The Invaluable Right of Freedom of Speech

It is certain that in the west, secularism has prevailed; Well, at least in Europe, replacing religious ethics with cultural hedonism that is paradoxically more restrictive than religion ever was. Hedonism, rather then being the construct of a divine text, is directly derived from the individual. This creates something of a more limiting environment. The west has embraced this pleasure-seeking ideal, but not without a few strings attached. The west's hedonistic culture has in itself created artificial walls of conduct that has proved to be more restraining than dogma at times, because it is a product of something much more fundamental; one's own mind; and we must cherish this right and not let it be dwarfed in the name of "protection from offense." This is where I fear most of all that the west, especially Europe, might relinquish their Voltairean principle of free speech.

In January of 2012, France passed the 'Armenian Genocide Bill' which criminalized the denial of it happening. Although noble in writing and true in its intent, this type of legislation is particularly dangerous. Why are we constructing a society free of offending? The real purpose of free speech, as espoused in the age of Enlightenment, is for the protection of unpopular speech; popular speech has little to be protected from. It is this dilemma from which I fear the subtle censorship that is present in European society, which is done in the name of protection from offense. As Christopher Hitchens, the prominent journalist, eloquently put it in this video; "don't take refuge in the false security of consensus" simply because you are in majority. If one person disagrees, and says so, then there should be special protection bestowed to that individual because what that person has to say is intrinsically more important. Now, this is not because that person has something more of substance to say; it is because what that person has to say is vital to reverifying truths that may be taken for granted. It refreshes the principles of the majority, in this case the recognition of the Armenian genocide. And moreover, if your opinion is truly the correct one you should not fear the dissenting opinion of one mere individual to the point where you have to resort to censorship.

Furthermore, who is going to protect you from the offensive language? When you empower the state to censor your society, to decide who is the harmful speaker, you have relinquished your right to dissent; and pity you when you need that right of speech, if you ever do.

The largest threat to limiting our fundamental right of speech, it seems, is those claiming to be protecting in the name of religion. Islam, especially, in European society feels it is entitled to special protection under the law. In the case of the Danish cartoon controversy of 2005, where pictures of Muhammad were drawn and printed in a newspaper, they were said to be "offensive" by some Muslims in the community. They protested the cartoon, and there was a global movement where they called for the Danish government to bring it down. Self-censorship ensued. Is this the society we've grown into, where it's forbidden to offend and exercise one's right to say what he or she wishes? Retrospectively this is offensive to us, those who follow the Enlightenment, to have to see our rights of speech slandered for the religious. No creed deserves to special protection under the law, for then it becomes tyranny to all those not under the that umbrella of "tolerance."
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Hitchens on the Danish riots.

The Reality of Trickle-Down Economics

The Future Dilemmas of Keynesian Capitalism

Although I do not believe the current economic paradigm will fully collapse on its own, since that would be naïve, there are a few problems the modern market, and even the state, cannot properly solve and Keynesians should consider:

The issue of ecology and environmentalism; during the 2009 Copenhagen Summit this was especially evident, where the state and its corporate interests failed to make any law-binding decisions. This problem has been going on for a while, where the consensus has always been “We urge people to pollute less!” without enacting any legislation to enforce that. And the inevitable collapse and depletion of the oil and the energy market, predicted to happen around 2040, will prove to be destructive to globalization.

The issue of transhumanism and the rapid advancement of biogenetics is an issue the markets will fail to control and the state will probably succumb to, which would ultimately create a physical and intellectual divide between the wealthy and the poor, aside from their socio-economic status, because only the rich will have access to such enhancements.

The issue of intangible capital; the market has always functioned on physical capital that could be exchanged in the real world, but now with the rise of digital assets (which is now worth more than real world assets) all that is changing and it seems that the current laws on intellectual property and copyright are proving to be useless. The problem comes from that regulating this kind of capital and the digital market in general is inherently intrusive and stripping of liberty. The pressure of corporations on the state to enact further laws to limit internet freedom will surely come as a result, representing a new form of censorship and Orwellian infringement of basic rights (more info here).

The issue of new forms of apartheid; Zizek discussed this in a few of his interviews, in which there is a new class of people that are just excluded from the system completely. This is becoming increasingly prevalent in South America, Africa, Asia, and even in the United States, where there are artificial barriers being set up between the slums and the rest of the nation. There is little state control in these areas, and they are completely disregarded in the political sphere and there is little hope of incorporating them back into the system since they are so disproportionately poor. A good example of these “little Berlin Walls,” that Zizek calls them, are the slums of the Romani people (the Gypsies) in Europe, specifically Eastern Europe. Just look up modern antiziganism and you will find the oppressive hatred and exclusion the Gypsies face in modern day Europe, and their rights are completely ignored in the political sphere and even by the transnational bodies like the UN, which is apparent in their reaction to Roma refugees in the aftermath of the Kosovo war. 

And finally, the issue of state interventionism is a problem in itself. I think most Keynesians would agree that if that state did not intervene the market would abolish itself; the allocative capacity of the market is just not efficient enough, especially in a world where there are more overweight people (1.5 billion) than malnourished individuals (925 million), where food is being misallocated to areas where it is not needed because of unethical profits. Industries are attracted to areas with high levels of GDP. Since the ‘Golden Age of Capitalism’ after WW2, there has been substantial growth but with this economic expansion also comes increased state involvement. This destructively centralizes democratic power rendering it useless, and increases state power to bounds that could endanger democracy in itself. Authoritarian capitalism, or ‘capitalism with Asian values,’ as is present in Singapore and China, is at this point in time working more efficiently than liberal capitalism which is something we should all be concerned with. It used to be that argument that free markets will ultimately lead to democracy eventually, but now the authoritarian way is proving to be much more efficient in many respects and that liberal argument for capitalism may soon be disproved.

Christianity and the Founding of the United States

In response to an individual who used the founding of the United States to justify opposing gay marriage:

Well I would expect you to at least give me one example as to why [the right to marry established in Supreme Court cases overturning interracial marriage laws] doesn't apply to gay marriage, or to recall your statement that marriage is a "privilege" but I suppose that would be too much to ask:

And don't justify your religious agenda by using "this nation was founded on theistic religious belief." This is the most overused, and misrepresented argument uttered by conservatives in defense of injecting religion and legislating morality in public policy. No, this nation was not founded on "theistic religious belief" and let me elaborate;

Firstly, many of our Founding Fathers were deists or anti-clerical, but most importantly they were children of the Enlightenment, believing in empiricism and the worth of scientific endeavors to support a seemingly naturalistic world view. This isn't to say they were all deists, some were religious, one being John Jay who believed that Christians are best fit to serve this country, but does not represent a public policy position. For that, you have to look at the ideas that were behind the Founding Documents.

Thomas Jefferson, the author of the Declaration of Independence, was vehemently opposed to religion. In his letters to Adams, he talks of the religious superstitions of Christianity as "one day being amongst the likes of Jupiter and other false gods." He authored the Jefferson Bible, where he rewrote the New Testament taking out the supernatural, believing strongly in the ethical teachings of Jesus but denying his divinity. Jefferson was the first to note and advocate the "wall between church and state" of the Founding Fathers, initially used by the founder of Rhode Island Baptist Roger Williams. He demonstrated his support of this separation in public policy as well apart from his private letters, writing the Virginia Statute for Religious Freedom, which would become the basis for the First Amendment and the Free Exercise Clause in the Constitution.

James Madison, the author of the Constitution, has expressed in countless letters his original secular intent of the government, calling for the "perfect separation between the ecclesiastical and civil matters" in a letter he wrote to Edward Livingston in 1822. He even expressed opposition to Congressional chaplains and days of prayer.

George Washington was arguably a deist, or at least a nonreligious man, although not expressing it in public, but rather his personal letters. He refused to take Holy Communion on Sundays. Benjamin Franklin was a deist, denouncing religion in many of his writings; "The way to see by Faith is to shut the eye of Reason." John Adams expressed doubts, especially in his writings to Jefferson. And Thomas Paine was perhaps the most outspoken of them all, completely denouncing religion and despising it in his book "The Age of Reason" and his other writings.

Also you should note, the Constitution makes no mention of "Jesus Christ, divinity, Bible, Creator, Divine, or God." And the Declaration of Independence, although mentioning the rights "endowed by our Creator," this does not make it explicitly Christian, it was simply the reiteration of a Lockean concept that Jefferson elaborated on.

And lastly one of the most important pieces of evidence for the secular intent of the United States is the Treaty of Tripoli signed in 1797. "As the Government of the United States of America is not, in any sense, founded on the Christian religion" is the direct quote from it, and was passed unanimously in the Senate, being read out loud on the Senate floor and copies being passed out for each Senator to read. There were no objections, because the secular intentions were clear, no matter how religious these Senators were they agreed on this basic concept of separation because they feared religion in politics would be destructive in the United States, as it had been in Great Britain. It was even published in the Pennsylvania Gazette with no public backlash. Although this treaty is now defunct, it makes the position of the Founding Fathers quite clear; that we were to be seen as a secular nation throughout the world, that we do not profess any particular faith, and that we are a nation that allows all different creeds none of which would ever hold an advantage or special privilege in the rule of law.

I hope that clears everything up for you, and I hope you also realize that even if all of this nation was Christian that would not make the United States a Christian nation. We are, at least our original intent was, to be a secular republic that does not succumb to mob rule of the majority; where the rights of the peoples are protected, and this includes their right of religion or belief not to be infringed by the legislating power of another. It was a pure product of the intellectual followers of the Enlightenment, and its importance cannot be understated.