I've written about freedom of speech extensively in all manner of forums, but the one thing that has become clear to me lately, is that people are genuinely uninterested in the philosophical underpinnings of freedom of speech. Today they would rather quote an XKCD comic, than John Stuart Mill's seminar work On Liberty.
Because of this, I've decided to try to reframe the original notion of freedom of speech, into a term I coined: Open Ideas.
Open Ideas is nothing more than what freedom of speech has always been historically: a philosophical declaration that the open contestation of ideas is the engine of progress that keeps moving society forward.
Today the tyranny of the majority believes freedom of speech is anything but that. They believe that "freedom of speech doesn't mean freedom from consequences", despite the fact that such term came from nowhere, has no author, and in addition all great free speech thinkers argued precisely the opposite. The great thinkers argued that if people are afraid of expressing unpopular opinions, that is functionally the same as government censorship: ideas are suppressed, society stagnates, and progress is halted.
So far I have not yet heard any sound refutation of any of these ideas. All people do is repeat the aforementioned dogmatic slogan with zero philosophical foundation, or mention First Amendment details, which obviously is not equal to freedom of speech.
How is anything I've stated in any way an inaccurate assessment of what is happening?
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Notes -
Contrary to common belief, freedom of speech does not only apply lengthy substack articles explaining ideas in great detail, but also to symbolic acts which show support of an idea, such as flying symbols or flags, or burning them.
This is a load-bearing feature of free speech. A society where people could only academically discuss ideas but not establish common knowledge about certain ideas being popular would not be a free society.
In the Western world, the meaning of the swastika is rather well established. It is a handle attached to a certain ideology with well established ideas. I see very little difference between our baker putting the swastika in his logo and him writing a lengthy article regurgitating Mein Kampf. I mean, with the logo, I do not learn if he blames the Jews, the Left, or the Blacks for high flour prices, but I am unlikely to find that very interesting, personally.
No it doesn't. Quote a freedom of speech thinker stating anything similar to that.
So?
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