speech" and "obnoxiousness". Aside from the fact that post posts contain these words, I am at a loss to understand how it connects in any way to anything I wrote.

When you said, "There appears to be a alchemical transformation that results in people's minds, where "<Obnoxious Statement X>" on its own is obnoxious, but "I know it's politically incorrect to say so, but <Obnoxious Statement X>!" makes you a Free Speech Martyr and a real deep thinker.", you were implying that free speech shouldn't protect obnoxious ideas, but that's wrong. Free speech exists specifically to protect unpopular ideas.

>"You appear to have been moved (triggered, even)..."

This kind of uncharitable guessing at others' states of mind isn't very constructive. Focusing on one's impression of a speaker often makes it harder to parse their speech.

I still don't understand what your point was or how it was relevant to what I originally wrote, and you haven't seen fit to explain.

Reply on news.ycombinator.com