tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5939915290794973654.post716397987173644284..comments2024-03-08T14:23:31.503-05:00Comments on A Puff of Absurdity: Censorship QuizMarie Snyderhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13872774009526266579noreply@blogger.comBlogger4125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5939915290794973654.post-48656513731094337432018-08-31T00:10:19.470-04:002018-08-31T00:10:19.470-04:00Here in the USA I can remember the days when it wa...Here in the USA I can remember the days when it was mostly the Right calling for censorship. The days and years in the wake of 9/11, the days and years of "those who have nothing to hide have nothing to fear", the days in which critical voices on the Left such as Chris Hedges were not only booed out but really <i>menaced</i> out of university speaker podiums, etc., with the tacit collusion of uni administrators who literally told him "don't come back to this campus, we'll mail you back your jacket that you accidentally left". Nowadays it's mostly the Left calling for censorship, because although they're not in governmental power in any branch of national gov't here, they think they've won the "culture war". Otherwise they wouldn't be calling for it. I'm a centrist btw. The 1st amendment, combined with the 14th which the courts have interpreted as putting 1st amendment protections onto public university campuses, is a very uneasy peace between two very divided political tribes. But right now it's the only tool we have for getting voices from "the other side" onto disparate uni campuses, each of whom probably <i>would</i> shut down "the other side" if they had the chance and thus deny the people who are genuinely interested in hearing another viewpoint.Dustin Vinland Jarlhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/06321791031988119649noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5939915290794973654.post-39362913081603932452018-08-19T06:18:50.911-04:002018-08-19T06:18:50.911-04:00My position on those limits tend to focus, similar...<i>My position on those limits tend to focus, similar to yours I believe, on who has the power, how they plan to use it, and to what extent it can be monitored to prevent abuse.</i><br /><br />Indeed, which would seem to suggest active voice.Larry Hamelinhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/08788697573946266404noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5939915290794973654.post-84755557629201308792018-08-18T14:02:40.941-04:002018-08-18T14:02:40.941-04:00Yes, there are many more nuances of each question ...Yes, there are many more nuances of each question that need clarification in order to decide, but it's meaty for class discussion. My point here, however, is that there are SOME cases in which even the most intensely free speech advocate will want some measure of control. Free speech isn't the highest value or the end all and be all that some suggest. My position on those limits tend to focus, similar to yours I believe, on who has the power, how they plan to use it, and to what extent it can be monitored to prevent abuse. We always have to be allowed to critique the current government. And there should be at least social sanctions in place to prevent open cruelty. Marie Snyderhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/13872774009526266579noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5939915290794973654.post-64884933746378769702018-08-18T12:10:35.061-04:002018-08-18T12:10:35.061-04:00I love Bob Altemeyer (like The Authoritarians, Ath...I love Bob Altemeyer (like <i>The Authoritarians</i>, <i>Atheists</i> is also a very good book), but he does not always present things in the best way possible. Altemeyer, for all his strengths, will sometimes compress a complex issue into a simple dichotomy: dogmatic/flexible, censorship/freedom of speech. It's one thing to just measure a simplified question, but he will sometimes draw conclusions that would not hold with more complicated analysis. <br /><br />For example, in <i>Atheists</i>, he calls atheists just as "dogmatic" about evolution as religious people are about their theology, ignoring (or downplaying) that atheists are unlikely to change their minds about evolution <i>because of</i> the massive evidentiary foundation, whereas religious people are often unlikely to change their minds <i>in spite of</i> massive evidentiary contradiction.<br /><br />The biggest problem in the questionnaire you reproduce is the reliance on the passive voice, which sets my teeth on edge as an English teacher. Who precisely is doing the allowing or disallowing? How are they doing so? Why are they doing so? These questions are, I think, critically important.<br /><br />If the question whether the government should punish (imprison or fine) a university professor who argues that men are naturally superior to women or a teacher who assigns a book in a Grade 12 English course that presents homosexual relationships in a positive light, etc., the answer is almost too obviously, "Of course not." First Amendment, right? But literally no one (other than the occasional insincere troll) argues for more coercive government censorship. This is not a controversial position.<br /><br />The issue gets more complicated when it's not the government who is doing the "censoring" and when the issue is not censorship per se but platforming. Is it a matter of "censorship" when some institution, such as a primary/secondary school or college/university, denies their platform to this or that opinion? Does it matter what kind of institution discriminates access to its platform: does State University denying access to its platform differ from Facebook or Twitter denying access? How about a cell phone company or ISP?<br /><br />It also matters <i>why</i> someone might object to some idea: one might object because they have a contrary opinion, or they might object because of some notion of factual or objective truth. All educational institutions are concerned with not only discussion of but also legitimation and <i>de</i>legitimation of ideas, and propagation of legitimate ideas. No educational can or wants to encompass <i>every possible</i> idea. We don't teach the humours theory of disease in medical school, Velikovsky in astronomy class, or Flood geology in geology class. Why are we somehow obligated <i>in principle</i>, then, to teach equally factually discredited theories of gender or racial superiority?<br /><br />How about the <i>means</i> of deprecating or delegitimizing ideas? Is is "censorship" in any meaningful sense to, for example, refuse tenure or promotion because that teacher or professor holds an illegitimate position, especially when that position is "supported" by atrocious scholarship? How about student boycotts? Should students be admonished for boycotting a class, or even coercively compelled — perhaps under threat of suspension or expulsion — to take a "controversial" class in the name of anti-censorship?<br /><br />There are so many dimensions to the issues that reducing everything to a censorship/anti-censorship dichotomy loses too much complexity to be useful.Larry Hamelinhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/08788697573946266404noreply@blogger.com