This whole thread proves that free speech isn't possible in any society. The only question is who gets to decide what is verboten.

Interesting. The whole thread proves to me the exact opposite. That free speech is very alive since nothing here has been censored yet. The only way I can explain our disparate perceptions is that we're talking about entirely different things.

By "free speech" I mean not being arrested or physically harmed for saying something.

Is it possible that by "free speech" you in contrast mean being entitled to be invited, keeping your job, and/or remaining uncontradicted?

I would have agreed to your statement until around now-ish when this entire discussion-tree got flagged, including my mostly factual root-comment.

Around the same time the San Fransisco morning/lunch shift kicked in?

You’re only allowed to have such “controversial” discussions here in European time-zones it seems ;)

Well, we’re still neither arrested nor physically harmed, aren’t we? So our speech is still free. Ycombinator is not obliged to give our discussion a visible platform.

Here’s the obligatory xkcd: https://xkcd.com/1357/

If we let intolerant people thrive, we will build a system where intolerance thrives while tolerant people, as well as the people the intolerance is directed towards, will be dealt with in a totalitarian way. "Paradox of tolerance" is a fundamentally liberal idea coined by Karl Popper, and it is fundamental to a free society, as the Soviet and Nazi regimes have shown by essentially targeting the same people under different coats of paint.

I have heard this "Paradox of tolerance" mantra many times. And in my opinion it is the doorway to a totalitarian society, which is perfectly demonstrated to us by cancel culture excesses. It is basically a terrorist tactic, scaring people into making them keep their mouths shut.

If you claim to be 'tolerant', but do not tolerate those who aren't, you are not really tolerant. Period. What a truly tolerant person should do with those who aren't, is to find ways to persuade them to change their ways. It is not impossible. Civil rights movements in 1960s or suffrage movement achieved success not by scaring 'white racists' or 'male supremacists' into submission, but by persuading a sufficient number of them that segregation or discrimination based on sex is bad.

Well then be tolerant towards those who open the doorway to a totalitarian society. Period.

See the paradox kicking in?

No. We can argue (like we do now) that moving towards a totalitarian society is a bad idea.

No paradox.

So, you should tolerate Nazi's, even if they are jumping at the bit to kill and murder jews and bring back gas chambers? What if somebody runs on that very platform issue for congress -- legalizing the murdering of jews? would that be okay? should we tolerate it? I mean ... if it's legal...it's a perfectly good view point (it is NOT ...devils advocate).

Tolerating people being themselves and living their own lives independent of you VS tolerating specific hate speech and allowing it to thrive online are TWO totally different things. There is no comparison betwixt the two.

Oh no, look what you've done! You Godwin'd us :(

> What if somebody runs on that very platform issue for congress -- legalizing the murdering of jews?

There's nothing illegal about wanting to change the law to make something which currently illegal into something legal. All major changes in society the last century has happened by doing so. Think about cannabis-legalization if you need a slightly less morbid, but more recent example.

If I understand your point of view correctly (and I hope I don't), by your logic it should be illegal to argue legalization of anything which is currently criminalized. That would IMO be conflating legality with morality, a common error, especially among the conservatives.

Obviously anyone should be allowed to argue that there are reasons for why killing jews (or Canadians, or white people, whatever) should be legal. And we should, as a mature society, be there and be prepared to tell them why they are wrong.

Well, you found the flaw in their logic and by focussing on that, you kind of missed their point. Replace "legal" with "morally allowed“. Would you then tolerate the legalization of killing jews?

I 100% agree that we as a mature society, should be there and be prepared to tell them why they are wrong. But I think you are overlooking the possibility that they shrug and start killing. We should be prepared for that too.

Moral allowances change with times rather dramatically, and a very relative, so I wouldn't rely on them too much. For example, a few centuries ago it was perfectly normal in Europe to marry 13 year old girls.

If it comes to being confronted with the question whether legalizing genocide is tolerable, you claim moral beliefs are so relative that you would not rely on them too much.

If it comes to judging „what a truly tolerant person should do“ you make an absolute normative, hence moral claim.

This strikes me as rather inconsistent and therefore unconvincing.

I am a product of our time and morals of late 20th century. Of course for me, a person born in this age, the idea of genocide looks bad. But if I was born in Russia in 14th century, I'd probably be very fine with the idea a complete and full extermination of every single mongol: men, women, children, all of them. And for a person born in 25th century the idea of genocide might look fine again. Moral is too relative and comes from education and surrounding society, not from some universal rule of what's good and what's bad.

On being 'confronted' with the question about legalizing genocide. Well, if there ARE people with such ideas, it's not like making the ideas illegal will stop such people from having them. So open discussion about it and democratic voting will have just 2 outcomes: nazis will be either reduced to nothing and their political base will dissolve, or they'll get to power and a genocide will happen. However, I believe that a society that will openly vote for genocide is beyond saving, whether you criminalize some ideas or not.