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Free speech means congress isn’t allowed to silence the media. Free speech does not mean you can say whatever you want without consequences. Arguably, one pur

Free speech means congress isn’t allowed to silence the media. Free speech does not mean you can say whatever you want without consequences. Arguably, one purpose of HR is to help employees work well together. It is in their literal job description to be arbiter of decency.

sg47 6y ago
"Free speech means congress isn’t allowed to silence the media." - Exactly but Facebook the platform can but they choose not to because it's convenient for them regardless of whether someone spreads misinformation or maligns another person.
- vosper 6y ago
  > Exactly but Facebook the platform can but they choose not to because it's convenient for them regardless of whether someone spreads misinformation or maligns another person. You've gone way off topic, missed the point of the people you're responding to, and seem to have some agenda regarding Facebook that's not relevant to this discussion, which is about Facebook as an employer.
jakelazaroff 6y ago
I think GP is trying to say that Facebook routinely takes the stance that they shouldn't be the arbiter of acceptable speech. So it's notable that they are actively policing speech in this instance.
- Shish2k 6y ago
  Facebook-the-product doesn’t want to be the arbiter of acceptable speech for the whole world. Facebook’s HR department does want to be the arbiter of acceptable speech for facebook employees communicating with each other inside the company. These are quite different situations, IMO.
ponker 6y ago
"Free speech means congress isn’t allowed to silence the media." Wrong. The First Amendment means that Congress isn't allowed to silence the media. The First Amendment and "free speech" are entirely different entities, with really not much shared between them. The First Amendment is a law and what it does and doesn't mean has been quite precisely specified by the Supreme Court. "Free speech" is a more loosely-specified concept, and is much broader than the First Amendment. One could easily believe (as I and many others do) that free speech is very valuable, so valuable that it deserves even stronger protections than those granted by the First Amendment.
- Reelin 6y ago
  Due to the seemingly consistent inability of many people to understand the broader concept you expressed there I feel the need to spell it out in a bit more detail. Free speech: the freedom to speak one's mind (this can apply in any context). Any and all consequences for speaking one's mind are a direct assault on one's freedom of speech in the relevant context, by definition. The first amendment protects individuals who speak their minds from government imposed consequences for doing so. This is meant to prevent the government from curtailing their freedom to express themselves. "Freedom of speech, not freedom from consequence" means (in the context of the US) that even if there aren't any governmental consequences for speaking your mind there might still be social ones. Hypothetical situation: People debate the merits of a non-governmental entity (for example, an employer) placing various restrictions on speech in some context (say, in the work place). Someone comes along and glibly points out that "freedom of speech doesn't mean freedom from consequence". Said commenter has _completely_ missed the point.
  - imagiko 6y ago
    > Any and all consequences Is the implication of violence/aggression in said speech is a justified consequence? > Said commenter has _completely_ missed the point I'm I understanding this correctly, this is because it is against the principle of free speech, and people might conflate it with 1A? Isn't it preconditioned on everyone being on the same page about free speech? We've seen people having extreme opinions being shunned by the the rest of the cohort. How does this group then maintain cohesion, rather is it even possible to do so?
nostromo 6y ago
“Guys, guys, Galileo wasn't actually cancelled. He just found out that free speech has consequences.” @konstantinkisin
neonate 6y ago
"Free speech means congress isn’t allowed to silence the media" That's the narrow redefinition of free speech that's currently in vogue with people who want to crack down on free speech. The whole time I was growing up, until quite recently in fact, free speech meant the freedom to speak your mind. The idea that people would routinely get fired for voicing their opinions, which is the world the new ideologues want to create for us, would have seemed shockingly unfree. The classic cliché of the limits of free speech is "yelling fire in a crowded theater". That's where society used to draw the limit. Those lines are being way, way, way moved, and the people moving them are pretending that they're just reiterating the old standard. It's a radical shift, and everyone who doesn't subscribe to this orthodoxy can feel it, even if they're too vulnerable to be able to stand up to the priests.
- snowwrestler 6y ago
  Companies can fire employees who they believe are being disruptive to a productive workplace. This is not a recent development in America. Also, firing someone stops them from receiving a paycheck, not from speaking.
  - neonate 6y ago
    Whacking their knees with a crowbar wouldn't stop them from speaking either, but we don't do that when someone expresses a wrong view, nor should we try to get them fired. Free speech as a cultural value requires that people actually be free to speak. If one fears losing one's livelihood, one is not free to speak. That's obvious. For a long time, it was the left who championed this. Noam Chomsky, an archetype of the left, has always been one of the biggest free-speech advocates in the US, and takes a far more expansive view than "free speech only means the government can't put you in prison". He advocated for Walt Rostow, a technocrat whom he had condemned in print as a war criminal, to be allowed to teach at MIT. But he's a libertarian socialist, and the left has taken an authoritarian turn. The social-media driven ideological lust for driving wrong-speakers out of their jobs (and inflicting anything else the mob can muster) is clearly a recent development in America, and you have to go back at least to McCarthyism to find anything comparable.
  - 6y ago
raxxorrax 6y ago
If you extend HR policies to your users, you won't have too much left after a while. And that isn't what free speech means at all. It is trivial that there a consequences to speech as there are consequences for trying to police speech.

sg47 6y ago

"Free speech means congress isn’t allowed to silence the media." - Exactly but Facebook the platform can but they choose not to because it's convenient for them regardless of whether someone spreads misinformation or maligns another person.

vosper 6y ago
> Exactly but Facebook the platform can but they choose not to because it's convenient for them regardless of whether someone spreads misinformation or maligns another person. You've gone way off topic, missed the point of the people you're responding to, and seem to have some agenda regarding Facebook that's not relevant to this discussion, which is about Facebook as an employer.

jakelazaroff 6y ago

I think GP is trying to say that Facebook routinely takes the stance that they shouldn't be the arbiter of acceptable speech. So it's notable that they are actively policing speech in this instance.

Shish2k 6y ago
Facebook-the-product doesn’t want to be the arbiter of acceptable speech for the whole world. Facebook’s HR department does want to be the arbiter of acceptable speech for facebook employees communicating with each other inside the company. These are quite different situations, IMO.

ponker 6y ago

"Free speech means congress isn’t allowed to silence the media." Wrong. The First Amendment means that Congress isn't allowed to silence the media. The First Amendment and "free speech" are entirely different entities, with really not much shared between them. The First Amendment is a law and what it does and doesn't mean has been quite precisely specified by the Supreme Court. "Free speech" is a more loosely-specified concept, and is much broader than the First Amendment. One could easily believe (as I and many others do) that free speech is very valuable, so valuable that it deserves even stronger protections than those granted by the First Amendment.

Reelin 6y ago
Due to the seemingly consistent inability of many people to understand the broader concept you expressed there I feel the need to spell it out in a bit more detail. Free speech: the freedom to speak one's mind (this can apply in any context). Any and all consequences for speaking one's mind are a direct assault on one's freedom of speech in the relevant context, by definition. The first amendment protects individuals who speak their minds from government imposed consequences for doing so. This is meant to prevent the government from curtailing their freedom to express themselves. "Freedom of speech, not freedom from consequence" means (in the context of the US) that even if there aren't any governmental consequences for speaking your mind there might still be social ones. Hypothetical situation: People debate the merits of a non-governmental entity (for example, an employer) placing various restrictions on speech in some context (say, in the work place). Someone comes along and glibly points out that "freedom of speech doesn't mean freedom from consequence". Said commenter has _completely_ missed the point.
- imagiko 6y ago
  > Any and all consequences Is the implication of violence/aggression in said speech is a justified consequence? > Said commenter has _completely_ missed the point I'm I understanding this correctly, this is because it is against the principle of free speech, and people might conflate it with 1A? Isn't it preconditioned on everyone being on the same page about free speech? We've seen people having extreme opinions being shunned by the the rest of the cohort. How does this group then maintain cohesion, rather is it even possible to do so?

nostromo 6y ago

“Guys, guys, Galileo wasn't actually cancelled. He just found out that free speech has consequences.” @konstantinkisin

neonate 6y ago

"Free speech means congress isn’t allowed to silence the media" That's the narrow redefinition of free speech that's currently in vogue with people who want to crack down on free speech. The whole time I was growing up, until quite recently in fact, free speech meant the freedom to speak your mind. The idea that people would routinely get fired for voicing their opinions, which is the world the new ideologues want to create for us, would have seemed shockingly unfree. The classic cliché of the limits of free speech is "yelling fire in a crowded theater". That's where society used to draw the limit. Those lines are being way, way, way moved, and the people moving them are pretending that they're just reiterating the old standard. It's a radical shift, and everyone who doesn't subscribe to this orthodoxy can feel it, even if they're too vulnerable to be able to stand up to the priests.

snowwrestler 6y ago
Companies can fire employees who they believe are being disruptive to a productive workplace. This is not a recent development in America. Also, firing someone stops them from receiving a paycheck, not from speaking.
- neonate 6y ago
  Whacking their knees with a crowbar wouldn't stop them from speaking either, but we don't do that when someone expresses a wrong view, nor should we try to get them fired. Free speech as a cultural value requires that people actually be free to speak. If one fears losing one's livelihood, one is not free to speak. That's obvious. For a long time, it was the left who championed this. Noam Chomsky, an archetype of the left, has always been one of the biggest free-speech advocates in the US, and takes a far more expansive view than "free speech only means the government can't put you in prison". He advocated for Walt Rostow, a technocrat whom he had condemned in print as a war criminal, to be allowed to teach at MIT. But he's a libertarian socialist, and the left has taken an authoritarian turn. The social-media driven ideological lust for driving wrong-speakers out of their jobs (and inflicting anything else the mob can muster) is clearly a recent development in America, and you have to go back at least to McCarthyism to find anything comparable.
- 6y ago

raxxorrax 6y ago

If you extend HR policies to your users, you won't have too much left after a while. And that isn't what free speech means at all. It is trivial that there a consequences to speech as there are consequences for trying to police speech.