The basic rule of philosophical writing is: respect the intelligence of your reader as you would your own. If you find yourself being asked to to 'explain like you would to a child' to another fully grown human being, then you may as well be asking them to go intellectually fuck themselves. If you don't ask something of your reader, if you don't attempt to wrest their mind from torpor ever so slightly, you may as well not bother. Become a politician or something instead. — StreetlightX

:kiss:

It's always easiest to make fun... especially when one does not understand what it is that they are making fun of.

Surely you're not using "unacceptable" in this context to refer to whether we personally accept something a la believing it or considering it to be true ourselves, are you?I — Terrapin Station

You're conflating warrant/justification for assent to 'X' with X being unacceptable.

No.

I'm using "unacceptable" to refer to thought/belief and/or behaviour that is not acceptable to one; that one does not and/or would not condone, assent to, or agree upon as something that ought be thought, believed, and/or done in whatever situation you choose and/or find yourself in.

Why one does or does not condone thought/belief and/or behaviour is one's moral foundation. That one does is one's moral judgment. The judgment is based upon the foundation.

What sparked this exchange was your claim that - purportedly - on your view there is no such thing as immoral speech. You may not admit to condemning certain thought, belief, and/or behaviour. You may not call any speech act "immoral". There are a slew of them that you would and do find completely unacceptable in certain situations.

Cherry picking is a logical fallacy. I can keep on repeating that if you like. — S

Oh you do.

Some folk hereabouts offer valid arguments and counterarguments on a regular basis. You're not wunuvem.

And here yet again...

The facts speak for themselves.

Anyone who denies the power that hate speech has to move an entire population of people to war either doesn't know what they are talking about or they are speaking insincerely(deliberately misrepresenting their own thought/belief).

Neither is acceptable, for in both cases they're wrong.

The facts speak for themselves.

Thought/belief has efficacy. Hate speech consists entirely of statements thereof. Hate speech moves people to war.

That's not just an idea my friend.
— creativesoul

If you can show it's not just an idea (per my assessment of course--I don't just mean if you believe you can show it), I'll accept that. We've kind of been talking about that for awhile in the thread. — Terrapin Station

I did... as best can be shewn given the written medium.

What's the difference between a description of God and God?

Nope. They're just doing it to be funny. That's their job. — S

Many find the deliberate belittling of another to be funny. Doesn't make it hate speech. Everyone deserves a certain modicum of respect(dignity, worth, value) simply because they are human.

Don't quit your day job. The comedy needs work.

Yep.

If hate speech is accepted using freedom of speech, then you've licensed the groundwork(the means) for war and bloodshed.

Pick an enemy.
— creativesoul

The enemy I've picked is the idea that speech causes actions. — Terrapin Station

That's not just an idea my friend.

Look! Wait. Go!

They were long steeped in censorship. Weimar Germany has the most modern hate speech laws in history. Nazis were persecuted for their speech up until the Nazis seized power. Not only did they use their sense of martyrdom to propel their cause, they turned around and used that persecution as justification for their own persecutory actions.

Censorship licensed the groundwork for war, bloodshed and genocide. — NOS4A2

There are numerous problems with the above...

Weimar Germany(The Weimar Republic) no longer exists. History has continued on. Any and all hate speech laws written and/or enacted/enforced since are appropriately called more modern.

That's one issue.

Nazi's used hate speech to wage a horrible war on all sorts of others. You're supposed to be - unless I'm mistake - objecting to my position. I'm attempting to set out first that thought/belief and speech has efficacy. I'm using actual examples. What you've said here offers support. Is that what you wanted to do?

So then, do you agree that thought, belief, and speech has efficacy?

I do, but only on the person thinking, believing and speaking. I don’t believe they have any efficacy beyond that. — NOS4A2

Speech shares thought/belief. Then there were two...

Hate speech cultivates the conditions of/for war.
— creativesoul

Do you think the following example of hate speech cultivates the conditions for war between Britain and the US?

Too much guns, religion, celebrity, flag waving nationalism, egomaniac, warmongering, stupid constitutional rights obsession. The U.S. is like our deformed offspring.
— S

If not, is there any circumstance in which you think it could? Or maybe you think it isn't hate speech at all? — jamalrob

Looks like ridicule to me. It's related to hate speech in that they are both founded upon a personal value system which devalues others for irrational reasons.

Not hate speech though...

Yet to think that well equipped effective armed forces should then be banned is the wrong way to think about it. — ssu

I agree, but then again... I'm not the one thinking about it like that.

Africa has had poorly equipped small armed forces for a long time and that hasn't prevented genocidal wars of happening.

Hate speech was not absent.

Hate speech cultivates the conditions of/for war.
— creativesoul
Just as well equipped, effective armed forces give the ability for politicians to go to war in distant places. — ssu

False analogy.

Well equipped armed forces are not always used in aggressive action. All hate speech is aggressive.

...conflicts don't emerge from countries having armed forces. — ssu

They most certainly have.

Because what typically would be "hate speech" in this way would be just propaganda for the war, a tool used to sell the war. — ssu

So...

Some hate speech is propaganda. Propaganda is used to manufacture consent for war. Some hate speech is used to manufacture consent for war.

Hate speech cultivates the conditions of/for war.

Just an observation that conflicts don't emerge from the existence of hate speech.

Just like conflicts don't emerge from countries having armed forces. — ssu

Hate speech - all by itself - does not cause war.

It's takes more.

No argument here. Eliminating hate speech reduces the risks of war and bloodshed.

Just look how many places the US has bombed without any hate speech against the people of those countries. — ssu

Irrelevant. So what? I'm not claiming that hate speech was a causal factor in every US bombing.

There are wars which were caused by hate speech.

Dr. Seuss and the characterization of the Japanese and/or Asian people. Look it up. That's hate speech. It's used to manufacture consent.

Yet wars don't rise from the existence of hate speech. Hate speech or it's variants can be used in propaganda, yet the idea that hate speech being a reason for wars is silly. — ssu

Care to critic and/or argue against something I wrote?

Where's the common sense?

I mean does anyone really think that situations like Nazi Germany somehow happened without being long since steeped in hate speech?

Is anyone denying that there are groups of people being trained at an early age to be one thing and one thing only, and that being that thing requires and/or includes causing deliberate and intentional harm to complete strangers.

If hate speech is accepted using freedom of speech, then you've licensed the groundwork(the means) for war and bloodshed.

Pick an enemy.

Inculcation. Indoctrination. The pure adoption of one's first worldview.

Who here is denying the efficacy of thought/belief?

What social conditioning factors are at play here?

Constant belittling of another simply because they are a(n) 'A' is justified(or not) depending upon what exactly counts as being an A.

Judging an other's value(determining their worth) based upon one's political affiliation is not always a good measure of character(assuming, of course, that the party does not consist of unsavory characters). Despising someone else on the grounds that they are Democrat, Republican, Left, Right, or whatever political party they identify with shares common unreasonable ground with racism.

Being able to voice one's utmost displeasure does not require hate speech. Being able to face ones accusers does not require hate speech. Being able to effectively express - as best they can - their own emotional state of mind sometimes does. That's all they know.

Watch a video of any group singing and chanting in unison. These are evidence/result of common thinking.

Different groups find different things acceptable/unacceptable. Hate speech finds it's home in those filled with ill will and hatred. It also gives voice to many of those who've been harmed by another through no fault of their own.

Pick an enemy.

As I've said before, I'm not interested in the least bit in your opinion. I'm interested in the solidity of my opinion. I'm using you (or others in this discussion) to test it. — Isaac

I feel ya.

However, one must consider another's opinion in order to use it as a test or in a test. There are good critics around here.

Speech acts are statements of thought/belief. Thought/belief have efficacy. They lead to patterns of thinking, habits, and acts.

Does anyone here deny this?

What we’re denying is that those thoughts and beliefs have efficacy beyond the person thinking or speaking them. Most have argued that, yes, words fly through the air and alter the matter in someone else’s brain. — NOS4A2

I'm inclined to think/believe that you're playing the devil's advocate here. I appreciate that. Knowing both sides of debates is pivotal for better understanding. This one(freedom of speech being used as a defense for saying anything one wants) needs to be discussed.

I'm not going to argue that words fly through the air and alter matter in another's brain. There are all sorts of problems with talking like that.

So then, do you agree that thought, belief, and speech has efficacy?

On my view, nothing counts as morally (or legally) unacceptable thought, belief or speech. — Terrapin Station

I guarantee that that's not the case. You're arguing against what you hold to be unacceptable thought, belief, and statements all the time here.

:brow:

Nice writing here...

Knowing consists - in large part at least - of true thought/belief. All thought/belief has emotional content. Knowing is - in large part at least - emotional.

We are interdependent social creatures. Each of us has a certain power to influence the world around us. The context here - the backdrop if you like - is ethics/morality. What counts as acceptable/unacceptable thought, belief, and/or behaviour(speech).

It ought go without saying that unfettered/unregulated freedom is impossible. So, there is a need to regulate freedoms, including freedom of speech.

Hate speech ought not be banned. Rather, it ought be used as an example of that which is unethical and thus ought be further shunned and frowned upon.

Speech acts are statements of thought/belief. Thought/belief have efficacy. They lead to patterns of thinking, habits, and acts.

Does anyone here deny this?

How you depict the Anti-Trump crowd is quite similar how the Anti-Bernie / Anti-AOC etc. camp could be described..just coming from another perspective.

This is the way tribalism spreads.

You see, at first you don't like some politician because of his or her agenda and views. At the second stage you feel that disgust not only about the politician, but also at those who support publicly him or her in the media and the party the politician is a member of. And finally on the third stage of tribalism it is the voters who vote for the politician are the one's you start hating. And at that stage a republic starts to come apart because you aren't just angry at politicians, you are angry at your fellow citizens, your neighbors and even family members.

This rabbit hole you can go down to worse places: after this it's the vilification of the other, then the portrayal of the other being an enemy and the dehumanization of your fellow citizens. — ssu

Indeed. The Hillary camp dove head first into exactly that. Belittling not only Trump supporters but also Bernie supporters prior to. Fatal mistake. Many feminists do the same thing towards all males. Another fatal mistake. Many minority feminists do the same thing towards all white males(anyone other than another white male). Racists do the same.

It all starts with the disgust part. Different is disgusting.

It’s also magnified by the worst kind of sensationalism. Up until the election and beyond, Trump was compared to every brutal dictator in recent history, from Hitler, Mao, Mussolini, Stalin, to Mugabe—hundreds of millions of victims between them—even if Trump has never engaged in any injustice or abuse of power. Whether it was the press, late night television, magazines, politicians, comedians, we never had a shortage of people crying wolf, and never a shortage of people believing them. — NOS4A2

Begging the question(regarding whether or not Trump has abused his power over people) and a bit ironic(as a result of the characterization of "the worst kind" of sensationalism).

The notion of "political correctness" began falling out of fashion for good reason, but one of them was not as a means to exonerate unacceptable thought, belief, and/or behaviour until folk like Trump began to use it for exactly such a thing.

Denying/dismissing political correctness does not offer license for otherwise unacceptable behavior.

Seriously speaking, Trump is one of the worst possible deal makers ever, but the perfect example how it doesn't matter at all as some Americans put on a pedestal and worship any person that has the balls to outright lie with ease about his awesome abilities and success. It simply doesn't matter that the person is full of bullshit. If the person is against what these people don't like, anything goes. The lies are totally OK when they anger the people who you hate.

Besides, the mantra of yelling out loud how astoundingly rich and successful one is has this mesmerizing effect on one part of the American crowd that takes these people with a narcissistic personality disorder as quasi-religious saints, victors of the American dream, and disregard totally the lies, because they simply are awed by the "balls" that these person have in their self-promotion. Anyone voicing the obvious facts that these people are liars and charlatans are simply seen as jealous 'un-American' pinko-liberals, who don't believe in the American dream. — ssu

This rings true...

Not only “pinko-liberals”, but snobs and champagne socialists as well. It’s no strange wonder that the unmitigated consternation of antiTrumpism is magnified by the voices of celebrities, corporate public relations and coastal elites. All they have to do is turn on the television to have their biases confirmed. — NOS4A2

Sure. For some the fear and/or worry of andor about Trump is magnified - in part at least - by confirmation bias.

The consternation of Trump is also magnified as a direct result of a multitude of different personalities sharing similar thoughts and/or concerns regarding Trump. Many different people from many different walks of life have openly voiced consternation of Trump. These people differ across the board, including but certainly not limited to, those mentioned in the above quote.

If what's being confirmed is true... well. It's not always such a bad thing after-all. True thought/belief makes the best ground.

I'm going to leave this here. Clearly you are not willing to engage honestly, sincerely, and respectfully. May our paths never again cross.
— creativesoul

I’d hate to say ‘I told ya so’, if I did — praxis

All good. I was just curious if s/he/they would give their word.