SOFiA values the honest (and clearly-expressed) exploration of ideas and views that challenge or reflect on the status quo in the fields of reason, philosophy, ethics, religion, science and the arts. We share a common interest in discovering, as individuals, what we can and cannot believe in.

Our Network is therefore, by default, a fan of free speech.

Nine Media commentator Elizabeth Farrelly has outlined some important fallacies regarding free speech, fallacies well worth reflecting upon:

  1. Disagreement is insult.
  2. Words are deeds.
  3. Silencing a thought disempowers it.
  4. Ideas come in bundles.
  5. Emotional comfort is your right.
  6. In an ideal world everyone agrees.

I would add one more fallacy, in light of trends in political debate across the Pacific (if not here): a shared sense of reality and rationality in debate is unimportant.

Disclaimer: views represented in SOFiA blog posts are entirely the view of the respective authors and in no way represent an official SOFiA position.

Photo by Clay Banks on Unsplash