Free Alex Jones

[Ana the Ist]

Lol. Since it's datelined today, not hard at all.

Lol. Don't you care about the destruction of private property?

Is that your comparison here? With nazis??

I could probably pull 1-2 dozen examples like this from the left....

https://www.google.com/amp/s/ottawa...wa-anti-feminist-at-ottawa-public-library/amp

For every example like the one you linked from the right. What does that make the left in your eyes? Super-nazis?

I don't recall you giving a hoot about free speech on any number of examples of this kind of shenanigans from the left....but suddenly I'm supposed to believe you care about it coming from the right?

The irony is that in your example...nobody was actually silenced. Any books destroyed can likely be conveniently bought online and read at home. Why not choose any number of examples of the left silencing an actual speaker instead?

 

[Yonny Costopoulis]

(What a political party with a problem with free speech might look like.)

Also a way of finding the political party and people that has problems with free speech:

A Brief History of 'Lügenpresse,' the Nazi-era Predecessor to Trump's 'Fake News'

 

[Tom 1]

I would be interested to read the defense of those social media outlets for keeping the same thing on their sites when it comes from left-wing outfits.

Oh, thats right. In their case, it is not harassment and violence [sic] against anyone, but rather free speech on a privately owned news site exercising its rights blah blah.

I think you are confusing a belief about how these things work with what actually happens. Or maybe you aren’t familiar with what Alex Jones actually peddles? Imagine if you had a crazy neighbour who took a dislike to you and decided to spread a rumour that you are a pedophile, not just locally but internationally on social media platforms, using kind of ‘proofs’ that regularly feature on these kind of conspiracy sites and are frustratingly difficult to disprove to anyone who has chosen to buy into the narrative, posing reasonable sounding questions about some of your activities that make everything you do look shady, gradually letting slip some of your personal details. One day some character taken in by this turns up armed at your house demanding to know what is going on. How do you feel then about your neighbour’s ‘right to (slander you) free speech?’. Alex Jones isn’t a reasonable man speaking out against PC abuses, whatever motivates him it quite obviously isn’t a concern for the good of the nation. Do you have an example of a site with different political views spreading the same kind of dangerous slander about individuals on the political right?
What reason would social media platforms have for continuing to provide a space for him to violate their user agreements?

 

[Albion]

I think you are confusing a belief about how these things work with what actually happens. Or maybe you aren’t familiar with what Alex Jones actually peddles?

Here's what I think. All or almost all of those who are writing back to me have ignored the point of my initial comment here. It was not to defend Alex Jones.

That said, I was about to summarize my earlier statements, but I think maybe I should just ask you (and anyone else for whom it is appropriate) to take the time to go back and review what I wrote.

 

[essentialsaltes]

I don't recall you giving a hoot about free speech on any number of examples of this kind of shenanigans from the left...

That's because your powers of recall are weak.

 

[Albion]

That's because your powers of recall are weak.

I assume that that post was intended for someone else despite the sequence of posts here, but if you are attempting to claim with that link that the political Left is in favor of free speech when the evidence--not one alibi from a previous time--is to the contrary, I would say to give up the attempt.

 

[Albion]

NP

 

[iluvatar5150]

Lol how hard did you have to look for that example?

It's been going around social media. I don't pay much attention to things like that and I'd already heard about it before seeing it here.

Here's what I think. All or almost all of those who are writing back to me have ignored the point of my initial comment here. It was not to defend Alex Jones.

Except you did defend Alex Jones. You described the attacks on Alex Jones as:

the efforts of one political party to win the next presidential election by preventing the exercise of free speech by anyone who does not agree with them.

The campaign to shut up people who are not politically correct has been ongoing for some time now, and this is simply the latest development in that movement

In your attempt to point out what you perceived to be left-wing hypocrisy, you whitewashed the terrible things Alex Jones has said and done. You presented a dishonest, twisted description of reality in order to push your agenda. Just like Alex Jones does.

 

[RDKirk]

No, I support free speech as enshrined in the Constitution.

Everyone must decide for themselves what degree of deliberate deception or sincerity someone is employing in their communication, and respond accordingly.

They had libel, slander, and fraud laws before and immediately after the Constitution was ratified. It was never their intention to permit libel, slander, and fraud in the name of "free speech."

Their intention was to prevent the federal government (and only the federal government) from inhibiting speech.

 

[RDKirk]

Certainly - if it is a completely private entity.

So you don't actually have a gripe here.

 

[essentialsaltes]

Except you did defend Alex Jones. You described the attacks on Alex Jones as:

As far as I can tell, Albion was not talking about Alex Jones. He was making an off-topic post about some other leftwing conspiracy that he is unwilling to elaborate on.

 

[iluvatar5150]

As far as I can tell, Albion was not talking about Alex Jones. He was making an off-topic post about some other leftwing conspiracy that he is unwilling to elaborate on.

I know you're kidding, but in case anybody actually believes that, Post #20 was in direct response to a question about Alex Jones:

Desk trauma said: ↑
In what way is Mr Jones being prevented from speaking? Is my freedom of specking being prevented by the New York Times not publishing my writings?

The campaign to shut up people who are not politically correct has been ongoing for some time now, and this is simply the latest development in that movement (which was demonstrated when Facebook, Spotify, You Tube and other social media discovered on the same day (!) that this one outlet fails to meet their standards and so must go).

 

[ananda]

They had libel, slander, and fraud laws before and immediately after the Constitution was ratified. It was never their intention to permit libel, slander, and fraud in the name of "free speech."

Their intention was to prevent the federal government (and only the federal government) from inhibiting speech.

I don't believe government can regulate libel, slander, and fraud.

 

[ananda]

So you don't actually have a gripe here.

Yes, my contention is with the OP. I don't believe that it is a crime for private entities to exclude those they do not approve of.

 

[super animator]

I don't believe government can regulate libel, slander, and fraud.

It doesn't matter what you think, it matters what the SC think.

 

[Ana the Ist]

That's because your powers of recall are weak.

That's you quoting the ACLU....not you stating an actual position.

If you'd like to clarify though....feel free.

 

[Ana the Ist]

I don't believe government can regulate libel, slander, and fraud.

? Is this serious?

They're called "laws".

 

[Ana the Ist]

It's been going around social media. I don't pay much attention to things like that and I'd already heard about it before seeing it here..

Social media elevates the voices of idiots to the same level as intellectuals.

The problem is there's a lot more idiots in the world than intellectuals...so wisdom has gone from being something sought out in experts, to something agreed upon by a herd of dupes.

 

[Yekcidmij]

it's a crime for a private company to not allow certain content on their platforms? please go to work tomorrow and start just spewing some alex jones rhetoric out loud and tell me if you're still employed the next day. and alex jones isn't even employed by youtube or facebook or anything. he, and all other users on these platforms, are allowed the privilege of using them. so why not go to say a mcdonalds as well after work and do the same and tell me how long it is before you are kicked out.
pffft alex jones peddles lies and fear for profit. he is a modern day flimflam man going from town to town peddling snake oil.
he himself, via his lawyer, has stated in court, when going through his divorce, that it was performance art.
he has for years been harping on about how the government has been trying to shut him down and that people should buy his herbal supplements, with lead in them btw, to keep him in business.
well he, and frankly all these other guys that whine about it, are more than free to buy their own servers and host their own sites off of their own dime instead. nobody is stopping them from doing it but their own greed at having to shell out money to continue their charades.

I agree. It's Facebook and Google's servers. If they dont want his crackpot rhetoric on there, then they can take it off. If anyone doesn't like it, they can buy some servers and host Alex Jones crackpottery.

 

[ananda]

? Is this serious?

They're called "laws".

Yes, government, via laws, can feign an attempt to regulate things like libel, slander, and fraud, but - absent objective measurements - I do not believe that any civil government can legitimately do so.