Others responding to my speech by exercising their own rights to free speech and free association as individuals does not violate my right to free speech. One can make an argument that corporations doing those things (e.g. your Play Store example) is sufficiently different in kind to individuals doing it -- and a lot of people would even agree with that argument! It does, however, run afoul of current first amendment jurisprudence.
Either way, this is categorically different from China's policies on e.g. Tibet, which is a centrally driven censorship decision whose goal is to suppress factual information.
I see you trying to equalize the arugment, but it sounds like you are conflating rules, regulations and rights versus actual censorship.
Generally the West, besides recent Trump admins, we aren't censored about talking about things. The right-leaning folks will talk about how they're getting cancelled, while cancelling journalists.
China has history thats not allowed to be taught or learned from. In America, we just sweep it under an already lumpy rug.
- Genocide of Native americans in Florida and resulting "Manifest Destiny" genocide on aboriginals people
- Slavery, and arguably the American South was entirely depedant on slave labour
- Internment camp for Japanses families during the second world war
- Students protesters shot and killed at Kent State by National Guards
>Private entities might have their own policies, but government censorship is fairly small.
It's a distinction without a difference when these "private" entities in the West are the actual power centers. Most regular people spend their waking days at work having to follow the rules of these entities, and these entities provide the basic necessities of life. What would happen if you got banned from all the grocery stores? Put on an unemployable list for having controversial outspoken opinions?
CBS News installed a new editor-in-chief following the above merge and lawsuit related settlement, and she has pulled segments from 60 Minutes which were critical of the administration: https://www.npr.org/2025/12/22/g-s1-103282/cbs-chief-bari-we... (the segment leaked via a foreign affiliate, and later was broadcast by CBS)
TikTok has been forced to sell to an ally of the current administration, who is now alleged to be censoring information critical of ICE (this last one is as of yet unproven, but the fact is they were forced to sell to someone politically aligned with the president, which doesn't say very good things about freedom of expression): https://www.cosmopolitan.com/politics/a70144099/tiktok-ice-c...
rvnx|1 month ago
In practice, you will have loss of clients, of investors, of opportunities (banned from Play Store, etc).
In Europe, on top of that, you will get fines, loss of freedom, etc.
amalcon|1 month ago
Either way, this is categorically different from China's policies on e.g. Tibet, which is a centrally driven censorship decision whose goal is to suppress factual information.
mgazzer|1 month ago
Generally the West, besides recent Trump admins, we aren't censored about talking about things. The right-leaning folks will talk about how they're getting cancelled, while cancelling journalists.
China has history thats not allowed to be taught or learned from. In America, we just sweep it under an already lumpy rug.
- Genocide of Native americans in Florida and resulting "Manifest Destiny" genocide on aboriginals people - Slavery, and arguably the American South was entirely depedant on slave labour - Internment camp for Japanses families during the second world war - Students protesters shot and killed at Kent State by National Guards
epolanski|1 month ago
What are you talking about?
Balinares|1 month ago
This might be a good year to revisit this assumption.
computerthings|1 month ago
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holoduke|1 month ago
rvnx|1 month ago
seniorThrowaway|1 month ago
It's a distinction without a difference when these "private" entities in the West are the actual power centers. Most regular people spend their waking days at work having to follow the rules of these entities, and these entities provide the basic necessities of life. What would happen if you got banned from all the grocery stores? Put on an unemployable list for having controversial outspoken opinions?
lambda|1 month ago
Earlier they broke down the door of a US citizen and arrested him in his underwear without a warrant. https://www.pbs.org/newshour/nation/a-u-s-citizen-says-ice-f...
Stephen Colbert has been fired for being critical of the president, after pressure from the federal government threatening to stop a merger. https://freespeechproject.georgetown.edu/tracker-entries/ste...
CBS News installed a new editor-in-chief following the above merge and lawsuit related settlement, and she has pulled segments from 60 Minutes which were critical of the administration: https://www.npr.org/2025/12/22/g-s1-103282/cbs-chief-bari-we... (the segment leaked via a foreign affiliate, and later was broadcast by CBS)
Students have been arrested for writing op-eds critical of Israel: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Detention_of_R%C3%BCmeysa_%C3%...
TikTok has been forced to sell to an ally of the current administration, who is now alleged to be censoring information critical of ICE (this last one is as of yet unproven, but the fact is they were forced to sell to someone politically aligned with the president, which doesn't say very good things about freedom of expression): https://www.cosmopolitan.com/politics/a70144099/tiktok-ice-c...
Apple and Google have banned apps tracking ICE from their app stores, upon demand from the government: https://www.npr.org/2025/10/03/nx-s1-5561999/apple-google-ic...
And the government is planning on requiring ESTA visitors to install a mobile app, submit biometric data, and submit 5 years of social media data to travel to the US: https://www.govinfo.gov/content/pkg/FR-2025-12-10/pdf/2025-2...
We no longer have a functioning bill of rights in this country. Have you been asleep for the past year?
The censorship is not as pervasive as in China, yet. But it's getting there fast.
naasking|1 month ago