Can the Radical Left Be Trusted With Free Speech?
Ironically, sometimes freedom of speech must mean even going so far as to question freedom of speech itself – in the name of preserving freedom of speech.
With Leftoids being sacked and suspended all over the place right now for making gloating comments after Charlie Kirk’s assassination, many on the free speech wing of the Right like ourselves have been making impassioned pleas not to cancel such ghoulish, blue-haired individuals at all. In airy principle, I quite agree. In concrete practice, however, I wonder if doing so will simply allow such malign and apparently murderous Leftists to dominate us forever in the future, if allowed infinite leeway to get away with such things wholly without any consequence.
To read the rest of this article, you need to donate at least £5/month or £50/year to the Daily Sceptic, then create an account on this website. The easiest way to create an account after you’ve made a donation is to click on the ‘Log In’ button on the main menu bar, click ‘Register’ underneath the sign-in box, then create an account, making sure you enter the same email address as the one you used when making a donation. Once you’re logged in, you can then read all our paywalled content, including this article. Being a Donor will also entitle you to comment below the line and access the premium content in the Sceptic, our weekly podcast. A one-off donation of at least £5 will also entitle you to the same benefits for one month. You can donate here.
There are more details about how to create an account, and a number of things you can try if you’re already a donor – and have an account – but cannot access the above perks on our Premium page.
To join in with the discussion please make a donation to The Daily Sceptic.
Profanity and abuse will be removed and may lead to a permanent ban.
Sometimes you can win by turning the other cheek, showing your compassion, but sometimes you can only win by fighting fire with fire. We are in the latter position. We have to let the entire thing burn to the ground and hope something is understood from the flattened landscape of ashes and glowing embers.
So it’s not ‘radical left’, it’s ‘far-left’. Let’s start as we mean to go on.
This is where Socialism, Marxism, Communism, etc always eventually lead – to the complete collapse of a country. I would think we are beyond the halfway point now.
‘Don’t turn the other cheek unless you want it beaten in. Fight violence with violence it’s the only to win.’ All The Lessons – Rose Tattoo
Yes indeed. Fight back through the use of language which clearly exposes these West-haters for what they are. The hard left have adopted their own language which is, effectively, a form of Newspeak – for example, attaching ‘phobia’ or ‘phobic’ to any of their treasured identity groups to shut down reasoned debate.
Most importantly call out what the hard left are doing for what it undoubtedly is: the long march through the institutions, and keep repeating the phrase until the wider electorates of the West finally begin to wake up to what has been going on for the last 50+ years – before it’s too late.
Re Popper – substitute “Islam” for “intolerant” and that’s where we are.
No. They can’t think. They don’t have morals. They don’t understand logic. They don’t argue. They shoot, they attack, they rape, they demonise, they hate. They are fascists.
In game theory is not tit for tat strategy a very successful strategy- sometimes the most successful strategy? The problem is winning the propaganda war.
Sigh. Another free speech advocate who seems not to understand what free speech is and why it’s a good idea.
Yes I read the article and had some feelings of the same notion. However, with direct parallels, the current traits of the left have very similar attributes to those of Pre WW2 Germany, Japan, and Italy. where there they removed, physically, all their opposition, burned books that were non state and in Germany removed the church and religion from public life. The left state was all that mattered and nothing else was worthy of thought. It won’t happen here” they say, let us pray that it doesn’t.
Stopping us going that far requires more speech, not less
Church and religion were never removed from public life in Germany. The NSDAP invented its own brand of protestant Christianity, the so-called Deutsche Christen (German Christians) and negotiated an official agreeement with the pope about the Catholic church.
Socialists always have to control everything in order to impose their policies. It seems clear such control is not just a necessary tool for them but actually a policy choice.
Socialists claim the State (ie them) can make better decisions than free acting citizens so naturally they do not believe the Oiks have any useful opinions different from theirs.
Unfortunately successive governments for 30 years have been progressing the introduction of state control so this lot have little more to do to turn us into a hell hole of poverty and authoritarian rule.
Let’s give the belief in Free Speech a social rating of (say) 60%. More people ‘believe’ in Free Speech than not. Hooray!
But if modern Marxism gets a rating of (say) 90%, even if by only small group of people, then Free Speech will lose out to those who ‘march to the beat of a different drum’.
Beliefs are very difficult to change by mere facts alone. So if the loss of Free Speech is to be reversed then those with other beliefs must reap the consequences inevitably. I make no call for violence but unremitting criticism is fine.
The Oxbridge debating unions are a platform because the press take their conclusions seriously – much as back in the 70s, the NUS (which all students were joined up to and paid for automatically) were able to do press releases saying “British students support [insert left wing cause here].”
It also seems likely that holding off ice in the Oxbridge unions still looks good on a political CV to those politicians who experienced them in an earlier age.
You can’t lose a war against pacifists.
You can’t survive by being a pacifist when you have violent enemies.
The death of Sir Tony The Liar, Govenor of Gaza, warmonger and architect of the destruction of the UK is an interesting case. To put it into perspective, consider how the Left still celebrate the death of Baroness Thatcher, saviour of this country the last time it was a socialist shithole. So yes, I would be dancing with joy at Tony ‘digital ID because I will get wads of cash from it’ Blair’s demise.
I think the question should be simply “Can the Radical Left be trusted?”. The answer is no of course in both cases.
Popper’s statement may sound sound on the surface but it’s literally what’s behind the current attempts of the left-wing establishment in Germany to outlaw the AfD. I’d advise extreme caution here: Assume that any mechanism for fighting the intolerant with intolerance will some day be used by your political enemies against you. Especially if it’s based on vague terms like intolerance. The notion of someone not being willing to tolerate costumed men on the female toilet would immediately come to mind here. Clearly, that’s intolerance and thus …