Free Speech Vs Censorship
Open-Forum Idea-Invalidation as the practical middle ground
Free Speech protests at the University of California, Berkeley USA in 1964
Information:
Free Speech Movement
Author: Multiple Wikipedia Contributors
Wikipedia
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Free_Speech_Movement
Information:
Hate Speech
National Coalition Against Censorship
HOME / ISSUES / HATE SPEECH
http://ncac.org/issue/hate-speech
Sub-Reference:
Should government control, even ban, speech that “incites religious and ethnic hatred”?
...censoring disturbing or even offensive speech, especially in art and literature, often violates not only the intentions or spirit of the speaker or writer, but suggests a perhaps willful lack of understanding of language itself: the ambiguity of words and images, as well as the role of context in determining meaning.
Information:
Curbing hate speech isn’t censorship – it’s the law
New Scientist
Magazine issue 3166, published 24 February 2018
https://www.newscientist.com/article/mg23731662-900-curbing-hate-speech-isnt-censorship-its-the-law/
Sub-Reference:
A survey of 115 UK universities and students’ unions carried out by online magazine Spiked supposedly found that 63 of them “actively censor speech and ideas”. But a closer look reveals that the majority simply attempt to prohibit hate speech.
Defining the Problem
Declaring "freedom of speech" as a right is often thought of as a counter against the state control of criticism against public policy. Governments are inherently formed on top of certain ideals and ideologies and formed by groups that support those ideals and ideologies. What this inevitably means is that governments, no matter what process forms them (democratic, communist, capitalist, socialist, military coup etc), are always going to be formed from a coming together of common interests and by validating a common way of experiencing the world. It is inevitable therefore that the ruling body of people that form the government bureaucracy, all are going to be promoting one set of ideas often to the exclusion of others. Free speech therefore is an idea that is championed as a basic right throughout free thinking movements as a way of making sure the special interests and biases of the ruling body, do not subjugate, suppress and/or oppress those who may have a different experience base, a different point of view and different ideas to share. Allow freedom of speech and we allow a lively environment of debate, discussion and intellectual growth within our communities, we prevent the oppression of the intelligent and we allow open communication of problems and issues so that we may collectively seek to find solutions to them.
Of course one of the downsides to allowing free speech is that often, we will get individuals and groups who for various reasons, attach themselves to ideas that are commonly thought of as crazy, frustratingly disruptive or perhaps even dangerous. Not just bad ideas but also suggestions for causing harm to others can be stirred up in emotion fueled frenzies, socially validated with mobs forming around them. These ideas can sometimes be promoted by well meaning people who themselves occupy the middle ground on a subject. They connect themselves to a legitimate concern while disconnecting themselves from the extremism they toe along with them. For example feminist groups who have very clear man-hating prejudice as a part of their group, free trade promoters who have weapons and drug dealers as their advocates, open government advocates seeking government accountability who also have radicalised conspiracy theorists amongst them, anti-terrorism campaigners who have people amongst them thinking all terrorists are muslim etc. Groups formed around legitimate concerns and legitimate ideas can have the scope of their ideology tribe creeped out into some very illegitimate areas. So we are faced with the challenge of allowing and promoting the right to discuss those legitimate concerns and ideas freely while at the same time discouraging and in some cases even preventing other ideas which could be described as illegitimate or even harmful.
Debate rages currently in response to hate speech. While it is very clear to most objective observers that there are subjects and concepts that could be communicated to cause harm to others, those who wish to strictly protect people's rights to free speech say that any form of censorship imposed on those who speak out with hate, is putting government, law-makers and law-enforcers in charge of determining what can be said and what can't. They offer a slippery slope argument suggesting that opposition against and laws against clear hate speech may result in, for example, people also being prevented from speaking out hatefully against some of the poor practices of government, government agents and law enforcers.
So what might be the answer?
Currently I would say that most of the free world has for a very long time been locked into a state of apprehension where the lack of a clear solution has meant that hate speakers have at times been given a free run and free speech advocates have been tortured to justify this openness. The balance appears to push and pull as time goes by where sometimes government control is too controlling and sometimes government and community groups are rendered powerless against some very clear injustices.
In summary:
- If we allow governments to actively censor information and ideas then we potentially open the door to oppression and the silencing of political criticism.
- Censorship as the silencing of political criticism leading to the shutting down of ideas that could bring social benefit.
- Censorship as the silencing of political criticism allowing government created injustices, corruption and political bias to go without opposition.
- If we allow governments to actively censor information and material based on the sensibilities of some then we prevent access by those with different sensibilities.
- If we create the freedom to speek as a universal right without exception then we potentially open the door to hate speech, prejudice, harrassment, calls to violence, obscenity, the normalising of hurtful or harmful expressions and we lose the ability to control information and ideas that influence our lives and the lives of those we live around.
- Allow freedom of speech and we allow a lively environment of debate, discussion and intellectual growth within our communities but we must be careful to balance this with mechanisms for discouraging and in some cases even preventing the spread of ideas which could be described as illegitimate or even harmful.
The Proposed Solution
I would say that the problem comes from thinking about free speech as a universal, unconditional right or a rule. I would say that instead of having it as an absolute, we must instead bind it to a purpose. The freedom to speak must be granted for a purpose, for a social benefit. I would say that only when we disconnect it from this purpose and benefit do we start to encounter problems with letting crazy people and the emotionally disturbed run the show. So let us have freedom of speech protected as a rule but let us discuss its conditions, its limitations, when it is done for a beneficial purpose and when clearly the freedom no longer serves that purpose. As I see it, the purpose is to allow the exploration of new ideas; it is to allow for the collection of information; it is to allow criticism of government; but this is just my vision of purpose. We might ask who defines this purpose and who defines this list of conditions, limitations and exceptions and who decides when the freedom to speak is no longer beneficial to society? I would say that society as a whole needs to decide. With Politify as a tool, we no longer need to rely on groups of self-interested people who impose their biases and their limitations on the creation of this list. We get to crowdsource good reasoning on the subject.
The solution (as if you haven't guessed already) is the open-forum, direct-democracy systems of the Politify platform paired with the reasoning assistance tools and idea challenge tools that allow individual ideas to be invalidated by good reasoning practices. The ideas forming the concept of good reasoning themselves being open for debate but with the expectation that there are core principles and ideas that will be affirmed as objective and without good contest.
Have the ideas be free within the Politify framework; allow free debate around them in an open forum; but any ideas that are found to be actively working against the social benefit, these ideas can be invalidated by good academic reason, marked as not wanted in a public broadcast external to Politify and some even marked as uncontestably wrong/damaging. Once invalidated, the arguments that invalidate them are recorded and kept so that if anyone then wants to revisit those exact same ideas thinking they know better, the rest of us don't need to waste further time on it. Successfully invalidated ideas then are unlikely to gain further traction. That said, should new evidence come to be known or a new angle on existing ideas be seen, theoretically an invalidated idea could be rescued so long as it could be rescued by good reason. Here we bypass the problems of censorship as technically nothing is truly deleted or censored out of existence but we also solve the problem of not allowing hate speech or other socially damaging forms of expression because whenever someone revisits a long ago notion of hatred or obscenity, the arguments that invalidate the idea (including the history that is cited against it) are right next to it, forever pulling that idea apart.
Author's Note: While creating the Politify plaform, I operate with caution and an understanding that my own personal subjectivity and bias may be imposed on any system I create that would act to censor ideas. However, I must balance this with an understanding of the following... There are people amongst us who have an aversion to those rules of thought that are commonly considered amongst academics as the rules of good reason and logic. This aversion can be taken to the extremes of phobia and agitated rants against establishable facts. While it is a philosophical truth that nobody can truly know anything and this philosophical truth is clung to by many hoping to push through their evidence lacking notions of reality, there are practices of thought that can be used to establish points of knowledge that are so unlikely to be falsified by any practical test that attempts at its falsification are not worth effort. Here we can consider a philosophical saying of mine which sums up the scientific process but can also be used philisophically: "I think therefore I am, I measure it therefore it is, I perceive it in common with others who have measured it therefore my delusion is unlikely." Unlikely, not impossible but through peer review of our ideas and information gathering, we improve the chances of only the best of our ideas being promoted. The flaws in our ideas either being debated into oblivion or our flawed ideas so lowered in standing as to be no longer entertained as valid by the majority, hence never making it into public policy.
In Summary:
- Instead of freedom of speech being considered as a universal and unconditional right it should instead be connected to a socially beneficial purpose whereby the benefit is tested. If there is no longer a benefit to the freedom then the freedom must be removed or at least discouraged.
- The open forum debate systems of the Politify platform are proposed as a solution whereby the systems reward good reason and social benefit while discouraging flawed reason and social harm.
- Invalidated ideas are recorded next to the details and arguments that invalidate them.
- Invalidated ideas can potentially be rescued by good reason, new information or new insights into their application.
The Benefit of the Solution
Open-Forum Idea-Invalidation like the type being built into the Politify platform is the practical middle ground between government censorship and free speech as an unconditional right. Government censorship which has the potential for oppression. Unconditional free speech which gives hate speech and damaging ideas a free run through society. It is the best of both worlds because it still allows anyone to revisit an invalidated idea and allows the theoretical potential for ideas to be rescued. This is balanced by the fact that invalidated ideas are connected to all the good reasons why those ideas are considered to be inappropriate. These good arguements for the invalidation of any idea must be overcome in order to facilitate an idea rescue.
The direct democracy systems allow anyone to contribute either to the invalidation of an idea or to the rescue of an idea. The "Improve Politify" mechanisms allow for the systems of idea invalidation to be improved over time meaning that it is a total democracy system that does not harbour the subjective biases of its creators. Any intellectual limitations of the creators that exist can be overcome.
Proposed Implementation
The Politify, Direct Democracy portal is being developed now.
Suggested Discussion Topics
- Government censorship as the silencing of political criticism.
- Government censorship as the imposition of subjective sensitivities.
- Government censorship as a tool of oppression.
- Freedom of speech.
- Freedom of ideas.
- Freedom of hate.
- The benefit of criticism.
- The purpose of having freedom of speech.
- When the freedom to speak is no longer beneficial.
Author
Cameron Gibbs
Politify Founder
Disclaimer: Politify is a neutral platform created to allow anyone to share their ideas and to debate those ideas. Views expressed by Employees, Directors, Authors, Sponsors and/or Affiliates of Politify are their own views shared with equal opportunity using the Politify network. The veiws expressed are in no way indicative of any official policy of Politify as an organisation.
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