Another thing that muddies the discussion is the confusion between the legal protection of free speech and the ethical value of free speech.
"Free speech" does not equal "freedom from being criticized" or "right to an audience". Me making fun of your argument or calling your argument stupid and x-ist is me exercising my free speech just as much as you are exercising yours in making you argument in the first place.
But that being said, I would argue that going on campaigns to get someone fired from their job or preventing people from making their argument in the first place and the like is against free speech the ethical value, even if not against the legal principle.
A lot of times what people are really talking of when they express concerns about "free speech" is the ethical value. This is frequently countered with an argument about the legal protection, but that's kind of missing the point IMHO.
I think of the two sides as "pro-speech" and "anti-speech" dissent.
I can disagree and oppose your opinions by exercising my own right to free speech. I can afford you your own pulpit, air time, and freedom to make your point, and then I can take mine and make my point as loudly as I can. I can schedule a march or rally the same day, across the street.
This is what "pro-speech" dissent looks like.
I can also disagree and oppose your opinion by removing your right to free speech. I can contact people who might give you a platform, and convince them not to do so. I can attempt to impose consequences for you legally, socially, or physically that discourage you from speaking. I can shout over you from across the street, to ensure people can't hear your speech.
This is what "anti-speech" dissent looks like.
And, IMHO, "pro-speech" is more important than almost* any consequence of speech.
* The sole exceptions probably being speech that inspires imminent action to violate any person's individual rights (e.g. violence) or that has an imminent or fundamental threat to bring about a change in government to one which does not allow, support, and respect free speech.
If Alice wants to talk but Bob doesn't want to listen to her, then he indeed shouldn't have to. But if Alice wants to talk and Bob does want to listen to her, then they should be able to without Karen being able to stop them.
> A lot of times what people are really talking of when they express concerns about "free speech" is the ethical value. This is frequently countered with an argument about the legal protection, but that's kind of missing the point IMHO.
That's true, but also I think people sometimes have an overly narrow focus on one single aspect of legal protection - especially, in the US context, the First Amendment. While 1A is the most crucial way in which the US legal system seeks to support that ethical value, there are other ways – something which violates the ethical value of free speech may not violate 1A, yet may violate other legal provisions.
To give just one example – California Labor Code sections 1101 and 1102 outlaws political discrimination in employment in the State of California. This can provide added protection to the ethical value of free speech compared to 1A. 1A does not prevent private employers from firing employees for publicly expressing particular political views – at least in some cases, 1101&1102 will. And a few other states have similar legal provisions, and there is always the chance that more states could adopt laws like this – getting state laws amended is far easier than amending the federal constitution, or putting in place a Supreme Court bench which will interpret it a certain way.
“Deplatforming” is anti-freedom. It violates the free speech of the speaker, it violates freedom of assembly for the listeners, and it violates freedom of association for all of the parties involved.
Showing up to shout someone down who had people voluntarily show up to hear them speak because you feel like you are empowered to unilaterally decide and enforce through aggression who is “allowed” to speak in your city or on your campus, is inherently an act against freedom of speech. It’s also the ultimate act of “entitlement”, getting away with it is the ultimate act of “privilege” to be allowed to so utterly disrespect another person’s rights.
There is no other way to color this and very little nuance here. “Platforms” in the virtual space have more leeway as they’re mostly privately owned and extended as a privilege of access, not a right. Shouting down speakers in public (or paid and invited) venues though is unequivocally against freedom of speech.
> “Deplatforming” is anti-freedom. It violates the free speech of the speaker, it violates freedom of assembly for the listeners, and it violates freedom of association for all of the parties involved.
Is it though? And to what extent? We don't have unlimited freedom of speech in the US constitution because we agreed that there are limits and realize that words do mean things (like a threat).
But on a platform let's be nuanced. Some people believe that saying a racist word and having their comment removed is deplatforming. Some think they can promote violence. Others think getting down voted is deplatforming. There's a lot of people getting grouped together here and many making claims of being deplatformed are not acting in good faith.
So unfortunately we need to define what deplatforming means otherwise we'll just be arguing and making assumptions because many people will be working off of many different definitions pretending that we all agree on the definition (or that we hold the true definition and others are dumb).
Deplatforming does not violate freedom of association for all parties: you seem to be forgetting that the platform also has the right to freedom of association, and would be exercising that right by refusing to associate with the individual(s) being deplatformed.
I'm yet to see a convincing argument that broadly, one person's free speech right always trumps other's freedom of association when the other doesn't like your speech, for any reason.
What I don’t understand is the nuance between freedom of speech in public spaces versus privately owned spaces. If the US government had a public social network, then people would have the right to shout ZYX. It is not the same on Facebook or TikTok right? Those are privately owned spaces. That would be like you coming into my property to shout XYS and I could remove you from my land. Am I understanding this correctly?
In making this argument, you should clarify that you think it's important to not limit "freedom of speech" to its legal definition. Currently, you only make an allusion to that distinction.
To fully make your argument, you need to convince people that the overall philosophical point of "free speech" is worth societal value even beyond that which we have accorded it via law (assuming you're in the US).
Coming from someone who doesn't agree with you, but who doesn't agree with your opponents either.
I'm confused by what you are saying here. Corporations have always been totalitarian in their decision making. How often have you heard from your boss "this isn't a democracy" when they make a decision that's unpopular among the employees?
The more interesting dynamic to me is the free-market, anti-regulation, low-corporate-tax capitalist politicians arguing we should create regulations to make the market less free.
For some weird reason, the same people can be OK with Cloudflare or Twitter banning someone for their political views, but wouldn't be OK with a bank or electricity provider banning someone for their political views.
An electrical provider is typically a government-granted monopoly, and given that, it is not unreasonable to extend the protection of speech against government action to the electrical provider.
Banks are not however, and in fact, banks and the financial system do act against classes of people. Visa and Mastercard frequently pressure their customers in an effort to prevent sex work in the name of preventing sex trafficking. If their customers do not do enough they will cut them off. This most recently happened with OnlyFans. See also PornHub.
In my mind there is a big difference between banning particular views versus banning someone for their particular views.
Like, Cloudflare or Twitter should be free to choose what speech they publish and what they prohibit, but they (and banks and electricity providers) should not be banning someone because of who they are as a person or for their political views expressed elsewhere. Cloudflare should be free to ban Daily Stormer as they did, but if the same people from Daily Stormer were just running a cat picture site through Cloudflare (and publishing their neo-Nazi stuff elsewhere) then IMHO Cloudflare should not ban their cat picture site.
To choose an extreme (but less-political?) example of paedophilia, it's obviously okay to ban distribution of child sexual abuse material, but IMHO someone who's just came out from prison after being convicted for child rape should not get automatically banned from platforms (or banks, or electricity providers) as a person despite being a paedophile child abuser, they should be able to participate in the society unless/until their ongoing acts become criminal and they get removed from the society by the courts. And if that's the case, then it also applies to the less extreme views.
If there is a pulpit in the town square, then the 1st amendment says that a speaker *is* entitled to that pulpit. This is the essence of free speech, and always has been. The 1st amendment is very explicit about this: citizens have a right to assemble *in public* and air their opinions *publicly.* Cordoning off opinions and declaring them unfit for certain public squares is a classic form of censorship. Communists, Republicans, the KKK, NAMBLA, the NRA, GLAAD, Gay Geeks for Bernie and the ASPCA all have the right to march on the National Mall.
Exactly. IMHO, we just need to accept that "public" has extended and changed to encompass publicly-accessible, privately-owned platforms of a sufficient size.
> If there is a pulpit in the town square, then the 1st amendment says that a speaker is entitled to that pulpit.
Okay but what about when I want to use the pulpit? By your logic, if you're using the pulpit you are restricting my speech, because I can't exercise my speech while you're exercising yours. And by that token, if everyone in the town square wanted to shout you down and drown you out while you were at the pulpit, you can't really complain on the basis of free speech, right? Because any restrictions on their shouting would encroach on their free speech rights.
Apparently this is what we call "cancel culture", and the reason we're still talking about it today is that people complaining about it have no coherent ideas on how to fix it without also trampling all over the very free speech principles they are decrying have been violated.
This knot people have tied themselves into is fascinating.
Beltalowda|3 years ago
"Free speech" does not equal "freedom from being criticized" or "right to an audience". Me making fun of your argument or calling your argument stupid and x-ist is me exercising my free speech just as much as you are exercising yours in making you argument in the first place.
But that being said, I would argue that going on campaigns to get someone fired from their job or preventing people from making their argument in the first place and the like is against free speech the ethical value, even if not against the legal principle.
A lot of times what people are really talking of when they express concerns about "free speech" is the ethical value. This is frequently countered with an argument about the legal protection, but that's kind of missing the point IMHO.
ethbr0|3 years ago
I can disagree and oppose your opinions by exercising my own right to free speech. I can afford you your own pulpit, air time, and freedom to make your point, and then I can take mine and make my point as loudly as I can. I can schedule a march or rally the same day, across the street.
This is what "pro-speech" dissent looks like.
I can also disagree and oppose your opinion by removing your right to free speech. I can contact people who might give you a platform, and convince them not to do so. I can attempt to impose consequences for you legally, socially, or physically that discourage you from speaking. I can shout over you from across the street, to ensure people can't hear your speech.
This is what "anti-speech" dissent looks like.
And, IMHO, "pro-speech" is more important than almost* any consequence of speech.
* The sole exceptions probably being speech that inspires imminent action to violate any person's individual rights (e.g. violence) or that has an imminent or fundamental threat to bring about a change in government to one which does not allow, support, and respect free speech.
josephcsible|3 years ago
If Alice wants to talk but Bob doesn't want to listen to her, then he indeed shouldn't have to. But if Alice wants to talk and Bob does want to listen to her, then they should be able to without Karen being able to stop them.
skissane|3 years ago
That's true, but also I think people sometimes have an overly narrow focus on one single aspect of legal protection - especially, in the US context, the First Amendment. While 1A is the most crucial way in which the US legal system seeks to support that ethical value, there are other ways – something which violates the ethical value of free speech may not violate 1A, yet may violate other legal provisions.
To give just one example – California Labor Code sections 1101 and 1102 outlaws political discrimination in employment in the State of California. This can provide added protection to the ethical value of free speech compared to 1A. 1A does not prevent private employers from firing employees for publicly expressing particular political views – at least in some cases, 1101&1102 will. And a few other states have similar legal provisions, and there is always the chance that more states could adopt laws like this – getting state laws amended is far easier than amending the federal constitution, or putting in place a Supreme Court bench which will interpret it a certain way.
tristor|3 years ago
Showing up to shout someone down who had people voluntarily show up to hear them speak because you feel like you are empowered to unilaterally decide and enforce through aggression who is “allowed” to speak in your city or on your campus, is inherently an act against freedom of speech. It’s also the ultimate act of “entitlement”, getting away with it is the ultimate act of “privilege” to be allowed to so utterly disrespect another person’s rights.
There is no other way to color this and very little nuance here. “Platforms” in the virtual space have more leeway as they’re mostly privately owned and extended as a privilege of access, not a right. Shouting down speakers in public (or paid and invited) venues though is unequivocally against freedom of speech.
godelski|3 years ago
Is it though? And to what extent? We don't have unlimited freedom of speech in the US constitution because we agreed that there are limits and realize that words do mean things (like a threat).
But on a platform let's be nuanced. Some people believe that saying a racist word and having their comment removed is deplatforming. Some think they can promote violence. Others think getting down voted is deplatforming. There's a lot of people getting grouped together here and many making claims of being deplatformed are not acting in good faith.
So unfortunately we need to define what deplatforming means otherwise we'll just be arguing and making assumptions because many people will be working off of many different definitions pretending that we all agree on the definition (or that we hold the true definition and others are dumb).
sangnoir|3 years ago
I'm yet to see a convincing argument that broadly, one person's free speech right always trumps other's freedom of association when the other doesn't like your speech, for any reason.
fumar|3 years ago
ss108|3 years ago
To fully make your argument, you need to convince people that the overall philosophical point of "free speech" is worth societal value even beyond that which we have accorded it via law (assuming you're in the US).
Coming from someone who doesn't agree with you, but who doesn't agree with your opponents either.
LudwigNagasena|3 years ago
ModernMech|3 years ago
The more interesting dynamic to me is the free-market, anti-regulation, low-corporate-tax capitalist politicians arguing we should create regulations to make the market less free.
tomp|3 years ago
drdec|3 years ago
Banks are not however, and in fact, banks and the financial system do act against classes of people. Visa and Mastercard frequently pressure their customers in an effort to prevent sex work in the name of preventing sex trafficking. If their customers do not do enough they will cut them off. This most recently happened with OnlyFans. See also PornHub.
PeterisP|3 years ago
Like, Cloudflare or Twitter should be free to choose what speech they publish and what they prohibit, but they (and banks and electricity providers) should not be banning someone because of who they are as a person or for their political views expressed elsewhere. Cloudflare should be free to ban Daily Stormer as they did, but if the same people from Daily Stormer were just running a cat picture site through Cloudflare (and publishing their neo-Nazi stuff elsewhere) then IMHO Cloudflare should not ban their cat picture site.
To choose an extreme (but less-political?) example of paedophilia, it's obviously okay to ban distribution of child sexual abuse material, but IMHO someone who's just came out from prison after being convicted for child rape should not get automatically banned from platforms (or banks, or electricity providers) as a person despite being a paedophile child abuser, they should be able to participate in the society unless/until their ongoing acts become criminal and they get removed from the society by the courts. And if that's the case, then it also applies to the less extreme views.
leaflets2|3 years ago
But you can, via Twitter and Facebook.
Communication is its own different animal
ambrozk|3 years ago
ethbr0|3 years ago
ModernMech|3 years ago
Okay but what about when I want to use the pulpit? By your logic, if you're using the pulpit you are restricting my speech, because I can't exercise my speech while you're exercising yours. And by that token, if everyone in the town square wanted to shout you down and drown you out while you were at the pulpit, you can't really complain on the basis of free speech, right? Because any restrictions on their shouting would encroach on their free speech rights.
Apparently this is what we call "cancel culture", and the reason we're still talking about it today is that people complaining about it have no coherent ideas on how to fix it without also trampling all over the very free speech principles they are decrying have been violated.
This knot people have tied themselves into is fascinating.
hotpotamus|3 years ago