It’s quite a sad day when defending free speech is controversial. Should we be shocked? No. We saw this iceberg miles away. The Left has a political correctness code, they like speech codes, safe zones, and will try to cancel those with a differing view. Right now, there is an effort to just erase certain words like “manpower,” “whitelist,” and “blacklist.” These are everyday words with zero racist connotations, and it doesn’t make it so when a mob of lefty crybabies with worthless degrees whine about it. There is a lot of huffing and puffing going on right now because some liberals decided to sign a letter in Harper’s magazine that espoused support for free speech and debate.
I don’t care if these folks are privileged. They can still say what they want in a liberal democracy. Is it to pad their own monopoly? Maybe. Still, they have a right to say things and be totally wrong about them given their liberal leanings. The swipes against this group from other lefties probably points to why this open letter was necessary to begin with, as the lefty mob marches to destroy and erase all that they find disagreeable.
Ezra Klein of Vox tweeted, “A lot of debates that sell themselves as being about free speech are actually about power. And there's *a lot* of power in being able to claim, and hold, the mantle of free speech defender.”
So, defending free speech, which is codified in our Bill of Rights, is…what—something of a privileged position? If that’s the case, you know we’re in deep trouble because such activities are usually targeted for termination by left-wingers. At the very least, mentioning so-called privilege is a classic go-to for the Left to shut you out of debate out of fear of you making them and their trash agenda items look absurd, contradictory, and utterly unhinged. Also, going after folks trying to defend free speech means you’re the ones making an attempt to control it, right?
The Wall Street Journal’s Kimberley Strassel noted that and wasn’t having any of this nonsense responding, “Um. In ALL cases, power comes from controlling speech. It’s the ‘free’ part that provides the guard.”
A lot of debates that sell themselves as being about free speech are actually about power. And there's *a lot* of power in being able to claim, and hold, the mantle of free speech defender.
— Ezra Klein (@ezraklein) July 8, 2020
Um. In ALL cases, power comes from controlling speech. It’s the “free” part that provides the guard. https://t.co/5AeE4SOeQw
— Kimberley Strassel (@KimStrassel) July 9, 2020
Oh yes, our friends at Twitchy found it first and it once again exposed the Left’s illiberal trajectory here. Of course, they need to control free speech. They can’t allow anyone, even those who might agree with them 90 percent of the time, voice a contrary opinion and risk blowing up authoritarian lefty institutions they’re so desperately trying to establish here. In some cases, you can argue they’ve succeeded given what academia and higher education are shoveling out these days.