yea, thanks, but I was able to find some USN source pretty quickly and I feel that could be what you are using as your own source. You can list some if you think they would be compelling, but I am feeling pretty confident you wouldn't have anything that would change my mind.
so ok, sounds like you are pretty rational. here is my response.
you are not gonna like my short answer, but to some it up lets just say I can feel it in my heart, haha. based on everything I have seen over the years, and places I have been, and things I have read, there is no country with the kind of opportunity, beauty, safety and prosperity of the USA.
That is why I say the US is the greatest country.
So then you say:
and my quick response to that is summed up decently by what you say next:
You are right, "greatest country" is mostly subjective. So I am inherently suspicious of any sources you might have that could disprove any of my sources. Also I was suspicious of the nature of your data, because surveys reveal more about the populations that respond than populations in general.
I was curt with you because if I don't consciously try to keep my posts brief, they will become a novel, like this post probably will. And who wants to read a novel written but some guy on the internet?
as I said before, my criteria is my perception of the USA's beauty, safety, security, wealth, and foundational principles. I can't necessarily show you hard facts cuz I am not trying to write a book report right now, and as we both know the data is out there.
We could probably argue non stop on these kinds of things and I could get into it with data and stuff, but really I think I can just win my argument by explaining to you how the USA is the greatest country in the world because it is the only country that actually protects free speech, which allows for websites like we are communicating on right now to exist.
Nope, none of those countries protect free speech. Except the USA. Maybe those countries have some protected speech, but they do not protect free speech. Anti hate speech laws are an obscene joke and it is the death of free speech. Sooo, that pretty much eliminates all of the European countries. I am not really sure what is going on in Japan but I know for sure they do not protect free speech.
Obscenity laws are little better than blasphemy laws... kinda getting back to how things are subjective here... what is obscene? what is blasphemous? Did you know that in many modern countries in the world today (Asian. African) you can be executed for saying something some religious people do not like? Blasphemy! Witch! They kill you. That is basically what an obscenity law is, people being upset by your taste instead of your ideology. And for the same reason it is crazy to police ideology with blasphemy laws, it is crazy to police free speech with anti hate speech laws. What the fuck is hate speech?
Popular ideas do not need to be protected. Everybody likes those ideas. But society changes and grows, ideas everybody likes today are different than they were in the past. Free speech is needed to protect unpopular ideas. What if there were laws that prevented abolitionists in the USA from getting together to end the god damned entire north American slave trade because some people (wealthy slave owners with political power) at the time were offended by such an idea?
Who really cares what a bunch of ignorant boring losers think about race or gender or love or anything? Let the retards be retards. Protect free speech! You should not shy away from dissent, you should embrace it, try to understand it, argue against it, it can do nothing but make you more insightful.
What, you think it will poison your mind? Don't worry, I am confident you can see the flaws in bad ideas. Plus keeping the poisonous ideas censored does not make them go away, it makes them grow, like mold in the wet darkness, rotting society from the inside out.
No, I believe we should protect free speech, not kill it with stupid bullshit like anti-hate speech laws. Let all ideas be heard, good and bad, and hopefully most people out there will have had good teachers in life to help them make sense of the world and think for themselves and create their own meaning and unique perspective in life.
And the fact that the USA protects free speech where no other country in the world does makes the USA the greatest country in the world.
... Yeahhh, I have nothing. You're right. Re: freedom of speech, I was viewing it on a gradient rather than a B&W yes or no; but that's bullshit for exactly the reasons you've stated. Sorry to even take up that much of your time, but I do appreciate it.
