At New English Review, Dalrymple reflects on the subtle necessity of self-censorship even for advocates of free speech, arguing that restraint is not inherently a vice but a condition of civilized social life.
When to self-censor and when to let rip, so to speak, is always a matter of judgment, and judgment is fallible. Restraint is pusillanimity in one situation, but politeness in another. How one discusses a subject with an interlocutor—what language to use, how forceful and uncompromising to be, what euphemisms, if any, to employ, what amount of humour, irony or contempt to express, and so forth—depends, or ought depend, on social circumstances. If humankind cannot bear too much reality, neither can many people bear too much plain speaking: and if nothing much hangs on a conversation, the avoidance of giving offence is an important consideration.