by brigandish | 2025-06-07 17:41:06+00:00
> let's be honest here, you do agree with limiting speech

Let's not introduce a straw man: I haven't claimed I'm for unrestricted speech; and let's also not introduce a Nirvana fallacy[0], my position is thus because the world is imperfect, hence freedom of speech is necessary to improve it and as mitigation against its misfortunes and burdens. It actively reduces violence by providing a better way to "win" an argument.

> Would you mind explaining how speech could be harassment and assault and who would decide that?

Assault is a very old law with a lot of case law behind it (that is the answer to the who decides) that is very easy to understand:

> A person commits an assault if he performs an act (which does not for this purpose include a mere omission to act) by which he intentionally or recklessly causes another person to apprehend immediate unlawful violence.

Spoken threats are an obvious one, so is shouting at someone in the manner that would lead a reasonable person to feel threatened.

Harassment is also easy to understand:

> The Protection from Harassment Act 1997 indicates that someone’s actions amount to harassment when they make the victim feel distressed, humiliated, threatened or fearful of further violence. The main goal of harassment is to persuade victims either not to do something that they are entitled or required to do or to do something that they are not obliged to do. Actions listed under the Protection from Harassment Act include, but are not limited to:

> phone calls > letters > emails > visits > stalking > verbal abuse of any kind, including on social media > threats > damage to property > bodily harm

You can see several types of speech in there.

> And I'm presuming that you're okay with libel and slander being decided in a Court of Law

You're contradicting your earlier straw man now, you have no such presumption. I do, however, support defamation as a civl tort (though not how it is currently instituted in the UK, the US has a much saner implementation).

> We're not really discussing here whether limiting speech is okay, we're both already doing it. No, it's about where we draw the line.

I'm glad you've caught up.

> It's just where I put the line also protects vulnerable people from extremely dangerous rhetoric that kills people.

Rhetoric doesn't kill people, people kill people, and you're justifying it. So the argument goes: their offence is justified, their violence is inevitable, hence, we should stop the speech.

Have you considered allowing the speech and punishing those who act violently because of their supposed hurt feelings? Would that not be peaceful co-existence?

> the reality is that peaceful co-existence requires intolerance of intolerance

Popper defined, in his "paradox of tolerance" two simple tests for telling an intolerant group:

- They shun debate.

- They turn to violence.

You've picked the wrong group to criminalise.

> In this formulation, I do not imply, for instance, that we should always suppress the utterance of intolerant philosophies; as long as we can counter them by rational argument and keep them in check by public opinion, suppression would certainly be most unwise. But we should claim the right to suppress them if necessary even by force; for it may easily turn out that they are not prepared to meet us on the level of rational argument, but begin by denouncing all argument; they may forbid their followers to listen to rational argument, because it is deceptive, and teach them to answer arguments by the use of their fists or pistols. - The Open Society and Its Enemies

[0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nirvana_fallacy [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Common_assault