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It still is a virtue and a right in the US. Freedom of speech is not about giving every idea and every person and equal platform to spread their ideas. It's not

It still is a virtue and a right in the US. Freedom of speech is not about giving every idea and every person and equal platform to spread their ideas. It's not about forcing others to host/spread ideas they disagree with. I think the internet has given people a warped sense about what freedom of speech is. We have no less freedom of speech now than we did before social media/internet.

Xeoncross 4y ago
On a related note, litigation has increased. If you do express an opinion that isn't supported by pop culture then you are threatened with serious economic impacts and civil action to a greater extent than what I remember pre-internet. Then again, less people knew you held some alternative view back then. Nowadays it's popular to shout across all the media so everyone in the US knows about that kooky view the old guy in Montana has or that violent group in the middle east holds.
- marcopolo3333 4y ago
  I would offer that the solution to increased litigation is reforming our civil courts to prevent their abuses.
  - sseagull 4y ago
    This is correct. Everyone should support anti-SLAPP laws. These make such frivolous lawsuits very expensive if they do infringe on clearly-protected speech. SLAPP = strategic lawsuit against public participation (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Strategic_lawsuit_against_public_participation https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Strategic_lawsuit_against_publ...)
jimbokun 4y ago
In practice, this means a small number of tech companies having final say over what ideas do or don't get spread.
- marcopolo3333 4y ago
  And? before the internet those ideas didn't spread anyways or they were spread by a small number of media companies. Pre-internet was not this mythical golden age of an exchange of ideas. On the whole of it these small number of tech companies are actually pretty hands off when compared to how legacy media operates. In fact now fringe/"banned" ideas spread faster.
- preordained 4y ago
  Winner winner, chicken dinner. It's obvious that at a certain scale you shouldn't have as much license to censor, as you effectively become the public square. If you run Cathy's Cat forum where you have a thousand users and you want to decree pro cat speech all the time...be as dictatorial as you want.
deleted 4y ago
[deleted]
MarkMarine 4y ago
100% Freedom of speech in the terms of the first amendment is the government not infringing on your speech (like, throwing you in jail for criticizing it) It has zero to do with what you can say on twitter, or if the people you’re deciding to say something to band together and decide you’re an asshole who should be ignored or fired.
- MichaelCollins 4y ago
  > 100% Freedom of speech in the terms of the first amendment Freedom of speech is a principle, not an amendment. The first amendment exemplifies the principle of freedom of speech, but does not define the bounds of that principle.
  - MarkMarine 4y ago
    Do you think that you should be free to say whatever you want, and the person you say it to should have the freedom to punch you in the fucking face infringed on?
Georgelemental 4y ago
1. "Freedom of speech" ≠ "First Amendment". The First Amendment provides for a minimum level of free speech, a healthy society will go above and beyond the minimum. In fact many of the Founders were conflicted about the Bill of Rights, exactly because they were afraid it would be interpreted as a maximum and not a minimum. 2. Modern tech monopolies actively collude with government. Just a few days ago we learned that Facebook had been holding regular meetings with White House officials to coordinate censorship. In exchange, the government passes laws and regulations that help the tech giants kept their monopolies and crush their competitors, and doesn't pass antitrust bills that would hurt them. So the public/private distinction is kind of dead
dotnet00 4y ago
I think this line of reasoning, while technically valid, is also what's being used to pervert the idea of freedom of speech. The idea behind the first amendment was that the government was the only entity which could realistically stop someone from saying something without running afoul of other existing legal frameworks when most public discourse was via literal town squares, so by limiting the government's ability to persecute speech, a more free 'market' of ideas could be encouraged. These days a lot of public discourse is online and increasingly so. The argument that companies being forced to host ideas they disagree with can be construed as a free speech issue is reasonable (although not entirely convincing, as we clearly do find utility companies to be providing a service so essential that they can't arbitrarily refuse service), but equally there is the problem that the vagueness of the matter is being abused by small groups of people, thus not really leaving it as a free 'market' of ideas. Nowadays a small group of people can do a ton of damage to someone simply by harassing the companies (and the clients of those companies) they rely on, taking it all the way to even getting bank accounts closed or cutting off payment processors. One can imagine that if water and electricity weren't classified as utilities they'd even go after those. Thus, some balance is needed because while it's technically possible to live without banking or to have a business without a (well known) payment processor, it's clearly an increasingly unreasonable limitation to be able to be imposed on anyone without a legal process. Beyond that there's the point that social media companies often act as per the government's "suggestions", thus technically not violating the first amendment despite not really being in its spirit either. Facebook and/or Twitter doesn't legally have to do X when government hints at wanting it but if they don't they might happen to find themselves brought in front of Congress for a hearing about Y or facing regulation/investigation.
- em-bee 4y ago
  in germany (since 1995) and austria (apparently only since 2016) having a bank-account is a legal right.

Xeoncross 4y ago

On a related note, litigation has increased. If you do express an opinion that isn't supported by pop culture then you are threatened with serious economic impacts and civil action to a greater extent than what I remember pre-internet. Then again, less people knew you held some alternative view back then. Nowadays it's popular to shout across all the media so everyone in the US knows about that kooky view the old guy in Montana has or that violent group in the middle east holds.

marcopolo3333 4y ago
I would offer that the solution to increased litigation is reforming our civil courts to prevent their abuses.
- sseagull 4y ago
  This is correct. Everyone should support anti-SLAPP laws. These make such frivolous lawsuits very expensive if they do infringe on clearly-protected speech. SLAPP = strategic lawsuit against public participation (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Strategic_lawsuit_against_public_participation https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Strategic_lawsuit_against_publ...)

jimbokun 4y ago

In practice, this means a small number of tech companies having final say over what ideas do or don't get spread.

marcopolo3333 4y ago
And? before the internet those ideas didn't spread anyways or they were spread by a small number of media companies. Pre-internet was not this mythical golden age of an exchange of ideas. On the whole of it these small number of tech companies are actually pretty hands off when compared to how legacy media operates. In fact now fringe/"banned" ideas spread faster.
preordained 4y ago
Winner winner, chicken dinner. It's obvious that at a certain scale you shouldn't have as much license to censor, as you effectively become the public square. If you run Cathy's Cat forum where you have a thousand users and you want to decree pro cat speech all the time...be as dictatorial as you want.

deleted 4y ago

[deleted]

MarkMarine 4y ago

100% Freedom of speech in the terms of the first amendment is the government not infringing on your speech (like, throwing you in jail for criticizing it) It has zero to do with what you can say on twitter, or if the people you’re deciding to say something to band together and decide you’re an asshole who should be ignored or fired.

MichaelCollins 4y ago
> 100% Freedom of speech in the terms of the first amendment Freedom of speech is a principle, not an amendment. The first amendment exemplifies the principle of freedom of speech, but does not define the bounds of that principle.
- MarkMarine 4y ago
  Do you think that you should be free to say whatever you want, and the person you say it to should have the freedom to punch you in the fucking face infringed on?

Georgelemental 4y ago

1. "Freedom of speech" ≠ "First Amendment". The First Amendment provides for a minimum level of free speech, a healthy society will go above and beyond the minimum. In fact many of the Founders were conflicted about the Bill of Rights, exactly because they were afraid it would be interpreted as a maximum and not a minimum. 2. Modern tech monopolies actively collude with government. Just a few days ago we learned that Facebook had been holding regular meetings with White House officials to coordinate censorship. In exchange, the government passes laws and regulations that help the tech giants kept their monopolies and crush their competitors, and doesn't pass antitrust bills that would hurt them. So the public/private distinction is kind of dead

dotnet00 4y ago

I think this line of reasoning, while technically valid, is also what's being used to pervert the idea of freedom of speech. The idea behind the first amendment was that the government was the only entity which could realistically stop someone from saying something without running afoul of other existing legal frameworks when most public discourse was via literal town squares, so by limiting the government's ability to persecute speech, a more free 'market' of ideas could be encouraged. These days a lot of public discourse is online and increasingly so. The argument that companies being forced to host ideas they disagree with can be construed as a free speech issue is reasonable (although not entirely convincing, as we clearly do find utility companies to be providing a service so essential that they can't arbitrarily refuse service), but equally there is the problem that the vagueness of the matter is being abused by small groups of people, thus not really leaving it as a free 'market' of ideas. Nowadays a small group of people can do a ton of damage to someone simply by harassing the companies (and the clients of those companies) they rely on, taking it all the way to even getting bank accounts closed or cutting off payment processors. One can imagine that if water and electricity weren't classified as utilities they'd even go after those. Thus, some balance is needed because while it's technically possible to live without banking or to have a business without a (well known) payment processor, it's clearly an increasingly unreasonable limitation to be able to be imposed on anyone without a legal process. Beyond that there's the point that social media companies often act as per the government's "suggestions", thus technically not violating the first amendment despite not really being in its spirit either. Facebook and/or Twitter doesn't legally have to do X when government hints at wanting it but if they don't they might happen to find themselves brought in front of Congress for a hearing about Y or facing regulation/investigation.

em-bee 4y ago
in germany (since 1995) and austria (apparently only since 2016) having a bank-account is a legal right.