Today felt like a significant day and moved me to finally move into blogging and social commentary. I guess the combination of a US election and finishing a re-read of Al Gore's very inspiring book The Assault on Reason moved me to participate in the marketplace of ideas.
As a tool for democratic discourse the Internet is a significant step forward, comparable in many ways to the invention of the printing press. After all, democracy depends on the free exchange of ideas, which not only requires that people have access to new ideas, but that they are able to debate and discuss ideas which are presented to them, give feedback and allow these ideas to either flourish in the light of acceptance or wither on the vine and die away. Indeed, the Internet has many significant advantages over printing press, as its widespread availability makes it more accessible to the common man than the expensive and bulky presses operated by our forefathers. Dissemination of ideas likewise is significantly easier with the internet than with the printed word; the difficulty with this modern iteration of the Internet is not that there is a dearth of opinions but that there are so very many opinions that a lone voice is lost in the babble of the crowd.
I don't really have a problem with that. The principle of democracy is that there should be a consensus of an informed electorate; that the officials elected to high office represent the will and the opinions of the people. The submission of the electorate to the will of the executive and the surrender of the rights of the people cannot truly represent the best interests of our species.
In order to maintain the essential freedoms guaranteed by the First Amendment it is incumbent upon us, as a people, to protect the rights afforded to ourselves and to others. This means that while the opinions and beliefs of others, no matter how objectionable, muddleheaded or crazy, are theirs to hold and theirs to protect, their right to dissent from our own opinions is something which we all must hold in common and something we all must defend.
It should be noted - and this is an important caveat - that opinions, no matter how honestly or sincerely they are believed to be true, remain opinions. This distinction seems to be lost on many people in this day and age, a fact which I personally find to be startling.
We have a new President-Elect of the United States, I propose that we mark the occasion by taking on a new approach to our discourse. I firmly resolve that in my private life and in my blog I shall make no assertion of fact without solid evidence to support my position. I ask that my commentators, should there be any, return the courtesy.
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