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Popper's paradox of tolerance: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paradox_of_tolerance

Similarly, we should not tolerate the "free speech" of those that seek to silence others (e.g. fascists).






Popper said we should tolerate the intolerant as long as they aren't violent, so its the exact opposite of what you say.

In general intolerance just breeds more intolerance, people are much less tolerant today than 10 years ago due to the massive amount of intolerance towards intolerance that proliferated the past 10 years.


Violence is such a nebulous concept, though. There are forms of violence that aren't physical, even though the law typically only recognise those. Is publicly mocking people for having a different culture violence? Is calling for harm upon them? Is, through policy, causing harm to them violence? Is it violence if it's through willful inaction?

I think all the above are, although the trade-off line is somewhere above mockery.


Violence = actual illegal physical violence or (legal) credible threat of illegal physical violence by individuals, or legal state-authorized physical violence or seizure of assets (policy).

> Is publicly mocking people for having a different culture violence? no

> Is calling for harm upon them? maybe

> Is, through policy, causing harm to them violence? maybe

> Is it violence if it's through willful inaction? no


Yes and no.

Nowadays, there's a lot of violence that is predicated upon misinformation in social media platforms.

e.g. The Southport riots (UK) were fuelled by entirely fabricated and false information: https://www.bbc.co.uk/bitesize/articles/zshjs82

40 police officers were injured and 27 taken to hospital, so I would certainly classify that as violence. I don't think we should tolerate that level of misinformation designed to stir up racist hatred.




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