Re:Elon Musk makes $43B unsolicited bid to take Twitter private
by strogonoff on Thursday April 14, 2022 @09:30AM
(#31026702)
“Free speech” tends to be used in two ways: free speech the compound phrase, and free speech as two words taken literally.
Certain subsets of population love to hijack discussions by forcing the latter meaning[0]—they break the phrase up into separate words and take them as absolutes. Yet the reality is that free speech in absolute sense doesn’t exist: a bit like free market, in a world where malicious actors exist at all, it has to be subject to limits (moreover, in any culture there are its own taboos defining additional unwritten constraints).
The first meaning is what “free speech” refers to in any meaningful political discussion about free speech. It is fundamentally vital in a democracy, and no sane person would qualify it as absolute.
Fine aspects of what conditional free speech actually implies could be a worthy topic. Off the top of my head, free speech is where you don’t need to censor yourself provided you are of sound mind and do not mean harm, but this is not very precise. How should we define the limits of free speech on a meta level? Is it their vagueness that causes distress? Once the terminological ambiguity is settled, meaningful debate becomes possible.
[0] I believe in most cases such individuals have their own agenda to push, and one would become equally opposed to absolute free speech as soon as their preferred agenda is implemented.
Certain subsets of population love to hijack discussions by forcing the latter meaning[0]—they break the phrase up into separate words and take them as absolutes. Yet the reality is that free speech in absolute sense doesn’t exist: a bit like free market, in a world where malicious actors exist at all, it has to be subject to limits (moreover, in any culture there are its own taboos defining additional unwritten constraints).
The first meaning is what “free speech” refers to in any meaningful political discussion about free speech. It is fundamentally vital in a democracy, and no sane person would qualify it as absolute.
Fine aspects of what conditional free speech actually implies could be a worthy topic. Off the top of my head, free speech is where you don’t need to censor yourself provided you are of sound mind and do not mean harm, but this is not very precise. How should we define the limits of free speech on a meta level? Is it their vagueness that causes distress? Once the terminological ambiguity is settled, meaningful debate becomes possible.
[0] I believe in most cases such individuals have their own agenda to push, and one would become equally opposed to absolute free speech as soon as their preferred agenda is implemented.