Splitting The Baby
Virtually everyone knows this parable and its self-evident wisdom. But I think we can apply this Solomonic technique to some issues that have arisen recently.
There has been a concerted push of late to rid the internet, particularly social media, of “misinformation.” The idea is that the First Amendment, which protects free speech, is too permissive in an environment where people can amplify falsehoods at scale. Those who would police misinformation argue the harms of misinformation outweigh the benefits of free expression.
Those (like me) who believe in the First Amendment don’t dispute that it protects online expression that could turn out to be false, and that false information can lead to real-life harm. But my belief is the far greater harm is in stifling free expression because (a) no one is wise enough to be the ultimate arbiter of truth; (b) false assertions can be corrected by true ones; and that (c) disallowing free speech is a path to the ultimate tyranny wherein the only corrective mechanism we have has been totally disabled.
I believe were King Solomon to weigh in on this dispute he would say, “Let’s flip a coin. If it’s heads, ideas with which I disagree would be banned, and if it’s tails the ideas with which I agree would be banned.” Then he would take me aside and whisper: “Don’t worry, both sides of the coin are heads!” (And he would take the misinformation police aside and assure them both were tails.)
At which point, I would say, “No! I don’t want opposing ideas to be banned! I want dissenters to be able to make their case because maybe I’m wrong about something.” By contrast, the misinformation police would say, “Great, we can finally rid the internet of harmful wrongthink! Let’s have the coin flip!”
And then Solomon would say, “The greatest purveyor of misinformation over the long haul is those who would police it” and re-affirm a commitment to the First Amendment.
. . .
I saw a recent interview with J.D. Vance where he was asked whether he believed the 2020 election were stolen. Vance pivoted to talking about the effect of censoring the Hunter Biden laptop story, but I think he might have asked a more pertinent question back of the interviewer, namely, “Would you concede an election you earnestly believed were stolen, i.e., one where you believed Kamala Harris had won fair and square, but only due to cheating Trump were declared the winner?”
In other words, would you accept the results of an election you thought were fraudulent? The answer is obvious: one must accept a fair result and reject a rigged one, no matter who wins.
Of course, because both sides are so distrustful of one another, that means any result could be rejected on suspicion of fraud, and a peaceful transfer of power would therefore be impossible. How to resolve this dilemma?
Enter Solomon who asks: “Who is willing to take all necessary measures to ensure undetected fraud cannot occur?”
And then depending on which side were advocating for voter ID, hand-counted paper ballots, one-to-one signature matches, transparent and open access to recounts, rigorous purging of non-citizens from voter rolls and a process that was completely auditable from start to finish, he would declare that side as the one upholding the democratic process.
. . .
Humans are fallible, they make errors, they cheat, lie and manipulate. One cannot merely trust technocrats to know what’s true and false any more than one can trust election officials to administer high-stakes elections without total transparency.
It doesn’t matter whether you have the “correct” beliefs or belong to the faction that is “good.” Everyone thinks his beliefs are correct, virtually everyone believes his party is the good one. To the extent you care about the truth, you will view dissent policing as the ultimate scourge. To the extent you have respect for democratic institutions that ensure the peaceful transfer of power you must view opaque and inauditable elections as the ultimate threat to the state’s legitimacy.
If you make exceptions because in the short term they help your cause, you are like the mother in the parable, willfully and short-sightedly sacrificing the thing about which you purport to care the most.