>The natural question from this is: how long until this type of power is used against views you support?
I'm conflicted. On the one hand, I support free speech, even when the speech is hateful and malignant, because I honestly believe the best way to combat vile ideas is out in the open where people can see them, hear them, discuss them and repudiate them. Cultures can't innoculate themselves against ideas without an intellectual herd immunity, and that is impossible without mass exposure.
On the other hand, fuck Nazis.
I think I'm quite willing to let them come for the Nazis then start caring when they come for the Socialists and Trade Unionists, etc. If that makes me a hypocrite, so be it.
Of course, on the third hand, I have no real power over anyone else's speech, and I'm just some rando on the internet, so it doesn't really matter what I think.
Right -- for some reason or another, there is A Bright Line around Nazis that makes this a brain-dead decision. It might be that the name has become a by-word for "evil," but as someone who is _very much_ a free speech advocate, I have no sympathy for Naziism, or any kind of "speech" (however people try to bend that word) that advocates the ill physical will toward others. It's that simple. Any attempts to give a heady definition only result in convolution.
I'm conflicted. On the one hand, I support free speech, even when the speech is hateful and malignant, because I honestly believe the best way to combat vile ideas is out in the open where people can see them, hear them, discuss them and repudiate them. Cultures can't innoculate themselves against ideas without an intellectual herd immunity, and that is impossible without mass exposure.
On the other hand, fuck Nazis.
I think I'm quite willing to let them come for the Nazis then start caring when they come for the Socialists and Trade Unionists, etc. If that makes me a hypocrite, so be it.
Of course, on the third hand, I have no real power over anyone else's speech, and I'm just some rando on the internet, so it doesn't really matter what I think.