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from the I-Disapprove-of-What-You-Say,-But-I-Will-Defend-to-the-Death-Your-Right-to-Say-It dept.
From an editorial in the Otago Daily Times out of New Zealand, Censorship a Trojan Horse:
It's an oft-cited maxim that the news media is the "fourth estate" upon which a healthy democracy stands.
It ensures the three traditional powers of state — the legislature, executive and judiciary — can be critiqued, challenged and curbed from quietly drifting into the arms of corruption and authoritarianism.
A free, fair, open and uncensored media is an antidote to state power and, for all its failings (and there are many), should be treasured as such. There are many countries around the world whose people would give anything for such a freedom.
Yet calls for the banning of certain opinion pieces, cartoons and commentary have risen in recent months, especially from those using social media, a world where such talk is becoming a trend. It is a trend we must confront.
Censorship is to suppress the harmful, the unacceptable, the obscene and the threatening from the media and other forms of public communication. Like a virus attacking democracy from the inside out, it was traditionally the tool of the dictator, though it is one used by many in power.
[...] It pays to query what those demanding censorship — be they celebrities, social-media activists or anybody else — see their ultimate goal as being.
To reduce hurt? To make the world a better place? Possibly, and those motivations are laudable. But the method employed to achieve them is not.
While censorship may be meant as a figurative horse upon which a better future rides, inside the belly of that horse lurks an army of conformity, quite capable of unwitting oppression.
History shows what happens when the fourth estate is no longer free to table all opinions.
It is a bleak picture. Without the disinfectant of exposure, power and ideals tend to corrupt even the most seemingly incorruptible.
(Score: 1, Interesting) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday October 03 2018, @03:28PM (1 child)
It depends how you define respect. If in your view there are two sets in which all the humans (and other potentially respectable entities) fall, and the "not respected" set is "abuse at will" set, then I must demand that all unassigned entities must be placed by default in "respected" set, and very small number of *specially deserving abuse* entities perhaps could be placed in "not respected" set.
Because, you see, respect is internalized fear - you learn to respect others as an infant, and the content of respect (and politeness) is actually "act as if it will hurt you to incidentally upset the respected". When you respect someone who is fear-inducing, that is just common sense and damage evasion. When you fear to hurt someone who cannot get back at you - that is being nice and well-brought up (unless you cower before them ... that would be a sign of mental illness).
So, I hope that you actually do respect people (and ... etc.) in general, and you just conflated respect with admiration, the latter, agreed, requiring to be earned.
(Score: 1) by khallow on Friday October 05 2018, @11:12AM
[...]
I suggest you define it differently. Respect is a social indication that you care about the other person's attitudes. That can be through fear, but fear is not the only relevant human emotion. You mentioned admiration as if it were a different thing, but that just as well is a reason to show respect.
It can also be phony as in one deems the act to be advantageous, even if one doesn't actual care about the target, for example, the "endeavor to persevere" speech in the movie, The Outlaw Josie Wales.