I understand what you’re saying. A problem is we have enemies weaponizing free speech as propaganda through social media. We have fascist wannabe dictators with a speaker in every citizens wallet. We have role models peddeling antiscientific junk to our kids.
This isn’t the free speech of the 1900’s. Social media is a game changer and a possible weapon of mass destruction - imo.
Free speech to me doesn’t mean you get to say everything everywere. Try standing up in a restaurant and shout political propaganda - you’re gonna get thrown out.
This is great evidence that most people know nothing about history. The same arguments have been made about TV, Radio, Magazines, Newspapers, Books, Philosophy and practically any other medium that people have used to convey ideas. This is exactly why you need to protect an individuals rights to free speech and expression from anyone with power because chances are that they'll have a biased streak a mile wide and won't be ashamed to impose their personal view of how the world should be on everyone around them no matter how much human suffering it produces. The only way to have a free society is to realize that everyone, the president, your hairdresser, doctors, factory workers, lawyers, farmers, journalists, grocery store clerks and you and me are all flawed, weak, limited human beings who are mostly trying to be good but are perfectly capable of evil at any turn and so we have to all agree to limit anyone's power over anyone else to the largest extent possible. If we misjudge and allow too much power to collect in any one office then we will inevitably be subjugated by it as it uses that power to accrue more and more influence over time and as we roll the dice with every new person that takes control of it. This has played out throughout all of human history and there's absolutely nothing about our time that guarantees it won't happen again.
And TV, Radio, Books, Magazines, newspapers were time and again weaponised against democracy, up to and including genocides. The Nazis, RTLM, Pravda, Facebook, Murdoch to name just a few examples.
Any tool can be a weapon. Those communication media have also spread democracy and toppled dictatorships as often as they have been perverted by them. Crippling those tools only favors the people in power and those people will be tyrants sooner or later.
Neither you nor the era in which you live are special enough to erode generations of protections for the ability to think freely, speak freely, and to do so without fear of repercussions.
This isn’t the free speech of the 1900’s. Social media is a game changer and a possible weapon of mass destruction - imo.
Free speech to me doesn’t mean you get to say everything everywere. Try standing up in a restaurant and shout political propaganda - you’re gonna get thrown out.