[surgical_fire]

> I trust free speech over any system that relies on a sanctioned arbiter of truth. And I think that protection of people from bad ideas often backfires (see European history and the Catholic Church, McCarthyism, Nazi propaganda, Soviet censorship, etc.)

I choose to believe that a democratically elected government with proper functioning institutions can regulate speech properly instead.

Absolute freedom is not possible nor desirable to live in a society. And cultural problems should be addressed with regulations. If it was cultural norm to engage in revenge killings, I would very much expect government to step in and stop that, not to take a wishy-washy stance "eh, it is a cultural problem" and handwave it away.

I see unshackled free speech as much more dangerous than that of a democracy being overzealous in speech, as the first can absolutely undermine democracy if enough imbeciles decide to believe in.... erm... "challenging" ideas (and I use those quotes very sarcastically).

A proper democracy being overzealous can be fixed by the democratic process.

[int_19h]

> A proper democracy being overzealous can be fixed by the democratic process.

The democratic process can only work if citizens are fully informed on the issues, which is precisely what censorship prevents. It allows complete excision of some viewpoints from political discourse and even actual voting (if parties can be banned on the basis that their platforms contain such and such). Imagine for a moment what happens that your democratic society decides that advocating against hate speech laws is itself hate speech.

[surgical_fire]

> The democratic process can only work if citizens are fully informed on the issues, which is precisely what censorship prevents.

Ah yes, if only citizens could speak that the Holocaust didn't happens and could call black people monkeys, then they would ve fully informed to do Democracy.

> Imagine for a moment what happens that your democratic society decides that advocating against hate speech laws is itself hate speech.

This is some outlandish claim, that would need some serious argument to support how it might come to pass.

A proper democracy with functioning institutions has a lot of checks and balances to avoid outlandish bullshit to become law.

[d4v3]

> I choose to believe that a democratically elected government with proper functioning institutions can regulate speech properly instead.

Abuse of free speech has almost always been justified by those very "proper institutions" that you place so much faith in. I'd say you're being a wee bit optimistic about them. One embarrassing example that comes to mind was during the Troubles [1]

> I see unshackled free speech as much more dangerous than that of a democracy being overzealous in speech, as the first can absolutely undermine democracy if enough imbeciles decide to believe in.... erm... "challenging" ideas (and I use those quotes very sarcastically).

> A proper democracy being overzealous can be fixed by the democratic process.

You assume a “proper” democracy won’t go too far, and if it does, democracy will fix it. Yet, speech is what allows people to challenge, protest, and critique. So regulating that speech undermines the very tools needed for democratic correction. Also, free speech is often what prevents overstepping in the first place.

> If it was cultural norm to engage in revenge killings, I would very much expect government to step in and stop that, not to take a wishy-washy stance "eh, it is a cultural problem" and handwave it away.

Indeed, so would I! But there is a difference between violent actions and bad ideas, and there can be laws for violent actions without needing to suppress discussion about them. We don’t need to outlaw speech in order to outlaw violence. Ultimately, I think robust free speech doesn’t undermine democracy but protects it, even if um "challenging ideas" (I'm smirking) are uncomfortable to hear

[1] - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1988%E2%80%931994_British_broa...