Speech Vein 14: What Does the Speaker's Location Have to Do with the Truth or Falsehood of Their Statement?

Come inside and speak!

What does the speaker's location have to do with the truth or falsehood of their statement?

Imagine a semi-closed country where a large number of its members live outside that country. Let us call this hypothetical country "Niran" (rhyming with "Iran"). Niran, by virtue of being semi-closed, is such that the virtual communication channel between Niranians inside and outside the country is not entirely shut. Also, assume that Niran's government does not have close ties with the West, and Niran and the West consider each other enemies. Some expatriate Niranians, while criticizing Niran's mode of governance, also criticize Western policies and may even defend some of Niran's policies. In such a situation, some Niranians might take issue with such expatriate critics with remarks like: "If you love Niran so much, come live in Niran like us, then I'll see if you still say these things," or: "The guy is sitting in Paris, London, and Washington, and then he criticizes the West; if you're telling the truth, come to Niran, let's see if you can endure it for two days." Let us call this type of objection the "come inside and speak" criticism. This time, I want to pitch my tent in the vein of this type of criticism and argue that the speaker's location has no connection to the truth or falsehood of their speech.

The cup is good, hear my words!

The first point is that it is entirely possible to find convincing reasons for the Western residence and Niran-avoidance of critics who criticize the West and defend some of Niran's policies. We said above that Niran is a semi-closed country. Hence, although these critics may defend some of this country's policies, they criticize another important part, and this country, by virtue of being semi-closed, may not tolerate such criticisms and may land the critics in trouble and suppress their freedom of speech. Therefore, the critics prefer to live somewhere where their critical voice is not silenced. One might object to such critics that they are not brave enough, because if they were brave, they would have stayed inside, paid the price, and would not be silenced at any cost. Let us assume that exile from one's homeland is not itself a kind of enormous emotional cost that expatriate critics pay; consequently, it might be accepted that these critics are not brave (or not brave enough) to stay and pay the price, but this has nothing to do with the truth or falsehood of their criticism and defense. In other words, even if there is no convincing reason for the expatriation of this group of critics, this still does not make the speech of these critics false, just as merely staying inside and paying the price does not, in itself, make the speech of this brave group of domestic critics true. It remains possible that the expatriate critics' criticism of the West and their defense of some of Niran's policies are defensible, even though these critics themselves may not have been brave enough to express these criticisms inside and possibly pay the price for them. Accordingly, the "come inside and speak" criticism is not a valid objection because it unjustifiably links the speaker's location to the truth or falsehood of the speech itself; whereas there is no connection between the speaker's location and the truth or falsehood of their statement.

I am a critic by nature, has the truth of my speech been lost?

To better clarify the irrelevance of the speaker's location to the truth or falsehood of their statement, consider an individual who lives six months of the year in Nairan and six months of the year in Yerevan. This individual is also among those who defend some of Nairan's policies and criticize Western policies. The question now is whether the criticism "come inside and talk" applies to such a critic as well. If the truth or falsehood of a statement were connected to the speaker's location, this connection must hold here too. In that case, how would it be implemented? Should we say that because this person lives equally in two locations, their statement is neither true nor false? But it seems that their criticisms must be either true or false. Furthermore, if this individual decided from now on to spend six and a half months in Nairan and five and a half months in Yerevan, would their statement then be true, and conversely, if the opposite, would it be false? This hypothetical example clearly demonstrates the absurd consequences of linking the truth or falsehood of a statement to the speaker's location, and consequently, this link is fundamentally erroneous and must be discarded.

Yaser Mirdamadi / Speech Vein 14