Paradox of tolerance and all that.

I don't see it as a paradox at all. You cannot include all ideas, because one of the loudest ideas, is "We should silence the ideas of Black people!" 🙂🙃

You cannot include this idea without excluding other ideas. So absolute inclusion shouldn't even be anyone's goal. It's certainly not mine.

And dealing with annoying people online can be exhausting. Even if they're not malicious! Me doing "racism 101" individually for millions of people, just doesn't work.

@dan613 @mekkaokereke
Maybe it is because USA was born with that principle of free speech that they have a hard time what it meant not having it. Free speech is about not being persecuted by officials for stating an opinion, about the state, about the church, about science. It has never been about gaining access to a platform or a right to a public.

Free speech applied to hate speech gives them the right to not be jailed for stating their opinion in a KKK rag.

Free speech also means that everyone is free to set up rule in their media, social or otherwise, to select opinions it wants published.

@ktp_programming @dan613

The US has never really had free speech. Ever.🤷🏿‍♂️

There's never been a point in US history when Black folk could speak freely without severe consequences from their government. By severe consequences, I mean government programs designed to falsely imprison or execute them.

Slavery was obvious.

To Jim Crow: cops & politicians targeting "uppity" negroes.

To COINTELPRO.

To "Black Identity extremists."

US free speech usually just means "Let the nazis talk"

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@ktp_programming @dan613

And the most obvious: voting is arguably the most important form of free speech. But it's 2024, and there has never been a single presidential election in US history where it was as easy for Black people to vote as it is for white people to vote.

I don't think most folk in the US realize how shameful that is. We just... kinda accept it. We don't realize that we're the only major country that restricts the free speech of *an entire race* this way.

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@ktp_programming @dan613

The US government had a specific program for "neutralizing" people who they perceived as a threat. Neutralizing is... what it sounds like.

MLK was targeted by the US government for neutralization. For his speech!

All civil rights leaders were targeted, because saying "There should be less racism, maybe?" was seen as dangerous. And MLK was perceived to be "The most dangerous negroe" because of his "I have a dream" speech.

https://hachyderm.io/@mekkaokereke/111759677741315727

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@mekkaokereke @ktp_programming @dan613

This is a "yes and" post.

Look what they're trying right now with LGBTQ+ people. Its to the point where some are claiming that existing in public is 'grooming.' Never mind even trying to speak.

Freedom of speech has (nearly always) meant "freedom for normative cis het white men to say the most sayable".

I quit believing the liberal freedom of speech fetish when I realised it only ever applies to Klan marches and almost never to queers.