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imonroe comments on Offense versus harm minimization - Less Wrong
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This is an interesting thread.
Here's a difference between the British-salmon and Muslim-Mohammed scenarios.
In the British scenario, you've postulated that the British politely ask the rest of the world to refrain from waving photos of salmon in their faces.
In the Muslim scenario, the ultra-religious are DEMANDING that the rest of the world obey their edicts on what is appropriate to draw.
I personally feel a very visceral reaction when I'm told that I'm not allowed to draw/write about/think about something. "Who are you," I think, "to presume to tell me what I can and can't express? Just who do you think you are that you get to have that sort of control over my expressions?"
My gut instinct then, is to write/draw/think about/talk about that forbidden thing.
It's the difference between a suggestion and a command. Were the Muslim community to say something like, "Ok, do as you please, but for the sake of civility, we hope you'll refrain from exposing us to the images of Mohammed you might create," you know, I'd probably say sure, ok. That's civilized. But to say, "You may not, UNDER THREAT OF DEATH, make any images or jokes about X," that's just too dictatorial for me to accept, on any level.
Is that justified though? Suppose a subset of British go about demanding restriction on salmon image production. Would that justify you going out of your way to promote the production of such images, making them more likely to be seen by the subset not making such demands?
The above looks like a standard least convenient possible world adjustment; and the original post was already trying for a scenario like that, so I'm not sure why it was downvoted.
The question of why we experience that visceral revulsion at attempted control of our private thoughts and expressions is a fascinating one. I could try to attack it with introspection, but I'd like to see some experiments if anybody knows of relevant studies.
It makes game-theoretical sense. People who aren't willing to kick in a bit of extra vitriol when somebody touches their private thinky-parts tend to get violated and modified until that willingness increases.
That might depend on whether it discouraged the salmon extremists from making such demands.
We don't have to suppose. This has happened in recent history. When a small group of british people turn hostile and violent for a specific cause, the media services and the population decry their actions, and the British government invariably arrests them. Thatnks to football hooligans, riots, the IRA, 7/7, and its nanny state system of CCTV cameras, the UK is actually quite good at this sort of thing.
In comparison the islamic world tends to take a 'boys will be boys' attitude to this kind of thing. While I appreciate the utility of avoiding words like 'blaim' and 'fault' it's kinda hard when the 'victims' are not only indirectly supporting terrorism but actively egging them on.