Dear Phanto,

<<speech of itself cannot hurt anyone. Unless you can prove that it is the speech that causes the pain then you cannot restrict it.>>

A bird poo'd on a car's mirror, the driver stopped the car and came out to clean the mirror - and was hit by a truck.

The truck by itself did not hurt anyone - the bird, the driver and some bump on the road may all share the blame, but the driver is hurt.

In ideal principle, one should not be hurt even when their body is injured, how less so when somebody calls them 'idiot'. In practice we do hurt because we identify with our bodies and minds, consider their hurt to be ours and experience this as pain.

The truck-driver, seeing a man on the road cleaning their car's mirror should press the brakes, rather than drive on saying "it's the bird".

All sensations create impressions in our brain/mind, often unwanted. Why then should unwanted sensations of touch be considered "hurt" but not likewise unwanted sensations of sight, smell and sound? It makes no sense (pun intended)!

Yes, insecurities are involved: can you show me a person who has no insecurities? Our core insecurity is for not knowing who we are, believing that we are this body, which must eventually perish, therefore let the man who has no insecurities cast the first stone.

<<You can move away from such a person and refuse to relate to them until they change their behaviour. This is the most natural response. You could stop buying their magazine...>>

Definitely, but that person should respect this decision and not pursue me any further. If they continue, then it is aggression and should be a criminal offence.

I was not referring to people who buy the magazine - if they do despite knowing what the magazine is about, then they have none but themselves to blame. However, if the offending pictures appear on the cover page, then they are likely to hurt innocent people who visit the news-agency to buy something else.

Yuyutsu:

I never said that people cannot be hurt by physical blows to their body. I said they cannot be hurt by words or speech. If speech can hurt by the physical act of hearing it then why does not all speech hurt since it is the same physical experience? If I say you are wonderful then it is just a set of sounds that vibrate your ear drums. If I say you are an idiot then it is exactly the same event – it is the reaction that takes place inside of you that makes all the difference.

Maybe we do all have insecurities but that does not excuse us from taking responsibilities for them and not expecting governments or anyone else to temper the right to free speech because of them.

We do not need to know your theories about body/mind dynamics or whether we are more than a body. These things are totally irrelevant to the discussion. We are talking only about physical action and reaction. Someone speaks, another listens and feels pain. There is nothing metaphysical about any of it.

Dear Phanto,

If you beat someone physically, they normally experience it as pain - unless they are a masochist. Depending on one's mental constructs one may experience the same as a pleasant stroke or as a threatening sexual advance, as a physical assault or as a good massage.

Occasionally physical pressure is unavoidable, such as on a crowded bus or train, but we do try to minimise it if we can except when the other party agrees.

Why should this be different when instead of the sense of touch are involved the senses of smell, sight and hearing, is beyond me.

In general, differences in metaphysical outlook can account for ethical differences, but I think that in this particular case our metaphysical outlooks are close enough so we can arrive at the same conclusion (unlike for example someone who believed that for every pain you feel now you are saved 100 such pains later in hell).

So yes, the situation is such: someone speaks, another hears (not necessarily with intent to listen) and feels pain. Can we agree that the one who speaks should do their best to avoid such situations?

Regarding the call to government, it comes down to the question whether or not it is legitimate for one to defend themselves against verbal/sound attacks. If it is legitimate, then it is also legitimate to delegate this form of self-defence to a government, otherwise it is not.

So if the neighbours or the ice-cream man play loud music that you really hate and cannot escape from, or if the neighbour constantly calls you and your family dirty names, day and night, or if they don't stop telling you and your family unsolicitedly about their products and prices, and assuming you are not a saint who embraces such suffering as penance, surely there is a point where self-defence is a legitimate option?

Yuyutsu:

There is a difference between speech and noise. If someone is speaking too loudly and you are trying to sleep of course it is annoying. It is not what they say but the intrusiveness upon your environment that you are unhappy with and have every right to try and stop. If someone says something in a clear and calm way which causes you pain then it is the content that is the issue. You cannot respond with legislation against speech in the same way as you respond to the sound of a jack hammer.

“Can we agree that the one who speaks should do their best to avoid such situations?” It shouldn’t make any difference. People use speech with the intention to hurt because they suspect someone to be insecure enough for it to trigger pain. It can only cause pain because such insecurity exists. The exact same insult to another person may cause no pain whatsoever so who is responsible for the pain?

The fact that a person has shown a willingness to cause pain means that you deal with their attitude and not their speech. We should avoid such people not because of their speech but because of their willingness to hurt. We know from experience that if they cannot hurt by words that they may well resort to violence and this is why every bone in our body wants to retreat from them. You cannot legislate to silence people because they have an intention to hurt – you can only legislate for actions which inflict pain and speech cannot inflict pain.

Many people find it hard to make such a retreat especially from someone who has some kind of power over them. Instead of owning their insecurities and taking themselves out of the relationship they remain because they feel powerless. These are the people who want some authority to step in and control the speech of their aggressor. It does not work. A person intent on harming you will find another way.