Post #2933761

2023-03-10 10:31 UTC

The logical conclusion to free-speech absolutism is that, if a time traveller gave you the chance to prevent the holocaust, but only by introducing hate-speech laws in the Weimar Republic, you&#39;d have to decline.

Replies (1)

@gabri@tech.lgbt 2023-03-13 09:05

@darkwiiplayer@fosstodon.org You don't even need to go that far. Just say that free speech absolutism implies allowing fraud, CSAM, threats and criminal solicitation. I like to make the following argument: speech changes our emotions and this happens through physical and chemical processes so some forms of speech are, in effect, drugs. The best examples here are how porn, gore, and hateful speech can be addictive and how they impair people's ability to think rationality. This is to say if something can act like a drug then it should be possible to regulate it like a drug. I know that my argument is very far from airtight and that philosophers will have a lot to say about how I assumed the relationship between mental and brain states work but I still feel my argument has rethoric value as it invites a new way of thinking for a lot of people who are used to seeing speech as fundamentally different from actions.

Open ##3129292