So that those with the currently loudest voices can silence all others?
So that the "invisible hand of the market" may decide who is wisest (as demonstrated when we look at all the instances where this happened)?
I think all of these wishes of a true public space are usually colored by the (mis?)perception of certain opinions being opressed, when in fact they are often just socially unacceptable because of their destructive nature.
Not to be that guy, but I grew up in Austria inbetween old Nazis and young Neo-Nazis. When they said: "you are trying to silence us" what they meant is "we want to establish the old power again, so we can silence you. until that happens, we want free speech". This is literally (translated from a very thick accent in Austrian German) what one of the neo nazis said to me after the 8th beer and a heated discussion. To assume these people want free speech for anybody other than themselves is naive. For them tolerating others is a vehicle to convince them of their cause: Once they have what they want they will get rid of it.
The question how much tolerance we have to show those who themselves are intolerant is a old one and still not easy to answer. However to me it is quite clear that we should sacrifice the free society we have without a fight.
It appears to me that our society is currently threatened by a group using the exact strategy that those Nazis were using in your home country, except they're at the next stage, past the using free speech and actively now attempting to destroy it.
I'm of the belief that to protect your free society you protect it's virtue, even when people take advantage of it. If you hold steadfast to "free speech", no group ever gets past that first stage, so they can never take power. It means sometimes tolerating hearing reprehensible views of the world, but it is either that or giving someone all the guns and the power to control what you say, and if history teaches us anything, that always ends badly for the regular people no matter the initial intention of the person doing the censoring, a power like that is irresistible to those who want to use it to benefit themselves.
So that the "invisible hand of the market" may decide who is wisest (as demonstrated when we look at all the instances where this happened)?
I think all of these wishes of a true public space are usually colored by the (mis?)perception of certain opinions being opressed, when in fact they are often just socially unacceptable because of their destructive nature.
Not to be that guy, but I grew up in Austria inbetween old Nazis and young Neo-Nazis. When they said: "you are trying to silence us" what they meant is "we want to establish the old power again, so we can silence you. until that happens, we want free speech". This is literally (translated from a very thick accent in Austrian German) what one of the neo nazis said to me after the 8th beer and a heated discussion. To assume these people want free speech for anybody other than themselves is naive. For them tolerating others is a vehicle to convince them of their cause: Once they have what they want they will get rid of it.
The question how much tolerance we have to show those who themselves are intolerant is a old one and still not easy to answer. However to me it is quite clear that we should sacrifice the free society we have without a fight.