I think we’d both agree that speech-policing is helpful in some contexts, but unhelpful if it extends across an entire society.
I think statements like this lack nuance: “Speech-policing contributes to broadly turning more of our environments into political ones. This worsens our quality of life.”
I agree that speech-policing turns political situations into Political situations. It makes their political nature explicit. However, to some extent all human interactions are political, and there are many environments where explicit speech policing (or in these cases, censorship) can improve quality of life.
Example 1: I’m a member of a feminist career Facebook group with explicit rules that people are not allowed to state women are unequal with men. If they do, their post will be deleted, and they may eventually be banned. The Facebook group’s goal is to encourage women to pursue high-powered careers and it occasionally attracts trolls who start bad-faith discussions. The rule supports us to pursue our goal of giving each other career advice, and stops us from being distracted by repetitive arguments. We enjoy the group and it feels more relaxing than other feminist social media because the censorship is enforced quietly and consistently.
Example 2: I used to teach primary school. I didn’t teach children under age 10 about sex, or let them teach each other about sex. This allowed their parents to teach them about sex on their own schedule.
Although I think broader society should allow conversations about whether men or women are better suited to particular careers, and conversations about sex, in these narrow situations censorship was really useful.
I think we’d both agree that speech-policing is helpful in some contexts, but unhelpful if it extends across an entire society.
I think statements like this lack nuance: “Speech-policing contributes to broadly turning more of our environments into political ones. This worsens our quality of life.”
I agree that speech-policing turns political situations into Political situations. It makes their political nature explicit. However, to some extent all human interactions are political, and there are many environments where explicit speech policing (or in these cases, censorship) can improve quality of life.
Example 1: I’m a member of a feminist career Facebook group with explicit rules that people are not allowed to state women are unequal with men. If they do, their post will be deleted, and they may eventually be banned. The Facebook group’s goal is to encourage women to pursue high-powered careers and it occasionally attracts trolls who start bad-faith discussions. The rule supports us to pursue our goal of giving each other career advice, and stops us from being distracted by repetitive arguments. We enjoy the group and it feels more relaxing than other feminist social media because the censorship is enforced quietly and consistently.
Example 2: I used to teach primary school. I didn’t teach children under age 10 about sex, or let them teach each other about sex. This allowed their parents to teach them about sex on their own schedule.
Although I think broader society should allow conversations about whether men or women are better suited to particular careers, and conversations about sex, in these narrow situations censorship was really useful.