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Comment by cratermoon | Hacker News Reader

> I wish we could charge those kinds of groups with the impediment of free speech (at least in the US) and fine them out of existence

That would be an actual violation of free speech, penalizing a legal, private, first amendment-protected activity. Remember, the first amendment only prevents the government from constraining the speech of citizens. Telling an organization, especially a religious organization, what they can and cannot advocate for would be an egregious violation of first amendment protections.

https://xkcd.com/1357/

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Sorry, this is a pet peeve of mine. The expression "free speech" has a meaning outside the US constitution. It's like if I were to start quoting the Magna Carta at you. I'd further argue that it clearly has a meaning outside of a legal one.

When the author states they want to fine the groups, specifically in the US, based on violating free speech principles, it is clear that they are referencing the legal free speech in which a government would impose a penalty when an institution violates the law.

My comment was in response to the mention of the US. I could have been more exact, instead of "actual violation of free speech", it would be "an actual violation, in the US, of the First Amendment guarantees of free speech. Outside the US, that doesn't apply.

I get what you are saying, but these groups effectively operate as a DDoS attack against content they do not like. Content which is not promoting or showing anything "bad", it just violates their beliefs.

Those groups are, and would be, free to voice their concerns and beliefs on their own platforms, in their own buildings, etc. I am not saying they should not have an equal right to free speech, just that their should be a cost or penalty for trying to impose your beliefs on all of society via those kinds of organized actions.

But isn't this category of "bad" the entire dispute? People opposed to pornography don't typically agree with your perception that it's just about their individual tastes; they argue that it is "bad", in precisely the same way as racial slurs or planning a crime or any of the things that you and I think obviously need to be prohibited.

> should be a cost or penalty for trying to impose your beliefs on all of society via those kinds of organized actions.

At least in the US, "organized actions" would be protected under "right of the people peaceably to assemble" part of the First Amendment. Unless those organized actions presented a "clear and present danger"[1], it's difficult for me to see how a government could restrain organizing.

1 Cantwell v. Connecticut, 310 U.S. 296 (1940)

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