Free Speech vs. Hate Speech

Free Speech vs. Hate Speech by Bill Wilson

In the early days of the commercialization of the internet, those of us working in the space were committed to freedom of speech and building on a platform where ideas could flow unimpeded at the speed of the wire. It was a time when invention was flourishing. Free speech was unlimited in this wild west of technology. It was an open network that revolutionized how people communicated, conducted commerce, and expressed their beliefs. There was good and bad, but the information superhighway brought people closer together, afforded opportunity to evangelize the Word of God, and increased opportunity for those who would take advantage of it. Today, however, that freedom is dwindling fast.

 

Technology companies like Apple, Yahoo, Google, YouTube, Facebook, Spotify, and others pledged to be open to all forms of expression and ideas in the beginning. These companies lured people into their platforms using as bait a sense of freedom and security. They built empires based on masses of people using their free and open services. Then came along their politics-an extreme leftist nature where their strength in numbers allows them to dictate political thought. They sold out to the leftists in government who used these open platforms to spy on Americans, and now many of them are making up their own definitions of hate speech and shutting down people who disagree with them.

 

Not surprising those who disagree with them and are most vulnerable to Silicon Valley's political intolerance and ideological bigotry are conservative thought leaders. Make no mistake that Christians who openly share the Lord, and also voice opposition to abortion and sexual deviation are in the cross-hairs. A New York Times editorial by University of Richmond Professor Erik Nielson is questioning the use of hate speech to shut down conservatives the left considers extreme "because "hate" is a dangerously elastic label, one that has long been used in America to demonize unpopular expression. If we become overzealous in our efforts to limit so-called hate speech, we run the risk of setting a trap for the very people we are trying to defend."

 

Nielson then lists those who could fall into that trap if it were applied according to "hate speech" criteria: Black Lives Matter, Black Nationalists groups like the Nation of Islam, the Women's March (because it was organized by questionable groups), the Palestinian-led Boycott, and Divestment and Sanctions Movement against Israel. Nielson's fear is that if the hate speech argument is prosecuted equally, the extreme leftist resistance would be shut down-those, he says, are the people "we can least afford to lose." It's an admission that "hate speech" restrictions are designed to protect the haters and quell their opposition. Ultimately, the opposition is God and the target is religious free speech. May we always, as Ephesians 6:19 exhorts, "open my mouth boldly to make known the mystery of the gospel" in following God, not man.