Hate Crimes? Thought Crimes? Crimethink?

Hi, Tangle. This is an interesting comment, because I think it highlights the source of the 'slippery slope' paranoia. You're kind of suggesting here that, although it isn't likely that the legal system could ever be used to directly punish 'thought crimes,' there is an underlying process of social engineering in which harboring certain thoughts or opinions can increase one's likelihood of legal scrutiny and punishment.I can see how that could be a 'slippery slope' toward an overall socio-politico-legal system that feels like it effectively operates on a system of 'thought crimes,' even though it doesn't technically do so. However, is there evidence of such a process? I'm not sure, but I wouldn't be overly surprised if I learned that there was.

Hi, Tangle. While I agree that the 'slippery slope' arguments are mostly expressions of a person's paranoia, my mind isn't fully comfortable completely dismissing them yet, so allow me to play devil's advocate for a moment. Here is a Snopes article on the NYC transgender discrimination guidelines that came out. The claim being evaluated is that you could be fined up to $250,000 for not using the preferred pronoun for a transgendered person.Of course, that claim was found to be a gross exaggeration, but it does seem like there's an element of the 'slippery slope' that Jon was talking about: for example, wantonly refusing to use a transgendered person's preferred pronoun is actually prosecutable under these new guidelines.An outside observer could reasonably conclude that this law pretty closely fits the predictions of a 'slippery slope' hypothesis. Of course, the trouble with the 'slippery slope' argument is that the endpoint is more mercurial, so 'slippery slope towards thought crime' is harder to confirm. Still, this law does make me feel a little insecure in my belief that the 'slippery slope' hypothesis is just paranoia.

Hi, Tangle. I feel a little back-of-the-brain itch when I see this statement, because this feels like the entire essence of the 'slippery slope' paranoia: they're more concerned with the government trying to control their thoughts than with the technical definition of 'thought crime.'I mean, you're right of course: laws are made to dissuade behaviors that have a disruptive effect in society. But then, the observation that such laws tend to proliferate over time, and that it seems relatively easy to condition people to accept new rules, gives the uncomfortable impression that government is becoming more intrusive over time.Basically, while I'm pretty sure I agree with your views, I can still see how it's easy to misinterpret the available evidence as a 'slippery slope' toward... well, toward something different from the current state of affairs, I guess?

Hi, NoNukes. Does this make you a legal baraminologist?"No matter how much a crime micro-evolves, it will never macro-evolve into a thought crime."

Hi, Tangle. Yeah, I'm not sure where I'm going with all this. I probably just have some residual conspiracy-theorist memes still embedded deep in my mind due to my former life as a fundamentalist (and my continued association with still-fundamentalist family members).I've got a lot to tease out still.

Hi, NoNukes.Okay, maybe I'm not done sorting this out yet. Based on the above-quoted comment, I think you see what I'm trying to get at.Conspiracy theories can be surprisingly tenacious because they are very difficult to completely disprove, they prey on more general fears, and their followers tend not to make a practice of following parsimony. I certainly don't believe that there is some gang of liberal conspirators meeting in dark rooms to discuss the best strategy for ridding the United States of its Bill of Rights so they can subjugate the entire human race.But, I still think there is a modicum of merit to some of the more moderate 'slippery slope' arguments. Right now, the country's legal systems seem willing to experiment with laws that flirt with the limits of individual rights, like freedom of speech. I think it's fair to say that, if there is no resistance to these experiments, future policy makers will be willing to entertain thoughts of deeper intrusions into personal freedoms.I guess what I'm saying is that it feels like a line I thought would never be crossed... has been crossed. Maybe it's only a minor line, but it does set the precedent that lines can be crossed, and that makes me call into question anybody's claim about the sanctity of lines.So NoNukes says "it's still not a thought crime," but that's just another line in the sand, and my faith in lines-in-the-sand has recently been shaken. And, if I read between the lines, it isn't hard to interpret Tangle's comments as saying that smudging --- and even crossing --- lines-in-the-sand is perfectly acceptable, as long as the intention is honorable. So, how can I believe that any line-in-the-sand will remain un-smudgeable in the future?It's probably mostly paranoia on my part, but I'm not quite ready yet to just dismiss it as completely irrational or outlandish.

Hi, Tangle. The specific example I'm thinking of is the NYC transgender guidelines, and the implications for free speech.

Hi, Ringo. Stop picking on my metaphor, you bully! What did he ever do to you?

Hi, NoNukes. I think it's more of a "line smudge" than a "line cross." Like Tangle said, it'll probably be really difficult to prosecute somebody for anything but the most egregious pronoun misuses, so freedom of speech probably remains intact here.But, is the overreaction --- "NYC is trampling all over our right to free speech" --- necessarily wrong? Couldn't it be argued that, if the conservative nuts weren't constantly yammering about 'slippery slopes,' we might just become complacent enough to slide all the way down that slope? Alright, I can trust you, because you don't like smudging lines. Not like that Tangle character: he's a line-smudger, so I can't trust him when he tries to reassure me that other lines won't be crossed in the future.So, if you say there's a distinct legal line between 'bigot' and 'bully,' I'll believe you. But, I'll have no truck with line-smudgers. There was a recent workplace misconduct case that resulted in punitive actions against my supervisor, which most of the office personnel felt was entirely without merit. As a result, I also have a lot of reservations about 'hostile work environment' policies.I guess it's just that there's a lot of difficulty finding where the lines are, which makes for some measure of legal 'mess,' and that's bound to cause frustrations and even, regrettably, some unnecessary harm. My overall impression is that it's just because our society is in a sort of exploratory phase in relation to social policies, and that we'll eventually find our center through empirical experience; but there's still that nagging feeling that there is a danger of setting bad precedents that will put us on the wrong path.I think that nagging feeling is a good thing, and it will help us in our search for the right approach to these social issues, so we shouldn't just dismiss it as outlandish paranoia. At the same time, we can't let overreaction translate into paralysis, mistrust and bad policies; so line-drawers need to learn how to work together with line-smudgers.