{"id":21457,"date":"2020-07-13T09:19:49","date_gmt":"2020-07-13T14:19:49","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/ifamnews.com\/?p=21457"},"modified":"2020-07-13T12:02:00","modified_gmt":"2020-07-13T17:02:00","slug":"shutting-down-open-debate","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/ifamnews.com\/en\/shutting-down-open-debate","title":{"rendered":"Shutting Down “Open Debate”"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Harper\u2019s<\/em> magazine published last Tuesday \u201cA Letter on Justice and Open Debate,\u201d<\/a> a call for \u201c[t]he free exchange of information and ideas, the lifeblood of a liberal society,\u201d which the signatories to the letter believe \u201cis daily becoming more constricted.\u201d The letter was signed by some dozens of artists, intellectuals, and leading public figures, including David Brooks, Salman Rushdie, Margaret Atwood, Gloria Steinem, David Frum, and J.K. Rowling\u2014leftists and neoconservatives, black and white, male and female, trans, gay, and heterosexual are all represented.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The letter is short, a mere three paragraphs. It opens, \u201cOur\ncultural institutions are facing a moment of trial. Powerful protests for\nracial and social justice are leading to overdue demands for police reform,\nalong with wider calls for greater equality and inclusion across our society .\n. . \u201d But alongside such disruptions, a new regime has arisen, one which tends\n\u201cto weaken our norms of open debate and toleration of differences in favor of\nideological conformity.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Such attacks on free speech, the signatories acknowledge, is\nsomething they \u201chave come to expect . . . on the radical right,\u201d but now \u201can\nintolerance of opposing views, a vogue for public shaming and ostracism, and\nthe tendency to dissolve complex policy issues in a blinding moral certainty\u201d\nare becoming widespread. \u201cThis stifling atmosphere,\u201d the letter closes, \u201cwill\nultimately harm the most vital causes of our time.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The letter has quickly gained widespread notoriety, with many finding it offensive and annoying. Jeff Yang at CNN<\/a> calls it \u201cself-interested and elitist at best.\u201d But leading black intellectual Gregory Pardlo (who signed the letter) told The New York Times<\/em><\/a>, \u201cIt seems some of the conversation has turned to who the signatories are more than the content of the letter.\u201d Particular ire has been leveled at the inclusion of J.K Rowling, who (as iFamNews has reported<\/a>) recently came under intense fire for asserting the reality of biological sex, to the outcry of transgender activists around the globe. Indeed, as if to emphasize the point the letter makes, transgender critic-at-large at Vox <\/em>Emily VanDerWerff posted on Twitter a letter<\/a> that she had sent to her editors, complaining that Vox<\/em> coworker Matthew Yglesias had signed the Letter on Justice. Other original signers have backed out<\/a>, claiming they did not know who the other signatories were.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The whole thing is rather an interesting commentary on the\nstate of discourse in America, wherein even leading leftist intellectuals are\narguing that public Internet shaming and the shutting down of all dissent has\ngone way too far. And yet, as the blowback to this letter shows, even\npolitically and culturally leftist leanings or opinions are not enough to\nshelter these signers from attack. Note the example of VanDerWerff, criticizing\na respected coworker\u2019s signature in part because of the letter\u2019s supposed \u201cdog whistles\ntoward anti-trans positions\u201d<\/a> but also largely because in signing, Yglesia\nwas keeping company with \u201cseveral prominent anti-trans voices.\u201d We cannot even\nkeep company, the message goes, with people who have reasoned objections to our\nown opinions.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The left has often accused pro-family forces of being exclusionary of alternate family forms, or (as in this letter) accused the \u201cradical right\u201d of being the ones who shut down debate. But historically, the pro-family movement has shown remarkable inclusion and diversity, working across the aisle to promote marriage, or to better the lives of children, or to promote religious freedom for all. The Letter on Justice and Open Debate is rather a breath of fresh air\u2014a bold move by people with wildly different views, willing to take a public stand together and say that discourse is being endangered. \u201cWe are already paying the price,\u201d they say, \u201cin greater risk aversion among writers, artists, and journalists who fear for their livelihoods if they depart from the consensus, or even lack sufficient zeal in agreement.\u201d <\/p>\n\n\n\n

And yet, already, forces are arguing that even calling for\nfree speech is a radical act, and partnering with people with whom one\ndisagrees to impart a common message is a dangerous move.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Let\u2019s hope the backlash to the letter makes clear how\nnecessary its message is.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The Letter on Justice and Open Debate is rather a breath of fresh air\u2014a bold move by people with wildly different views, willing to take a public stand together and say that discourse is being endangered<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":29,"featured_media":21552,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"give_campaign_id":0,"om_disable_all_campaigns":false,"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"mc4wp_mailchimp_campaign":[],"jnews-multi-image_gallery":[],"jnews_single_post":{"subtitle":"The Letter on Justice and Open Debate is rather a breath of fresh air\u2014a bold move by people with wildly different views, willing to take a public stand together and say that discourse is being endangered.","format":"standard","video":"","gallery":"","source_name":"","source_url":"","via_name":"","via_url":"","override":[{"single_blog_custom":"","sidebar":"","second_sidebar":"","share_position":"","share_float_style":"","post_date_format":"","post_date_format_custom":"","post_reading_time_wpm":"","zoom_button_out_step":"1","zoom_button_in_step":"1","number_popup_post":"1"}],"image_override":[{"single_post_thumbnail_size":"","single_post_gallery_size":""}],"trending_post_position":"","trending_post_label":""},"jnews_primary_category":{"id":"511"},"jnews_social_meta":{"fb_title":"","fb_description":"","fb_image":"","twitter_title":"","twitter_description":"","twitter_image":""},"jnews_override_counter":{"view_counter_number":"0","share_counter_number":"0","like_counter_number":"0","dislike_counter_number":"0"},"footnotes":""},"categories":[804,511,805],"tags":[4689],"class_list":["post-21457","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-breaking-news","category-culture","category-foreground","tag-freedom-of-speech"],"yoast_head":"\nShutting Down "Open Debate" - 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King is the Managing Editor of IOF's journal, The Natural Family: An International Journal of Research and Policy, the United States\u2019 leading journal of family-policy research. In that capacity, she writes, edits and corresponds with editors and contributors to ensure that each issue provides the most relevant and accurate research and policy analysis available. Nicole holds a B.A. in English as well as M.A.s in English and Political Theory. She has contributed to The Front Porch Republic and Chronicles: A Magazine of American Culture, among others. She is also a contributing editor to SALVO Magazine and a blogger at salvomag.com.","url":"https:\/\/ifamnews.com\/en\/author\/nkingifamnews-com"}]}},"amp_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/ifamnews.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/21457","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/ifamnews.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/ifamnews.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ifamnews.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/29"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ifamnews.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=21457"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/ifamnews.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/21457\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":21593,"href":"https:\/\/ifamnews.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/21457\/revisions\/21593"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ifamnews.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/21552"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/ifamnews.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=21457"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ifamnews.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=21457"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ifamnews.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=21457"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}