[san_dimitri]

I am surprised how much less discussion takes place about cyberbullying and the deaths caused by it. I agree with freedom of speech but if it violates someones right to exist then shouldn't the culprits be punished? If not punished atleast have a legal process to discuss/debate it in the court of law? Thoughts?

[whatshisface]

The problem with what you're saying is that incivility does not directly cause death. I could not actually kill you by writing a lot of really clever insults, not even if they were worthy of Guybrush Threepwood. The deaths "caused" by insults are in fact mediated through rare mental illnesses, and that calls in to question the issue of responsibility. If you bumped into me on the sidewalk and, because a rare illness made me extremely sensitive to impacts, I died, a court would not hold you responsibly like they would me if I hit you with a car. The degree to which the effect of the cause is typical matters a lot in designing legislation or making fair decisions that apply equally to everyone.

[comrh]

That really undersells how horrible targeted harassment of a person and everyone that person knows can be.

> The degree to which the effect of the cause is typical matters a lot in designing legislation or making fair decisions that apply equally to everyone.

I think this was added after I replied. I would certainly agree this legislation is overly broad and probably not helpful. At first I thought you were arguing cyberbullying could only be a matter of life and death if you had a "mental disorder".

[whatshisface]

Targeted harassment is beyond the ken of this discussion, which is about laws regulating all speech uniformly, that do not distinguish between yelling at someone's house from the street every night, and saying something to nobody in particular on Twitter.

[wowokay]

How? An individual can block numbers, block or deactivate social media, if those dont work law enforcement of civil litigation are likely available options.

I actively practice antisocial online behaviors. I disable game chats and rarely use voice, I block or purge things in my news feed that I don't like and at the end of the day my preferences dont impact other peoples' online lives.

[makeitdouble]

How would it be different if you purposefully tried every possible insult until the “right” one hits and has the other side die ? Or flooded the person by every means you can think of until it exceeds their capacity to ignore your insults ?

There is an intentionality that you are not addressing, and is at the core of this law.

[whatshisface]

Is there any combination of words I could write to you that would kill you? That, to me, sounds like something from an SCP story, not the real world. Are you really suggesting that everyone has a secret password that will make them commit suicide?

[makeitdouble]

I think that fundamentally yes, you could.

I see myself as a relatively stable person, but there will be topics and angles that touch me more than others. Someone digging through my post history should be enough to come with a general life profile and reasonable attack vectors.

We can keep a thick skin against attacks that are vague and/or indiscriminate, but it becomes harder when it’s more focused and resonates with thoughts we already have. You are right that one or two comments might not be much, but bullying isn’t about one-off acts, and any button that yielded a different reaction will be pushed again and again…

So yes, it’s not a fully random process to look for that “secret password”, the victim is online with an identity, and it comes down to how much effort is invested in trying to hurt them. Even worse when it’s a semi-public figure, or someone that exposed part of their everyday life.

Doing it enough times/for long enough, and there will be some chance to hit the victim during a vulnerable period (professional issues, friend/couple issues etc.). If they lose their place in society (lose their job, or are ostracized in their irl community), effects will compound.

[boredumb]

Speech is not violence and it is absurd for anyone to imply otherwise.

[shadowgovt]

We, who tread in the realm of computers where symbols have tangible weight, can probably appreciate the thinness of the wall between speech and action more than many.

https://daily.jstor.org/wittgenstein-whether-speech-violence...

[wowokay]

The difficult part is I am not convinced anything someone says can violate someone else's right to exist. In the past the solution was to focus on promoting personal mental health, someone who commits bodily harm as a result of something someone else said likely has personal issues that need to be dealt with. People need to realize that other people's opinions should not translate into self harm. The only time I can really understand the need for punishment is when looking at situations like Depp vs Amber, where companies and individuals are prejudice against you because of unsubstantiated claims.

[fatherzine]

This is poorly formulated. Using speech to make social / political / legal / economical arguments doesn't violate anyone's right to exist.

Generally speaking, pernicious "speech" is not the speech itself, rather targeting the social network of the victim with slanderous messaging.

For a simple example, somebody plastering their ex's nudes into their ex's linkedin network.

For another example, pernicious forms of cancel culture, where pressure groups take pleasure in contacting the employer of the victim and threaten reputational damage (scandal) unless they fire the poor sap.

In these cases is not the "speech" that is a problem, but the targeted malicious slandering.

[Manuel_D]

The fact that someone killed themselves following some public outrage does not mean said speech violates their right to exist. Say someone is so appalled that someone does not support a political candidate that they kill themselves over it. Does it mean any criticism of this candidate is "violating someone else's right to exist"?

[throwaway675309]

You are not thinking things through and you're really not defining what it means to "violate someone's right to exist".

What if there is a person who was mentally ill and if they hear the word coconut it could cause them to inflict self harm? Now what happens if I'm talking to that person and I say the magic word coconut? Am I liable in the situation, even if I wasn't aware that this would cause them harm?

Now let's take a more real world example, let's take the word rape. Some people may have had traumatic experiences in the past that can cause just the mention of this word alone to act as a trigger that could lead to negative thoughts and possibly self harm, even suicide. What about now?

[nness]

I am in agreement. Speech can cause harm, and like all things that can be used to cause harm to another person, should have safe-guards in place to prevent that harm.

[alephnan]

> if it violates someones right to exist then shouldn't the culprits be punished

What happens when the culprits are society as a whole?

In this case, there are varying levels of toxicity, but the general sentiment among Japanese netizens was disproportionately against the Hana Kimura.

[kelseyfrog]

People dying is a small price to pay for free speech.

Of course, if everyone died and the last person was able to speak freely, it would be worth it.

Everything else is trading safety for liberty.

Slippery slopes of free speech crackdowns inevitably lead to loss of liberty.

Leave if you don't like it.

Absolutism in free speech is the only justifiable position.

Welcome to debate.

[shadowgovt]

That's probably the most absolutist statement of the concept I've ever seen; my respect for posting it plainly.

In this form, it's easy to show the flaw in this line of thought, because it concludes with literal extermination of the species ("the last person" implies no further people). And if a right leads to extermination of the species, what good was that right in the first place?

All rights have a balance point. Most hinge on where the rights of others begin. The freedom of speech (in the form of criticism of power) has massive value to the formation and maintenance of a free society, which is why some nations protect it so zealously. But even those nations have recognized its constraint in various contexts.

The position described here is a fringe position and should remain one to maximize the value of free speech.

[djkoolaide]

Genuinely can't tell whether this is irony or frightening sincerity.

[kelseyfrog]

edited for clarity.

[tangjurine]

>If everyone died and the last person was able to speak freely, it would be worth it.

?

[aluminum96]

> People dying is a small price to pay for free speech.

Well, that depends on the amount of dying and the kind of speech.

[rnd0]

>People dying is a small price to pay for free speech.

Easy to say when it's not you doing the dying.