bigideas

So, today holocaust denier David Irving and leader of the far-right British National Party Nick Griffin are to address the Oxford Union, causing the media and the blogosphere to pick up the free speech debate right where the fuss over James Watson‘s remark last month left off.

According to tabloid newspaper the Daily Mail (not the most reliable source, but they don’t really have an axe to grind here, although see below),

[Chair of the Equality and Human Rights Commission Trevor Phillips] told BBC1′s Andrew Marr Show: “I think it is an absolute disgrace. As a former president of the National Union of Students I’m ashamed that this has happened. This is not a question of freedom of speech, this is a juvenile provocation.”

Mr Phillips said people had not fought and died for the right to freedom of speech only for it to be used as a “silly parlour game”.

But this is exactly what we mean by “freedom of speech”, even if it appears to you to be exercised as a juvenile provocation.

In a similar vein, pressure group Unite Against Fascism will be mounting a protest at the event, saying:

There is a world of difference between defending free speech and choosing to provide a platform for fascists.

Far from being the champions of free speech history shows that when fascists rise to power they destroy freedom of speech, democracy, human rights and they have murdered millions of people and attempted to annihilate entire communities. Wherever fascists have a presence, violence and intimidation increases.

Let’s leave aside the very broad-brush use of the term “fascism”, and the fact that neither the BNP nor Irving, unpleasant as they may be, have either “murdered millions of people” or proposed doing so. The key point is that “defending free speech” actually does sometimes mean providing a platform for people you don’t agree with.

Very few people think that “freedom of speech” is an absolute, inviolable right. It’s not okay for certain things to be said under certain circumstances. For instance, I accept Irving’s right to believe that the holocaust didn’t happen; it’s okay for him to write books and speak at university conferences. On the other hand it absolutely wouldn’t be okay for him to speak on the subject at, say, a primary school.

Why not? Because in the former cases his work is being scrutinised by people who are qualified to test its merits, whereas in the latter there’s an asymmetry of power that makes challenging the views being expressed much harder. Irving is (or was) a professor, he’s got a tweed jacket and a posh voice, and he knows lots of facts. I couldn’t win an argument with him either, and would be pretty intimidated if I had to try.

It’s partly the presence of a power imbalance that makes me dislike a boss who tells a homophobic joke in an office much more than someone who tells it to a friend in private. Indeed, I’m beginning to think that freedom of speech is contingent mainly on symmetries of power.

But the kicker is that speech, including but not limited to what’s commonly called “hate speech”, can itself be used to create such asymmetries. Take, as an example, an office with only one non-white employee. A racist remark made from one white employee to another weakens the non-white employee’s position even if the remark itself is not overheard.

I do, though, think it’s okay for Griffin to describe homophobic policy proposals to a Guardian journalist because I think Griffin, the journalist and the readers are all capable of making their own minds up about it. I suspect the same about the members of the Oxford Union, although in general one might want to be a bit careful about introducing radical politics into the crucible of a university campus.

Union president Luke Tryl has given the assurance that

[Irving and Griffin] will be speaking in the context of a forum in which there will be other speakers to challenge and attack their views in a head-to-head manner.

I think that makes a very big difference. In fact, it turns out that the event is to be a debate about free speech, a matter the Daily Mail‘s sensational coverage neglects to mention. If you’re going to have such a debate it would seem sensible to invite some people who had been censured for exercising their freedom of speech, and with whom the majority of the audience could be assumed to have little sympathy. That foregrounds the existence of hard cases, which are what make the debate into a debate rather than a drinks party.

Once you accept freedom of speech as the default, then any exceptions we make to it — banning certain linguistic acts under certain circumstances — have to be justified. The justification based on power is a start, although it doesn’t feel comprehensive or entirely convincing on its own.

Certainly I think “juvenile provocations” are okay, and are part of the intellectual growing-up process. And, as I said above, I also think that having a serious debate has to mean giving a platform to people you don’t agree with. Otherwise why not just invite someone you already agree with to talk to people who already agree with them?

Anyway, if you give them enough rope, they’ll do the rest. Here’s an easy example that just came readily to hand. Griffin recently wrote on his blog:

[W]hile I used to be very angry at (and rude about) the way the left-liberals use the Holocaust as a moral club to silence debate on the key issues of our time – I have never denied the fact that the Nazis murdered huge numbers of Jews in one of the great crimes of a century of terrible inhumanity.

and here’s the young Griffin doing exactly that:

I don’t see much ambiguity there, but maybe I’m missing something subtle — there are lots of weasel-words in the blog post when you re-read it. Yet without giving him the freedom to express his views, how would we know what they are, that we disagree with him, and that he’s an idiot?

[Update 20071128:

The Guardian newspaper has an account of the evening, although inevitably it focusses on drama involving protesters rather than what was actually said in the debate. Tryl is quoted as saying that "[a]t the end of [the debate] David Irving came out looking pathetic”.

I should also point out that I find myself in the unwonted position of being in complete agreement with Peter Hitchens.

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