Sam Newman at it again!

[mateinone]

I disagree with the way "free speech" is understood in society, and the direction this concept has taken. Free speech is not an excuse for hate speech, it's not an excuse to say whatever you like. Words don't just fall into a black hole after they've been uttered. Words are important, they have consequences. It's not a coincidence that the rise of far right ideologies has occurred at the same time as "free speech" has been trumpeted as some kind of panacea to cure the worlds ills. One follows the other. It's not a coincidence that hate crimes have increased in recent times.

i don't agree that hate crimes are actually increasing, perhaps if looking at a micro timeline this is true, but certainly not over any extended period. As much as you say Free Speech is misunderstood, i believe it is even more true of "hate speech".

I won't go into great details, but gender identity is an example of an area that is rife with accusations of hate speech, which in fact discourages a much needed (and desired) discourse on the subject. There are many people who understand that gender identity is a real issue, but completely disagree with the way society is handling the subject and the impacts it is having on current society, but by constantly shutting down opinions that differ and being quick to label them as something the are not, it discourages people even engaging in the conversation and society being out of touch and increasingly divisive.

We seen this  phenomenon when Donald Trump was first elected president. The polls had absolutely no idea that this was going to occur, because the right didn't want to engage in conversation because it turned to lectures and condemnation from the left, rather than any meaningful discussion, so people stopped publicly supporting (of course this done a 360 once he was elected).

We seen this with Brittney Higgins. We had a tv presenter come out and basically declare someone guilty who had never been through the legal system and anyone who openly questioned this was a terrible person. The #IBelieveHer movement allows hate speech against an accused, but it doesn't consider it so. We have constant hate speech against males and in particular white middle aged hetero sexual males with claims of toxic masculinity, inherent privilege etc in main stream media, but any attempt to have cohesive discussions on this is met with total derision. This is despite the fact that most men don't have any of this inherent privilege, often their bodies are destroyed by the time they are in their 40s due to years of hard physical work and they have the highest rate of suicide by far in society.... but any attempt to suggest that this "male bashing" is a real problem in society is scoffed at because  "women have had it worse", "ethnic minorities have had it worse" etc etc. Again a meaningful and required discussion cannot be easily had, so people keep their problems inside with no real idea how to deal with them.

Free Speech to so many people has become "Freedom to agree" and this is why people need to be able to hear the likes of idiots like Joe Rogan and Sam Newman and any other idiot with ridiculous opinions (if not of course illegal hate speech), if only to know it is okay to have an unpopular opinion and to voice it...

Free Speech does NOT of course include inciting acts of violence, anything to do with racial superiority etc, there are reasons certain 'free speech' has been made illegal and it should be, but we should not be stopping people from voicing opinions and people need to stop "being offended" and start debating actual views.