Complex Numbers

Freeze Peach

A provocative one from "JAFBG"  [XGC].

Should there be limitations on free speech. And if so, what should those limitations be?

Of course there should be: anything I don't like should be banned.

Okay, no, of course I'm joking. Still, it seems some people actually think that way. This is not a jab at any one political side; it's an actual rare case of "both sides are bad," or, rather, extremists on both sides are bad. True freedom begins when you realize that it's better to hear opinions you don't like, and to have the opportunity to refute them, than it is to ban them.

Keeping in mind that I am and have always been a US citizen, and this is therefore written from a US point of view.

There are of course some limitations on free speech. We've seen what happens when there aren't: internet boards getting filled up with ads, for example.

The limit most often trotted out involves shouting "Fire!" in a crowded theater, on the theory that doing so could lead to injury or loss of life in the ensuing panic. (The actual court decision adds the word "falsely" to that -- just so you know, in case you're ever in a theater and you actually see something burning and want to warn people.) Never established, as far as I know, is if it's okay to shout "Movie!" in a crowded firehouse.

But the basic idea -- that some forms of unfettered speech can cause imminent harm, and should thus be proscribed -- seems to have some validity. It's the "imminent" part that leads to gray areas: there's a difference between "Trespassers should be shot" and "Let's shoot those trespassers now."

And there are always gray areas. That's why we have arguments.

As I see it, anyway, imminent harm isn't the only criteria. We've decided that public pornography isn't acceptable, for example. Or naming your business something containing a curse word (though I find it hilarious that there are actual Vietnamese restaurants named Pho King, because I'm secretly 12 years old).

The point is, yes, there are always limits, because speech isn't the only right worth protecting. Sometimes it comes into conflict with our other rights: life, liberty, privacy, whatever; and a balance has to be maintained there. Where exactly that balance lies is why we have courts and shit. And the freedom to argue about it.

Most importantly, private companies and other entities get to set their own limits on free speech, which I think a lot of people miss in their whining about being silenced. Someone comes into my house going "Hitler was right," and while I would never say that they shouldn't be allowed to say that, they'd be unwelcome in my house forevermore. In fact, I want to know if someone's a racist, classist, Judeophobe, sexist, etc., so I can know who to ignore, and I can't know that unless we give them free rein to express their idiotic opinions.