“Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances.”
— United States Constitution, First Amendment
I like Fox News. If you know me, then you know that.
But in an article on their web site called
Free Speech Doesn’t Always Exist Online, the author feeds a fire that should never have been lit, basing the entire article on a premise that has to be rejected outright: specifically that there is a censorship problem in online communities that the government should step in and address. Quoting:
“Rant all you want in a public park. A police officer generally won’t eject you for your remarks alone, however unpopular or provocative. Say it on the Internet, and you’ll find that free speech and other constitutional rights are anything but guaranteed.”
Sorry? Let me get this right: You’re saying freedom of speech is supposed to be guaranteed... by the government?
I’ll have to go “not” along with that. Here’s the (obvious?) reason why:
The First Amendment to the United States Constitution doesn’t come anywhere near to guaranteeing freedom of speech. That’s right. If you think that it does, you are in for a big, big surprise. Read it, above.
The framers of the Constitution had it among their highest concerns that the government not become
despotic like the one under which they were living.
A government which can or does suppress political discourse is, of course, already in — or capable of — a state of despotism and absolute control. The founders didn’t want that, and I don’t want that. No free person wants that.
Consider the current governments of Cuba, Venezuela, and North Korea... not to mention China... if you disagree with the government and you are subject to that government, your “life, liberty, and persuit of happiness” are all pretty much theirs for the taking. Why? Because their leaders are petty, frightened, typical despots, terrified that they may not be able to hold on to their power. For this reason, opposition must be quashed.
Aside: Curiously, I believe this is also the underlying motivation of “men” who verbally, physically, or sexually abuse their wives and/or children — they’re desperate and pathetic inside, feeling a need for control over other people, and terrified they will lose it. I certainly hope that doesn’t sound like I’m making an excuse. I’m not. All I’m giving is an explanation. No battered woman is a free woman, and the man will make sure to keep her that way, under his control — exactly the same as a despotic government — with implicit or explicit threats of more violence and bad things to come, if she tries to make a break for it., as well as with the occasional affection and tenderness that gives her hopeful heart a chance to believe that he really loves her.
These guys can’t bear the thought of parting with that power, sick as it is... and it’s very similar to my impressions of the motivations and the power a dictator has over his subjects... as well as that which people of a certain nameless “religion of peace” and culture exercise over their “property” (i.e., women). They are quite simply stated, neurotic.
The best thing we accomplished with our overthrows in the Middle East was letting women out into the sunlight. Not so we could see them, but so they could feel it on their skin (proverbially) and know they didn’t want to ever be on the sidelines or closet, and give it up again.
An abused woman, if she can break free, feels something very similar, in my experience: she finally realizes how badly she needed to leave, so long ago, and just how despotic the king of their castle had really been — and if she has a shred of emotional stability and dignity left that he didn’t steal from her, she is committed to never getting into such a situation again, whether with him or anyone else.
The only discrepancy or possible disagreement I have with some others’ beliefs along this regard is that I don’t think many of these men consciously manipulate their women: I believe many of them are just acting in a way that seems sensible, driven by an inner force rather than deliberate scheming. This does not absolve them in any way — it illustrates my belief that many of them are mentally ill and refuse to find help. That may seem contradictory — as if I am saying this is “just the way they are,” but I don’t believe that to be true. As I have said before, “a scizophrenic cannot think his way or talk-therapy his way out of his condition... but he can seek medical treatment and choose to stay on his prescribed medication therapy.”
If you know consciously what you’re doing is wrong, even though it is driven by subconscious means or motivations, then you seek whatever help is available to help you fight your own inner “demon.” I am not an abuser, but I do understand this state of mind due to the flawed perceptions I have experienced, of other people and of life, in times past. I assure you it is possible for evidence to be ignored by the human brain. One more time, though, this is an explanation, and not an excuse.
In their wisdom, our framers and founders wanted this possibility to be absolutely impossible in the United States. The very premise of the Declaration was that God, and individuals, were important, and government was a necessary evil that only derived its power from the consent of those governed.
We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.
That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed, That whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new Government, laying its foundation on such principles and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their Safety and Happiness.
Prudence, indeed, will dictate that Governments long established should not be changed for light and transient causes; and accordingly all experience hath shewn, that mankind are more disposed to suffer, while evils are sufferable, than to right themselves by abolishing the forms to which they are accustomed.
But when a long train of abuses and usurpations, pursuing invariably the same Object evinces a design to reduce them under absolute Despotism, it is their right, it is their duty, to throw off such Government, and to provide new Guards for their future security.
Despite the fact that they were in a position to rally the people of this nation into what would ultimately turn out to be a new state of despotism, they didn’t — they had the wisdom, restraint, and forethought to restrain the government with a document that can only be amended by a significant majority of the people... the “governed”... which is why amendments don’t happen very often.
Along this train of thought, it should be obvious on a simple reading (no absolutely no need for word-twisting or obscure between-the-lines “
penumbral” meaning) that the first amendment only guarantees that
no law made by Congress will
abridge (reduce or lessen in duration, scope, authority, etc.; diminish; curtail; deprive; cut off) freedom of speech, or the press, or the right of peaceable assembly — laws can’t be made by congress and (implicitly) can neither be manipulated by the judicial branch and Supreme Court nor imposed by the Executive Branch if such laws would abridge these freedoms.
So just as ridiculous as the “separation of church and state” which are words not only not found in the constitution, and which many people want to interpret as freedom “from” religion, not freedom “of” religion from government interference (specifically, the establishment of a theocracy, like the Church of England’s relationship to the government back in that day) — is the notion that the government of the United States has an obligation to protect your right to speak freely, saying anything, any time, anywhere.
Nonsense. The government is only constrained from being the suppressing entity — because without a guaranteed freedom of government oppression, the government has more power than is appropriate when it comes to protecting itself from people who oppose it.
This is what I mean by rejecting the premise outright. While the author makes true statements in the article, those statements do not carry any weight, because, true-or-not, they are not relevant to the underlying premise — there is no guarantee of free speech in any forum.
I don’t know if it’s naïveté, infection with a
meme when the author is unaware of his infection, or a deliberate foisting of an agenda, but the underlying premise is that private companies who operate forums on the Internet are depriving people of their “constitutional rights.”
Companies in charge of seemingly public spaces online wipe out content that’s controversial but otherwise legal.
My response: “and?”
“As we move more of our communications into social networks, how are we limiting ourselves if we can’t see alternative points of view, if we can't see the things that offend us?” asked Fred Stutzman, a University of North Carolina researcher who tracks online communities.
Aside: When you are reading an article, and the words line up in this order: “asked/said {name} ... a university {title} ...” you can pretty safely rewrite the phrase as “asked/said {name} ... a liberal {title} with an agenda.”If you’re going to speak your mind on whatever topic, the forum is always relevant. This point can be made by way of a few very simple examples. In every case, you’re dealing with a public place. Each place is one where you and everybody else are absolutely welcome. Try doing any of these things or anything similar, and see if the government protects you:
- Go to the Wal-Mart parking lot and try speaking about a product you want people to purchase, a business you want people to patronize, or a cause you want them to donate to. Strangely enough, [yes, that’s sarcasm] you’ll find that they don’t allow this. They call it “soliciting.” What you are saying is perfectly legal, yet they will ask you to leave or have you escorted away. Yes, it’s a public area, and no, your free speech is not guaranteed.
- Try going into a bank and talking with every customer who walks in why the bank is crooked, failing, dishonest, has high fees, or why its customers would be better served by a different bank. Interestingly, once again, your speech is not illegal, but where you are giving it, you’re not welcome. The government has no role in “protecting” this freedom of speech.
- Go to a Pentecostal church. Say “the Holy Spirit is a myth and Satan is my pal.” You will be allowed to do this for just exactly how long? Not very long. One more time, there is no law against what you are saying.
However, say whatever you like about the government — it’s corrupt, too conservative, too liberal, has crappy representatives, whatever — and if the forum where you’re communicating does not object (i.e., you are not violating an express or implied policy by being disruptive or inciting violence,) nothing will be done to stop you.
No law will ever be passed to prevent these types of communications. Publish a book, write a flier, give speeches, say “George Bush Sucks” and “no blood for oil” — what you are doing will not be made illegal.
Aside: George Bush does suck, the fact that I voted for him twice and would not change that notwithstanding. He sucks because he has sacrificed the lives of men and women of the United States who love their country and paid the ultimate price for the protection of Muslim people, who would never have done the same for us. He sucks, because he has increased the national debt. He sucks, because he has increased entitlement spending. He sucks because, despite the fact that he is an intelligent person, he sounds like an idiot when he talks. In short, many people think he sucks because he is not a liberal. Not me. I say he sucks because he isn’t a genuine conservative.
End of diatribe (almost), and you will notice that despite him arguably being the most powerful man in the world (President of the world’s wealthiest and most powerful nation, as well as Commander-In-Chief of the best-funded, best-trained, non-emperialistic military in the world) that nothing is going to be done on Capital Hill that would restrain my speech. He also says “nucular.” Cringe! I just now “didn’t” commit a crime. In a despotic regime, this would indeed be a crime... but there is nothing we can or should do about that. Constitutional rights, human rights, are not protected outside of our borders.But this is a stark contrast to having the ability to say whatever, whenever, to whoever, in any given forum.
Service providers write their own rules for users worldwide and set foreign policy when they cooperate with regimes like China. They serve as prosecutor, judge and jury in handling disputes behind closed doors.
So? It’s their forum. They judge what to allow and what to prevent. To say they are prosecutor, judge, and jury is far beyond the bounds of reason: They can’t find you liable for prison terms, monetary forfeitures or fines, or the death penalty. They merely set rules and enforce them at their sole discretion — but only in their own forums.
The governmental role that companies play online is taking on greater importance as their services — from online hangouts to virtual repositories of photos and video — become more central to public discourse around the world.
Once again, it is a tremendous stretch to claim that they take on governmental roles. They do not control the lives of unwilling subjects under their power. They can’t tax, they can’t deploy nuclear weapons... nothing they can do is a “governmental role.”
Why do they exercise such control? Should they be stopped? Absolutely not. It’s really quite clear that the United States Constitution simply does not “guarantee” freedom of speech. The only protection is from government interference.
It’s amazing to me how many people are infected with this Freedom of Speech meme. The only thing I can’t discern is whether they are actively pushing an agenda to take their minority opinions mainstream, or whether they’re all a bunch of ignorant dupes.
The United States government does not regulate or control Internet content… so what could they possibly be talking about? After all, what the First Amendment to the United States Constitution doesn’t come anywhere near to guaranteeing freedom of speech. It guarantees that no law made by Congress will abridge (reduce or lessen in duration, scope, authority, etc.; diminish; curtail; deprive; cut off) freedom of speech, or the press, or the right of peaceable assembly — laws can’t be made that would abridge these freedoms.
That is not the same thing as to say that it’s against the law to have these freedoms abridged by anyone other than the government. It isn’t.
How hard is this?
“It’s a fallout of the Internet’s market-driven growth, but possible remedies, including government regulation, can be worse than the symptoms.”
Where to start? It’s not a fallout of anything. It’s just the way things are, and the way things should be. Indeed, government regulation is not a possible remedy of this non-existent problem. I see no “symptoms” that need to be addressed. If you think you have this mythical “freedom of speech,” then you are way, way, way off-base.
Simply put: a radio station or television station doesn’t have to broadcast your opinion. If you think they do, try it. Sure, newspapers have editorials, radio stations have call-ins, and television news programs have guests. But you’re not guaranteed to be a participant.
Even the “public park” analogy in the article at hand falls flat on its face, because if you are annoying someone else, “the law” is still likely to be called and to escort you away from the scene. Notice how the author carefully sidestepped this, saying the police “won’t eject you for your remarks
alone.” No, not for what you say, but how you say it and whose face you get into while saying it – these are different matters entirely.
Shopping malls have moved You can’t walk in to Wal-Mart (not even onto their parking lot) and start saying whatever you want to say – it’s their private property. Even though they allow access to their property by the general public, that does not make it a “public place.”
Hmmm, I wonder if there’s a parallel... Internet forums are private property. The owners, managers, custodians of the site have every right to quash anything and everything you post.
"We often get caught in the middle between a rock and a hard place," said Christine Jones, general counsel with service provider GoDaddy.com Inc. "We're obviously sensitive to the freedoms we have, particularly in this country, to speak our mind, [yet] we want to be good corporate citizens and make the Internet a better and safer place."
Neither the rock or the hard place is a fear of violating constitutional regulations. It’s about the delicate balance between angering a speaker and angering an audience — all of which are customers, paying or not, of the online forum.
“First Amendment protections generally do not extend to private property in the physical world, allowing a shopping mall to legally kick out a customer wearing a T-shirt with a picture of a smoking child.”
Well... do coin a phrase, “duh!” The author has disproven the premise of the entire article. But he doesn’t seem to understand the implications of his own words:
“With online services becoming greater conduits than shopping malls for public communications, however, some advocacy groups believe the federal government needs to guarantee open access to speech.”
Of course they do — their content isn’t acceptable to the particular privately-owned Internet forum, and they want Big Government to step in and force providers to abandon practices that are good for business, in favor of practices that guarantee dissenters, cranks, and holders of minority or controversial opinions a “right” to use their forums in whatever way the individual sees fit.
(tap)(tap) Is this thing on?
I’m talking to myself? If you want a forum on the Internet, and you can’t find one that allows what you want to do, there is nothing – zero, zip, nada – stopping you from starting your own web site with anything you want on it. Nobody and no government exercises any control over what United States citizens can do on web sites visited by United States citizens. Simply stated, there is nobody who will stop you.
Sure, I wish
The Daily Cos and similar crackpot groups didn’t have a forum. But the beauty is, nobody is required to read their hate and venom. And, despite their apparent hatred of motherhood, baseball, apple pie, and American Exceptionalism, they can’t force it on us, and the government can’t outlaw them.
“But,” you object, “if I started my own forum, it wouldn’t have such as widespread audience as established
fora (yes, that is the actual plural of “forums”) like Flickr/MySpace/Facebook” (or wherever).
This is not my problem, and it is not the government’s problem. My argument is, it’s not a problem at all. Businesses do not exist to serve humanity, create jobs, or do anything else other than make money for the owners and shareholders. And government has no business stepping in and imposing regulations on them. Such regulations are not only contrary to good business, they, themselves, would be in direct opposition to free speech: What do you think it is when the author of a blog rejects a comment? It’s free speech on the part of the author. What do you think it is if Flickr blocks your photos? It’s their freedom of expression of their dislike of your content.
It’s really pretty simple. If you oppose it, I doubt your motives are purely in the interest of fairness. Your motives are much more likely to be in the interest of hijacking my forum and making it your forum, using something I pay for to express yourself for free.
Bottom line: Why can’t you go in and speak your mind anywhere on any Internet forum? Simple: it’s because they don’t have to let you! Furthermore, there’s absolutely no reason they should let you.
Does the entire world owe you something? It seems like some people think the answer to that question must be “yes.”
Sorry, but the correct answer is “no.” You are the weakest link.
But if you want to come into my business or even my living room, even if I invite you in, and then start talking to me and my guests about something I don’t want to hear, I have no obligation to allow you to continue.
How is this different than any web site?
There is no freedom of the press unless you happen to own the press. This is right along the lines of my train of thought, here. A newspaper has no obligation to let you speak your mind in their paper, you have no right there, despite the fact that they are protected by the constitution from government interference in what they say.
If you don’t like it, then do what I did — cancel your subscription! That really is the ultimate rejection of their policies, whether we’re talking about newspapers or web sites. The fewer eyeballs viewing their product, the worse off they are. Boycott them. Speak freely against them in a forum they do not control. Those things are fine. They’re great. Congress shall make no law to abridge your right to do so.
But don’t get the government involved in things where it should not be. Even if it suits your agenda at the time, the unforeseen impacts and implications are unspeakably bad.
Simply put: there is no guarantee of free speech, constitutional or otherwise. The only thing the constitution provides protection for is speaking against the government when you do not agree with it or support it.
Try commenting on this blog. I may approve your comment even if I don’t agree — I’m not afraid of dissent — but you will get nowhere on my forum, which is what this is, if you’re a hate-filled, attack-mode liberal. If you disagree, state the facts that support our position. No matter what, if I don’t approve and post your comments, the government will not, cannot, and most especially should not lift a finger against me or in favor of you. And that’s not because I’m right — it’s because I live under the United States Constitution, which doesn’t impose your speech on my forum.
I know a lot of people who hate Fox News (whether they’ve actually watched it or not) because it has a “conservative bias.” The fact is, as this pathetic article helps demonstrate, they may appear conservative, but they are still oftentimes on the “left” side of the truth.
“I’m from the government. I’m here to help you.”
Right.
