Monday, November 30, 2015

Leiter
Panic and fear at colleges nationwide...
...and I'm sure it will only get worse, since the country is awash in firearms and the insufficiently regulated Internet provides a forum for crazies and malcontents to spark terror.
"The Case Against Free Speech," revised...
...after lots of helpful feedback and workshops over the last year or so. My "case" is only against arguments that speech has some unique positive value; I think the libertarian approach towards speech regulation in the U.S. is basically the right one, given the nature of our political culture. I also think, but don't discuss in this paper, that universities are a special case (something Marcuse also thought in the famous, or infamous, essay on "Repressive Tolerance"); I will take that up in a separate paper.
"the insufficiently regulated Internet"
"the libertarian approach... given the nature of our political culture." [emphasis in orig.]

Is there anyone else calling him on this shit?  But he's only read by people who, one way or another, are opposed to free speech.

The worst of populist demagoguery is rooted in the most extreme snobbery of an elite. The fish rots from the motherfucking head.

Hofstadter is probably the purest American symptom. "The Decline of the Gentleman". I'm pretty sure he had no idea what it meant. He belongs in the book. I've been lazy.

Aristocratic pessimism vs technocratic optimism. Service and self-sacrifice as an ideal vs liberty as an ideal. Republican virtue, conservatism, democratic pessimism, unthinkable, etc. etc.

And again since it's the issue de jour: liberalism associates freedom of speech and freedom of property; republicanism can see see them as separable. Freedom of speech as freedom of inquiry is necessary to facilitate self-government.  As a corollary, if your life is governed by triggers, you should give someone power of attorney until you're able to you're able to fulfill your obligations as a citizen.

No comments:

Post a Comment

Comment moderation is enabled.