ZOT!!! Speaking Freely in a Time of War

Barry Mauer's "Fair and Balanced" Page for Education, Entertainment, and the Arts ^ | 9/30/03 | Barry Mauer

[bmauer]

Speaking Freely in a Time of War

Abstract:
Anti-speech advocates have made several arguments aimed at critics of the Iraq War. Many of these anti-speech arguments are enthymemes. If the purpose of these rhetors is to deceive others into accepting a weak claim, then enthymemes are ideal forms because they hide the weakest parts of the argument. By exposing their hidden premises, the parts that are implicit but left unstated, I demonstrate that the anti-speech arguments used against critics of the war are not sound. In this essay, I address the logos, ethos, and pathos in these anti-speech arguments.

Essay:

"I think this war is an attempt by President Bush to concentrate his hold on power," said ----- -----, 37, an English Professor at the University of ------ -------. "This [war] is clearly a power grab." (Orlando Sentinel, 2003)

The day my quote appeared in the Orlando Sentinel, I received this response by email:

My father was a WWII Navy veteran. He served on an aircraft carrier (USS Enterprise CV6). He passed away 2 years ago, but NEVER forgot what he fought for over 50 years before. I was lucky enough to turn 18 during a peaceful time, and as the draft (and registration) were done away with. But I have NEVER forgotten what these brave soldiers sacrificed in order for me to live free. I played taps for Memorial Day and Veterans Day ceremonies. I played taps at Veterans' funerals. This was just a tiny payback to them for all they did for ALL OF US. At my father's funeral, I watched these feeble but proud WWII Veterans fold the American flag that they presented my mother. You are a disgrace to the memory of my father and all those who preceded him in death so that you would have the freedom to speak your mind.

Your assertion that "this war is clearly a power grab" shows your lack of rational thinking. Liberals are controlled only by emotions. Logic never comes into play. Facts only get in the way. You hide behind the veil of academic freedom. You have every right to speak your mind, but words have consequences. That is why I exercise my right to accuse you of being anti-American.
God Bless President Bush
God Bless America!! (Garry Eaton, personal communication, April 18, 2003)

This email is typical of several anti-speech responses I received, filled with arguments aimed at shutting up critics of the Iraq War. Many of these anti-speech arguments are enthymemes. If the purpose of these rhetors is to deceive others into accepting a weak claim, then enthymemes are ideal forms because they hide the weakest parts of the argument. By exposing their hidden premises, the parts that are implicit but left unstated, I demonstrate that the anti-speech arguments used against critics of the war are not sound. In this essay, I address the logos, ethos, and pathos in these anti-speech arguments.

Because the hidden premises I expose are unstated, I admit to a certain imprecision in describing them. This is a necessary part of the process, however, and any misrepresentations can be corrected should those making the arguments choose to step forward and re-state them.

Most deductive arguments do not use complete syllogisms--which are three-part arguments with a major premise, a minor premise, and a conclusion. Rather they use enthymemes, which are syllogisms with at least one part unstated. A classic enthymeme was used during a protest joined by Martin Luther King of garbage workers in Memphis. The workers held signs saying simply, "I am a man." (Turner, 2002) This proposition was the minor premise. The major premise and conclusion were left unstated.

Sample enthymeme:

Major premise (unstated): All men are created equal and are endowed by their creator with certain inalienable rights . . .

Minor premise: I am a man.
Conclusion (unstated): Therefore I deserve equal treatment and recognition of my rights.

The receiver of an enthymeme has to supply the missing parts. By doing so, the receiver completes a logical circuit and persuades himself.

Some of the best arguments are enthymemes, but so are some of the worst arguments. If the purpose of the rhetor is to deceive others into accepting a weak claim, then enthymemes are ideal forms because they hide the weakest parts of the argument.

Logos

Logical arguments appeal to the intellect of the audience. If the premises are true and the reasoning is valid, then the conclusion must be true. However, it is often the case in arguments that the premises are false, that the reasoning is invalid, or both. In the section below I present analysis of flawed logical arguments made by anti-speech advocates.

The author of the above letter claims that his father sacrificed so that I may speak my mind. His claim is built upon the assumption that only troops can defend freedom of speech.

Argument 1: Soldiers Defend Free Speech

Major premise (hidden): Only soldiers can defend the rights of all to free speech.

Minor premise: You are not a soldier.

Conclusion: You cannot defend the rights of all to free speech.

Analysis: In this argument, the major premise is clearly false. Only if soldiers in all cases defended others' freedom of speech would it be true. Although I am not a soldier, I could defend a co-worker's freedom of speech by creating a forum for her to express her view. Therefore, we must conclude that the argument above is not sound.

One anti-speech advocate wrote to me: "the troops are risking their lives to give you the very right which you are so ironically, (sic) now using to attack the very government that sent them to protect this right in others." (Ryan Gibbons, personal correspondence, April 23, 2003)

Should we think it "ironic" to use a right that we have? It would be ironic indeed if we did not use our right to free speech when it most counted.

Argument 2: The Effectiveness of Soldiers
Major premise (partially hidden): Since U.S. soldiers defend our right to speak freely, anything that weakens the effectiveness of soldiers undermines our free speech.
Minor premise: Criticism of the military or the administration in control weakens the effectiveness of soldiers.
Conclusion: Critics of the military or the administration must be isolated, vilified, and intimidated because they undermine our free speech.

Analysis: The major premise is false because it presumes that the primary purpose of soldiers' activities is to defend free speech. In the case of the Iraq war, there was no clear connection between the actions of U.S. soldiers in Iraq and the defense of free speech in the U.S. Rather, the opposite was true. We heard a demand to suppress criticism of the Bush administration and "Support our troops!" The massive PR campaign spouting this slogan was an effective effort to divert attention from the policy itself. If the slogan were honest, it would have stated, "Support our policy!" or "Support our war!"

The minor premise is false because there are many cases in which there is no causal relation between criticism of the military or critics of the administration and any weakening of military effectiveness. Some criticism may even improve military effectiveness: one example would be the claim that U.S. chemical warfare suits were of poor quality. (Donnelly, 2002) Although it turned out that the Iraqis had no chemical weapons, a point that U.N. inspections and defectors' statements had made somewhat obvious, (UNCOM, 1995) if there had been a chemical weapons attack, many U.S. soldiers would have become casualties because of their faulty suits. Many anti-war critics pointed out that soldiers are most effective when they are not used in combat; such was the case in the months before the U.S. and British troops attacked Iraq, when these troops backed up the U.N. inspections teams with the threat of force.

We heard from many anti-speech advocates that criticism of the U.S. government was tantamount to sympathizing with the enemy and thus endangering our troops. (Horowitz, 2002) This view represents a failure of imagination, however, for it is possible to sympathize with the people of Iraq, who are victims of Saddam Hussein and of American bombing, without sympathizing with Saddam Hussein. It is also possible simultaneously to sympathize with American troops, many of whom will die needlessly in a war that may have little justification other than the greed of a few powerful people tied to Bush.

The greatest threat to military effectiveness has not come from critics of the war but from the Bush administration itself. Among the charges against the Bush administration on these counts is the following: "Issues of principle aside, the invasion of a country that hadn't attacked us and didn't pose an imminent threat has seriously weakened our military position. Of the Army's 33 combat brigades, 16 are in Iraq; this leaves us ill prepared to cope with genuine threats. Moreover, military experts say that with almost two-thirds of its brigades deployed overseas, mainly in Iraq, the Army's readiness is eroding: normal doctrine calls for only one brigade in three to be deployed abroad, while the other two retrain and refit." (Krugman, 2003)

Anti-speech advocates sometimes use the argument that critics of the war "demoralized" the soldiers. Perhaps criticism of the war does demoralize some soldiers, though that is not its intent. Is demoralizing soldiers somehow worse than sending them to die and kill in an unjust war? None of the 200+ U.S. soldiers killed in Iraq so far have died as a result of any anti-war criticism. It is rare to hear anyone state the conclusion to this argument--that critics of the military or the administration must be isolated, vilified, and intimidated because they undermine our free speech--because it is clearly contradictory; one cannot intimidate critics and claim to uphold free speech at the same time.

One anti-speech advocate, however, did just that. He wrote: "You are right in concluding that critics of the military or the administration must be isolated, vilified and intimidated . . . because we as free speakers have the right to do this as a majority. If you do not like the government, that is fine with all of us. You just need to be prepared to take the 'intimidation' from us when it comes flying at you." (Ryan [last name unknown], personal correspondence, April 23, 2003)

I find intimidation and the atmosphere it produces to be incompatible with free speech values. The case articulated here--that the intimidation tactics practiced by members of the majority constitute a form of free speech--is clearly flawed. This form of "speech" flows only in one direction: from the powerful to the less powerful. The email I quoted above accuses me of being "anti-American." This term is used against critics of administration policies. Critics of the war love America, however, and don't want to see it hurt by false patriots. Only in a repressive state would this kind of accusation be heard routinely. At times, such as the civil rights era, the government enacted legislation to protect the speech of the less powerful. This is not one of those times. In these times, even Republicans are attacked viciously for straying from the party line even slightly. (AP, 2003)

The anti-speech advocate continues:

Criticism . . . needlessly undermines the government. Our nation cannot be run without the support of its citizens. The voice of one influences many, and fools are prone to listening to and acting upon rebellious voices they hear when they would otherwise have a simple void where that undermining voice takes hold. In light of this, it is a needless endangerment not to our troops, but to our nation itself to criticize the government and its worthy officials in such a way. (Ryan [last name unknown], personal correspondence, April 23, 2003)

The undemocratic sentiments in this remark are stunning. Does one "undermine" our government by trying to keep it honest? It is my understanding that in a democracy the people lead and the government must be responsive to them. To prevent tyranny from developing in a democracy, people must be free to criticize their government. I will also note the dangerous conflation of the "nation" and the "government" in this writer's remark, a common move in totalitarian countries. My primary focus, however, is on the writer's notion of "fools" following rebellious voices. Such an argument implies that fools only follow but do not lead, though there are numerous examples of fools leading. It also implies that fools are only threatening when incited to action by rebellious voices, though never threatening when incited by the regimenting voices of those in power. Clearly there are cases of regimenting voices causing great harm to nations.

John Dean writes:

As Ohio's Republican Senator Robert A. Taft, a man whose patriotism cannot be questioned, remarked less than two weeks after Pearl Harbor, "[C]riticism in time of war is essential to the maintenance of any kind of democratic government.... [T]he maintenance of the right of criticism in the long run will do the country ... more good than it will do the enemy [who might draw comfort from it], and it will prevent mistakes which might otherwise occur." (Dean, 2003)

Argument 3: Enemies of Free Speech

Major premise (hidden): If the U.S. were to be invaded and occupied by an enemy who didn't believe in free speech, we would lose our free speech.

Minor premise: We are fighting an enemy who doesn't believe in free speech.

Conclusion: We must defeat this enemy in order to maintain our free speech.

Analysis: A true threat to U.S. sovereignty, such as the Axis powers during World War II, might make this argument sound. When anti-speech advocates used this argument earlier this year, they implied that the military of Iraq would invade and occupy the United States and then strip away our freedom of speech. By stating the implications of this premise so starkly, we are impressed with its absurdity.

The anti-speech advocate also made this comment:

Even if the threat (of weapons of mass destruction) was nonexistent, Saddam and his regime need to be ousted and replaced by a government that does not suppress its religious majority, gas a hated minority and oppress its people in other such ways. (Ryan [last name unknown], personal correspondence, April 23, 2003)

This writer apparently missed the irony produced by his statements; he believes it is necessary to support the voices of dissent in Iraq and to suppress the voices of dissent in the U.S.

Argument 4: Needless Endangerment
Major premise: Speech that needlessly endangers other people, like yelling "fire" in a crowded theater, is not protected speech.
Minor premise: Criticism of the war needlessly endangers the troops.
Conclusion: Criticism of the war is not protected speech.

Analysis: In this argument, the minor premise is questionable at best. If the war itself is needless, then the war itself certainly endangers the troops needlessly. It is not criticism of the war that endangers the troops, it is the war itself, an unnecessary war at that.

It is justifiable to yell "fire" in a crowded theater if there really is a fire. In fact, even if a person thinks there is a fire, he is justified in yelling "fire" because of the precautionary principle, which indicates that it is less risky to yell "fire" and be wrong than it is not to yell "fire" and be right. For example, if you smell smoke in a crowded theater, you are justified in yelling "fire." It is unjustified and malicious to yell "fire" in a crowded theater if you have no evidence that there is a fire.

Let us test this argument in relation to the Iraq war. Several U.S. intelligence experts stated that the Iraq war would pose a threat to Americans; they argued that instead of reducing the threat of terrorism, the Iraq war would increase the threat of terrorism. (Slevin, 2003) Their warnings are similar to that of the person who smells smoke and yells "fire" in a crowded theater. They had evidence--the "smoke"--that al-Qaeda was using the Iraq war as a recruiting tool. On May 12, 2003, within weeks after the conclusion of major hostilities in Iraq, al-Qaeda suicide attackers struck again, this time in Saudi Arabia, killing dozens of people, including eight Americans, and wounding dozens more. The intelligence agents' warnings were accurate. (Norton-Taylor, 2003) They were certainly within their rights to warn others about the threat of "fire"--impending terrorist attacks as a result of the Iraq war.

In contrast to the intelligence agents, George W. Bush is like the person without evidence of a fire yelling "fire" in a crowded theater. For example, Bush said that Iraq was an imminent threat to the United States because the Iraqi regime was acquiring enriched uranium, a key component in the development of nuclear weapons. The "evidence" for this claim was a forged document. It appears that the Bush administration knew their claims were phony. (Wilson, 2003, Waxman, 2003) Also, both Bush and Colin Powell have stated that the Iraqi regime was allied with al-Qaeda, a claim made without evidence and one that most American intelligence agencies did not support. (Risen, 2003, Kristoff, 2003) Falsifying and exaggerating threats in order to take a country into war qualifies as an unjustified use of speech, analogous to yelling "fire" in a crowded theater. The Iraq war endangered U.S. troops, Iraqi citizens, (Jeffery, 2003) and American citizens who now face greater risk of terrorist reprisals as a result of the war.

[hellinahandcart]

He was sure typing freely, ya gotta give him that. ;P

[M1Tanker]

I address this to the author of the article, not the poster, if they are different people (some of the responses indicate they may be the same, but I'm new):


"Argument 1: Soldiers Defend Free Speech
Major premise (hidden): Only soldiers can defend the rights of all to free speech.
Minor premise: You are not a soldier.
Conclusion: You cannot defend the rights of all to free speech."

With this point, what are your views on the 2nd Ammendment and the right of individual civilians to keep and bear arms?

Rights entail Responsibilities. They are not entitlements. Those who speak must be willing to accept criticism. If you yell "fire" in a theater, and the resulting panic causes deaths, you are reponsible for thoses deaths, but you are still free to shout "fire". In the same vein, when you accuse the President of executing his Constitutional duties for the sole purpose of gaining power, and this applies to most claims by the "anti-war" crowd, you must be prepared to answer such claims with facts, logic, reason, and without emotion. You can say whatever you want, you have that right. You have the responsibility to back up those claims and, especially considering accusing someone of acts entailing treason.

I fully support the war with Iraq on firm, logically based arguements. I would support it even if Al Gore or Hillary Clinton was President. When I speak on those arguements, I am called many names and threatened with bodily harm. Since I am a soldier, fully capable of defending myself and others, I find this quite outlandish.

When, in the 1990s, as I attended college, I was also threatened and shouted down for simply believing in the US Constitution, being a member of the ROTC and the Army, and speaking out against the abuse of power in the Clinton Adim. I defended those positions and tried to debate my opponents, who also called me "anti-American" for daring to question Clinton. That was my responibility for my right to free speech. Consequently, I learned those on the Left care not for debate, only obediance to thier views, however misguided.

The short of it is, you have full rights to your views and full rights to express them. When you make accusations as such, you have the responsibility to defend those views and the responsibility to debate them while listening to other's views in a rational manor.

[dirtboy]

I mean "Major premise (hidden): Only soldiers can defend the rights of all to free speech" - nice one, try leaving the "only" off the front and maybe you'll get within a mile of a real persons opinion.

Just like the time that Clinton said something along the lines that "you won't find evidence that I changed policy solely due to campaign contributions."

Different weasels, same methods...

[dirtboy]

I address this to the author of the article, not the poster, if they are different people

They are, or, more accurately, were...

[dighton]

Dear Nutty Professor ... Don't be a jerk.

Don't ask the impossible.

;-)

[AppyPappy]

no proven links to al-Qaeda

How do you explain that we found Al-Qaeda operatives living in Baghdad?

((crickets))

[DrNo]

It is my understanding that in a democracy the people lead and the government must be responsive to them. To prevent tyranny from developing in a democracy, people must be free to criticize their government.

Hey! I thought we were talking about the U.S.?

The U.S. ain't a democracy; wasn't designed to be.

You almost get it right though, when you note that there is a whole lot of representin' goin' on, it is a constitutional republic.

Or, at least it was designed to be.

Buy a pocket constitution; check it out!

[AppyPappy]

This is as nutty as the posters who thought Clinton would use Y2K to invoke "marshall" law to stay in office.

[MEGoody]

"This email is typical of several anti-speech responses I received."

So what the author says is called 'speech,' but what someone who disagrees with him says is 'anti-speech'.

::::sigh::::

The sad thing is, the lefties will eat up that kind of silly 'logic' like it's candy.

[<1/1,000,000th%]

Where are the Viking Kitties???

[RightWhale]

Drop the Aristotelian syllogisms and go with dialectic of negatives. It won't help, but at least the failure won't be so obvious.

[m1911]

"Major premise (unstated): All men are created equal and are endowed by their creator with certain inalienable rights . . .
Minor premise: I am a man.
Conclusion (unstated): Therefore I deserve equal treatment and recognition of my rights. "



And yet you spend a whole article undermining your minor premise. Come out from under the bed, I don't think the JBTs are after you.

[VRWCmember]

For example, Bush said that Iraq was an imminent threat to the United States because the Iraqi regime was acquiring enriched uranium, a key component in the development of nuclear weapons. The "evidence" for this claim was a forged document. It appears that the Bush administration knew their claims were phony.

1. President Bush did not state Iraq was an imminent threat. He stated that we could not afford to wait until Iraw became an imminent threat because to do so would put us in unnecessary and unacceptable peril. Your misunderstanding or misrepresentation of this fact destroys your credibility.

2. President Bush did not state Iraq "was acquiring enriched uranium" but rather stated that British intelligence had learned that Iraq had attempted to acquire weapons-grade uranium. (Do you comprehend the difference between those two statements or not?) Is this additional inaccuracy a case of misunderstanding or deliberate misrepresentation?

3. The evidence for the claim was much more than just the document that turned out to be a forgery. British officials stand by the previous intelligence data in spite of the one forgery that you cited as the basis of the claim. Are you ignorant of the continued insistance of the British government that the intelligence was valid, or are you again deliberately misrepresenting the facts?

Thank you for your dubious contribution to the forum.

I detect ozone.

[cibco]

You rang? http://users.wolfcrews.com/toys/vikings/

[dighton]

He never knew what hit him.

[Billthedrill]

Labeling those who disagree with your point of view "anti-free-speech advocates" is a childish and unworthy attempt to - yes, a logical term - beg the question. And it doesn't work.

[muleskinner]

...solipsist can attach no meaning to the supposition that there could be thoughts, experiences, and emotions other than his own....

This sounds very similar to someone who lacks empathy. Which is a big problem with alcoholics.

[glock rocks]

American citizens who now face greater risk of terrorist reprisals as a result of the war.

[PeoplesRepublicOfWashington]

I find intimidation and the atmosphere it produces to be incompatible with free speech values.

All liberals have to offer is intimidation! This guy should apply his logical analysis to his own speech for cyring out loud.

[TheBigB]

Well, that's too bad. We had what I thought was a good debate on this thread, starting at post #53:

http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/983229/posts