Monday, February 20, 2017

on Milo, the limits of free speech, and who gets thrown under the bus

I recently published an essay on Medium called Free Speech and the Paradox of Tolerance. In that piece, as well as in a follow up essay I published yesterday morning, I touched upon recent debates regarding whether Milo Yiannopoulos should be granted a platform to speak at universities and other high profile venues. I argued that Yiannopoulos has a long history of inciting hatred and harassment campaigns toward women, people of color, trans folks, immigrants, and other marginalized groups. I invoked Karl Popper's "Paradox of Tolerance" to make the case that we should not tolerate people (such as Yiannopoulos) who attempt to use their "free speech" in order to suppress and silence others.

While many people (especially those who have witnessed the real harm Yiannopoulos has caused over the last several years) agree with this position, others have taken a free speech absolutist stance that can be paraphrased as follows: "Yiannopoulos may say horrible things that I don't agree with, but I support colleges and others who offer him a platform to speak (and you should too!) because FREE SPEECH." (or something like that.)

But today, we learned the true hypocrisy of the "let Milo speak because FREE SPEECH" crowd. Yesterday, audio/video clips surfaced wherein Yiannopoulos suggests that teenage boys are old enough to consent to sex with older men. In the wake of that revelation, the American Conservative Union, who had previously invited Yiannopoulos to speak at their upcoming CPAC conference, rescinded that invitation. Simon & Schuster, who had been vigorously defending its decision to sign Yiannopoulos to a huge $250,000 book deal, announced that it was canceling that deal. Even employees at the alt-right/white nationalist news outlet Breitbart (where Yiannopoulos is a senior editor) have threatened to quit if he is not fired.

In other words, the same people who were arguing for, or even championing, Yiannopoulos's FREE SPEECH a few days ago, are now disassociating themselves from him. They are, in effect, "no platforming" him.