"THE PECULIAR evil of silencing the expression of an opinion is that it is robbing the human race; posterity as well as the existing generation; those who dissent from the opinion, still more than those who hold it. If the opinion is right, they are deprived of the opportunity of exchanging error for truth: if wrong, they lose, what is almost as great a benefit, the clearer perception and livelier impression of truth, produced by its collision with error." John Stuart Mill, On Liberty |
'OPEN DISCUSSION of many major public questions has for some time now been taboo. We can't open our mouths without being denounced as racists, misogynists, supremacists, imperialists or fascists. As for the media, they stand ready to trash anyone so designated." Saul Bellow, Novelist |
'A LIBERAL SOCIETY stands on the proposition that we should all take seriously the idea that we might be wrong. That means we must place no one, including ourselves, beyond the reach of criticism (no final say); it means that we must allow people to err, even where the error offends and upsets, as it often will. In other words, liberal science is built in two pillars. One is the right to offend in pursuit of truth. The other is the responsibility to check and be checked." Jonathan Rauch: Kindly Inquisitors: The New Attacks on Free Thought |
George Orwell: "ANYONE WHO challenges the prevailing orthodoxy finds himself being silenced with surprising effectiveness. A genuinely unfashionable opinion is almost never given a fair hearing." John Stuart Mill: "UNMEASURED VITUPERATION, employed on the side of prevailing opinion, deters people from expressing contrary opinions, and from listening to those who express them." |
 write
to David Irving |
