HN user
Perhaps because scholarly research into the last five or so decades of conflicts has shown that politics is the main cause of violence, and that groups from the European fascists, anarchists to todays militants have been using similar technicques of warfare, organisation, propaganda, and follow conflicts follow similar trajectories.
The examples in the piece seem to me to be so colored so as to confuse the whole issue. Actual limiting of rights occurs due to a power structure. The right to offend an unpopular minority or foreign group is usually easy to exercise and it doesn't take much guts to defend it. Rights are usually curtailed by the powers that be.
The article seems to imply that a monolithic "Western World" has been a fountain head of free expression until the problematic Muslims and a few left-liberals came along. So Jews in the last few centuries, or blacks during Jim Crow had wonderful free expression rights that an un-sullied European civilization had always cherished?
Fast forwarding to this time, quite a few people are in jail within the Western world for espousing extremely un-popular political views.