The Fattening



  • Yes, and what exactly is a "free discussion"? There is no true freedom, that's a myth and you'll run into boundaries in no time.

    Just take the classic example that yelling "Fire!" in a crowded cinema is not covered by "free speech".

    It only gets murkier when considering stuff like mobbing, criminal behaviour, racism and general asshatism. The problem is that "freedom of speech" is defined as an ideal, when in reality trying to actually enact this "freedom" is more akin to nailing a pudding to the wall.



  • @ScholRLEA said:

    Has anyone pointed out that one does not have a right to free speech of any kind in a privately-run. moderated forum? Just curious.

    No, I'm sure nobody has ever thought of that before. Thank you for bumping a dead thread to point it out.



  • Riveting tale, chap.

    My point is, if people see you as a thing, and you betray those expectations, people will become dissatisfied with you. They will leave. At least trying to keep up your image is important for survival if you are something like Reddit, and they seem to not care. I don't use it in the first place, so whatever happens to it is fine with me.



  • And how exactly are they supposed to uphold their "image of a bastion of free speech" when the damn thing doesn't exist in the first place?



  • Look, I've met other humans. I don't really care if you haven't.



  • And the price of rice in China has fallen.


  • ♿ (Parody)

    @Rhywden said:

    And how exactly are they supposed to uphold their "image of a bastion of free speech" when the damn thing doesn't exist in the first place?

    Step one would be ignoring the sort of sophistry / no true scotsman denial of free speech that you offered.



  • @dkf said:

    If people start running up lots of ever-less-likely hypotheticals, I stop listening to them.

    But what if their hypotheticals were just on the edge of plausibility, and charged with relevant and emotive issues? What if they were shouting them though a megaphone, and their pockets were full of cheese? What if GamerGate was involved somehow? What if they had a gun to your head? What then? What would you do then?!!?


  • Discourse touched me in a no-no place

    @tar said:

    What would you do then?!!?

    Consider playing the lottery? It still hits “too unlikely” very quickly…



  • @RaceProUK said:

    You don't really understand what free speech is, do you?

    Free speech means I can say anything I like whenever I feel like it and there are no consequences?


  • Java Dev

    @RaceProUK said:

    You don't really understand what free speech is, do you?

    The Dutch version of that phrase, "Vrijheid van meningsuiting", translates as "Freedom of expressing opinion". I wonder if there's an actually different definition behind that, or whether it more closely represents the core concept.


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