They gag themselves and others at the upmost peril. Political correctness is literal mind control and free speech is the only thing standing between them and tyranny:
The reason free speech is always THE primary target is that the first thing a kidnapper does is gag the victim so they cannot sound the alarm. Give up your free speech and the freedom of the press at your peril. Once they are able to silence you, the game is over. The loss of all of your other freedoms will fall like dominoes after. Anyone that advocates to censor you, or to unmask your anonymity is your adversary. Treat them like one - no matter what else they say.
But why is it so vital and necessary for the combined monolithic apparatus of government, corporations, and NGOs, to brute force censor everyone while decimating the careers and reputations of the dissenters? Here is why:
The reason the First Amendment is prime directive order 1, is because it is the most important freedom we have for the same reason it is the first target an adversary subverts, disrupts, and destroys during a crime, a war, or a takeover—preventing a target from assembling, communicating, and organizing a response to an assault grants an enormous advantage to the aggressors.
"If freedom of speech is taken away, then dumb and silent we will be led, like sheep to the slaughter." -George Washington
The Second Amendment is second because it is the remedy for anyone trying to subvert the First.
Good article. I find their slippery slope argument unpersuasive. We accept distinct biological differences between men and women, yet women’s rights are stronger than ever. Data is not policy. We can handle the truth without losing our moral compass.
The Blank Slate view of Humanity is foundational to Liberalism in all of its forms (both Leftist & Right Wing). That's why Liberals are hostile to anything that suggests innate biological differences between people of different demographics.
If Blank Slatism is false then Liberalism, Leftism and the Mainstream Right no longer makes any sense.
Intelligence is essential to human survival and well-being and indeed is what separates us from the other animals. We must come to understand its biological basis as fully as possible. Once we do, we will necessarily know all there is to know about the genetics of group differences.
It's unfathomable to me that Pinker, a cognitive psychologist, let alone any other serious academic or intellectual, would rather have us fail to understand how our minds work. Really guys, for how long would you like our species to remain in the dark? Is there a sunset provision on such ignorance?
Their concern is especially misguided and parochial because such knowledge could only ever disadvantage the group(s) their hearts go out to in the relative sense, if that. In the absolute sense, human wealth in the form of knowledge trickles down, e.g., compare the population of sub-Saharan Africa today versus the recent past. The locals didn't invent chemical fertilizers.
Or to take one of countless possible examples, what if embryo selection trickled down to the dumbest among us? Fewer kids might then be too stupid under existing law (generally, IQ<70) to decide whether or not to commit murder.
Anyway, excellent article, just adding that I find the scientific concern far more compelling than free speech even.
“We know that they are lying, they know that they are lying, they even know that we know they are lying, we also know that they know we know they are lying too, they of course know that we certainly know they know we know they are lying too as well, but they are still lying. In our country, the lie has become not just moral category, but the pillar industry of this country.”
― Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn
How I wish he was still here.
I remember reading that Harvard had him for the 1978 Commencement Address.
I think that they do not want to talk about and prohibit research on the topic because:
1) They know that they are wrong.
2) Admitting that they are wrong on this one issue forces them to reassess their entire worldview on equality and what the government should do about it.
3) Their worldview is so tied closely with their own view of morality that doing #2 makes them feel like a bad person and they know that other people will consider them a bad person.
So they try to maintain a social taboo that makes them feel like a moral person and project that image to other people.
'“people might be tempted to use [such findings] as Bayesian priors in their treatment of individual African Americans, unjustly putting them at a disadvantage.”'
It is absolutely acceptable, of course, to take as a Bayesian prior that white people have white privilege, and this is the cause of them having better educational outcomes.
Well that’s because no one actually believes in free speech, even Mill himself didn’t, he argues that free speech is a means for the end of getting rid of “superstition” not that it’s good in the abstract. If he was born outside of Victorian England instead say 1980s where Evangelicals people practicing “superstition” appealed to liberal norms to undercut his belief system then he would say they are backwards and illegitimate. That’s why Marcuse and the entire Frankfurt school actually quote On Liberty favorably and view themselves as his successor. Mill now would be a progressive he’s not not a model at all
They gag themselves and others at the upmost peril. Political correctness is literal mind control and free speech is the only thing standing between them and tyranny:
The reason free speech is always THE primary target is that the first thing a kidnapper does is gag the victim so they cannot sound the alarm. Give up your free speech and the freedom of the press at your peril. Once they are able to silence you, the game is over. The loss of all of your other freedoms will fall like dominoes after. Anyone that advocates to censor you, or to unmask your anonymity is your adversary. Treat them like one - no matter what else they say.
But why is it so vital and necessary for the combined monolithic apparatus of government, corporations, and NGOs, to brute force censor everyone while decimating the careers and reputations of the dissenters? Here is why:
The reason the First Amendment is prime directive order 1, is because it is the most important freedom we have for the same reason it is the first target an adversary subverts, disrupts, and destroys during a crime, a war, or a takeover—preventing a target from assembling, communicating, and organizing a response to an assault grants an enormous advantage to the aggressors.
"If freedom of speech is taken away, then dumb and silent we will be led, like sheep to the slaughter." -George Washington
The Second Amendment is second because it is the remedy for anyone trying to subvert the First.
Good article. I find their slippery slope argument unpersuasive. We accept distinct biological differences between men and women, yet women’s rights are stronger than ever. Data is not policy. We can handle the truth without losing our moral compass.
One such fundamental "noble lie" leads to many more, compounded "noble lies". Eventually the entire structure is compromized.
The Blank Slate view of Humanity is foundational to Liberalism in all of its forms (both Leftist & Right Wing). That's why Liberals are hostile to anything that suggests innate biological differences between people of different demographics.
If Blank Slatism is false then Liberalism, Leftism and the Mainstream Right no longer makes any sense.
Bo Winegard is a national treasure. Never obstreperous, at times pleasantly sesquipedalian, always clear and brave. Bravo.
Intelligence is essential to human survival and well-being and indeed is what separates us from the other animals. We must come to understand its biological basis as fully as possible. Once we do, we will necessarily know all there is to know about the genetics of group differences.
It's unfathomable to me that Pinker, a cognitive psychologist, let alone any other serious academic or intellectual, would rather have us fail to understand how our minds work. Really guys, for how long would you like our species to remain in the dark? Is there a sunset provision on such ignorance?
Their concern is especially misguided and parochial because such knowledge could only ever disadvantage the group(s) their hearts go out to in the relative sense, if that. In the absolute sense, human wealth in the form of knowledge trickles down, e.g., compare the population of sub-Saharan Africa today versus the recent past. The locals didn't invent chemical fertilizers.
Or to take one of countless possible examples, what if embryo selection trickled down to the dumbest among us? Fewer kids might then be too stupid under existing law (generally, IQ<70) to decide whether or not to commit murder.
Anyway, excellent article, just adding that I find the scientific concern far more compelling than free speech even.
“We know that they are lying, they know that they are lying, they even know that we know they are lying, we also know that they know we know they are lying too, they of course know that we certainly know they know we know they are lying too as well, but they are still lying. In our country, the lie has become not just moral category, but the pillar industry of this country.”
― Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn
How I wish he was still here.
I remember reading that Harvard had him for the 1978 Commencement Address.
Can you imagine that now?
I read the Gulag A one year after his address.
I think that they do not want to talk about and prohibit research on the topic because:
1) They know that they are wrong.
2) Admitting that they are wrong on this one issue forces them to reassess their entire worldview on equality and what the government should do about it.
3) Their worldview is so tied closely with their own view of morality that doing #2 makes them feel like a bad person and they know that other people will consider them a bad person.
So they try to maintain a social taboo that makes them feel like a moral person and project that image to other people.
'“people might be tempted to use [such findings] as Bayesian priors in their treatment of individual African Americans, unjustly putting them at a disadvantage.”'
It is absolutely acceptable, of course, to take as a Bayesian prior that white people have white privilege, and this is the cause of them having better educational outcomes.
Well that’s because no one actually believes in free speech, even Mill himself didn’t, he argues that free speech is a means for the end of getting rid of “superstition” not that it’s good in the abstract. If he was born outside of Victorian England instead say 1980s where Evangelicals people practicing “superstition” appealed to liberal norms to undercut his belief system then he would say they are backwards and illegitimate. That’s why Marcuse and the entire Frankfurt school actually quote On Liberty favorably and view themselves as his successor. Mill now would be a progressive he’s not not a model at all