The tyranny of the prevailing opinion and feeling
Often, when one cites Millian views on liberty, open discussion and the like, it emerges that people think Mill was talking only about legal rights. He wasn’t.
The fourth paragraph of On Liberty:
Like other tyrannies, the tyranny of the majority was at first, and is still vulgarly, held in dread, chiefly as operating through the acts of the public authorities. But reflecting persons perceived that when society is itself the tyrant–society collectively, over the separate individuals who compose it–its means of tyrannizing are not restricted to the acts which it may do by the hands of its political functionaries. Society can and does execute its own mandates: and if it issues wrong mandates instead of right, or any mandates at all in things with which it ought not to meddle, it practises a social tyranny more formidable than many kinds of political oppression, since, though not usually upheld by such extreme penalties, it leaves fewer means of escape, penetrating much more deeply into the details of life, and enslaving the soul itself. Protection, therefore, against the tyranny of the magistrate is not enough; there needs protection also against the tyranny of the prevailing opinion and feeling; against the tendency of society to impose, by other means than civil penalties, its own ideas and practices as rules of conduct on those who dissent from them; to fetter the development, and, if possible, prevent the formation, of any individuality not in harmony with its ways, and compel all characters to fashion themselves upon the model of its own. There is a limit to the legitimate interference of collective opinion with individual independence; and to find that limit, and maintain it against encroachment, is as indispensable to a good condition of human affairs, as protection against political despotism.
Precisely the point that I wanted to make in response to your last: ‘Wot’s it matta?’ I still can’t believe you lost a friend over this – I say this with outrage and pain, not doubt – which is precisely why the bruhaha over Dawkins et al. is really hard to understand. The response is not to say how awful and strident they are; the answer is to show them where they’ve gone wrong. That the first response is chosen suggests that they don’t know how to do the second.
Those of us who grew up in “traditional” (read: fundamentalist) American households are acutely aware of the tyranny of prevailing opinion. There are silly expectations about what you “should” wear, how you “should” cut your hair, what you “should” believe, what you “should” want do with your life. If you start diverging from those expectations, you run up against people’s prejudices at every turn.
And I’m straight and male. It’s even more difficult for females, and even worse than that for homosexuals.
True, he wasn’t just talking about (negative) legal rights. But he was talking about at least negative legal rights, and it’s a lot easier to work out how to limit the power of governments (by constitutional arrangments and widely held sentiments that governments should have limited power over individuals) than it is to limit the kind of oppressive social power that Mill decried.
The latter can only be done by a general spirit of toleration of eccentricity; if you try to do it by laws, it becomes counterproductive. E.g. you’d end up with laws favoured by the majority telling people with minority opinions to shut up and be more “accommodating” of the majority. Where have we heard that?
Still, it’s worth everyone trying for that general spirit of tolerance of eccentricity, etc. This entails not telling people with minority opinions to shut up and bloody well conform.
Hmm. I’m going to disagree, somewhat: I think the tyranny of prevailing opinion and feeling is actually quite useful in many, many instances that we take for granted. I don’t think we lose anything in the public sphere by not having repeated debates over whether or not the earth is flat, or whether or not evolution is the best theory for the origins of humanity. I think we gain a lot by having ‘tyranny’ in those areas.
Whether or not we should tell ‘eccentric’ people to shut up and go away depends on what they’re saying. I suppose, even if they’re saying the earth is flat, the ideal response would be to reason them out of it–but that can be a huge waste of time, as people who hold those views have no wish to listen to reason.
Jenavir –
Keep in mind that for many people, hearing the reasons is precisely what they need, especially given how some people are raised in “protected” environments and may never have heard those reasons before.
As for some people not being willing to listen, sure there are such people. But even some of those who may not want to listen right now, may eventually come around after the reasons given to them have had the time to percolate in their minds. It worked for me.
Jenavir, there’s a difference between the tyranny of prevailing opinion, and the weight of general consensus, which is what you seem to be talking about. Of course, it would be a pain if everyone argued every minute point that was settled long ago, and there are people like that, and they’re a nuisance. But the tyranny of prevailing opinion is where a prevailing world view or belief tends to bury opposition under heaps of contempt and ridicule, and that is surely not healthy. I recall Mark Twain’s poem about war, and how the spirit of war tends to overcome good sense and rationality – as actually happened after 9/11, when the voice of caution and reason – anything which ran contrary to the idea of the war on terror – was, unfortunately, silenced.
“The tyrrany of prevailing opinion” …
Like the completely irrational fear that women going out to VOTE could have anything happen to them (Afghanistan, last week).
Exactly.
Jenavir, keep in mind that Mill was talking about social coercion of people. I’m not sure that your flat earth example really fits. Is it coercion to teach people the truth (with all the existing caveats, like publicly available evidence and an explicitly acknowledged admission that all truth claims are tentative and subject to revision in light of new evidence)?
When Mill talked about society extending its influence into areas where it “ought not meddle” is where the sparks seem to fly. Just what aspects of culture are acceptable candidates for the majority imposing on the minority?
As long as there are people pushing their personal religious beliefs in the public square, I will be contesting them in my own quiet, ineffectual way. And as long as there are other people deriding the idea that I ought to resist the will of the majority, or somehow mollify it, I will double my efforts. (Not to imply that Jenavir is pushing accommodation with the above post.)
The ‘money quote’ of the paragraph OB quoted is, for me, the end: “There is a limit to the legitimate interference of collective opinion with individual independence; and to find that limit, and maintain it against encroachment, is as indispensable to a good condition of human affairs, as protection against political despotism.”
When people like M & K try to limit the ‘new atheists’, they are interfering with a quite legitimate attempt to fulfill Mill’s dictum to find and maintain the limits of what the majority should be allowed to get away with.
Eric, you didn’t just want to make the point in your response to my last, you did make it. I liked your comment – liked it in silence only for the usual reason – feeling silly saying ‘yeah’ too often in one reply.
Jenavir, I agree with the others in thinking Mill didn’t mean flat-earthers! He said ‘ideas and practices as rules of conduct’ – not ‘ideas about factual matters.’
There are some ways in which a consensus on how to behave is useful – like the merit of not persecuting people. But surely Mill was careful to leave room for that by saying ‘any mandates at all in things with which it ought not to meddle.’ It ought to meddle with persecution. With speech, inquiry, thought? Only under dire necessity.
Okay, point taken about factual matters vs. practices.
Coming back to this, as it’s been on my mind: I suppose I still think there’s an acceptable “tyranny” about rules of conduct, including heaping ridicule and contempt on some people. I know you (and Mill by implication) made room for that with regard to persecution, but I think some speech ought to be met with ridicule and contempt as well. Racial slurs, to take an obvious and extreme example.
I think we can best keep this tyranny under restraint, not by not ridiculing people, but by having a continual and open discussion about what precisely we should and shouldn’t ridicule people for.