The way I see it is it's not free speech that is the problem, as such, it's that people who used to gossip to a small audience down the pub now have equal platforms to newspapers.
The internet has levelled the playing field and now everyone is a politician with an agenda to push. The 'truth' has been revealed to mean whatever the audience is persuaded and agrees to believe.
We are all subject to various cargo cults. What was once limited to political think tanks to guide a nation (propaganda and lies in all) is now in the hands of everyone who can build a significant social following.
Free speech needs to be defended to avoid thought police mentality, but it comes with the understanding that we all determine our own realities and without critical thinking one is subject to subversive influence.
The internet as a platform is a good candidate for the undoing of our civilization. Popular individualism that is enabled by echo chambers drives polarization and therefore a govt. that is increasingly under threat of irrelevance. As such they must identify and nullify an enemy that has no head to cut off. And so legislation is proposed to cut the means to communicate which drives the dialog underground and toward violence.
Humans are starting to lose definition, falling into chaos and struggles for control where there really can be none. Two extremes I can see this going in the direction of are urban guerrilla wars or 1984 Orwellian dystopia. Maybe both, one following the other.
> people who used to gossip to a small audience down the pub now have equal platforms to newspapers.
I'd say they have a bigger audience than newspapers. "Gossip" and "fake news" have higher engagement rates than boring real news, and thus are more likely to show up in the news feed on social advertisement platforms.
And worth noting that major news orgs caught onto this in the 90s. News these days is essentially entertainment. I think as people we are responsible for this, we ask for this stuff and approve of by consuming it. We are most certainly authors of our own demise but for some reason we think this is 'happening' to us.
The internet has levelled the playing field and now everyone is a politician with an agenda to push. The 'truth' has been revealed to mean whatever the audience is persuaded and agrees to believe.
We are all subject to various cargo cults. What was once limited to political think tanks to guide a nation (propaganda and lies in all) is now in the hands of everyone who can build a significant social following.
Free speech needs to be defended to avoid thought police mentality, but it comes with the understanding that we all determine our own realities and without critical thinking one is subject to subversive influence.
The internet as a platform is a good candidate for the undoing of our civilization. Popular individualism that is enabled by echo chambers drives polarization and therefore a govt. that is increasingly under threat of irrelevance. As such they must identify and nullify an enemy that has no head to cut off. And so legislation is proposed to cut the means to communicate which drives the dialog underground and toward violence.
Humans are starting to lose definition, falling into chaos and struggles for control where there really can be none. Two extremes I can see this going in the direction of are urban guerrilla wars or 1984 Orwellian dystopia. Maybe both, one following the other.