Just because we let Westborough baptist church shout nonsense does not mean it is legitimate or that anyone that lets them shout thinks it is legitimate.
It actually does mean that. Not opposing bigotry means that bigotry will be a stronger force in society than it otherwise would. Complicity, y'know.
I disagree. Suppressing bigotry makes it stronger, arguing against it makes it weaker. The proper response to hate speech is to counter it with reason. Banning it empowers the hateful ideas. It legitimizes them, and makes their proponents martyrs.
If you ban a book, everyone's going to want to read it, because it now has the lure of being forbidden.
Additionally, I would like to see either Tuss or Teia respond to issue that the civil rights, gay rights, and women's suffrage movements could very easily been stymied by anti-hate speech laws had they been in place at the time (keep in mind, when bigots decide what's bigotry, the results can get nasty).
They wouldn't have been stymied by Canada's hate speech laws, at least. Not without grossly misapplying them so hard that by that point it doesn't really matter anyway since the spirit of the law has been lost anyway, so at that point any trumped-up charge would accomplish the same thing (and some laws were historically used that way).
Why does this principle not work in reverse?
Quote from "Tiax" »
I disagree. Suppressing bigotry makes it stronger, arguing against it makes it weaker. The proper response to hate speech is to counter it with reason. Banning it empowers the hateful ideas. It legitimizes them, and makes their proponents martyrs.
If you ban a book, everyone's going to want to read it, because it now has the lure of being forbidden.
Agreed. Also see drugs and alcohol use by minors
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"Proving god exists isn't hard. Proving god is God is the tricky part" - Roommate
Its good you can draw that distinction, many cannot - unfortunately rules have to be made with the worst in mind not the best. (And note my own views although nonreligious are relatively the same including my subtle encouragement against at most with gay friends - at least with men - women I've yet to know of during that phase (wife had been in a phase as had a friend but not when I knew either))
What, that misapplying a law is indictment against that law? Pretty much any law can be misused. No reason to single out hate speech in particular just because it's heavily stigmatized.
Quote from ColonelCoo »
So yes, as a Christian, I view homosexual lusts and sex as sin and believe it seperates you from God. That's a far cry from hating on my friends.
It's still hating on the expression of an intrinsic and immutable part of themselves. Also repression isn't healthy. So the whole "be gay but don't have gay sex" thing is really just a way of saying "I'm not homophobic, but..."
And when you start slipping into "I'm not X, but..." you're plain and simply into the realm of rationalization.
Teia-What? Repression is unhealthy from a hate speech law proponent, wtf? Does not compute!
Does that mean you reject the concept of sexual objectification being vile? Since it is just an attempt to demonize an intrinsic and immutable part of human sexuality, specifically used to demonize male sexuality.
Teia-What? Repression is unhealthy from a hate speech law proponent, wtf? Does not compute!
What's not to get? Sexual repression is unhealthy. Gay sex doesn't hurt anyone (non-consensually anyway, but hey). No reason to look down on it. It's not like hate speech that actually does have negative effects.
Does that mean you reject the concept of sexual objectification being vile? Since it is just an attempt to demonize an intrinsic and immutable part of human sexuality, specifically used to demonize male sexuality.
Sexual objectification does in fact cause some degree of harm (even if it's nothing more than the stress from being objectified). Your comparison is invalid.
But having your natural sexual attraction to others demonized never causes stress?
It seems like you always choose a side and completely disregard the rights, feelings, and value of the other side usually doing so with a quip about privilege or some other such BS.
My principle? My point is that demonizing straight male sexuality is as redeeming intellectually as demonizing gay people's sexuality even if it stresses some people out.
This is one of the few reasons that I'm glad to live in the States. There are many disadvantages for sure, and the video highlights some mistakes, errors and injustices.
Yet, at the end of the day, I can feel confident that I live in one of the few areas of the world where my speech is rarely if ever hampered by government bureaucrats. The ability to freely express myself is all the more precious to me when I realize that even most first world citizens do not have the full breadth of protection that we do in the States.
I would hope that the cultural relativists would hold true to their "principles" and leave Americans alone about this. For those that do not fall into that category, I urge you to consider that the free exchange of ideas is a boon to a free society. I shutter at the thought of government speech controls, which are little more than mind control - and might very well have banned publications such as The Liberator had those controls existed at the time.
(in case it wasn't obvious, i abhor censorship EXCEPT in the case where speech is demonstrably FALSE or UNGROUNDED, i.e. teaching creationism, or impersonating a soldier to get benefits, lying in court testimony, or false advertising).
I guess you prove the point . . . you hate it except when it is supporting what you believe in . . . like evolution.
there's a profound difference between allowing all voices to be heard, and giving all voices equal weight. censorship can be either - complete, or partial. suppressing the expression of an idea is still censorship. in the case you mentioned, teaching science requires substantial evidence (see: several centuries of epistemology).
also 'i hate it except when it benefits me' is human nature, it's why we have laws that are (hopefully) impartial to all that crap. we're all flawed, man.
Don't forget . . . just because a belief may or may not be backed by knowledge, doesn't mean it isn't true. God is the One who wants choice.
The difference between your mythology and scientific fact is fact over belief. One might believe that god exist, but one can scientifically prove evolution.
I too am quite put off by the source of this, but censorship in our public education books is crazy. Even at the high school level they don't really teach the messier parts of history. It is a shame that we base the knowledge that we teach our children with such a conservative bias.
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In life all we can do is try to make things better. Sitting lost in old ways and fearing change only makes us outdated and ignorant.
Peace cannot be kept by force. It can only be achieved by understanding.
Albert Einstein
Millions of innocent men, women and children, since the introduction of Christianity, have been burnt, tortured, fined and imprisoned; yet we have not advanced one inch towards uniformity.
So yes, as a Christian, I view homosexual lusts and sex as sin and believe it seperates you from God. That's a far cry from hating on my friends.
It's still hating on the expression of an intrinsic and immutable part of themselves. Also repression isn't healthy. So the whole "be gay but don't have gay sex" thing is really just a way of saying "I'm not homophobic, but..."
And when you start slipping into "I'm not X, but..." you're plain and simply into the realm of rationalization.
But...it's not. There's no hatred involved in stating that you believe the act of gay sex is a sin.
To believe something is wrong doesn't necessarily mean you hate that thing, or even the person doing that thing.
I believe that smoking is wrong because I've lost relatives to cancer. But I don't hate cigarettes, or people who smoke, or the act of smoking itself.
Live and let live, and all. It's a person's choice whether they want to have gay sex or smoke a cigarette, it's none of my business. Even if I disagree with it. I hold no hard feelings towards anyone who disagrees with me and decides to go do their own thing.
(in case it wasn't obvious, i abhor censorship EXCEPT in the case where speech is demonstrably FALSE or UNGROUNDED, i.e. teaching creationism, or impersonating a soldier to get benefits, lying in court testimony, or false advertising).
I guess you prove the point . . . you hate it except when it is supporting what you believe in . . . like evolution.
there's a profound difference between allowing all voices to be heard, and giving all voices equal weight. censorship can be either - complete, or partial. suppressing the expression of an idea is still censorship. in the case you mentioned, teaching science requires substantial evidence (see: several centuries of epistemology).
also 'i hate it except when it benefits me' is human nature, it's why we have laws that are (hopefully) impartial to all that crap. we're all flawed, man.
Don't forget . . . just because a belief may or may not be backed by knowledge, doesn't mean it isn't true. God is the One who wants choice.
The difference between your mythology and scientific fact is fact over belief. One might believe that god exist, but one can scientifically prove evolution.
I too am quite put off by the source of this, but censorship in our public education books is crazy. Even at the high school level they don't really teach the messier parts of history. It is a shame that we base the knowledge that we teach our children with such a conservative bias.
That's why creationism is required curriculum in all public schools, contraceptives are illegal, and my college campus has an annual lynching...of hippies
What, that misapplying a law is indictment against that law? Pretty much any law can be misused. No reason to single out hate speech in particular just because it's heavily stigmatized.
No, that's not what I meant. I was pointing out that you had said that ultimately any law could have been bent/stretched to criminalize unwanted speech, and therefore outright making a law for it wasn't necessary. Given that, why wouldn't the reverse be true: why make a law prohibiting hateful speech when all manner of other laws can just be stretched for extenuating circumstances?
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"Proving god exists isn't hard. Proving god is God is the tricky part" - Roommate
When did I say that having your sexual attraction demonized doesn't cause stress? If anything my last couple of posts have said the exact opposite.
Sexual objectification does in fact cause some degree of harm (even if it's nothing more than the stress from being objectified). Your comparison is invalid.
The idea of "sexual objectification" is used to demonizes natural straight male sexual behavior.
It's still hating on the expression of an intrinsic and immutable part of themselves. Also repression isn't healthy. So the whole "be gay but don't have gay sex" thing is really just a way of saying "I'm not homophobic, but..."
It's still hating on the expression of an intrinsic and immutable part of them. Also, repression isn't healthy. So the whole "be a straight male but don't do straight male behavior" thing is really just a way of saying "I'm not a man-hating heterophobe, but..."
So, that is how you think?
Perhaps your need to learn to be tolerant of those with different views. Like us. Instead of trying to force your morals on others in this case.
If gay =/= wrong
How can straight male sexuality = wrong?
If your gonna have a selfish view of morals how can you expect anyone to go along with your selfish version of morality?
"I have no idea what it's like not to be a straight white male, and the experiences of others are irrelevant." -Conservative Motto
Calling someone a Commie is flaming and must be stopped, but turning the word Conservative into a loaded pejorative and using it over and over again is perfectly acceptable.
So far, it seems like there's two camps in this thread.
definition crap:
i'm defining 'morals' here as the stuff we don't agree on - not core morals. for example, a core moral would be that laws should treat everyone equally. the morals i'm talking about below would be, "is it ok to be gay" or "the needs of the few outweigh the needs of the many" or "from each according to his ability, to each according to his need"
1. these people believe that their version of morality is immutable, and that all others must subscribe to their morality. This notion of morality is the basis for defining hate speech. speech that qualifies as hate speech under this regime should be censored. This is an authoritarian perspective.
2. these people believe that morality is subjective, and as such, no universal code of morality can be defined. for this reason, each individual is entitled to form (or inherit.....) their own opinions, and to express those opinions using their freedom of speech. this philosophy holds that nothing should be censored (regarding the morals in question). This is a libertarian perspective.
So I think what's really going on here is a debate about whether or not everyone should have a standardized (authorized) moral code. Should we all accept gay people? Should we all subscribe to the ideology that social welfare programs are in the best interest of the local or regional population? et cetera et cetera forever. What I think we really need to move this debate forward is for someone to state an OBJECTIVE reason that their philosophy is better than someone else's. for example,
having a standardized moral code is in our best interest because we need to make minority people comfortable in our civilization. If we don't have a standard moral code, the moral code of the majority could shift, and minorities could be persecuted.
This argument has enormous historical precedent. It is an authoritarian argument, from a 'negative liberty' perspective. But it has a counterargument:
regardless of whether the majority's morals are insulting or hurtful to minorities, part of living in a free society is having a thick skin. sticks and stones can break my bones, et cetera. if you want freedoms, you have to be prepared for other people to exercise their own.
this is the libertarian viewpoint argument, and is from a 'positive liberty' perspective.
So far, it seems like there's two camps in this thread.
1. these people believe that their version of morality is immutable, and that all others must subscribe to their morality. This notion of morality is the basis for defining hate speech. speech that qualifies as hate speech under this regime should be censored. This is an authoritarian perspective.
2. these people believe that morality is subjective, and as such, no universal code of morality can be defined. for this reason, each individual is entitled to form (or inherit.....) their own opinions, and to express those opinions using their freedom of speech. this philosophy holds that nothing should be censored (regarding the morals in question). This is a libertarian perspective.
Or camp 3:
There is objective morality, however the advantages of maintaining freedom outweigh the costs of restricting certain "wrong" actions.
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"Proving god exists isn't hard. Proving god is God is the tricky part" - Roommate
There is objective morality, however the advantages of maintaining freedom outweigh the costs of restricting certain "wrong" actions.
that's a viable position to take. I haven't seen anybody make that claim in the thread yet though. I think an authoritarian's criticism of that would be that if there is objective morality, why would we bother allowing people to voice an opinion outside of it? if we know our viewpoint is true, why bother allowing people to express opposing ideas?
in other words, why not practice censorship, if we're only censoring things we know to be wrong?
There is objective morality, however the advantages of maintaining freedom outweigh the costs of restricting certain "wrong" actions.
that's a viable position to take. I haven't seen anybody make that claim in the thread yet though. I think an authoritarian's criticism of that would be that if there is objective morality, why would we bother allowing people to voice an opinion outside of it? if we know our viewpoint is true, why bother allowing people to express opposing ideas?
in other words, why not practice censorship, if we're only censoring things we know to be wrong?
Why not lock people up for lying? If anything, lying is worse, because it presumes that the speaker itself knows that they are incorrect. However, in this case, we are presuming that the speakers (by and large) do believe what they are saying is correct.
So objectively, why not lock people up for lying? Besides the fact that we would all end up behind bars and we would all die off?
Simply because I do not have any objective authority to do so.
Well your analysis is slightly wrong because of the fact that I DO believe in an objective moral code as taught in the Bible through God and Jesus. But I don't believe that we should have authoritarian restrictions on freedom of speech and censorship of things that are deemed offensive but do not qualify as hate speech.
"I hate the gays and we should kill them all" is Hate Speech due to it's influence over people to commit violent acts against a specific group.
"I feel the act of gay sex is a sin as defined in the Bible but that doesn't make you any lesser of a person than me, because we are all sinners" is decidedly NOT hate speech. As that's pretty much the de facto definition of tolerance of one group for another.
The biggest problem I've seen in this thread so far is that the opposition on the i'll say "Liberal" point of view wants the second quote I just said to be quantified as hate speech because it says anything negative AT ALL about a person's gay lifestyle. Which is wanting forced acceptance, not tolerance of the act of gay sex as morally right and not sinful in any way. For some reason, it is considered hateful and bigoted to hold any other position other than "Gay sex is O.K. by me".
We SHOULD be able to disagree on this subject and have a proper debate around the parameters set. But when one side of the argument has already demonized the opponent as bigoted and hateful simply for disagreeing with you, then well, there's not really anywhere the debate can go is there?
For either side, really. As the left side of the room has already made up their minds that anything the right side of the room says is crazy talk from hatefilled bigots that believe in an invisible pony God. While the guys on the right side of the room have no hope of even having their voices heard because all the left side hears is "Hatehatehatebigothatehatehate".
Why not lock people up for lying? If anything, lying is worse, because it presumes that the speaker itself knows that they are incorrect. However, in this case, we are presuming that the speakers (by and large) do believe what they are saying is correct.
So objectively, why not lock people up for lying? Besides the fact that we would all end up behind bars and we would all die off?
Simply because I do not have any objective authority to do so.
we do lock people up for lying, when damage is caused. see: breach of contract, conspiracy (as criminal examples) and then a plethora of civil examples (many lawsuits are over lying).
but what you're saying is, that even if you had an objective definition of morality (as Quirkiness101 suggested), an argument against censorship is that you lack the authority to censor people? on what basis do you lack that authority? said another way, what is the practical reason that you shouldn't have the authority to silence people that are objectively morally wrong?
please keep in mind that this isn't my actual argument (i'm firmly in the second camp from my previous post). I'm just saying that it's hard to legitimize a lack of authoritarian control when you have (or impose) absolute moral truths. Objectivity is all that separates education from indoctrination - why wouldn't you teach those people who are morally different?
regarding the topic of authority, the question in the OP wasn't whether YOU should censor anybody, its whether institutions that HAVE such authority should censor.
Well your analysis is slightly wrong because of the fact that I DO believe in an objective moral code as taught in the Bible through God and Jesus. But I don't believe that we should have authoritarian restrictions on freedom of speech and censorship of things that are deemed offensive but do not qualify as hate speech.
As i pointed out above, this philosophy isn't internally consistent. think about it this way: why bother letting other people voice opinions that are blatantly wrong (remember, your morality is objective here)? What is the reason for giving them that freedom? If it's anything about 'everybody's opinion is important', your morality isn't objective at all. I guess you could argue that people are happier when they can voice their own blatantly wrong opinions, but in the context of hate speech, your own happiness is trivial compared to the damage you could be causing to others by violating the objective moral standard.
"I hate the gays and we should kill them all" is Hate Speech due to it's influence over people to commit violent acts against a specific group.
how terrifyingly paternalistic. if a person hears such 'hate speech' and decides to commit a crime based on it, that's their own choice as a free individual. I should be allowed to say as many times as I want "kill all albinos, genocide them, shoot them with crossbows". If a person decides to do that based off my idiotic ramblings, that's on them.
The biggest problem I've seen in this thread so far is that the opposition on the i'll say "Liberal" point of view wants the second quote I just said to be quantified as hate speech because it says anything negative AT ALL about a person's gay lifestyle. Which is wanting forced acceptance, not tolerance of the act of gay sex as morally right and not sinful in any way. For some reason, it is considered hateful and bigoted to hold any other position other than "Gay sex is O.K. by me".
that's because those 'liberals' (not the best label here) are the authoritarians i was talking about. they (like you) have a set standard of moral codes which they believe to be objective. they want the law to respect those morals, and silence speech that transgresses them. "i'm creeped out by gay people because a sky wizard told me that it's wrong", according to them, is hurtful to those gay people. so you shouldn't be able to say it. it has nothing to do with tolerance or how well you put up with folks different from yourself, it has to do with how many hoops you jump through so you don't get anybody's panties/jockstrap in a twist.
hilarious example: in my last sentence, i added jockstrap so that my joke wouldn't be construed as sexist. sexism is against the dogmatic moral code of those whom you label "liberals", and i censored myself in order to avoid the aforementioned twisting of undergarments.
Why not lock people up for lying? If anything, lying is worse, because it presumes that the speaker itself knows that they are incorrect. However, in this case, we are presuming that the speakers (by and large) do believe what they are saying is correct.
So objectively, why not lock people up for lying? Besides the fact that we would all end up behind bars and we would all die off?
Simply because I do not have any objective authority to do so.
we do lock people up for lying, when damage is caused. see: breach of contract, conspiracy (as criminal examples) and then a plethora of civil examples (many lawsuits are over lying).
but what you're saying is, that even if you had an objective definition of morality (as Quirkiness101 suggested), an argument against censorship is that you lack the authority to censor people? on what basis do you lack that authority? said another way, what is the practical reason that you shouldn't have the authority to silence people that are objectively morally wrong?
please keep in mind that this isn't my actual argument (i'm firmly in the second camp from my previous post). I'm just saying that it's hard to legitimize a lack of authoritarian control when you have (or impose) absolute moral truths. Objectivity is all that separates education from indoctrination - why wouldn't you teach those people who are morally different?
Because the objective moral authority (In my case, God) has already declared that free will is a thing, and people have the right and freedom to disagree with even objective moral facts. Not to mention times when peoples facts get mixed up in the first place and everyone has their own statistics to back up their own facts, even when they contradict what you know to be true.
Everyone knows it is objectively morally true that murder is wrong. Someone can totally disagree with that and suggest that they believe murder should be allowed in the cases of proven rapists and pedophiles. And they can argue that belief even though we objectively know it is wrong. They are allowed to believe that. So long as they do not act on any thoughts that would bring harm to others.
I don't see why this is such a new or baffling concept.
Because the objective moral authority (In my case, God) has already declared that free will is a thing, and people have the right and freedom to disagree with even objective moral facts.
I hate to be that guy that tells people their religions are screwy, but come on man. you've got to have some hard core cognitive dissonance to swallow that one. If that's true, what's the point of education? or debate? why bother trying to change peoples' minds about anything, or even to make them understand your viewpoint? If you're objectively right about something (let's say, the pythagorean theorem), and you want people to be educated, you should educate them. same concept. you wouldn't tolerate someone teaching elementary school, telling kids "OK kids, the hypotenuse is equal to the sum of both sides times pi".
Everyone knows it is objectively morally true that murder is wrong.
nope. not true. that is very far from an objective truth. from a population perspective, we need to murder each other more, or human life won't be sustainable (subject = population). from the murderer's perspective, murder was morally awesome (subject = murderer). from the murderee's perspective, yeah, murder sucks (subject == dead guy). different subjects, different viewpoints. the DEFINITION of subjectivity. maybe if you said "murder is objectively detremental to the person who got murdered" I'd buy it.
Someone can totally disagree with that and suggest that they believe murder should be allowed in the cases of proven rapists and pedophiles. And they can argue that belief even though we objectively know it is wrong. They are allowed to believe that. So long as they do not act on any thoughts that would bring harm to others.
the fact that you tried to convince me otherwise, however, is ample evidence that you DO want to 'educate' people to your own moral system, as i mentioned before.
I don't see why this is such a new or baffling concept.
of course you don't, you believe in an objective moral code the part you're missing (from my viewpoint) is WHY you let people be wrong. what does that accomplish? where's the logic behind it? you'll say god, and that's cool for you to believe that. it's just not something i can ever accept without concrete logic behind it.
I disagree. Suppressing bigotry makes it stronger, arguing against it makes it weaker. The proper response to hate speech is to counter it with reason. Banning it empowers the hateful ideas. It legitimizes them, and makes their proponents martyrs.
If you ban a book, everyone's going to want to read it, because it now has the lure of being forbidden.
Why does this principle not work in reverse?
Agreed. Also see drugs and alcohol use by minors
Re: People misusing the term Vanilla to describe a flying, unleash (sometimes trample) critter.
What, that misapplying a law is indictment against that law? Pretty much any law can be misused. No reason to single out hate speech in particular just because it's heavily stigmatized.
It's still hating on the expression of an intrinsic and immutable part of themselves. Also repression isn't healthy. So the whole "be gay but don't have gay sex" thing is really just a way of saying "I'm not homophobic, but..."
And when you start slipping into "I'm not X, but..." you're plain and simply into the realm of rationalization.
Does that mean you reject the concept of sexual objectification being vile? Since it is just an attempt to demonize an intrinsic and immutable part of human sexuality, specifically used to demonize male sexuality.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fkUhW41Qpjg&list=FLcmnLu5cGUGeLy744WS-fsg&index=1
What's not to get? Sexual repression is unhealthy. Gay sex doesn't hurt anyone (non-consensually anyway, but hey). No reason to look down on it. It's not like hate speech that actually does have negative effects.
Sexual objectification does in fact cause some degree of harm (even if it's nothing more than the stress from being objectified). Your comparison is invalid.
It seems like you always choose a side and completely disregard the rights, feelings, and value of the other side usually doing so with a quip about privilege or some other such BS.
When did I say that having your sexual attraction demonized doesn't cause stress? If anything my last couple of posts have said the exact opposite.
Oh and just to argue for the sake of argument some people do get stressed out at the idea of gay people having sex.
Some people get stressed out at the idea of black people living in their neighbourhood. Does your principle hold in that instance too?
Yet, at the end of the day, I can feel confident that I live in one of the few areas of the world where my speech is rarely if ever hampered by government bureaucrats. The ability to freely express myself is all the more precious to me when I realize that even most first world citizens do not have the full breadth of protection that we do in the States.
I would hope that the cultural relativists would hold true to their "principles" and leave Americans alone about this. For those that do not fall into that category, I urge you to consider that the free exchange of ideas is a boon to a free society. I shutter at the thought of government speech controls, which are little more than mind control - and might very well have banned publications such as The Liberator had those controls existed at the time.
The difference between your mythology and scientific fact is fact over belief. One might believe that god exist, but one can scientifically prove evolution.
I too am quite put off by the source of this, but censorship in our public education books is crazy. Even at the high school level they don't really teach the messier parts of history. It is a shame that we base the knowledge that we teach our children with such a conservative bias.
Albert Einstein
Thomas Jefferson
But...it's not. There's no hatred involved in stating that you believe the act of gay sex is a sin.
To believe something is wrong doesn't necessarily mean you hate that thing, or even the person doing that thing.
I believe that smoking is wrong because I've lost relatives to cancer. But I don't hate cigarettes, or people who smoke, or the act of smoking itself.
Live and let live, and all. It's a person's choice whether they want to have gay sex or smoke a cigarette, it's none of my business. Even if I disagree with it. I hold no hard feelings towards anyone who disagrees with me and decides to go do their own thing.
That's why creationism is required curriculum in all public schools, contraceptives are illegal, and my college campus has an annual lynching...of hippies
No, that's not what I meant. I was pointing out that you had said that ultimately any law could have been bent/stretched to criminalize unwanted speech, and therefore outright making a law for it wasn't necessary. Given that, why wouldn't the reverse be true: why make a law prohibiting hateful speech when all manner of other laws can just be stretched for extenuating circumstances?
The idea of "sexual objectification" is used to demonizes natural straight male sexual behavior.
It's still hating on the expression of an intrinsic and immutable part of them. Also, repression isn't healthy. So the whole "be a straight male but don't do straight male behavior" thing is really just a way of saying "I'm not a man-hating heterophobe, but..."
So, that is how you think?
Perhaps your need to learn to be tolerant of those with different views. Like us. Instead of trying to force your morals on others in this case.
If gay =/= wrong
How can straight male sexuality = wrong?
If your gonna have a selfish view of morals how can you expect anyone to go along with your selfish version of morality?
It's the golden rule(positive) for a reason.
You need to learn to tolerate others if you want to be treated with tolerance.
Flame infraction. - Blinking Spirit
Calling someone a Commie is flaming and must be stopped, but turning the word Conservative into a loaded pejorative and using it over and over again is perfectly acceptable.
definition crap:
1. these people believe that their version of morality is immutable, and that all others must subscribe to their morality. This notion of morality is the basis for defining hate speech. speech that qualifies as hate speech under this regime should be censored. This is an authoritarian perspective.
2. these people believe that morality is subjective, and as such, no universal code of morality can be defined. for this reason, each individual is entitled to form (or inherit.....) their own opinions, and to express those opinions using their freedom of speech. this philosophy holds that nothing should be censored (regarding the morals in question). This is a libertarian perspective.
So I think what's really going on here is a debate about whether or not everyone should have a standardized (authorized) moral code. Should we all accept gay people? Should we all subscribe to the ideology that social welfare programs are in the best interest of the local or regional population? et cetera et cetera forever. What I think we really need to move this debate forward is for someone to state an OBJECTIVE reason that their philosophy is better than someone else's. for example,
This argument has enormous historical precedent. It is an authoritarian argument, from a 'negative liberty' perspective. But it has a counterargument:
this is the libertarian viewpoint argument, and is from a 'positive liberty' perspective.
i just thought i'd clarify what's going on here.
Or camp 3:
There is objective morality, however the advantages of maintaining freedom outweigh the costs of restricting certain "wrong" actions.
that's a viable position to take. I haven't seen anybody make that claim in the thread yet though. I think an authoritarian's criticism of that would be that if there is objective morality, why would we bother allowing people to voice an opinion outside of it? if we know our viewpoint is true, why bother allowing people to express opposing ideas?
in other words, why not practice censorship, if we're only censoring things we know to be wrong?
Why not lock people up for lying? If anything, lying is worse, because it presumes that the speaker itself knows that they are incorrect. However, in this case, we are presuming that the speakers (by and large) do believe what they are saying is correct.
So objectively, why not lock people up for lying? Besides the fact that we would all end up behind bars and we would all die off?
Simply because I do not have any objective authority to do so.
Well your analysis is slightly wrong because of the fact that I DO believe in an objective moral code as taught in the Bible through God and Jesus. But I don't believe that we should have authoritarian restrictions on freedom of speech and censorship of things that are deemed offensive but do not qualify as hate speech.
"I hate the gays and we should kill them all" is Hate Speech due to it's influence over people to commit violent acts against a specific group.
"I feel the act of gay sex is a sin as defined in the Bible but that doesn't make you any lesser of a person than me, because we are all sinners" is decidedly NOT hate speech. As that's pretty much the de facto definition of tolerance of one group for another.
The biggest problem I've seen in this thread so far is that the opposition on the i'll say "Liberal" point of view wants the second quote I just said to be quantified as hate speech because it says anything negative AT ALL about a person's gay lifestyle. Which is wanting forced acceptance, not tolerance of the act of gay sex as morally right and not sinful in any way. For some reason, it is considered hateful and bigoted to hold any other position other than "Gay sex is O.K. by me".
We SHOULD be able to disagree on this subject and have a proper debate around the parameters set. But when one side of the argument has already demonized the opponent as bigoted and hateful simply for disagreeing with you, then well, there's not really anywhere the debate can go is there?
For either side, really. As the left side of the room has already made up their minds that anything the right side of the room says is crazy talk from hatefilled bigots that believe in an invisible pony God. While the guys on the right side of the room have no hope of even having their voices heard because all the left side hears is "Hatehatehatebigothatehatehate".
we do lock people up for lying, when damage is caused. see: breach of contract, conspiracy (as criminal examples) and then a plethora of civil examples (many lawsuits are over lying).
but what you're saying is, that even if you had an objective definition of morality (as Quirkiness101 suggested), an argument against censorship is that you lack the authority to censor people? on what basis do you lack that authority? said another way, what is the practical reason that you shouldn't have the authority to silence people that are objectively morally wrong?
please keep in mind that this isn't my actual argument (i'm firmly in the second camp from my previous post). I'm just saying that it's hard to legitimize a lack of authoritarian control when you have (or impose) absolute moral truths. Objectivity is all that separates education from indoctrination - why wouldn't you teach those people who are morally different?
regarding the topic of authority, the question in the OP wasn't whether YOU should censor anybody, its whether institutions that HAVE such authority should censor.
As i pointed out above, this philosophy isn't internally consistent. think about it this way: why bother letting other people voice opinions that are blatantly wrong (remember, your morality is objective here)? What is the reason for giving them that freedom? If it's anything about 'everybody's opinion is important', your morality isn't objective at all. I guess you could argue that people are happier when they can voice their own blatantly wrong opinions, but in the context of hate speech, your own happiness is trivial compared to the damage you could be causing to others by violating the objective moral standard.
how terrifyingly paternalistic. if a person hears such 'hate speech' and decides to commit a crime based on it, that's their own choice as a free individual. I should be allowed to say as many times as I want "kill all albinos, genocide them, shoot them with crossbows". If a person decides to do that based off my idiotic ramblings, that's on them.
that's because those 'liberals' (not the best label here) are the authoritarians i was talking about. they (like you) have a set standard of moral codes which they believe to be objective. they want the law to respect those morals, and silence speech that transgresses them. "i'm creeped out by gay people because a sky wizard told me that it's wrong", according to them, is hurtful to those gay people. so you shouldn't be able to say it. it has nothing to do with tolerance or how well you put up with folks different from yourself, it has to do with how many hoops you jump through so you don't get anybody's panties/jockstrap in a twist.
hilarious example: in my last sentence, i added jockstrap so that my joke wouldn't be construed as sexist. sexism is against the dogmatic moral code of those whom you label "liberals", and i censored myself in order to avoid the aforementioned twisting of undergarments.
Because the objective moral authority (In my case, God) has already declared that free will is a thing, and people have the right and freedom to disagree with even objective moral facts. Not to mention times when peoples facts get mixed up in the first place and everyone has their own statistics to back up their own facts, even when they contradict what you know to be true.
Everyone knows it is objectively morally true that murder is wrong. Someone can totally disagree with that and suggest that they believe murder should be allowed in the cases of proven rapists and pedophiles. And they can argue that belief even though we objectively know it is wrong. They are allowed to believe that. So long as they do not act on any thoughts that would bring harm to others.
I don't see why this is such a new or baffling concept.
I hate to be that guy that tells people their religions are screwy, but come on man. you've got to have some hard core cognitive dissonance to swallow that one. If that's true, what's the point of education? or debate? why bother trying to change peoples' minds about anything, or even to make them understand your viewpoint? If you're objectively right about something (let's say, the pythagorean theorem), and you want people to be educated, you should educate them. same concept. you wouldn't tolerate someone teaching elementary school, telling kids "OK kids, the hypotenuse is equal to the sum of both sides times pi".
nope. not true. that is very far from an objective truth. from a population perspective, we need to murder each other more, or human life won't be sustainable (subject = population). from the murderer's perspective, murder was morally awesome (subject = murderer). from the murderee's perspective, yeah, murder sucks (subject == dead guy). different subjects, different viewpoints. the DEFINITION of subjectivity. maybe if you said "murder is objectively detremental to the person who got murdered" I'd buy it.
the fact that you tried to convince me otherwise, however, is ample evidence that you DO want to 'educate' people to your own moral system, as i mentioned before.
of course you don't, you believe in an objective moral code the part you're missing (from my viewpoint) is WHY you let people be wrong. what does that accomplish? where's the logic behind it? you'll say god, and that's cool for you to believe that. it's just not something i can ever accept without concrete logic behind it.