Excellent letter on Freedom of speech to appear in Harper's Mag

[Imnobody4]

harpers.org/a-letter-on-justice-and-open-debate/
Signed by JKR, Margaret Atwood and Salman Rushdie among many others.
Are more people starting to say enough?

www.theatlantic.com/international/archive/2020/07/why-millennial-harry-potter-fans-reject-jk-rowling/613870/

NC to post this link, my regular name is too linked to identifying details and I'd be in deep shit at work (academic) for any association.

Fancy signing a letter supporting independent thought and then getting cold feet because someone you don't like has also signed it

I do think Dido makes a good point. Singling out Trump and 'right wing demagogues' when so much of the current threat is from the left looks like crass virtue signalling - pretty ironic given the context of the letter.

The victim playing narcissism of the critic from Vox is astounding and ironic.
twitter.com/emilyvdw/status/1280580388495097856?s=19

This might explain it, Flo. It might have triggered some more uncontrollable sobbing.

The "intolerant climate" they are referring to has been created by the left- not the right.

Yes, I thought that. The far right libertarians are very keen on their own right to free speech generally.

It's weird that it's being dubbed transphobic purely by virtue of being signed by JKR when it doesn't at any point mention trans or sex

Quite!

[quote Doyoumind]The victim playing narcissism of the critic from Vox is astounding and ironic.
twitter.com/emilyvdw/status/1280580388495097856?s=19[/quote]
Nice to see them getting a lot of pushback in the replies.

Oh this is hilarious, Temp.

"The twoo sites announcedd last week that they will remove her photograph from their sites, stop linking to her website and writing about her other endeavors, and tag Twitter posts that include news about her with the hashtag #JKR, so users can filter out triggering content from their social-media feeds."

Fancy a potter fan being triggered by the very mention of JKR.

And why are so many adults still obsessed with Harry Potter? Sorry I know it's a derail but I just don't get it.

It's pretty smart not to explicitly refer to issues relating to the conflict between women's rights and trans ideology.

This means that the Today programme on R4 are able to talk about free speech but slip in a reference to JKR. I get the impression a lot of the presenters are well-informed and fully understand the subtext. But this way the topic can be discussed under the radar.

The cancel culture and assault on free speech is an important issue in itself - this needs to be tackled in addition to the separate but related movement to protect women's sex based rights.

Fancy signing a letter supporting independent thought and then getting cold feet because someone you don't like has also signed it

Says it all really.

Activist: We must have free speech

JKR: I agree

Activist: Glaring. NOT YOU!

There’s a lot of beeping on twitter from signatories backing up. So they dont agree with free speech then? Interesting.

This is what you get when a generation of kids are brought up to all win medals at sports day and nobody loses at pass the parcel. And everyone gets a A and goes to university.

They just can’t debate or bear to not win an argument.

There’s a lot of beeping on twitter from signatories backing up.

Do you mean backing out? Removing their name from the list? Is this happening, or are they under pressure to do so?
Oh, the irony!

Yes ‘oh I don’t know it said that’. I just had a flash through twitter and there was one person who recently tweeted that they had 2 late teens/29 something’s in the house wailing and gnashing their teeth over JKR. I think it was deleted when people pointed out that this was a) a massive parenting fail and b) a worrying mental health issue (or possibly c - absolute hogwash).

Imagine having an opinion that is the same as someone else that you may not always agree with? Wow. Philosophers worldwide must be scratching their heads.

@SerenityNowwwww

There’s a lot of beeping on twitter from signatories backing up. So they dont agree with free speech then? Interesting.

This is what you get when a generation of kids are brought up to all win medals at sports day and nobody loses at pass the parcel. And everyone gets a A and goes to university.

They just can’t debate or bear to not win an argument.

Who else is reversing?

The reason discussion is impossible is that people pick the "goodies" and the "baddies" and decide everything the goodie says is right and everything the baddie says is wrong.

What happened to agreeing with something's someone says but no others.

Why can't we agree and disagree with opinions rather than people (who have a range of views on a range of topics).

I’ll have a peek and check them out (I need to go on a conf call right now )

Sorry, that was garbled and typo riddled. Hopefully it makes sense.

@BentBastard

The reason discussion is impossible is that people pick the "goodies" and the "baddies" and decide everything the goodie says is right and everything the baddie says is wrong.

What happened to agreeing with something's someone says but no others.

Why can't we agree and disagree with opinions rather than people (who have a range of views on a range of topics).

I agree with this, it's just tribalism so much of the time - (virtue) signalling what group you belong to, done in a hugely irritating juvenile way to boot.

I posted a screenshot of Jennifer Finney Boylan's tweet where she describes her twentysomething offspring "sobbing uncontrollably" upthread.

One signatory recanted within hours of the letter being published.
Jennifer Finney Boylan, a US author and transgender activist, tweeted: "I did not know who else had signed that letter.
"I thought I was endorsing a well-meaning, if vague, message against internet shaming."
She added: "I am so sorry."

Oh, the irony! 🤣

“I thought I was signing something about the stupidity of virtue-signally internet sanctions on free speech, although I actually didn’t understand what it said, but I’ve now noticed that some very successful people with different opinions to me have signed it, so I’m cancelling my own signature and issuing a virtue-signalling apology,” said someone that nobody has ever heard of.

That quote from JFB (who even is she?) is hilarious. But also a perfect, tragic illustration of the issues raised in the letter.

JFB is one of the overlords Scrimpshaw...

Blimey, whatever happened to: “I disapprove of what you say, but I will defend to the death your right to say it”