First of all, let me be clear: I have absolutely no hesitation about
silencing Nazis, so I don't want anything I say to be taken as a
contribution to any hand-wringing discussion about THAT.
With respect to Foucault, however, I think that Foucault is quite
explicit about one thing: the ideal of a society in which no one
exercised power (e.g., silencing, labelling, etc.) over anyone else
would be an incoherent ideal even if it were an attractive one (which
in his view it isn't). There would, for example, be no socialization,
no language, etc., and so it would not be a "society" in any sense
familiar to a speaker of English. Above all it would be a life
"nasty, poor, brutish and short," as Hobbes said in another context.
So Foucault could never plausibly be read as saying that the mere fact
that one labels fascists as engaging in illegitimate speech makes you
somehow an accomplice in something somehow politically tyrannical.
There are people who say such things. But certainly Foucault was too
politically sophisticated to be one of them.
Second, speaking as someone who was attacked and beaten by a gang of
organized Nazis in Toronto a couple of summers ago while giving out
anti-racist literature, I can assure anyone who has illusions in this
regard that Nazi "speech" has the same status as most other politcal
speech: it is part of a practical organizing strategy (just like the
anti-racist "speech" that I was distributing that day).
Those who believe that politics somehow falls out of beliefs like
magic are simply making a factual error. Politics is organized.
Whether it is tennants staging a rent strike, fascists murdering an
immigrant, political parties winning elections, the International
Monetary Fund encouraging the torture of Peruvian trade unionists, or
senior citizens lobbying for better state-funded pensions -- in every
case, these things have to be organized. And the way people organize
is by doing things like having meetings, publishing newsletters or
magazines, using web-pages or e-mail lists, etc., holding marches and
rallies, circulating petitions, sponsoring cultural events, and so on.
There are, of course, any number of additional tactics, from
assasinations to letter-writing campaigns to boycotts, etc. I'm just
mentioning some of the more common ones, many of which involve speech
that is sometimes censored.
Whether it's the US Republican Party or some tiny Fascist gang of
immigrant-killing thugs, politics happens because people organize it.
And political speech, such as Nazi speech, is part of that organizing
process (in most cases, at least, although academics tend not to
notice this for reasons which are more or less obvious).
So the question is not, "Does a majority have the right to silence the
political speech of a minority of which it disapproves?" Rather, the
question is, "(a) Should we allow Nazis a space in which to organize?,
and (b) If not, how can we prevent them from gaining such a space?"
People fascinated by the first version of the question, which I regard
as positively saturated with delusions and mystifications, are
generally not the sort of people who can be relied on to be helpful in
the struggles of people interested in the second version. (It is
notable that, at least in my experience, philosophers who are
politically active tend not to study political philosophy, and vice
versa).
As for the idea that there is an inviolable right to free speech, I am
(as you might guess) tempted to dismiss the idea out of hand, and
ignore the "issue" altogether. But I won't. Instead I will point out
that free speech, too, must be organized. And one of the things that
somebody has to be willing to do if free speech is going to be
organized successfully is to prevent Nazi thugs from beating up people
who distribute anti-racist literature on street corners. But that
means organizing AGAINST them, in order to block their own organizing
efforts (rallies and marches, magazines, meetings, and so on).
The only worry I have in this area is that it is often difficult to
silence Nazis, and there are too few people trying to do it.
Steve D
Toronto
silencing Nazis, so I don't want anything I say to be taken as a
contribution to any hand-wringing discussion about THAT.
With respect to Foucault, however, I think that Foucault is quite
explicit about one thing: the ideal of a society in which no one
exercised power (e.g., silencing, labelling, etc.) over anyone else
would be an incoherent ideal even if it were an attractive one (which
in his view it isn't). There would, for example, be no socialization,
no language, etc., and so it would not be a "society" in any sense
familiar to a speaker of English. Above all it would be a life
"nasty, poor, brutish and short," as Hobbes said in another context.
So Foucault could never plausibly be read as saying that the mere fact
that one labels fascists as engaging in illegitimate speech makes you
somehow an accomplice in something somehow politically tyrannical.
There are people who say such things. But certainly Foucault was too
politically sophisticated to be one of them.
Second, speaking as someone who was attacked and beaten by a gang of
organized Nazis in Toronto a couple of summers ago while giving out
anti-racist literature, I can assure anyone who has illusions in this
regard that Nazi "speech" has the same status as most other politcal
speech: it is part of a practical organizing strategy (just like the
anti-racist "speech" that I was distributing that day).
Those who believe that politics somehow falls out of beliefs like
magic are simply making a factual error. Politics is organized.
Whether it is tennants staging a rent strike, fascists murdering an
immigrant, political parties winning elections, the International
Monetary Fund encouraging the torture of Peruvian trade unionists, or
senior citizens lobbying for better state-funded pensions -- in every
case, these things have to be organized. And the way people organize
is by doing things like having meetings, publishing newsletters or
magazines, using web-pages or e-mail lists, etc., holding marches and
rallies, circulating petitions, sponsoring cultural events, and so on.
There are, of course, any number of additional tactics, from
assasinations to letter-writing campaigns to boycotts, etc. I'm just
mentioning some of the more common ones, many of which involve speech
that is sometimes censored.
Whether it's the US Republican Party or some tiny Fascist gang of
immigrant-killing thugs, politics happens because people organize it.
And political speech, such as Nazi speech, is part of that organizing
process (in most cases, at least, although academics tend not to
notice this for reasons which are more or less obvious).
So the question is not, "Does a majority have the right to silence the
political speech of a minority of which it disapproves?" Rather, the
question is, "(a) Should we allow Nazis a space in which to organize?,
and (b) If not, how can we prevent them from gaining such a space?"
People fascinated by the first version of the question, which I regard
as positively saturated with delusions and mystifications, are
generally not the sort of people who can be relied on to be helpful in
the struggles of people interested in the second version. (It is
notable that, at least in my experience, philosophers who are
politically active tend not to study political philosophy, and vice
versa).
As for the idea that there is an inviolable right to free speech, I am
(as you might guess) tempted to dismiss the idea out of hand, and
ignore the "issue" altogether. But I won't. Instead I will point out
that free speech, too, must be organized. And one of the things that
somebody has to be willing to do if free speech is going to be
organized successfully is to prevent Nazi thugs from beating up people
who distribute anti-racist literature on street corners. But that
means organizing AGAINST them, in order to block their own organizing
efforts (rallies and marches, magazines, meetings, and so on).
The only worry I have in this area is that it is often difficult to
silence Nazis, and there are too few people trying to do it.
Steve D
Toronto