Tea at Trianon: Facebook, Aquinas and the Sins Of Free Speech

John Wilson Croker on Marie-Antoinette

"We have followed the history of Marie Antoinette with the greatest diligence and scrupulosity. We have lived in those times. We have talked with some of her friends and some of her enemies; we have read, certainly not all, but hundreds of the libels written against her; and we have, in short, examined her life with– if we may be allowed to say so of ourselves– something of the accuracy of contemporaries, the diligence of inquirers, and the impartiality of historians, all combined; and we feel it our duty to declare, in as a solemn a manner as literature admits of, our well-matured opinion that every reproach against the morals of the queen was a gross calumny– that she was, as we have said, one of the purest of human beings."

~from History of the Guillotine by John Wilson Croker, 1844

Edmund Burke on Marie-Antoinette

"It is now sixteen or seventeen years since I saw the queen of France, then dauphiness, at Versailles; and surely there never lighted on this orb, which she hardly seemed to touch, a more delightful vision. I saw her just above the horizon, decorating and cheering the elevated sphere she had just begun to move in, glittering like a morning star full of life and splendor and joy. Oh, what a revolution....Little did I dream that I should have lived to see such disasters fall upon her, in a nation of gallant men, in a nation of men of honor and of cavaliers! I thought ten thousand swords must have leaped from their scabbards, to avenge even a look which threatened her with insult. But the age of chivalry is gone; that of sophisters, economists, and calculators has succeeded...."

~Edmund Burke, October 1790

Friday, February 17, 2023

Facebook, Aquinas and the Sins Of Free Speech

From John Clark at the National Catholic Register:

More than seven centuries ago, Saint Thomas Aquinas addressed this question in the Summa Theologiae in his entry on “Reviling,” which “denotes the dishonoring of a person” and occurs “when a man publishes something against another's honor.” Aquinas argues that “reviling is greater if one man reproach another in the presence of many.”

The Catechism of the Catholic Church echoes Aquinas, teaching that a public false statement about others, for instance, “takes on a particular gravity.” The logic is simple and sound: Private calumny speaks to those within earshot; public calumny speaks to the whole world.

These are often sins of objectively serious matter. As Thomas bluntly states, “reviling is a mortal sin.” In terms of gravity of evil, publicly posting libelous comments can rank alongside looking at pornography. It’s worth considering that fact before pressing “Post.”

Aquinas understood something that we have largely forgotten: these sins can have a serious and lasting imprint. A spoken word can be easily forgotten, but a printed word endures — sometimes permanently. (Read more.)