It's ironic that this article mentions Professor Peter Singer and his controversial views on infanticide. This topic came up in an early thread on Tildes and, when I said that this topic should be...
Exemplary
It's ironic that this article mentions Professor Peter Singer and his controversial views on infanticide. This topic came up in an early thread on Tildes and, when I said that this topic should be open for discussion... someone was so shocked that I would even suggest discussing such a "preposterous" and "reprehensible" topic (their words, not mine) in good faith that they said they needed a break from the internet. That wasn't even me advocating for killing babies, that was just for me saying that it's a topic which is ripe for philosophical discussion.
If I got that response just for saying we should be allowed to discuss such a controversial topic, I can only imagine what sort of response Professor Singer and Doctor Minerva get! Actually, I don't need to imagine: they told us.
A plain-speaking Australian, Singer has experienced many death threats as a result of his philosophical writings on euthanasia, abortion and newborn infanticide. He was also once physically attacked on stage while trying to give a lecture in Germany.
The idea for the journal came from the third and most junior member of the founding triumvirate, Francesca Minerva, after she received numerous death threats.
If these respected philosophers and ethicists are receiving death threats and being subjected to actual physical attacks just for discussing a hypothetical ethical situation, why shouldn't they protect themselves by any means necessary? When people stop issuing death threats and attacking professors, then maybe they won't need an anonymous journal to publish their views.
I've often said as a moderator that people need to play the ball, not the player - engage with the argument rather than the person presenting the argument. Some people are constitutionally incapable of separating an argument from the arguer, and will attack the other person personally if that says something they don't like. Removing the writer's name removes this distraction, and helps in allowing people to focus on the argument rather than the presenter behind the argument. Actually, it's only one step away from what happens on pseudonymous forums like Tildes, Hacker News, Reddit, and StackOverflow: noone knows who's behind the comments. This journal is just the same, but more so.
This is an interesting article about the politics of academia and how it relates to a newly announced annual journal where authors will be anonymous as long they present "verifiable evidence". It...
This is an interesting article about the politics of academia and how it relates to a newly announced annual journal where authors will be anonymous as long they present "verifiable evidence". It includes a lot of anecdotes from both supporters and opposition. The Guardian itself published two dissenting columns from their own ranks.
It also mentions attempts to label the three founders as rightwingers, which seems hollow. None seem to be on the right at all, if anything they are all pretty leftwing to me. As somone who considers himself firmly on the left (European, not American left), I found myself in agreement with the idea of this journal, assuming their position mentioned on this paragraph holds true:
There is going to be one issue a year and the criteria for selection, says McMahan, are that the articles “give plausible arguments, good reasons and verifiable evidence in support of a position that is controversial, in the sense that is likely to arouse anger and hostility in some people, and that these arguments should be presented in an unpolitical non-ad hominem manner. That is, we’re not going to accept papers that are designed to antagonise people. We want to protect the authors not their ideas, so I certainly think that the journal should welcome the publication of replies.”
So, what do you think Tildes? Do you think there is merit to the idea?
PS: I'd urge everyone to read the article in full (I know, it's long) before replying because otherwise the discussion is moot as we don't have a common baseline.
This to me is the most important part of the article. It insures that this project won't become a “basically an opportunity for white male rightwing politically motivated researchers to whine on...
There is going to be one issue a year and the criteria for selection, says McMahan, are that the articles “give plausible arguments, good reasons and verifiable evidence in support of a position that is controversial, in the sense that is likely to arouse anger and hostility in some people, and that these arguments should be presented in an unpolitical non-ad hominem manner. That is, we’re not going to accept papers that are designed to antagonise people. We want to protect the authors not their ideas, so I certainly think that the journal should welcome the publication of replies.”
This to me is the most important part of the article. It insures that this project won't become a “basically an opportunity for white male rightwing politically motivated researchers to whine on about how unpopular their abhorrent ideas are.” as Gemma Angel ignorantly put it.
I wonder who will decide whether a certain topic is controversial? "controversial, in the sense that is likely to arouse anger and hostility in some people" seems too vague to me. There will always be 'some people' that will be angered by a certain opinion.
Also this article is horrible in that it provides zero citations for certain claims such as "Many academics dispute that proposition" and "He is renowned for his work on animal liberation, and is seen by many as the godfather of animal rights as well as the intellectual force behind the growth of veganism."
Other than that, I fully support this journal and I think that it's necessary in the current climate that we're living in.
Provided this Journal for Controversial Ideas has mechanisms to prevent, say, a cabal of "oppressed scientists" from pushing a truly Nazi-style agenda*, which is partially already covered by its...
Provided this Journal for Controversial Ideas has mechanisms to prevent, say, a cabal of "oppressed scientists" from pushing a truly Nazi-style agenda*, which is partially already covered by its requirements for evidence.
Controversial ideas have a place in the world. They re-affirm what we know, push us to new areas of discovery, and at worst keep our critical thinking skills honed, and a journal that offers a place for reasonable, evidence-based study free from the risks of less level-headed readers may be the only way to do this safely.
The funny thing is the claim that this is a perversion of "safe space" policies, given that both groups (the researchers and disenfranchised people who want to hide from a seemingly oppressive world) both want the same thing: to be validated and understood without fear of violence.
*I mean this in the sense of conspiracy theorists, race supremacists, and others who have actually dangerous agendas and try to hide by playing the victim.
I honestly have to say, I don't believe there IS an "encroaching intolerance of free expression"; what I think there is, are a large number of people who are unused to being told that their...
Exemplary
I honestly have to say, I don't believe there IS an "encroaching intolerance of free expression"; what I think there is, are a large number of people who are unused to being told that their viewpoints are no longer considered gospel.
The problem is that every single generation has said exactly this. Every single generation has recorded examples of people saying "why are the youth today so intolerant of free expression?". But the "youth" are not intolerant of free expression, instead, it is those who have historically expressed themselves freely who are now finding that a new generation no longer considers what they say to be acceptable.
Consider homophobia. For decades, open and often quite vitriolic homophobia was considered generally acceptable, even encouraged. We were a society that persecuted non-heterosexual people most aggressively, and the espousal of those views was considered normal and right. But over time, we as a society have moved away from that. We no longer consider those views to be acceptable, and thus we now criticise those people who have always been saying homophobic things, where in the past we would not have criticised them (or may even have joined in). Those who have always been saying homophobic things view themselves, not unreasonably, as having not changed their output. They have always freely expressed their views, that has not changed. What has changed, though, is that the views they have always expressed were once accepted and are now considered reprehensible - essentially, fewer people are willing to tolerate their bigotry, and fewer people are willing to give them a platform to air those views. The younger generations are no longer allowing those people to use the platforms that younger people set up, to espouse views that they disagree with.
The same thing happened with racism, and sexism. It's not that society has become "less tolerant of free expression", it's that society has become less tolerant of what is being expressed, by those specific people. We no longer accept what they say, and are thus no longer inclined to support them on platforms we created - which is a part of free expression. They are free to say what they wish, but they are not free to do so on any platform created by anyone for any reason, and when they express what they like they are not free from the consequences of their actions.
People who complain about "safe spaces" or about "universities are too coddling/echo chamber/whatever" or similar forget that their own experiences were exactly the same. It's just that now the spotlight has turned against them, and suddenly it feels scary and cold and they want to know why everyone is angry at them now when their view hasn't changed. It's because society did, when they didn't. It's because we do tolerate free speech - and they don't; they want everyone to listen to them, and have their views heard no matter what they are.
So, while I certainly don't approve of death threats, I also think that the premise of their argument is fundamentally flawed. They are arguing that the world has turned against free speech - it simply hasn't. The world has turned against them, and they have misattributed the cause. It's not that people don't like free speech anymore, it's that what they are freely speaking is no longer acceptable, and now they're realising how cold it is when you say something most people disagree with... and it scares them. Ultimately, I'm a gay polyamorous woman, I'm pretty familiar with the world disagreeing with me, sometimes violently. I never felt the world was against free speech, because it wasn't. Now that people are starting to agree with me, and I feel more supported, I don't believe that "free speech has won the day!". I just accept that I got lucky and my views are now the acceptable ones. They are experiencing the opposite. I have had many, many death threats in my time, and at least two attempts on my life. They're scary, VERY scary, and when you feel like the whole world is against you then you're terribly inclined to want to paint it as, "the world is against me because it's stupid and wrong and against freedom!". But it isn't. It's just against you. When you forget that, you lose focus.
I'm not against them having their "controversy journal". But I want them to stop deluding themselves about the reasons behind the outrage.
People don't hate free speech, they just hate what you're saying. There's a big, big difference.
I've wen't ahead and tagged this as off-topic. I'm also quite surprised that this can be tagged as exemplary, and I question the legitimacy of such tagging, including those I received. I think we...
Exemplary
I've wen't ahead and tagged this as off-topic. I'm also quite surprised that this can be tagged as exemplary, and I question the legitimacy of such tagging, including those I received. I think we should reconsider the boost it provides in sorting comments and maybe stop giving people what boils down to a "double or triple upvote button".
If I'm not mistaken, when I read through this thread for the first time, the paragraph that goes "So, while I certainly don't approve of death threats..." wasn't there. Apparently, it was added as a response to the criticism of being off-topic, without any marker like "Edit:" whatsoever, and it appears (intentionally or not) as if it was there since the beginning. Nevertheless, the entirety of this comment is a populist strawman, even with that paragraph included. And it continues to be so under the responses to the replies to this comment.
The discussion is about "writers whose ideas are deemed so controversial that it is unsafe for them to reveal their identity". Words "homophobia", or even "homo-" or "-phobia" do not occur in the article. It's not about the leftover religious or traditionalist bigots, like this comment tries to portray it. The people behind the mentioned journal are the opposites of such people. Quoting the article quoting Singer:
“If you come to the United States,” [Singer] says, “and you get death threats and you know how easy it is for people to get guns, you feel threatened. When I arrived at Princeton I had a meeting with the security people here, at their request, not at mine, in which they told me to take various precautions. So, yes.”
The person that came up with the idea of this journal received death threats because
she co-authored a paper on the moral viability of newborn infanticide. She argued, as have several others, that there is no moral difference between a late abortion and ending the life of an extremely premature baby, and that therefore, at least in principle, both should be allowed.
and she continues to receive them
“I still receive death threats” she says. “The last one was at the beginning of October, saying that I was a ‘waste of sperm’ and ‘we should get rid of you’. They said I should be killed.”
and finally
Since publishing the article, she has managed to find only temporary jobs.
WRT freedom of speech, Singer is quoted saying
People have become sensitive to things being said, and it’s clear that people have suffered personally from saying them. So the situation has got worse for freedom of speech in that respect.
An academic criticising such stance could not afford making their name know for some reason:
Many academics dispute that proposition, denying that there is any kind of enforced narrowness of approved opinions. As one historian told me: “A lot of people who think we need this are the people who scoff at the idea of safe space for students. If we’re realistic, we’re talking about a handful of death threats. I would defend colleagues’ rights to make arguments that I profoundly disagree with on academic and political and moral grounds, but I don’t think we need a journal that allows people to do that anonymously.”
Unfortunately this academic wanted to remain anonymous himself, because, he said, he didn’t believe the issues were “best pursued in newspapers”. Several others also refused to speak. [emphases mine]
I also can not leave the following unquoted:
McMahan cites the example of Allison Stanger, the liberal professor at Middlebury College in Vermont, who last year invited to a debate Charles Murray, the political scientist and co-author of the 1994 book The Bell Curve, which notoriously examined racial differences in intelligence. Stanger’s intention was to challenge Murray’s positions but the debate was closed down by angry protesters in a melee that left Stanger concussed in a neck brace, and at one stage, she later wrote, fearing for her life. [emphasis mine]
Also
In the same year, Rebecca Tuvel, an assistant professor at Rhodes College in Memphis, was the focus of an online shaming campaign after she published an article in the feminist philosophy journal Hypatia arguing in defence of “transracialism”. Tuvel compared the plight of Caitlyn Jenner, a trans woman, with that of Rachel Dolezal, a white woman identifying as black. As a result of social media protests, many Hypatia contributors, including members of Tuvel’s dissertation committee, called for the journal to retract the article. The dispute ended up with the journal’s editor-in-chief resigning, followed by various associate editors and finally the board of directors.
And so on.
So we're talking about material issues academics face should they part from the flock. They are being physically attacked, silenced by metaphorical social-media lynching, receiving threats and face the threat of being unemployed for doing what is their job. And here the top comment is a strawman attack on this that also is an apology of a "tables have turned" approach to progress. I'd rather prefer an accumulative approach. If one accepts the status quo as good, they're no different than those who were doing so about non-cisgendered / non-"white" peoples' lives and rights a few years/decades ago. It's just a different sort of bigotry. I want the society to progress towards no-bigotry, not to the other bigotry.
There is no "edited" notation on @witchbitch's comment. If a comment is edited more than 5 minutes after it was first posted, it will show a notation saying "edited X days, Y hours, Z minutes...
If I'm not mistaken, when I read through this thread for the first time, the paragraph that goes "So, while I certainly don't approve of death threats..." wasn't there. Apparently, it was added as a response to the criticism of being off-topic, without any marker like "Edit:" whatsoever, and it appears (intentionally or not) as if it was there since the beginning.
There is no "edited" notation on @witchbitch's comment. If a comment is edited more than 5 minutes after it was first posted, it will show a notation saying "edited X days, Y hours, Z minutes ago"...
Conventionally in forums like these edits, even if as small as typos, are marked with an "Edit:" prefix as in: or If you indeed added that paragraph later, editing it again to have the said prefix...
Conventionally in forums like these edits, even if as small as typos, are marked with an "Edit:" prefix as in:
Edit: I think I need to add some clarifications .....
or
Edit: typo
If you indeed added that paragraph later, editing it again to have the said prefix for that paragraph would help make it clear. But if as Algernon said I happened to mistakenly skip over that paragraph, I'm sorry, I read your comment on the move and on my phone, so I might have misread. But I think my reply applies with or without the edit.
With regards to lynching, I'm only refuting your comment, no lynching. I think I've explained my disagreement clearly enough.
How do you extend this argument about homophobia, racism, and sexism to cover the topic of infanticide, which is what's causing so much trouble for two of the people interviewed for this article?...
How do you extend this argument about homophobia, racism, and sexism to cover the topic of infanticide, which is what's causing so much trouble for two of the people interviewed for this article? It's not like this topic was once not acceptable and has become more so. It doesn't seem to fit your narrative. I'd hazard a guess that the intersection of ethics and genetics (mentioned at the end of the article) also doesn't fit your narrative. Same for religious studies.
Not all the controversial ideas this proposed journal wants to discuss are ideas that have become obsolete due to changing social mores. How does your theory work for those ideas?
Because generally in the past, ethicists were given vastly more leniency to suggest extreme things primarily because people didn't listen to them. The average person didn't care what ethicists had...
Because generally in the past, ethicists were given vastly more leniency to suggest extreme things primarily because people didn't listen to them. The average person didn't care what ethicists had to say, since they had other things to worry about or because they had no access to the information. Now, with the internet freeing up anyone and everyone to access anything any ethicist has ever said, suddenly the world is no longer tolerating their views because the world has discovered what it is they're saying.
Do you have any sources on this claim? I'm sure (although not certain) that academics were also shunned in the past for expressing things that went against the grain. Edit: Grammar
Because generally in the past, ethicists were given vastly more leniency to suggest extreme things primarily because people didn't listen to them.
Do you have any sources on this claim?
I'm sure (although not certain) that academics were also shunned in the past for expressing things that went against the grain.
I'm not sure I understand here - surely if people responded to you in the past with threats and violence, those people were very much against your freedom to speak and act as you wish? My take...
I'm not sure I understand here - surely if people responded to you in the past with threats and violence, those people were very much against your freedom to speak and act as you wish?
My take away from your comment is that people have never been truly in favour of free speech, because they would respond not with debate (or by simply ignoring) but with violence. Whether you believe the target of that violence is "right" or "wrong", and whichever way the "acceptable" target may be shifting, this suggests to me that the fundamental concept is being undermined and always has been.
From your summary, it sounds like you don't agree, though?
It's ironic that this article mentions Professor Peter Singer and his controversial views on infanticide. This topic came up in an early thread on Tildes and, when I said that this topic should be open for discussion... someone was so shocked that I would even suggest discussing such a "preposterous" and "reprehensible" topic (their words, not mine) in good faith that they said they needed a break from the internet. That wasn't even me advocating for killing babies, that was just for me saying that it's a topic which is ripe for philosophical discussion.
If I got that response just for saying we should be allowed to discuss such a controversial topic, I can only imagine what sort of response Professor Singer and Doctor Minerva get! Actually, I don't need to imagine: they told us.
If these respected philosophers and ethicists are receiving death threats and being subjected to actual physical attacks just for discussing a hypothetical ethical situation, why shouldn't they protect themselves by any means necessary? When people stop issuing death threats and attacking professors, then maybe they won't need an anonymous journal to publish their views.
I've often said as a moderator that people need to play the ball, not the player - engage with the argument rather than the person presenting the argument. Some people are constitutionally incapable of separating an argument from the arguer, and will attack the other person personally if that says something they don't like. Removing the writer's name removes this distraction, and helps in allowing people to focus on the argument rather than the presenter behind the argument. Actually, it's only one step away from what happens on pseudonymous forums like Tildes, Hacker News, Reddit, and StackOverflow: noone knows who's behind the comments. This journal is just the same, but more so.
This is an interesting article about the politics of academia and how it relates to a newly announced annual journal where authors will be anonymous as long they present "verifiable evidence". It includes a lot of anecdotes from both supporters and opposition. The Guardian itself published two dissenting columns from their own ranks.
It also mentions attempts to label the three founders as rightwingers, which seems hollow. None seem to be on the right at all, if anything they are all pretty leftwing to me. As somone who considers himself firmly on the left (European, not American left), I found myself in agreement with the idea of this journal, assuming their position mentioned on this paragraph holds true:
So, what do you think Tildes? Do you think there is merit to the idea?
PS: I'd urge everyone to read the article in full (I know, it's long) before replying because otherwise the discussion is moot as we don't have a common baseline.
This to me is the most important part of the article. It insures that this project won't become a “basically an opportunity for white male rightwing politically motivated researchers to whine on about how unpopular their abhorrent ideas are.” as Gemma Angel ignorantly put it.
I wonder who will decide whether a certain topic is controversial? "controversial, in the sense that is likely to arouse anger and hostility in some people" seems too vague to me. There will always be 'some people' that will be angered by a certain opinion.
Also this article is horrible in that it provides zero citations for certain claims such as "Many academics dispute that proposition" and "He is renowned for his work on animal liberation, and is seen by many as the godfather of animal rights as well as the intellectual force behind the growth of veganism."
Other than that, I fully support this journal and I think that it's necessary in the current climate that we're living in.
Provided this Journal for Controversial Ideas has mechanisms to prevent, say, a cabal of "oppressed scientists" from pushing a truly Nazi-style agenda*, which is partially already covered by its requirements for evidence.
Controversial ideas have a place in the world. They re-affirm what we know, push us to new areas of discovery, and at worst keep our critical thinking skills honed, and a journal that offers a place for reasonable, evidence-based study free from the risks of less level-headed readers may be the only way to do this safely.
The funny thing is the claim that this is a perversion of "safe space" policies, given that both groups (the researchers and disenfranchised people who want to hide from a seemingly oppressive world) both want the same thing: to be validated and understood without fear of violence.
*I mean this in the sense of conspiracy theorists, race supremacists, and others who have actually dangerous agendas and try to hide by playing the victim.
I honestly have to say, I don't believe there IS an "encroaching intolerance of free expression"; what I think there is, are a large number of people who are unused to being told that their viewpoints are no longer considered gospel.
The problem is that every single generation has said exactly this. Every single generation has recorded examples of people saying "why are the youth today so intolerant of free expression?". But the "youth" are not intolerant of free expression, instead, it is those who have historically expressed themselves freely who are now finding that a new generation no longer considers what they say to be acceptable.
Consider homophobia. For decades, open and often quite vitriolic homophobia was considered generally acceptable, even encouraged. We were a society that persecuted non-heterosexual people most aggressively, and the espousal of those views was considered normal and right. But over time, we as a society have moved away from that. We no longer consider those views to be acceptable, and thus we now criticise those people who have always been saying homophobic things, where in the past we would not have criticised them (or may even have joined in). Those who have always been saying homophobic things view themselves, not unreasonably, as having not changed their output. They have always freely expressed their views, that has not changed. What has changed, though, is that the views they have always expressed were once accepted and are now considered reprehensible - essentially, fewer people are willing to tolerate their bigotry, and fewer people are willing to give them a platform to air those views. The younger generations are no longer allowing those people to use the platforms that younger people set up, to espouse views that they disagree with.
The same thing happened with racism, and sexism. It's not that society has become "less tolerant of free expression", it's that society has become less tolerant of what is being expressed, by those specific people. We no longer accept what they say, and are thus no longer inclined to support them on platforms we created - which is a part of free expression. They are free to say what they wish, but they are not free to do so on any platform created by anyone for any reason, and when they express what they like they are not free from the consequences of their actions.
People who complain about "safe spaces" or about "universities are too coddling/echo chamber/whatever" or similar forget that their own experiences were exactly the same. It's just that now the spotlight has turned against them, and suddenly it feels scary and cold and they want to know why everyone is angry at them now when their view hasn't changed. It's because society did, when they didn't. It's because we do tolerate free speech - and they don't; they want everyone to listen to them, and have their views heard no matter what they are.
So, while I certainly don't approve of death threats, I also think that the premise of their argument is fundamentally flawed. They are arguing that the world has turned against free speech - it simply hasn't. The world has turned against them, and they have misattributed the cause. It's not that people don't like free speech anymore, it's that what they are freely speaking is no longer acceptable, and now they're realising how cold it is when you say something most people disagree with... and it scares them. Ultimately, I'm a gay polyamorous woman, I'm pretty familiar with the world disagreeing with me, sometimes violently. I never felt the world was against free speech, because it wasn't. Now that people are starting to agree with me, and I feel more supported, I don't believe that "free speech has won the day!". I just accept that I got lucky and my views are now the acceptable ones. They are experiencing the opposite. I have had many, many death threats in my time, and at least two attempts on my life. They're scary, VERY scary, and when you feel like the whole world is against you then you're terribly inclined to want to paint it as, "the world is against me because it's stupid and wrong and against freedom!". But it isn't. It's just against you. When you forget that, you lose focus.
I'm not against them having their "controversy journal". But I want them to stop deluding themselves about the reasons behind the outrage.
People don't hate free speech, they just hate what you're saying. There's a big, big difference.
I've wen't ahead and tagged this as off-topic. I'm also quite surprised that this can be tagged as exemplary, and I question the legitimacy of such tagging, including those I received. I think we should reconsider the boost it provides in sorting comments and maybe stop giving people what boils down to a "double or triple upvote button".
If I'm not mistaken, when I read through this thread for the first time, the paragraph that goes "So, while I certainly don't approve of death threats..." wasn't there. Apparently, it was added as a response to the criticism of being off-topic, without any marker like "Edit:" whatsoever, and it appears (intentionally or not) as if it was there since the beginning. Nevertheless, the entirety of this comment is a populist strawman, even with that paragraph included. And it continues to be so under the responses to the replies to this comment.
The discussion is about "writers whose ideas are deemed so controversial that it is unsafe for them to reveal their identity". Words "homophobia", or even "homo-" or "-phobia" do not occur in the article. It's not about the leftover religious or traditionalist bigots, like this comment tries to portray it. The people behind the mentioned journal are the opposites of such people. Quoting the article quoting Singer:
The person that came up with the idea of this journal received death threats because
and she continues to receive them
and finally
WRT freedom of speech, Singer is quoted saying
An academic criticising such stance could not afford making their name know for some reason:
I also can not leave the following unquoted:
Also
And so on.
So we're talking about material issues academics face should they part from the flock. They are being physically attacked, silenced by metaphorical social-media lynching, receiving threats and face the threat of being unemployed for doing what is their job. And here the top comment is a strawman attack on this that also is an apology of a "tables have turned" approach to progress. I'd rather prefer an accumulative approach. If one accepts the status quo as good, they're no different than those who were doing so about non-cisgendered / non-"white" peoples' lives and rights a few years/decades ago. It's just a different sort of bigotry. I want the society to progress towards no-bigotry, not to the other bigotry.
There is no "edited" notation on @witchbitch's comment. If a comment is edited more than 5 minutes after it was first posted, it will show a notation saying "edited X days, Y hours, Z minutes ago"...
... like this comment does!
That's possibly my mistake then, sorry if that is the case. Thanks for the heads-up!
Conventionally in forums like these edits, even if as small as typos, are marked with an "Edit:" prefix as in:
or
If you indeed added that paragraph later, editing it again to have the said prefix for that paragraph would help make it clear. But if as Algernon said I happened to mistakenly skip over that paragraph, I'm sorry, I read your comment on the move and on my phone, so I might have misread. But I think my reply applies with or without the edit.
With regards to lynching, I'm only refuting your comment, no lynching. I think I've explained my disagreement clearly enough.
How do you extend this argument about homophobia, racism, and sexism to cover the topic of infanticide, which is what's causing so much trouble for two of the people interviewed for this article? It's not like this topic was once not acceptable and has become more so. It doesn't seem to fit your narrative. I'd hazard a guess that the intersection of ethics and genetics (mentioned at the end of the article) also doesn't fit your narrative. Same for religious studies.
Not all the controversial ideas this proposed journal wants to discuss are ideas that have become obsolete due to changing social mores. How does your theory work for those ideas?
Because generally in the past, ethicists were given vastly more leniency to suggest extreme things primarily because people didn't listen to them. The average person didn't care what ethicists had to say, since they had other things to worry about or because they had no access to the information. Now, with the internet freeing up anyone and everyone to access anything any ethicist has ever said, suddenly the world is no longer tolerating their views because the world has discovered what it is they're saying.
Do you have any sources on this claim?
I'm sure (although not certain) that academics were also shunned in the past for expressing things that went against the grain.
Edit: Grammar
I'm not sure I understand here - surely if people responded to you in the past with threats and violence, those people were very much against your freedom to speak and act as you wish?
My take away from your comment is that people have never been truly in favour of free speech, because they would respond not with debate (or by simply ignoring) but with violence. Whether you believe the target of that violence is "right" or "wrong", and whichever way the "acceptable" target may be shifting, this suggests to me that the fundamental concept is being undermined and always has been.
From your summary, it sounds like you don't agree, though?