[PaulDavisThe1st]

That's right! Because there are just 1 or maybe 2 steps from Scientific American publishing a godawful article about Wilson & refusing to print a rebuttal (+), to peole being actually beaten to death. We need to take action, right now.

(+) and let's not overlook that UPenn is actively considering changing tenure rules just because a poor law professor made some actually racist remarks. Labor camps could be here by 2023!

[SpicyLemonZest]

I don’t think anyone’s gonna die soon. What we are a couple steps away from, I think, is an environment where this rebuttal would be considered hate speech and the signatories would be fired for endorsing it. (We might be only half a step away, honestly; I give it a 50% chance that one of the signatories faces a Title IX complaint about it by next week, although I understand that such an unconfident prediction doesn’t really mean much.)

[etangent]

You know, I started out thinking that very bad language should indeed be censored. But considering what I see -- how eagerly language is used to eliminate one's political opponents from the public sphere, and how expansive definitions become over time (e.g. what happened to "literally violence") -- I now believe in complete freedom of speech, even down to fully genocidal rhetoric (and yes, that includes freedom from civilian consequences, not just government-imposed consequences). As a free speech absolutist, I now believe that the government should perform a proactive role in ensuring that the 1st amendment is obeyed -- not just a passive one.