Americans Abandoning Free Speech Better Brace for the Consequences

The political turbulence of recent years, culminating in the Capitol riot on January 6, may similarly liberate the political class to do its worst-this time with free speech as the target.

Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez agrees that the public needs to be protected from speech she considers false and misleading.

After the ugly exchanges that erupted in the Capitol riot, CNN pointed out that "Questions emerge about unrestrained free expression, long championed by First Amendment theorists as a benefit to society, no matter how ugly and hateful." The network quoted scholars who conclude that the Internet and free speech protections make it too easy to exchange bad ideas.

Government officials even lie to each other, as then-Director of National Intelligence James Clapper did to Congress to conceal the inconvenient truth about domestic surveillance by the NSA. Protections for free speech, it's worth pointing out, aren't some perfect counter to false and extreme ideas.

If popular support for free speech continues to erode, it's difficult to see how legal protections survive for long without foundations in the wider society.

A culture of free speech can't prevail if the culture comes to prefer censorship.

Eventually, people who've come to believe it's better to challenge "Bad" ideas not with other ideas but with a muzzle will erase or reinterpret protections for speech.

https://reason.com/2021/01/29/americans-abandoning-free-speech-protections-better-brace-for-the-consequences/