What country would you say has stronger free speech protections than the US? I won't say there's none, because there are roughly 200 countries, and I don't know enough about many of them, but I cannot name one.
Not the UK, France or Germany, and I'd be surprised to find any other European country.
For a sampling of other laws/measures:
- https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Insult_(legal)
- https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/L%C3%A8se-majest%C3%A9
- https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Blasphemy_law
- https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Freedom_of_the_press#/media/File:World_Map_of_the_Freedom_of_the_Press_Status,_OWID.svg
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/World_Press_Freedom_Index
My main problem with free speech in America is how it’s become some sort of unquestionable belief that it’s absolute. There are many instances of freedom of speech being curtailed by the USA government, yet they are somehow redefined into some sort of “unspeech” and don’t count instead of being honest and saying “yes, we restrict speech on this occasion for X reason”. It’s a very dangerous Orwellian approach to not allow yourself to see when your freedoms are being restricted.
The simple example that UK is ranked higher than US is prima facie evidence that it is complete bullshit, considering the lack of First Amendment and much stricter libel laws that UK media has to worry about.
You can say “land of the free my ass” every time a law prevents you from doing something you want, but that doesn’t mean other places have more freedom.
I never said that other places have more freedom though. I just find it fascinating that American really believe in their "rights" and frequently mock other countries, societies, etc...
About 74 points higher than China based on my math
I don’t think they should be be laughed at for that.
Imagine I made the same argument for Russia, or China, or North Korea, or Syria, or Venezuela, or some other country the Western mainstream media says is bad. You'd presumably come up with a reason - immediately, effortlessly, almost without thinking - why it didn't apply in that case, and that that country really was bad, and their imperfections really meant they were not good.
Unlike the U.S., which simply cannot fall out of favour with some people, no matter what they do.
If an organisation doesn't serve its purpose, whether through ignorance, stupidity, or malice, it should be either broken up or restructured. There's no reason not to do this with businesses, states, etc, other than the usual quasi-religious ones, centered around various tired and confused dogmas involving markets, freedom, human nature, and that sort of thing.
Summary: Human beings should be given second chances, and third chances, and so on, as many chances as we can give them. Organisations on the other hand should be given one chance. We owe them nothing.
The point is simply that U.S. democracy is visibly in tatters. Clinging on to this notion that still, in spite of all the evidence in front of our eyes, the U.S. is somehow fundamentally and essentially different to the other historical empires, is just your usual bog-standard nationalist delusion.
I think that the founding story of the States is beautiful, and that some of the early writing is really quite something (I'm thinking of Paine in particular here). And I'm very fond of some of the other cultural output. It's not "pleasant" to face the reality of the modern day U.S.A., is what I'm saying, but to hope to improve the state of the world, it has to be done.
There are many statistical datapoints which suggest the country is doing very poorly socially. Then it seems to me that a serious case can be made that the vast network of state, semi-private and private institutions over there involved in the "security" sector (arms, cyber, related fields) has gotten completely out of hand and answers effectively to itself only.
I'm trying to refrain from making specific examples here, because any mention of a specific issue will result in the assumption that some partisan point is being made. Accepting that risk, perhaps we could: look at the president; look at what the alternatives were; look at the previous presidents from the last decades; look at the legal system; look at the prison system; look at povery rates; look at crime rates; look at political prisoners; look at the increase in attacks on the media; look at military spending; look at straightforward, old-fashioned corruption; look at drone strikes; look at studies of how the state's actions tracks with polls of what the populace want; etc etc.
At a certain point, it's hard to believe in the intellectual integrity of observers who cling on to the argument: "ah, but look, that other country is worse!" This is an obvious race to the bottom, and can excuse any level of depravity. Again, it's hard to see how this belief is possible to hold without a solid dose of quasi-religious nationalist fervour.
And so on and so forth.
Like you know other parts of Bill or “Rights” like “prohibiting unreasonable searches and seizures” except like your toothpaste at the airport… Americans are generally too funny thinking it is still “land of the free”