[ExI] Mathematics Risque tale :)

[Rafal Smigrodzki]

On Wed, Oct 30, 2019 at 7:58 PM William Flynn Wallace via extropy-chat <
extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org> wrote:

> I'm not sure that banning rape jokes is moral progress at a time when
> rape and sexual violence is the main theme in the massively popular
> Game of Thrones series
>
> The above is a non-sequitur.  You can't ban anything like this, but if it
> were up to me, I'd do it in a split nanosecond, and I am usually a powerful
> opponent of censorship.  Many women have been scarred emotionally for life
> even by attempted rape, much less the real thing.  Not a topic for humor if
> you have any empathy for women.  What's next?  Abortion jokes?  Syphilis
> jokes?  Completely disgusting.  ( No, I am not hung up about sex.  I taught
> the course for several years.)
>
>
### What's wrong with abortion jokes?

There was a time when if you asked me whether cruelly torturing dogs should
be punished by incarceration I would have answered "Yes, of course", since
I love doggies and the thought of intentionally torturing them makes me
sick to my stomach. But on further reflection and goaded by my
systematizing instincts, I changed my mind. Since only humans are a true
repository of value, humans may not be grievously harmed if no human harm
is at stake. So, if you wanted to run a dogfight ring in Mytopia no
enforcer would break down your door. Of course, nice people might still
choose to deny you any association with them, ban you from walking into
their homes and businesses - but they wouldn't give themselves the right to
infringe on your property, including furry and breathing property.

For a similar reason I would not ban any jokes, no matter how distasteful.
Claimed "emotional scarring" is no basis for inflicting actual physical
harms in revenge. Speech must be free. To say otherwise is hate speech, and
hate speech must be stopped. There is a self-referential paradox here but I
don't care. Speech must be free.

Rafal
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