Tagged: public discourse

On Popular Intellectuals

Being a popular or public intellectual, particularly in this era of digital communication and global fora, demands two things above all, namely that you tell your audience what they want to hear, and that you phrase your every statement with the kind of absolute certainty and lack of circumspection that reassures the audience that they need not have any reserve, hesitation, or doubt...

Reflections on the Elon Musk Twitter Cataclysm and Dire Threat to Democracy

The notion that democracy is best served by restricting the public exchange of ideas to only those ideas pre-approved by one political party or faction is absurd. The notion that allowing ideas with which you disagree to be uttered in a public forum constitutes a threat to your freedom is a clear admission that you lack confidence in your own ideas or your...

My Boycott

Boycotting is a perfectly legitimate form of behavior within a democratic political structure. A group of individuals strongly object to the way a business or other entity is using its profits or its public profile to promote ends of which that group disapproves. Knowing that this entity is able to exert public sway, or to influence public opinion, precisely because, or to the...