I'd intended to write a post about what exactly "free speech" means. I started it. I had quotes from the EU Charter, and all sorts of very carefully thought out points and good intentions of sharing knowledge with the world at large. But then I realised: there are more of you than there are of me, and I ran out of steam.
I love information. I love facts and trivia and just knowing things. The most exciting thing in the world is stumbling across a trove of information about a subject I didn't know anything about before, or meeting with someone who holds a completely different perspective who can speak about it rationally and intelligently. My friends and family, at times, get annoyed by this quest for information, the barrage of questions that comes when I'm faced with something I don't understand. New friendships go through a teething period where I have to explain: I just want to understand. Most established friendships have reached the point where they know they have to say: Too much information, Sashi.
I forget that not everyone is like this. Some people are told a particular thing, and they're happy with that explanation. They feel no need to investigate further and break it down to it's smallest parts. That's not a criticism of those people. It's not saying that mentality is less than mine. I don't understand it, but I'm sure there are many out there who don't understand how I can get completely lost in researching the minutiae of the evolution of spiders (as an example).
My first reaction when confronted with an opposing viewpoint is to evaluate it for credibility. Is it stated in a clear manner? Are there facts to back up that position? Are those facts verified by unbiased sources? If the answer to any of those questions is "no", I ask questions. Hell, I ask questions, anyway, but that's besides the point. If I find weaknesses or flaws in the argument, I point them out, and usually have a handful of resources to pass on, because that's my way of being helpful. If I wrote something littered with inaccurate information, I would hope that some kindly person would come along and say so. If they offered resources, all the better. More information for the magpie!
So when things like Julie Burchill's article come along, I find myself profoundly baffled. (You can read my my response to the article in a previous post.) I don't generally understand hate, particularly impersonal hate. (This is another trait that often tests the patience of friends and family; I can't count the number of times I've heard how can you defend that person? - simple: I don't have enough information to judge.) Hate, I think, takes an awful lot of energy. It also doesn't seem particularly productive. So to see so much hatred crammed into so few words temporarily short-circuited the language centres in my brain. I just couldn't process it. So I went back and tried to ferret out the purpose of the article. I tried to find some reason in it.
I couldn't.
Apparently neither could a lot of other people, and the article has since been taken down. Now Twitter is awash with cries of injustice and the infringement of free speech, the oppression of journalists, etc. ad nauseam. Again, I spent several hours watching the Twitter feed throw up claim after claim that Burchill is completely within her right to express her opinion, trying to wrap my head around the fact that a very essential fact was being overlooked: freedom of speech is not a limitless pass to say whatever you please in whatever form you wish. The issues was not in Burchill's opinion, but in her language. There are many, many ways she could have addressed what she felt was an injustice to Suzanne Moore in a composed and dignified manner, without reducing a very wide and diverse community to the cheapest insults. In fact, many of the people targeted by her article addressed her in just such a composed and dignified manner.
Freedom of speech does not protect you against libel, slander or sedition (among other things). Beyond that fact, however, is the matter of personal responsibility. Even if hate-speech were protected under freedom of speech (it's not; countered by the rights to dignity, safety, and protection from discrimination), and even if her article hadn't been littered with factual inaccuracies about the transgendered community, where is the personal responsibility involved in dredging up and perpetuating so many stereotypes that a highly discriminated against minority (and its allies) have fought long and hard to try to correct?
But, enough of that. Burchill is not the only culprit, and the fact is: I'm tired. I'm tired of fighting. I'm tired that I have to fight. I'm tired of scrambling to make my voice heard among the cacophony of anger, hatred and ignorance that just feed each other. I am tired of wanting to shut myself away from the world because everyone is screaming and no one is listening.
I'm an American. I live in the UK. If I criticise the British (though I tend to specify 'English' because those are the people I'm around), I am brushed off, ridiculed, or slapped with the label "insert negative adjective American". Sometimes all I have to do is ask why they do a particular thing here to get the same result. At the same time, I hear a constant barrage of criticisms and derogatory statements about Americans with varying levels of legitimacy. I'm not allowed to contradict these statements, either, though, because again I'm just being a "insert negative adjective American". I have one lecturer who somehow manages to include at least one derogatory statement about Americans per lecture - I'm actually a bit amazed at her ability to slip these in considering the lectures have nothing to do with Americans or the United States. No one speaks up. I don't even speak up. Why? Because I have been taught that pointing out that something is offensive is wrong.
We've all been taught that. If you're offended by someone's statement, you're minimised and illegitimised. You're told that you're just "too sensitive"; others are told that you're "throwing a tantrum" or "having a hissy fit". At best, you are patronised and pandered to, if not out and out attacked.
Back home, guns are a big topic at the moment. Every time there's a school shooting, guns are a big topic. Except. Is anyone talking about the propensity in American society for individuals to take guns into public places and shoot people they don't know for no particularly identifiable reason? No. Everyone is screaming "Don't take my guns away!" because it was mentioned that part of solving this quandary of public shootings might be examining the gun control regulations already in place. The real issue - why this happens so frequently in our country - is completely ignored.
What does that have to do with hate? Well, my dears, it's very simple. It becomes a form of hate. Meme posts depicting liberals as illiterate idiots for wanting stricter gun control laws, sensationalist articles written on both sides to further their agenda, two camps of people screaming bile at each other and no one bothering to listen.
Pick any topic and you'll see it - over and over these cycles of animosity impeding the channels of reasonable discussion, impeding progress and resolution, impeding acceptance and peace.
Don't you ever want it to just stop? Don't you get tired of it?
When are we going to stop reducing each other to impersonal labels and accept that we are all human? We are all vulnerable. We are all flawed. We all want the same things - safety, health, happiness. The rest doesn't matter. Strip us down to the barest principles and we are all the same. Why can't we talk to each other? Why can't we come together and work towards finding practical solutions to the issues - whether it's the issue of a journalist who abuses her role or the vast number of people without food or ensuring everyone has access to adequate health or - dear god there are so many problems to fix in this world, why are we wasting so much time slinging childish insults back and forth?
When are we going to stop hating?
I love information. I love facts and trivia and just knowing things. The most exciting thing in the world is stumbling across a trove of information about a subject I didn't know anything about before, or meeting with someone who holds a completely different perspective who can speak about it rationally and intelligently. My friends and family, at times, get annoyed by this quest for information, the barrage of questions that comes when I'm faced with something I don't understand. New friendships go through a teething period where I have to explain: I just want to understand. Most established friendships have reached the point where they know they have to say: Too much information, Sashi.
I forget that not everyone is like this. Some people are told a particular thing, and they're happy with that explanation. They feel no need to investigate further and break it down to it's smallest parts. That's not a criticism of those people. It's not saying that mentality is less than mine. I don't understand it, but I'm sure there are many out there who don't understand how I can get completely lost in researching the minutiae of the evolution of spiders (as an example).
My first reaction when confronted with an opposing viewpoint is to evaluate it for credibility. Is it stated in a clear manner? Are there facts to back up that position? Are those facts verified by unbiased sources? If the answer to any of those questions is "no", I ask questions. Hell, I ask questions, anyway, but that's besides the point. If I find weaknesses or flaws in the argument, I point them out, and usually have a handful of resources to pass on, because that's my way of being helpful. If I wrote something littered with inaccurate information, I would hope that some kindly person would come along and say so. If they offered resources, all the better. More information for the magpie!
So when things like Julie Burchill's article come along, I find myself profoundly baffled. (You can read my my response to the article in a previous post.) I don't generally understand hate, particularly impersonal hate. (This is another trait that often tests the patience of friends and family; I can't count the number of times I've heard how can you defend that person? - simple: I don't have enough information to judge.) Hate, I think, takes an awful lot of energy. It also doesn't seem particularly productive. So to see so much hatred crammed into so few words temporarily short-circuited the language centres in my brain. I just couldn't process it. So I went back and tried to ferret out the purpose of the article. I tried to find some reason in it.
I couldn't.
Apparently neither could a lot of other people, and the article has since been taken down. Now Twitter is awash with cries of injustice and the infringement of free speech, the oppression of journalists, etc. ad nauseam. Again, I spent several hours watching the Twitter feed throw up claim after claim that Burchill is completely within her right to express her opinion, trying to wrap my head around the fact that a very essential fact was being overlooked: freedom of speech is not a limitless pass to say whatever you please in whatever form you wish. The issues was not in Burchill's opinion, but in her language. There are many, many ways she could have addressed what she felt was an injustice to Suzanne Moore in a composed and dignified manner, without reducing a very wide and diverse community to the cheapest insults. In fact, many of the people targeted by her article addressed her in just such a composed and dignified manner.
Freedom of speech does not protect you against libel, slander or sedition (among other things). Beyond that fact, however, is the matter of personal responsibility. Even if hate-speech were protected under freedom of speech (it's not; countered by the rights to dignity, safety, and protection from discrimination), and even if her article hadn't been littered with factual inaccuracies about the transgendered community, where is the personal responsibility involved in dredging up and perpetuating so many stereotypes that a highly discriminated against minority (and its allies) have fought long and hard to try to correct?
But, enough of that. Burchill is not the only culprit, and the fact is: I'm tired. I'm tired of fighting. I'm tired that I have to fight. I'm tired of scrambling to make my voice heard among the cacophony of anger, hatred and ignorance that just feed each other. I am tired of wanting to shut myself away from the world because everyone is screaming and no one is listening.
I'm an American. I live in the UK. If I criticise the British (though I tend to specify 'English' because those are the people I'm around), I am brushed off, ridiculed, or slapped with the label "insert negative adjective American". Sometimes all I have to do is ask why they do a particular thing here to get the same result. At the same time, I hear a constant barrage of criticisms and derogatory statements about Americans with varying levels of legitimacy. I'm not allowed to contradict these statements, either, though, because again I'm just being a "insert negative adjective American". I have one lecturer who somehow manages to include at least one derogatory statement about Americans per lecture - I'm actually a bit amazed at her ability to slip these in considering the lectures have nothing to do with Americans or the United States. No one speaks up. I don't even speak up. Why? Because I have been taught that pointing out that something is offensive is wrong.
We've all been taught that. If you're offended by someone's statement, you're minimised and illegitimised. You're told that you're just "too sensitive"; others are told that you're "throwing a tantrum" or "having a hissy fit". At best, you are patronised and pandered to, if not out and out attacked.
Back home, guns are a big topic at the moment. Every time there's a school shooting, guns are a big topic. Except. Is anyone talking about the propensity in American society for individuals to take guns into public places and shoot people they don't know for no particularly identifiable reason? No. Everyone is screaming "Don't take my guns away!" because it was mentioned that part of solving this quandary of public shootings might be examining the gun control regulations already in place. The real issue - why this happens so frequently in our country - is completely ignored.
What does that have to do with hate? Well, my dears, it's very simple. It becomes a form of hate. Meme posts depicting liberals as illiterate idiots for wanting stricter gun control laws, sensationalist articles written on both sides to further their agenda, two camps of people screaming bile at each other and no one bothering to listen.
Pick any topic and you'll see it - over and over these cycles of animosity impeding the channels of reasonable discussion, impeding progress and resolution, impeding acceptance and peace.
Don't you ever want it to just stop? Don't you get tired of it?
When are we going to stop reducing each other to impersonal labels and accept that we are all human? We are all vulnerable. We are all flawed. We all want the same things - safety, health, happiness. The rest doesn't matter. Strip us down to the barest principles and we are all the same. Why can't we talk to each other? Why can't we come together and work towards finding practical solutions to the issues - whether it's the issue of a journalist who abuses her role or the vast number of people without food or ensuring everyone has access to adequate health or - dear god there are so many problems to fix in this world, why are we wasting so much time slinging childish insults back and forth?
When are we going to stop hating?
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