Despite agreeing with the rest of the essay (which is very good), this is not true. Tiresomely standard counter-example: “Heil Hitler! No, there are no Jews in my attic.”
If the nazi starts to believe it, you should suppress such a belief (probably by acting inocculuously, but if suppressing it violently would work better you should do that instead.)
That statement is bad for the nazis, who are now unable to achieve their desires. The statement is about instrumental badness, not universal moral badness. They’re really quite different.
Despite agreeing with the rest of the essay (which is very good), this is not true. Tiresomely standard counter-example: “Heil Hitler! No, there are no Jews in my attic.”
I would say this is not ALWAYS true. But for the purpose of civilized discussion between human beings, it does seem like a very useful rule of thumb.
Substitute “statement” with “belief”.
Sorry, I don’t understand. I believe there are Jews in my attic, but this belief should be suppressed, rather than spread.
Fair enough.
This seems like fallacy of the excluded middle. Suppressed and spread are not the only two options.
If the nazi starts to believe it, you should suppress such a belief (probably by acting inocculuously, but if suppressing it violently would work better you should do that instead.)
That statement is bad for the nazis, who are now unable to achieve their desires. The statement is about instrumental badness, not universal moral badness. They’re really quite different.