I have a free-speech quandary.
I still believe in the First Amendment (long-time readers will call me out for Gertruding). I will continue fighting with every fiber of my being to preserve Constitutional protection for as much speech as possible.
The remedy for bad speech, they say, is more speech. Counter negative speech with positive speech: it’s very rational. And the right answer to bad speech would indeed be the rational answer—more speech—if it were only the literal meaning of the words that mattered.
If, that is, we were calculating rational beings.
But we are not.
Instead of calculating rational beings, humans are feeling beings. Speech’s effects on us pass far beyond our awareness. Hypnotic language, for example, speaks to our unconscious minds. Persuasive language makes us feel we should do what we might otherwise know we shouldn’t do. We decide things based on emotion, and then we rationalize our decisions. The literal meaning of the words is of secondary importance to the emoti…