ALB
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This article from June 2011 "Windy Nimbies mean nothing can get done" by David Aaronovitch showed how Nimbies also misuse science to protect their backyards.http://www.thetimes.co.uk/tto/opinion/columnists/davidaaronovitch/article3057289.eceUnfortunately, you have to pay to see it, but the part you can see gives the gist of it:
Quote:Whether it’s turbines or high-speed rail, the vocal and time-rich will dredge up any argument to stop progressWhat is it you want, SP? Would you be satisfied with the ending of "mod queues" and the only sanction against persistent rule-breakers, after due warning, being suspension (for, say, 72 hours)?
A list of "top" historians have a letter in today's Times supporting Gove's history plans. When you see some of the names this is not surprising: Niall Ferguson, Andrew Roberts and David Starkey, hardly serious, objective historians but ardent nationalists.The Times does have the honesty to quote some critics too:
Quote:Sir Richard Evans, Regius Professor of History at Cambridge, condemned plans to restore "rote learning of the patriotic stocking-fillers so beloved of traditionalists".Quote:… Greg Jenner, who describes himself as "chief fact nerd" for Horrible Histories, said that the new curriculum "represents an ideological shift back towards the moral didactism of yesteryear".What next? They're thinking of introducing "negative interest rates":http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-21589128This was tried in Japan but didn't work. They seem be running around like headless chickens clucking at straws.
The full list of candidates was published at noon today. There are 6 including the BNP:http://www.islington.gov.uk/publicrecords/library/Democracy/Publicity/Public-notices/2012-2013/%282013-02-25%29-SOPN-Junction.pdfTUSC are not standing but seem to be concentrating on the Gospel Oak by-election on 14 March in nearby Camden where their candidate is an official of the RMT union. The BNP is standing there too and in the other by-election in Islington in St George's ward the same day as in Junction ward.
Thanks for confirming what I thought. That you started this thread, not in order to discuss, as appears on the surface, whether or not there would be any restrictions on free speech in a socialist society, but to discuss the moderation policy pursued by this and most other internet forums and its application in one case. In other words, it should not have been here, in the "General Discussion" section, but in the "Website/Technical" section where there is already an on-going thread on this. It is not me that has derailed the discussion here (I only discussed what was on the tin) but you who have derailed the General Discussion section. I'm quite prepared to continue the discussion of your point in the appropriate place — the Website/Technical section. But here is not the place.My apologies for not checking that you had already answered the question you posed in the title, at least in relation to future socialist society, by a “yes (in certain restricted circumstances)”. My only excuse is that this thread had been dormant for six weeks until you revived it the day before yesterday.
I don't know whether or not the initiator of the thread had an ulterior motive or not, but look at the title again and re-read the first post. It quotes the following definition of "censorship" (from wikipedia):
Quote:Censorship is the suppression of speech or other public communication which may be considered objectionable, harmful, sensitive, or inconvenient as determined by a government, media outlet, or other controlling body. It can be done by governments and private organizations or by individuals who engage in self-censorship. It occurs in a variety of different contexts including speech, books, music, films and other arts, the press, radio, television, and the Internet for a variety of reasons including national security, to control obscenity, child pornography, and hate speech, to protect children, to promote or restrict political or religious views, to prevent slander and libel, and to protect intellectual property. It may or may not be legal. Many countries provide strong protections against censorship by law, but none of these protections are absolute and it is frequently necessary to balance conflicting rights in order to determine what can and cannot be censored.At the end he nailed his colours to the mast and stated:
Quote:My stance is that restriction of free speech and expression would have no place in a socialist society and therefore has no place on any socialist platform.That' seems clear enough.Or is it? Does he really think that there should be no regulations against "child pornography" or to "prevent slander and libel" in a socialist society? Is he really against everything that the wikipedia definition defines as "censorship"? Not even Index on Censorship go that far. After quoting from an Article in the European Convention on Human rights, they say:
Quote:These qualifications suggest that the universal right is not absolute, so can be balanced against other rights such as the right to privacy and in certain limited cases, can be restricted. Index recognises this balance, but believes that other fundamental human rights can only be realised if the right to freedom of expression is protected.The point I'm making is that, on the wikipedia definition, there is "censorship" and "censorship" and that it is too facile to simply state that nothing whatsoever should ever be "censored". Having said this, I agree of course that the censorship of ideas should have no place in "the struggle towards socialism and/or within a future socialist society".
John H, it is true that under capitalism today many scientists are like lawyers, "hired guns" paid by commercial entreprises to express in scientific language a case for or against something that would enhance or harm their profit-seeking. So, yes, there is a perversion of science in the service of capitalism or, rather, of particular capitalist interests and we need to beware of this.But this criticism assumes that there is an objective standard by which such perversions can be judged and exposed. In other words, an "objective science".To deny that there is any such thing as "objective science" is to go down the road of post-modernism and its view that everything is just a intersubjective "narrative". The Earth is spherical whatever the narrative of flat-earthers might say.
From the title and first posting of this thread a casual observer would get the impression that it was going to be about to whether or not the same sort of restrictions as libel, not naming rape victims, jury secrecy, child pornography that exist today would or could continue into a socialist society and which purists might describe as "censorship", and whether or not any or all of these would be compatible with socialist principles.But it appears to have veered off into a discussion as to whether a socialist discussion forum should be moderated and even of a single case of such moderation on one particular such forum; which is a discussion not so much as to what can be expressed as to how it can be and where and when; a rather different issue.So, what do people think? Will there be no regulations in socialism against spreading lies about people, naming rape victims, disclosing what goes on in a jury, etc? And would these regulations fall under the generally accepted understanding of what censorship is?
The same discussion seems to be going on in two places. Here and in this place:http://www.worldsocialism.org/spgb/forum/general-discussion/does-use-censorship-have-place-among-struggle-towards-socialism-andor-withi?page=9Shouldn't they both go on here so that there's no duplication?
JH wrote:It may well be as ALB suggests that the position taken by Paddy is the position most SPGB members would support. It is clearly a position taken by the ruling class and we all know that ruling ideas are ever ideas of the ruling class.That's a very weak argument as I'm sure that there are all sorts of "ruling ideas" (beginning with that the Earth moves round the Sun) that you share too but that doesn't make you a lackey of the ruling class any more than it makes Paddy.Incidentally, Paddy wasn't arguing for fracking, only against dismissing it out of hand.This is a better argument, though:
Quote:I am listening on a local radio phone-in to a discussion on attempts to set up a barrage to harness the power of tides on the Mersey. It is argued that such a technology could provide 80% of Merseyside's current energy use. Now there are environmental concerns about the effects such a barrage could have, fish, wildlife, etc. but someone has just rung in to propose floating barges that would rise and fall with the tides thus minimising effects on wildlife. However the main reason the scheme was rejected after investigation was apparently the return on investment which would take up to 30 years to recover.I raise this to point out both the main motivations governing energy use under capitalism and the untapped potential of human ingenuity which would be utilised in socialist revolution and which would make energy problems so qualitatively different.Exactly, and the same thing has happened over the Severn barrage: not profitable so not done.The obvious renewable energies to use on these islands off the North West of the European mainland are wind and tidal power and in socialist society there will be no such obstacle to building barrages across the Mersey, Severn, etc, but there is opposition too to these. How would you answer their concerns and fears if not by appealing to "objective science"?
That's a point, but Alan was talking about the early days of socialism and the energy structure that might well be inherited. Socialist society wouldn't be able to suddenly close down all nuclear or fossil fuel burning power stations that might exist at that time and conjure up a world-wide energy structure based entirely on renewable sources of energy. There'd have to be a gradual phasing out of the first in favour of the second.
alanjjohnstone wrote:You do a disservice to other comrades when you infer that Pathfinders article on fracking is party-policy.I don't think Paddy was laying down Party policy. He was merely arguing that we were not necessarily opposed to fracking, as some Greens, Nimbys and others are. In fact, if he had said that we opposed fracking and supported the "Stop It" campaigns that would have been trying to lay down Party policy, but it would have been the wrong policy because it is not the Party's policy get involved in such campaigns. I think he put the position most members would support when he writes in his reply:
Quote:Fracking is a mining technology, not an index of political crises. If it can be made safe, and if we need it, we may use it in socialism.Incidentally, since we started having regular columns in the Socialist Standard the writers have had a certain leeway to express their views. Readers might have noticed the differing emphases sometimes taken up by Pathfinders and the Material World column. In this month (and next month) if you read between the lines you can see that Stefan is essentially taking up an anti-car position. Many members will no doubt find this exaggerated (I know I do) but he's not laying down Party policy nor is he that explicit.But to return to the Party's policy or, better, the Party position, I think you too express it well when you write:
alanjjohnstone wrote:We enter a socialist society not with a blank page but with what exists now in capitalism. We have coal mines, we have nuclear power stations and we frack oil/gas. Those will be phased out, imho, as the renewables come on-stream replacing them and the waste of the capitalist economy diminishes.In other words, it is not inconceivable that fracking may (have to) exist in socialism. Or, as Paddy put, "if we need it, we may use it in socialism".
alanjjohnstone wrote:Until workers can decide without the evidence from science being distorted we must abide by the physicians "first do no harm" and exercise the precautionary principle. That is not sitting on the fence and being neutral but siding with the anti-fracking, anti-GM and anti-nuclear power in as much as we say Stop It!The "precautionary principle" is one of the sillier slogans to have emerged (rivalling "think global, act local" and "the personal is political"). One definition of it is:
Quote:the precept that an action should not be taken if the consequences are uncertain and potentially dangerous.If applied to everyday life, this would lead to complete inaction, not even having a bath or a shower in case you slipped and banged your head on the tiles causing death or brain damage. Nobody would drive a car or get on a plane. Nobody would cycle to work (in fact that is so dangerous that they probably shouldn't).It is the slogan of conservatives who want to justify the status quo. It's the argument that, on another thread, Alaric has been using against socialism.It also can also have a perverse effect. Say fracking was banned on the "precautionary principle". There would still be a demand for energy. Where would it come from? The only immediate, practicable source is nuclear energy. But the precautionary principlers want to ban this too. So we are back to coal, which of course they say should never have been allowed in the first place. They'd have probably opposed the use of fire when its use was first proposed.And the principle can be used to defend vested interests. GM food for humans is banned in Europe but not elsewhere. The ban, justified on the precautionary principle, allows competition from GM crops in the US and Brazil to be kept out, so protecting European farming interests.We're best not to get involved in the inter-capitalist interests that are often behind these arguments about which policy governments should pursue. We should certainly not be "siding with the anti-fracking, anti-GM and anti-nuclear power in as much as we say Stop it!" (not that we do or ever have). We should either be neutral on these issues or criticise these lobbies for wanting to throw the baby out with the bathwater (or rather, in most cases, for not even wanting to throw out the bathwater). We should also of course criticise and expose the opposing lobbies that plead for capitalist entreprises to be allowed the freedom to do what they want in the pursuit of profit. But whatever we do we must never give the impression that we are anti-scientific advance and anti-new technology.
Stuart, there is another thread on this SWP business and it was discussed there:http://www.worldsocialism.org/spgb/forum/events-and-announcements/swp-pre-conference-bulletins-2012
