Is the left anti-censorship or pro-censorship? - Politics Forum.org | PoFo

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#14923509
Since the 1960's the left has largely been anti-censorship. The left has fought to liberalize themselves from the "prude" restrictions of expression the social conservative right has tried to keep in place. The left has against the censorship of violence, profanity, and sexual expression in film/tv, comic books, music, video games etc. Meanwhile the social conservative have sought to limit those expressions as corrupting social forces, especially for youth.

Nowadays ironically it seems the left is increasingly in favour of censorship to further its politically correct agenda, to silence "cultural appropriation", to silence controversial right-wing speakers on campuses, to silence what it sees as sexism, racism, homophobia etc. in the media/workplace/school/political sphere etc.

As a flipside, the socially conservative right could be seen as being more pro-censorship in the past decades, while now it stands for free speech in light of the above.

To me, it seems the left or right are neither pro or anti-censorship, but will simply support whatever advances its own ideological agenda.
#14923514
Unthinking Majority wrote:Nowadays ironically it seems the left is increasingly in favour of censorship to further its politically correct agenda, to silence "cultural appropriation", to silence controversial right-wing speakers on campuses, to silence what it sees as sexism, racism, homophobia etc. in the media/workplace/school/political sphere etc.


The formation of a "New Morality." The same old cycle. Many leftist are as eager to pillory Conservative Thought as the "Puritans" were to purge carnality.

Zam :smokin:
#14924314
Unthinking Majority wrote:Since the 1960's the left has largely been anti-censorship.


:?:

Interesting point of view. How do you explain censorship in the Soviet Union, China, East Germany, and every other left wing state at the time? The left has always been happy to remove ideas harmful to the working class from circulation.
#14924327
Decky wrote::?:

Interesting point of view. How do you explain censorship in the Soviet Union, China, East Germany, and every other left wing state at the time? The left has always been happy to remove ideas harmful to the working class from circulation.


True. I'm not talking about authoritarian/communist states, I was talking about western liberal democracies.
#14928784
Unthinking Majority wrote:To me, it seems the left or right are neither pro or anti-censorship, but will simply support whatever advances its own ideological agenda.


Many people are like that, yes.

But its pretty obvious: either you have to support free speech of those of different opinion than your own as well, or you are not supporting free speech.
#14928790
The propaganda is always geared to convince people of their ‘moral superiority’, it is then easy for them to decide others don’t count in sharing freedoms. Self righteousness is an easy thing for people to accept.
#14931216
Unthinking Majority wrote:To me, it seems the left or right are neither pro or anti-censorship, but will simply support whatever advances its own ideological agenda.

Indeed, and whoever is against free speech shows which side thinks it has more to lose than gain from it. For progressives there are no more worthwhile taboos to break and since socially enforced PC hasn't succeeded in completely preventing objectionable views being expressed, they now want to preserve what they have achieved and fear any challenge.

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A somewhat modified case against free speech from the NYT:


The Ignorant Do Not Have a Right to an Audience

On June 17, the political commentator Ann Coulter, appearing as a guest on Fox News, asserted that crying migrant children separated from their parents are “child actors.” Does this groundless claim deserve as much airtime as, for example, a historically informed argument from Ta-Nehisi Coates that structural racism makes the American dream possible?

Jordan Peterson, a professor of psychology at the University of Toronto, has complained that men can’t “control crazy women” because men “have absolutely no respect” for someone they cannot physically fight. Does this adolescent opinion deserve as much of an audience as the nuanced thoughts of Kate Manne, a professor of philosophy at Cornell University, about the role of “himpathy” in supporting misogyny?

We may feel certain that Coulter and Peterson are wrong, but some people feel the same way about Coates and Manne. And everyone once felt certain that the Earth was the center of the solar system. Even if Coulter and Peterson are wrong, won’t we have a deeper understanding of why racism and sexism are mistaken if we have to think for ourselves about their claims? And “who’s to say” that there isn’t some small fragment of truth in what they say?

If this specious line of thought seems at all plausible to you, it is because of the influence of “On Liberty,” published in 1859 by the English philosopher John Stuart Mill. Mill’s argument for near-absolute freedom of speech is seductively simple. Any given opinion that someone expresses is either wholly true, partly true or false.

To claim that an unpopular or offensive opinion cannot be true “is to assume our own infallibility.” And if an offensive opinion is true, to limit its expression is clearly bad for society. If an opinion is partly true, we should listen to it, because “it is only by the collision of adverse opinions, that the remainder of the truth has any chance of being supplied.” And even if an opinion is false, society will benefit by examining the reasons it is false. Unless a true view is challenged, we will hold it merely “in the manner of a prejudice, with little comprehension or feeling of its rational grounds.”

The problem with Mill’s argument is that he takes for granted a naïve conception of rationality that he inherited from Enlightenment thinkers like René Descartes. For such philosophers, there is one ahistorical rational method for discovering truth, and humans (properly educated) are approximately equal in their capacity for appreciating these truths. We know that “of all things, good sense is the most fairly distributed,” Descartes assures us, because “even those who are the hardest to satisfy in every other respect never desire more of it than they already have.”

Of course, Mill and Descartes disagreed fundamentally about what the one ahistorical rational method is — which is one of the reasons for doubting the Enlightenment dogma that there is such a method.

If you do have faith in a universal method of reasoning that everyone accepts, then the Millian defense of absolute free speech is sound. What harm is there in people hearing obvious falsehoods and specious argumentation if any sane and minimally educated person can see through them? The problem, though, is that humans are not rational in the way Mill assumes. I wish it were self-evident to everyone that we should not discriminate against people based on their sexual orientation, but the current vice president of the United States does not agree. I wish everyone knew that it is irrational to deny the evidence that there was a mass shooting in Sandy Hook, but a syndicated radio talk show host can make a career out of arguing for the contrary.

Historically, Millian arguments have had some good practical effects. Mill followed Alexis de Tocqueville in identifying “the tyranny of the majority” as an ever-present danger in democracies. As an advocate of women’s rights and an opponent of slavery, Mill knew that many people then regarded even the discussion of these issues as offensive. He hoped that by making freedom of speech a near absolute right he could guarantee a hearing for opinions that were true but unpopular among most of his contemporaries.

However, our situation is very different from that of Mill. We are seeing the worsening of a trend that the 20th century German-American philosopher Herbert Marcuse warned of back in 1965: “In endlessly dragging debates over the media, the stupid opinion is treated with the same respect as the intelligent one, the misinformed may talk as long as the informed, and propaganda rides along with education, truth with falsehood.” This form of “free speech,” ironically, supports the tyranny of the majority.

The media are motivated primarily by getting the largest audience possible. This leads to a skewed conception about which controversial perspectives deserve airtime, and what “both sides” of an issue are. How often do you see controversial but well-informed intellectuals like Noam Chomsky and Martha Nussbaum on television? Meanwhile, the former child-star Kirk Cameron appears on television to explain that we should not believe in evolutionary theory unless biologists can produce a “crocoduck” as evidence. No wonder we are experiencing what Marcuse described as “the systematic moronization of children and adults alike by publicity and propaganda.”

Marcuse was insightful in diagnosing the problems, but part of the solution he advocated was suppressing right-wing perspectives. I believe that this is immoral (in part because it would be impossible to do without the exercise of terror) and impractical (given that the internet was actually invented to provide an unblockable information network). Instead, I suggest that we could take a big step forward by distinguishing free speech from just access. Access to the general public, granted by institutions like television networks, newspapers, magazines, and university lectures, is a finite resource. Justice requires that, like any finite good, institutional access should be apportioned based on merit and on what benefits the community as a whole.

There is a clear line between censoring someone and refusing to provide them with institutional resources for disseminating their ideas. When Nathaniel Abraham was fired in 2004 from his position at Woods Hole Oceanographic Institute because he admitted to his employer that he did not believe in evolution, it was not a case of censorship of an unpopular opinion. Abraham thinks that he knows better than other scientists (and better than other Christians, like Pope Francis, who reminded the faithful that God is not “a magician, with a magic wand”). Abraham has every right to express his ignorant opinion to any audience that is credulous enough to listen. However, Abraham does not have a right to a share of the intellectual capital that comes from being associated with a prestigious scientific institution like Woods Hole.

Similarly, the top colleges and universities that invite Charles Murray to share his junk science defenses of innate racial differences in intelligence (including Columbia and New York University) are not promoting fair and balanced discourse. For these prestigious institutions to deny Murray an audience would be for them to exercise their fiduciary responsibility as the gatekeepers of rational discourse. We have actually seen a good illustration of what I mean by “just access” in ABC’s courageous decision to cancel “Roseanne,” its highest-rated show. Starring on a television show is a privilege, not a right. Roseanne compared a black person to an ape. Allowing a show named after her to remain on the air would not be impartiality; it would be tacitly endorsing the racist fantasy that her views are part of reasonable mainstream debate.

Donald Trump, first as candidate and now as president, is such a significant news story that responsible journalists must report on him. But this does not mean that he should be allowed to set the terms of the debate. Research shows that repeatedly hearing assertions increases the likelihood of belief — even when the assertions are explicitly identified as false. Consequently, when journalists repeat Trump’s repeated lies, they are actually increasing the probability that people will believe them.

Even when journalistic responsibility requires reporting Trump’s views, this does not entail giving all of his spokespeople an audience. MSNBC’s “Morning Joe,” set a good precedent for just access by banning from the show Kellyanne Conway for casually spouting “alternative facts.”

Marcuse also suggested, ominously, that we should not “renounce a priori violence against violence.” Like most Americans, I spontaneously cheered when I saw the white nationalist Richard Spencer punched in the face during an interview. However, as I have noted elsewhere, Mahatma Gandhi and the Rev. Martin Luther King, Jr. showed us that nonviolent protest is not only a moral demand (although it is that too); it is the highest strategic cunning. Violence plays into the hands of our opponents, who relish the opportunity to play at being martyrs. Consequently, while it was wrong for Middlebury College to invite Murray to speak, it was even more wrong for students to assault Murray and a professor escorting him across campus. (Ironically, the professor who was injured in this incident is a critic of Murray who gave a Millian defense of allowing him to speak on campus.)

What just access means in terms of positive policy is that institutions that are the gatekeepers to the public have a fiduciary responsibility to award access based on the merit of ideas and thinkers. To award space in a campus lecture hall to someone like Peterson who says that feminists “have an unconscious wish for brutal male domination,” or to give time on a television news show to someone like Coulter who asserts that in an ideal world all Americans would convert to Christianity, or to interview a D-list actor like Jenny McCarthy about her view that actual scientists are wrong about the public health benefits of vaccines is not to display admirable intellectual open-mindedness. It is to take a positive stand that these views are within the realm of defensible rational discourse, and that these people are worth taking seriously as thinkers.

Neither is true: These views are specious, and those who espouse them are, at best, ignorant, at worst, sophists. The invincibly ignorant and the intellectual huckster have every right to express their opinions, but their right to free speech is not the right to an audience.


There once was a good cause for free speech, but we have reached the end of history. The left now knows what's true or not, so right wing perspectives must be suppressed. Let's not call it suppression though as that sounds bad and offends our sensibilities.
#14945147
Kaiserschmarrn wrote:A somewhat modified case against free speech from the NYT:


There once was a good cause for free speech, but we have reached the end of history. The left now knows what's true or not, so right wing perspectives must be suppressed. Let's not call it suppression though as that sounds bad and offends our sensibilities.


Progressive left is for diversity, except diversity of thought or opinion or speech that is contrary to their determined positions that are completely intolerant of questioning. It's frightening self-righteous group-think nonsense, enforced by bullying and often false and over-generalizing pejorative labels ie: "racism/xenophobia", and spread using institutional propaganda throughout the educational systems from pre-school through university. Are we going to start burning certain books soon?
#14945153
The so-called 'Left' are, like the 'Right', interested, ONLY in power, once that is obtained, they no longer respect, or practice real democratic exercise of the power.
They, on achieving power, do not 'Listen' to the electorate, or how it feels on issues, it will never allow the people to give vent to their thinking by allowing referenda on particular issues.

It feeds into the argument that both sides of the political fence are 'pro-censorship'.

In a democracy, the exercise of democratic powers should ALWAYS be 'OPEN' to the public ears, with no debates behind closed doors.
That politicians hide decisions from the public, means that they are acting AGAINST the public democratic interest, in favour of the smoke & mirrors of corruption within the business interest.

Because you cannot reasonably trust any politician, it follows that you cannot trust them in the political structures that serve their interest, as opposed to the democratic one.
Censorship is a generalised tool of the political process, people are ignorant of it, because their snouts are in the Capitalist pig-trough & are unlikely to look around them to see their place in the scheme of things that they have lost control of.

'Democracy' is a SHAM, people living in 'democracies' live on one side of the fence, thinking that the side they are on is the 'superior' side, they are absolutely delusional..

As Winston CHURCHILL once said, "Many forms of Government have been tried, and will be tried in this world of sin and woe. No one pretends that democracy is perfect or all-wise. Indeed, it has been said that democracy is the worst form of Government except all those other forms that have been tried from time to time."
#14945154
Fuser wrote:Everyone is pro-censorship, its what they want to censor is where they differ.
QFT.

Right-wing Westerners want to censor free speech, or anyone who disagrees with them. Left wing Westerners want to censor hate speech.
#14945158
Godstud wrote:Left wing Westerners want to censor hate speech.

No they love hate speech. They love the Koran and the Hadiths. They love rap(e) music. The most rabid of them, nearly every thing that spews form their mouths is hate speech. I only have to turn on the BBC, its a near endless stream of Cultural Marxist, anti-White, anti-Infidel anti-Gentile hate propaganda.
#14945169
Rich wrote:No they love hate speech. They love the Koran and the Hadiths. They love rap(e) music. The most rabid of them, nearly every thing that spews form their mouths is hate speech. I only have to turn on the BBC, its a near endless stream of Cultural Marxist, anti-White, anti-Infidel anti-Gentile hate propaganda.
:lol: Do you actually believe all that idiocy or are you simply trolling? If you believe it, then you're hopeless. :moron: :moron: :moron:
#14945174
If we use the US as an example, I see a not so subtle difference between what the left would censor and what the right does. Simply put, the left accepts a diversity of ideas to the point that it acts as enabler to ideas it finds anathema. Then, shocked at itself, tries to pound them down after the genie is out of the bottle. When they do this the right accuses them of attempting to censor.

Rich mentions "rap(e)" music. This is a great example. The left which sees itself as uplifting minority expression is confronted with a parade of horribles and does not know how to act.

Then Decky says, "What's left wing about western liberal democracies? They are all centre right capitalist state" which is also correct. The term "left" and "liberal" have simply lost their meaning. The "right" has co opted these terms and at this point they are little more than epithets. While on the subject, we are just now beginning to see a real right wing movement in the US. Trump is not the result of it he is the beginning of it. Before we had, as Decky said, an almost universally center-right path.

There is one thing I think we can clearly point out. By definition and certainly in practice, the right in the US stays on-message way better than the left. Since, in practice, it is constucted of one issue voters, it must to take any useful political shape. Conservatism is always a simpler path. It is not pushing at the edges of the envelope. Buckley said, "Conservatives stand athwart history and shout stop".

It is important to point out here that there has been a shift when no one was looking. The republican party has become more socially conservative in recent years but it has completely lost its economic conservative position. It is NOT in any way, shape of form the economically conservative party it once was. In fact today's republican party makes Johnson's great society look pinched and mean by comparison. The republicans are spending like drunken sailors while the democrats natter about runaway spending. (Though arguably not too loudly.)

Why there is a censorship debate at all is that both sides are shocked at what "happened". Neither expected a serious discussion anywhere on whether it was OK for a company to sell songs about killing cops to 12 year olds. Neither expected witches to want a seat at the political table. Who could imagine 30 years ago that we would accept as completely normal that every child in America has unlimited access to the most deviant forms of pornography?

Perhaps it is time that we look at censorship a bit differently. The problem is not that we have allowed people to express too much. The problem is that we seem to have absolved them from any personal responsibility for what they express.

We had a court case this week that shows a bit of push back. The man who struck the white supremacist after the Charlotteville clash last year was found guilty of assault and battery. He appealed. He was found guilty again. The jury fined him $1.00. Perhaps in the end, the majority of people are just coping and really not listening. They are looking for justice and reason. The rest of it just sells soap.
#14947819
fuser wrote:Everyone is pro-censorship, its what they want to censor is where they differ.


Wait, what ?

I strongly disagree, I'm against censorship.

Obviously there are limits, such as child porn, but in general it does no good to tell people to shut up about their opinion. That doesnt change their opinion.
#14947972
Wait, what ?

I strongly disagree, I'm against censorship.

Obviously there are limits, such as child porn, but in general it does no good to tell people to shut up about their opinion. That doesnt change their opinion.


You need not qualify your statement and prove fuser's point. child porn is not about censorship. It is about a horrific crime.

It is not censorship to outlaw the publishing of military secrets, weapons plans, copyrighted material, etc. Censorship, to have any reasonable meaning, must only include those things that a reasonable person could expect to publish and another want to suppress.

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