this post was submitted on 04 Aug 2026
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I believe there are a few things you simply shouldn't joke about. Killing children is one of those things. But yes, everybody has a fundamental right to their privacy and it's insane that mass surveillance is becoming more and more common and way too many people seem to just accept or ignore it.
You SHOULD be able to joke about ANYTHING. Who decides what things are permisible? Whoever yoy give the power to do so will then use it arbitrarily to only allow the speech that supports them — that's how fascism is built, in fact.
Yes, we agree. You should be able to. No one should face legal action until an actual crime has been commited and joking isn't a crime. But that doesn't mean doing so is good. I did not say there are things you shouldn't be able to joke about, just that there are a few topics so serious and tragic that joking about them is bad.
Saying something isn't good is the same to say that something shouldn't be done, is a logic equivalence in ethics.
Yes. Again, we agree.. I'm both saying it shouldn't be done because it's bad, and that you should be able to do so because it's legal and freedom of speech is incredibly important. Those aren't contradicting statements.
"You should do that but you shouldn't do that"
Anyways, besides the straw man, the point is that I don't even consider that to be bad, so I think that saying that it shouldn't be done — even if merely at the moral-level, but not at the legal level — it's problematic.
Edit: The straw man is "You should do that but you shouldn't do that", that's simply a joke.
Ok.. At least stop putting words in my mouth. And aside from what you're trying to do right now, there have been no strawmen in our conversation so far. Something not being illegal doesn't inherently mean everyone should do whatever that is. I'm not saying "you should do that but you shouldn't do that". I'm saying you shouldn't do that, but that is has to remain legal. As an example that I truly hope most people would agree with, cheating on your partner isn't illegal (most places), but it's still a really shitty thing to do.
We can definitely disagree on the social ethics around such jokes. As you say, you think such jokes are fine and I don't. And that's fine. I'm not advocating for censorship or anything like that. I think I've made it very clear that I think freedom of speech is important.
I was referring to "You should do that but you shouldn't do that" lmao, because I was recognizing that it was a straw man, as I only said it as a joke.
I don't think we could be friends. Not because I have a need to make jokes about killing kids, but because I don't want to spend the whole time worrying about how you'll take a joke.
That's fine. I think we'd get along fine if you don't make a habit of joking about killing kids, slavery, rape or animal abuse. If you think that makes me too sensitive then I'm happy to stay away.
Do you think the same about peoples pronouns?