We seem to have reached an impasse over whether or not authoritarianism can come from outside the govt. Have a good weekend.
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You too!
I think it should be up to the employer/shareholders/boss. The safest thing to do from a business standpoint is STFU and not take any sides (like Starbucks, they just sell coffee). But if the employer wants his/her staff to soapbox (or not) then have at it.
I think workers should be smart enough to read the damn room though. I have clients around the country who are very different. Was working with a woman in Austin who’s an arch conservative. I valued her business and wrote in a little comment “good work, you did build that”.
Later that day I was on a two hour conference call with two 60yo gay guys in California. They were bitching about the VA and Medicaire paying slow. “Collusion”.
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In regard to universities spending money on security for people like Milo to speak, I don’t think they should spend any more money on him than the do for a non controversial speaker.
Why, because if his not actively inciting violence(which I haven’t heard him do), he has the right to say whatever he wants.
If some people want to stop other people from going to listen to him, they are the ones causing the problem, and the police should come and do their job, and uphold free speech.
The people that want to limit such speakers are using violence and intimidation to break the law.
Universities are a breeding grounds for weirdo, radical, loonies, like neo Marxists, feminists, post colonialist racists etc.
If they don’t like controversy they should do something about at the root, rather than try to blame everyone else.
Just to clarify, I’m not for the government forcing business to silence their employees.
In principle I agree, the people who instigate violence should absolutely be arrested. But practically, if there are a 1000 protestors who want to shut down a speaker, how many police and campus security would it take to deal with that threat?
Oh me either. I was just saying that I AM all for businesses controlling what their employees may say on the clock.
Like Trump saying publicly that nfl owners should get rid of players who take a knee?
Politics and culture have been part of sports for years.
Considering half the fans of the NFL actually support police and near zero fans want politics with their sports… it’s up to the owners whether to fire or punish kneelers who protest on company time and hurt profits.
If Vox employed an editorial writer who all the sudden wrote pro Trump/pro NRA/anti abortion articles he’d be gone. Visa versa applies with the National Review.
Even fast food workers are getting fired for calling cops “pigs” or taking political stances.
What does that have to do with the president pushing cancel culture?
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Ah. I thought you were implying that Trump poop tweets are the same as government restricting speech. If you were just implying he is guilty of snowflakery, then I concur.
I wasn’t saying it was an attack on free speech merely that I don’t understand the idea that if an actor, athlete, businessman, whoever does something they don’t like it’s an automatic “I’m done with that for forever now.”
It’s weird to me that so many people get offended over ads a company makes or something like a peaceful protest and automatically decide they are done with stuff because of what I typically find are trivial things.
Example:
A game company apologized because it caught some flack for having multiple black characters voiced by white people. I don’t necessarily think the intention was bad but whatever I was just skimming it. The first comment says “this PC culture has gone too far I won’t buy this game and I was looking forward to it because these developers said they would take that into consideration in the future.”
I just think it’s people with too much time and organized outrage. I mean if people want to hound companies for advertising on a certain show or boycott over something a restaurant does it’s just whatever to me. People must have way more time than me. I’m not a Hannity fan but I can’t imagine ever taken the time to tweet some advertiser about why are you buying ads on his show? And I don’t go to Starbucks but I swear to Santa I’m killing the next person who talks about a war on Christmas.
Social media’s a double edged sword as I think sometimes people get fired now for things shared that shouldn’t but I’m also not crying when the CEO gets fired because people find out he’s a Nazi. I’m definitely a hypocrite on some if it!
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Yeah it would take a lot of cops. You could re comp the cost via fining the protesters for inappropriate behaviour: breach of the peace, assault etc
The reason these Antifa types keep doing it is because the cops won’t do their job. The result is law abiding citizens trying to exercise their free speech get quashed. In effect it is terrorism, with the Antifa types using violence and intimidation to silence free speech. They keep getting rewarded for bad behaviour, so they will continue to do said bad behaviour unless stopped, and punished.
I agree 100%, and think it would only take one major crack down, mass arrest to break that cycle.
On the other hand, my brother-in-law is a math professor at a major University. He catches students cheating all the time, says administration does nothing. Students are like customers or revenew streams or something and they don’t want to lose even one. I’m sure they wouldn’t want to lose a few hundred, even if they were antifa.
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Yeah it’s got to get tiring keeping up with all the brands you’re boycotting. I heard on a podcast the CEO of twitter, (or maybe snapchat?) got in “trouble” for eating at Chik-fil-a. Because the CEO of Chik-fil-a was against gay marriage, I guess. I thought, that was six fucking years ago, gay marriage won, it’s over, let it go.
But, looking at myself, I hate to get fuel at an Exxon station, because I grew up watching the Exxon Valdez. Those cunts spent more money fighting in court to keep from having to pay for the clean up, than they spent on the clean up. I’m not even sure if that’s true, it’s just the story I grew up on, so I’m like fuck those guys! I didn’t even remember the oil spill until very recently. It took some introspection to sort out why I never stop at Exxon.
Is there a single Antifa douche that’s gainfully employed ? I suppose the bike lock cocksucker used to be… A cross section of those mutants looks like a D and D coming out party at an arcade.
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I agree with your post and particularly this part. That said, I do feel strongly that one thing we should be doing is guarding free speech jealously. Slow death of a thousand cuts, apathy, and all that. It bothers me intensely that we have a POTUS who openly criticizes free speech when it’s something he doesn’t like.
My great fear is that we have it so good that we neglect to fight the fights that really matter, instead focusing on the distractions of bad news and controversy as you say
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With regard to college campuses and speakers like Milo, let me offer another perspective. Milo is not a scholar. He has no academic credentials or real world experience in anything that would justify him speaking in an academic environment. He doesn’t seek to teach anything but rather he just repeats divisive talking points and makes snarky remarks with the sole intent of instigating emotional responses. He then uses that to his personal benefit. He has admitted he is a provocative troll.
If paying students at a university don’t want him to come and profit from speaking at their school then that is not only their right but it makes perfect sense. People think it’s about snowflakes not wanting their feelings hurt but it’s more that they don’t want someone speaking on campus whose intent is to hurt feelings for the sake of creating viral videos.