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Comment by daenz | Hacker News Reader

>In 1978, the ACLU successfully defended the right of neo-Nazis to march in Skokie, Illinois, a community populated by Holocaust survivors.

Is it any surprise that the ACLU has succumbed to the tide of public opinion? Their support of free speech in 1978 meant supporting the rights of literal neo-Nazis. Do people understand how unpopular that is? Their adherence to higher principles (free speech), when it results in those actions, cannot be tolerated in the modern era. The ACLU simply wouldn't survive.

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Your attitude is completely wrong in the same way the ACLU has gone wrong. Defending speech _as a right_ means defending it for everyone in all cases, most especially when it is unpopular. Otherwise you're not acting as a defense of free speech, but as an amplifier of speech you agree with. You become the Committee In Favor Of Speech We Like, which is pretty worthless.

I think I miscommunicated my point. I agree with you, I am merely providing my perspective as to why they no longer hold those principles: because it "cannot be tolerated" in the modern era. We're still in an era of "punch people whose views i don't like."

We see such bias within the Twitter sphere - but outside of that people are still a lot more reasonable. There is a fair bit of fear, I think, that mainstream allowance of neo-nazi groups is empowering recruitment but the real core of the issue is extremism being fed by a lack of general education.

I see what you are saying. Glad we agree. That attitude sets people who could make common cause at each other's throats instead.

> Their adherence to higher principles (free speech), when it results in those actions, cannot be tolerated in the modern era.

Why not?

I remember when the definition of supporting free speech was supporting speech you find repugnant and I really can't think of a group who's speech I find more repugnant than Nazis, both conceptually and contextually.

It cannot be tolerated because people are willing to commit and support acts of violence against those that use repugnant free speech. Whether it can be tolerated is orthogonal to whether or not it should be tolerated. I am merely commenting on the observation that more people than ever cannot tolerate free speech.

Have they gone against those on the left who advocate and even perform violence against certain groups? Why haven't they taken active stance against these monsters who want attack others?

Understood. I read your comment as "I can not tolerate" or "we should not tolerate" when you meant more that society doesn't seem capable of tolerating it, when it should, which I strongly agree with.

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