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Culture War Roundup for the week of September 2, 2024

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I now recall that we've disagreed before on the meaning of the word "fairness". Yet again, you seem to have your own definition for "symmetry" as well.

It is not "symmetrical" to kill in the process of robbery and to kill in self-defense. The latter is a more "fair" act, even in a situation that is not evenly matched. I doubt even your training would provide you with the means to quickly and accurately evaluate any attacker in order to make your self-defense perfectly, rationally "symmetrical" (the classic home invasion scenario - few on this forum would say they'd hold themselves back from shooting the invader, even if he's not obviously armed and threatening). This does not matter in a sane legal code because as one who has not initiated the aggression, you are in the right.

Similarly, if you claim that you want to suppress the speech of others, I would HAPPILY support restricting your speech because you can't really complain about being treated the way you already agreed its fair to treat others.

Am I correct to assume that if I want to suppress others expressing a certain set of ideas A, you would support restricting my speech entirely? That's hardly symmetrical, and not very fair either. What would be symmetrical and fair is to support restricting my speech around the set of ideas A. You'll find that many people readily agree to such proposals. In my view, that supports my interpretation of fairness. People tend to agree to fair counterproposals and reject unfair ones.

Or you could just use twitter's own tools to mute the words you don't want to hear/read and block the people you don't want to interact with.

I don't think this can be done before encountering the random person who'd say the words to me. Similarly, you can't shoot a robber before they appear and try to rob you. Instead, you rely on implicit intimidation to deter robbers. Instead of putting the onus on every possible robbery victim to "block" them, many would-be robbers decide not to rob in the first place.

Am I correct to assume that if I want to suppress others expressing a certain set of ideas A, you would support restricting my speech entirely?

If your proposal is that freedom of speech isn't absolute, I simply ask you to delineate the exceptions to it. And if you want to apply those exceptions to others, you must be fine with them vigorously being applied to you.

And it can't be simply something like "The N-word is forbidden." More like 'words which are offensive to a particular racial or other identity group can be silenced and/or punished." At which point, if you use any words which any racial or other identity group finds offensive, then you, too, will be silenced and punished.

If your position is broader than that, such that "No racially discriminatory language whatsoever," then again, I will apply the same to you.

All I'm saying is that denying someone the blanket protection of 'free speech' as a principle means you aren't later entitled to claim that same protection for yourself. And honestly, I'm not going to protest for you if somebody else is arbitrarily silencing you since I wouldn't expect you to do the same for me.

Instead, you rely on implicit intimidation to deter robbers. Instead of putting the onus on every possible robbery victim to "block" them, many would-be robbers decide not to rob in the first place.

Yes, this is the preferable outcome, but I am making it crystal clear what my intentions are in the event that somebody expresses intent to rob me.

Again, can't complain about the consequences if I've warned you in advance about the risks.

I suppose the core of our disagreement is that I do not expect you to act symmetrically. I expect you to act in the worst faith, because you do not actually like symmetrical restrictions on free speech, you just dislike when yours is restricted in any way. This makes moot any discussion of fairness.

For example, in response to "don't call people nigger on the public square" I would expect you to invent "offense" for the most milquetoast word describing you that was never considered a grave offense. Musk reportedly banned the word "cis" on twitter despite his aura of a free speech warrior. I'd expect you to behave in bad faith similarly. You're welcome to deny that.

Please refrain from insisting others don’t actually believe what they say. On the occasions when it’s true, it’s rarely productive, and vice versa.

If you think there’s a contradiction, there are better ways to prosecute it.

Musk reportedly banned the word "cis" on twitter despite his aura of a free speech warrior.

I don't think this is a accurate summary of this policy, and the implementation is more limited than the policy. There's supposedly an interstitial on mobile (app?), but on desktop, I don't even get that (and I've gotten interstitial for 'fuck'!), and I'd know.

For example, in response to "don't call people nigger on the public square" I would expect you to invent "offense" for the most milquetoast word describing you that was never considered a grave offense.

Oh this is interesting. After interrogating free speech to such an extent, surely you'll be able to give us a precise way of determining what is a "grave offence".

Musk reportedly banned the word "cis" on twitter despite his aura of a free speech warrior.

I see the word "cis" pop up ony feed all the time, so I have no idea what you're talking about. By contrast, progressives have argued at length how they should be able to call people "cracker" or "gusano", or invented offense at completely mundane things like the OK handsign.