One of the things that most disturbs me about politics nowadays is the consistent brutality politicians and Hivemind Podpeople (but I repeat myself; Mass MEdia Hivemind Podpeople are just political operatives with bylines *sigh*) perpetrate upon language and reason by means of corrupting terms. For example, there are very (very) few “conservatives” who espouse anything even remotely resembling conservative values or policies, and there are even fewer “liberals” who have any even remote connection to liberal values or policies. (Democrats who continually try to poison democracy by vitiating voting integrity commit vile calumny of democracy by claiming “democratic” principles, for example.)
My mind was “tainted” as a lad when both my extended family of pastors and theologians and historians, and my readings of Aquinas, Mill, and many others led me to think that calling things by honest terms is really the only way to approach finding true things, and that finding that which is true is a Very Good Thing.
Nowadays, in politics, The Hivemind (in all its forms), in the groves of Academia Fruitcake Bakeries, etc., lies in the form of words used to cloak their opposites are the norm.
Consider a fair definition of “speech codes” often in effect on so-called “liberal” campuses, nowadays,
“. . .a “speech code” [is] any university regulation or policy that prohibits expression that would be protected by the First Amendment in society at large. Any policy—such as a harassment policy, a protest and demonstration policy, or an IT acceptable use policy—can be a speech code if it prohibits protected speech or expression.
“Many speech codes impermissibly prohibit speech on the basis of content and/or viewpoint. An example of this type of policy would be a ban on “offensive language” or “disparaging remarks.” Other speech codes are content-neutral but excessively regulate the time, place, and manner of speech. A policy of this type might limit protests and demonstrations to one or two “free speech zones” on campus and/or require students to obtain permission in advance in order to demonstrate on campus.”
As against such statements as these from the prototypical classic liberal, John Stuart Mill:
“If all mankind minus one, were of one opinion, and only one person were of the contrary opinion, mankind would be no more justified in silencing that one person, than he, if he had the power, would be justified in silencing mankind. . .
“He who knows only his own side of the case knows little of that. His reasons may be good, and no one may have been able to refute them. But if he is equally unable to refute the reasons on the opposite side, if he does not so much as know what they are, he has no ground for preferring either opinion… Nor is it enough that he should hear the opinions of adversaries from his own teachers, presented as they state them, and accompanied by what they offer as refutations. He must be able to hear them from persons who actually believe them…he must know them in their most plausible and persuasive form.”
~ John Stuart Mill, On Liberty
Mill, in his essay, “On Liberty” expands on the very principles the Founders sought to carve into the law of the land. Interestingly, Edmund Burke, the prototypical English conservative recognized that the Founders were expressing their understanding of the rights of individuals within the framework of conservative values. (“Conciliation with the Colonies,” March, 1775)
GENUINE liberalism and GENUINE conservatism BOTH hold free speech to be a cardinal liberty, due protection by the state. So-called “liberals” nowadays most certainly do not (though they lie and say they do), and many so-called “conservatives” today are not much better.
One can simply list fundamental individual rights and go down the list checking off those that so-called “liberals” genuinely demonstrate support for or that so-called “conservatives” genuinely attempt to protect and find little in the way of liberal efforts to support expression of individual rights or conservative efforts to protect existing expression of individual rights. What one is more likely to find is both camps saying they are doing so while really simply trampling individual rights in the process of creating privileged classes.
I really tire of these lying scum. One suspects such behavior would only be amenable t amelioration by means of citizens’ vigilance committees bringing back tar and feathers. Like that’s gonna happen. . . *sigh*
Why bother learning to listen to what the other person has to say when it’s so much easier to knock down a straw man? Refuting the position actually held by someone else requires real intellectiual work – as well as the possibility that their arguments might persuade you to change your own mind. Of course that latter can only happen if you don’t truly understand your own position in the first place and aren’t grounded on a solid foundation.
Bring the tar. I’ve got a few old pillows I can sacrifice to the cause for their feathers. (Actually, I may want to keep the feather pillows will polyester batting stick to tar?)
“Of course that latter can only happen if you don’t truly understand your own position in the first place and aren’t grounded on a solid foundation.”
Or, as has been the case for me from time to time, it can happen when the position I hold is simply wrong. Good argument can change my mind, if I am shown thereby to have been wrong. It’s a win-win when that happens.
Yeah, being wrong is another case. Sometimes it seems that people often fight harder for their beliefs when they’re wrong.
“Sometimes it seems that people often fight harder for their beliefs when they’re wrong.”
Of course we do. *heh* But that just emphasizes the importance of hearing out others’ arguments. Of course, that only applies if someone advances an argument. *heh*