Originally published at: https://boingboing.net/2018/03/02/chart-speech-mostly-freer-tha.html
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Free speech time! Listen up folks: gods don’t exist.
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Racists are stupid enough to believe that this situation is somehow a violation of their First Amendment rights.
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The chart seems to be an example of “word” vs “deed”. I do not doubt the extreme liberals claim to be very supportive of free speech I just cannot recall any recent events where that was seen… See Berkeley protests, treatment of Dana L, and the common shout down not to mention the violence against Milo and others are just too common to make these charts more than a sugary fiction.
In the long run, though, we’ll find that “political correctness” was the most liberal form of selective intolerance that racists could have hoped for,
knew I was right - pardon me while I gloat
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And what proportion of respondents said, "The question is fundamentally misguided. Speech isn’t free if it is something you believe you can “disallow”?
Also, the groups commonly accused these days of becoming less liberal about speech are mostly on the Left, and racists (arguably militarists, that’s less clear to me) are the only group in that list of whom that side of our politics disapproves. I notice the study didn’t seem to include antisemites, homophobes, evangelicals and Christian fundamentalists, sexists, authoritarians, or other generally-Left-disapproved types of speakers.
Really the graphs look to me like “how have approval/disapproval ratings of different types of people changed over time, broken down by political ideology of the approver?” The degree to which these correlate with “would you let the person speak?” is a measure of how not supportive of free speech rights you are.
For now I’m filing this under, “Studies that claim to show the opposite conclusion of what the data seems to mean.”
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I knew folks of your ilk would show up soon. Just didn’t think it would be quite that soon.
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Oh yes of course! It’s the Left that hates free speech. Thank you for reminding us.
In case anyone forgot who ‘Dana L’ is it’s this lady:
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What’s wrong with shouting down and quashing speech that calls for violence and exclusion of innocent people?
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In the long run, though, we’ll find that “political correctness” was the most liberal form of selective intolerance that racists could have hoped for, and they will eventually become its last advocates.
I do not understand this sentence at all. Racists advocating political correctness? What does that even mean?
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Right?
And why don’t those who call for “free speech” in such instances also call for the free speech of those doing the shouting? 
(After all, it was Bill O’Really and other FoxNews bloviators who taught me that the loudest speaker wins.)
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you do realize that while ms. loesch has the right to speak she does not have the right to force anyone listening to her to agree with her? talk about “precious snowflakes” the rightwingers have the thinnest skins and are the biggest crybabies of all time.
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I’m sure that’s true. Very hard to recall something that you don’t expose yourself to.
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Velcome, comrade…
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I think it’s trying to say “political correctness was the nicest pushback against racism racists were ever going to get, and non-racists are just about done playing nice with bigots”
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“Burn her” is not protected speech… It’s inciting to riot… So odd how those that claim to be against racism and bigotry all use it for their cause… Weird times. Very weird times. You are never justified in calling for violence… Period.
I’m a little horrified that more of these graphs aren’t close to 100% for everybody. If the question is really “allowed to speak”, then anybody who doesn’t say “yes” for everybody simply does not get the idea of what free speech is. If the question were about who is worth listening to, then the graphs would not be alarming. (Well, except that then the racist percentage should be lower.)
Sure, some things are rising. But the fact that lines are going down, or staying level, should be a little alarming to all of us. All it takes is labeling an idea “communist” or “racist” to make it heresy to speak that idea; when enough of the population agrees that some things are too heretical to be allowed to be expressed, then it becomes serious. Heresy has a very bad history when it comes to sharing of ideas.
And, while, yeah, racists hide behind calls for free speech, that’s less dangerous than those who would agree that free speech needs to be limited based on a higher principle-- for it becomes very easy for authoritarians to hide behind strict doctrine, as history has shown.
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