| | | The Los Angeles Times recently revealed its letters policy on climate: It allows only letters that toe the line, because otherwise, well, they would not be "factual." At this late stage of the climate fervor, no politically denounced scientist finds this at all novel. But it is remarkable how effortlessly such a brazenly unbalanced policy is rationalized.
The editor's explanation was reminiscent of the justification for using psychiatric hospitals to incarcerate political dissidents in the Soviet Union: You have to be crazy to oppose socialism.
This is more than mere cultural distortion; it's a premeditated political tactic. Activist organizations, such as Greenpeace, post bizarre definitions of free speech on the web that practically write the Times's letters policy and make the incoherent complaint letter to the BBC seem lucid. Free speech, for them, excludes those with views they deem incorrect.
This dressed-up totalitarianism is defective on many levels, but, for science, particularly, brilliant discoveries famously look incorrect at first, so this just won't do. |
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