The remedy for speech that is false is speech that is true. This is the ordinary course in a free society. The response to the unreasoned is the rational; to the uninformed, the enlightened; to the straight-out lie, the simple truth.
Anthony Kennedy
The remedy for speech that is false
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This Schlock Mercenary strip stands as a rebuttal.
https://www.schlockmercenary.com/2012-11-18
The biggest problem with the truth these days is the false makes for better sound bytes and helps pay for more ads.
Then there’s his truth, her truth, my truth, your truth – none of which might even be in the same ballpark.
And we’re writers – the makers of worlds and the truths within them – and there seem to be some of us so lost in our own little worlds that we wouldn’t know/believe this world’s truths if they came up and bit us on the backsides! 😉
I would say the saying aloud of whatever point of view, for citizens, is easy
However.
Being entitled to a venue that is wide and deep is more ‘guarded’ by the few, than the DMZ. Even the majority dont have venue for ‘reach.’
One can speak truth all day long, in one’s home, online, in the grocery store, but the reach is either squished to a narrow aperature wherein there really is no audience for more than a couple seconds, if at all. A news article with 50, 500 or 5000 comments doesnt hold.
Those who ‘preach on tv/radio/newspapers’ night after night, day after day, have the venue to tell truth or lies or half lies– that has real reach
No single truthteller without venue can have balancing effect over those who are in the eye and ear of millions every day, broadcasting, rebroadcasting, streaming, transcripts.
Freedom of speech is the tool by which cis white males silence the minority and maintain their hegemony.
You’d think I was making a joke, but I’ve heard people say that. Seriously. That’s one of the common anti-free speech mantras. 🙁
How common the idea is outside of the ragesphere of social media and tabloid news I dunno.
With true respect to Justice Kennedy, it is not that simple.
“The truth wears many faces.”
“You speak the truth you know, and I, the truth I know.”
A young socialist told me that, in 1968, after the assassination of Dr Martin Luther King, Jr, black soldiers in the US Army mutinied and refused orders for two days. The problem with his story is that I remember 1968. The mutiny he swears by did not happen. It is a damned lie. But he believes it. Takes it on faith. ‘Cause that’s the fashion in his circle.
I have been in court many times, and I know that both sides in a dispute believe they speak the truth and that the other side lies. The purpose of the proceedings is to put an end to the dispute. That’s all.
We do not go to trial to find out which side speaks the truth. We go to trial to find out which truth is stronger.
For too many people “truth” = belief, rather than objective fact. Worse, for many it is what they *want* to believe rather than what they have seen or experienced.
There is no limit to humans’ capacity for self-delusion and “magical thinking”.
One would think that’s obvious…but many people respond to a lie with a counter-lie.
That gets society accustomed to lying, and dilutes their ability to perceive truth.