There cannot be a division between the exercise of a right and the protection of repercussion of exercising said right. To not afford protection to those who exercise a constitutional right is to strip all practical effect of those rights

It is illogical to conclude that we give people certain rights if we were simply to abandon them to their persecutors when they choose to exercise their rights. What was theoretically protected becomes merely a facade and an illusion that people have rights when in fact they are at the mercy of those who would attempt to subvert their rights

The practical effect of legislation is at the core of even the most introductory and basic courses of any law degree whether it is from an Ivy League University or the most rundown backwater campus

The general statement that you don't benefit from a certain degree of protection when exercising a constitutional right without any sort of mention of what a reasonable limit on those rights would be completely ignores the fact that constitutions were drafted PRECISELY to protect individuals who wished to exercise those rights

The problem in cases of "social outrage" is that the outrage is, itself, expression.

The same protections that you demand exist for people expressing their right has to fall on both sides of a debate.

You can't draw a neat box around one person's thought and say "protect this from others".

This makes it a complex problem and a balancing act, but it doesn't mean we just throw our hands up in the air and give up. For example, California's Labor Code contains this piece of legislation protecting freedom of speech against retaliation in very specific circumstances: http://leginfo.legislature.ca.gov/faces/codes_displaySection...

The "chilling speech" effect is one of many reasons why anti-SLAPP statutes exist, a way to explicitly protect freedom of speech from specious attacks.

We certainly couldn't expect people to have no reaction to speech, in fact, no reaction to speech would mean the speech is worthless! But there are cases where we can decide that a certain retaliation to speech is explicitly prohibited, and this is uncontroversial enough to find many examples of laws and statutes doing just that.

California's statues are about protecting an individual from retaliation against workplace complaints. While you can argue it is related to FoS, I think it's a bit of a stretch. The statues would not, for instance, protect you if you told your co-workers your boss was murdering children in his office every day, no matter how much you believe it to be true.

Anti-SLAPP is about protecting people from the financial drain of a lawsuit by a third-party looking to intimidate. It does nothing to force anyone involved to continue to employ, or do business with, any individual.

The problem in this case, from an employer's perspective, is that they have one employee who is creating a toxic atmosphere not from a protected position, but from a hostile one.

And while you might believe that people who read his memo as "toxic" are over-reacting to it (and there is an argument there, though one I wouldn't agree with), they must be free to "overreact" and speak their mind.

It does get very, very tricky, since while unpopular racist/sexist opinions may necessarily create problematic dynamics in the work place, that could easily also be true of opinions those who decry this memo would think should be protected. If I work at a company with a steeped culture of faith, and I walk around talking about how Christian's are stupid, to what extent should the employer be forced to continue to employ me?

I tend to believe that, to the extent we have freedom of speech, we chose when and how to exercise that in public. Our choices have consequences, and it is on us to accept those.

I'm a small business owner. If tomorrow, I write a "memo" which says something as moronic as "Women don't make good clients", and I HAVE women as clients, I can't expect them to continue to want to do business with me. I can't demand any type of legal protection which would force them to continue to do business with me.

It is just as true that, at least with my company, I can see many types of clients who would not appreciate the libertine culture of my agency. I've had more than one potential client, who found out we used to take our employees to a regional Burning Man event, show extreme discomfort at it, and it likely cost me the account.

I've had job applicants turn down working here because they were more conservative (and one I remember who thought we were too conservative for them).

That's just the nature of the thing. People are free to say what they want, to associate with who they want, and must accept the social consequences for doing so.

> This comes down to your views on a single question: do you have to be tolerant of opinions or actions that harm others?

The debate and argument of ideas is non-negotiable if we desire a free society.

EDIT: I choose to be tolerant of ideas that may be abhorrent or cause harm, because the alternative is much worse.

Freedom of speech is only relevant to government and public spaces, shareholders of google may impose restrictions they deem appropriate.

EDIT: Wtf is wrong with people on HN today? I merely stated the law, it isn't even my opinion. It demonstrably passed Google's legal team, so it's unlikely that I'm wrong.

> shareholders of google may impose restrictions they deem appropriate.

As may the government through statute. This is simply a matter of the constitution not going far enough, and additional law needed to prevent employment termination from expression not deemed "in fashion".

> This is simply a matter of the constitution not going far enough

I don't have to hear obscenities on my private property.

There's also freedom of association. It seems weird to me that one would be against authoritarianism when it comes to freedom of speech but be blindly for authoritarianism when it comes to association. I won't and can't judge whether the firing of that googler was justified but shareholders of google should have the right to fire whoever they bloody want.

> I won't and can't judge whether the firing of that googler was justified but shareholders of google should have the right to fire whoever they bloody want.

Would you hold the same argument if I decided to acquire 51% of Google stock and fire all female employees? Or just the ones that decided to exercise their free speech? What shareholders wants comes second to government regulations to protect workers, for good reason.

>This comes down to your views on a single question: do you have to be tolerant of opinions or actions that harm others? Right now, I think most progressives say no, conservatives obviously say yes. That is the actual gray area this comes down to.

Firing someone is a harmful action. Progressives obviously support this.

As for your cartoon - Categorizing anyone who disagrees with your values as a cartoon villain of pure evil, deserving of no rights and no response but violence, is the foundation of evil. The cartoon glorifies harmful action - and it's a great representation of the far left now.

Progressives absolutely tolerate opinions and actions that harm others - they hold the opinions and commit the actions with great energy.