Friday, November 10, 2017

Peter Dorman — Freedom of Speech for Fascists?


Peter Dorman considers when liberalism needs to become illiberal, e.g., squelching dissent based on freedom of thought and expression, in order to protect itself. The question is where to draw boundaries and on what basis.

Econospeak
Freedom of Speech for Fascists?
Peter Dorman | Professor of Political Economy, The Evergreen State College

6 comments:

Andrew Anderson said...

The fascists in Germany got their power from the Great Depression the government privileged banking cartels caused.

So how about removing those privileges and providing restitution to the cheated population? Instead of toying with the idea of speech suppression?

Tom Hickey said...

The fascists in Germany got their power from the Great Depression the government privileged banking cartels caused.

Uh, no. The Nazis came to power owing to the effects of the onerous settlement at the end of WWI. See Treaty of Versailles

Andrew Anderson said...

Actually, it was both Tom, and I may have a direct quote somewhere on the Internet from Wiki that says so under "causes of World War II." That Wiki article was changed some time later to eliminate the Great Depression as a major cause of WWII and place the blame largely on one man, Adolph Hitler.

Anything to save the banks though, even if history must be re-written?

I'll look for that quote, now.

Andrew Anderson said...

Can't find that quote but a little searching found this:

HITLER COMES TO POWER

In the early 1930s, the mood in Germany was grim. The worldwide economic depression had hit the country especially hard, and millions of people were out of work. Still fresh in the minds of many was Germany's humiliating defeat fifteen years earlier during World War I, and Germans lacked confidence in their weak government, known as the Weimar Republic. These conditions provided the chance for the rise of a new leader, Adolf Hitler, and his party, the National Socialist German Workers' Party, or Nazi party for short.
from https://www.ushmm.org/outreach/en/article.php?ModuleId=10007671 [bold added]

Noah Way said...

@AA During the roaring 20's, when much of the rest of the world was enjoying dazzling economic conditions, the Weimar Republic was experiencing hyperinflation due to punative economic demands of the Treaty of Versailles. In June 1922 a dollar was worth 320 marks, by December it was worth 7,400. By November 1923, the dollar was worth 4,210,500,000,000 marks. This is six years before the Great Depression. Versailles directly created the conditions that led to Hitler's rise to power and WWII.

Andrew Anderson said...

This is six years before the Great Depression. Noah Way

But Hitler coming to power in 1933, not in 1923, so it was, like I said, BOTH the Treaty of Versailles AND the Great Depression that led to Hitler coming to power.

I continue to be astonished at how people will bend over backwards to defend the government-privileged usury cartels - even to the point of ignoring history.