Asserting that cancel culture has put freedom of expression in crisis, a statement initially signed by 45 prominent individuals from universities, think tanks, and other organizations asserts that expressing “ideas we find offensive is not an act of ‘violence.’”
Called the Philadelphia Statement, the 845-word document says in part:
If we seek to change our country’s trajectory; if we desire unity rather than division; if we want a political life that is productive and inspiring; if we aspire to be a society that is pluralistic and free, one in which we can forge our own paths and live according to our own consciences, then we must renounce ideological blacklisting and recommit ourselves to steadfastly defending freedom of speech and passionately promoting robust civil discourse.
They named the statement after Philadelphia, where men of strongly differing viewpoints came together in 1776 to declare America’s independence from England.
The Philadelphia Statement underlines the freedom of Americans to openly disagree while respecting the viewpoints of others:
Our liberty and our happiness depend upon the maintenance of a public culture in which freedom and civility coexist—where people can disagree robustly, even fiercely, yet treat each other as human beings—and, indeed, as fellow citizens—not mortal enemies.
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