In an earlier post, I opined that a large problem for American society is that social space occupied by the concept of “Taste” has been usurped by Radical Free Speech and PC Speech. I think I’ve hit upon a slightly more coherent formulation of that idea.
We can define “Taste” as “Variable Self-Censorship”, wherein the variability is a function of one’s awareness of one’s social circumstances. Radical Free Speech advocacy seeks to nullify “Censorship” part, whereas PC Speech attacks the “Variable” part. The latter might need an extra word of explanation: Political Correctness is all about the increased codification of speech, which in turn decreases the range of legitimate expression available to the individual(*). Both attacks, however, decrease the space available to individual for expressing himself on the basis of his perceived relationship with the social network in which he operates. In other words, the modes of personal expression advocated by Radical Free Speech and PC Speech encourage solipsism and mechanism, respectively. The basis of Radical Free Speech is the isolated individual, and the basis of PC Speech is the universal impersonal code. As a result, neither fosters actual interpersonal engagement or understanding.
(*) Ok…so I’m aware that this is a blunt over-generalization, esp. in light of the potential counter-examples from societies founded on a highly structured sociolinguistic apparatus (cf. levels of politeness in Japanese). But even there, one could make the argument that such highly structured speech conventions have over time contributed to the minimization/marginalization of the role of the individual in Japanese society.
