In his very provocative blog on Kant, Glenn Beck in “I Kant Explain” raised the question of citizens being scared into silence. There was a time, or so Mr. Beck pined, when a person’s honor was tied to his saying what he believed. This does not mean that a person was brazen or, as we now say, “in your face” with his beliefs. But the idea was that in general one knew where a person stood, if only because the person’s silence made it clear that he did not stand where one supposed that he did.
The essence of Mr. Beck’s point is that in the throes of modernity there has been an extraordinary disconnect between honor and truth. Why is that? Mr. Beck failed to answer that question.
On my view, the explanation is tied to the fact that we no longer live in a world in which we can expect others to take our words in the way that we meant them, even if we did not say things just right. The honor that was once associated with being a forthright person has been eroded by a world in which there is almost a rush to distort what we say.
We live in a society in which it is nothing for others to take a string of words out of context and brand the person as racist or sexist or antisemitic. A person could heap praise after praise upon another and yet end up being called a sexist or a racist because he made one infelicitous slip of the tongue. Here might be an example: Suppose that during a speech a white person, call him John, had nothing but praise for a black who is a public figure who is 47 years old. That would all be for naught if John ended his speech with “I love this boy”.
All sorts of people would seize upon the fact that John referred to a 47 year old black man, call him George, as boy and entirely set aside all the praise that John had for George. It would be irrelevant that George wasn’t offended and understood that John meant nothing malicious by it, because they both affectionately referred to one another as boy.
Honor in speech is a two-way street. We are honorable in what we say when we can count on others to be honorable in grasping what we meant by what we said.
To be sure, there are times when it is not at all clear what a person meant to say. Just so, there are lots and lots of times when we are absolutely clear what a person meant to say even though he fumbled all over the place in the choice of words used. Specifically, we are clear that the person meant to say something kind even if his word choice was less that felicitous. Between people of goodwill, what a speaker can count upon is that the listener(s) will make every effort to understand his (the speaker’s) words in the spirit that they were intended. Against this backdrop, honor in speech is natural and can be expected.
Not so, when people are chaffing at the bit to use any excuse whatsoever to excoriate our character and so to discount our goodwill. Against, that backdrop silence becomes a rational choice in a hostile social environment. And honor in speech (which is tied to truth) is sacrificed for safety.
Like Mr. Beck, I am fortunate in that I do not have to sacrifice honor in speech for safety. But it is a simple truth that most people are not as fortunate as either one of us is.
Mr. Glenn Beck has an extremely successful radio program; and he is particularly artful at pushing the envelope without crossing the line. Moreover, he is masterful in his use of humor and humor coupled with “different voices” to raise questions about the ways in which people are lambasted for a single slip of the tongue.
I, on the other hand, am a black professor; and that gives me considerable latitude. I can be conservative without being racist; and I am generally perceived, rightly or wrongly, as being quite capable intellectually; and this shelters me, to some extent, from the charge of being the white man’s lackey. Moreover, it is generally conceded that I am too fiercely independent to be anyone’s lackey.
There are other alternatives. For instance, a person could be known for her ideological beliefs that, in turn, speak to many public issues. So there is a very real sense in which one already knows what she is going to say. Alternatively, a person could simply be known for her outspoken views.
But here is the substantive point: Society is no longer nurturing of honor in speech. There are those who will find a way to maintain honor in speech no matter what. Most, however, will bow to reality and become what I think of as social zombies: they merely say what it is expected of them to say. In the words of Mr. Beck: Most people are scared into silence. Rather, they are scared into speech conformity.
The chilling consequence of all of this is that, in the matter of freedom of speech, we as a nation are not as free as we once were. In one sense, then, religious conservatives and liberals are but two sides of the same coin. Each is about suppressing speech. They merely differ with regard to which kind of speech it is that gets oppressed. Liberals will take just about anything out of context to raise the spectre of racism and religious conservatives can see brimstone and the fires of hell in the slight reference to sexuality.
There is a difference, however, between the two sides. Religious conservatives are in this regard quite honest about what they are up to. Liberals will insist that next to life itself, they hold nothing in higher esteem than freedom of speech. This they say all the while casting aside the honor that comes with freedom of speech. They will excoriate and ostracize the white who does not trip over himself saying “African American”, no matter how legitimate her or his reasons might be. They will lambaste the male who extols the virtues of the stay-at-home mother, as if he were for some form of slavery of women. The issue is not up for debate. In general, one is properly reflective only if one speaks in support of the ideology of the status quo.
Do we want honor in speech or submissiveness? History shows that wherever we have the later, we have the makings for a totalitarian state. The problem lies in folks thinking that this truth does not apply to the views that they cherish.
