First published in Oct 2024 on LI

There is a lot being said and discussed recently on Freedom of Speech, fascism and Tolerance that I think it’s time I should share few thoughts on that since societies around the world are being influenced and moved on these ideas.

Technology and Tolerance are inversely related. When a Society starts having Technology seep deep into it’s core, it eventually leads to an Intolerant Society.

However Technology doesn’t create Intolerance. It just speeds up.

What actually creates Intolerance is a Tolerant Society. A Society that champions Freedom of Speech.

This might sound counter-intuitive to many, because that’s what it actually is:

The Paradox of Tolerance:

Tolerance and Freedom of Speech are directly related. More the Freedom of Speech, more Tolerant the society towards everyone’s right to express themself.

It’s an easy intuitive straightforward idea understood by most and hence the recent movements towards inciting that idea amongst masses.

However, what’s not much understood by most is that Intolerance is a fundamental consequence of a society that tries to have unrestricted Freedom of Speech.

If a society’s practice of tolerance is inclusive of the intolerant, intolerance will ultimately dominate, eliminating the tolerant and the practice of tolerance with them.

When people demand Freedom of Speech because they claim to not want a despotic and fascist rule, what they don’t understand that Freedom of Speech just like Tolerance is paradoxical in itself:

Because by definition when you imply unchecked Freedom, it leads to implying the freedom to act to limit the freedom of others. The act of being Tolerant, Freedom of Speech for all, needs extension of that idea to extremists who… if successful, would ruthlessly suppress the speech of those with whom they disagree.

Which eventually leads to a despotic rule and an Intolerant Society in the end for all.

A society can thus never have True Freedom of Speech, a true Tolerant society because it will eventually lead to a society that will be dominated by Intolerance and no Freedom of Speech.

The Paradox of Tolerance - Karl Popper, Vol I, The Open Society and its Enemies, 1945.

This paradox leads to the fact that, in order to maintain a tolerant society, the society must retain the right to be intolerant of intolerance.

A society can never truly have a Freedom of Speech (Tolerance) without blowing itself up in the end which will eventually require to restrict Freedom of Speech.

So when your favorite tech leaders incite masses in the name of “Freedom of Speech” what they are uneducated on is that ultimate Tolerance and Freedom of Speech leads to a society that becomes Intolerant and a restrictive Freedom of Speech, a despotic rule, the very thing they claim they are fighting against.

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