Although I now consider myself too cool to go to conventions, and in general find the people who do weird, I can still recite every line of Episodes IV and V, and vast chunks of VI. What a wasted youth.
For what it’s worth Thursday, May 17 2007
Current Affairs 11:38 am
Do i think that too much news-time is being dedicated to the abduction of Madeleine McCann?
Yes.
Am i therefore a heartless bastard who doesn’t care if she is ever returned safely?
Well no, obviously.
So is it because it seems very much to me as though the (mostly tabloid) press is exploiting the misery of Madeleine’s family under the pretext of helping them, and is in general exploiting the fears and emotions that constitute ordinary people’s reactions to child abduction?
Yes.
Do i think David Beckham, Wayne Rooney and all the other celebrities out to canvass some good press for themselves should fuck off, and give that money to some concrete organisation – or even Madeleine’s family – rather than gesturing vaguely about ‘rewards’ they may never have to give?
Most Definitely.
Up the Latics Thursday, May 17 2007
Sports 10:13 am
I’ve got to say, i’m fully behind Dave Whelan on this one.
He may own JJB, The Mecca of all Chavs, but it’s good to see that even with Wigan avoiding the drop he’s continuing the fight against West Ham. I felt so bad for Sheffield United on Sunday; less so for Niel Warnock, but I will miss his hilarious antics in the Premiership next season.
But seriously, you can’t help thinking that if West Ham had been a smaller club, with less money behind them this season, then the Premier League would have come down like a ton of bricks over the Tevez/Mascherano affair. It’s especially harsh for Sheffield United when you consider that Tevez essentially kept West Ham up single-handedly.
So yeah, screw the Hammers, sue them for every penny and send that weird bald twat back to Iceland. I mean, he’s not even human really is he…
Freedom of Speech, Part 2 Thursday, May 17 2007
Philosophy and Politics 12:33 am
As a man of my word I always intend to fulfil earlier promises. So I give you
Freedom of Speech, Part 2
I ended Part 1 by appeal to what might be termed a ’slippery slope’ argument; that because we cannot consistently differentiate between what is an is not acceptable ‘all the way down’ (so to speak), we should therefore not attempt to do it at all. But that seems, on reflection, not a powerful enough argument. For as I myself am fond of pointing out to people, “just because the edges are fuzzy and we don’t know exactly where they lie, it doesn’t mean we don’t know what’s in the middle”. That is, while it may be hard (perhaps, and as i suspect, impossible) to say what differentiates a racist from a union-basher, then it doesn’t follow that we don’t know that racism is disgusting and hence should be countered. Simply because of a highly philosophical ’slippery slope’ argument, it has not been shown that we should thereby confer a right upon Nick to make his racist speech. For while we may not be sure at the philosophical level what separates racism from union-bashing, we still know, in the here and now, that racism is bad. Therefore we should prevent people from making racist speeches.
Let us call that line of thought ‘The Intuitive Objection’. There is much appeal in the Intuitive Objection. Indeed, I myself am generally suspicious of ’slippery slope’ arguments (for a host of reasons i will not discuss here), and it is plain to see that the philosophical considerations of Part 1 can only do so much work in the case, especially, or racism. So what i seek to present here are a series of practical considerations; less abstract than those previously offered, but when combined with those more abstract considerations, overwhelmingly decisive, and serving to show that the Intuitive Objection is misguided. That is what I hope to go some way to showing now.
Where to begin? It will help if we have a target in mind, so an example is useful. The example I wish to work with will (eventually) constitue what i think is the hardest to example argue against. So if my arguments are successful against this example, we can take them as being (pretty much) decisive. However, to break things down and make them more accessible I will start with a simplified version of the example. It will be made more complex – and hence harder to deal with – at a later stage. I do this simply for ease and clarity of exposition.
To begin, let us once more consider our racist, Nick, and his giving a racist speech in Oldham. Let us consider ourselves to be State Enforcers; we possess the capacity to shut Nick and his cronies down in accordance with the government policy we consider to be most fit. It is up to us, after careful consideration, to decide as to whether or not we should shut Nick down. Let us further assume that we are all agreed (rightly) that racism is abhorrent, and that a decent society – which we all aspire to bring about – condemns racism. Should we therefore stop Nick from giving a racist speech? In the language of Part 1, should we not only abstain from protecting Nick’s choices over giving racist speeches, but actively impede those choices, thus denying him the ability to make such choices? This is our starting example. I now draw on three sets of considerations, taken from J.S. Mill’s On Liberty, to say that argue that we should not deny Nick freedom of speech, even to make a racist speech.
The first consideration is that we might be wrong about racism, so we should not ban it. Now at first glance that appears a hopeless line of thought; indeed we took it as a starting assumption that we are not wrong about the disgusting nature of racism . But bear with me. This consideration in it’s original presentation (by Mill) was used to temper the self-confidence of arrogent men, of whom history provides so many examples. For history points to countless instances of men assuming themselves to have reached some matter upon which their thougts infallible, only to be laughed at by future generations for their stupidity and their self-assurance. For example, men were once made public laughing stocks for saying the earth was not flat; but in time it was those who themselves maintained that the earth was flat who came to be the laughing-stocks of succeeding generations. Mill used this point to argue against those who claimed that they could prevent others from speaking freely because they themselves were in possession of some eternal, infallible truth. For whenever men think themselves to have achieved a universal truth, they are usually wrong!
However, this won’t carry much weight in the current example. For regardless of whether future generations come to scorn us for our attitudes towards racism, and whether or not we hold the abhorrence of racism to be an “eternal truth”, these considerations miss the point. The point is that we think – or rather, know – that racism is wrong, and we want it’s pernicious effects to be eradicated from our society. An argument that runs “we should allow racism because we might be wrong; racism might be a glorious thing” isn’t going to cut any ice. And nor should it. So we must move on, and look elsewhere.
What of the second consideration advanced by Mill? That in most matters, neither the received nor the newly proposed wisdom is entirely right, but rather that the truth is a mixture of the two? Mill thought that the advance of human knowledge would be much impeded if new ideas and approaches were rejected out of hand, as only by considering and assimilating those new approaches could progress be achieved.
This seems as vulnerable to the same objections as our first consideration. We know racism is bad. We likewise know that there is no unrealised ‘truth’ inherent in racism. Again, an argument that runs “you must allow people to be racist because otherwise you impede the progress of human knowledge and thought” will cut no ice. And again nor should it.
At this point it might seem that i’m not getting anywhere, and that my ‘argument’ has failed to materialise. Why have i bothered to detail such considerations? Well firstly (and to invert what Aristotle said) completeness is a virtue. But more importantly, by laying out first what i am not saying i hope to make it (eventually) clear what I am saying. For the third consideration, to which i now turn, is vital. And much of what i am about to say seems to be synonymous with the above considerations. In fact this is not the case, and by having laid out what I am not saying, I hope to head-off some potential confusions before they arise.
The third – and, for our present enquiry, the most important – consideration applies when we know that the opinion we hold is the right one, and we know that the one we reject is mistaken. Indeed, in our present case the opinion we reject is not only mistaken, but in some way malicious, hostile and directly opposed to the views and ideals we ourselves hold. At first glance this would appear to be the hardest case of all to deal with – for why should we tolerate a view we know to be not only mistaken, but also pernicious?
Essentially, the reason is that surpressing such unpleasant views won’t work. By simply banning a racist from expressing his or her racism, that will neither stop them being racist, but more importantly it will not convince others of their views being unacceptable. It is, i would venture to assert, a fact about human beings that whenever state authorities simply ban something outright, this only serves to add a sort of warped legitimacy to the views (or individuals, or groups) being banned. The classic example is of course the Nazi Party in 1920s Germany. To be sure, economic depression played the greater part in the rise of Hitler. But by banning Hitler and the Nazis the Weimar government not only gave both a national platform, but also (and rather perversely) substantially increased their appeal. When ordinary people are simply told that a certain view or way of thinking is unacceptable, they tend to be suspicious of the organisation banning it. Human beings like to side with the underdog, and hence turn against the government, with its perceived monopoly of power and coercion and its apparently unchallengeable authority to dictate what is and is not acceptable. People don’t like to be dictated to: they like to be able to make up their own minds, and are suspicious of any organisation that denies them the chance to do so, or tells them they are not capable of doing so.
After all, if the government is in the right in banning racists, then why doesn’t it provide reasons for doing so? A failure to provide reasons always raises the suspicion that there aren’t any (or at least, not any good ones). This in turn gives a warped legitimacy to the banned views or groups. Such views or groups end up being cast as the innocent victims of state bullying. So here we have a key part of my argument: that by banning racists, you can actually end up helping them spread their racism and their appeal.
This is made especially true of the fact that racists will not stop after being banned: they will simply go underground. And underground they’re harder to keep track of, harder to control, and harder to regulate…unless, that is, you are prepared to start throwing everybody suspected of involvement with such groups or views in prison. And recall that we are considering this question from the perspective of state policy enforcers. Is that the kind of state we want to create? Not only would such a policy rapidly erode the liberal character of state and society, but such a practice would, once again, cause the general population to suspect the government - which is simply throwing people in jail for expressing opinions - as itself warped and in the wrong. Hence the banned group or view again receives the veneer of legitimacy, as well as the curious appeal human beings so often confer upon the outlawed and the illegal.
Now at this point you might be thinking: “fine, but can’t the government just ban such views or groups and provide reasons for the ban?” That appears to be a logical line of thought, but actually it just entails either the granting of freedom of speech for all, or the counter-productive outcomes just detailed.
If the government simply bans views (or groups) and declares that it is banning them for a certain reason, which we shall designate ‘reason X’, then surely people might want to argue that X is not a good reason? Most obviously, if the views or groups being banned are racist ones, then racists will be likely to complain about reasons X. In response the government can do one of two things. On the one hand, it can refuse to tolerate the questioning of reason X, and include questioning of reason X under the ban on whatever it is X provides reasons for banning. But if it does that, then the point of reason X – to prevent giving an air of legitimacy to the views being banned – is somewhat lost. We are back to where we started. Yet if the government allows the discussion of reason X, then that means the granting of free speech (or whatever is in question) to all.
For those who spotted what might appear to be a small piece of fraud I just employed to make that argument work, let me explain why it is quiet legitimate. An objector is likely to say that you could consistently ban racism (or whatever), yet simultaneously not ban the discussions of reason X. However, if discussion of reason X is allowed, but a blanket ban on racism (or whatever) remains enforced, then discussion of reason X becomes hollow and pointless. For what is the use in discussing a ban, if it is out of the question that the very ban under discussion can ever be lifted? This will only lead, once more, to fuelling the perceived legitimacy of banned groups, along with the perverse appeal they will thereby attain. Seeing this, an objector might want to argue that a government could get so good at tricking people into believing discussion of reason X might alter the status of a ban (even though the government would never actually consider lifting the ban) that the government could institute a ban and the appearance of discussion, thus apparently solving the problem. That certainly seems (depressingly) possible. But let us remember that we are imagining ourselves to be the government agency making policy decisions. Do we really want to implement a policy that advocates the systematic deception of the entire population? For I most certainly do not.
Having established those considerably forceful arguments, let me offer one final one (at least, for now. I’m afraid this big, difficult issue is going to require a Part 3). Presumably, the reason we wish to stamp out racism is because we think it is a bad thing. Hence, we presumably wish to cultivate a population of people who reject racist ideas and sentiments. That would seem to me a most laudable goal, and one we ought to pursue. But is it really plausible that people will become convinced of the abhorrence of racism simply because the government bans it, along with all discussion of whether it should be banned? Surely people will want to know why racism is a bad thing, and not just know that the government thinks it’s a bad thing, and hence has banned it.
What is the best way of explaining why racism is abhorrent? Let us consider a government ban on racist speeches and the expression of racist views, where either no reason for the ban is provided, or reasons are given but are not up for debate. Will this convince many people of the abhorrence of racism? It is hardly likely. For as I have already noted, people do not like to be dictated to – they like to either have things explained, with the capacity to question, or to decide for themselves. Blanket-banning racism won’t stop established racists (they will go underground), nor will it convince others of the abhorrence of racism; they want to have issues explained and questioned. But that requires open debate, not government decrees. And that in turn means allowing people to be racist.
And it turns out that the best way to fight racism, as well as convincing people of its abhorrence (and therefore fighting racism again), is via open, public debate. The best way to show that an opinion is wrong is to confront it head on, openly and publicly. If we are right about racism, then we should be able to show why we are right. This may require extensive time and effort, but if done properly, we will simultaneously educate the population, discredit the racists, and avoid driving ordinary people into their arms. Yet note that cannot achieve any of those things by simply applying a blanket ban. Note also that this way we do not muddy the concept of freedom of speech as a right given to all, and hence our arguments remain in conformity with the philosophical considerations already advanced in Part 1.
However, at this point i must take on a serious (and I find somewhat worrying) objection: that ordinary people are very stupid, and despite the best education we could provide they will not see the falsity of racism, and so the racists will win if we allow open debate. In fact, racism is quite a poor example in this case, because roughly two decades of anti-racist campaigns in schools, the media etc has radically altered average British conceptions about race. So let’s pick the live example; holocaust denial.
It is often alleged – tacitly or explicitly – that ordinary people are very stupid, and hence are easily taken in by the seductive lies of holocaust deniers. It is reasoned that it is too risky to allow holocaust deniers freedom of speech to holocaust deny, because ordinary people are too thick to see that the arguments against holocaust denial are superior, hence the deniers will gain the upper hand, and thus we risk the repetition of one of mankind’s most shameful chapters.
What can i say to this? Well firstly I do not believe that it is anyways true that people are that thick. I think if enough effort was put in by government, anybody who wasn’t already a vicious anti-Semite could come to see that arguments by the likes of David Irving are pathetic when compared to the overwhelming evidence that the holocaust happened (evidence which exists because it didhappen!). However nobody said things were going to be easy; combating racists, anti-Semites etc is hard, long, and often boring work. But as is so often in life, what is worthwhile is hard, long and boring. Consequently, we have good reason to suspect that simply banning racists (or whoever) is a suspiciously easy solution. In fact, I am convinced that is is too easy – and because it is so seductively simple it cannot do the work we might want it to, and as I hope these arguments are showing.
But let me not rest my argument on such a contentious point, for what has already been said can serve us here regardless of how stupid you think ordinary people are. In fact, if you think people are that stupid, then banning holocaust denial (or whatever) isn’t going to work anyway. For if people are so stupid that they cannot see the falsity of holocaust denial, banning holocaust denial will simply cause them to believe that the government is suppressing the truth. This will in turn push people into believing the conspiracy-nuts who claim that the holocaust is part of a sinister conspiracy organised by Jews who run the world. Banning holocaust denial would simply fuel holocaust deniers. Alternatively, by having an open debate about the issue, we can force deniers out into the open where they must state their claims - with the full attention of decent society, ready to take them on and show why they are wrong (as well as evil, dishonest, dangerous etc etc). Which do you think is more likely to be effective to countering holocaust deniers? Blanket-bans or open debates? So which do you think we, as policy-enforcers, ought to adopt? Although it is worth noting that if we decide that we would prefer open debate, we’re going to have to be prepared to back it up with time, money, effort and commitment. Freedom of speech is not an option for governments who want to scrimp on these issues. And that is worth thinking about in the context of the modern world.
That pretty much concludes Part 2. I hope to have offered you some quite convincing practical arguments as to why denying people freedom of speech is not only ineffective, it is essentially counter-productive.
But, as this is a long and difficult issue, and there remain questions. Indeed, it may seem I have not really addressed the starting objections. For let us refine our initial example and make it tougher to deal with in the manner i have so far advanced. Let us imagine that not only does Nick give a racist speech. Rather, in giving his speech he either specifically tells his listeners, or deliberately puts the idea into their heads, to go out and harm, perhaps even kill, those who are not white, or who oppose his organisation. Surely we must not grant him freedom of speech if we think that his doing so will lead to others perpetrating violence against others, others whom the government has a responsibility to protect?
That is the big question i have yet to address. I will address it, in part 3. And don’t worry, i’m not going to say people should (or do) have a right to tell others to go out and murder. But as i hope to show, incitement to harm is a long way from merely giving a racist speech. But also, you may be surprised to hear, it is a long way from inciting people to hate. So in Part 3 i will and try and show why I think New Labour’s Incitement to Racial Hatred laws are deeply, deeply misguided, and threaten all our civil liberties as well as subverting the concept of having rights.
However, as a way of anticipating some of the arguments that Part 3 will employ, ponder the following. So far I have advanced practical and philosophical considerations as to why a right to freedom of speech extends to scumbags like Nick Griffin. Consider also that there is a matter of principle in play; a matter i have so far deliberately chosen not to bring out explicitly. This allows one to postulate this further thought: that liberals like myself confer rights upon everybody simply by virtue of their being human, and conditional upon nothing else. Racists, on the other hand, confer rights upon people only conditionally; people must fulfill some form of criteria – i.e. being a certain colour – before they get any rights. That is something that separates us fundamentally from the racists. Interestingly, is is also something that separates liberals like me from Tony Blair. More interestingly, it implies that the conception of a rights New Labour has been pushing for the last 10 years is in some way akin to the conception held be racists. And it also implies that the New Labour project is rather incompatible with the liberal conception of rights I am here promoting. Controversial stuff, perhaps you will agree.
And with those curious little thoughts, i leave you.
This Might Be Satire Tuesday, May 15 2007
Stuff only I know why is here 2:55 pm
Well I wanna chew my bubble gum
With you
And I wanna walk you home from school
And I wanna carry your books
To every class
And I wanna fuck you up the ass.
Girl,
Don’t you know it’s true,
How much I love you?
I wanna sing it ‘cross the land,
Oh won’t you hold my hand?
She tells me that she loves me,
Now i’m gonna tell her that i love her,
She tells me that she loves me,
Now i’m gonna try and fuck her
But where hell are my priorities?
Left in the hands of the authorities.
Patrick Moore Tuesday, May 8 2007
Current Affairs 6:54 pm
If you’re looking for the Freedom of Speech post, scroll down.
If you want something a little more light-hearted, here’s some classic Patrick Moore madness to keep us all amused.
Apparently the BBC is deteriorating because it’s run by too many women!
Seriously though, i sympathise. I too enjoyed Star Trek until they started making women commanders. The bastards. Take us back to the Golden Days, Patty!
(If you are suddenly finding yourself taking old Patty too seriously, then go here to have the natural order restored).
Freedom of Speech, part 1 Tuesday, May 8 2007
Philosophy and Politics 1:14 pm
Recently i’ve found myself getting into heated discussions with various people about freedom of speech, what it means, and what it entails. Usually the heated nature of the argument leads to neither side being clear on what the other wants to say, and hence nobody being satisfied.
So I thought i’d lay out my thoughts on this topic not only so people could as clearly as possible get what i’m trying to say, but also to check that I myself know what it is I think. So i give you
Freedom of Speech – Part 1
It seems we can agree on all hands that freedom of speech is a right – in fact, some would go so far to say it is a human right. But let us just be content here with thinking of it as a right.
But what is a right? That’s actually a big philosophical question, and there is plenty of literature out there (much of it confused and wrong-headed) to investigate if anybody is dissatisfied with my account. Yet if we are to make headway on the matter of free speech, we will need some sort of account to get us going. The one I favour is as follows, and is laid out in formal terms because this yields, with a little concentration, the greatest clarity (that is, i’m not trying to bully anybody by employing technical terms they haven’t had the opportunity to come across yet. This is just the best way to deal with this stuff).
DEF: “Agent A has a right to f if and only if agent A’s choices over f -ing are to be protected”
Before continuing, let me explain what the Greek letter f is doing in the above. For philosophers f is schematic for any verb of action, for example meeting people freely, walking where you like unrestricted, or, of course, speaking freely. It allows us to provide what is effectively an agreed baseline for how to think about many things that fall under the same banner. Likewise, ‘Agent A’ is just schematic for any unspecific and undesignated person: this avoids the use of partial or emotive examples concerning real people, and helps keep things formal and neat. What this all comes down to is that if we agree that A has a right to speak freely, then we agree that A has a right to freedom of speech.
However, this in turn means spelling out what we mean by “protected”:
“If A chooses to f then everyone has a duty not to interfere with A’s exercise of his or her choice, and moreover, if B tries to prevent A exercising his or her choice, then B is to be prevented from doing so.”
I hope that so far nothing too controversial has taken place – if anybody has been reduced to a burning rage by what has said so far, i suspect that is due to a technical disagreement regarding my definition of a right. If so, then feel free to comment/e-mail me as to why my, i would hope uncontroversial, definition is so unsatisfactory.
Putting that to one side, for those less well-versed in the technical stuff let’s run an example through the above schematics so as to make everything more intuitively straight-forward. For example, if we wanted to say that Sarah has a right of freedom of association, then this would play out as follows.
If Sarah wishes to associate with Arthur, then Sarah’s choices in associating with Arthur are to be protected.
Which requires spelling out what we mean by “protected”:
If Beth attempts to interfere with Sarah’s choice to associate with Arthur, say by locking her in a cupboard, then Beth is to be prevented from doing so.
Pretty uncontroversial, right? Because we all think Sarah has a right to freedom of association, and we all think it should be protected, whether Beth be a malign individual, or a member of the oppressive State Police.
But, judging from recent conversations about freedom of speech, I reckon I can put the cat among the pigeons quite easily, and simply by doing this:
If Nick choses to give a racist speech in Oldham, then Nick’s choice in giving a racist speech is to be protected.
And that means spelling out what we meant by “protected”:
If Duncan Money and his Socialist Hordes attempt to stop Nick from choosing to give the racist speech, then Duncan and Co. are to be prevented from doing so.
Now that probably got a reaction. So what is going on? In the case of Sarah and freedom of association, everything seemed to be going so well. Yet using exactly the same schematic, and taking what many would hold to be an equally if not more important right – that of freedom of speech – i’ve managed to make everything far less clear cut. Essentially, in the case of freedom of association I constructed a non-controversial example which ensured that most if not all readers’ intuitions went in the usual, comfortable direction. Yet by picking a controversial case, that of racism, i’ve made the intuitions go all over the place.
And that, i think, is a major cause of most of the disagreements i’ve been having with people about freedom of speech; that when I say that we have to protect somebody’s right to make a racist speech, the intuitions go haywire:on the one hand there is the intuition that we all have a right to freedom of speech, on the other is the intuition that racism is a bad thing. What, i think, is happening with most people is that the intuition about racism, while in itself a good thing, is subverting the less strong intuition about rights to freedom of speech, and making eveything uncomfortable and messy. So what i want to show here is that not only is that outcome an unecessary mistake, but it is a very serious one indeed.
Let us return to the example of Nick and his giving a racist speech, and let us be clear on exactly what it entails. Notice that nothing said above entails or even implies that we have to do any of the following: buy Nick a train ticket to Oldham, find him a place to give his speech, publicise the event, etc. In short, we do not have to assist Nick in any way. All that is required of us is that we be neutral towards Nick, and prevent Duncan and Co. from interfering with his choice. This is a subtle yet important point: we are neither condoning nor condemning Nick’s choice – we are neutral towards it except for an acknowledgement that it is to be protected (which is neutral because we extend the same protection to everybody).
But you’re probably thinking “hang on a minute Racism is a bad thing, why are we required to protect someone’s choice in being racist?”. And to that i now turn. Although i warn you now that the answer is a long one, and it’s long because it’s important and difficult, as important things usually are.
To begin, consider the following. We are all perfectly aware that racism is a bad thing – essentially that’s because we are well brought-up human beings with a sense of empathy towards fellow living creatures, and hence do not feel the urge to perpetrate direct or indirect violence against others simply because they look different to us. So for us the intuition that racism is wrong, and therefore shouldn’t (if at all possible) happen is a strong and clear one. But let’s take another, more difficult example. Thomas is a Colonel in a popular army made up of volunteers that has recently won a decisive civil war. Thomas has the belief that under the regime poised to replace the old one, individuals should have the ability to take part in the political process, regardless of class status of property qualification. At a specially convened meeting where officers and ordinary soldiers are for the first time allowed to come together and discuss the future, Thomas puts forward his ideas in a series of speaches. However, the commander of the armed forces (and would-be-Sovereign) Oliver decides he does not like the idea of this new political regime Thomas is proposing. He would quite like to keep things as they were, except with him in charge. Hence he decides that Thomas is not going to be allowed to make such speeches in future – in fact, he decides to have Thomas murdered so as to keep him out of the way once and for all.
You’ll be interested to know that this last example is far from fanciful. It is the true story of Colonel Thomas Rainsborough, the man who died so that we could have rights, and Oliver Cromwell, the man who killed him hoping we’d never get them, following the Putney Debates.
The point i want to make here is the following. Notice that it is impossible to supply a neutral, non-emotive reason why there is any difference in Nick’s having a right to give a racist speech, and Thomas’ right to advocate political equality. That is, you can’t say “racism is a bad thing” and “advocating political equality is a good thing” – those are emotive justifications. Of course, now you will want a reason for why i’m banning emotive justifications. In fact The reason is crucial to this argument.
It is easy to condemn racism – we all (rightly, i hope) observe that racism is abhorent. Hence it feels as though we should say that people do not have a ”right” to be racist. But notice now an important problem: from Oliver’s perspective in the above example, it is obvious that Thomas should have no right to advocate political equality.
So what separates us from Oliver? I think we can all agree that we are right and he is wrong. But how exactly does a distinction like that get put into practice? The point is that it can’t be. While it is now, at this stage of history, relatively clear cut that racism is unacceptable, many many things that fall under the remit of a right to freedom of speech are nowhere near so straight-forward. For example, does Duncan have the right to give speaches advocating the full unionisation of supermarket workers? We may think he does -but Walmart probably disagrees. Yet what if Walmart holds all the cars – it dominates workplace organisations and has massive government lobbying power? It seems Walmart could then advocate, and probably be quite successful in, the taking away of Duncan’s right to freedom of speech on this matter. Yet we clearly think this is wrong (or at least, I hope we do). After all just because Walmart has more power than Duncan, and has a vested interest in silencing him, it doesn’t follow that he loses a right to free speech, does it?
But now two problems arise if you want to continue to say that Nick has no right to give a racist speech . Firstly, how are we to decide what is and what is not permitted under the right to freedom of speech. There might appear to be an easy answer: racism is a bad thing, advocating worker rights is a good thing. But now things get really messy. Firstly, while i agree racism is a bad thing, who are we to say so? The moral majority? Well i rather doubt that there is a clear majority of anti-racist sentiment in this country (think here of Islamaphobia). To take a sligtly different example to make the same point, if a government was elected on the back of a clear populist sentiment to make it illegal for adult consenting males to have sexual relations, would we therefore say that homosexual men should lose the right to sleep with each other? Of course not: so a populist justification is not what we seek, as it is too contingent, and too easily subverted, when what we want to say is that racism just is bad, not ‘racism is bad because lots of people now think it is’.
Alternatively, should we instead consider ourselves the intellectual elite that is able to step back and decide what is an is not morally acceptable? Well if so, more messy questions arise. For a start, who are we to say so? It may well be obvious to us that racism is wrong, but then again it is obvious to Walmart that allowing Duncan to give a speech about worker solidarity is a bad thing (they may even purport to say that it is bad for the workers themselves!). What separates us from Walmart? Even if you believe that it is an objective moral truth that racism is abhorrent (i personally don’t go in for ojectivism, but that’s another story), it’s hard to tell the same story about unionisation; “it’s morally bad to unionize” sounds not only hopeless but also silly, even if you happen to think unionisation is undesirable. It seems we have no clear way of saying that giving racists speaches is a “bad thing”, and yet simultaneously stipulating which side of the moral line other forms of controversial use of freedom of speech fall on.
The second point, and very much in light of the above, is as follows. If we say that Nick can’t give his speech, but Duncan can, how do we justify this to either Nick or Walmart? Nick can protest that he knows that racism is not a bad thing (even if he admits he is being racist), and Walmart will protest that unionisation is a bad thing. Notice how Nick uses an argument we tried to use to surpress him, and Walmart tries to use the argument we want to use to surpress Nick in order to surpress Duncan. Where does it stop? How do we draw the dividing lines between Nick and Walmart, racism and unionisation?
The answer is, i’m affraid, that we can’t. If we think that freedom of speech is sufficiently important to be consiered a right, then by the nature of a right we have to extend it to everyone. If we think John has a right to speak out against government corruption, then we think Duncan can speak about unionisation. If we think Henry has a right to advocate, through his newspaper column, the privatisation of the NHS, then we think Nick has a right to give a racist speech. Why? Because if we start arbitrarily excluding certain things – and i hope the previous considerations will show that it isan arbitrary exclusion – then freedom of speech loses all its moral and political importance. If we restrict Nick from speaking, then Walmart can restrict Duncan, and so forth. The point about freedom of speech is that we think it is vitally important, as part of a free society, for people to be able to say what they think without fear of being murdered, or thrown into jail, or intimidates, or marginalised, or whatever. But the only way that concept can be made to work is if we extend that right to everybody, no matter how disgusting they, or the things they say, are. Hence that old cliche – having freedom of speech means having the right to tell people what they don’t want to hear – is so very true. If freedom of speech is to mean anything, it means extending it to those people we don’t agree with. If you don’t accept that, then consider what use freedom of speech would be if another Oliver Cromwell, or an oppressively homophobic government, came to power (because rights to sleep with consenting adults work in the same way as rights to freedom of speech - see how important our initial schematic for a right is?). In both those cases, already established “rights” would mean nothing, because you would only have the “right” to do what those in power approved of. And that is no right at all. The whole point about rights is that they do not rest upon the whim of any dictator, government, popular majority or even our own well-meaning intentions. They rest upon a principle applied to everyone, because we think that that principle – freedom of speech, association, press, whatever - is sufficiently important to merit the status.
Hence now we can see what is going on with the intuitions i spoke about earlier. We all know that racism is a bad thing, and we naturally want it to end. Therefore when i say that Nick has a right to be racist, this bends the good intuition about racism in an uncomfortable direction. But it doesn’t have to so bend it - and I hereby hope to fulfil an earlier promise. For it is completely consistent to say that, on the one hand, “I think racism is abhorrent” and yet on the other “I will respect Nick’s right to be racist”. For while we don’t have to support Nick – remember what I said earlier about not buying him train tickets, etc – we must recognise that for freedom of speech to mean anything, we must say, in those famour words falsely attributed to Voltaire, that we may disagree with what Nick has to say, but will defend to the death his right to say it. And that is because of the other intuition i talked about – the one that says freedom of speech is an important and good thing, which we all think it is. Even when it means we have to tolerate nasty little bastards like Nick (Griffin).
That pretty much concludes Part 1. However there are I admit issues left outstanding from the above. For some might protest that even if we can’t explicitly state why racism is a bad thing but advocating unionisation (or whatever) isn’t, we still know that racism is bad and should be stopped, and that is all we need to know to act against racism. Or - an argument I am worried by having heard a lot recently – that the general population is too stupid to hear the seductive words of a clever racist (insert Holocaust Denier, if you like), and so we cannot risk letting people be seduced. These and similar arguments will be dealt with in Part 2, which will come whenever I have the time to write it. But until I have the time, I would point anybody interested in what has been said here to a rather important litte book, one that will prepare you for - nay, give you all you need to know regarding – Part 2.
I’m sorry this has been so long, but as i said at the outset this stuff is important, and important things are almost always difficult (and usually long). Comments are especially welcome on this topic, as is general correspondence. I will be happy to respond to criticisms, or just general confusion or lack of clarity where-ever it is flagged up.
Over and Out.
[Note: the above owes a considerable debt to Bob Hargrave's little page "How to think about rights". For any observant readers who have noticed that socio-economic rights, like "a right to education" or "a right to free healthcare a the point of need" simply won't go into the above rights-schema, go to Bob's page to have all made clear.]
Thames Valley Police and their stinking hypocrisy Wednesday, May 2 2007
Sagar's Social Commentaries 11:57 pm
Can somebody please explain to me why the following makes sense.
If i own a dog, and while taking it for a walk down Broad Street it craps on the floor (and i don’t pick it up), a passing policeman should uphold the law by issuing me with a £150 fine.
However, if the police are out and about on their glorified fluorescently-clad ponies, and one of them takes a dump in the middle of Broad Street, that is not only in itself fine, but it is also accompanied by no fine.
Horses are, i would say, at least 10 times bigger than dogs. Correspondingly, their crap is 10 times bigger. Why, exactly, is it OK for police horses to shit on the street, but not dogs?
Is it because we don’t ride dogs? If so, the next time I ride my (imaginary) St Bernard down Cornmarket Street, am I within my rights to gleefully ignore the disapproving coppers going the other way on their ponies, whilst Rex (excellent name for a dog, i’m sure you’ll agree) does his business?
If somebody could sort that out for me, i’d be very grateful. Thanks.
My favourites are the white ones. I especially like their shin-pads. Almost as if they were off to play horse football. Which might be a bit like polo. Except for poor horses.
May Day Wednesday, May 2 2007
Current Affairs and Politics and Sagar's Social Commentaries 12:40 am
Anybody else think there was something rather disappointing about the London May Day protests this year?
Don’t get me wrong, in previous years its been characterised by full-on idiots taking any excuse they can to commit vandalism and violence. As is often the case when you give people a chance to do something ‘external’ – protest, burn stuff, fight – it’s generally a sign of nasty ‘internal’ stuff being let loose – i.e. the fact they are shit people. At least, that has been my experience of various ‘anarchists’ and ‘new age revolutionaries’ thus far; nasty people with nasty issues, using a jumped-up idealist cause to externalise their nastiness. (The classic example being, of course, those stupid bastards in the ALF. If they really cared about animals*, then they would realise terrorising people isn’t going to help anybody or anything. But then it’s not really about animals, it’s about them playing at being outcast revolutionaries-cum-saviours).
But having said that, i always rather liked May Day. Even if McDonalds was getting smashed for the wrong reasons, I still think McDonalds getting smashed is a good thing (apologies if my leaning towards consequentialism annoys any agent-centred moralists out there). In general, if Starbucks’ deep, deep coffers (built, let’s not forget, on the back of third-world exploitation and mindless, unreflective consumerism) become a little shallower because some crust punk from Leeds decided to smash a window or two, then that is fine by me. I may have “matured” and “grown-up”, but I still think that globalisation as it is being conducted is not something we should be particularly proud of, nor something we should quietly acquiesce in the continuation of.
And further, it’s not just that Kentucky Fried Chicken gets to keep its aesthetically pleasing and comfortably-styled plastic seats. It’s that the whole May Day spirit has been commandeered by a bunch of pretentious, ‘post-ironic’, anti-idealist fucks. The kind of people who spend 6 years wasting the tax-payers’ money doing an art degree the end product of which is “a modern interpretation of protest as an art form, but where protest becomes anti-protest, as a symbol of contemporary anxiety”, or some other such shit. By all means can you pass me the joint, because you twits have had far too much of it.
Yet this co-opting of the spirit of being genuinely pissed off about stuff that matters, regardless of how many idiots jump the bandwagon, is made especially worse when you consider that the world is, on many counts, actually shitter than 5 or 10 years ago. Here’s a short list of some major reasons.
- An illegal war in Iraq, 3000+ dead American troops, hundreds of dead Britons, HUNDREDS OF THOUSANDS of dead Iraqis. A destablized middle-east, and a nasty looking future for many, many people.
- The other war in Afghanistan which is turning into a right quagmire, with no visible exit strategy either.
- Despite the above two, Blair is leaving power on his own terms, rather than with his tail between his legs.
- Brown is succeeding him, unopposed by a Labour Party that sold socialism up the river around the time it was having its balls lopped off, and without anybody pointing out that the debacle in Iraq was made possible by his agreement, because after all the Treasury is where the money for it all came/comes from.
- The right to protest has itself been severely curtailed; you can’t protest outside Parliament (a centuries-old freedom, i believe), you have to register protests etc.
- In line with the above, the constant curtailment of those nice little historically anomalous luxuries known as civil freedoms and rights.
- The constant surveilance by private and public organisations we now all accept as routine.
- The fact that globalisation is not stopping or slowing down, and is still responsible for the misery of millions world-wide when this frankly need not be the case (so don’t give me any “it’s just how it is”, or “they could have NO jobs” bullshit, please; i’m too tired).
- That despite a general consensus that global warming is happening, measures to combat it have been minimal at best, and on a more cynical view falling far short of what is required.
So yes, i’m still a raving idealist with his head in the clouds. And while i appreciate the irony of cleverly facilitating a new form of legit-protest via the government’s own measures to curtail protest, it just doesn’t have quite the same impact as throwing bottles at riot-pigs, and giving old Winston a mohawk out of grass whilst rolling him a makeshift spliff.
In fact, i’m so agitated by the moral decline of this country’s ability to protest that i might just go and set fire to Sainsbury’s Local right now. That’ll teach The Man to fuck with me.
*Note that I am myself a vegan and therefore I have the ultimate moral highground (something i am going to bash Peter Singer over the head with in a couple of weeks), so remember that before any of you ALF-types start threatening to burn my boathouse down.
EDIT: Also, a little May Day-esque joke, nicked from the Stoa.
Binge Drinking Sunday, May 13 2007
Current Affairs and Sagar's Social Commentaries Paul Sagar 4:05 pm
The Government has some new adverts out, intended to discourage young people from binge drinking. They mostly involve disgusting drunkards making arses of themselves.
And they’re pretty good; when you watch them you end up agdmitting that you don’t really want to be like the person making an arse of themself. This is more effective than, say, a cartoon human liver pleading that you treat it kindly. Nobody cares about their liver.
But will this stop me binge drinking?
No.
Because as soon as one of those adverts comes on, I think “oh fuck it’s that horrible advert that makes me feel like a twat”. And so I switch channels.
Such are the upsides of having 900 channels, all broadcasting nothing but crap.
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