John Stuart Mill The Harm Principle Summary

Although technology has greatly increased our ability to communicate and to communicate freely, it has also, as Cass Sunstein points out, "greatly increased people’s ability to “filter” what they want to read, see, and hear." In other words, technology has facilitated our wishes to view opinions that we find favorable. Naturally aiming to find happiness through pleasure, we are not as compelled to seek out materials the challenge, frustrate, or upset us. In the harm principle, Mill assumes that we regularly interact with offensive opinions, people, and actions. He is right to assume this for the time during which he was writing wherein communication was less controlled as most of it was done face-to-face or by newspaper, for example. In the case of the newspaper, if one read to find a story of particular interest, one could not filter out the rest. If there was an upsetting story on one's "route" to the story of interest, the …show more content…
However, the majority acts to satisfy its own opinions, "tyrannically" impeding the growth of individual within such a culture. This culture of self-appeasement seems to only fortify with the dominance of technology, as Sunstein notes. Mill's proposes the harm principle to back his utilitarian vision. What he wants from its implementation is the freedom of expression for the pursuit of the truth that will lead us to happier lives. Mill argues that finding an opinion offensive and silencing that opinion through either laws or cultural forces entails harms so great that the offensive opinions must be allowed to be expressed. Although I conclude that Mill's harm principle is increasingly tested for its ability to produce Mill's utilitarian outcome in contemporary society, I recommend only that Mill's harm principle be considered and weigh in fewer of our legislative justifications of the interference of liberty of action by the