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[ECrownofFire]

Your body has told you how it is, but you're free to define what ought be in whatever way seems best to you.

This has nothing to do with "oughts". It has to do with what your brain has actually mapped your body as being composed like. Deciding that it would be nice to have wings, or that I ought to have wings, is vastly different from my brain thinking I do have wings, which is exactly what I'm talking about.

To reiterate, this has nothing to do with what people want. It has to do with the brain mapping itself to parts that aren't there, or aren't there in the form that the brain expects. It's like how amputees get phantom limb pains and stuff like that; it's nothing to do with "I should still have a leg" and more to do with "god dammit I REALLY FEEL LIKE A LEG SHOULD BE THERE".

To reiterate, again, this has nothing to do with personal choice or preference in any way, what we're talking about are very fundamental aspects of how the brain maps itself to different parts of your body. The hypothetical wing-person I'm talking about doesn't "choose" that he "should" have wings any more than you "choose" that you "should" have two feet with toes on them. You cannot just will away the brain's somatic mapping, or will new parts into it. It doesn't work that way, and has absolutely nothing to do with choice, "ought"s, or desires. It has nothing to do with the conscious mind at all, or even with the more cognitive aspects of the unconscious mind.

Just a note, those are known as supernumerary phantom limbs.

[Leafsnail]

Once you start inciting people to violence, it's no longer a matter of "Your beliefs need to be challenged", and more a matter of "People are going to be hurt if we don't stop you from saying this".

In terms of holocaust denial... I guess it's part of Germany's penitance to the international community - a promise that what happened in the past won't be denied or forgotten.  It probably shouldn't be a law, but there's only so much sympathy I can have for holocaust deniers really (considering that they're effectively calling holocaust survivors liars, which is obviously gonna be distressing).

[KaelGotDwarves]

It doesn't have to be the third-world for you to lose your freedoms. We must be forever vigilant of the governments of the free world, or it won't stay free. I see hate speech legislation for what it really is, a hole in people's civil liberties that can and will be exploited. When a government does anything, anything, you have to assume the worst of them because there are people out there who do want the worst for everyone.

No, I see hate speech legislation for what it really is through my opinion, a way to defend people from getting attacked out of irrational hatred.

You're welcome to have your paranoia of the government without actually being involved in the democratic progress, of course.

[kaijyuu]

Yeah I remain unconvinced. If someone yells a bunch of stuff intending to start a riot, they are in my opinion a sociopath, a jerkass, and a bunch of other mean words, but not a criminal. The actual criminals are the rioters. (of course if person who incited the riot participates as well, haul their sorry ass off too)


I guess it ultimately depends on how utilitarian you are with ethics. Is taking away one person's rights ok if it potentially prevents others from losing their rights (to property, etc)? Most would probably say yes. I don't in this case, because their rights can be protected in other ways.

[Lysabild]

It is unprotected speech in Germany to deny the Holocaust.  Publicly doing so nets you three years in jail.

Opinions?

I think you're all misunderstanding the intent, it's illegal to deny the holocaust in more countries than Germany, and it's illegal because it can be proven to have happened, yet people try to "redeem" nazi's by claiming it to be made up, to protect the 'honest good Nazi' being framed.

[Andir]

Hate is an emotion. I'm not saying that you can censor hate. Hate speech is the act of inciting violence and further hate towards other a person or groups of people because of no actual fault of their own. You can deny a public forum to that.

How does irrational hate start in the first place? It is spread.

You said you are perfectly okay with censoring hate speech here:

Similarly, I'm not sure I'd be comfortable with any organization, governmental or private, deciding what's acceptable speech based on its degree of hate. I'm not saying such speech shouldn't be argued against, but I don't think an authoritative ban is going to solve any real problems, and its potential for abuse is far too great to be outweighed by the slim chance of the good it would do.

Implemented properly it prevents the sort of cultural institutions that leads to genocide. I'm perfectly okay with censoring hate speech.

You say you can't censor hate (I agree), but you say you should censor hate speech. How?  It's impossible to police every forum (public and private) to find out if someone is spreading hate... and even if you could process every word typed/said by everyone in the world, how do you know it's not coded?

[G-Flex]

I think it's important here to remember their recent history, though. Germany had a very recent run-in with a case of harmful ideology leading to drastic human atrocities. I can honestly see why they'd be afraid of that happening again, or of a resurgence in the popularity of national socialism or antisemitism.

Ideally, yeah, you want to educate and not force people, but if a situation is drastic enough, I can see measures like this being a little more defensible than they normally would be.

Just a note, those are known as supernumerary phantom limbs.

Thanks! That's an example that demonstrates what I'm talking about. Wanting to have something, or feeling like you should, is much different from literally feeling its presence because your brain's somatosensory apparatus/homunculus basically have it mapped as a real part of your body. People also get phantom visions after going blind, for instance, because their brains are still interpreting input that has long stopped arriving.

[Vector]

I think you're all misunderstanding the intent, it's illegal to deny the holocaust in more countries than Germany, and it's illegal because it can be proven to have happened, yet people try to "redeem" nazi's by claiming it to be made up, to protect the 'honest good Nazi' being framed.

No, I'm aware of that.  Just thought it was an interesting problem to work through.

Ideally, yeah, you want to educate and not force people, but if a situation is drastic enough, I can see measures like this being a little more defensible than they normally would be.

Then I suppose the question is just how drastic things are in this country, and others.

[Bauglir]

This has nothing to do with "oughts". It has to do with what your brain has actually mapped your body as being composed like. Deciding that it would be nice to have wings, or that I ought to have wings, is vastly different from my brain thinking I do have wings, which is exactly what I'm talking about.

To reiterate, this has nothing to do with what people want. It has to do with the brain mapping itself to parts that aren't there, or aren't there in the form that the brain expects. It's like how amputees get phantom limb pains and stuff like that; it's nothing to do with "I should still have a leg" and more to do with "god dammit I REALLY FEEL LIKE A LEG SHOULD BE THERE".

To reiterate, again, this has nothing to do with personal choice or preference in any way, what we're talking about are very fundamental aspects of how the brain maps itself to different parts of your body. The hypothetical wing-person I'm talking about doesn't "choose" that he "should" have wings any more than you "choose" that you "should" have two feet with toes on them. You cannot just will away the brain's somatic mapping, or will new parts into it. It doesn't work that way, and has absolutely nothing to do with choice, "ought"s, or desires. It has nothing to do with the conscious mind at all, or even with the more cognitive aspects of the unconscious mind.

Okay, I think we may have a misunderstanding going on. I'm not talking about deciding or personal preference, either, but I have difficulty mapping the language to the concepts I wish to express. For that, I apologize. I was very careful to avoid the word "choose" for this reason, and that was also the reason for the first of my two edited-in clarifications (which you might not have seen before making your post).

What I'm saying is that I doubt a person who believes herself to be a woman despite having a man's body believes she has a vagina. She believes she ought to, and that her body is not correctly constructed; she is aware that she has a penis, because (EDIT: many of) her senses indicate that it is so. That is the definition of "ought" that I've been using. And I don't see any reason to deny her this; to classify it as a mental disorder seems to me to be indicating that the problem lies in how her mind is put together, and that her body is fine the way it is. If it must be classified, it's far more sensible to call it a physical disorder, because you're not insisting that a person's identity is somehow wrong.

Now, if my assumptions about what such a person actually experiences are wrong, then that doesn't hold, but if that's the case then it's news to me.

It is unprotected speech in Germany to deny the Holocaust.  Publicly doing so nets you three years in jail.

Opinions?

I don't think it's right for that to be the case, but I see the reasoning and I'm not sufficiently familiar with the culture to guess whether or not there actually is a possibility of glorifying Nazi rule, starting with a denial of their crimes. So while I don't think it's ideal, my pragmatism is okay with it, and I'd add that the fact that it applies to a very specific category of speech (leaving little wiggle-room) resolves a great deal of my worries about abuse.

[sonerohi]

Hate is an emotion. I'm not saying that you can censor hate. Hate speech is the act of inciting violence and further hate towards other a person or groups of people because of no actual fault of their own. You can deny a public forum to that.

How does irrational hate start in the first place? It is spread.

You said you are perfectly okay with censoring hate speech here:

Similarly, I'm not sure I'd be comfortable with any organization, governmental or private, deciding what's acceptable speech based on its degree of hate. I'm not saying such speech shouldn't be argued against, but I don't think an authoritative ban is going to solve any real problems, and its potential for abuse is far too great to be outweighed by the slim chance of the good it would do.

Implemented properly it prevents the sort of cultural institutions that leads to genocide. I'm perfectly okay with censoring hate speech.

You say you can't censor hate (I agree), but you say you should censor hate speech. How?  It's impossible to police every forum (public and private) to find out if someone is spreading hate... and even if you could process every word typed/said by everyone in the world, how do you know it's not coded?

You cannot monitor every single bit of speech. But if you dam up the flow of hate speech enough, you can more easily deal with what trickles through.

[MetalSlimeHunt]

You're welcome to have your paranoia of the government without actually being involved in the democratic progress, of course.

There isn't much I can do about being too young to vote other than aging, Kael.

[Leafsnail]

You say you can't censor hate (I agree), but you say you should censor hate speech. How?  It's impossible to police every forum (public and private) to find out if someone is spreading hate... and even if you could process every word typed/said by everyone in the world, how do you know it's not coded?

I'm pretty sure this is Perfect Solution Fallacy.  The fact that we'll never catch every murderer doesn't mean we shouldn't try to catch the ones we can.

[G-Flex]

What I'm saying is that I doubt a person who believes herself to be a woman despite having a man's body believes she has a vagina. She believes she ought to, and that her body is not correctly constructed; she is aware that she has a penis, because her senses indicate that it is so. That is the definition of "ought" that I've been using. And I don't see any reason to deny her this; to classify it as a mental disorder seems to me to be indicating that the problem lies in how her mind is put together, and that her body is fine the way it is. If it must be classified, it's far more sensible to call it a physical disorder, because you're not insisting that a person's identity is somehow wrong.

Neither is more sensible than the other. The inverse of what you said would be: "To classify it as a physical disorder seems to me to be indicating that the problem lies in how her body is put together, and that her mind is fine the way it is. If it must be classified, it's far more sensible to call it a mental disorder, because you're not insisting that a person's body is somehow wrong." This is exactly as reasonable for exactly the same reasons.

You're operating from the assumption that you can't consider a person's identity to be "wrong" in any way. This is false. A person's identity can very easily be inconsistent with reality in one way or another, via delusion or psychosis or, in this case, something more fundamental. The identity does not match the anatomical reality, and the anatomical reality does not match the identity. Neither is a problem except with regard to the other, and in that regard, they're both problematic.

[Heron TSG]

Righto, the PRT has moved on to covering hate speech and censorship. This I can do.

I am personally of the opinion that no speech should be censored, save for that which directly harms people. Evil warlocks notwithstanding, words don't usually directly harm people. People may be offended by each other, but it won't kill them. If someone's being verbally harassed, though, I imagine that there should be a law that can get the harasser to stop. Libel, of course, directly harms people in some circumstances.

[Andir]

You cannot monitor every single bit of speech. But if you dam up the flow of hate speech enough, you can more easily deal with what trickles through.

You mean all speech?  There's still no way to know that "wheat" implies "death" when someone writes that word to someone else.  That's my argument.  You can't filter out hate speech.