Free Speech Leftists Still Exist | Hacker News Reader

Free Speech Leftists Still Exist

quillette.com

25 pointsandrenth12 comments

It's a shame that the left has strayed so far from classical liberalism. The pendulum will eventually (hopefully?) swing back the other way.

I think one of the multiple factors that helped the right to add a lot of people to their pool in the last years, it's because the regressive part of the left have abandoned the thesis of "I will defend your right to speech even if I don't like what you said" instead going for the "Let's censor all that hurt my (subjective) feelings". Of course this it's not the left in general, but a small but vocal minority.

Probably the best way to fight a bad argument (e. Racism, Sexism, etc) it's not to censorship, but educate and discuss about it, and expose the fallacies in their logic. Censor ideas we don't like, gives them a martyr status. Of course it's hard and requires work, but at the long term freedom of speech it's a great investment for a democratic society.

But recall that Noam Chomsky himself, a titan of left thought, rejected postmodernism for his entire life, and debated Michel Foucault in 1967, dismissing the blank slate and Foucault’s naïve argument that there was no defined human nature.

Yet a good deal of investigation supports Foucault's position over the years.

https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2017/05/170502112607.h...

What? That link doesn't support a "blank slate" argument at all. While I'm not a parent, ask any parent and they will tell you that their children show very different personalities from an incredibly young age. To act as if it is 100% nurture (or 100% nature) is ludicrous.

Language influencing thought (modernized Sapir Whorf) forms a base foundation against innate facets / late Humanist thinking.

The field of perception and "optical illusion" is another such foundation. See Carpentered World hypothesis for example.

The first paragraph kinda threw me off with the mentioning of BDS.

While the criminalization of BDS activism as they put it might be a problem, BDS is entrenched in the “regressive” left.

They push no platforming to a whole new level, blocking, rioiting and outright assaulting pro-Israeli speakers and groups, heck you don’t even have to be “pro-Israel” if you don’t agree with what BDS stands for (especially if you are a Jewish group) or their actions it’s enough for you to be an enemy which is the core problem with much of the left today if you don’t agree 100% with both the ideology and the execution you are part of the problem.

E.g. Sam Harris

The concept of free speech has become fertile ground for ideologues and culture warriors. It's been an excellent wedge issue for pulling generally-progressive centrists to the right by appealing to their intellect and penchant for abstract principal.

But what of policy? Free speech doesn't feed the hungry or provide healthcare for the sick or protect the environment.

I suppose there will be plenty of time for those things after we've dealt with censorious college students.

In many environments, including when (ahem) we have a leaders in power who do not share our values, free speech is a prerequisite for advocating for what we care about. It's great that you care about the environment and LGBT rights, but try advocating for those things in China or Putin's Russia. You might as well just cross your fingers and hope the ruling party comes around to your point of view under those circumstances.

The left is in a very dangerous spot right now. I have seen leftists equate free speech with white supremacy.

The danger is that people start to believe them.

You have seen idiots call themselves leftists.

> the left should embrace free speech rights and other legal protections of rights because, due to our lack of power, the left is most likely to be subject to assaults on those rights from above.

This quote bothers me deeply. Isn't the spirit of this essentially, "free speech is good because without it my voice might not be heard, and my voice is very important".

It seems to me that many people on the left are much less rights concerned than I would have though. Can't help but feel it's because the left began to realize people they disagree with would end up with rights too, god forbid.

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