Seriously, my grandpa is “very MAGA”, as he calls himself, a “radconservative” or something. He is very open about his views on people being able to freely speak their minds without censorship, yet he gets REALLY mad when I say the following:
Swear words (even “hell”, “crap”, or “damn”)
Epstein Files should be released
Trump being on the Files apparently more times than God’s name appears in the book about Himself: the Bible.
Even mentioning the word “gay” or saying something about a gay couple
Trans people
Seriously, I have cousins who are grown adults, maybe mid-20s who would absolutely FREAK if I said the word “trans”. They will actually panic and say “Oh, um, maybe let’s not talk about that…” and then nervously laugh like it’s a super taboo subject.
This is NOT the 1950s.
Can I tell you a secret?
Nobody is ever 100% for free speech. No one.
Invariably everyone who says they’re for “free speech” has a point at which they feel speech should no longer be free - whether it’s the classic “yelling fire in a theater” or expressing a viewpoint they feel is actually harmful. And that last bit is kind of the rub: Social media and people being siloized into echo chambers where they’re repeatedly told that everything the “right” people say is 100% absolute truth and everything “they” say is dirty horrible lies.
‘Free speech’ is very difficult to discuss with someone from a different, let alone opposing echo chamber because it’s so easy for people to fall into the belief that only their speech should be ‘free’, but those other peoples’ speech is all dangerous and bad, which makes it hard to discuss when speech is actually harmful. It’s been very, very eye opening to watch organizations all over the place twist themselves into pretzels to accommodate this.