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Comment by jchw | Hacker News Reader

I think censorship is bad because it restricts expression, and I believe restricting expression is bad because I believe free expression is both a human right and incredibly important to free society. But obviously, there are times when we collectively are going to agree to restrict rights to some other benefit. The question is of balance. To what degree are we restricting expression, and to what end? Is it truly justified?

I have no idea if this proposal is shit or not, I'm not steeped enough in it, but it's not enough to point to hate speech laws and say "censorship is okay here, why not there?" - well, the important details are literally everything else other than the part where it is censorship, so that's the part we need to address...

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> it's not enough to point to hate speech laws and say "censorship is okay here, why not there?"

That’s not what your parent comment is saying. Asking “how do these things differ” does not imply support for either thing, it’s a request for clarification. Not every question is an argument in disguise.

Yes, merely asking how two things differ is not necessarily intended to be an argument in favor or against something. I used deduction based on context to figure out that part.

Text being low bandwidth, I could be wrong, but what you're saying implies it's unreasonable to assume that making a comparison to something that people are highly sympathetic to isn't likely to be an appeal to sympathy for the other thing being compared. I just disagree, my interpretation was completely reasonable here. If it's wrong, well, it's not like I told them to go fuck themselves. It would then merely be a misunderstanding. Though, I doubt it.

(To be honest, though, I also should say that I actually have no idea whether they would lean more for or against on the comparison. Not everyone is a fan of hate speech laws, after all.)

> I could be wrong, but what you're saying implies (…)

You are wrong. My point is closer to “don’t make assumptions; it muddies and derails the conversation and leads to unnecessary unproductive disagreements”.

Compare your original answer to a sibling response, which was made before yours.

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49811633

Significantly shorter than yours and answers the question (yours frankly doesn’t) without assumptions.

America constantly restricts expression it doesn't like. It's just that you believe being topless in the park is bad speech but calling for genocide is good speech. Billionaires using computers to slurp up and regurgitate others work is good, but people copying others work is bad. Saying "lets kill the president" is bad, but saying "lets kill the senator" is good.

America does not have a monopoly on what good and bad speech is, and it certainly restricts speech, via legal means, via cultural means, and via application of force.

I'm not personally a big fan of all U.S. restrictions on speech, but I don't really see your point, to be honest. The U.S. can right sometimes and wrong others. In principle, I don't really see why the U.S. government and its officials generally shouldn't be able to raise concerns about legislation and litigation that may impact U.S. businesses, especially if they believe they might impact inadvertently the rights of U.S. citizens. There are plenty of examples where I believe the U.S. official or agency was spot-on.

If you are not a fan of U.S. soft power though, then it seems like the future will be brighter for you; we're certainly burning all of those bridges as fast as possible. But, that is really neither here nor there.

All countries restrict speech their government (which is the will of the people in a democracy) finds does more harm than good.

America protects the speech of the rich and powerful but allows stoking division and outright propaganda. It hides a lot behind "it's not technically illegal but you'll lose your job if you say the wrong thing", or "you'll get arrested but if you're rich enough to afford a lawyer you might get charges dismissed"

Perhaps solve those problems before criticising other countries for fighting back in the war.

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