Speech and its freedoms

“His freedom of speech protects my freedom to call him a bigot.”

I believed this would be an easy article to write: quote J.K. Rowling in the opening, always a good move, and then skewer the French and expand on the First amendment of the US Constitution, with maybe a nod to Tyrion Lannister for good measure. I believe the initial argument still stands: freedom of speech should not be a la carte, only for those you agree with. Censoring people you don’t agree with is a slippery slope: you may feel righteous in doing so, because what they say seems outrageous, insulting, violent, threatening (insert any kind of Trump statement here for example). The only problem with that is that your right might be someone else’s wrong, and arbitrariness in power always plays out to someone’s advantage. And secondly, more crucially maybe, as Tyrion says: silencing someone does not prove them wrong, it only shows that you’re afraid of what they might say.

The French have had a vivid example of this: when a comic started spewing antisemitism on stage, he was banned from performing; this only gained him more following and attention, and ultimately amplified his message. No one in the media thought that instead of vilifying him and ramping up the scandal, simply and factually proving him wrong would be more constructive. It does not make for good spectacle though, this whole fact-checking thing, so I’m only faking surprise.

But the point still stands: I would argue that anyone preventing anyone from speaking, whoever we’re talking about and whatever the topic is, is going about it the wrong way. And, unfortunately, progressives seem sometimes quite fond of this tactic. Everytime students in a university protest the intervention of a far-right figure and try to have them banned, I want to shake them a little bit and remind them that having someone debate those people and demonstrate the falseness of their views is much more effective and true to what is supposed to be the core of progressivism. But it might mean get into a nuanced argument and actually debate, which is not as easy and satisfying as yelling someone is wrong and brandishing clever signs.

I had already admitted one limit to my view in this, which is a direct threat to someone personally. It’s one thing to have opinions, no matter what they are, but another to threaten harm to identified individual(s). That, I agree. But there’s a second caveat that a recent event in the US brought to my attention quite vividly: police officers were fired for making racist statements, on social media I believe. Now this raises a question: what happens to your first amendment, if what you say suggests that you cannot do your job correctly or even safely?

Every time someone got in trouble professionally for saying outrageous things on their own time, I couldn’t help but think we lived in a strange and dangerous time of public prosecution. In this case however it seems that there is a serious danger here. Same goes for the governor of Puerto Rico: you are entitled to your opinions, but when they put your ability to do your job in question, it seems justified to raise the alarm.

So what kind of conclusion can we draw here? Should their be a fine print to freedom of speech for public servants? I am, deep inside, persuaded that there are right and wrong beliefs and moral systems, but it seems dangerous that anyone should be in a position to adjudicate them and condemn people for thinking a certain way. On the other hand, it seems equally dangerous to overlook how deeply entrenched biases can play out when mixed with power – this is hardly a revolutionary statement.

The answer might lie in seeing freedom of speech not as a fixed principle, written in stone once and for all and its modalities decided forever, but as an idea evolving and having to be constantly fought for, reasserted, and evaluated. In any case, we need to beware of righteousness: it’s usually the worst possible guide in public affairs.