tags: personal journal

Nicholas' journal. I also write a programming blog and a tumble log. RSS feed.

Mar 18, 2010
Encyclopediadramatica and epistemology

I just read a great interview with a moderator of encyclopediadramatica.com. It's clear that the interviewer was expecting the moderator to be a young stoner with anarchist leanings, but this expectation turned out to be hilariously wrong as the guy is a middle-aged professional and father. Ninemsn applied the standard you've-been-a-naughty-boy, what-have-you-to-say-for-yourself line of questioning anyway.

Choice quotes from the article:

Do you think it's possible for people to go too far with free speech? Is there a line that can be crossed?

Let us talk epistemology for a moment. The minute there is a hidden limit on speech, it is no longer free. Free speech with limits is not free speech under any circumstances. But Matthew 15:11 (what goes into a man's mouth does not make him "unclean", but what comes out of his mouth, that is what makes him "unclean") certainly applies to some users of ED and virtually any other web community in existence.

Later:

Allowing such material to be published doesn't seem to me like something most Christians would be comfortable with. How do you justify this to yourself?

All the things Christ said and did would make most "Christians" uncomfortable. He called the leaders of a specific ethnic group murderers and liars (John 8:44), demanded hatred (Luke 14:26) and flogged bankers and flipped over their tables. John 8 is an extremely condemning document — at the time it would have been considered worse than anything on ED. Many people were brutally murdered by the Pharisitic establishment over it. The synoptic gospels and the gospel according to John were so revolutionary that no publishing platform would take them.

These days most Christians focus on Paul and completely ignore the life and actions of Christ. If Christ were here again today he'd probably start a website and people would be crying for its censorship.

Interview with ED moderator.

Update: I'm late with this. Here's the relevant reddit thread which includes a couple of level-headed comments from the interviewer.

People I like: liedra.net | spacepants.org | puzzling.org | benno.id.au | tristesse.org | hardy.dropbear.id.au | marauder.com.au | xeny.net | progsoc.org/~curious | oneofthoseblogsonthethemeof.wordpress.com