In a podcast with Russ Roberts, Megan McArdle says,
as you pull those things in, you create this climate of everyone feeling like they have to lie, in public. And, what’s interesting about reading the Soviet, those Soviet era things, is how many people–Orwell talks about this, lots of [?] talks about this. It’s the feeling that making you tell a lie is the point. That, there’s no, like, greater point of what you are saying except that they have undermined your character by forcing you to lie for the regime.
The overall topic of the conversation is the role that the Internet plays in free speech. On the one hand, the Internet enables you to express any point of view. On the other hand, it enables mobs to form to shame you, and to cost you your job. It is this latter capability that seems to have surged to the forefront recently. And ultimately it may make people willing to say things that they do not believe, because of fear of the mob.
Keeping the mob away isn’t to hard if you are the typical internet user
Well without a lot of government stopping free speech, then other actors will control speech that is right for the population.
1) My guess the internet allows a lot more free speech by individuals so it allows a lot more spoken opinions than any time in history. My guess in the 1970s who knows what opinions we would have heard with the internet.
2) There is fair amount conservative wrong opinions and their mobs the last 2 years have gotten really bad. Red States are going against anybody who says anything wrong with Israel.
3) Probably the main point on Corporate free speech with employees is most large companies are global and sell to a lot of customers. And employees in the United States stating strong opinions about Muslim religion may cause riots against that company in the Middle East.
The fact is, currently, many, many respectable people have to knowingly lie by commission or omission about their beliefs in order to be employable, and in a way that is completely asymmetric between right and left.
West Point recently graduated an overt Communist over the vociferous objections of a member of the faculty, but there are plenty of things besides threats and insults that a cadet can say that will not be tolerated and will incur harsh discipline. About two years ago at the Citadel, cadets were disciplined – despite a judgment of having no mens rea or ill intent – for dressing up as “ghosts of Christmas past” and not realizing the risk that someone could take that the wrong way.
The question to libertarians is what can or should be done about this social fact, if one is willing to agree that rhetorial influence on norms is not a viable strategy (which it is clearly not.)
The legal issue here is really a matter of discrimination. Should the government protect expression or belief the same way it protects race?
Note that some states already do this, for instance, South Carolina . See Eugene Volokh’s note, “Private Employees’ Speech and Political Activity: Statutory Protection Against Employer Retaliation.”
The position that the state should prevent certain kinds of identity discrimination, but tolerate (or even encourage / participate in) certain kinds of expression discrimination is essentially the progressive one.
But there are two possible answers that are consistent and coherent on libertarian principles.
1. Free associatiion absolutism: the government should not get involved in any private discrimination at all.
2. The state should intervene to prevent discrimination both on the basis of race and on the basis of belief / expression, whenever the conditions for some underlying rationale are met.
Most prominent public intellectual libertarians have bitten the bullet on state intervention for racial anti-discrimination. See the “Discrimination and Liberty” issue of Cato Unbound (June 2010). The question is, does the reasoning (some might say, “rationalizations”) employed in those cases also apply to speech in the contemporary context.
I would not only argue that the “context matters / social cartel” argument does apply to speech in our contemporary context, but also that it no longer applies to the racial context.
“…many, many respectable people have to knowingly lie by commission or omission about their beliefs in order to be employable”
Can you expand on this claim some? I suppose if you were an academic in certain places this might be true, but I really don’t see this at all for most of us.
West Point is not a particularly instructive example, and frankly, your citation of the Citadel incident is nauseating.
For anyone wondering why these poor cadets were treated so unfairly, take a look:
http://www.bbc.com/news/world-us-canada-35070702
Nauseating? Please, give me a break. There’s no sense trying to have a conversation about these manners in a calm, civil way if people can’t be mature adults about these topics without getting all emotional.
Take a second more to google and you will find Lieutenant General Rosa’s statement on the matter, which confirms my description above, that it was a matter of bad judgment instead of any premeditated ill intent to resemble klansmen.
Indeed, you have helped proved the point about social media lynch mobs, of which there was one surrounding this event, and most of the members of which responded without charity, to put it very mildly, and exactly as you just did.
I find your logic upsetting. These kids were wearing pointy hoods and all white outfits. No one is that naive. Does someone need to sign an affidavit to convince you they are racist? At some point, you need to have some measure of respect for the truth.
The idea that the public statements of the Citadel President proves anything is ridiculous. His position was anything but neutral. How many times have we seen leaders minimize or obfuscate bad behavior to protect the institutions they serve?
I have not trolled you, or threatened you, or even used foul language. I am angered by the fact that someone as intelligent as you uses his voice to defend overt racism.
You clearly don’t understand what a “lynch mob” really is. Someone has criticized you because what you wrote was offensive to them.
A lynch mob is what happens when an angry crowd tosses a rope over the limb of a tree and hangs someone until they are dead. You know, like the KKK used to do.
> I find your logic upsetting. These kids were wearing pointy hoods and all white outfits.
Is there some resemblance with Klan outfits? Yes. Are they identical with Klan outfits? No – for one thing, the hoods aren’t as pointy and there are no robes. Do you know what else they resemble? https://www.google.com/search?tbm=isch&q=ghost&tbs=imgo:1
Also, what was their behavior? Were they acting like segregationists, or were they acting like ghosts?
You do realize that perception involves a great deal of pattern recognition? And that the patterns we perceive are often influenced by our background? Is it at all plausible to you that young men, men who grew up in an era where the Klan cannot even “adopt a highway” in Virginia (or wherever, I don’t remember the specific state) and where membership of in that detestable organization is minuscule, might not be aware that so many people would be triggered by even the rough appearance of Klan outfits?
If I wear a suit by Hugo Boss does that make me a Nazi? (fyi, Hugo Boss designed the SS outfits)
> I am angered by the fact that someone as intelligent as you uses his voice to defend overt racism.
False equivalence. How is it “defending overt racism” to claim that something is not, in fact, overt racism? Handle is not saying that overt racism is good, merely that the label is misapplied in this situation.
[comment deleted for hostile tone]
@ lliamander
Even the official statement of the President of the Citadel, who Handle cites as confirmation of his description of events, acknowledges that some of those students knew how what they were doing would be construed:
“The investigation found that the cadets did not intend to be offensive. However, I am disappointed some recognized how it could be construed as such but didn’t stop it,” said Lt. Gen. John Rosa, Citadel President.
http://www.citadel.edu/root/citadel-completes-investigation-into-photos-of-cadets-in-costumes
Lt. Gen. Rosa is engaging in some tortured logic. Knowing that you are wearing something something that most people find to be at the outer extremes of hate and violence, but choosing to ignore it because, you know, we just want to look like ghosts, is overtly racist.
The KKK is not some distant historical boogieman. There are many people alive today that had loved one’s murdered by the KKK. It is still a movement with thousands of people participating. To reference the KKK is to make a physical threat. And by the way, the Klan may not be able to adopt a highway in Virginia, but the still can in Georgia.
So you don’t think the hoods were quite pointy enough. So here is the pattern that I see. Two highly intelligent people discussing political correctness, and both choose to find injustice in the treatment of people who are looking through the cut out eye holes of a pointy white hood.
Is this really where you want to plant your flag on this issue? That political correctness has run amok, because a good man just can’t wear a pointy white hood with eyes cut out any more?
I think the point is that a person’s actions matter a lot more than appearances. There are plenty of violent racists that don’t wear pointy hats. We should spend our time condemning them instead of people that aren’t couth enough to wear a better ghost costume, despite knowing that it resembles something offensive.
To reference the KKK is to make a physical threat.
No, it is not. Period. A threat is a threat. A costume is a costume.
Che Guevara was a murderous ideologue who would have been happy to kill me. Someone who wears a Che shirt is either ignorant or a political idiot. But their wearing the shirt is not a threat.
@bobroberts17e1
We are talking about free speech and political correctness.
You see this as “people that aren’t couth enough to wear a better ghost costume”.
This seems to boil down to whether you see speech as something that can ever, under any circumstances, cross the line from expressing ideas into the realm of threatening people physically. Apparently, some of the commenters don’t see this.
If your family was never touched by the KKK or the holocaust, you might not get this distinction. But these are living breathing fears for some families.
Your impression of this incident was that these students were uncouth. Don’t you see how some people could see this, not as rudeness, but as an expression of a thinly veiled but very real physical threat?
This seems to boil down to whether you see speech as something that can ever, under any circumstances, cross the line from expressing ideas into the realm of threatening people physically.
Okay, but weren’t these guys singing Christmas carols as part of a long-running holiday tradition at the school? Kind of undermines your whole “ethnic intimidation” narrative.
Dude, the KKK isn’t a serious problem and you know it. Racism literally doesn’t exist anymore on any scale that would matter to anyone. That’s why they had to invent things like implicit bias, microaggressions, and every more ridiculous applications disparate impact.
There is a huge demand for real world racism so that goodwhites can be moral saviors and show off what good SJWs they are. However, there isn’t enough supply to meet demand so we have to basically invent it.
@Jeff R.
You either believe that the students were knowingly trying to signal something or you don’t. Pressure/hazing by upperclassmen on freshmen was involved, which often results in attempts at humiliation and worse in such situations, and I’m sure part of the reason the school decided to let this go lightly was the difficulty of precise attribution of blame. Ambiguity and forcing them to sing was just a common part of the conceit.
@asdf – You might be the wrong person to deliver the message that “Racism literally doesn’t exist anymore on any scale that would matter to anyone.”. You have never attempted to hide your views on the primacy of genetics, and you regularly argue that the political impact of racial politics matters.
This discussion is effectively anonymous. Other than Prof. Kling, none of us achieves any public signaling by making these posts. No one I know reads this stuff. I am receiving no positive social feedback here.
A KKK reference is not a micro-aggression. We are not talking about wearing a Pocahontas costume on Halloween.
My views on genetics and racial politics are pretty mainstream in Asia. They work very well and lead to good outcomes that improve the lives of millions. If they are racist then racism is a good thing.
But that isn’t the kind of thing I’m talking about. I’m talking about a common sense understanding of racism. Like “racism is randomly lynching black people for no reason other then blind hatred in your deep dark heart” or “racism is denying a black PhD with a 150 IQ and a track record of accomplishment a job simply because he’s black.” There appears to be zero, or statistically close enough to zero, of that in America today. So it seems to me an accurate statement.
There are people who do claim there is a lot of this in America today, mostly by citing disparate impact in various outcomes, but I’m convinced that’s pretty much all just genetic variance coming through and there is a lot of evidence for that view. The people who push this narrative have an agenda and want to use the charge of racism to push that agenda, an agenda that means pain for many despite its proven track record of failure.
Anti-racism results in actual death. In huge inefficiencies that make life worse for millions. Anti-racism has real power. It’s the reigning orthodoxy of our entire society. One can’t go through a single day without being under its power.
What does racism have? I heard some guy from Charlottesville lost his job at the hot dog stand. I guess nobody will have their hot dog spit in again. Way to stick it to the man brave hero!
Signaling isn’t just about appearing good to others. It’s also about selling yourself to yourself. Am I a good enough person? Well, at least I’m not Hitler.
I still think (perhaps because of my preference for minimal government intervention) that much of what we are witnessing is the indirect result of government intervention. Specifically, the way labor regulations, a la anti-discrimination and ‘hostile work environment’ laws, are enforced (and interpreted by judges) differentially means that, for an employer, it is more risky to employ, say, an outspoken conservative or libertarian, than an outspoken progressive (or even socialist or radical feminist). Some ideological groups are just more litigious than others, and enjoy greater sympathy from courts and bureaucracies. So businesses may well have a rational incentive to try extra hard to treat customers or employees of certain beliefs ‘more fairly’ than others, which often by definition means treating others unfairly.
And this effect would naturally spill over. People whose views are more protected will share them more aggressively and openly on social media than those whose views are less protected.
At least that’s one narrative consistent with a preference for free association absolutism as a solution. It is of course highly speculative.
And, the unintended consequence of suppressing the truth is that the regime doesn’t truly know who is loyal or not, which is one reason regimes fail. The law of unintended consequences.
Speaking of unintended consequences, labeling the truth (or, at least propositions that are possibly true) as evil or subversive, then evil and subversive people have now been given the immense power of being the only ones willing to speak the truth.
People are mesmerized by those who boldly speak the truth no one else is willing to say. The problem is that it then the speaker now has the leverage to convince his audience of any number of other things that are untrue.
It also makes it harder for pollsters to predict how people will vote when they become habituated to lying about their views, and we end up with November surprises.
Another way of expressing almost the same idea is it’s about forcing everyone to choose sides. This was part of the core of Benjamin Constant’s idea about what went so wrong during the French Revolution on all sides, the domain of politics took over all other domains (business, personal lives, etc.) and people were no longer free to be neutral about anything. (By the way, this is why demanding loyalty oaths by public servants to someone sitting in the White House instead of the Constitution is vile.)
Reminds me of Havel’s story of the greengrocer:
http://www.vaclavhavel.cz/showtrans.php?cat=eseje&val=2_aj_eseje.html&typ=HTML
And ultimately… fear of the mob.
I don’t think this is going to last. The internet has gotten too important to just repeat opinions and biases and we’re developing tools to clarify staements. As an example. suppose we read “HILARY CLINTON IS A THIEF” ten years hence in a readers comment in an Arnold Kling blog. We tap the sentence with a mouse and press the Control Key.
The sentence appears in bold black. A box of smaller sized text informs us that Presidential contender Hilary Clinton was convicted of Grand Theft and Larceny in January 2019 in the state of Iowa and is currently serving a 7 to 10 year prison sentence in the Dubuque state prison, so the statement is substantially correct–
not as absolutely certain as” 2 + 2 = 4″ but very close.
Alternately, the sentance appears in green. The side box informs that us Greta Hillary Clinton, a 19 year old Mississippi high school drop out, was convicted of shoplifting from a 7-11 store in Mansfield, Alabama in March 2021 and sentenced to 90 days imprisonment in jail, and that the sentence was completed in July of that year. The statement is judged factually correct, but it may be interpreted incorrectly in context.
And perhaps the sentence apears in bright red. The side box notes that “Hillary Clinton” is often used as a stereotypical reference to American liberals , and in particular as a stereotype for elderly American liberal women. Numbered references point to several dozen articles and web sites which have denounced Hillary Clinton for various sins. The text continues on to note that that the actual Hillary Clinton has never been accused of breaking state or federal laws, nor convicted, and that the sentence selected for examination is certainly false and probably malicious.
We can do this. And I suspect in ten years or so, we WILL do this. Reading text or watching videos on the internet without “truth controls” is going to be like listening to the radio with the volume all the way up. Get ready for it.
“I know of no country in which there is so little independence of mind and real freedom of discussion as in America. … [I]n a nation where democratic institutions exist, organized like those of the United States, there is but one authority, one element of strength and success, with nothing beyond it.”
– Tocqueville
There might be some legal free speech that still results in the loss of a job, but this should be very very sharply curtailed.
The guy who had to resign from Mozilla (for supporting a CA Prop against same sex marriage) should have had legal protection for his free speech AND from being fired for exercising that right outside of work. Then he could have stayed … until he found another place, or continued to work with those who hate him for his un-PC views.
Getting punished by the gov’t for not baking a same sex wedding cake << this is a tougher issue, but the state should not have punished the bakers.
The power of the PC mob is still mostly exercised thru gov't monopoly on force.
Not really. Had Mozilla not fired Brandon Eich, do you really think any government action would have been taken against him?
The CEOs of this company do it because they are true believers. Perhaps public opinion sways their belief, as it sways everyones beliefs, but its clear that government force was not the driver.
Here’s a great post that touches on the same topic:
http://slatestarcodex.com/2017/10/23/kolmogorov-complicity-and-the-parable-of-lightning/
“…Every couple of weeks, I have friends ask me “Hey, do you know if I could get in trouble for saying [THING THAT THEY WILL DEFINITELY GET IN TROUBLE FOR SAYING]?” When I stare at them open-mouthed, they follow with “Well, what if I start by specifying that I’m not a bad person and I just honestly think it might be true?” I am half-tempted to hire babysitters for these people to make sure they’re not sending disapproving letters to Stalin in their spare time.”
Not challenging that a planned economy can’t possibly work killed how many tens of millions of people? Or if that doesn’t work because its leftist and they had “good intentions”, does not challenging Hitler or not asking “why should we bomb Pearl Harbor when they have ten times our industrial capacity” represent some masterful 4D chess of waiting till the right time to speak truth to power.
The problem is its assumed that one can go on their business while ignoring the orthodoxy, or that one can pick up the pieces later. That the only problem is something like saying the trinity is whatever the Pope says it is because who cares it doesn’t really matter in the real world.
However, what if the orthodoxy is so destructive and/or its results so permanent, that letting it slide is just too big an ask. Then laying low isn’t a savvy way of surviving till the time is right, but a kind of cowardice with important real world consequences.
Here’s something Alan Bennett said in the 1980s:
“Some people are at ease with themselves so the world is at ease with them. My parents thought this kind of ease was produced by education: ‘Your Dad and me can’t mix; we’ve not been educated.’ They didn’t see that what disqualified them was temperament, just as, though educated to the hilt, it disqualifies me. What keeps us in our place is embarrassment.”
Maybe you come from the wrong class. Maybe you come from the right class. Everyone feels like they have to lie, but at least if you come from the right class, you’ve had more practice at it. It comes naturally, because your parents started early. You’re at ease with yourself to the extent you don’t believe you’re lying. An unembarrassed liar just thinks this is the air she breathes. This is water. She’s internalised the lying so completely that it’s not a lie.
Which puts her at a huge advantage over all the lousy mimics, the outsiders, the poor people, the foreigners and the scholarship kids. Microaggressions are a minefield if you’re autistic, or if you’re an immigrant, because you’re already an imposter. First you had to learn a second language, then you had to learn this third language of rapidly-evolving euphemisms and ornate, abstruse code words. The insiders have a certain privilege but the outsiders are always wrong-footed. They’re always checking themselves.