Freedom of Speech, Freedom of Markets

Recently, I have been trying to get participants in discussions at the Party of Reason and Progress to respect conservative ideas.

This is not because I think that intellectual diversity has any type of intrinsic value, or because I believe that everything is just a matter of opinion and one opinion is as good as any other, or because I think that beliefs should be evaluated on any standard other than (or addition to) whether they are true. It is because I hold that some beliefs attributed to conservatives and Republicans are true, and some beliefs attributed to liberals and Democrats are false.

If the Party of Reason and Progress and its members adopt the idea that one major party is a fountain of all wisdom and virtue, and the other is a cesspool of ignorance and malevolence, then it will not be operating on the principles of reason. It will, in fact, be embracing a great many fictions precisely because they are the beliefs that one must have to obtain membership in a particular political tribe.

In this respect, recently, I noticed an interesting parallel between the arguments for freedom of speech and the arguments for freedom in the marketplace.

In a nutshell, the main argument for a right to freedom of speech goes as follows:

A right to freedom of speech is a right to an immunity from violence or threats of violence for what one says and does. We wish to prohibit the introduction of violence into the forum. The reason for this is, primarily, because introducing violence will start us down a road where those with power will ultimately decide what is said and written in the public forum. If they have the power to say what is said and written, they will inevitably allow those things that serve their interests, and prohibit that which goes against their interests. We do not need to even imagine a malevolent conspiracy on their part. This will come about simply because of the common arrogance people have to exaggerate the benefits to themselves, to imagine benefits to others in that which benefits themselves, to minimize harm to others, and to imagine harms to others in that which harms them. In other words, we do not need malevolence. We only need self-deception. And we have plenty of that. Though, clearly, this will also tempt the malevolent.

We can write the freedom of exchange in almost exactly the same terms.

A right to freedom of speech is a right to an immunity from violence or threats of violence in exchange. We wish to prohibit the introduction of violence into the market. The reason for this is, primarily, because introducing violence will start us down a road where those with power will ultimately decide what is traded and for what price. If they have the power to say what is traded, they will inevitably allow those trades that serve their interests, and prohibit that which goes against their interests. We do not need to even imagine a malevolent conspiracy on their part. This will come about simply because of the common arrogance people have to exaggerate the benefits to themselves, to imagine benefits to others in that which benefits themselves, to minimize harm to others, and to imagine harms to others in that which harms them. In other words, we do not need malevolence. We only need self-deception. And we have plenty of that. Though, clearly, this will also tempt the malevolent.

Employing this argument, I suspect many liberals will have little trouble imagining a society a few decades after we introduce violence into the forum - and the wealthy and powerful have gained increasing power to dictate what is said and written. Those who oppose the people in power are arrested and imprisoned - their property compensation - and otherwise forced into silence. The defender of freedom of speech would then tell these people, "I told you this would happen. You didn't listen. Now you have a forum where speech only benefits those in power."

Today, a few decades since violence was introduced into the marketplace, conservatives are saying the same thing. They see many liberals complaining that activities benefit to those with power more than any other group. They see economic activity going to increase their power. Indeed, the force of government is used quite extensively to take wealth from those who lack power and give it to those who have power - which tend to be those who can afford lawyers, lobbyists, and public relations firms that specialize in manipulating the public. Against this, the defender of freedom of markets would then tell these people, "I told you this would happen. You didn't listen. Now, you have markets where trade only benefits those in power."

I favor the affordable care act.

However, I condemn the attitude common among liberals that conservative who oppose the act get off on the idea of taking medical insurance away from tens of millions of people and watching them suffer and die. However, the liberal attitude in this case is like that of a person viewing a person perceiving a defender of freedom of speech as a defender of all sorts of malevolent and harmful beliefs that are sometimes found in an unregulated forum. Interpreting a defender of freedom of speech as a defender of lies, and interpreting a defender of freedom of market as a defender of suffering and death, are comparable malevolent and dishonest distortions of an opposing view.

If I may quickly summarize a sketch of an opposing view, it goes as follows:

People are resourceful and imaginative. The best way to deal with the health-care problem is to put that resourcefulness and imagination to work to come up with solutions that have the lowest cost and maximum benefit. When we "kick tens of millions of people" off of government-funded health insurance, we do not expect them to suffer and die. We expect them to find new and better ways to prevent suffering and death.

The liberal plan is one of violence and arrogance. It is violent in that people are forced to participate in their plan; those who do so face people with guns, and those people with guns have a legal permission to kill any who resist. This is not an exaggeration - this is a description of how the state works. The government passes a law. People with guns who have a permission to kill those who resist enforce the law. The liberal plan is arrogant because it assumes that a government employee can come up with a brilliant plan to solve the problems - a plan that is so certain that he can be justified in sending people with guns to threaten to kill any who do not obey his dictates.

Instead, the conservatives expect these tens of millions of people - so long as they have the freedom to do so - to come up with some number of non-violent answers to the problem and to implement them. Since the costs come from their own pockets, and since they harvest the benefits directly, they will inevitably seek the solutions that produce the greatest benefits at the least cost. To the conservative, "We are not the ones condemning people to suffering and death. You are. You are the ones relying on arrogant bureaucrats with guns. You are the ones who are blocking the invention of dozens of non-violent solutions that will ultimately provide far more help to far more people at a much lower cost."

In my posts, I argue extensively for the freedom of speech using precisely the argument I outlined above. As such, I have to admit that the same argument applied to a freedom of market has some merit.

I note, however, that the right to freedom of speech is not absolute. It does not give a person a right to lie. Perjury, fraud, libel, slander, false advertising, are all prohibited. At the very least, the right to freedom of speech applies only to those who believe what they are saying. In many cases, they must also believe on the basis of good reason. Negligent speech is also prohibited.

Consequently, we can argue, even where these arguments are parallel, that there are some market activities that can also be considered harmful to the public good and, thereby, regulated. In this respect, I would argue that the very poor actually lack market freedom. Their economic situation means that they are often acting under duress, as in, "Do what I say or your children starve and your spouse will not get needed medical care." A right to freedom in the market no more applies to these types of trades than a right to freedom of speech applies to lies and negligent acts of libel and slander.

But the more important point is that this is a type of conclusion that one can reach if one takes the arguments of critics seriously - rather than manufacturing straw men that allow one to charge the critics with stupidity or malevolence. Sometimes the critic has a grasp of a truth. Presuming that they are malevolent or foolish merely blinds oneself to a truth that could, ultimately, produce great benefit or prevent great harm.