Thread by @docrussjackson

"What I stated was, that the Conservative party was, by the law of its constitution, necessarily the stupidest party. Now, I do not retract this assertion; but I did not mean that Conservatives are generally stupid; I meant, that stupid people are generally Conservative." JS Mill

The Liberal philosopher John Stuart Mill MP (1806-1873) was elected MP for the City of Westminster in 1865 on a platform including votes for women.

This is from a speech he gave on May 31st, 1866:

JS MIll is often invoked by Right as well as left-wingers
in discussions about free speech.

In his book 'On Liberty' he makes an impassioned defence of free speech.

Mill argues that free discourse is a necessary condition for intellectual and social progress.

He argued that we can never be sure that a silenced opinion does not contain at least some element of the truth, but that allowing (STUPID, IGNORANT, UNHINGED, HATEFUL, DOGMATIC or GRIFTING) people to air false opinions is productive for two reasons:

First, individuals are more likely to abandon erroneous beliefs if they are engaged in an open exchange of ideas.

Second, by forcing other individuals to re-examine and re-affirm their beliefs in the process of debate, these beliefs are kept from declining into mere dogma.

It's not enough that one has an unexamined belief that happens to be true; one must understand why the belief in question is true.

Abusive language, on the side of prevailing opinion, deters people from expressing contrary opinions, & from listening to those who express them.

Mill outlines the benefits of 'searching for and discovering the truth' as a way to further knowledge.

He argued that even if an opinion is ENTIRELY FALSE, the truth can be better understood by refuting the error.

But as most opinions are neither *completely* true nor *completely* false, he points out that ALLOWING FREE EXPRESSION & DEBATE allows the airing of competing views as a way to preserve partial truth in various opinions.

Worried about minority views being suppressed, Mill argued in support of freedom of speech on political grounds, stating that it is a critical component for a representative government to have to empower debate over public policy.

He also argued that freedom of expression allows for personal growth & self-realization: that freedom of speech was a vital way to 'develop talents & realise a person's potential & creativity'. He repeatedly said that eccentricity was preferable to 'uniformity & stagnation'.

But the belief that freedom of speech would advance society, naively presupposed a society sufficiently culturally & institutionally advanced to be capable of progressive improvement, that 'the public' were capable judge if an argument was wrong or harmful.

Mill argued that even arguments which are used in justifying murder or REBELLION AGAINST THE GOVT should NOT be POLITICALLY SUPPRESSED or socially persecuted. According to him, IF REBELLION IS NECCESSARY, PEOPLE SHOULD REBEL; if murder is truly proper, it should be allowed.

The way to express those arguments should be in public speech or writing, not in ways that causes actual harm.

Harm principle: "The only purpose for which power can be rightfully exercised over any member of a civilised community, against his will, is to prevent harm to others."

Nowadays, Mill's argument is generally accepted by many democratic countries, & they have laws at least guided by the harm principle: in both the UK & USA there are limits on free speech such as obscenity, defamation, breach of peace, & libel.