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September 26, 2018 08:52 pm PDT

Jordan Peterson's gamma lobsters find a new low: defending censorship

Jordan Peterson is a Canadian academic whose mysticism-soaked misogyny revolves around the social hierarchy of some lobster species and the literal existence of witches and dragons; somehow, when this rubbish is blended with anodyne life advice for angry manbabies, it creates a potent elixir that transforms internet dudes into an army of argumentative internet assholes.

Peterson's principal grievance against progressive movements is that it interferes with his free speech rights (for example, he was very upset that he might have to refer to a hypothetical nonbinary student using a gender-neutral pronoun).

But as much as Peterson loves free speech, he's not very good at sharing. He has sued and threatened to sue numerous critics, on flimsy and absurd grounds, in ways that, in my opinion, were designed to intimidate them into silence and forced apology rather than face his deep-pocketed legal weapons.

Mike Masnick is definitely from the free speech wing of the free speech party and has faced extinction-level lawsuits over his willingness to criticize figures with expensive counsel and a willingness to use the law to stifle critics.

Masnick called out Peterson's censorious hypocrisy in a sensible post that pointed out that defenders of the right to speak critically and offend people are assholes if they sue people who speak critically and offend them.

Predictably, the Gamma Lobsters of Jordan Peterson's army came out in force to jordansplain that free speech is improved when wealthy, powerful people sue their critics.

In response, Masnick has published a followup post with 12 rules for not being a total free speech hypocrite, which attempts the impossible: explaining the importance of consistency in free speech argument to people whose status as members in good standing of a personality cult requires that they deny this. Read the rest


Original Link: http://feeds.boingboing.net/~r/boingboing/iBag/~3/71rf0fkYFjo/sosumi.html

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