It is absolutely not a coincidence that immediately after the passage of the 13th amendment, the incarceration of people of color skyrocketed following the passage of numerous racially-targeted "black codes". It's also not a coincidence that the majority of the current incarcerated population are people of color, it's a direct legacy of that system. Sure, you can't explicitly write racially targeted laws anymore, but applying an ounce of critical theory shows how the laws can be enforced along racial lines.
>And to fix that, we need more active suppression of speech, surely?
Note that no one actually suggested this as the solution.
It's always very telling that when someone of privilege is told that society has not, actually, been equitable in its supposed ideals (in this case free speech) the first reaction is always, "So instead you want to oppress and censor me??" instead of attempting to engage with the idea that maybe we should be structuring things so they're not oppressing anyone.
The best explanation I've seen of this phenomenon is that when someone has lived in an privileged and elevated position for their whole life, any calls for equity seem like an attack on your position.
> The best explanation I've seen of this phenomenon is that when someone has lived in an privileged and elevated position for their whole life, any calls for equity seem like an attack on your position.
Ah yes, the old “there can’t possibly be a flaw in my idea, it’s just your own insecurity” argument.
Penal labor and slavery are two very different things, and confusing them doesn't make any sense. Both have nothing to do with free speech - it looks like you're just grasping for arguments to say "US is bad". What's the point?
> applying an ounce of critical theory shows how the laws can be enforced along racial lines.
Laws certainly can be applied in a racist way - though you don't need any "critical theory" (which in most instances is a bunch of insane pseudo-scientific drivel anyway) to know that. Of course people can be racist and apply laws in racist ways, and there should be safeguards against that, as against any other abuse of law for purposes the law is not intended for. There's no contradiction with free speech.
> Note that no one actually suggested this as the solution.
That's patently false - a REAL LOT of people - including prominent politicians (lately one Hillary Clinton, for example), business tycoons, CEOs and C* of major companies, prominent press and culture figures, professors and government functionaries - are suggesting exactly that as a solution. And not just suggesting - implementing. Thorough and comprehensive speech suppression and censorship, in the name of correcting some past wrongs and preventing some future ones, real or invented. It is not ever about equal enforcement - nobody objects to equal enforcement of laws, but the solution they are pushing is not equality, it's censorship and suppression.
> the first reaction is always, "So instead you want to oppress and censor me??"
Because they DO want to oppress and censor me, and they are not hiding it either - they are saying it openly and boldly. They call for censorship and speech suppression all the time - and not only calling for it, they has been doing it for years, with much success and they aren't going to stop. It's not something I imagine might be happening in some distant future, it's something that has been already happening for decades. All major social media platforms are strictly censored now, all academia research is censored now, all mainstream news and entertainment is censored right now. The only reason the government is not censoring directly is the First Amendment does not let them, but they work around it by just asking their operatives in Big Tech to do it for them, and those are glad to oblige. Most of the political, academia, big tech, entertainment and press establishment are 100% in on censorship. There are some resistance to it, but those are outside mainstream, the mainstream is all censorship, all the time, and more of it.
> The best explanation I've seen of this phenomenon is that when someone has lived in an privileged and elevated position for their whole life, any calls for equity seem like an attack on your position.
That's one of the example of insane drivel I referred to above. Every time some argument is challenged, the response is "oh, you're just saying that because your privilege is attacked". You know nothing about me, you know nothing about my experience, your argument contradicts basic facts and makes no logical sense - but all that is irrelevant, because you always have this mega-argument - just say "privileged" and everything you say is automatically right and everything the "privileged" say is automatically wrong, no logic or connection to facts is needed.
> maybe we should be structuring things so they're not oppressing anyone.
Yeah, maybe we shouldn't have censorship, for example? Try to convince somebody in Big Tech of that... So far I see not much progress on this.
In what ways are you oppressed and censored? Actually, let's be more specific in that question, based on an axiom we've already agreed on:
>free speech has to be free for everybody - any gender, any race, any societal stature
Specifically, in what ways are you oppressed and censored based on your "gender, race, or societal stature"?
Because the only topics I see getting censored (by "big tech") are:
a) Rhetoric that negatively targets others based on their gender, race, or societal stature
b) Information spread with the intent of spreading harm to others
So white supremacists are censored, people calling for violence and harm are censored, and yes, people spreading counter-scientific information which would harm public health are censored.
> just say "privileged" and everything you say is automatically right and everything the "privileged" say is automatically wrong, no logic or connection to facts is needed.
Privilege doesn't mean you're wrong, it just means you lack the perspective of being discriminated against based on certain factors.
But beyond that, you haven't provided anything in the way of evidence, your logic is shaky, and when one of your "facts" get called out you simply question its relevance.
>You know nothing about me, you know nothing about my experience
I can infer pretty easily from what you've said that you're very likely white, male, and lean heavily to the political right - conservative (or possibly "libertarian"). Am I incorrect?
>The only reason the government is not censoring directly is the First Amendment does not let them
The "government" is actually censoring people - but not through some shadowy "operatives in Big Tech" (what?) but through legislation. Nine Republican states have recently directly passed laws restricting free speech. But I assume you're not angry about those, for reasons you might want to re-examine.
And just so you don't miss it, I'll repeat:
Specifically, in what ways are you oppressed and censored based on your "gender, race, or societal stature"?
I can not publicly speak on any controversial topic (at least taking the position not approved by the orthodoxy) without risk of being fired, and myself and my family attacked. In fact, merely using my true legal name instead of a pseudonym is a very risky thing right now, which has cost many people their livelihoods, their careers and sometimes their very safety. I can not publish any controversial opinion, disagreeing with government-approved policy, on any of the major social networks. I can not share information that is deemed "harmful" by the same social networks - and by "harmful" I mean politically inconvenient to them. That sounds pretty oppressive to me.
> Specifically, in what ways are you oppressed and censored based on your "gender, race, or societal stature"?
I am not claiming I am oppressed based on my race - though I know if I weren't white, speaking unorthodox thoughts would likely carry less risk for me. But the threat, of course, comes not from the race angle itself, but from the heresy. The race and social stature just changes the amount of danger the heresy leads to. But the censorship is not based on race, it's based on speaking the things that the censors do not want to be spoken.
> Because the only topics I see getting censored (by "big tech") are:
That's because you choose not to see what does not fit your predetermined conclusion. It is not possible to convince the person that something exists if the person declared upfront they wouldn't see it. There's just no way to do it.
> So white supremacists are censored
No, it works the other way - people who are censored are declared white supremacists. Including, hilariously, people like Larry Elder, Candace Owens and Winsome Sears (if you're not in the know, all these people are black), and many others like them. "White supremacist" has become a generic pejorative that the left applies to anybody they want to censor, and they no longer even bother to make it sound plausible.
> it just means you lack the perspective of being discriminated against based on certain factors.
Again, you assume a lot about people you do not know. Hint: black people aren't the only group who faced prejudice and discrimination in human history. But my personal history here is completely irrelevant, since "oppression olympics" is the most stupid game known to man. You don't need to be oppressed to be right, and "privilege" is just an attempt to silence people who you can't find an argument against. If there was some "perspective", it would have been possible to explain it without claiming "you can't possibly understand this because your skin is of a wrong color and the bits between your legs are of a wrong shape". But there's never any explanation, only "shut up, you privileged!"
> I can infer pretty easily from what you've said that you're very likely white, male
And that tells you everything you need to know about me. As a true "anti-racist" (you're an anti-racist, aren't you?), once you know person's race and maybe gender, there's nothing more you need to know to know everything about them, right?
> Specifically, in what ways are you oppressed and censored based on your "gender, race, or societal stature"?
You seem to be confused. From the fact that there's censorship, and the fact that I declared nobody should be censored, regardless of their race, etc. you somehow got to the conclusion that I claim the censorship that exists is based on race, etc. No, it's not based on race - though, given that it is largely performed by "anti-racists" - of whom many are hardcore racists, that consider race the most - and sometimes the only - defining characteristics of a person - there may be certain racial angles in their actions, but the ultimate goal has nothing to do with it. It is always about suppressing the information and the opinion that diverges from the orthodoxy.
The US still explicitly allows slavery in its constitution, actually, so that's incorrect.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Penal_labor_in_the_United_Stat...
It is absolutely not a coincidence that immediately after the passage of the 13th amendment, the incarceration of people of color skyrocketed following the passage of numerous racially-targeted "black codes". It's also not a coincidence that the majority of the current incarcerated population are people of color, it's a direct legacy of that system. Sure, you can't explicitly write racially targeted laws anymore, but applying an ounce of critical theory shows how the laws can be enforced along racial lines.
>And to fix that, we need more active suppression of speech, surely?
Note that no one actually suggested this as the solution.
It's always very telling that when someone of privilege is told that society has not, actually, been equitable in its supposed ideals (in this case free speech) the first reaction is always, "So instead you want to oppress and censor me??" instead of attempting to engage with the idea that maybe we should be structuring things so they're not oppressing anyone.
The best explanation I've seen of this phenomenon is that when someone has lived in an privileged and elevated position for their whole life, any calls for equity seem like an attack on your position.