This might be stretching the definition of an “argument”, but I think there’s a class of speech that must be dealt with by violence. The key identifier of this class is that there is a time-critical danger from third parties accepting the argument.
In other words, its not so much violence used to prevent Alice from trying to convince you that the sky is red, but violence used to prevent Alice from trying to convince Bob to participate in a lynching.
I’d disagree that violence was the only option in that case. I think the best option might be to spirit away the potential lynchee. If they’ve already got him strung up—then firing a shot in the air, followed by harsh words from the local law-maker would be the next option… violence is still an option, but not the only one, and not necessarily the first port of call.
I think it’s quite rare for violence to be the only option available.
Drawing a sharp distinction like this between violence and the implied threat of violence (e.g., firing weapons and “harsh words” and the invoking of authority backed by force) is problematic. The efficacy of the latter depends on the former; a law-maker known to be reliably nonviolent firing a harmless noisemaker would be far less effective.
This might be stretching the definition of an “argument”, but I think there’s a class of speech that must be dealt with by violence. The key identifier of this class is that there is a time-critical danger from third parties accepting the argument.
In other words, its not so much violence used to prevent Alice from trying to convince you that the sky is red, but violence used to prevent Alice from trying to convince Bob to participate in a lynching.
I’d disagree that violence was the only option in that case. I think the best option might be to spirit away the potential lynchee. If they’ve already got him strung up—then firing a shot in the air, followed by harsh words from the local law-maker would be the next option… violence is still an option, but not the only one, and not necessarily the first port of call.
I think it’s quite rare for violence to be the only option available.
Drawing a sharp distinction like this between violence and the implied threat of violence (e.g., firing weapons and “harsh words” and the invoking of authority backed by force) is problematic. The efficacy of the latter depends on the former; a law-maker known to be reliably nonviolent firing a harmless noisemaker would be far less effective.
An easier and less politically charged example: libel is a crime iff you knew it was false at the time you said it.