Tag: politics

Why a right to free speech is not identical to an active Twitter account (and why having one and not the other – is not a problem).

This month I am responding to my good friend, Nick Morgan. Nick is an effortlessly talented teacher and someone who’s been at it for nearly twenty years. He’s one of those teachers that would’ve made you love maths as a kid especially, if like me, you hated every graph papered day of it! He was kind enough to suggest this topic and I thought this was a different way to approach a blog post. Here’s what’s been turning over in Nick’s mind this week:

…I started thinking about it again after reading some twitter responses to Trump being removed from social media. Exactly the same stuff that first brought this idea to my mind years ago when Katie Hopkins [Katie Hopkins is an outspoken self-styled iconoclastic rightwing social media sophist] was booted off Twitter. Lots of the responses refer to an erosion of freedom of speech in form. Now, my monologue is not about the merits of the decision, nor does it concern the nature of the speech that might be losing its freedom. What strikes me is the perception large proportions of people appear to have developed. As Twitter et al are all private companies, they can essentially promote and ban whomever they like based upon whatever criteria they deem reasonable. It’s up to them. Much like a store choosing to only stick certain books, or a radio station banning certain songs or artists. Social media platforms are not government provided or a universal right to access. There are lots of them about and I’m certain many wouldn’t ban Trump or Hopkins at all. What I find most interesting is that the ubiquitous nature of the big social media companies has eroded and blurred the lines. People seem unable to identify them as “just an app I use” but rather see them as “the world” and, hence, someone’s removal from a particular platform as an attack on overarching liberty itself. Essentially, more and more people seem to view social media platforms as society itself. Which is curious but also a little sinister and unnerving.

Nick has raised some interesting and other debatable topics in his question – from the nature of free speech itself to the pervasive role social media has in most of our lives. But let’s keep the brief narrow to his core complaint. His issue is social media platforms and how, by interfacing with these programs for over a decade, our perception of their nature and their purpose has become entailed with the nature and purpose of free speech itself.

Why is this a problem?

Because ultimately, they are not the same thing either by nature or purpose and viewing them as identical leads to the misconception that one depends on the other. In this month post I will try to give a philosophical account as to why this perception may be the case and why it is flawed.

To begin with, what do we mean by a thing’s ‘nature’ and a things ‘purpose’ because I’ve introduced this concept about ‘nature’ and ‘purpose’ near the beginning of the post and a good place to start is defining those terms philosophically. To do this, I’m going to ‘riff’ off Aristotle somewhat and suggest that when we talk about a thing’s ‘nature’ we are talking about its ‘essential properties’.

Essential Properties are the things an object (concrete or abstract) absolutely needs to possess to be rightly and truly identified as the thing it claims to be.

With me so far?

Let me give you an example. When we think about a ‘table’ philosophically we would say that its essential properties could be:

Being made of a hard material substance such as wood, plastic, or marble. A table made of warm jelly, whilst potentially hilarious…would struggle to retain its identity.

Having ‘legs’

Having a ‘top’

And that to be a good table (which would be its ‘purpose’ – more on this in a minute) it must be able to permit dining, or a game of cards, or a whole bunch of laptops when everyone is working at home. A good table fulfills its purpose by being the best table it can be and retains its nature by losing none of its essential properties. If a table becomes broken or somehow deficient, we can still call it a table – but it will have lost its purpose (the poor thing).

We could go on with the list of essential properties and there may be some debate over what should be included and to what detail. But if I were to stand in front of my dining room table and begin to remove or change some its ‘essential properties’ (like removing one leg at a time) it would very quickly cease to be a table and instead be the ‘parts of a table’ and I would have a degree of explaining to do to my perplexed family.

Next, let’s flesh out that ‘purpose’ a little more. We are going to stay with Aristotle who says that everything has a purpose and that a purpose is to always achieve some kind of ‘good’ (I type the word good with speech marks because it doesn’t just mean the opposite of bad; in a philosophical context – ‘good’ can also mean flourishing, thriving and growing). If you’re a person or a moral being your purpose is to be morally good (living a good life). If you’re an object: a knife, table or chair for example, then you’re being the very best knife (always sharp), table (always sturdy) or chair (always upright) you can be. This can sound a little far-fetched, but hopefully you get the point. I also hope any objects reading this post will feel suitably inspired.

Twitter

Twitter, of its nature, is a company which provides a service, but it also requires adherence to policies and rules of engagement. Furthermore, as a business, its necessary purpose is to make profit through the sale of its services. Just to sidetrack on slightly uneven footing for a second: as an abstract entity, Twitter is essentially amoral meaning it is neither good or bad and therefore under no obligation to be ‘morally good’. The folks who run Twitter are moral – and the persons who made laws that govern the business are moral and the shareholders and consumers are also moral and may demand the business act in certain ways– but Twitter as an abstract concept is amoral – because it’s not a person. Maybe that’s why it’s so easy to project differing values onto it…just a thought.

Clearly what’s best for a business is to make a profit. That is its ‘good’. If it does not make a profit, it is not a ‘good’ business (not thriving, flourishing, growing) and therefore does not fulfill its purpose. Likewise, if the purpose of the service it provides (to make money which sustains its nature) can be identified as connecting societies, and not just micro-societies (interest groups for example) but horizontally across global groups and vertically throughout every echelon of class and socio-demographic then that can certainly give it the look of being identical to society which is possibly why it has become so entwined with the right to ‘speak freely’.

Freedom of Speech

In Western democratic societies the nature of free speech is such that it is one of those inalienable rights which means, it cannot be taken or given away. Inalienable rights (happiness could be one, health another) are gifted to every person at birth. Some thinkers (such as John Locke) were of the view that ‘freedom’ itself was not a right bestowed upon a citizen by law, rather it is a ‘natural right’ that necessarily required laws to make it more concrete. For him, it was the egg that came first.

There is an also an argument that within democratic societies, the purpose of free speech is essential, maybe even necessary to such a society. In other words: it cannot be truly healthy or ‘good’ if its free citizens cannot speak freely with each other or are in some way restricted or silenced. Let’s also make the valid point that the problem of curtailing free speech only comes when governments do it, not necessarily private companies.

Now we begin to put the two together and see if we can blend the seams. To be active in the Twitter-sphere, whilst we do not speak per se, we do express our thoughts and opinions as is one’s inalienable right. With the borderless reach of Twitter adorning it the cape and cowl of society along with the secondary purpose of Twitter being somehow the same as one of the essential properties of a good society (speaking freely) then if some folks were denied access to freely speak via such a platform – they are arguably denied their inalienable right to free speech, its purpose to promote to a healthy and flourishing society. So now we can see the potential to view the two as identical. Put another way: I have an inalienable right to speak freely – I can speak freely through Twitter – Twitter has suspended me – my right is inalienable (you can’t take it away from me) – therefore, pitchforks at dusk.

However, the problem at hand is this: Twitter is not ‘society’. It is engaged in by ‘societies’ as a form of expression of speech but this does not mean it shares the same nature as ‘free speech’ (they have very different essential properties) and neither does it have the same purpose (the purpose of Free Speech is not to create profit).

Believing then that Twitter and Free Speech are identical to each other in so far as they are the same thing is a contradiction as they are each clearly different in both nature and purpose and that is why those who decry being suspended from such a service see their rights as impinged.

Contradictions always cause consternation:

How can it be possible that she runs a dog sanctuary and is cruel to cats?

How is it that he comes to work every day and yet gets nothing done?

That’s because running an animal sanctuary is not necessarily the same as being kind to animals (see Tiger King). Also, coming to work every day is not the same as being productive (ahem, though I can’t think of any examples). Therefore, whilst Twitter looks like free speech and leaps tall buildings in a single bound like free speech this does not mean it is free speech. Whilst having access to a social media account is a convenient and entertaining way to express our thoughts and opinions – it bears no resemblance to centuries old, carefully considered, legally defined and desperately cherished right such as ‘free speech’. One of the essential properties of free speech is that it is something you are born with a right to possess; unlike the services of an amoral profit-driven entity.

In conclusion (finally)

As I hope to have laid out in my argument; once we dismantle and analyze the different parts of something: its nature and purpose – we can quickly ascertain the differences in that nature and purpose giving us a much cleaner sense of what similarities or identities may exist. I would suggest Nick that the kind of folks who don’t engage in this mode of thinking are either not of a cast of mind to do so, or else they are deliberately speaking at a frequency not audible to every listener.

Post-Script (Optional)

I decided to keep the debate on free speech within Western democratic countries. Clearly, not every society views free speech as the ‘west’ does. Secondly, I focused on Twitter alone because it took centre stage in current affairs and just to keep the flow of the prose though please assume a tacit inclusion of Instagram, Facebook, Ello et al. Thirdly, the debate around the purpose of free speech which I set up as being necessary for a healthy society is arguably thin and possibly weak, but this was done consciously to keep the word count down. I can dive deeper into the topic on another post in the future if people are keen to have the discussion. Finally, there are millions of folks who don’t engage with any social media who feel perfectly happy with their free speech and find no issue in this at all. However, even as I type, President Trump has had his social media platforms pulled out from underneath him and his acolytes are decrying the move as suppression of freedom of speech. Therefore, whilst some of you really don’t see the issue, there’s clearly enough that do which makes it viable for discussion.

January 15, 2021
The Theist and gender neutrality – Why God should be a role model.

If God is a person and is gender neutral – is not permissible for all persons to be gender neutral – including humans?

In his book ‘Coherence of Theism’ Richard Swinburne discusses God’s ‘personhood’. For Swinburne, ‘personhood’ is a mental substance – it is what gives us our perception, allows us to act with intentions and moreover, personhood is experienced only by us. That said, we can recognise its presence in others. There is an argument that it is your ‘personhood’ that means we shouldn’t treat you as means to end – you are an end in yourself.

I hope that was the nicest thing you read about yourself today.

Put plainly, your personhood gives you a value beyond simply being of use to others. For example, a waiter in a restaurant is providing a service to you – that is his purpose…but only as a ‘waiter’. He is also a human with inalienable rights that guarantee his individuality and personhood. Animal rights activists claim personhood for animals when arguing for greater treatment of animals beyond ‘what they do (or is done to them) for us.’ However, for the benefit of my post – it should also be noted that for Abrahamic faiths too– God is a person – God possess the mental substance that I have just been discussing.

In contemporary thought – a distinction has been drawn between a person’s ‘sex’ and their ‘gender’. For the human being, as a mammal, the presence of a penis confers the biological and thereby physical ‘sex’ of male and where there is a vagina  – female. However, the gender prescription of how a male ‘acts’ and what a male actually is – is linked not to their anatomy, but to their own perceptions of self, through the application through their mental substance. Arguably, the penis is a physical substance entailed in the description ‘male’ but the concept of  ‘what is a man’ is far more complex than our physical bodies – it requires our mental capacity to ascertain – our personhood.

Therefore, I can be identified as male by a physical examination – but my gender, my sexuality, is a mental construction and…well…that’s jolly well up to me. For me I am both physically male and my gender is ‘man’ – and that was my choice.

And this is a problem for many – but why should it be a problem for the theist?  After all their God is the original ‘gender-neutral person’.

For thousands of years, since prophets and chosen persons brought into our collective minds the revelation of a single divine being – it has been written that this entity is a man. ‘Father’ ‘He’ ‘Him’ ‘Lord’. And yet the clear paradox is that this cannot be verified either empirically (by observation) or through logical deduction. Yet read any of the Abrahamic religions scriptures and God’s ‘sex’ is only visible in a prescribed (by men) pronoun and to a greater yet still controversial extent  – visible through incarnation. However, God’s gender – is clearly…neutral. He cannot be male or female and to say that God is would cause you all sorts of messy contradictions that could probably end up in Them popping out of existence.

I would also argue that our mental substance should have supervenience (a greater say) over our physical substance. I am aware that the theist may draw a line here as will the non-dualists among you – but where a person identifies as a gender, they have the right to align their other essential property – their body – with that gender choice.

Conclusion…

If the theist accepts God’s personhood and gender neutrality, then why not gender neutrality or non-binary in persons who are human. It seems logical that where a person has a conscious mind and mental capacity of personhood that they choose their own gender. There is another argument from Free Will (God’s gift to humans that gets Her off the hook when it comes to evil in the world) wherein it is through our Free Will that we choose our gender. Our capacity to choose our gender is through the grace of God. Either way – gender is fluid and constructed and there should be no issue with such a position.

October 10, 2020
Anti-Vaxxers: What are they saying when they claim to be ‘anti’?

In this post I will argue that being ‘anti’ something is a powerful stance. It can commit you to be in opposition to more than the actual thing you are against – and by doing so ties you to be opposed to things that could be a power for good. I will suggest that this is most true in areas of moral ambiguity such as those persons who are in opposition to vaccinations or ‘Anti-Vaxxers.’

When you think about it, we often define ourselves by what we are not. It’s such a powerful device to ensure our personality, our values and our identity are registered correctly by others. But when we claim to be ‘anti’ we are stating not just what we oppose – but all that fosters and sustains that which we find reprehensible.

I was born in the South-East of England but became an Everton fan at the age of ten. It wasn’t until much later when I worked in Leeds that I met “true blues.” I loved the stories of how Everton supporters would define themselves by how much they hated the “reds” of Liverpool FC. There was the grandfather who refused to have tomato ketchup in the house; the parent who would not allow his son’s best mate into the house to play because there was red trim on his trainers – I even worked for an Evertonian who wouldn’t allow red pens in the building! But I want to classify such things as ‘preferences’ because when the people of Merseyside remember the 96 who died at the Hillsborough tragedy over thirty years ago – they are truly one city.

That’s not to say there’s anything wrong in marking our personality traits through our preferences and dislikes. Announce to a room of strangers that you like pineapple on your pizza, marmite on your toast or cream first on your scone and get ready for a debate. Enjoy the ‘Hampden roar’ as you advocate the ‘correct’ way to put toilet roll on a holder or make a cup of tea. But these preferences, I would argue, are trivial and represent less of a holistic flag in the ground compared to what we are “anti.”

Understood grammatically – ‘anti’ is a prefix and is from the Greek to mean ‘opposite’ or ‘against’ and there are plenty of examples throughout history of ‘anti’ movements that have halted hate and evinced equality.

But how does it work for the more culturally divisive and more ambiguous moral panics such as vaccinations?

I am pro-vaccination, but I am always willing to listen to and be informed by an opposing view and I know that for those who have concerns on either religious, cultural or political grounds their stance on vaccinations couldn’t be starker. They are ‘Anti-Vaxxers’. But by making their position so vehemently and presciently on the negative don’t they risk causing more distance and distrust not only on this position but on a variety of others? I want to be clear on my issue with the prefix, when you say you are ‘anti’ you are saying you oppose much more than the single subject of your ire. If I say I don’t like olives on a pizza – my preferences are clear as to the presence of olives. However, to say I was ‘Anti-Olives’ would surely infer I have greater issues than with the olea europaea itself. I am fuming with the whole matrix of olive oil production from the techniques of olive cultivation, farming and production practices all the way to promotion, advertising and consumption of this small fruit. I would argue that when a person makes a claim to be ‘Anti-Vaccinations’ they are not just stating an opposition to injected medicine, they are also claiming an opposition to the machinery of government and the perceived oppression of the individual and free-will.

And that is part of the problem of the prefix ‘Anti’. Its power lies in its ability to not just offer a clear opposition to a things purpose – but also to the components of the assembly line that brought it into being and sustain its presence. For the ‘Anti-Abortionist’ the opposition isn’t just on the purpose of abortion (the ending of ‘life’) it is also toward perceived moral flaws or political agendas that maintain abortion as a lawful option. The Anti-Racist isn’t just opposed to a racist act but also the systemic structure which maintains a racist ideology. I would argue then that ‘Anti’ causes fear but also distrust because it demands of the listener a worry about more than the single subject and furthermore; it places the proponent of the ‘anti-stance’ as distrustful of others and as someone who operates within a negative platform.

But is this necessarily a bad thing?

I would forgive my fellow humans for waking up each day and finding something else to be ‘anti.’ The feelings of fighting against oppression and pushing back against an injustice are a dopamine hit. We can cast ourselves in the movie in our minds as the hero of the piece with permission to be loud, to be forceful and to be heard. And of course – significant events in history have demanded such action. In areas of moral absolutes – the ‘anti’ stance is justified by clear evidence of wrong-doing either through our shared human values or well as quantitative evidence. In doing so it can expose the objective and demonstrable ways a government, cultural/social institution has been acting in egregious ways to maintain an unequal or oppressive state of affairs. However, on the topics where the moral high ground is ambiguous, what is the value in appearing so demonstrably combative when there is ambiguity or muddier waters? I would argue that for the anti-vaxxers , the ‘anti’ causes them to expose mechanisms where its less obvious (than say ‘slavery’ ) that there is something ill at work. Their anger is not at the concept of ‘medicine’ or the metal millimeter width of a needle – the anger is more abstract – it’s at the concept of free will and more insidiously, the concept of objective truth. So by opening the floodgates to how vaccinations are harmful – the Anti Vaxxer also taints the scientist, observable evidence of ‘good’ and our very own conceptions of self (i.e. am I really in control of my own life – or am I being controlled?)

Because ‘Anti’ allows us to ‘expose’ the mechanisms of oppression it causes a greater fear in others. But if the Anti-Vaxer is fighting against the oppression and fear caused by governments and scientists isn’t there a contradiction when their stance causes exactly the same feelings of oppression and fear in others? I would suggest that negative actions, without dilution or a segue to compromise, simply cause more…negative actions. What if the Anti-Vaxxer were to find positive ways to promote choice for an individual citizen or positive ways to influence the scientific community or local government. Would you be more inclined to find some common ground with the one who makes you feel informed and empowered rather than left questioning and in fear? The issue the Anti-Vaxxer has, unlike the Anti-Slavery proponent, is that the Vaxxer’s ‘anti’ footing is on less firm ground.

In Conclusion…

We should, when we moved to do so, make our stands for the values and principles we believe in. Our values and principles of the more universally morally reviled human inventions (slavery, FGM, racism) deserve to have the engines of their machines of hate exposed – and we should use our ‘anti’ stance to do that. We should also find solutions and show the vulnerable and the afraid how to be empowered. But where the moral certainty becomes opaque – the evidence flawed or at the very least still open to debate or when, in the heat and adrenaline rush of a fight, Anti Vaxxer’s tarnish more than their perceived enemy, they create distrust to the ‘good’ of objective evidence, the science of healing and place others in the shadow of fear and uncertainty. Call for questions, call for more research – but a second thought towards calls to blanket opposition and the ‘anti’ stance may create more discourse and less discord.

October 3, 2020