Our fundamental right to shame and shun the New York Times

Re:Our fundamental right to shame and shun the New York Times by tptacek on Tuesday March 22, 2022 @08:43PM (#30773490)

You don't in fact have a right to food and housing. But a right to food and housing would be a coherent proposition; you could design such a right (within obvious limits). You can't do that with the proposition that people have a right to speech without fear of shame or shunning; like, the logic itself literally doesn't work. You could simply shut down anyone's objectionable political speech by saying that it is shaming or shunning; they could respond in kind. Again: this is what White is saying with his "First Speaker Problem".

I don't think you've very effectively rebutted his argument here.

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Re:Our fundamental right to shame and shun the New York Times by slibhb on Tuesday March 22, 2022 @09:29PM (#30773811)

I didn't try to rebut the blog. And anyway, my comment doesn't hang on right to no-shunning/right to food being identical. My point was that the blog is strange because the author agrees with the spirit of the op-ed while taking pains to criticize it. I think this is clearly because he dislikes being on the same side as conservatives.

If I was going to disagree with the blog, it would be over this strange idea that we should only talk about specific cancel culture incidents and never about the principle of free speech. Why not both?

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Re:Our fundamental right to shame and shun the New York Times by tptacek on Tuesday March 22, 2022 @09:44PM (#30773898)

He clearly doesn't agree with the spirit of the editorial (it's a staff editorial, not an op-ed). He thinks there are real free speech problems, but that the editorial (and the public sentiment it cites) terribly misconstrues them, succumbing to sloppy thinking in a way that not only works against their stated goal but actually further jeopardizes speech.

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Re:Our fundamental right to shame and shun the New York Times by slibhb on Wednesday March 23, 2022 @10:21AM (#30778726)

He agrees with the spirit of the op-ed:

> I believe that “cancel culture” exists — that is, I believe that some responses to speech are disproportionate and outside norms of decency, and I think the culture sometimes encourages such responses.

He's criticizing how the editorial talks about the problem. I agree with the spirit of the blog and the op-ed. I'm criticizing how the blog talks about the op-ed.

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Re:Our fundamental right to shame and shun the New York Times by juliusdavies on Wednesday March 23, 2022 @12:39AM (#30775021)

"I disapprove of what you say, but I will defend to the death your right to say it"

NYT would prefer:

"I slightly disapprove, err--- I mean I very very very mildly approve of what you say, and I will defend to the death your right to say it, while also acknowledging that I must be respectful to you in all that I say regarding what you said."

(Here in British Columbia, Canada, a Jewish lawyer famously defended a holocaust denier's right to free speech (pro-bono!). I remember the lawyer telling people that he planned to be the first to piss on his client's grave, but that he also intended to defend him in the courts to the very best of his abilities.)

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