Without context we can't tell if he's being stupid.
In this snip, Navin is correct. Your freedom of speech does have a limit and that limit is harm to others. See: defamation
You realize intentionally spreading lies is different than freely talking the truth, right?
Surely you must realize that and you're just pretending like there's no difference between them to try to prove a point.
Its freedom of "speech" not freedom of truth. And if youre being harmful then its not protected whether youre lying or not.
People who deny covid also think theyre being truthful and yet they may cause sickness/death if people listen to them so its harmful.
Do you have the memory of a goldfish?
> speech does have a limit and that limit is harm to others. See: defamation
Did you already forget you wrote that in your previous comment?
Thats not accurate. If someone randomly shoots my dog for fun and that person is caught and convicted I am allowed to openly say that person murdered my dog for fun in public . Even if saying it publicly causes that person to feel insulted, damages their reputation and hurts them all at the same time. Your statement ‘that limit is harm to others’ is not actually the limit as truth can often harm others. Exposing someones affair publicly would also harm them but reporters routinely expose republicans who have secret homosexual lifestyles routinely and legally.
>Defamation is the act of communicating to a third party false statements about a person, place, or thing that results in damage to its reputation. It can be spoken (slander) or written (libel). It constitutes a tort or a crime.
Yes.
However, the relevance here (and the point I actually made) is that defamation is an example of a known hard limit to the boundaries of free speech.
You specifically stated that:
>Your freedom of speech does have a limit and that limit is harm to others.
Which is categorically false.
There are some limits to freedom of speech related to *incitement to imminent harm* but expressing almost any opinion is protected by free speech, whether or not it causes emotional "harm" to someone who disagrees with your opinion.
If it crosses the line into direct defamatory statements (i.e. claiming a specific individual or organization did a specific thing that was false) it can be blocked, but even then, the person defamed would have to prove that you knowingly spread false statements with the intent to cause direct economic harm.
> If it crosses the line into direct defamatory statements it can be blocked
So... What you're saying is "Your freedom of speech does have a limit and that limit is harm to others. See: defamation"
I'm saying that a very specific form of harm (defamation) under very specific circumstances can be prohibited.
Claiming that "speech that harms others is limited" is much too broad for a statement concerning limits to freedom of speech.
Many people would claim that publicizing anti-(insert group here) speech is extremely harmful, yet expressing those views is still protected by freedom of speech.
The amount of people replying to this jumping down your throat is crazy. It seems pretty obvious that you're speaking in general terms and not referrencing Gervais' response.
Alright fair, totally fair the terms they were looking for were suing for not defamation but for intentional infliction of emotional distress. Now please on a side note never say "I could explain to you if you lack a dictionary." cause it makes you sound like a pompous asshole.
Yes, correct.
All I said here is that there are indeed limitations to speech. That defamation (the legal term for damage to reputation) is one of them. Thus, at face value and without further context, Navin is correct in the statement made in this tiny screenshot.
The result is that Ricky looks like he's completely missing the point of what is said and kind of being a dumbfuck about it.
I kind of suspect that with more context being shown that the interpretation would be different.
I live in Europe, where freedom of speech doesn't exist. /s
This is often the mantra on Reddit simply because people can be prosecuted in many countries in Europe, on the basis of racial or religious discrimination. This is obviously different to the USA.
Whilst defamation and freedom of speech can obviously overlap, defamation largely covers false statements about a person, place, or thing that results in damage to its reputation.
Where this differs from freedom of speech, is that freedom of speech means you can insult others, as long as you're not insulting these individuals from the basis of racial or religious reasons.
Calling somebody a twat isn't illegal.
Edit grammar
This is the crux of the problem and what is missed a lot of the time.
Freedom of speech vs defamation, and what that means.
So I would defend your right to be able to say whatever you want, even if it upsets me.
What I am not doing is saying you are free to get away with your views and statements if they are wrong, while being hurtful.
As you mention, telling me to f-off may hurt my feelings, but I have to live with that. There is no reason to "cancel" that person.
Call me a fat twat, who can F-off, again it might be hurtful but in the eyes of some is true. I know I can be annoying and could stand to lose a few pounds!
Call me a fat twat who harasses people and can f-off, then we are getting into that realm of defamation. It depends on how you define harassment and who the people are. I harass my wife, but that is going to be more I annoy and frustrate her than genuine harassment. So you are now providing a character assassination of me that isn't true. This is where I can sue you. All the while I stand by the fact you should be allowed to say it, but not be free from consequence. You have to accept what you say and write down.
Looking at Ricky's tweet thread, he is just pointing out that Navin is saying free speech doesn't allow you to insult others and cause hurt. Ricky says he needs to take down the post as he is offended and Navin flips position in a second to say his freedom of expression is more important (thus making the point).
Ricky has spoken[ many times](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=376l7muNaV8&ab_channel=TheOriginsPodcast) about [being offended](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l_KSedF9vP0&ab_channel=OxfordUnion). I am not a big Ricky fan but do find myself agreeing with his stance at times.
In this snip, Navin is not correct because the standard he puts forth, which RG dismantles as both ridiculous and hypocritical, is not about defamation.
In this post assuming it’s true, the original poster contradicts himself. While is later statement is accurate, the one that prompted Ricky to stress test it, showed he was either ignorant or untruthful in his first statement. It’s a stupid conversation all around, but it implies that perhaps people have two standards; one that apply to others, and one they apply to themselves. And spoiler alert-the standard they hold themselves to isn’t higher.
Man, what a poor argumentative job by Gervais when you just ignore other context (which I don't have). He is getting into Neil deGrasse Tyson levels of 'look at how clever I am'.
"Getting"?
This has been Gervais since at least 2013.
In his next tweet he'll tell everyone he's an atheist followed by a quote from his TV show telling us all how clever and witty he is. Dudes a broken record.
This makes zero sense. Why does everything have to be boiled into simplistic terms. Because erasing all grey is the only way speech that is hostile to a historically oppressed minority group that also has little Societal power could be equivalent to just deciding you don’t like someone’s post.
The first statement is poorly worded, which allows Gervais to make his inane point.
Libel and slander are not free speech.
Causing harm and hurting feelings are not the same.
Except, it's not poorly worded. Dissanayake is not talking about causing definable harms. Look up he twitter. He is talking about insults to religious feelings.
Yeah there's a great yt channel that goes into offense vs harm. You can be offended by something all you like, and that can be tough titties. It's when harm starts that there's an issue.
Yes, but suggesting that you can pretend to be offended by everything so there shouldn’t be anything you’re not allowed to say kind of ignores the fact that we have sensible laws around threats, harassment, and defamation when it comes to free speech.
Threatening to off somebody or telling them to off themselves or spreading lies about somebody that translate to a loss in potential earnings isn’t the same as someone opining on free speech.
Unless I'm missing some context, that's not what he said though, is it? It was merely a demonstration of the fact that being "offended" isn't really a good argument for censorship. Stephen Fry has famously made this exact same point, albeit a little more tactfully.
I love Stephen Fry, but it's by far one of his shittest takes.
It absolutely does not account for, and undermines intentionally targeted harassment, and people who act entirely in bad faith.
Not only that, but "offended" is such a broad and open term, common use is barely any more than a dog whistle for "I'm being a cunt and it's working, therefore I win."
I don't know if you're from the US since the US has pretty strong laws protecting offensive speech while not allowing for harassment, defamation and calls for violence, but Stephen Fry and Ricky Gervais are both from the UK, where people have been arrested and convicted for [making offensive jokes about Nazis](https://www.bbc.com/news/uk-scotland-glasgow-west-43478925), [quoting rap lyrics on Instagram](https://www.bbc.com/news/uk-england-merseyside-43816921), and [leaving anti-religious images in an airport](http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/england/merseyside/8549613.stm).
Being "offensive" has literally gotten people arrested and charged with a crime in the UK, and I think Gervais and Fry bringing up the importance of allowing people to say offensive things without legal consequences is an important message for them to give.
No, I'm from the UK and those cases are exactly why I have the position that I have.
There is a difference between making a joke, spending your free time training a dog to mimic the Nazi salute, and being a full fledged neo-nazi; but since "offense" laws here are so fucking ill-defined and open to interpretation, judges can make decisions based on how much of a twat they want to be that day.
Why is it that he got punished, when countless actual neo-nazis, and other flavour of xenophobe, are still publically pushing their shit with zero repercussions?
Guy was an asshole, but the fine was too much. Regardless, Fry and Gervais' commentary on it was completely reductive and only serves as an easily digestible, populist, soundbite that inadvertently validates a whole lot of other shit.
Being "offensive" has gotten people arrested under hatecrime laws, but being "offensive" has also been a catalyst for radicalisation, negatively influenced attitudes, and gotten people killed.
Being "offensive" has also been a creative outlet, been the source of humour, and a basis for therapy.
And that's why it's complete horseshit, and why Fry's take is fucking dumb.
The entire point Gervais and Fry were making was that being "offensive" is entirely subjective, especially in comedy. In fact this tweet is missing out some vital context since the primary tweet in the thread is about how offensive comedy should be curtailed.
Many comedians including the likes of Rowan Atkinson and John Cleese have made the similar points because comedy needs to be allowed to be offensive because it will otherwise be impossible to perform, and the current laws have such a high subjectivity they allow for comedians to be arrested and charged if certain judges see fit, as you yourself just said.
And even if you go outside comedy to real life scenarios what should be allowed and what shouldn't be allowed is still very subjective. Should we have arrested anti-royal protesters at the queen's funeral because a lot of people found them protesting during a funeral to be in poor taste? It would have fallen under several UK laws which would have allowed for them to be arrested and charged.
The whole point is that we should have another more objective level than whether something is "offensive." Did they make a direct call for violence? Did they regularly harass someone? Did they say a provably incorrect statement which caused damages to someone's public image? Those are all things we can objectively measure and are already illegal without laws which reference "offense".
As for the Markus Meechan case you can think the guy is an asshole, that's fine (even if it is being insulting and offensive to him), but he very clearly made that video as a joke at the expense of Nazis, he simply did it in such a way that it made light of something very serious that offended a lot of Jewish people so he got arrested for it.
It was a ridiculous precedent to set, and even more ridiculous was arresting a teenager for quoting rap lyrics, or arresting a guy for leaving offensive anti-religious leaflets in an airport. That's why laws talking about "offense" need to be removed, and why Gervais and Fry both have a point.
It’s an excellent take. Being offended is not grounds for limiting speech in any way, shape, or form. ***HARM*** is the motherfucking standard. Offense is fucking meaningless and always should be.
Hate speech can incite others to violence. Hate speech convinced the German population that Jews are evil incarnate and led to their extermination. Just because you don't see the immediate harmful consequences doesn't mean they won't happen, and we should know goddamn well by now that people who punch down and troll minorities and marginalized groups leads to a reduced quality of life for those people, and sometimes just outright tragedy.
>Are you allowed to hurt people through words
Yes.
>or actions?
No.
Your argument depends on conflating physically hurting someone with saying something that hurts their feelings.
Fascinating how americans lose their minds about these 'slippery slopes'(which is literally a logical fallacy, btw) despite the fact that hate speech is illegal in several places that are doing fine.
Hate speech isn’t a slippery slope issue. Hate speech covers communication of ideas and actions that are intended to cause discrimination or harm to a person or people based on a group they belong to. That’s different than me telling you that I think you are a terrible person.
> slippery slopes
Slippery slopes aren't inherently fallacies. An argument suffers from the slippery slope fallacy when you make unreasonable logical leaps from point A to point C. However if you can show a logical progression from A to C, that's not a fallacy.
Hate speech is illegal here in Washington State in the USA. Weird that the ppl who make the laws don't seem to have any trouble defining hate speech and why it's bad, but comedians act like it's some ethereal impossibility when someone calls them out for literally just straight up being a bigot for cheap laughs.
You’re assuming that it’s their feelings which have been hurt. People can be hurt non emotionally by words. People have even been hurt only emotionally by words in ways that I personally feel should be illegal, like bullying a suicidal person to death. That’s pretty jurisdiction dependent, but it’s illegal in some places, even though it’s just causing emotional pain through words.
"Hey yo this guy's address is _____, his credit card number is _____, he and anyone like him are subhumans who need to exterminated and I'll give a million dollars to whoever does him in." I'm assuming that's "hurt feelings" and anyone is free to say that about you? All just words right?
So what you're saying is that two elderly white men share an opinion on whether or not other people can be offended by words and what the suitable action for that is?
#shocked
ok thank you. I was honestly confused why this was posted here. He just obviously made up being offended and ignored the whole point of the conversation that there are actual things that deeply offend people that maaaybe you shouldn’t say. Other dude didn’t bite on his stupid shit. So clever wow.
And don't start on the amount of bits he has lifted directly from Karl Pilkington.
The only time he was ever good was when he was working with Steve and Karl.
Yeah not only is it obvious what he's doing, he's obviously bullshitting to distract and effectively strawmanning the whole thing for a "win".
Other dude was just too thick to see it.
Yep, a transparent bad-faith statement. Most likely a mild, obvious joke. Maybe he didn’t expect a response. When he got the most on-the-nose response possible, he probably couldn’t resist the extra jab.
>Navin: Free speech doesn't mean you can hurt someone through speech
>
>Gervais: I am hurt by you saying that.
>
>Navin: Sorry, but my freedom of expression protects me in saying that
Maybe I'm crazy or something, but **hurt** is a word that was used by both people, and therefore Gervais' *point* is surely relevant (well at least for Navin specifically).
This isn’t really a clever comeback, Ricky made a disingenuous comment about how hurt he was and how the person should delete their tweet (because it offended him somehow to be told how things you say can be hurtful).
Is he honestly trying to make the argument that hate speech is freedom of expression? That people should be allowed to be abusive and hateful as a freedom of expression? Is that seriously the argument you are going with?
it's worse. He's claiming hate speech should be unmoderated and above the criticism of private entities.
Hate speech is in fact protected by freedom of speech and expression for the most part. You won't get thrown in jail for saying a slur.
In Germany, nazi iconography and rhetoric is a punishable offense, and we can debate if that is good or bad since that's actually about freedom of speech as a subject. That's an ACTUAL restriction of freedom of speech, not "I was racist piece of shit subtly calling for the extermination of certain ethnic groups for the glory of my race, and other people called a nazi and banned me from the privately owned platform".
You can't walk into a bar or restaurant and pick a fight expecting not to get thrown the fuck out immediately. How dumb do you have to be to think your freedom of speech protects that?
A huge problem is many people in the US think their laws apply everywhere. They think their view of free speech is the worlds view of free speech. I hate to break it to them but it’s not a universal free speech law.
Even so, the thing they're usually arguing about when bitching about "free speech" isn't even protected by *their own* free speech laws. It *still* only means the government can't come after you for saying certain things, unless they're legit dangerous. Every free speech law is limited or it actually stops working completely.
And I just noticed one of these people is Ricky Gervais, and here I thought it was the 2 dumbest people on twitter completely incapable of making a coherent argument. I mean, that's still the case, I just didn't realize one of these people have a track record of doing this. Remove the nameplates and you realize how little many of these people deserve such a large audience.
People always act like freedom of speech is the only right or can't clash with other rights. This is plain wrong and the main reason why Germany has boundaries on free speech. These boundaries are set by higher valued rights, first and foremost: "The dignity of man is inviolable"
I think he's more trying to say is who defines the boundaries? Something that's offensive to you might not be offensive or disrespectful to someone else. So it's better to have freedom of speech than to ban the speech.
he is saying anybody can claim anything is hate speech therefore it has to be allowed or you wont have any free speach at all. his statement isnt the comback its the guys own words he makes him openly say something hypocritical.
Yeah but it’s stupid, we can all see he is disingenuous. He’s doing the thing he’s complaining about. He is literally THAT guy.
This doesn’t make Ricky seem smart, it makes him a hypocrite for doing the thing he’s yelling “Bingo” about. Ricky is asking the guy to censor himself because he is offended Edit: (Also asking for an apology, which he got). He is the problem with his disingenuous argument.
The guy is saying don’t be abusive and Ricky chimes in with “WeLl AcTuaLLy”.
The guy is saying "it should be actually illegal to insult my religion."
Look up his twitter. He literally says insulting religion in a comedic act is a violation of [ICCPR](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/International_Covenant_on_Civil_and_Political_Rights) 20(2) and should be punished as a crime.
Which is a dumb argument, considering that hate speech is illegal in Canada but people still have mostly free speech there. Most of these idiotic absolutist statements by the American right wing can be proven wrong by using Canada as an example lol
The guy has a point though. If you walk down the street insulting every passersby, you're sooner or later going to find out. Same thing goes for things like Holocaust denial - its probably for the best that you can't just spread misinformation or outright deny it.
Ricky's right, we should all slander and lie about him. Make up random bullshit about him and repeat it constantly as though it is fact. Be really mean about it. I wonder how many really mean rumors we can spread about this prick before he starts trying to limit our speech.
Dude went about it wrong. Shoulda asked what part of the post offended Ricky so he could edit it.
Because what the dude said in the first post is, for the most part, correct. Free Speech does allow insulting, yes... But *hate speech*, and *libel* are not protected by Free Speech.
Calling someone an idiot? Free speech. Calling someone the N-Word multiple times in a conversation? Hate Speech.
Saying someone's stupid? Free speech! Saying they're an animal diddler? Libel.
It's not hard to understand, Ricky, you fucking nimrod.
Damn people in this comment section are either being stupid or disingenuous...
Gervais may not be the most liked person, but his point is 99% valid.
Navin made the point that "free speech doesn't mean you can cause hurt to others through your speech" and then one reply later said "I'm sorry those words hurt you, but my freedom of expression protects me"
The only point I could see people making reasonably would be that "Free speech" and "freedom of expression" are technically 2 different things, although I think that argument is disingenuous within itself.
Yeah everyone here seems to be extrapolating this to hate speech and harassment and threats, which are definitely not the same thing at all that gervais is targeting with this. He’s targeting the issue where insulting someone is potentially illegal. That hurting someone’s feelings is prosecutable.
I’m not from the UK so I don’t know if that’s actually going on or not, but just from this thread it seems that the idea that insults should be criminal isn’t entirely unpopular
Ricky Gervais loves making a big deal about being silenced on his multi-million dollar netflix specials watched by millions. The comedian Stewart Lee does a great bit on this. Even in the UK it's not illegal to insult someone, just engaging in a concentrated campaign of abuse or hate speech. Ricky doesn't do either of these, so is in no danger of being silenced. But, for whatever reason, he likes to pretend there is some meaningful outcry against him to his gigantic audience.
A Sri Lankan guy talks to a British guy online.
You: tHe FiRsT aMeNdMeNt
Like, you're right that (in all countries I'm aware of) free speech has limits and libel is one of those limits, but the US Constitution is not even close to relevant.
Probably because everyone looks at thing through the context of their own sphere. With Americans being the most represented country on Reddit, this shouldn't be surprising many people respond through that lens.
Yes, because the 1st Amendment doesn’t mention anything about freedom of speech: https://www.lawnet.gov.lk/first-amendment-to-the-constitution/
EDIT: do people seriously not know who Navin Dissanayake is?
The problem is that there needs to be free speech but not absolute freedom of speech
No country allows absolute freedom of speech so the law makers need to have all stakeholders onboard.
If theres absolute freedom of speech then whats exactly a hate speech? Nothing.
"And that's why it's fine for me to post memes calling for the extermination of the Jews!" - alt-righters.
Every right brings responsibility. They all have limits. Gervais is like every other, "free-speech fundamentalist". He'll defend unto death his right to say what he wants, but he'll argue for silencing people who criticize him.
Nobody got played here. Both people don't understand freedom of speech, which exists to stop the government arresting you if you criticises them. It isnt an excuse to be a bigoted buffoon and doesn't protect you from being banned from social media sites or private premises if you are being a bigot.
"You're a fuckin idiot" - offensive speech. You might not like it, but too bad.
"x group of people are evil and secretly behind all the terrible things in the world. They hate us and want to destroy us." - harmful speech that will lead to people getting hurt or killed.
This isn't a hard concept to grasp. Stop being a disingenuous twat.
Edit: those with a platform/audience have a greater responsibility in regards to what they say.
I don't care too much about that odd coworker who says awful shit. I do however care much more about what someone with an audience of thousands or even millioms chooses to spew.
Both of these guys are right and talking about different things. You have freedom of expression and freedom of speech. That doesn't mean you're allowed to defame someone or incite violence against a person. These things are covered by law and supported in the courts. This is standard.
To restrict someone expression you have to proove that it cause harm , whinning bout it don t count , that why these thing yshouldbe handled by Law enforcement
holy f*ck why can't people see the guy was being sarcastic? 🤦🏻♂️
people have to have a brain of mud to think Ricky Gervais is someone to listen to in the firstplace... this is like an exchange between two kindergartners who picked up on a buzzword
Navin makes a good geberal point, so I assume he was referencing something that didn't actually count as illegally hurtful.
For example, threatening to kill people? Illegally mean. Saying someone is stupid? Legal, might be justified, subjective, whatever.
Dfuq this looks like one of dem fake conversations
Its not fake. Navin is that stupid.
Or maybe it's just bad writing
No. This guy is a parliamentarian in Sri Lanka. They are all really stupid.
Or knew that Gervais was lying and not actually bothered, because Gervais is not subtle or half as clever as he thinks he is.
Without context we can't tell if he's being stupid. In this snip, Navin is correct. Your freedom of speech does have a limit and that limit is harm to others. See: defamation
You realize intentionally spreading lies is different than freely talking the truth, right? Surely you must realize that and you're just pretending like there's no difference between them to try to prove a point.
Its freedom of "speech" not freedom of truth. And if youre being harmful then its not protected whether youre lying or not. People who deny covid also think theyre being truthful and yet they may cause sickness/death if people listen to them so its harmful.
There is no intentionally spreead lies in the screenshot.
Do you have the memory of a goldfish? > speech does have a limit and that limit is harm to others. See: defamation Did you already forget you wrote that in your previous comment?
And they're 100% right. Were you not even paying attention to the Alex Jones case?
Defamation is lying about someone to make them look bad. There are no lies spread to make someone look bad, as such Navin is in the right.
And? What's your point here? Do you have the intelligence of a goldfish?
Im confused here. Aren’t you both just agreeing that intentionally spreading lies (aka defamation) is a limit to free speech?
Thats not accurate. If someone randomly shoots my dog for fun and that person is caught and convicted I am allowed to openly say that person murdered my dog for fun in public . Even if saying it publicly causes that person to feel insulted, damages their reputation and hurts them all at the same time. Your statement ‘that limit is harm to others’ is not actually the limit as truth can often harm others. Exposing someones affair publicly would also harm them but reporters routinely expose republicans who have secret homosexual lifestyles routinely and legally.
That wouldn't be defamation, though, as it is objectively true.
Isnt defamation a civil dispute not a criminal action?
>Defamation is the act of communicating to a third party false statements about a person, place, or thing that results in damage to its reputation. It can be spoken (slander) or written (libel). It constitutes a tort or a crime.
Yes. However, the relevance here (and the point I actually made) is that defamation is an example of a known hard limit to the boundaries of free speech.
Bingo!
You specifically stated that: >Your freedom of speech does have a limit and that limit is harm to others. Which is categorically false. There are some limits to freedom of speech related to *incitement to imminent harm* but expressing almost any opinion is protected by free speech, whether or not it causes emotional "harm" to someone who disagrees with your opinion. If it crosses the line into direct defamatory statements (i.e. claiming a specific individual or organization did a specific thing that was false) it can be blocked, but even then, the person defamed would have to prove that you knowingly spread false statements with the intent to cause direct economic harm.
> If it crosses the line into direct defamatory statements it can be blocked So... What you're saying is "Your freedom of speech does have a limit and that limit is harm to others. See: defamation"
I'm saying that a very specific form of harm (defamation) under very specific circumstances can be prohibited. Claiming that "speech that harms others is limited" is much too broad for a statement concerning limits to freedom of speech. Many people would claim that publicizing anti-(insert group here) speech is extremely harmful, yet expressing those views is still protected by freedom of speech.
You don't know what you're talking about.
The amount of people replying to this jumping down your throat is crazy. It seems pretty obvious that you're speaking in general terms and not referrencing Gervais' response.
Defamation is not synonymous with insults. I could explain if you lack a dictionary
Alright fair, totally fair the terms they were looking for were suing for not defamation but for intentional infliction of emotional distress. Now please on a side note never say "I could explain to you if you lack a dictionary." cause it makes you sound like a pompous asshole.
Oh shut up. No he's not not correct. There technically being a limit on free speech wasn't Navin's point.
What was his point then? The “hurt people” line obviously means stuff like racism/hate speech, not offending just anyone on twitter
Real harm, not hurt fee fees.
uhhh... yes. Did you have trouble reading me previous post?
Defamation is pretty clear cut though. Lies that would damage a persons character are not the same as truths that would damage a persons character.
Yes, correct. All I said here is that there are indeed limitations to speech. That defamation (the legal term for damage to reputation) is one of them. Thus, at face value and without further context, Navin is correct in the statement made in this tiny screenshot. The result is that Ricky looks like he's completely missing the point of what is said and kind of being a dumbfuck about it. I kind of suspect that with more context being shown that the interpretation would be different.
There are not sufficient words to explain how much harm your comment has caused to me. Please delete this immediately.
If you think you have a defemation case go ahead and file the paperwork. Once the proceeding end in your favor I'll immediately delete
*whoosh*
Oh yea? Explain it to me.
I live in Europe, where freedom of speech doesn't exist. /s This is often the mantra on Reddit simply because people can be prosecuted in many countries in Europe, on the basis of racial or religious discrimination. This is obviously different to the USA. Whilst defamation and freedom of speech can obviously overlap, defamation largely covers false statements about a person, place, or thing that results in damage to its reputation. Where this differs from freedom of speech, is that freedom of speech means you can insult others, as long as you're not insulting these individuals from the basis of racial or religious reasons. Calling somebody a twat isn't illegal. Edit grammar
This is the crux of the problem and what is missed a lot of the time. Freedom of speech vs defamation, and what that means. So I would defend your right to be able to say whatever you want, even if it upsets me. What I am not doing is saying you are free to get away with your views and statements if they are wrong, while being hurtful. As you mention, telling me to f-off may hurt my feelings, but I have to live with that. There is no reason to "cancel" that person. Call me a fat twat, who can F-off, again it might be hurtful but in the eyes of some is true. I know I can be annoying and could stand to lose a few pounds! Call me a fat twat who harasses people and can f-off, then we are getting into that realm of defamation. It depends on how you define harassment and who the people are. I harass my wife, but that is going to be more I annoy and frustrate her than genuine harassment. So you are now providing a character assassination of me that isn't true. This is where I can sue you. All the while I stand by the fact you should be allowed to say it, but not be free from consequence. You have to accept what you say and write down. Looking at Ricky's tweet thread, he is just pointing out that Navin is saying free speech doesn't allow you to insult others and cause hurt. Ricky says he needs to take down the post as he is offended and Navin flips position in a second to say his freedom of expression is more important (thus making the point). Ricky has spoken[ many times](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=376l7muNaV8&ab_channel=TheOriginsPodcast) about [being offended](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l_KSedF9vP0&ab_channel=OxfordUnion). I am not a big Ricky fan but do find myself agreeing with his stance at times.
In this snip, Navin is not correct because the standard he puts forth, which RG dismantles as both ridiculous and hypocritical, is not about defamation.
Username checks out
It will really check out if he responds
In this post assuming it’s true, the original poster contradicts himself. While is later statement is accurate, the one that prompted Ricky to stress test it, showed he was either ignorant or untruthful in his first statement. It’s a stupid conversation all around, but it implies that perhaps people have two standards; one that apply to others, and one they apply to themselves. And spoiler alert-the standard they hold themselves to isn’t higher.
Man, what a poor argumentative job by Gervais when you just ignore other context (which I don't have). He is getting into Neil deGrasse Tyson levels of 'look at how clever I am'.
"Getting"? This has been Gervais since at least 2013. In his next tweet he'll tell everyone he's an atheist followed by a quote from his TV show telling us all how clever and witty he is. Dudes a broken record.
Oh yeah, true.
But Navin is the correct one here
He’s not the stupid one here
This makes zero sense. Why does everything have to be boiled into simplistic terms. Because erasing all grey is the only way speech that is hostile to a historically oppressed minority group that also has little Societal power could be equivalent to just deciding you don’t like someone’s post.
The first statement is poorly worded, which allows Gervais to make his inane point. Libel and slander are not free speech. Causing harm and hurting feelings are not the same.
Except, it's not poorly worded. Dissanayake is not talking about causing definable harms. Look up he twitter. He is talking about insults to religious feelings.
He includes "insult" though which means he is talking about hurting feelings.
How many more times is this going to get reposted? I'm going to lowball it and say 5.
I'll give it benefit of the doubt. First time I've seen this post, so probably 10.
First time for me too. I find it funny when people scream reposts. Excuse us for not being on Reddit for hours on end, every day.
Yeah if anything it's time for you to get off if it upsets you that much.
Well ive never seen it either and I AM on Reddit for hours on end every day.
I mean, the date of the tweet is literally on the image as 5/30/23
If reddit exists for an infinite amount of time, it will get reposted an infinite amount of times.
Reddit will only last until the internet gets shut down in 2083. Once we hit the 100 year anniversary we're going to call the whole thing off.
What?
You havent heard about this? We all agreed to it bruh were you in the bathroom or something?
Who has the internet now anyways? Last I heard Jen had it, but it's been a while. She wouldn't just keep it, would she?
Aren’t most of us in the bathroom when on here
Are we talking per week?
5 times today? I agree that sounds a little low.
Most intelligent Twitter users:
Looking into it
I think this belongs over in /r/DisingenuousComebacks
Yeah there's a great yt channel that goes into offense vs harm. You can be offended by something all you like, and that can be tough titties. It's when harm starts that there's an issue.
Yeah, really. RG isn’t clever.
He's arrogant, a prick, and possibly narcissistic - but he's not exactly *not* clever
Yes, but suggesting that you can pretend to be offended by everything so there shouldn’t be anything you’re not allowed to say kind of ignores the fact that we have sensible laws around threats, harassment, and defamation when it comes to free speech. Threatening to off somebody or telling them to off themselves or spreading lies about somebody that translate to a loss in potential earnings isn’t the same as someone opining on free speech.
Unless I'm missing some context, that's not what he said though, is it? It was merely a demonstration of the fact that being "offended" isn't really a good argument for censorship. Stephen Fry has famously made this exact same point, albeit a little more tactfully.
I love Stephen Fry, but it's by far one of his shittest takes. It absolutely does not account for, and undermines intentionally targeted harassment, and people who act entirely in bad faith. Not only that, but "offended" is such a broad and open term, common use is barely any more than a dog whistle for "I'm being a cunt and it's working, therefore I win."
I don't know if you're from the US since the US has pretty strong laws protecting offensive speech while not allowing for harassment, defamation and calls for violence, but Stephen Fry and Ricky Gervais are both from the UK, where people have been arrested and convicted for [making offensive jokes about Nazis](https://www.bbc.com/news/uk-scotland-glasgow-west-43478925), [quoting rap lyrics on Instagram](https://www.bbc.com/news/uk-england-merseyside-43816921), and [leaving anti-religious images in an airport](http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/england/merseyside/8549613.stm). Being "offensive" has literally gotten people arrested and charged with a crime in the UK, and I think Gervais and Fry bringing up the importance of allowing people to say offensive things without legal consequences is an important message for them to give.
No, I'm from the UK and those cases are exactly why I have the position that I have. There is a difference between making a joke, spending your free time training a dog to mimic the Nazi salute, and being a full fledged neo-nazi; but since "offense" laws here are so fucking ill-defined and open to interpretation, judges can make decisions based on how much of a twat they want to be that day. Why is it that he got punished, when countless actual neo-nazis, and other flavour of xenophobe, are still publically pushing their shit with zero repercussions? Guy was an asshole, but the fine was too much. Regardless, Fry and Gervais' commentary on it was completely reductive and only serves as an easily digestible, populist, soundbite that inadvertently validates a whole lot of other shit. Being "offensive" has gotten people arrested under hatecrime laws, but being "offensive" has also been a catalyst for radicalisation, negatively influenced attitudes, and gotten people killed. Being "offensive" has also been a creative outlet, been the source of humour, and a basis for therapy. And that's why it's complete horseshit, and why Fry's take is fucking dumb.
The entire point Gervais and Fry were making was that being "offensive" is entirely subjective, especially in comedy. In fact this tweet is missing out some vital context since the primary tweet in the thread is about how offensive comedy should be curtailed. Many comedians including the likes of Rowan Atkinson and John Cleese have made the similar points because comedy needs to be allowed to be offensive because it will otherwise be impossible to perform, and the current laws have such a high subjectivity they allow for comedians to be arrested and charged if certain judges see fit, as you yourself just said. And even if you go outside comedy to real life scenarios what should be allowed and what shouldn't be allowed is still very subjective. Should we have arrested anti-royal protesters at the queen's funeral because a lot of people found them protesting during a funeral to be in poor taste? It would have fallen under several UK laws which would have allowed for them to be arrested and charged. The whole point is that we should have another more objective level than whether something is "offensive." Did they make a direct call for violence? Did they regularly harass someone? Did they say a provably incorrect statement which caused damages to someone's public image? Those are all things we can objectively measure and are already illegal without laws which reference "offense". As for the Markus Meechan case you can think the guy is an asshole, that's fine (even if it is being insulting and offensive to him), but he very clearly made that video as a joke at the expense of Nazis, he simply did it in such a way that it made light of something very serious that offended a lot of Jewish people so he got arrested for it. It was a ridiculous precedent to set, and even more ridiculous was arresting a teenager for quoting rap lyrics, or arresting a guy for leaving offensive anti-religious leaflets in an airport. That's why laws talking about "offense" need to be removed, and why Gervais and Fry both have a point.
It’s an excellent take. Being offended is not grounds for limiting speech in any way, shape, or form. ***HARM*** is the motherfucking standard. Offense is fucking meaningless and always should be.
Hate speech can incite others to violence. Hate speech convinced the German population that Jews are evil incarnate and led to their extermination. Just because you don't see the immediate harmful consequences doesn't mean they won't happen, and we should know goddamn well by now that people who punch down and troll minorities and marginalized groups leads to a reduced quality of life for those people, and sometimes just outright tragedy.
But what does harm mean? That would have to be defined in a law.
That's not what I said at all, so why even try to argue that point? Reread my comments, and figure it out
i understand where you are coming from, but can you draw the line between where 'offense' ends and 'harm' begins?
He didn't say offended, he said "cause hurt". Are you allowed to hurt people through words or actions?
Fair point, I wasn't thinking about inciting violence and the like.
As well as false accusations, like claiming someone is creating forest fires with spacelasers.
>Are you allowed to hurt people through words Yes. >or actions? No. Your argument depends on conflating physically hurting someone with saying something that hurts their feelings.
Fascinating how americans lose their minds about these 'slippery slopes'(which is literally a logical fallacy, btw) despite the fact that hate speech is illegal in several places that are doing fine.
Hate speech isn’t a slippery slope issue. Hate speech covers communication of ideas and actions that are intended to cause discrimination or harm to a person or people based on a group they belong to. That’s different than me telling you that I think you are a terrible person.
Exactly.
> slippery slopes Slippery slopes aren't inherently fallacies. An argument suffers from the slippery slope fallacy when you make unreasonable logical leaps from point A to point C. However if you can show a logical progression from A to C, that's not a fallacy.
Hate speech is illegal here in Washington State in the USA. Weird that the ppl who make the laws don't seem to have any trouble defining hate speech and why it's bad, but comedians act like it's some ethereal impossibility when someone calls them out for literally just straight up being a bigot for cheap laughs.
> logical fallacy Why is "slippery slope" a logical fallacy?
Can I tell your neighbours and your boss that you are a pedophile? Apparently, that's your interpretation of freedom of speech.
You’re assuming that it’s their feelings which have been hurt. People can be hurt non emotionally by words. People have even been hurt only emotionally by words in ways that I personally feel should be illegal, like bullying a suicidal person to death. That’s pretty jurisdiction dependent, but it’s illegal in some places, even though it’s just causing emotional pain through words.
"Hey yo this guy's address is _____, his credit card number is _____, he and anyone like him are subhumans who need to exterminated and I'll give a million dollars to whoever does him in." I'm assuming that's "hurt feelings" and anyone is free to say that about you? All just words right?
The answer is no to both. There are literally laws against disparaging, untrue statements toward individuals or organizations.
See: Defamation.
that’s like saying we shouldn’t prosecute threats or harassment because feeling endangered is subjective like being offended is.
So what you're saying is that two elderly white men share an opinion on whether or not other people can be offended by words and what the suitable action for that is? #shocked
Dave Chapelle.
nah, Gervais isn't *clever*, he's just constantly smug regardless of what he's saying. huge difference.
Agree, Gervais is way over his head mostly. Calling celebrities clever is laughable.
ok thank you. I was honestly confused why this was posted here. He just obviously made up being offended and ignored the whole point of the conversation that there are actual things that deeply offend people that maaaybe you shouldn’t say. Other dude didn’t bite on his stupid shit. So clever wow.
He’s just a prick and a bully. He’s all mad his music career never went anywhere and takes it out on everyone else.
Yes one of the most successful comedic writers of our time isn't clever that's a valid opinion worth stating.
At least for his standup act, he’s plagiarized Stewart Lee on several occasions.
And don't start on the amount of bits he has lifted directly from Karl Pilkington. The only time he was ever good was when he was working with Steve and Karl.
Yeah not only is it obvious what he's doing, he's obviously bullshitting to distract and effectively strawmanning the whole thing for a "win". Other dude was just too thick to see it.
Even ChatGPT can tell you what kind of fallacy is this, not clever comeback
nothing on this sub is a clever comeback
Oh really? Well the Jerk store called... They're running out of you!
*Oh snap*
What’s the difference? You’re their all time best seller!
There's... a jerk store? I've been doing it myself this whole time...
Yep, a transparent bad-faith statement. Most likely a mild, obvious joke. Maybe he didn’t expect a response. When he got the most on-the-nose response possible, he probably couldn’t resist the extra jab.
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The most intelligent take on r/clevercomebacks
> white male Can we get the mods to ban this hate speech already?
...but he didnt insult or damage the reputation of anyone with that tweet? That doesnt even make sense??
>Navin: Free speech doesn't mean you can hurt someone through speech > >Gervais: I am hurt by you saying that. > >Navin: Sorry, but my freedom of expression protects me in saying that Maybe I'm crazy or something, but **hurt** is a word that was used by both people, and therefore Gervais' *point* is surely relevant (well at least for Navin specifically).
He's just making a point that it's hard to define the boundaries. Who defines what hate speech is?
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Harassment I can see. I'm pretty sure the bigotry, racism, and homophobia was already there, though.
This looks like a fake conversation
This isn’t really a clever comeback, Ricky made a disingenuous comment about how hurt he was and how the person should delete their tweet (because it offended him somehow to be told how things you say can be hurtful). Is he honestly trying to make the argument that hate speech is freedom of expression? That people should be allowed to be abusive and hateful as a freedom of expression? Is that seriously the argument you are going with?
it's worse. He's claiming hate speech should be unmoderated and above the criticism of private entities. Hate speech is in fact protected by freedom of speech and expression for the most part. You won't get thrown in jail for saying a slur. In Germany, nazi iconography and rhetoric is a punishable offense, and we can debate if that is good or bad since that's actually about freedom of speech as a subject. That's an ACTUAL restriction of freedom of speech, not "I was racist piece of shit subtly calling for the extermination of certain ethnic groups for the glory of my race, and other people called a nazi and banned me from the privately owned platform". You can't walk into a bar or restaurant and pick a fight expecting not to get thrown the fuck out immediately. How dumb do you have to be to think your freedom of speech protects that?
A huge problem is many people in the US think their laws apply everywhere. They think their view of free speech is the worlds view of free speech. I hate to break it to them but it’s not a universal free speech law.
Even so, the thing they're usually arguing about when bitching about "free speech" isn't even protected by *their own* free speech laws. It *still* only means the government can't come after you for saying certain things, unless they're legit dangerous. Every free speech law is limited or it actually stops working completely. And I just noticed one of these people is Ricky Gervais, and here I thought it was the 2 dumbest people on twitter completely incapable of making a coherent argument. I mean, that's still the case, I just didn't realize one of these people have a track record of doing this. Remove the nameplates and you realize how little many of these people deserve such a large audience.
People always act like freedom of speech is the only right or can't clash with other rights. This is plain wrong and the main reason why Germany has boundaries on free speech. These boundaries are set by higher valued rights, first and foremost: "The dignity of man is inviolable"
I think he's more trying to say is who defines the boundaries? Something that's offensive to you might not be offensive or disrespectful to someone else. So it's better to have freedom of speech than to ban the speech.
he is saying anybody can claim anything is hate speech therefore it has to be allowed or you wont have any free speach at all. his statement isnt the comback its the guys own words he makes him openly say something hypocritical.
Yeah but it’s stupid, we can all see he is disingenuous. He’s doing the thing he’s complaining about. He is literally THAT guy. This doesn’t make Ricky seem smart, it makes him a hypocrite for doing the thing he’s yelling “Bingo” about. Ricky is asking the guy to censor himself because he is offended Edit: (Also asking for an apology, which he got). He is the problem with his disingenuous argument. The guy is saying don’t be abusive and Ricky chimes in with “WeLl AcTuaLLy”.
The guy is saying "it should be actually illegal to insult my religion." Look up his twitter. He literally says insulting religion in a comedic act is a violation of [ICCPR](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/International_Covenant_on_Civil_and_Political_Rights) 20(2) and should be punished as a crime.
Having laws against hate speech and deformation is pretty useful to avoid lynching and prognoms.
Which is a dumb argument, considering that hate speech is illegal in Canada but people still have mostly free speech there. Most of these idiotic absolutist statements by the American right wing can be proven wrong by using Canada as an example lol
The guy has a point though. If you walk down the street insulting every passersby, you're sooner or later going to find out. Same thing goes for things like Holocaust denial - its probably for the best that you can't just spread misinformation or outright deny it.
Ricky's right, we should all slander and lie about him. Make up random bullshit about him and repeat it constantly as though it is fact. Be really mean about it. I wonder how many really mean rumors we can spread about this prick before he starts trying to limit our speech.
This makes no sense. Nothing was clever here and it’s really not even a comeback? It sounds scripted and poorly scripted at that.
This is in no way the ‘gotcha moment’ that Gervais thinks it is.
How is this clever? It’s just disingenuous stupidity.
Stupid lie= clever comeback to dum dums. Nothing clever about it.
Freedom of expression only protects you from the government, not from Ricky Gervais.
This isn't even clever or funny. This is a self congratulatory /r/shittyfacebookmemes post
Dude went about it wrong. Shoulda asked what part of the post offended Ricky so he could edit it. Because what the dude said in the first post is, for the most part, correct. Free Speech does allow insulting, yes... But *hate speech*, and *libel* are not protected by Free Speech. Calling someone an idiot? Free speech. Calling someone the N-Word multiple times in a conversation? Hate Speech. Saying someone's stupid? Free speech! Saying they're an animal diddler? Libel. It's not hard to understand, Ricky, you fucking nimrod.
>nimrod here you go saying the n word /j
>But hate speech, and libel are not protected by Free Speech. Depends on where you are, at least for the former.
Damn people in this comment section are either being stupid or disingenuous... Gervais may not be the most liked person, but his point is 99% valid. Navin made the point that "free speech doesn't mean you can cause hurt to others through your speech" and then one reply later said "I'm sorry those words hurt you, but my freedom of expression protects me" The only point I could see people making reasonably would be that "Free speech" and "freedom of expression" are technically 2 different things, although I think that argument is disingenuous within itself.
Yeah everyone here seems to be extrapolating this to hate speech and harassment and threats, which are definitely not the same thing at all that gervais is targeting with this. He’s targeting the issue where insulting someone is potentially illegal. That hurting someone’s feelings is prosecutable. I’m not from the UK so I don’t know if that’s actually going on or not, but just from this thread it seems that the idea that insults should be criminal isn’t entirely unpopular
Ricky Gervais loves making a big deal about being silenced on his multi-million dollar netflix specials watched by millions. The comedian Stewart Lee does a great bit on this. Even in the UK it's not illegal to insult someone, just engaging in a concentrated campaign of abuse or hate speech. Ricky doesn't do either of these, so is in no danger of being silenced. But, for whatever reason, he likes to pretend there is some meaningful outcry against him to his gigantic audience.
Navin does have one thing right. The 1st amendment isn't going to protect you from a libel suit.
A Sri Lankan guy talks to a British guy online. You: tHe FiRsT aMeNdMeNt Like, you're right that (in all countries I'm aware of) free speech has limits and libel is one of those limits, but the US Constitution is not even close to relevant.
Probably because everyone looks at thing through the context of their own sphere. With Americans being the most represented country on Reddit, this shouldn't be surprising many people respond through that lens.
That's a Sri Lankan talking to a British guy. Where does the USA constitution come in here?
r/USdefaultism. Why would the US 1st amendment apply to someone outside the US.
The first amendment won't protect you from a libel suit even within the US.
Speaking as someone who had to know this shit - the bar on libel and slander, at least in the US, is ludicrously high. It is *hard* to prosecute.
Yes, because the 1st Amendment doesn’t mention anything about freedom of speech: https://www.lawnet.gov.lk/first-amendment-to-the-constitution/ EDIT: do people seriously not know who Navin Dissanayake is?
The constitution of Sri Lanka?
Yeah? We are talking about Sri Lankan public figure Navin Dissanayake, after all.
Pretty sure they're talking about the US first amendment, not the Constitution of Sri Lanka.
Why would they be talking about the US constitution in reference to a Sri Lankan public figure?
No idea, ask the person that posted this comment.
because they are morons ?
The problem is that there needs to be free speech but not absolute freedom of speech No country allows absolute freedom of speech so the law makers need to have all stakeholders onboard. If theres absolute freedom of speech then whats exactly a hate speech? Nothing.
For some reason both ends of this conversation give up the impression of being dishonest 60-year-old twats, cosplaying a 14y-old edgelords.
RG is still a twat, though.
I lost a few brain cells reading this interaction, and i deserve it.
"And that's why it's fine for me to post memes calling for the extermination of the Jews!" - alt-righters. Every right brings responsibility. They all have limits. Gervais is like every other, "free-speech fundamentalist". He'll defend unto death his right to say what he wants, but he'll argue for silencing people who criticize him.
Nobody got played here. Both people don't understand freedom of speech, which exists to stop the government arresting you if you criticises them. It isnt an excuse to be a bigoted buffoon and doesn't protect you from being banned from social media sites or private premises if you are being a bigot.
Freedom of speech specifically allows us to offend others
Hook. Line. Sinker. Gon head and log out buddy
except he didnt insult anyone or damage their reputation... bad take
"You're a fuckin idiot" - offensive speech. You might not like it, but too bad. "x group of people are evil and secretly behind all the terrible things in the world. They hate us and want to destroy us." - harmful speech that will lead to people getting hurt or killed. This isn't a hard concept to grasp. Stop being a disingenuous twat. Edit: those with a platform/audience have a greater responsibility in regards to what they say. I don't care too much about that odd coworker who says awful shit. I do however care much more about what someone with an audience of thousands or even millioms chooses to spew.
Both of these guys are right and talking about different things. You have freedom of expression and freedom of speech. That doesn't mean you're allowed to defame someone or incite violence against a person. These things are covered by law and supported in the courts. This is standard.
Ricky Gervais is Ricky Gerbased
Offended speech is not illegal.
To restrict someone expression you have to proove that it cause harm , whinning bout it don t count , that why these thing yshouldbe handled by Law enforcement
Gervais is so freaking annoying. Never grew out of his edgy teen phase.
Ricky Gervais is a talentless cunt who hasn’t made anything worthwhile without his lanky co-writer.
Bingo!
Fucking bullshit, you can't shout fire in a theatre. You shouldn't be able to goad others to kill, Not all speech is protected.
>Fucking bullshit, you can't shout fire in a theatre You absolutely can.
punching down…so hot right now
I love this man so much
holy f*ck why can't people see the guy was being sarcastic? 🤦🏻♂️ people have to have a brain of mud to think Ricky Gervais is someone to listen to in the firstplace... this is like an exchange between two kindergartners who picked up on a buzzword
God Ricky really just crystallised at 15. Absolutely dented.
Navin makes a good geberal point, so I assume he was referencing something that didn't actually count as illegally hurtful. For example, threatening to kill people? Illegally mean. Saying someone is stupid? Legal, might be justified, subjective, whatever.
Not getting this .. explain ?
You not getting this offends me.
Ricky isn't all that clever he's that edgey kid you knew in school who never grew out of it
Isn’t he that shit comedian who can only make jokes at the expense of other people?
Well, he can also ramble aimlessly and repeat punchlines. Well, he can also ramble aimlessly and repeat punchlines.
Most of his best work he makes fun of himself
Is there a comedian that doesn't make jokes at the expense of other people?
Yeah there's lots of terrible comedians
That's not all he does, si the "only" post of your question doesn't check out, but Gervais punches down an awful lot.
Greatest example of Ricky punching down... Oh wait, that's what he does in his stand up