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Tim White's avatar

The right to free speech does not include the right to incite rights-violating *action* because there can be no such thing as a right to violate rights. Speech that threatens violence is not protected because it is not merely speech; it forcibly stops the victim from acting on his own judgment by creating a threat that he must respond to in order to protect himself. Forcibly preventing others from acting on their judgment *is* what it means to violate rights, except, of course, when one's judgment is that he should forcibly stop others from acting on theirs. This is the key principle that so many people miss, misunderstand, or misinterpret on this issue. I'm not familiar with the case you're talking about, so I can't comment on whether his particular words and actions constituted a violation of rights, but they were morally despicable in any case.

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Daniel Solow's avatar

It's good to criticize the left for failing to support free speech in the past, but it's a bad idea to use those past failures to criticize current attempts to support free speech. The government trying to deport a permanent resident without due process is not really comparable to a speaker being forced off-stage, which is bad, but not even close to the same level. Permanent legal residents get freedom of speech too. If he broke the law you put him on trial and after a conviction maybe the judge takes his green card away. That's called due process, it's very important.

I dislike pro-Palestinian protesters as I consider them ignorant conformists who believe everything they read on instagram. If Columbia wants to expel them, fine. But the government can't just snatch people it doesn't like.

Of course it's true that the left is hypocritical, but that's grounds to criticize the left, not to oppose free speech.

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