Thought Police examines the long history of governments suppressing speech—with clear echoes of George Orwell’s warning of a world without free speech. The program explores personal stories from Hong Kong, North Korea, and Peru, whose governments tried to suppress free speech. One instance resulted in a monumental—and avoidable—human tragedy.
0:00 – Introduction
1:51 – Hate Speech
14:21 – That’s Orwellian
19:08 – We Must Know Who Is Who
25:12 – Defying the Mainland
31:22 – Global Consequences
34:26 – Censoring Information
45:21 – Fighting for a Free Press
54:50 – Conclusion
55:57 – Credits
* * * * *
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Berlin will suffer for their laws and will suffer in a big way. You need to give all people a chance to speak and say what they want to say otherwise the pendulum will swing and when it swings back it swings hard.
The universities, colleges, and public schools no longer understand or teach 1st Amendment/free speech principals anymore. They ban and cancel all kinds of guest speakers and prohibit symbols/logos that they think have been designated as hateful by a vague "authority" or cited organization, yet at the same time schools are attempting to become the authority over students for teaching learning the ideas and rules for social responsibility while imposing the speech restrictions.
Prof. Neil Ferguson said, social media think linking the world of brains is going to be awesome but like most new techs, there are pros & cons, seems fast polarizing more extreme left & right thinking? OK whats balance solutions remain to be fine tune perhaps? Ground news like meter? yet whos to judge? which Ai? Personally felt the world shifting to cancelled culture, judging destroy history with today standard etc. e.g.This page could be shadowed limited to small group, blacklisted or cancelled like China all the way to western Doctors on covid 19 issues. Gather Universities worst for free speech now days, whichs worrying.
Hate Speech is allowed in Germany, it is just not allowed against minorities, left wing people, politicians and journalists. If you use a "bad word" against politicians your house will be raided. Happened numerous times, if you harass non-lefties on the internet nobody cares, and "Hateaid" only cares about hatespeech against lefties and politicians. Its a mean to surpress peoples voices against the governemnt. There is no more public discourse here, because everything is branded right wing extremism and hate speech.
"Every nation gets the government it deserves." – Joseph De Maistre
What is Freedom of Speech?
"Free Speech. It's the ability to express ideas without fear of government intervention." – Nadine Strossen, Attorney, Law Professor, & Past President of ACLU.
But should that freedom include Hate Speech?
"[Landmark U.S Supreme Court Case] Brandenburg against Ohio truly recognizes that free speech means not freedom of thought and speech for those with whom we agree, but freedom of expression for the expression we hate." – Ruth Bader Ginsburg, U.S. Supreme Court Justice
"Hate Speech" is vague, relative, and cannot be used as a restriction on freedom of speech.
"We were not defending their speech. We were resisting giving the government the power to decide that their speech could be banned. Because once you gave the government the power to decide that their speech could be banned, you've also given the government the power to decide that your speech could be banned." – Ira Glasser, Past Executive Director, ACLU.
"Saying it's not good if people are mean to each other is different than saying people aren't allowed to say mean things to each other. Because then the question is, what does it mean to say something mean to each other? [..] Who gets to decide? What is the punishment? And what does it mean to be mean?" – Emerson J. Sykes, Senior Staff Attorney, ACLU.
"If you want to give the government the power to ban hateful speech, you have to be willing to give people in power the right to decide what's hateful. And if you want to give that power, you have to imagine the people who don't like you exercising that power." – – Ira Glasser, Past Executive Director, ACLU.
My corollary: If you want to know who's in power, look at who gets to decide what's hate speech. Even if appears to be a "minority position", it has silent acceptance from the majority.
Unlike the US, Germany has laws against Hate Speech. It's not that Germany is unusual in prohibiting Free Speech, but that U.S is unusual in allowing it.
"If you don't have the right to make people aware of what's going on and to organize opposition to it then you can never address that underlying issue." – Ira Glasser, Past Executive Director, ACLU.
"Without Free Speech in The First Ammendment, the Civil Rights Movement would've been a bird without wings." – John Lewis, Voting Rights Activist
"Free Speech has always been the most powerful weapon in the hands of the marginalized, the powerless, because they may not have money, they may not have guns and tanks, but they can spread ideas." – Steven Pinker
Corollary: If you want to identify who's marginalized & oppressed, it's the group who's speech is being attempted to be controlled. The group able to demand the controlling is by definition not marginalized & oppressed.
"The abolitionist movement, the movement for women's equality, gay rights movement, the movement for marriage equality, all of these have depended on the expression of ideas that were unpopular to the point of being illegal in their own time." – Steven Pinker, Psychologist & Linguist.
"[Free Speech] is how we got women's rights, gay rights, and civil rights, and nothing out there breaks my heart more than seeing activists who represent (or claim to represent) oppressed minorities turn againnst free speech – our best and truest friend." – Jonathan Rauch, Senior Fellow, Brookings Institution
"Freedom of Speech requires more than words in a constitution or court decisions. It also depends on a supportive civic culture where all members of our society actually understand and exercise their free speech rights. Dialogue, debate, and tolerate the same rights for others. In other words, freedom of speech is not just a legal principle. It is real people actually speaking freely." – Nadine Strossen, Attorney, Law Professor, & Past President of ACLU.
Never understood this. Why are we penalizing hatred? I am allowed to hate things or people or whatever. Hating something or somebody does nothing. It when actions are committed because of hatred that you should be able to prosecute or outlaw and not before. Banning hatred is stupid. Words, thoughts and ideas should never be actionable as in a court of law. Only actionable items, which require action, should be outlawed.
I'm in the process of reading Orwell's 1984 and find it remarkable how relatable it is to many things that are going on in the west today, particularly his idea of Newspeak and its underlying strategy to limit and control one's thoughts by destroying and reducing language. One of the best examples is PC language, most especially as it applies to trans-activism (e.g., it's substitution of the word "gender" to replace the word "sex," the redefinition and subsequent destruction of the words "male" and "female," and, in many venues, the social and sometimes institutional and legal attempt to enforce the use of pronouns that are biologically inappropriate, thereby attempting to negate freedom FROM speech, which is inherent in the idea of freedom OF speech, i.e., if you are forced to say something — ANYTHING — you don't want to say, then you don't have the freedom of your own speech.
In the UK, up until the 1960's books and films were strictly censored. That's weird isn't it? It wasn't that long ago.
Clearly the 1st amendment "meant" everything because it had no qualifiers. You just reject liberty and think nobody would allow actual liberty when they could kill, cage or take your property.
32:00 Covid came from a lab (like Lyme Disease did) not the sea food market (where SARS came from, likely). Censorship on this was across the planet including the US and social media. still exists today,.