In July of 2020, Harper’s Magazine published an open letter on “Justice and Open Debate”, signed by over a hundred writers, journalists, and thinkers — including big names such as Salman Rushdie, Margaret Atwood, and JK Rowling.

The letter itself is only three paragraphs long, and speaks mostly in broad strokes, arguing that we as a society must protect the right to discuss any idea, even those we disagree with, and particularly warns against punishing those who raise ideas that are unfashionable or supposedly dangerous with the loss of jobs or reputation. 

It goes on to say that even so-called “caustic counter-speech” must be aired and defeated in the public sphere, and a culture of limiting our freedom to debate them openly can be just as dangerous as the caustic ideas themselves.

The argument itself is so unspecific, it’s sort of hard to argue against on principle. “Free speech, we like it!”

But the response has shown that’s exactly the problem: in making such a broad argument, it comes off as naive and totally unhelpful. In a time where people without a voice are finding it in new ways, it feels out of touch. As a veiled swipe against “cancel culture” it seems to miss the point that free speech is exactly what’s being deployed, finally, to hold powerful people and gatekeepers to account for their words and actions.

That in reality, “cancel culture” should more honestly be thought of as “consequence culture”. Sometimes when you use your freedom to say things, everyone else uses their freedom to say you’re out of line.

This all comes just weeks after another Big Internet Discussion that sprung up following an editorial, written by Senator Tom Cotton and published in the New York Times Opinion section, arguing for the deployment of the military against protestors. 

In the blowback that followed, editor James Bennet resigned from the Times. He was not fired, fined or punished. But he did resign, probably under pressure. Which is important to the ensuing discussion around whether consequences like this are ultimately damaging to free speech in a broader sense.

In an interview with WNYC’s On The Media, Vox writer David Roberts discussed his response, in which he outlines how the farthest right thinkers are no longer operating within the bounds of good faith debate, particularly when it comes to free speech. (See video for excerpt.)

This is a helpful distinction: when we’re talking about what speech is “acceptable,” we aren’t usually talking about the concept of free speech in an absolute sense. We’re more often talking about which ideas get the benefit of certain platforms to amplify them.

Think of two extremes: in one world, everyone gets their own prime-time TV show. That’s crazy and impossible, because there aren’t time slots and studio spaces to make that real. Someone, somewhere, has to choose.

On another extreme: a guy in a park screaming that all left-handed people are witches who should be shot into the sun. Now, this guy is just a guy, given no resources or platform by anyone. But even so, if he did this day after day, his community would probably choose to keep him out of that park, eventually. His crazy, violent speech is baseless, disruptive, and harmful to the public good.

Neither extreme is realistic, but illustrates that either extreme is not the real point: not everyone gets unfettered access to a large audience, and not every idea is up for good faith discussion in public.

So what we’re really talking about are the basic rules we agree upon for public debate. And under those rules, for example, we might decide that lying conspiracy peddlers don’t get to have Twitter accounts because they spread misinformation, which hurts everyone. Or that White Supremacists aren’t appropriate to interview on live TV because their fundamental position runs counter to our shared ideals of equality, and so at their very core, they don’t deserve unfiltered distribution.

And especially when we’re talking about publication or broadcast, we can’t forget all the ideas that never get their turn on the stage to begin with, because the powers behind those platforms traditionally favor certain views or voices.

So, maybe it’s time to consider what the world could be like if there were a core set of principles that outline what’s suitable for public debate — either basic requirements, or possibly a few select restrictions.

Imagine the five rules for good faith public debate; 
what might they be?

How and where should they be applied, and what spaces, if any, deserve to be free of any and all restrictions?

How would applying rules like this make public discourse better, or potentially worse?

The point of this project has always been to take a look at the news and pop culture of the moment and try to dig a little bit deeper.

To spark conversations about ideas, beyond superficial reactions of: “this movie is good and I like it” or “this article is interesting and I agree with it”, by taking the focus off of opinions and instead asking questions that lead to discussions among friends. Ideally, discussions that reveal something about who we are, and what matters to us. The kind of conversations that maybe even bring us closer to some deeper truths, and to each other.

It seems like that’s the kind of discussion we’re all having right now, about one very big thing: America’s structural racism, and the police violence that’s both a symptom — and a perpetuator — of that racism.

Beyond acknowledging their validity, I’m no expert on this stuff. I’m still very much in listening and learning mode right now. So in this moment, I wanted to share someone else’s discussion. It’s between two people I admire even though I don’t always agree with them, who’ve both proven to have incredible critical minds, and who I know think deeply about the world’s problems and what we can do to fix them.

On the June 3rd, 2020 episode of the Ezra Klein Show, he and author Ta-Nahisi Coates discussed the role of the police in society, and what some alternatives might look like. The whole conversation was strangely hopeful, and though I wouldn’t normally lift such a large chunk verbatim, this exchange gave me a lot to think about — both on how to understand what’s happening today and how to imagine what the future could look like.

Right now feels like a critical moment to really consider ideas like these, and honestly discuss:

What situations have you seen or been in involving police, and how could they have gone differently with a different kind of help?

Instead of dialing 911 and having armed police respond to every problem in our communities, what might an alternative system look like?

What does the world need more of right now, that we could deploy in a nationwide effort, instead of more police forces?

**note: most of these are intended to have a long “discussable shelf-life,” which I believe to be equally true here — but this one takes on added importance at this moment in particular.**

**additional note: because of this moment in time (and the time it’s afforded us), I’ve also started experimenting with a video format. Similar content either way. Please be kind, it’s early days yet.**

In this coronavirus-plagued spring of 2020, we find ourselves stuck at home with our roommates, family or partners in a way we never have before.  Meanwhile the media (from news outlets to advertisers) have all-too-eagerly tried to frame this moment as a heartwarming opportunity — to spend that time growing closer, if we use it right.

This reminded me of an episode from John Greene’s podcast, The Anthropocene Reviewed, where late last year, while discussing the merits and uses of the iPhone’s Notes app, he quotes something he had once jotted down in his phone: a the poet Donald Hall’s much more artful take on how we spend time with loved ones. Less a maximization strategy, than a reckoning with the reality of relationships.

“We did not spend our days gazing into each other’s eyes. We did that gazing when we made love or when one of us was in trouble, but most of the time our gazes met and entwined as they looked at a third thing. Third things are essential to marriages, objects or practices or habits or arts or institutions or games or human beings that provide a site of joint rapture or contentment. Each member of a couple is separate; the two come together in double attention.”

So in this time of being together, alone, for longer-than-usual stretches, it seemed like a good time to reflect on those Third Things, and decide which ones are better at deepening our relationships vs merely filling time.

What are the Third Things in your relationships?

Which are best at bringing you together,
and what makes them better than others?

How is our reliance on Third Things a positive
or negative reality of how we connect to each other?

Everyone has a strong opinion about what movie was the best, or which actors put on the most convincing (or biggest) shows in their respective films.

Some of us consider ourselves film-literate enough to have opinions about screenplays or editing, or to think that Roger Deakins was robbed of his cinematography award yet again (fingers crossed for Blade Runner 2049, buddy. You deserve it!)

But with fully half the awards going to things most people have never seen (sorry short docs!), or barely understand (what’s the difference between sound mixing and editing again?), there still seem to be some glaring omissions for things that never receive recognition at all.

For example, Stephen Thompson of Pop Culture Happy Hour suggests (at 6:37 to about 7:15, below), that instead of male and female acting categories, we should do adapted and original roles. So one category for playing historical figures like Churchill or Harding, one for characters created out of thin air. This idea is incredible and should be instituted immediately.

Personally, I am angered every year that comedy is so grossly underrepresented, because writing and performing great comedy is very very hard (see: most comedy). I would suggest a category purely for Best Comedy Writing in a Film, so someone like Armando Ianucci, Kristen Wiig or Judd Apatow could finally be recognized for their indelible contributions to pop culture.

What category would you like to see added to the Oscars, and why?

 

If you truly want to be challenged emotionally and ethically, I suggest — though with the requisite warnings about content that’s troubling, difficult, and may put you in a head space you do not want to be in — listening to the Love + Radio episode, “A Red Dot”, an extended interview with a man describing what it’s like to live life on the sex offender registry.

This isn’t a gawking look at how awful people live. It’s an attempt to empathize with a person who for many will be the least empathetic person you can think of. And it’s successful in that it doesn’t let him off the hook for making some very bad decisions, or having moments that suggest there’s a lingering disturbance within this person. But it also confronts us with the fact that a man can make a bad decision and continue paying the price for the rest of his life, no matter how he may learn, or grow, or change. It’s heavy stuff. I dare you to listen and not find yourself, at least at moments, feeling that empathy.

The tough question is, what can or should be done in this trickiest of situations?

 

If it’s acceptable to keep persecuting people after they’ve paid their debt, what are the limits to punishment?

 

Do we believe people can change enough to be forgiven, or at the very least left to live their life?

 

If we do, why is it ok to keep vilifying them? If we don’t, do they deserve what we put them through, or is there a better way to handle those we want to permanently ostracize?