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PaperclipPerfector  25d ago (text post)   32423 thread views

Culture War Roundup for the week of April 7, 2025

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A few years months ago, before Elon Musk bought twitter, there was a very popular opinion here on the motte, and probably also among conservatives, that freedom of speech should not be limited in any way, whether directly by the government, or by powerful actors like social medias. When big tech fired people due to their right wing political opinions, conservatives were defending them while liberals were saying things like "they are bigots, they must be improductive anyway".

I don't know what happened, but it seems that a lot of people who had a very broad definition of free speech switched to a very precise and restricted one.

I don't know what happened, but it seems that a lot of people who had a very broad definition of free speech switched to a very precise and restricted one.

Name three.

I don't know what happened

I don't think you established that anything happened. I don't see anyone calling to fire the progressive equivalents of Brandon Eich, James Damore, or Peter Boghosian.

Do those even exist?

What does that have to do with what I wrote, particularly the part you quoted, i.e.

Optimistically, the academics leaving the USA are the ones most ideologically captured, such that their contributions to knowledge production is easily replaceable or even a net negative, as is the case for much of what is purportedly being cut by DOGE.

There's nothing in that quote that has anything to say in any way about firing anyone on the basis of their political opinions. Neither does my comment have anything relating to firing people on the basis of their political opinions.

I also think your characterization as "freedom of speech should not be limited in any way" is simply wrong. That's free speech absolutism, which is very rare anywhere, certainly on the Motte, versus free speech maximalism, which is uncommon but not too much so.

Neither does my comment have anything relating to firing people on the basis of their political opinions.

Given that the first comment has been removed, I might have misread yours, but it seems to me you were arguing in favor of incentivizing people to leave the country according to their opinions.

I see, I guess it was just a misread, as I'm not sure how my comment could be interpreted that way.

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