Myzozoa
to find better ways to say what nobody says
http://news.ku.edu/2017/05/01/resea...le-often-underpins-free-speech-defense-racist
“We wondered why people would go out on a limb to defend someone else’s misbehavior,” Crandall said. “We thought, maybe they felt personally implicated — they’re defending an extension of themselves. We did three studies and found no evidence for this idea at all.” “We thought that people would rush to the defense of people fired for saying prejudiced things because, firstly, people know they’re prejudiced and, secondly, watching someone getting punished for that same prejudice makes them feel like bad people,” White said. “Across three experiments, we found exactly no support for this idea. “It isn't so much that these controversies make prejudiced people feel bad about themselves; instead, it seems to be driven partially by prejudiced people feeling like they are not free to live how they want to live and say what they want to say — they feel as if their freedom is under attack,” he said. Indeed, people with high levels of prejudice were very sensitive to their own freedom of expression. “They weren’t defending their own attitudes, as much as ‘defending to the death their right to say it,’” Crandall said. “Just so long as the ‘it’ is the prejudiced speech they share.”
Ultimately, the researchers conclude the value of free speech appears “for the prejudiced person when it suits their needs but is absent when it does not. Freedom of speech defenses are unprincipled; it only appears for prejudiced people when it is needed. Values may be used as guiding principles to live by, but they are also strategically deployed to justify prejudices.”
“It would be irresponsible to say that everyone who makes this ‘free speech’ argument is prejudiced,” White said. “However, our data do show that racial prejudice is one of the many attitudes that go into people deciding to make this argument. We should not ignore the ‘free speech’ defense, but we shouldn’t assume that the motives are purely based on an abstract democratic principle, either.”
“We wondered why people would go out on a limb to defend someone else’s misbehavior,” Crandall said. “We thought, maybe they felt personally implicated — they’re defending an extension of themselves. We did three studies and found no evidence for this idea at all.” “We thought that people would rush to the defense of people fired for saying prejudiced things because, firstly, people know they’re prejudiced and, secondly, watching someone getting punished for that same prejudice makes them feel like bad people,” White said. “Across three experiments, we found exactly no support for this idea. “It isn't so much that these controversies make prejudiced people feel bad about themselves; instead, it seems to be driven partially by prejudiced people feeling like they are not free to live how they want to live and say what they want to say — they feel as if their freedom is under attack,” he said. Indeed, people with high levels of prejudice were very sensitive to their own freedom of expression. “They weren’t defending their own attitudes, as much as ‘defending to the death their right to say it,’” Crandall said. “Just so long as the ‘it’ is the prejudiced speech they share.”
Ultimately, the researchers conclude the value of free speech appears “for the prejudiced person when it suits their needs but is absent when it does not. Freedom of speech defenses are unprincipled; it only appears for prejudiced people when it is needed. Values may be used as guiding principles to live by, but they are also strategically deployed to justify prejudices.”
“It would be irresponsible to say that everyone who makes this ‘free speech’ argument is prejudiced,” White said. “However, our data do show that racial prejudice is one of the many attitudes that go into people deciding to make this argument. We should not ignore the ‘free speech’ defense, but we shouldn’t assume that the motives are purely based on an abstract democratic principle, either.”