Court blocks NY law mandating “hateful conduct” policies by social media
reason.com
reason.com
I used to donate to the ACLU, but they have completely lost their way.
I'd encourage more people who care about preserving free speech and expression to give money to FIRE. They are the new ACLU and need financial resources to do what the ACLU used to do.
https://rankings.thefire.org/rank
Of the top 6 that are rated "Good," L=Liberal to C=Conservative ratios are telling:
1. University of Chicago, L:C = 4 : 1
2. Kansas State University, L:C = 1 : 1.3
3. Purdue (main campus), L:C = 1.1 : 1
4. Mississippi State Univ, L:C = 1 : 1.9
5. Oklahoma State Univ, L:C = 1 : 1.2
6. Claremont McKenna, L:C = 5.2 : 1
The bottom 6 (Poor, Very poor or abysmal):
198. Yale, L:C = 5.2 : 1
199. Skidmore, L:C = 11.8 : 1
200. Georgetown, L:C = 3.3 : 1
201. Rensselaer Poly, L:C = 2.3 : 1
202. U. of Pennsylvania, L:C = 5.9 : 1
203. Columbia, L:C = 6.8 : 1
Looks like there's been a flip in the definitions of liberal and conservative, at least wrt free-speech
I mean, yeah? There is definitely a side more concerned with suppressing speech they consider reprehensible than the other and those roles have definitely switched in the last like 30 years.
The funny thing to me, is that the data objectively shows this, and Greenwald has good reason to rant about it: he has been one of the most vocal liberal critics of the security state for two decades, yet now finds himself alone, suddenly surrounded by conservatives while angry liberals call him a right wing grifter who's lost his way. But in fact it's the opposite; Greenwald has been steadfast in his principled opposition, whereas his previously stalwart allies have abandoned him in favor of reactionary politics that fits their confirmation bias.
I don't follow these things too closely, but my perception is they continue to do the same kind of work they always have.
https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/2022/05/aclu-johnn...
The ACLU taking donations to silently support Amber Heard suing Johnny Depp is so far afield of their mission it’s unforgivable.
tl;dr : the ACLU used to be a free speech absolutist organization to the point of self-sabotage. (eg: Jewish ACLU lawyers defending Neo-Nazis). In that sense, it went from a libertarian organization to a progressive activist organization that now supports cases that suppress civil liberties as long as the cause supports their (faux activist?) progressive agenda.
[1]https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/2022/05/aclu-johnn...
[2]https://www.nytimes.com/2021/06/06/us/aclu-free-speech.html
From a practical standpoint, the Nazi group they were defending didn't amount to anything, and they never even held their march after going to all the work of taking the case to the Supreme Court.
Basically all of the EFF lawyers are in real tight with the Library of Congress, which happens to have some oversight issues (as in they have almost none) that bipartisan efforts in Congress are trying to correct. I forget the exact details but basically there was an appointed position with no accountability to anyone that Congress was at least trying to make replaceable by the Executive branch.
The EFF ran all kinds of FUD through their mailing lists to try to keep the position unaccountable to anyone, which in my opinion is behavior running in direct oppoisition to the second letter in their acronym.
They do not claim to handle more than a fraction of what the ACLU does (which is fine):
https://www.thefire.org/about-us
Versus the ACLU:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/American_Civil_Liberties_Union...
~ Frederick Douglass
On the other hand, I cannot help but think that too many people have become soft these days. I am not old enough to remember a time before the late 90s, nor do I glorify a forgotten "Golden Age". But, when I occasionally watch old movies, documentaries, and TV shows, it is clear that people used to have a much thicker skin. This is not to say that I believe that free speech shouldn't have reasonable constraints. I am not denying the emotional impact that words can have on people, or the potential unhealthiness of excess emotional fortitude. But it is to say that it would be misguided and, in my humble opinion, a disservice to future generations to envelop them in a sanitized cocoon of sterile experiences, where they cannot be uncomfortable. Because the real world is full of colorful characters, and surprises, generally speaking. Like an immune system that grows weaker when it goes too long without exposure to viruses and bacteria, I believe that a person's character can and in a certain measure must be allowed to be steeled and sharpened by the unexpected, the random, and, perhaps, the uncomfortable.
It seems everyone nowadays wants to be coddled and there’s just this overwhelming sense of entitlement in the air.
The real world isn’t perfect; in fact, it’s quite chaotic, just how it’s supposed to be. A lot of folks seem to only want to look at the world from a utopian lens. The elephant in the room is, your utopia isn’t my utopia. Put differently, our differences create the very imperfections that actually make our world interesting and keep society functioning as it should.
There are white, heterosexual, etc (the list of ways people say they privileged is ever expanding lol) men who have been on the receiving end of hateful speech because they are white, heterosexual, etc. and there are black or gay men who have never been personally attacked based on that identity.
But yeah, shielding yourself from speech or anything else you may find uncomfortable may make you feel better in the moment, but hurts you in the long term
I honestly don’t believe it’s possible to be racist against the majority in the same way as against the minority.
It's also a very recent phenomenon, and the most recent wave seems to be pushed by elites in society that don't seem to realize the average working class citizen has more contact with minorities than they ever will.
But not every white person who encounters racism is able to escape unharmed. Some have been physically hurt or even killed in racist attacks. Some are harassed at school or work or in their neighborhoods and can't afford to escape.
Their situation isn't different from other victims of racism (except perhaps that they receive less support), even if you haven't experienced it and don't believe it's possible.
If you're a Uyghur Muslim in China, racism against you is going to be far more harmful than the reverse -- in the typical case. That's just fact and stems from the demographic numbers differences.
Ditto with White people in the West but perhaps less stark since Whites tend to be a smaller majority.
I agree, but that isn't what mathieuh wrote. I'd say racism against white people is less common and generally less impactful, but it isn't impossible or inevitably different.
> since Whites tend to be a smaller majority
You're underestimating the diversity of the United States. There are many places in the US where white non-Hispanic Christians are a minority. In fact, white non-Hispanic (but including Jewish and Muslim) people are only 60% of the population of the US.
This is what people are trying to point out when they talk about Whiteness. They're talking about the construct that it's good and default to be White (or Han if you live in China or Japanese if you live in Japan) and this construct can even hold true in places with a White minority (e.g., how White people get treated in Singapore, or colorism culture in non-White countries).
That having being said, White people as individuals are empirically the least racist people. That's just empirically true according to survey data. But this is largely besides the point that was being made above.
In the middle of the last century, people were murdered for interracial relationships, beaten and imprisoned for being gay, institutionalized for being different. Undoubtedly, people wanted to avoid these things.
By your own admission, you've lived in a sanitized cocoon where you've never been the victim of hateful speech. Do you think you're weaker than others who have experience in that area? Would a generation full of people like you be a disservice?
I don't really think state censorship is the answer, but I find your point of view contradictory.
Now, we're working through the experiment. We'll see how it goes. It's not a sure thing.
Since it also needs to be said, the fact that you have a constitutional right to say hateful things does not mean you should or that you have a right not to be judged by other people if you choose to exercise this particular right. As long as people are free to express views that almost everybody regards as reprehensible, the rest of us can feel confident that our 1st Amendment rights remain secure.
And, transitively, don't understand or care about their civic duty to uphold and promote those values, as elected leaders. It's not a "no-op" to pass an unconstitutional law that's immediately struck down by courts. It's an erosion of norms. The norm that elected leaders uphold the constitutional order, which constrains their power; and don't seek to break out of it. The norm that the system of freedom we live under is an expensive and valuable thing (and that this is a universally shared value); not something cheap and haggle-able.
Let's be real: When has that /ever/ been the norm?
Anyone who chooses to pursue an office in governance is there to grab power or enrich themselves. No exceptions. The only question is how brazen they are about it.
Every one of them swears an oath to uphold the US constitution. The sad thing is that their civic knowledge is so limited that few of them understand the principles they are proclaiming to serve by.
Sadly the two party elected system is probably one of those things that is difficult to impossible to break out of, as the parties will never vote to suicide themselves.
Yes, sortition sounds dumb until you learn that those who seek positions of power are the last ones you want to get them.
Frankly it's ideas like this that normalize grabbing power and enriching yourself.
It's worth going further to point out that the First Amendment (and Free Speech protections in general) exists specifically to protect and guarantee speech that someone sometime somewhere might or will find objectional for any or no reason.
Non-objectional speech doesn't need Free Speech protections because there's nobody to censor non-objectional speech in the first place.
I never would have imagined a few short years ago we'd be here.
But there is no "benefit" to unfettered free speech other than the fact that we have unfettered free speech; it's very straightforward. Some people won't care about it.
> The Court emphasized that "[b]y compelling individuals to speak a particular message, such notices 'alte[r] the content of [their] speech.'"
The “notices” refer to their hate speech mitigation policies.
Read the full decision that the article summarized
I figure they know it is unconstitutional and will be overturned by the courts, but they will still get brownie points from their supporters for trying.
This is the interesting part of the debate. It is commonly stated that freedom of speech doesn’t equal freedom from consequences, and it’s hard to imagine a law that could guarantee anyone freedom from the consequences of their speech, but is there a point where the consequences become disproportionate?
The first amendment only limits government, but there are private entities which have government-like powers in some circumstances. For example, the church. Historically if you said something the church didn’t like, you might risk shunning, or worse. People have lost livelihoods and been shut out of civic society for using speech in opposition to religious authority. Is that a legitimate and proportionate consequence of speech?
The church in America is in decline, but religiosity has found new homes amongst political mobs, who can wield their powers against free speech. They can put pressure on the private companies that act as the government of the internet. All while acting in a private, non-governmental capacity, so it’s not censorship, it’s just consequences, right?
Should we seek to limit the consequences that churches can impose?
Like many commonly stated things, this is completely wrong. Freedom from consequences is the only possible thing that "freedom of speech" could mean. Essentially every living person has some way of communicating and so if freedom of speech weren't freedom from consequences, then every living person has freedom of speech definitionally. "Freedom of speech" wouldn't mean anything then. Persons living under the most oppressive regime would, by this flawed definition, have perfect freedom of speech.
The common but wrong idea stems from fundamentally confusing "freedom of speech" and "the first amendment to the United States Constitution". What it's attempting to say is that the 1A doesn't guarantee that purely private actors can't find a way to penalize you for your speech. However, what it gets wrong is that such penalties would still be an abrogation of freedom of speech, but a kind of freedom of speech which isn't protected by 1A. Just because that kind of freedom of speech [against private actors] isn't guaranteed by 1A, doesn't mean it's not valuable. Many of us believe this kind of freedom of speech is also valuable.