> There is no era of Western history where unpopular opinions were more acceptable than today. In the past, dissenting opinions voiced loudly were often punished by blacklisting or excommunication or prison or death.
Granted, but what's the logic here? We ought to content ourselves with regression so long as no one is being imprisoned or killed? We want to progress, not regress. We don't want a conformist society, we want a tolerant society[^1]. We want free speech[^2], not compelled/coerced speech. We want ideas to compete freely so the best rise to the top; we don't want a prescribed set of beliefs to be forced on everyone.
[^1]: (yes, I know all about the Paradox of Tolerance and how some use it to give themselves moral license to persecute anyone they deep intolerant).
[^2]: No, I'm not talking about the strict 1st Amendment legal definition, but the broader principle.
It seemed like “we have progressed, therefore it’s okay to backslide and no one should criticize cancellation”. After all, no one here is arguing that the 1500s, 1600s, etc were the golden ages of speech.
I think it's presumptuous to assume "it's okay to backslide" was part of that comment. What/when are we backsliding from? There was never some 'golden age' where comments anathema to the culture at large wouldn't have consequences. Even the popular victims of cancel culture now have it better than the ones in the 1950s, say (i.e., Gina Carano may have been fired from one company, but that was because she persisted in espousing views they disagreed with; compare that to 1950s era blackballing from all of Hollywood for being -suspected- of supporting communism/socialism).
I think for it to imply "it's okay to backslide" we have to have actually broached a time we've backslid -from-. Pursuant to the article, I don't really consider it backsliding if authors are now having second thoughts about writing from cultural perspectives other than their own. They have to be selective, of course, but we don't need, for instance, a white author writing about noble savages. That's not to say a white author can't write a western; it does mean they need to be very careful with the tone of it, or, yes, risk offending people. And recognize that some people will be offended no matter what, so they also need to recognize that some people aren't worth listening to.
It's called sensitivity, not censorship. Yes, sensitivity might lead to self-censorship, which isn't necessarily a bad thing. And you may miss the mark, and there will be consequences, and you might hit the mark but still have angry people, but angry people have yelled about every piece of literature we have. It's a balancing act, and it always has been; and I would contend consequences now are the weakest they have ever been.
> I think it's presumptuous to assume "it's okay to backslide" was part of that comment.
I wasn't assuming or presuming, I was asking.
> What/when are we backsliding from? There was never some 'golden age' where comments anathema to the culture at large wouldn't have consequences.
We're not just talking about comments that are "anathema to the culture at large", we're often talking about comments that offend only about 10% of the population. Things like "citing a celebrated academic's work on the efficacy of nonviolent protest" or "quoting a black man who wished more attention was paid to other issues in his community [besides police violence]" or "accidentally making the 'ok' gesture". With that out of the way, to answer your question more broadly, it has been rare in my life for people to be terminated even for quite controversial speech, and certainly not due to explicit pressure from large, often coordinated groups of strangers. If you were the public face of a company you were expected to steer clear of controversy, but ordinary people didn't need to fear a loss of income or access to healthcare.
The worst of it was during the height of the Iraq and Afghanistan wars when it was controversial to be seen as unpatriotic, but even then I think ordinary people were mostly insulated from the effects (i.e., it was "punching up"), the effects weren't especially chilling, and society quickly rallied around shared free-speech values and righted itself. For what it's worth, I don't think conservatives 15 years ago were morally better than today's woke progressives; rather, I think the difference is social media (notably, conservatives canceled Colin Kaepernick almost immediately after social media cancelation came into existence).
> It's called sensitivity, not censorship.
I didn't call it censorship?
> Pursuant to the article, I don't really consider it backsliding if authors are now having second thoughts about writing from cultural perspectives other than their own.
I've never found "ends justify the means" arguments to be very compelling, personally.
> And you may miss the mark, and there will be consequences
One problem with cancel culture is that there are consequences even if your speech is perfectly correct and moral, e.g., advocating for nonviolent protest. It turns out people with few scruples about canceling also tend to lack scruples about whom they target. And to be clear, "consequences" aren't "you've offended someone and now they won't speak with you"; rather, they're "you've offended someone and now they've rounded up a hundred people to harass your employer into firing you with the express purposes of making an example out of you for other would-be non-conformists".
> I would contend consequences now are the weakest they have ever been.
I strongly disagree. Worse by far than any time in my memory.
>> I would contend consequences now are the weakest they have ever been.
> I strongly disagree. Worse by far than any time in my memory.
And yet we have literal nazis posting on social media for the world to see, with the occasional one losing their job, and that's it. Hardly a chilling effect.
> For what it's worth, I don't think conservatives 15 years ago were morally better than today's woke progressives; rather, I think the difference is social media (notably, conservatives canceled Colin Kaepernick almost immediately after social media cancelation came into existence).
Is it just social media, or is it media? When somebody does a thing visibly enough to rile up a crowd... the crowd gets riled. What's new here? The words "cancel culture".
The idea that "ideas compete and the best rise to the top" is completely utopian. Such a "free marketplace of ideas" has never existed and cannot exist, because attention is a limited resource, bias exists, and not all ideas are equally valid.
The argument exists as a cover for constant relitigating of ideas that by all rational measures have lost in the "marketplace of ideas" time and time again.
If every single astronomy journal ever released contained a segment arguing about the merits of geocentrism because a few wackos continue to demand their right to "free speech and open debate" (which in reality means: unlimited speaking time on somebody else's platform), there would be no room for new science amid all the repetitive debunking.
Some debates are settled. Geocentrism is wrong. Racism is wrong. The holocaust happened. Authoritarianism is bad. Facts exist.
I think you fundamentally misunderstand free speech and the "marketplace of ideas" metaphor. It's precisely because of free speech that we can collectively condemn geocentrism, racism, holocaust-denial, authoritarianism, etc. Indeed, authoritarianism in general and Nazism, Stalinism, Maoism, etc in particular always starts with speech restrictions. The idea that free speech and authoritarianism are bed fellows doesn't make sense; these are mutually exclusive.
Moreover, "marketplace of ideas" is a metaphor for what happens in a society that has a high degree of free speech: the best most valid ideas rise to the top. You argue that the marketplace metaphor doesn't work because bias exists and because ideas vary in validity, but that doesn't make sense--these facts are the very mechanism by which the marketplace metaphor works: in speech-tolerant societies, a diversity of ideas compete and the best, most valid ideas rise to the top irrespective of bias.
> Indeed, authoritarianism in general and Nazism, Stalinism, Maoism, etc in particular always starts with speech restrictions. The idea that free speech and authoritarianism are bed fellows doesn't make sense; these are mutually exclusive.
This is a myth perpetuated by selective cultural memory. The Nazis were all about "free speech" before they were in power. They frequently complained about "Free speech" when papers published editorials criticizing them, or when their public appearances were protested, or when opinion pages didn't present "both sides".
One widely used Nazi propaganda poster from 1928 even showed Hitler with a big "CENSORED" block over his mouth, captioned "Only One of the 2000 million people in the world is not allowed to speak in Germany"[1]
> in speech-tolerant societies, a diversity of ideas compete and the best, most valid ideas rise to the top irrespective of bias.
I'm not sure that you understand what "bias" means. Bias is that which leads people to believe in ideas that are false for various sometimes difficult to quantify reasons. The fact that evidence opposing flat-eartherism is available has not prevented that idea from gaining popularity, in fact it is more popular today in 2021 than it ever has been.
The "marketplace" metaphor itself exposes that the argument comes from a utopian perspective, the argument only works if you pre-suppose that a free and unregulated economic market produces best results, but we know from experience that it produces monopolies, child labor, and bread doped with sawdust.
Public discourse is like a market in some ways, namely that people with more money are able to advance their ideas further by buying media outlets and marketing broadly and engaging in deceptive communication that exploits cognitive bias to acquire more believers, in just the same way as people with more money are able to buy out and undercut competition and exploit addictions and consumer psychology to get more sales than their products deserve.
(not parent throwaway)
Just because nazis used their free speech right to do their propaganda, that doesn't mean free speech caused nazism. In order to do any propaganda (whether that's for a morally good or bad cause), you need to be able to talk to people.
The first thing nazis did was to revoke free speech rights. That's an example of authoritarianism and free speech being opposites.
The parent commenter was claiming that free speech prevents nazism, which any honest look at the history of authoritarianism shows to be categorically untrue.
You say "we" want x&y almost as if they are firm, broadly held opinions. If there were a flash Brexit-style vote across the USA today, and democracy were on the ballot against some type of Trump-led monarchy, and the majority of the country voted for a system that dismantles all the things you value, are you now going to accept the fair and democratic result or fight back? Would you resort to blaming the masses for being uneducated and not knowing what's good for them? The Paradox of Tolerance may seem like some abstract concept but it could very well be central to an actual decision you'll have to make.
Granted, but what's the logic here? We ought to content ourselves with regression so long as no one is being imprisoned or killed? We want to progress, not regress. We don't want a conformist society, we want a tolerant society[^1]. We want free speech[^2], not compelled/coerced speech. We want ideas to compete freely so the best rise to the top; we don't want a prescribed set of beliefs to be forced on everyone.
[^1]: (yes, I know all about the Paradox of Tolerance and how some use it to give themselves moral license to persecute anyone they deep intolerant).
[^2]: No, I'm not talking about the strict 1st Amendment legal definition, but the broader principle.
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