Date: March 20, 2018
01) Demarcating Incitement: to Violence, Hatred and Examination
“I say that our conversation requires precision, and a concerted effort to strive towards it, because it is due to its absence, on some occasions more deliberate than others, that otherwise plainly false equivalences can be espoused and used as foundations upon which other arguments are built. When we use words such as “drove”, “radicalised”, “inspired”, “far-right”, “extremist” etc., we must do so consistently, and adhere to definitions so that our implications aren’t smuggled but are explicit and transparent. We must also acknowledge that the truth of a matter exists independently of whether, and however validly, it is argued for or against. Just because there are two opposing views on a given issue does not mean that the truth must lie between them, and where it happens to, it does not mean that it can only be found at the half-way mark. The implications arising from terms like the first three among my examples above, concern the constitution of responsibility, and its degree. I wish here to discuss whether we can conclude by implication, as Rowley does, that Tommy Robinson and others bear some responsibility for an atrocity such as that at Finsbury Park akin to that borne by Anjem Choudary for bouts of Jihadi violence.
[…]
But unless we wish to continue devaluing the meanings of our words in such conversations so that we can each rely on one another to be speaking the same language and genuinely make some progress, we must stop relying instead on such equivocations and false-equivalences to virtue-signal and score cheap points.”
Great post.
I’m most interested in the discussion of legal [as well as moral and ethical] culpability, as I’ve also recognized this being used to stifle open, free speech…speech about deeply important social issues of our time.
When it gets to the point where speech, and the people behind that speech, are grossly mischaracterized…and those same people cannot even express an honestly held thought, question, emotion, etc…something has gone dangerously wrong, within society.
…People aren’t hearing, listening, comprehending and dialoging, anymore…They are using tactics of domination, to make people they don’t want to hear from “simply go away”…which, effectively, kills all peaceful solutions…
…Peaceful solutions are what we should be pursuing.
The longer I have been out here as a MAP…the longer the list of people grows, who’ve accused me of substantive culpability in “child sexual abuse” [sexual violence against children]…despite myself holding no prior knowledge of specific incidents, never giving any assistance in such an event…never advising such behavior…never commissioning or encouraging such incidents…and always condemning any violation of the free will principle…As well as never having engaged in such violence, myself…
Some people are pissed off at me over my long history of associations and initiatives…and they think I should suffer for it, in whatever way they can manage to inflict said suffering.
It’s a sad, ruthless world we live in…when nobody can thoughtfully say anything, about the issues that impact their own lives, without being personally violated for having made the effort.
