zlacker

>>tosh+(OP)
Some bright spots I've noticed in the past month or so in this area, for those who care both about justice and open debate:

- John Carmack signal boosting[1] Sarah Downey's article "This PC witch-hunt is killing free speech, and we have to fight it"[2]

- The critical comments on the obligatory "BLM" post in r/askscience[3]

- Glenn Loury's response[4] to Brown University's letter to faculty/alumni about racial justice.

- The failure[5] of a group of folks to cancel Steven Pinker over accusations of racial insensitivity.

[1] https://twitter.com/ID_AA_Carmack/status/1279105937404579841

[2] https://medium.com/@sarahadowney/this-politically-correct-wi...

[3] https://www.reddit.com/r/askscience/comments/gvc7k9/black_li...

[4] https://www.city-journal.org/brown-university-letter-racism

[5] https://mobile.twitter.com/sapinker/status/12799365902367907...

>>dnissl+Tr
The broadening circle of people willing to exercise their free speech to condemn Pinker's recurrent and insidious appeals to race-informed genetic determinism is a bright spot, as are the numerous people dunking on Pinker for cosigning an open letter that decries "ostracism and public shaming" as injuries to our culture of free expression, rather than expressions of that culture.

Ken White had some smart things to say about this today, with respect to "the problem of the preferred first speaker". Worth tracking down.

That's not to say there aren't dark spots; David Shor's firing certainly appears to be one of them. But I don't think any of those dark spots put Pinker, the T-1000 version of Charles Murray, above criticism. Which is, of course, what an open letter against "public shaming" purports to do.

>>tptace+lP1
Of course people should be free to vehemently argue against Steven Pinker's ideas. The problem is that people are instead descending to personal attacks on him, including circulating a petition (with forged signatures, to boot) to get the Linguistic Society of America to strip him of his Fellow status.

>>nokcha+d12
People are free to circulate petitions, including those making demands about someone's Linguistic Society status. People are not required to express only opinions you approve of. Though, of course, you're free to circulate a counter-petition against them!

What's less free is threatening to use a billion dollar fortune to file a defamation lawsuit against someone for expressing an opinion on Twitter, which at least one of the signatories did.