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Perplexed comments on Offense versus harm minimization - Less Wrong
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Comments (417)
Yvain's salmon analogy has drawn some criticism. I have to agree that it is not a perfect analogy. Analogies rarely are perfect. The best course, I find, is to offer a choice of analogies and let people choose the one with the most resonance. Pick one from this list:
Photoshop the Queen with a salmon day. We don't need to surgically alter the Brits. Just have a bit of fun with their national symbol. If insulting the Queen doesn't work, try Lady Di.
Tell an ethnic joke day. Stereotyping can be funny and is never physically harmful. If an ethnic group is capable of making fun of itself, then everyone should be able to make fun of them. It is all just in fun.
Use a bad word day. Isn't it ridiculous that people get offended at the use of certain four letter words - particularly those denoting body parts or normal biological functions. Isn't it clever to make people angry when they are unable to justify their anger rationally?
Let it all hang out day. And some people are offended not just by hearing about body parts, but also by seeing them. The occasional practice of public nudism (weather permitting) will help to make the world a better, less neurotic, place.
Use racial epithets day. Sticks and stones can break your bones, but words can never hurt you. Some people, though, don't seem to realize this. It is time to confront their irrational viewpoint that speech should not be completely free.
Desecrate a religious symbol day. Don't draw Mohammed - he already has a day. Instead, burn a Torah, feed a sacremental host to rats, pull the pins out of a voodoo doll. Lets show some imagination here. What can we do in Delhi to a sacred cow? Catapults can be fun.
Piss in someone's vegetable garden day. Some people have the uninformed impression that human urine is unsanitary. Not true, it is actually a sterile medium. People in India sometimes consume small quantities of their own urine much as people in the West drink herbal teas. Its time to dispell this anti-urine superstition.
Barbecue a cat day. Confront dietary prejudices head on, and also lend a hand to the Humane Society in addressing the cat overpopulation problem. Actually killing and butchering the cats publicly provides a more vivid demonstration. And as an added benefit, leading people to care less about kittens will make the internet a more productive environment and may even increase contributions to the SIAI.
I have to admit that if I actually encountered one of the protests on this list in real life, my initial reaction would be amusement. Repetition might change that to annoyance. But only one of those ideas actually offends me. Which one? I won't tell. YMMV.
I don't see what's wrong with any of those.
Don't have Break a paperclip day. Or Unbend a paperclip day. Or Frivolously waste metal day.
What if I credibly believe that the long-term consequence of endorsing "unbend a paperclip day" will be that large numbers of contrarians will start to increasingly value properly-bent paperclips, resulting in more properly-bent paperclips existing in the long run?
You would be using incorrect reasoning.
Healthy urine is sterile. Unhealthy urine may not be. (To say nothing of the desirability of adulterating others' food with even the most harmless additives - I don't want mint oil on my vegetables, even though I'm certain it won't do me physical harm. I don't like the taste of mint.)
Also, large quantities of nitrogen in one spot (overfertilisation) can mess up a garden.
But it's barbecue a cat day that really offends me, since (unlike vegetables) cats have feelings too.
Cat overpopulation is an actual problem, gobs of cats are put down by the Humane Society every day. I don't know what they do with their dead cats, but I find wasting perfectly usable meat and tissue more offensive than the proposed barbecue.
FWIW, I am both a cat owner and a vegetarian.
I wonder if more or fewer people would adopt cats if the cats would otherwise be barbecued.
That's a good point. However, the danger with a cat BBQ is that people develop a taste for them and, rather than eating the leftovers from the Humane Society, breed their own for good flavour. In fact, I pretty much guarantee that, should Barbecue-a-Cat-Day ever catch on (and be celebrated in earnest), then this will indeed happen.
That is a ridiculously sensible proposal, and I feel silly for not having thought of it myself.
I was not under the impression that cats tasted good.
Are you a vegetarian?
Mostly. I could go into detail if you care.
With the exception of evicting the pisser from your garden I'd say none of these actions justifies a violent response. As a believer in the value of free speech I defend them all even if I would not choose to participate in them.
All of the above days seem quite fun and fine to me.
As for the original article point - I agree that there isn't any significant difference between the hypothetical British salmon case and Mohammad's case, but it this fact doesn't change anything. There isn't a right to never be offended. There is no duty to abstain from offending others. It's nice if others are nice, but you can't demand everybody to be nice - most of them will be indifferent, and some will be not nice, and you just have to live with it and deal with it without using violence - and if you don't know how to handle it without violence, then you are still a 'child' in that sense and have to learn proper reaction, so everybody can (and probably should) provoke you until you learn to deal with it.
Well said! It is shameful that many folks' response to this is that we need to punish those who act to offend. Those who enforce and enable the unreasonable standard of a right to not be offended are at blame.
A quick search shows that (the being most likely to be identified with the label) Lady Di is already dead.
People can still become offended by insults aimed at a deceased person, under certain circumstances. Perhaps confusingly, the intent wouldn't be to offend the Queen / Lady Di!