2 December, 2022 by Eric Dunkelberger
During the last couple of months, social media is ablaze with talk of free speech. Ever since Elon Musk purchased Twitter, statements have exploded either in support of the freedom of speech or against . Basically, the issue boils down to everybody wants their voice heard, but not necessarily opposing views.In my opinion, if you support free speech, it applies to all speech. I may not like what you have to say. You may not like what I have to say. The First Amendment of the US Constitution guarantees both sides have an equal right to express their opinions.
The problem isn’t new by any means. Until recently, social media has had an issue with speech. Big Tech has the same issues with speech. They had a prevailing view that their beliefs are the true viewpoint and they enforced it by canceling out any opposing view. I’ve been in both Facebook Jail and Twitmo numerous times. Every time, I stood behind what I said. It was the truth; it just didn’t fit into the prevailing agenda. Over the last ten years, the differences were mainly between the Anarchists and DemSocialists against the Conservatives. With Covid, a whole new disagreement came into being.
From the viewpoint of a Constitutional Conservative, there were many times and different ways to stifle our voice. Search engines would show only results to a search that agreed with their beliefs. To get to an opposing result, you would have to scroll down several pages to get there. Social media would flag a Conservative post with disclaimers or flat out ban it. I don’t use those search engines any longer. I left Facebook and Twitter in January of 2021. There were other platforms to use. The problem with that is you end up “preaching to the choir”.
I returned to Twitter in April of this year, after Elon Musk bought it. I’ve seen a huge difference. Voices that were missing, are back. The DemSocialists are up in arms! Their viewpoints are no longer the only voices. That’s why they are crying. They’ve had an echo chamber for to long. Well, their opinions no longer go unchallenged. They don’t argue their point now, they resort to name-calling and gaslighting. Anyone who argues against them, suddenly becomes a racist or a Nazi or a White Supremist. They run to management to have them removed from the platform.
Benjamin Franklin said, “Without freedom of thought there can be no such thing as wisdom: and no such thing as public liberty, without freedom of speech”. We know that the DemSocialists aren’t great disseminators of wisdom. It isn’t wisdom they are sharing in our public schools; it’s the ideas laid out by Big Government and Big Tech. Anything violating that needs to be squashed. Knowledge can be a dangerous thing. I mean, why do you think the people protesting in Iran hasn’t been in the news? Or those protests in Brazil? Or the Netherlands?
marjarhead1 