Thoughts on the Alt-Right and Hate Speech

     I am not a fan of President Trump, nor of National Policy Institute president Richard Spencer. Trump and Spencer have nothing better to do with their time than bully people on Twitter. The American people should be careful not to stoop to these people's level; be careful not to bully them back in a way that backfires on us.

     I do not want to see Spencer rise to fame even more, or perhaps even start a political party and run for office. In my opinion, the best way to overcome hate speech is to ignore it; don't respond if someone calls you by a racial slur and tells you to go ahead and fight them, don't engage people like Spencer on Twitter or other social media.

     We must also speak out in order to ensure that the constitutional process limits the Trump Administration properly. Using the same old Democratic Party machine procedural tricks will not cut it; if liberals and progressives want to be taken seriously, they have to respect decorum and not engage in disorderly behavior (like what we witnessed last June, with the Democrats' "No Fly, No Buy" sit-in).

     On the other hand, in my opinion, it is worth listening to the opinions of people like Alex Jones, Ben Shapiro, Milo Yiannopoulos, Gavin McInnes, and Jordan Peterson. These men don't spend all of their time praising people who share their ethnic heritage, nor do they dedicate most of their energy into making people look stupid, the way Spencer and Trump do (respectively). They talk about the effects of immigration, and they often do so in a thoroughly dignified, academic manner.

    

      I maintain my support of non-aggression; I still believe that it is wrong to initiate physical conflict against someone. That is, unless the attack is clearly on its way, and could be stopped. The Non-Aggression Principle (N.A.P.) should only be "broken" in order to prevent a clear and present danger from resulting in actual harm (although it is arguable whether this is actually a violation of the N.A.P.).

     Furthermore, when the physical conflict is retaliatory, the force used must be proportional; that is, you can't bring a chainsaw to a fist-fight. Defense of people other than oneself should only occur in defense of people incapable of defending themselves.

      On the issue of freedom of speech, the only time it is acceptable to interfere with someone's freedom of speech is if they are inciting a mob of people to riot. Empty threats should not be taken seriously unless they include specific information about a prospective victim. I have said about the Charles Manson murders, "if everyone who ever suggested killing the rich, or killing off several hundred million or billion people, were charged with a crime, then half of the country would be in prison".

     When you reveal someone's phone number or address of the workplace or home (this is called "doxing") - and it's the personal information of someone who you think is a racist or a Nazi - then you are trying to incite people to commit violence against someone, and you have given them all the tools they need to hunt people down. This creates a credible threat, and this fulfills the requirement that a threat be believable in order to be illegal.

     Moreover, if you publicly claim that someone is a Nazi or a racist, without any evidence, and you release such information, then you are engaging in extrajudicial vigilante justice. It is wrong to punch someone for being a Nazi, for the same reason that it is wrong to torture someone just because you think they're a terrorist. Even if you believe there's nothing wrong with vigilante justice, if you don't have any evidence, then you don't know for sure. Furthermore, there is a difference between simply hating people and inciting genocide.

     If you're making no formal charges, and you want someone punished without a warrant or fair trial, then you have no right to claim that you are standing up for people's constitutional rights, even if it's true that your political opponents are interfering with constitutional rights just a little bit more than you are.
      Additionally, the argument that "hate speech is not free speech" or "hate speech is unfree speech" is flawed. We don't have government-recognized freedom of speech because we want the freedom to talk about mundane things like the weather; we have protection of free speech because we need to talk about controversial topics like politics and religion in order to solve the problems of the day.
     If we prevent people from expressing their racism (or other phobias), then they won't be free to out themselves as racists. To admit that you believe your race is (or ought to be) supreme, or to suggest genocide through speech or writing, or to display a flag that might connote racism, do not present the same clear and present danger that actions like leading a mob or actively inciting genocide do.

     The argument that "you have the freedom of speech, but you don't have freedom from the consequences" is wrong as well. You do not get to decide that the consequences of someone standing in place giving a racist television interview includes being punched.
     You don't get to decide that, for the same reason that the T.S.A. should not get to decide that the consequences of walking into an airport includes being forced to choose between an intimate, grope-like search (or possibly strip search, or cavity search) and an electronic scanning that might give them cancer, without either a warrant or probable cause to believe that the person is a threat. It's for the same reason that G.G. Allin should not get to decide that the consequences of walking close enough to him include being raped full of A.I.D.S. and then shit on.
     That reason is simple: your body is your body, and other people's bodies belong to them, not you. You don't get to take away their freedom of choice, nor do you get to subject people to consequences that they didn't agree to or know about. It's the most important one of the first things we're taught in kindergarten to make sure we get along with each other; "don't steal, don't take, share, and don't hit". And if someone hits you, tell someone. It's just too bad that we also tell our kids that "it doesn't matter who started it".

     What is the most mind-boggling about this is that for some reason, I still defend the rights of "free speech" of people who engage in "doxing", even though it's pretty clear that it's a violation of the Non-Aggression Principle, and also of the law. So if you want to say that I'm defending hate speech, please draw attention to the fact that I am defending the hate speech of the left as well as of the right.

     If this is a free society, then we have the right to due process, the right of voluntary association, the freedom from association, the freedom of speech and press, and numerous other freedoms. I don't have to do anything for anybody, unless I am compensated to my satisfaction. I do not have to use the words that anybody else tells me to use. You have the same natural rights, whether you want them or not.

     We can either have a society where people on the left and right who hate each other are protected from one another equally; or we can have a society where we continue to isolate and abandon people, coercing them into striking out in their own defense, often using disproportionate violence. We can continue not obligating our police to protect and serve the general public (outside of a private contract), or we can incite people to attack others.

     I am not going to sit back and watch the left destroy themselves by throwing race-baiting boomerangs, and attack the Bill of Rights (like in December 2012, when The Journal News published a map of gun owners). I am speaking out not because I want to see non-whites exterminated, but because I don't want to see progressives kill themselves. We're not going to survive long as a society if we keep proclaiming the winner of the debate to be the person who can shout "racist" or "Nazi" first and loudest.

     If the Obama administration had made it illegal to call the president a Nazi, then Trump would have had an even easier time becoming president. It's legal to be a Nazi and read Hitler's book; if it weren't, then we'd have no idea what Nazis believe and we'd have no idea how to argue against it. Likewise, if Twitter censors Richard Spencer or other white supremacists, then we won't have any way to keep track of the latest racist dog-whistles, so we can shout-down and silence other progressive white people for accidentally using them.

Written on February 5th and 6th, 2017

Edited on February 18th and 21st, 2017

Thoughts on the 2004 Election

 Originally Written on November 27th, 2004

Edited on December 6th, 2015

Edits Shown in [Brackets]

     There are several things that have come to my attention concerning the presidential election that have to be addressed.

      Some people seem to believe that people should not criticize the president and his policies, sometimes saying, “he’s our president and we have to support him.” That statement represents the fear of questioning authority and disagrees with the very first freedom guaranteed by the Bill of Rights. If that statement were true, then everyone in the country would have no choice but to agree with every move the current president makes, and always reelect him, effectively doing away with the democratic voting process.

      This year’s candidates spend too much time talking about their war records. Showing the country how the fact that they served[,] and how long and how hard they worked[,] may have some influence on how they plan to deal with the armed forces and our foreign policy, but using attack ads is not the best way to do it. These candidates should get to debating right away about as many important issues as they can[,] and not waste the American people’s time with one issue that has so little to do with the future.

      The polls are not reflecting the country’s change in politics because the youngest citizens eligible to vote are not voicing their opinions. The majority of the United States is more liberal than the polls show because younger citizens, who are more liberal than the previous generation, tend to be less interested and active in politics than their parents. If the voting rate were any lower than it is now at about 50% (of eligible voters), we could never be assured that the laws are representing the will of the majority, like they are designed to do.

      Candidates’ spending time with children is a distraction from the legitimate questions and concerns that educated registered voters need to have answered to make their decisions. Reading books to schoolchildren and kissing babies are nothing but photo opportunities that waste time[, and are done in order to gain] votes from weak-minded people who vote for the candidate with the more attractive personality. Nobody should cast his or her vote based on which party a group of grade-school students favor.

      It should have no bearing on an election whatsoever whether Teresa Heinz Kerry would make a better first lady than Laura Bush based on how they act in public or what they think about education. Polls printed in magazines and even shown on CNN ask people which First Lady they would prefer, as though either of them is up for election to a government position. The first lady does not have any official duties and it is preposterous that George W. Bush would say the best reason for his reelection is that his wife would be the first lady for four more years. Their wives’ political thoughts should matter in an election only if they run for public office themselves.

Campaign Finance Reform

The following was written in November 2013 as a response to the questionnaire for federal candidates seeking an endorsement from the Liberty Caucus of the Republican Conference (i.e., the Republican Party).

Here is the link to the original questionnaire:

http://www.google.com/url?sa=t&rct=j&q=&esrc=s&source=web&cd=1&ved=0CC4QFjAA&url=http%3A%2F%2Fwi.rlc.org%2Fwp-content%2Fuploads%2F2010%2F05%2FFederal-Candidate-Questionnaire.doc&ei=u3B8UqXbBqPiiwL2ioCoDg&usg=AFQjCNHAzM58Dr-APGVchRKzOkVV0TKRyw&sig2=qStOgZ0RAgXVAbnHi2kFtw

This is my answer to Question #4.

4. B and D

   (Federal electoral campaign contributions and expenditures should be reported and publicly disclosed by state governments not financed and controlled by the Federal Election Commission, nor protected as free speech)

   The federal government has no enumerated constitutional authority to regulate campaign contributions and expenditures, so there is no constitutional precedent for campaign contributions to be (A) financed and controlled by the Federal Election Commission. This means that the right to make contributions to electoral campaigns should be (D) restricted only by state governments.

     I do not believe that campaign contributions are (C) protected free speech; I believe that campaign contribution is commercial business activity. The 1^st Amendment protects the right to non-violent spoken and written self-expression, including political speech and writing, but the absolute freedom of expression is not enumerated in the 1^stAmendment, so the notion that campaign contribution is political expression and therefore protected speech is invalid.

   The purpose of the free speech clause of the 1^st Amendment is to prohibit the federal government from making laws which inhibit the freedom of speech and writing which are not fraudulent, treasonous, slanderous, or libelous; the 1^st Amendment is designed to protect political speech. An interpretation of the 1^st Amendment which protects the right to unlimited, undisclosed campaign contributions does not protect political speech.

   I would support passing a constitutional amendment which requires any entity classified as a corporate person - whether an individual, a corporation, a labor union, a governmental agency, or some other organization - to have both the freedom of trade associated with corporation status and the responsibilities associated with humanity (in addition to responsibilities to investors as the public), such as the responsibility to provide restitution for fraud, and the responsibility to be transparent about campaign donations.

   In summary, while the only solution which is currently constitutional is (D) restriction on a state-by-state basis, I would support abolishing the F.E.C., and I would propose a constitutional amendment which explicitly authorizes the federal government to restrict campaign contributions and expenditures as commercial business activity, by requiring (B) the reporting and public disclosure of federal electoral campaign contributions and expenditures.

For more entries on election studies, please visit:

http://www.aquarianagrarian.blogspot.com/2010/12/cpac-straw-poll-results-2006-2010.html

http://www.aquarianagrarian.blogspot.com/2010/10/2010-2013-election-season-predictions.html

http://www.aquarianagrarian.blogspot.com/2010/11/110th-111th-congress-votes-in_07.html

http://www.aquarianagrarian.blogspot.com/2011/03/2012-electoral-college-predictions.html

http://www.aquarianagrarian.blogspot.com/2011/05/2012-republican-presidential-candidates.html

http://www.aquarianagrarian.blogspot.com/2013/09/pareto-optimality-in-political-economy.html

http://www.aquarianagrarian.blogspot.com/2013/10/us-political-spectrum-2008-2013.html

http://www.aquarianagrarian.blogspot.com/2013/11/percentage-of-public-support-for.html

http://www.aquarianagrarian.blogspot.com/2014/03/is-this-electoral-map-of-2016.html

http://www.aquarianagrarian.blogspot.com/2014/03/tea-party-approval-ratings-of-possible.html

http://www.aquarianagrarian.blogspot.com/2014/04/top-8-potential-presidential-candidate.html

http://www.aquarianagrarian.blogspot.com/2014/04/2012-gop-presidential-candidates-ranked.html