With some authors, like Gene Wolfe, rereading is not optional. I really like the books designed to be reread, each time you read them you discover something new.
Wolfe wrote in a letter, "My definition of a great story has nothing to do with 'a varied and interesting background.' It is: One that can be read with pleasure by a cultivated reader and reread with increasing pleasure."
The Gene Wolfe's novels are outstanding. I think it should be more well-known. I just heard of him by coincidence in a blog post that appeared in my RSS feed, and no one that I know had ever heard of him.
Absolutely astounding, the best book I've read in my life. Gene Wolfe has become my favorite author ever. Each time I reread the book I discover a million things I didn't notice before.
It's really terrifying that we have reached a point where you have to stop and think how to battle against all this woke nonsense or else you will become a social outcast immediately.
So you find yourself altering your behavior because you're afraid of the consequences of your actions?
That's called being part of society. You're not being "canceled". You've just ignored all the feedback loops and society decided you're no longer worth the effort.
You're free to run tor nodes. You just have to accept the consequences of others not liking that. That's not impacting on your freedom, and it's also part of their freedom to not like you for running a node.
This is such a silly thing to say. Freedom usually means the ability to do something without negative consequence.
Its sort of like how you were free to do anything you wanted in the soviet union, you just had to accept the consequences that if you do something the state doesn't like you will end up in the gulag.
By this logic, I don't have freedom of speech because I'll be thrown out of your house if I go there and start insulting you. The interesting part about freedom is where it intersects with someone else's freedom. Grandparent is pointing out that this is one of those cases, and the response is that it's not "real" freedom then?
Yes, that's correct - you don't have absolute freedom of speech in my house.
You do have some relative, qualified freedoms from government interference.
However, its entirely possible to still be quite restricted in your speech as a practical matter under american style "freedom of speech". For example, rightly or wrongly, parlor had trouble obtaining services. The government didn't interfere, but as a practical matter they probably had more trouble getting their "mesage" out than opposition groups in countries without freedom of speech that could more easily rely on international resources.
And that's not neccesarily a bad thing. America has identified freedom of speech as a sort of fundamental good - so instead of being truthful about it being a qualified right, seem to instead try to redefine the term so that anything not covered by by first amendment isn't "true" freedom of speech.
After all the saying goes:
"I disapprove of what you say, but I will defend to the death your right to say it" not "I disapprove of what you say, but I will defend to the death your right to be free from government interference in saying it". There is much more to freedom of speech than just what the first amendment covers.
By your own definition no one is really free then. I can camp on BLM land, but i can’t live on it. I can drive on roads, but there are still laws. I can go shopping, but i can’t just take things. I can go to the movies, but i can’t bring a camera to record them. People always abuse freedom to be absolute and that never works.
Everything in life has consequences. You have to weigh them.
There are consequences to everything and different consequences to the same actions in different places, to talk about “accept the consequences” without addressing that is not helpful nor insightful in any way. The real points to focus on are:
- whether the consequences are appropriate
- whether they are natural, a side effect of intervention, or direct consequence of intervention
For example, if you criticise the king of Thailand while in Thailand or as a Thai person you will have committed the crime of lese-majesty and can get you 15 years per instance. If we apply your principle of that being an example of freedom for which "you just have to accept the consequences" then we have learnt nothing and provided nothing of worth. If, however we ask whether that is appropriate and whether it can change (it is a direct intervention so it can) then we can assess it.
That clearly does impact freedom, as does the bank deciding not to serve a customer that is running a Tor node. How is it their business anyway? What impact does running a bridge have on them? Regardless, let's say it was an exit node and the OP was accessing bank services via their own exit node - do they not authenticate the customers accessing their accounts?
