Political stability. The US has operated under its current system of government for longer than any other democratic country. Allowing the craziest to express themselves without being silenced allows the democratic process to play out in a way that legitimizes the outcome.
It also helps set and/or make visible the window of acceptable-to-some-(epsilon,delta)-part-of-the-populace speech; that’s good because it prevents Bad Things from forming in a vacuum before suddenly appearing in the mainstream… but it can also be uncomfortable for some, or cause anxiety or fear. It seems better to get an opportunity to confront Bad Things, or debunk them, or whatever though.
Obviously it’s not okay or legal to threaten someone, but on the other hand we also get taught to a large degree that you have no right to not have your feelings hurt. This intuitively makes sense to me too-can you imagine if you tried to speak nearly anything and had to ensure that no one, anywhere, had their feelings hurt or felt anxious from it?
Speech outside that may not get you arrested, but it can certainly have personal and professional implications.
As an example (and they’re not all this clear-cut), it’s perfectly legal to espouse “plain racism” but it’s not a generally accepted thing, nor considered moral, and quite likely to cause you some backlash or, if applicable, loss of professional standing.
I agree, allowing bad opinions to be countered publicly is really important. Peer pressure is way more effective in changing bad opinions than unilateral pressure from someone preconceived to be a political enemy. The latter usually just cements bad opinions as justified.
I agree that having some of the world's broadest protections for free speech is important to the US political stability, & its technological/cultural/economic power.
But, hasn't the UK's "current system of government" been at least as continuous as the US for longer? (Has any regime-discontinuity happened since, say, the adoption of the US Constitution?)
It does very much depend on how you define “continuous” and “democracy”.
That aside, I think there is enough evidence that restricting political speech in a democracy kind of defeats the point and it disenfranchises people. Some counter this by saying “well we only want to ban the extreme speech”, but I’d argue those are exactly the people who are likely to take up pitchforks first.
A right to only “moderate” political speech doesn’t make any sense. Moderate speech isn’t a target of censorship.
That was arguable in the pre-Trump state of American politics. But now? You have total crazies saying whatever (either total bullshit, advocating for/admitting crimes, etc.) running for and winning elections. This is not a stable situation, as evidenced by the fact that the man who normalised this sort of thing tried a coup to stay in office, and many people, supporters of his, including people in office or running for office, supported that effort and are already organising for the next election cycles.
What you're describing is not being caused by free speech, it is being caused by online media filter bubbles that feed people confirmation bias, elevate controversy over quality, and isolate users from opposing opinions.
Forcing people into silence definitely will not solve the problem. It will only further convince people that they were right all along.
To fix this, SV needs to get their shit together and figure out how to solve the filter bubble problem. Traditional media used editorial discretion to solve this problem, but SV seems to think they can make more money by skipping that step entirely.
However, the current state of politics in the US is by far not as bad as many moments in our past.
>What you're describing is not being caused by free speech, it is being caused by online media filter bubbles that feed people confirmation bias, elevate controversy over quality, and isolate users from opposing opinions.
But free speech must allow for filter bubbles and confirmation bias, and elevating controversy over quality. Free speech must permit manipulation and distortion, indoctrination and radicalization.
>Traditional media used editorial discretion to solve this problem, but SV seems to think they can make more money by skipping that step entirely.
SV was exercising editorial discretion by moderating content and banning troublemakers, but free speech supporters have decided doing so violated their free rights. You can't have your cake and eat it, too. "Editorial discretion" by definition is a mean of forcing people into silence, which you're against. You want the crazies to be able to express themselves, so the modern social media landscape is what you want, because that's exactly what it optimizes for.
The context of this thread is specifically American-style free speech, which protects people from government interference in speech, but does not compel others to publish speech on your behalf.
I am criticizing SV for their choices, but I don't think they should be forced to do what I think is right.
Possibly a massive lot of good - or not. My point was, it doesn't seem questioned by those who espouse it so strongly, so if it's set wrongly (if we can decide such a thing) it can't be re-set better.
