Frankly, the left — so-called — is also responsible for this, because they’re the ones who came up with the inane “hate speech.” The concept has always been bullshit — as I’ve been saying ever since it was created.
Speech is speech. We already had laws on the books in the US for speech that incited violence. That was all we needed. But liberals — again, so-called, because so many of them are profoundly ILliberal — insisted on the batshit-insane concept of “hate speech.”
I'm a lifelong liberal and not afraid to call out the hypocrisies and idiocies of "my" side.
Democracy is flailing all over the world, and it's not just the authoritarian rightwing that's causing it.
Growing up in illiberal India and having lived in the Arab world where I didn’t have free speech, even as a teenager free speech was a no-brainer (pun intended).
I don’t go along with the concept of “hate speech.” “Hate speech” is an inane concept. That’s what I said. You seem to be simultaneously agreeing and disagreeing with it.
If I’d for instance would call for an armed insurrection against the chancellor calling for getting rid of him forcefully - would you call a crime or just speech?
I don’t know what the laws are in Europe, but in the US that’s considered incitement to violence. As I said, we already have laws on the books against speech inciting violence.
*Edited to add: Saying "You're an asshole and I hate your guts" or "You're a raging wop bitch and I wish you would die" (I'm Italian-American, so that's why I used that example) is an example of speech. Speech. It's obnoxious, but it's free speech. And I would fight for your right to say those things. It has nothing to do with my agreeing with them. You should have the right to say them.
I don't think I agree with this statement. I find it questionable that hate speech fosters hate. Hearing someone say something hateful doesn't magically make me become hateful as well. If anything, it dissuades me.
Conversely, *censoring* speech makes it more convincing. If something can't be said out loud, it almost naturally becomes more interesting. It turns into a sort of secret.
Okay, but to continue your example, if that hateful opinion gets severely punished, what's the effect on the reader? After all, they already shared it.
I'd say they learn to be silent about their opinion, but not weaken it. Given the perceived martyrdom, they're even likely to strengthen it.
My intuition is that the second effect is stronger.
Also others who disagree might well start to hate groups the speaker is associated with. Free speech advocates are not great at distinguishing what they actually need to argue for. This thread is good evidence of that. Hard to imagine a more virtue signalling statement than "hate speech doesn't exist"
Love and hate are two sides of the same coin of human passion. Humanity does not exist to be conveniently managed by technocrats according to legalistic rules. Humanity exists to express passion, make love, form tribes and nations, fight wars, murder, and behave violently. Hate is a feature, not a bug.
This makes you uncomfortable because the values you’ve been indoctrinated into run counter to human nature.
Hate speech laws foster hate of the people who import hordes of foreigners with obvious intent to replace the native population, then abuse hate speech laws to punish those who point this out or try to organize to stop their own replacement . This is why you invented such laws. It was never about justice or fairness . You ARE the hateful one, deeply and profoundly hateful of yourself, your nation and your people, this is why you impose such oppression on them.
And have you never heard the expressions, "Hoist by one's own petard" and "The revolution eats its own"?
The left promulgated the concept of "hate speech." And pushed to get laws against it passed. And now it finds that those laws are being turned against it. Those laws are coming back to bite it. That's the point.
Donald Trump, Vladimir Putin, Viktor Orbán, Narendra Modi, Xi Jinping, Paul Biya, Hibatullah Akhundzada, Benjamin Netanyahu, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, the list goes on. All rightwing authoritarians. All inimical to democracy.
Yes. Fact: when civil discourse dies democracy may soon follow. Trump and his supporters have played a major role in bringing this about (with some assistance from the woke left of course).
As a Brit I'd like to comment on the British cases. In the Maxie Allen and Rosalind Levine case the couple were released without charge. The county's elected Police and Crime Commissioner said "that shouldn't have become a police matter" and has asked the Chief Constable of the force to conduct a review and provide him with an explanation. In the Rose Docherty case the law she was accused of breaking is about protesting within 200 metres of an abortion clinic. It is legal to protest 201 metres from a clinic. It is legal to write to the newspapers about your views on abortion. It is legal to organise an abortion protest in front of the Houses of Parliament. What the law seeks to do is to stop people behaving in ways that could influence the decisions of women and staff to access services at an abortion clinic at what is a very emotionally difficult time for them. This includes praying if it could be intimidating to people attending the clinic. At present abortion is legal up to 24 weeks with the agreement of two doctors. You have complete free speech to lobby to change this law. What you don't have the right to do is seeking to intimidate women exercising their current abortion rights. The woman has been charged. I cannot find whether or not she has been found guilty and I expect the outcome of the trial will be newsworthy. With regards to the Lucy Connolly case what you describe as "the highly emotional hours after Axel Rudakubana killed three young girls at a Taylor Swift dance party in Southport in July 2024" was actually a series of nationwide riots over a number of days and was the largest incident of social unrest in England since 2011. It involved attacks on the police, on mosques, homes and businesses owned by immigrants, and hotels housing asylum seekers. What she tweeted was clearly an incitement to violence. You are right that we don't have a first amendment and I'm very glad we don't. It means that debates about the limits of free speech and how it clashes with other human rights are about what is the right balance for society and individuals rather than what some people meant when they wrote a document in the 18th century without any knowledge of what social media would do to society. The UK is still a signatory to the European Convention of Human Rights, and article 10 gives a right of free speech. Like nearly all rights in the ECHR it is not absolute, since it is recognised that the different rights are in tension. It is an ongoing political process determining what the right balance is. I agree with you that restrictions on much political speech are counterproductive and there is robust debate about that across Europe.
The use of the Rose Docherty case weakens this whole argument. Nothing to do with ‘online speech’, and as you say, Docherty could stand with her sad little sign almost anywhere else in the UK without recrimination. Indeed, picking a handful of cases that became well publicised BECAUSE they were controversial, as the proof points that ‘Europe is jailing people’ is problematic.
In American jurisprudence, the Lucy Connolly case would be considered protected speech because threats have to be very specific (“burn down a certain hotel at a certain time”) as opposed to something general. As I am close to an absolutist on free speech, I am very glad that we Americans have the First Amendment. On a related note, I am also glad that we can vehemently criticize Islam without the government coming after us for “Islamophobia.”
Would that be the case that persons tweets had been a small part of a highly highly coordinated operation to maximise civil disorder that had forced every police, fire and health service in the country on to a major incident footing because the credible assessment was that hundreds of occupied buildings could be attacked by mobs of arsonists?
I understand that Americans are proud of their 1st amendment. But holding it up to us Europeans is a bit like us saying to you: We‘re glad we have free health care. For all the outward similiarities in culture, we have societal models which are different in significant ways from the American one. Even within Europe, there are different framework of what can be said and what gets you into trouble: Malta outlaws abortion completely, and try saying something critical about Karol Wojtyła in Poland. Besides, Mr. Mounk like many commentators ignores the business side of the free speech argument. Simply put: The more outrageous a view, the more it will become amplified by social media‘s algorithms. It pays to offend. The US still have Section 230 of the Communication Decency Act; they are also home to the world‘s largest social media provider. Go figure.
But you Europeans are right to criticize our ridiculous health insurance system! I do realize there are cultural differences between the United States and European nations; I have lived in both France and Germany. In some cases, I think restrictions make sense given the historical context. For instance, I am not bothered that it is illegal to fly a Nazi flag in Germany. But many of the examples in this article are alarming. I am not sure what social media has to do with anything as it is just a platform for speech, and one that people can easily opt out of if they choose. I deleted my Twitter account when the atmosphere there became too toxic.
You might say that European healthcare is available to more people, but it's not free. Somebody pays for it. Europeans are fortunate they don't go bankrupt with an illness as occurs in the USA. Americans die from illnesses due to lack of affordable healthcare. All this is true, but healthcare is not truely free anywhere. The system must receive payment from somewhere.
That is true, Jeanne, but neither - to stay with the original comparison - is speech completely free in the US. There are limits, too. Fewer than in Europe, certainly (for better, for worse).
Whatever one might think about abortion, is free speech not precisely about having the right to try to persuade other people? I find the rationale that people who want to have an abortion should be “protected” about having their mind changed unpersuasive.
No one is disagreeing with that, but the individual right to express an opinion is balanced against the right of an individual to access a health service without being harassed. If we allow pro life activists to stand in the doorways of clinics handimg put pictures of dead foetuses, we'd need to be prepared to allow anti big pharma activists to stand in the doorways of paediatric oncology departments to try and get the parents of the child on end of life care to use herbs instead of recommended treatment.
Well the regulator is clearly disagreeing: that is exactly the point of that law, isn’t it? And the idea that protesting abortion is on the same level as promoting quackery is, at the very least, the expression of a very firm political stand on the topic of abortion. Which is exactly when freedom of speech comes under threat: after all people seldom have to fight for the right to express ideas everybody agrees with.
I don't think that is what is happening. The injunction left the protester concerned able to express their view pretty much anywhere in the UK except on about 2 squares metres of space, the space immediately in front of the door to the clinic waiting room. There is nothing remotely philosophically liberal in framing protection of any civil liberty as a zero sum game, it was always the case that liberties were balanced against each other. No society on each can function if we insist on absolute protectiom of all speech irrespective of how it interacts with other liberties. It is also very clear that I'm not of comparing any world views at all, it's an edge case example to illustrate a point.
It’s a 200m radius. That is not “2 square meters” but slightly less than 126,000, plus of course the surface of the relevant clinic. That means you cannot protest, even silently as that woman did, where you can be seen by people going to that clinic. Basically that is a ban on protests at places where it makes sense to protest. We are not talking about preventing people to access a clinic, just protesting. So why in your view is it legitimate to prohibit anti-abortion protests near abortion clinics? Should it also be forbidden, in countries where the death penalty exists, to protest it in a 200m radius of execution sites? As I wrote before, free speech is only an issue when that speech is controversial, and anti-abortion speech is massively controversial, at least in Europe. Your use of the word “harassment” for holding up a sign without saying a word also illustrates the fact that there is a part of the population that will not or barely countenance any criticism of abortion. It’s also the reason why in the comments here many try to justify limiting or banning it, often with disparaging comments about the protester. Also, don’t pretend this is an “edge case”, it’s not, otherwise that law wouldn’t even exist.
Thanks for the correction, although I think you've misinterpreted what I said about edge cases. You've convinced me in any event about the legislation being overkill.
Yascha, excellent piece. I am a bit demoralized by some of the comments below. I'm glad you invoked Mill, he was right. I have a pretty clear vision of liberal democracy, and criminalizing insults on the internet is not it. It goes to show you how illiberal certain "liberals" can be. Free speech is the root of any liberal democracy, along with the rule of law generally. I'm aghast at people who cheer on arresting people for the sort of speech contained in your examples. Those people seem oblivious to Mill's point that the people who get to censor speech will be highly selective. Let's censor speech - so advocating for trans women's rights is hateful and insulting against biological women, so let's put people in prison for that. In fact, supporting immigration is hateful towards law abiding citizens who want to be free from terrorism. Put those people in prison. I wish these people criticizing you would realize that what's good for the goose is good for the gander. Yasacha, keep up the great work.
I agree entirely on the importance of free speech—but I’d like to challenge your view of the rule of law, at least as it functions today. Here’s why:
In our world of economic interdependence, sovereignty must be ceded to coordinate the judiciaries of participating trading partners. It is the judiciary that upholds “the rule of law,” in which, internationally, the only acceptable laws are those which expose states to the economic discipline of the global market. If the citizens of a state decide, for example, that they do not want their manufacturing to be sent to a state whose comparative advantage is cheap labor, and they attempt to become autarkic, their state is sanctioned and shunned and will almost certainly remain poor. Then, it is not the will of the people, but the invisible [iron fist] of the global market which governs a state, and the poor plebs are left to be organized by the logic of comparative advantage. This model used to have legitimacy, as countries were emerging from debt crises, and after the Cold War there was great hope for creating economic growth. But it has run its course and created a whole host of new problems, the largest of which, in my opinion, is that it has created an untouchable class of global elites, who identify with one another, and generally despise the masses who stay rooted to place, to their traditions, their livelihoods, and their communities. The global elites’ capital, businesses, and, of course, their selves can float over borders, and their interest in keeping it that way are protected by the “rule of law.” Their armies of legislators and lawyers make it so that the law is impenetrable to a pleb – or any professional who does not specialize in international law, for that matter. And they believe that their system is too important to be smashed to pieces by the will of the people, who understand that their lives are being governed by great and far away forces, even if they cannot articulate it. But, through freedom of speech, they are trying and getting closer to being able to do so. Therefore, the censorship apparatus is being constructed by the elite to silence the plebs to protect economic interdependence
Brother, that was a lot, I know. But there you have my grand conspiracy of why it is “the rule of law” that is currently in tension with “freedom of speech.” Of course, it should not be that way.
You're welcome! And perhaps a simpler version just in case:
Neoliberalism = the free movement of goods, services, information, people and capital across borders. It is created by coordinating the law of participating members, and upheld with the rule of law. The rule of law means no king, dictator, or president can rule on a whim. It helps tremendously with economic stability. But every now and then an executive like Trump comes along and embodies the will of (mostly) the working class, and so threatens the "rule of law" with a "popular" mandate. (Populism). Understand this tension, and you will understand our times.
“Free speech is the root of any liberal democracy, along with the rule of law generally.”
Last August the DNC was here in Chicago. What did they think of the out of control crime and dreadful schools here? They didn’t think anything at all of it. They were too busy joyfully celebrating their hatred of Trump and his supporters. And then they claim they just can’t understand why so many people voted for Trump!?
Bill Maher on Kamala Harris and Chicago public schools.
“Chicago Teachers Union: Tests are racist.” (2 min)
Yeah, I'm from Chicago, I don't like the teacher's union either. Your comment has almost nothing to do with mine. It's also a script. You might be FSB, I say half-joking.
Didn’t you say “along with the rule of law generally”? Haven’t you noticed the “rule of law” is in rapid decline in Chicago? If not, I recommend following “Second City Cop” and “CWBChicago.” Plenty of evidence of it there.
Thanks for this. I am not certain how we got here, despite reading your book and Jacob Mchangama’s, yet here we are. Part of the problem is that partisans are outraged by the lies of their opponents while justifying the falsehoods of their compatriots. Those who attain power then use it to suppress speech. One giant calumny is that people have greater liberty of expression when some authority exists to police it.
It is ten years since we all paraded around claiming « je suis Charlie. » We seemed to understand that our collective failure to defend speech placed a target on the backs of the employees at Charlie Hebdo. How can we have forgotten so quickly the result of that failure? Moi, je suis Charlie.
I think we can all agree that people like us who post their opinions online *deserve* to be in jail, but I don’t want to live in any country that would actually follow through on that
I don't think so. Hurt people hurt people and I think Trump over the previous 4 years saw how one party did everything possible to jail him and unfortunately has decided to return the favor. This should be a lesson to all liberals and conservatives, what goes around comes around. In Germany, Trump would have ended up in jail for some of the outrageous things he says and I have no doubt about that. The people who think we will get there need to go to the Midwest, Texas, Kentucky, pretty much anything non-California and Northeast and see for themselves. Some of these people will defend their own freedom of speech even against the government. I live in Europe now and Europeans don't have this mentality and that's why Europeans get upset when you tell them they don't really have freedom of speech. While I have been critical of Yasha for not understanding Americans, lately he has been courageous in writing about "the world happiness report sham" and my personal favorite was the college essays. Keep up with digging into the small things that have big impact on both sides of the Atlantic.
Yes, and that’s the only thing that he was prosecuted for we wouldn’t be here. It’s the other things that was thrown at him that didn’t stick that got us here. We should be careful and make sure we can distinguish between actions and words. Because when you are not in power, then someone else can use words against you as well.
They “didn’t stick” because the Supreme Court granted him immunity. He was convicted of crimes after all. Justice was too slow. Not sure what you’re discussing anyway since it’s so vague but suffice to say Trump wasn’t tried for speech crimes.
The 2020 election was stolen and that was even admitted in the Time article by Molly Ball in 2021 called “The Secret History of the Shadow Campaign That Saved the 2020 Election.”
“They were not rigging the election; they were fortifying it. And they believe the public needs to understand the system’s fragility in order to ensure that democracy in America endures.”
“That’s why the participants want the secret history of the 2020 election told, even though it sounds like a paranoid fever dream–a well-funded cabal of powerful people, ranging across industries and ideologies, working together behind the scenes to influence perceptions, change rules and laws, steer media coverage and control the flow of information. They were not rigging the election; they were fortifying it. And they believe the public needs to understand the system’s fragility in order to ensure that democracy in America endures.”
“The Secret History of the Shadow Campaign That Saved the 2020 Election.”
The republican officials charged with identifying any fraud found none and said as much. Regardless, Trump attempted to usurp our constitution which delegates election to the states.
Here’s an excellent video of Rep. Massie trying, and failing, to get some answers from a government official about FBI involvement in the Jan 6 “Insurrection!” A very good example of why I so totally distrust your Democratic Party and their media. The same people who imported 12 million illegals for political gain and dumbed down our schools, even medical schools, for the sake of equity aka race based equal outcomes.
“Rep. Thomas Massie accused Attorney General Merrick Garland on Wednesday of lying during a House Judiciary Committee hearing about his knowledge of federal law enforcement activities during the Jan. 6, 2021, Capitol riot.”
“Massie (R-Ky.) previously tangled with Garland in October 2021 over the same issue, questioning whether undercover FBI agents were present at the storming of the Capitol.”
“Breaking: DOJ report shows FBI field sources stormed the Capitol on January 6th.”
"I think Trump over the previous 4 years saw how one party did everything possible to jail him"
What's tiresome about this line of argument is the refusal to acknowledge the possibility that Trump actually *did crimes* for which he was rightly prosecuted. That possibility is not considered, not even to dismiss it.
He probably did illegal things, but the rest of the politicians did to, and Trump is singled out for selective prosecution due to non compliance with the deep state and their totalitarian ambitions.
Very much in line with the person I was responding to, you don't seem to feel the slightest need to provide any evidence whatsoever to justify any of this, or even recognize the need to do so.
And actually, you'd need to have some understanding of the law and the history of its application to political figures to figure this out.
When bush lied about WMDs, did he get impeached, prosecuted and go to jail? Nope. The Iraq invasion was worse than anything Trump did in his first term and equally illegal. When Obama overthrew Libya , there was no investigation. Plenty more examples could be listed on and on. Trump is selectively prosecuted for considerably lesser things than other politicians have done.
Right on Chuck. What Cubicle Farmer doesn't grasp is the same reason why Democrats lost so many people last year. I'm a Liberal and registered Democrat. If you apply things equally, people understand that you are being fair. Trump should have been prosecuted for things he actually did (I didn't agree with Jan 6) but the 34 felonies were for checks he wrote to a prostitute. Show me a powerful men/women who hasn't done that and I will show you a red sky full of ponies. Democrats lost everybody. Ask yourself why that is the case.
That’s not the case though. AfD and other nazi-adjacent and putinist politicians have no problem making their case and threatening German status quo. In UK, both white supremacists and genocidal jihadist are more successful than ever before peddling dangerous, military-grade propaganda. For people like Trump, 1A is just a prop out of a huge box of other props - things they don’t know or give a shit about but occasionally find useful to drive a point home to the moronic audience.
And make no mistake, when those people do get access to power, they don’t rescind these restrictions- they capitalize on them. Just look at twitter under musk.
Letting Trump relentlessly lie in the public square has destroyed the country. Magas are fully delysional idiots. If you have unlimited free speech it just leads to fascism eventually cause the shameless liars always come out on top. Germany learned this the hard way and have laws to stop this shit in its tracks for a reason. America is currently learning this lesson as we speak.
Germany should have hanged Hitler after the Beer Hall Putsch for treason, or at the very least deported him back to Austria. His speech was irrelevant -- he led an insurrection that led to a bunch of people being killed.
It's not a binary choice between "unlimited free speech" and European-style speech laws.
When Popper talked about the Paradox of Tolerance, he used "intolerant" to describe violent criminals ("fists and pistols"), not common bigots.
To be absolutely clear – none of the arrests in the UK described here occurred because of individuals exercising or being denied the right to free speech, they involved alleged breaches of criminal law.
In the first case, the couple from Borehamwood were arrested following reports of harassment and malicious communications—both recognised criminal offences. The police explained, “The arrests were necessary to fully investigate the allegations, as is routine in these types of matters.” After conducting further inquiries, officers determined there was insufficient evidence and no further action was taken. These arrests were not made in response to the couple expressing opinions, but due to the alleged harmful manner and intensity of their communications, which had reportedly caused considerable distress to staff, parents, and school governors.
A school spokesperson clarified: “We sought advice from the police following a high volume of direct correspondence and public social media posts from two parents, as this was becoming upsetting for staff, parents and governors. We’re always happy for parents to raise concerns, but we do ask that they do this in a suitable way, and in line with the school’s published complaints procedure.” A police officer had issued a warning to the family in December, and they withdrew their child from the school the following month, before the arrests were made.
In a separate incident, Rose Doherty, a 74-year-old prayer vigil organiser, was arrested for trespassing after repeatedly and knowingly breaching a legally established buffer zone around an abortion clinic—despite multiple warnings from police. This buffer zone, mandated by the local council is a legal measure specifically created to protect patients and clinic staff from harassment and intimidation.
The abortion buffer zone law is designed to safeguard people accessing healthcare services. Doherty’s arrest was the direct result of repeatedly violating a legally enforced exclusion zone, which is in place for the safety and privacy of others.
Regarding Connolly’s tweet – which was viewed 310,000 times – the judge ruled that it was intended to incite serious violence in an already volatile situation, including rioting and acts of mindless aggression.
I'm not taking a position on whether the police action was right or wrong—but when commentating on a case it's important that we’re clear about what the alleged offence actually is. As ever, there's usually more to the story than the headline suggests.
Ok, how many times have left wing activists or Muslims in the UK tweeted “tear down Churchills statue”, “burn down white Britain”, “abolish police”, “I don’t care if these tories burn in hell.”
The problem is that the sensitivities go only one way. A woman angrily tweets about immigrants after a horrible crime is committed by some of them and she goes to jail for two years! Someone from a minority community tweets an equally harsh and violence-suggesting message and the spineless government says “these poor minorities have valid concerns. They must be responding to feeling unwelcome. We have to appoint more diversity administrators and reeducate young white boys who have latent fascism within them. We will never rest until we have scrubbed our country of anything that will make the migrants feel unwelcome.” The asymmetry is just brutal.
I can’t find any of the tweets you’ve quoted—except “abolish police,” which, by itself, isn’t illegal. That kind of statement is protected as a political opinion or slogan, as long as it doesn’t incite violence, hatred, or public disorder, and isn’t made in a targeted or threatening way. But if someone tweeted, for example, “Abolish the police — burn down the stations!” or encouraged rioting, that would cross the legal line. See the difference?
Connolly wasn’t jailed for “angrily tweeting about immigrants after a horrible crime.” She was charged and convicted under the Public Order Act for publishing threatening or abusive material intended to stir up racial hatred. Her tweet read:
“Mass deportation now, set fire to all the f**** hotels full of the b******* for all I care… If that makes me racist, so be it.”**
That’s not political speech—that’s incitement.
Also, the horrific Southport knife attack wasn’t carried out by an immigrant, let alone someone staying in asylum accommodation. Connolly’s post wasn’t just inaccurate—it was inflammatory and dangerous. She pleaded guilty to the charge. Her conviction was not about silencing political opinion; it was about inciting racial hatred, which is a criminal offence in the UK.
You talk about “asymmetry,” but haven’t offered any concrete examples of comparable cases being treated differently. Without evidence, that’s just conjecture. No one in government has used the language you suggest, and it’s not true that only “right-wing” speech is policed - Remember Sally Bercow, wife of former Commons Speaker John Bercow? In 2012, she tweeted:“Why is Lord McAlpine trending? *innocent face*”This followed a BBC Newsnight report that wrongly implicated Lord McAlpine in child abuse. While the report didn’t name him, social media did. The High Court ruled Bercow’s tweet was defamatory and implied guilt. She accepted the ruling.
It’s also interesting that many who defend “free speech” in the context of immigration rarely extend the same concern to, say, climate activism. Between November 2023 and April 2024, 695 Just Stop Oil activists were arrested, with 353 charged—a notably high charge rate for a protest group. And yet, none were charged with violence, threats, or incitement. Their tactics, while disruptive, were based on non-violent civil disobedience: blocking roads, staging sit-ins, targeting artworks. Charges included criminal damage and conspiracy to cause public nuisance.
If there’s an asymmetry, it seems to be in how “free speech defenders” selectively care about freedom—mainly when it’s about expressing racist or inflammatory views.
According to a plain reading of that tweet, the only thing that Connolly called for was mass deportation. How is saying "I don't care if someone else were to do this thing" incitement? She didn't even say that someone SHOULD do it. Had she said that in the US, it would 100% have been protected speech, no matter how regrettable.
As for the climate activists, as you yourself said, they weren't punished for their speech. They were punished for their actions, actions which were wholly separate from their speech. It's called civil disobedience for a reason. If you weren't violating the law, it wouldn't be disobedience!
Lastly, just to be clear that I'm not ignoring it, I have nothing to say about supposed non-punishment of leftist or Muslim speech as I'm not in the UK and don't use social media, so I have no idea if that's true or false.
“I went on TV to discuss Pakistani grooming gangs in my Labour-run hometown of Telford.
The next day, officers came banging on my door. They ignored victims for decades, but tried to intimidate me for blasting their failings
Labour doesn’t care.
They didn’t then, they don’t now.”
- This is testimony from a young British woman. Do you really want your fellow citizens treated like this? Even if you are a leftist and have much more sympathy for minorities than white women concerned about diversity?
Explain this - “Axel Rudakabana murdered 3 children and has access to kitchen facilities in prison.
Tommy Robinson made a documentary and is in permanent solitary confinement.”
Why is this? Why do the UK police and justice system think this is just?
“Racist” is not a word that applies anymore. Wanting to shut borders means you care about the stability and well being of your countrymen and women. It does not mean you hate anyone else. Left wingers cannot even think clearly anymore. It is like their brains short circuit and arrive at “racism” and “fascism” whenever a disagreement arises
I strongly believe that if even someone like you writes an article like this, it clearly shows how deeply dystopian influences are shaping the American debate. But aren't you the ones turning tourists away at the border just because of the subjective judgment of an officer, or because they have ironic memes about the president on their phone, or have sharply criticized him? Even just referring to Europe as a unified entity makes any logical reasoning collapse. What are we even talking about? Here, everyone criticizes everyone and everything. No one is turned away at the border out of personal dislike, and no one is massively relocated to another country without any kind of legal process. It seems to me you're living with a beam stabbing through your gut, your head, and your heart—while you worry about a few straws falling on the complex issues we're dealing with here at home. Unless, of course, you're talking about Hungary… now that is a real mess when it comes to democracy.
Nothing in this reply addressed any idea or example that Yascha included. It didn't even come close. If you believe that these laws (against nonviolent expression online) are good, perhaps you could explain why. If you believe they're bad then we agree. "No one is turned away at the border out of personal dislike." It appears that no one is turned away, for any reason... but what border? What are you talking about? I thought Europe was not a unified entity. Surely having "a border" would at least partially contradict that...
And doesn't Hungary consistently have one of the most popular governments in Europe? If your definition of democracy is supporting institutions and agendas that are increasingly unpopular (like the liberal immigration policies and generous migrant support in Germany) in the face of widespread public criticism, and using the police and the media to deride and dismiss that criticism, then not only is your definition of 'democracy' different from mine: it's the opposite.
British voters have wanted to halt and reverse non-European migration for over 20 years (it's more than 5 years for Germany) and no government has even begun to execute these wishes. That's not democracy. That's rule by a technocratic class which is increasingly hated by the regular people of EVERY country. Reversing that trend will require 'the elect' (the people who believe that their education and social status give them the right to coordinate society and manage the affairs of others, and the people who have advocated for increased international migration to bolster their economic and political position) to honestly deal with the growing chorus of hostility and complaint. When you're in power you don't have to pay too much attention to the commoners. They won't be in power forever, though-perhaps not even for much longer.
Francesco, I think it shows a poor judgement of Yascha to believe that any calls for the nations of Europe to improve means he thinks the USA is perfect! Both of these wide, large, and diverse locations are quite far from it.
Alright, that’s fine. Look, I’m not someone who usually comments, so the fact that I wrote the previous comment is already exceptional for me — and with this, I’m done. The world is beautiful because it’s diverse.
The point isn’t to say that everything is perfect in Europe — who cares, I’m not here to defend anyone. The point is to tell you that you’re focusing on tiny events that are insignificant in the lives of Europeans. None of the dangers you mention actually exist. Not because we don’t see them, but because they’re episodes that end just a little beyond where they began.
What I’m saying is that the democratic crisis we’re all witnessing with the degeneration of the American system is so devastating, enormous, gigantic, that it feels like we’re watching a chicken thief in the henhouse while a nuclear bomb explodes in the farmer’s house.
The situations are so vastly incomparable that I don’t believe there’s any way to convince you otherwise — everything is so obviously clear that only political or cultural affiliation could prevent someone from seeing it.
“None of the dangers actually exists” except that people are, in fact going to prison in Europe.
Bemoaning the legitimate election of American president as a “degeneration of the American system” is odd as he was elected. Like I get you don’t like him, but sometimes democracies elect people you don’t like
Considering the political crisis in France, the rise of the Vox, reform party and AFD in Spain, the UK and Germany, the clustefuck of Romanian elections, the justice party winning in Poland, Hungary and Slovakia, or the collapse of the government in the Netherlands, the idea that Europe isn’t facing severe democratic challenges is so naive it’s laughable. It’s quite plausible (maybe even likely) that in the next 5 years the Vox, the AFD, Reform, and the National rally will be in charge
Excellent piece Yascha. I think we need to criminalize speech that undermines US foreign policy. Criticizing Israel? Prison - you're undermining our foreign policy. Advocating for transgender rights? Send them to prison, they are insulting biological women. Advocating for immigrants? Prison, of course - you're insulting law abiding citizens, and supporting terrorists to boot. Criticizing Trump? Then you go to the prison in El Salvador, sucker. Uggh. I'm aghast and demoralized by the fact that people criticizing your point of view seem oblivious to the concept that what's good for the goose is good for the gander. Keep up the excellent work Yascha, and for all you Europeans supporting these insane speech laws, please open your eyes to the fact that all of this could be turned around on you, and you too could be censored by a right-wing government.
Perhaps the worst is things like effectively banning Marine Le Pen, and that guy in Romania whose name I can never remember. And who doubts that now that AfD is the biggest party in Germany, the powers-that-be will find a way to ban them next time there is an election.
A very interesting and enlightening read for a European like me. The examples given are alarming: they make it flagrantly obvious that this kind of censorship is not sustainable and toxic for democracy. So thank you for waking me up to this.
But I’m surprised not to see a single mention made on algorithms. Social media is impossible to avoid even for those who aren’t connected at all, as it shapes the overall discourse, which is then reflected in traditional media.
While social communication should sustain the social fabric, it is on the contrary controlled by private corporations using opaque, profit-driven algorithms. This leads to increased polarization, as it triggers our animalistic attention based largely on fear and combativeness.
The cocktail of free speech and these algorithms is toxic as hell too, isn’t that quite obvious? Can speech really be qualified as free in such conditions?
Alas, it’s a well-known human weakness to take the easy path and pick on the weakest culprit, as Europe does in your examples. Censoring individuals is hitting the wrong target. Perhaps, in Europe as elsewhere, sleeves should be rolled up and action taken on a whole other scale. Communication between citizens should be a public good. Can we imagine an agora where the range of its members’ voices is amplified or muffled by dark algorithms?
The sad part is the people who think they're making sure they stop the next Hitler before he gains a following. Just remember that Hitler banned free speech just as soon as he had the power to do it.
No tyrant cementing power around himself claims to be doing it for himself. He proclaims that he is doing it for the people. The ability of the 'authorities' to silence any and all opposition is the essential component of totalitarianism.
Thanks for writing this. This story has festered in the background while everyone left of center including the DNC has continued to gaslight. Really appreciate your integrity in pushing out so many of these uncomfortable issues that absolutely need to be dealt with. The democrats have been denying this reality and making lame excuses while they simultaneously liken Trump to Hitler and Stalin. It's not the heat....it's the hypocrisy. Trump is no more (and admittedly no less) than a populist. Stalin and Mao were not charismatic and they were not populists--not by any reasonable definition. A populist is a charismatic politician (left or right) that rises to said popularity on a backlash sparked by elite overreach. That's us, folks, that's what we are and that's what did. A democracy is by definition a political framework in which populist backlashes can, and apparently do, occur when elites hog all the resources, hog all the power, and then hog all the culture. Anybody truly interested in beating Trump better start by admitting our own culpability in the overreach that led to this backlash. Then the next step is to publicly denounce the culture and cancellation war that has been waged against regular folks. Then, and only then, can you recover the centrists who cast a negative vote against whoever it is that was running things. An honest look at this story is 100% essential and has been far too long in the waiting. @Yascha if my poly-sci 101 is oversimplified don't pull any punches please.
Not really sure how the Dems should be so focused on European lack of freedoms of speech. Sure, I would like to see it, but it’s not their first priority surely ?
And first amendment sadly doesn’t protect against cancellation, online mobs, etc. Only constrains government. This is a deep cultural issue we’ll have to solve from non-political angles. Politics is downstream of culture after all.
The story goes beyond Europe. It's a western issue and we should be watching this very closely. So far the dems mainline response to speech issues has been to deny and gaslight even in the face of the reporting by Taibbi Shallenberger et al. My point is that this behavior played a decisive role in this backlash. When so many liberals ask "why are you making such a big deal [of the cultural issues] that would be why.
Dear Yascha, We have the European Convention on Human Rights, separate from the EU, and this has been incorporated into British law and entrenched as much as anything else in our system. You should have picked this up when you did your obviously too shallow research for this piece. Hopefully, you will review your piece and withdraw it meantime. Yours Simon
Yascha gave many specific examples. What does the Convention, or any laws, have to do with the actual people who were arrested and punished (and the many thousands of others who received the intended message)?
Lots of countries have laws about human rights and equality and democracy on the books, and they're completely ignored. If national governments are arresting pensioners and children for nonviolent comments, then I think that's a problem. There must be SOME reason why tens of thousands of Brits have been arrested, and thousands of Germans? The laws are irrelevant. These are consistent, long-standing, oppressive policies which are designed to protect the powerful. Do you think these kinds of policies are good, or bad?
Yascha, that you have to write this today shows how little we (even in the West) understand how democracies work. For years I have been trying to raise awareness of the importance of building citizen competencies including critical thinking and dialogic capabilities- both of which (at a bare minimum) require freedom of thought and speech. For my sins I was told I was unreasonable, clueless and even insensitive to minority sentiments, while those who ignored my warnings about an inept citizenry created profitable careers for themselves and spoke eloquently about the imminent collapse of democracies. After all it is far safer and profitable to talk about the dangers of authoritarianism and the Right-Wing than to suggest that the foundational problem of all democracies was that 'We, the People' didn't even have the cognitive capabilities needed to separate fact from fiction, let alone preserve their complex democratic political systems.
As you painstakingly explain, Hate Speech laws are the gateway to censorship and illiberalism. It shouldn't require a PhD to understand this.
Frankly, the left — so-called — is also responsible for this, because they’re the ones who came up with the inane “hate speech.” The concept has always been bullshit — as I’ve been saying ever since it was created.
Speech is speech. We already had laws on the books in the US for speech that incited violence. That was all we needed. But liberals — again, so-called, because so many of them are profoundly ILliberal — insisted on the batshit-insane concept of “hate speech.”
I'm a lifelong liberal and not afraid to call out the hypocrisies and idiocies of "my" side.
Democracy is flailing all over the world, and it's not just the authoritarian rightwing that's causing it.
Growing up in illiberal India and having lived in the Arab world where I didn’t have free speech, even as a teenager free speech was a no-brainer (pun intended).
Hate speech fosters hate. You seem to accept that. I don’t.
What?
I don’t go along with the concept of “hate speech.” “Hate speech” is an inane concept. That’s what I said. You seem to be simultaneously agreeing and disagreeing with it.
Sorry, but it’s definitely not an insane concept.
The answer to speech one doesn’t like is MORE speech, not less.
And arresting and putting people in jail for speech is inane. Yes, it is.
And insane fo sho....😆
If I’d for instance would call for an armed insurrection against the chancellor calling for getting rid of him forcefully - would you call a crime or just speech?
I don’t know what the laws are in Europe, but in the US that’s considered incitement to violence. As I said, we already have laws on the books against speech inciting violence.
*Edited to add: Saying "You're an asshole and I hate your guts" or "You're a raging wop bitch and I wish you would die" (I'm Italian-American, so that's why I used that example) is an example of speech. Speech. It's obnoxious, but it's free speech. And I would fight for your right to say those things. It has nothing to do with my agreeing with them. You should have the right to say them.
I don't think I agree with this statement. I find it questionable that hate speech fosters hate. Hearing someone say something hateful doesn't magically make me become hateful as well. If anything, it dissuades me.
Conversely, *censoring* speech makes it more convincing. If something can't be said out loud, it almost naturally becomes more interesting. It turns into a sort of secret.
That might hold for you. But the reader who shares my hateful opinion will most probably agree and increase his hatred.
Okay, but to continue your example, if that hateful opinion gets severely punished, what's the effect on the reader? After all, they already shared it.
I'd say they learn to be silent about their opinion, but not weaken it. Given the perceived martyrdom, they're even likely to strengthen it.
My intuition is that the second effect is stronger.
You’re right, maybe that’s the reason for the fact that harmful bullying is hard to come by.
There are limits on freedom: my freedom ends where the freedom of others begins. Moral is above freedom.
But the relevance of moral based constraints seems to be vanishing (unless it’s restraining the others). Bad, as Mr Trump would utter.
Whose "moral" should trump freedom? I'm sure you wouldn't agree with Islamists massacring the staff of CHARLIE HEBDO.
Hate speech laws are the left-wing equivalent of blasphemy laws.
Also others who disagree might well start to hate groups the speaker is associated with. Free speech advocates are not great at distinguishing what they actually need to argue for. This thread is good evidence of that. Hard to imagine a more virtue signalling statement than "hate speech doesn't exist"
If people have the right to love, they must also have the right to hate.
State the law that provides for exactly that.
We don’t need a law, it’s philosophically self evident. Your legalism is bullshit.
What is philosophically self evident? That hatred is good? Or what? Legalism is definitely no bs, we all profit from laws.
Love and hate are two sides of the same coin of human passion. Humanity does not exist to be conveniently managed by technocrats according to legalistic rules. Humanity exists to express passion, make love, form tribes and nations, fight wars, murder, and behave violently. Hate is a feature, not a bug.
This makes you uncomfortable because the values you’ve been indoctrinated into run counter to human nature.
Then you are an authoritarian.
I’m definitely not.
You want to control people’s speech for social ends!
What’s the problem with social ends?
I don’t want to control anything.
Yes you do, that’s the point of hate speech laws. Stop lying and admit it.
Hate speech laws foster hate of the people who import hordes of foreigners with obvious intent to replace the native population, then abuse hate speech laws to punish those who point this out or try to organize to stop their own replacement . This is why you invented such laws. It was never about justice or fairness . You ARE the hateful one, deeply and profoundly hateful of yourself, your nation and your people, this is why you impose such oppression on them.
I’m obviously too stupid to get your point, sorry.
No you aren’t, you’re arrogant and hateful.
At least I don’t need AI to express my thoughts.
Cut the nationalistic right-wing collectivist bullshit.
No. You cut out the neoliberal degeneracy.
Do you know what neoliberalism IS?!
Free markets, open borders, deregulation , globalism privatization
“The left is responsible for this” the left are the ones going to jail because of this 😂 what are you talking about
Jakob, did you read what I wrote?
And have you never heard the expressions, "Hoist by one's own petard" and "The revolution eats its own"?
The left promulgated the concept of "hate speech." And pushed to get laws against it passed. And now it finds that those laws are being turned against it. Those laws are coming back to bite it. That's the point.
It’s not uncommon that these things end up harming the people who caused them.
What are the "right wing" doing to make Democracy flail all over the world?
Donald Trump, Vladimir Putin, Viktor Orbán, Narendra Modi, Xi Jinping, Paul Biya, Hibatullah Akhundzada, Benjamin Netanyahu, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, the list goes on. All rightwing authoritarians. All inimical to democracy.
I asked what, not who. And what specifically has trump done to make democracy flail?
I will note that unlike Biden he didn't open up the border to mass illegal immigration, nor ignore scotus on student loans.
And unlike Obama/Hillary/Deep State didn't engage in massive corruption to attempt a "soft coup" on a sitting president.
Can you explain why Biden being one thing or another has any bearing on a factual assessment of Trump?
Can you provide any useful factual information?
Yes. Fact: when civil discourse dies democracy may soon follow. Trump and his supporters have played a major role in bringing this about (with some assistance from the woke left of course).
“Democracy is flailing all over the world, and it's not just the authoritarian rightwing that's causing it.”
America is disintegrating and our whole world is in a tailspin. Only AI can save our sinking ship. The best of times. The worst of times.
“It takes something more than intelligence to act intelligently."
— Dostoevsky
AI Models Are Self-Aware. (1 min)
BuzzRobot. Shorts. Apr 18, 2025
https://youtube.com/shorts/2WeEq-DBBPk?si=jmk3502z8LoKyh6V
“All My Predictions Have come True, So Far.” (27 min)
This Is World. Ray Kurzweil. Mar 28, 2025
https://youtu.be/gGEu_5KbVe8?si=4Bvk89Fj8wkRS7Dz
"Only AI can save our sinking ship"??
Sorry, but that's ridiculous. And frankly, it sounds like your whole comment was written by AI.
“And frankly, it sounds like your whole comment was written by AI.“
Thank you. That’s a truly wonderful compliment. I am awed by AI intelligence and deeply flattered that you think it was from AI.
Now that's hilarious!
Yascha, I am often critical down here in the comments, but this piece was courageous. Thank you for posting it. 1up.
As a Brit I'd like to comment on the British cases. In the Maxie Allen and Rosalind Levine case the couple were released without charge. The county's elected Police and Crime Commissioner said "that shouldn't have become a police matter" and has asked the Chief Constable of the force to conduct a review and provide him with an explanation. In the Rose Docherty case the law she was accused of breaking is about protesting within 200 metres of an abortion clinic. It is legal to protest 201 metres from a clinic. It is legal to write to the newspapers about your views on abortion. It is legal to organise an abortion protest in front of the Houses of Parliament. What the law seeks to do is to stop people behaving in ways that could influence the decisions of women and staff to access services at an abortion clinic at what is a very emotionally difficult time for them. This includes praying if it could be intimidating to people attending the clinic. At present abortion is legal up to 24 weeks with the agreement of two doctors. You have complete free speech to lobby to change this law. What you don't have the right to do is seeking to intimidate women exercising their current abortion rights. The woman has been charged. I cannot find whether or not she has been found guilty and I expect the outcome of the trial will be newsworthy. With regards to the Lucy Connolly case what you describe as "the highly emotional hours after Axel Rudakubana killed three young girls at a Taylor Swift dance party in Southport in July 2024" was actually a series of nationwide riots over a number of days and was the largest incident of social unrest in England since 2011. It involved attacks on the police, on mosques, homes and businesses owned by immigrants, and hotels housing asylum seekers. What she tweeted was clearly an incitement to violence. You are right that we don't have a first amendment and I'm very glad we don't. It means that debates about the limits of free speech and how it clashes with other human rights are about what is the right balance for society and individuals rather than what some people meant when they wrote a document in the 18th century without any knowledge of what social media would do to society. The UK is still a signatory to the European Convention of Human Rights, and article 10 gives a right of free speech. Like nearly all rights in the ECHR it is not absolute, since it is recognised that the different rights are in tension. It is an ongoing political process determining what the right balance is. I agree with you that restrictions on much political speech are counterproductive and there is robust debate about that across Europe.
The use of the Rose Docherty case weakens this whole argument. Nothing to do with ‘online speech’, and as you say, Docherty could stand with her sad little sign almost anywhere else in the UK without recrimination. Indeed, picking a handful of cases that became well publicised BECAUSE they were controversial, as the proof points that ‘Europe is jailing people’ is problematic.
In American jurisprudence, the Lucy Connolly case would be considered protected speech because threats have to be very specific (“burn down a certain hotel at a certain time”) as opposed to something general. As I am close to an absolutist on free speech, I am very glad that we Americans have the First Amendment. On a related note, I am also glad that we can vehemently criticize Islam without the government coming after us for “Islamophobia.”
Would that be the case that persons tweets had been a small part of a highly highly coordinated operation to maximise civil disorder that had forced every police, fire and health service in the country on to a major incident footing because the credible assessment was that hundreds of occupied buildings could be attacked by mobs of arsonists?
I understand that Americans are proud of their 1st amendment. But holding it up to us Europeans is a bit like us saying to you: We‘re glad we have free health care. For all the outward similiarities in culture, we have societal models which are different in significant ways from the American one. Even within Europe, there are different framework of what can be said and what gets you into trouble: Malta outlaws abortion completely, and try saying something critical about Karol Wojtyła in Poland. Besides, Mr. Mounk like many commentators ignores the business side of the free speech argument. Simply put: The more outrageous a view, the more it will become amplified by social media‘s algorithms. It pays to offend. The US still have Section 230 of the Communication Decency Act; they are also home to the world‘s largest social media provider. Go figure.
But you Europeans are right to criticize our ridiculous health insurance system! I do realize there are cultural differences between the United States and European nations; I have lived in both France and Germany. In some cases, I think restrictions make sense given the historical context. For instance, I am not bothered that it is illegal to fly a Nazi flag in Germany. But many of the examples in this article are alarming. I am not sure what social media has to do with anything as it is just a platform for speech, and one that people can easily opt out of if they choose. I deleted my Twitter account when the atmosphere there became too toxic.
You might say that European healthcare is available to more people, but it's not free. Somebody pays for it. Europeans are fortunate they don't go bankrupt with an illness as occurs in the USA. Americans die from illnesses due to lack of affordable healthcare. All this is true, but healthcare is not truely free anywhere. The system must receive payment from somewhere.
That is true, Jeanne, but neither - to stay with the original comparison - is speech completely free in the US. There are limits, too. Fewer than in Europe, certainly (for better, for worse).
Whatever one might think about abortion, is free speech not precisely about having the right to try to persuade other people? I find the rationale that people who want to have an abortion should be “protected” about having their mind changed unpersuasive.
No one is disagreeing with that, but the individual right to express an opinion is balanced against the right of an individual to access a health service without being harassed. If we allow pro life activists to stand in the doorways of clinics handimg put pictures of dead foetuses, we'd need to be prepared to allow anti big pharma activists to stand in the doorways of paediatric oncology departments to try and get the parents of the child on end of life care to use herbs instead of recommended treatment.
Well the regulator is clearly disagreeing: that is exactly the point of that law, isn’t it? And the idea that protesting abortion is on the same level as promoting quackery is, at the very least, the expression of a very firm political stand on the topic of abortion. Which is exactly when freedom of speech comes under threat: after all people seldom have to fight for the right to express ideas everybody agrees with.
I don't think that is what is happening. The injunction left the protester concerned able to express their view pretty much anywhere in the UK except on about 2 squares metres of space, the space immediately in front of the door to the clinic waiting room. There is nothing remotely philosophically liberal in framing protection of any civil liberty as a zero sum game, it was always the case that liberties were balanced against each other. No society on each can function if we insist on absolute protectiom of all speech irrespective of how it interacts with other liberties. It is also very clear that I'm not of comparing any world views at all, it's an edge case example to illustrate a point.
It’s a 200m radius. That is not “2 square meters” but slightly less than 126,000, plus of course the surface of the relevant clinic. That means you cannot protest, even silently as that woman did, where you can be seen by people going to that clinic. Basically that is a ban on protests at places where it makes sense to protest. We are not talking about preventing people to access a clinic, just protesting. So why in your view is it legitimate to prohibit anti-abortion protests near abortion clinics? Should it also be forbidden, in countries where the death penalty exists, to protest it in a 200m radius of execution sites? As I wrote before, free speech is only an issue when that speech is controversial, and anti-abortion speech is massively controversial, at least in Europe. Your use of the word “harassment” for holding up a sign without saying a word also illustrates the fact that there is a part of the population that will not or barely countenance any criticism of abortion. It’s also the reason why in the comments here many try to justify limiting or banning it, often with disparaging comments about the protester. Also, don’t pretend this is an “edge case”, it’s not, otherwise that law wouldn’t even exist.
Thanks for the correction, although I think you've misinterpreted what I said about edge cases. You've convinced me in any event about the legislation being overkill.
Yascha, excellent piece. I am a bit demoralized by some of the comments below. I'm glad you invoked Mill, he was right. I have a pretty clear vision of liberal democracy, and criminalizing insults on the internet is not it. It goes to show you how illiberal certain "liberals" can be. Free speech is the root of any liberal democracy, along with the rule of law generally. I'm aghast at people who cheer on arresting people for the sort of speech contained in your examples. Those people seem oblivious to Mill's point that the people who get to censor speech will be highly selective. Let's censor speech - so advocating for trans women's rights is hateful and insulting against biological women, so let's put people in prison for that. In fact, supporting immigration is hateful towards law abiding citizens who want to be free from terrorism. Put those people in prison. I wish these people criticizing you would realize that what's good for the goose is good for the gander. Yasacha, keep up the great work.
I agree entirely on the importance of free speech—but I’d like to challenge your view of the rule of law, at least as it functions today. Here’s why:
In our world of economic interdependence, sovereignty must be ceded to coordinate the judiciaries of participating trading partners. It is the judiciary that upholds “the rule of law,” in which, internationally, the only acceptable laws are those which expose states to the economic discipline of the global market. If the citizens of a state decide, for example, that they do not want their manufacturing to be sent to a state whose comparative advantage is cheap labor, and they attempt to become autarkic, their state is sanctioned and shunned and will almost certainly remain poor. Then, it is not the will of the people, but the invisible [iron fist] of the global market which governs a state, and the poor plebs are left to be organized by the logic of comparative advantage. This model used to have legitimacy, as countries were emerging from debt crises, and after the Cold War there was great hope for creating economic growth. But it has run its course and created a whole host of new problems, the largest of which, in my opinion, is that it has created an untouchable class of global elites, who identify with one another, and generally despise the masses who stay rooted to place, to their traditions, their livelihoods, and their communities. The global elites’ capital, businesses, and, of course, their selves can float over borders, and their interest in keeping it that way are protected by the “rule of law.” Their armies of legislators and lawyers make it so that the law is impenetrable to a pleb – or any professional who does not specialize in international law, for that matter. And they believe that their system is too important to be smashed to pieces by the will of the people, who understand that their lives are being governed by great and far away forces, even if they cannot articulate it. But, through freedom of speech, they are trying and getting closer to being able to do so. Therefore, the censorship apparatus is being constructed by the elite to silence the plebs to protect economic interdependence
Brother, that was a lot, I know. But there you have my grand conspiracy of why it is “the rule of law” that is currently in tension with “freedom of speech.” Of course, it should not be that way.
Great points, very interesting. Thanks for that.
You're welcome! And perhaps a simpler version just in case:
Neoliberalism = the free movement of goods, services, information, people and capital across borders. It is created by coordinating the law of participating members, and upheld with the rule of law. The rule of law means no king, dictator, or president can rule on a whim. It helps tremendously with economic stability. But every now and then an executive like Trump comes along and embodies the will of (mostly) the working class, and so threatens the "rule of law" with a "popular" mandate. (Populism). Understand this tension, and you will understand our times.
“Free speech is the root of any liberal democracy, along with the rule of law generally.”
Last August the DNC was here in Chicago. What did they think of the out of control crime and dreadful schools here? They didn’t think anything at all of it. They were too busy joyfully celebrating their hatred of Trump and his supporters. And then they claim they just can’t understand why so many people voted for Trump!?
Bill Maher on Kamala Harris and Chicago public schools.
“Chicago Teachers Union: Tests are racist.” (2 min)
Illinois Policy. Oct 28, 2024
https://youtu.be/xp1DsUDCj1Q?si=cNST9rE_WvM_5qRw
“Maybe We Should Stop Calling Them Schools.”
Real Clear Education. Mar 26, 2025
https://www.realcleareducation.com/articles/2025/03/26/maybe_we_should_stop_calling_them_schools_1100065.html
Yeah, I'm from Chicago, I don't like the teacher's union either. Your comment has almost nothing to do with mine. It's also a script. You might be FSB, I say half-joking.
Didn’t you say “along with the rule of law generally”? Haven’t you noticed the “rule of law” is in rapid decline in Chicago? If not, I recommend following “Second City Cop” and “CWBChicago.” Plenty of evidence of it there.
Thanks for this. I am not certain how we got here, despite reading your book and Jacob Mchangama’s, yet here we are. Part of the problem is that partisans are outraged by the lies of their opponents while justifying the falsehoods of their compatriots. Those who attain power then use it to suppress speech. One giant calumny is that people have greater liberty of expression when some authority exists to police it.
It is ten years since we all paraded around claiming « je suis Charlie. » We seemed to understand that our collective failure to defend speech placed a target on the backs of the employees at Charlie Hebdo. How can we have forgotten so quickly the result of that failure? Moi, je suis Charlie.
Moi, je ne suis pas Charlie; et je n’etais pas Charlie.
Pourquoi?
I think we can all agree that people like us who post their opinions online *deserve* to be in jail, but I don’t want to live in any country that would actually follow through on that
True! 🤣 But sadly, or happily, many people deserve many things that the legal system shouldn't enforce!
Give us a second, we'll get there.
I don't think so. Hurt people hurt people and I think Trump over the previous 4 years saw how one party did everything possible to jail him and unfortunately has decided to return the favor. This should be a lesson to all liberals and conservatives, what goes around comes around. In Germany, Trump would have ended up in jail for some of the outrageous things he says and I have no doubt about that. The people who think we will get there need to go to the Midwest, Texas, Kentucky, pretty much anything non-California and Northeast and see for themselves. Some of these people will defend their own freedom of speech even against the government. I live in Europe now and Europeans don't have this mentality and that's why Europeans get upset when you tell them they don't really have freedom of speech. While I have been critical of Yasha for not understanding Americans, lately he has been courageous in writing about "the world happiness report sham" and my personal favorite was the college essays. Keep up with digging into the small things that have big impact on both sides of the Atlantic.
Trump wasn’t prosecuted for merely saying things. He attempted to overturn the results of an election via extralegal means. Apples to apples, please.
Yes, and that’s the only thing that he was prosecuted for we wouldn’t be here. It’s the other things that was thrown at him that didn’t stick that got us here. We should be careful and make sure we can distinguish between actions and words. Because when you are not in power, then someone else can use words against you as well.
They “didn’t stick” because the Supreme Court granted him immunity. He was convicted of crimes after all. Justice was too slow. Not sure what you’re discussing anyway since it’s so vague but suffice to say Trump wasn’t tried for speech crimes.
The 2020 election was stolen and that was even admitted in the Time article by Molly Ball in 2021 called “The Secret History of the Shadow Campaign That Saved the 2020 Election.”
“They were not rigging the election; they were fortifying it. And they believe the public needs to understand the system’s fragility in order to ensure that democracy in America endures.”
“That’s why the participants want the secret history of the 2020 election told, even though it sounds like a paranoid fever dream–a well-funded cabal of powerful people, ranging across industries and ideologies, working together behind the scenes to influence perceptions, change rules and laws, steer media coverage and control the flow of information. They were not rigging the election; they were fortifying it. And they believe the public needs to understand the system’s fragility in order to ensure that democracy in America endures.”
“The Secret History of the Shadow Campaign That Saved the 2020 Election.”
Time. By Mollie Ball. Feb 4, 2021
https://time.com/5936036/secret-2020-election-campaign/?xid=emailshare
The republican officials charged with identifying any fraud found none and said as much. Regardless, Trump attempted to usurp our constitution which delegates election to the states.
Here’s an excellent video of Rep. Massie trying, and failing, to get some answers from a government official about FBI involvement in the Jan 6 “Insurrection!” A very good example of why I so totally distrust your Democratic Party and their media. The same people who imported 12 million illegals for political gain and dumbed down our schools, even medical schools, for the sake of equity aka race based equal outcomes.
“Rep. Thomas Massie accused Attorney General Merrick Garland on Wednesday of lying during a House Judiciary Committee hearing about his knowledge of federal law enforcement activities during the Jan. 6, 2021, Capitol riot.”
“Massie (R-Ky.) previously tangled with Garland in October 2021 over the same issue, questioning whether undercover FBI agents were present at the storming of the Capitol.”
“Breaking: DOJ report shows FBI field sources stormed the Capitol on January 6th.”
LiveNow from Fox. Sept 25, 2024
https://youtu.be/aItGIPk0eKA?si=EPVSMB1J2jW6Bts-
"I think Trump over the previous 4 years saw how one party did everything possible to jail him"
What's tiresome about this line of argument is the refusal to acknowledge the possibility that Trump actually *did crimes* for which he was rightly prosecuted. That possibility is not considered, not even to dismiss it.
He probably did illegal things, but the rest of the politicians did to, and Trump is singled out for selective prosecution due to non compliance with the deep state and their totalitarian ambitions.
This really isn’t that hard to figure out.
Very much in line with the person I was responding to, you don't seem to feel the slightest need to provide any evidence whatsoever to justify any of this, or even recognize the need to do so.
And actually, you'd need to have some understanding of the law and the history of its application to political figures to figure this out.
When bush lied about WMDs, did he get impeached, prosecuted and go to jail? Nope. The Iraq invasion was worse than anything Trump did in his first term and equally illegal. When Obama overthrew Libya , there was no investigation. Plenty more examples could be listed on and on. Trump is selectively prosecuted for considerably lesser things than other politicians have done.
Right on Chuck. What Cubicle Farmer doesn't grasp is the same reason why Democrats lost so many people last year. I'm a Liberal and registered Democrat. If you apply things equally, people understand that you are being fair. Trump should have been prosecuted for things he actually did (I didn't agree with Jan 6) but the 34 felonies were for checks he wrote to a prostitute. Show me a powerful men/women who hasn't done that and I will show you a red sky full of ponies. Democrats lost everybody. Ask yourself why that is the case.
He did it, why can't I????
(pre-ethics cognition)
She did it, why can't I????
(pre-ethics cognition)
That’s not the case though. AfD and other nazi-adjacent and putinist politicians have no problem making their case and threatening German status quo. In UK, both white supremacists and genocidal jihadist are more successful than ever before peddling dangerous, military-grade propaganda. For people like Trump, 1A is just a prop out of a huge box of other props - things they don’t know or give a shit about but occasionally find useful to drive a point home to the moronic audience.
And make no mistake, when those people do get access to power, they don’t rescind these restrictions- they capitalize on them. Just look at twitter under musk.
Letting Trump relentlessly lie in the public square has destroyed the country. Magas are fully delysional idiots. If you have unlimited free speech it just leads to fascism eventually cause the shameless liars always come out on top. Germany learned this the hard way and have laws to stop this shit in its tracks for a reason. America is currently learning this lesson as we speak.
Germany should have hanged Hitler after the Beer Hall Putsch for treason, or at the very least deported him back to Austria. His speech was irrelevant -- he led an insurrection that led to a bunch of people being killed.
It's not a binary choice between "unlimited free speech" and European-style speech laws.
When Popper talked about the Paradox of Tolerance, he used "intolerant" to describe violent criminals ("fists and pistols"), not common bigots.
🤣😭
To be absolutely clear – none of the arrests in the UK described here occurred because of individuals exercising or being denied the right to free speech, they involved alleged breaches of criminal law.
In the first case, the couple from Borehamwood were arrested following reports of harassment and malicious communications—both recognised criminal offences. The police explained, “The arrests were necessary to fully investigate the allegations, as is routine in these types of matters.” After conducting further inquiries, officers determined there was insufficient evidence and no further action was taken. These arrests were not made in response to the couple expressing opinions, but due to the alleged harmful manner and intensity of their communications, which had reportedly caused considerable distress to staff, parents, and school governors.
A school spokesperson clarified: “We sought advice from the police following a high volume of direct correspondence and public social media posts from two parents, as this was becoming upsetting for staff, parents and governors. We’re always happy for parents to raise concerns, but we do ask that they do this in a suitable way, and in line with the school’s published complaints procedure.” A police officer had issued a warning to the family in December, and they withdrew their child from the school the following month, before the arrests were made.
In a separate incident, Rose Doherty, a 74-year-old prayer vigil organiser, was arrested for trespassing after repeatedly and knowingly breaching a legally established buffer zone around an abortion clinic—despite multiple warnings from police. This buffer zone, mandated by the local council is a legal measure specifically created to protect patients and clinic staff from harassment and intimidation.
The abortion buffer zone law is designed to safeguard people accessing healthcare services. Doherty’s arrest was the direct result of repeatedly violating a legally enforced exclusion zone, which is in place for the safety and privacy of others.
Regarding Connolly’s tweet – which was viewed 310,000 times – the judge ruled that it was intended to incite serious violence in an already volatile situation, including rioting and acts of mindless aggression.
I'm not taking a position on whether the police action was right or wrong—but when commentating on a case it's important that we’re clear about what the alleged offence actually is. As ever, there's usually more to the story than the headline suggests.
Ok, how many times have left wing activists or Muslims in the UK tweeted “tear down Churchills statue”, “burn down white Britain”, “abolish police”, “I don’t care if these tories burn in hell.”
The problem is that the sensitivities go only one way. A woman angrily tweets about immigrants after a horrible crime is committed by some of them and she goes to jail for two years! Someone from a minority community tweets an equally harsh and violence-suggesting message and the spineless government says “these poor minorities have valid concerns. They must be responding to feeling unwelcome. We have to appoint more diversity administrators and reeducate young white boys who have latent fascism within them. We will never rest until we have scrubbed our country of anything that will make the migrants feel unwelcome.” The asymmetry is just brutal.
I can’t find any of the tweets you’ve quoted—except “abolish police,” which, by itself, isn’t illegal. That kind of statement is protected as a political opinion or slogan, as long as it doesn’t incite violence, hatred, or public disorder, and isn’t made in a targeted or threatening way. But if someone tweeted, for example, “Abolish the police — burn down the stations!” or encouraged rioting, that would cross the legal line. See the difference?
Connolly wasn’t jailed for “angrily tweeting about immigrants after a horrible crime.” She was charged and convicted under the Public Order Act for publishing threatening or abusive material intended to stir up racial hatred. Her tweet read:
“Mass deportation now, set fire to all the f**** hotels full of the b******* for all I care… If that makes me racist, so be it.”**
That’s not political speech—that’s incitement.
Also, the horrific Southport knife attack wasn’t carried out by an immigrant, let alone someone staying in asylum accommodation. Connolly’s post wasn’t just inaccurate—it was inflammatory and dangerous. She pleaded guilty to the charge. Her conviction was not about silencing political opinion; it was about inciting racial hatred, which is a criminal offence in the UK.
You talk about “asymmetry,” but haven’t offered any concrete examples of comparable cases being treated differently. Without evidence, that’s just conjecture. No one in government has used the language you suggest, and it’s not true that only “right-wing” speech is policed - Remember Sally Bercow, wife of former Commons Speaker John Bercow? In 2012, she tweeted:“Why is Lord McAlpine trending? *innocent face*”This followed a BBC Newsnight report that wrongly implicated Lord McAlpine in child abuse. While the report didn’t name him, social media did. The High Court ruled Bercow’s tweet was defamatory and implied guilt. She accepted the ruling.
It’s also interesting that many who defend “free speech” in the context of immigration rarely extend the same concern to, say, climate activism. Between November 2023 and April 2024, 695 Just Stop Oil activists were arrested, with 353 charged—a notably high charge rate for a protest group. And yet, none were charged with violence, threats, or incitement. Their tactics, while disruptive, were based on non-violent civil disobedience: blocking roads, staging sit-ins, targeting artworks. Charges included criminal damage and conspiracy to cause public nuisance.
If there’s an asymmetry, it seems to be in how “free speech defenders” selectively care about freedom—mainly when it’s about expressing racist or inflammatory views.
According to a plain reading of that tweet, the only thing that Connolly called for was mass deportation. How is saying "I don't care if someone else were to do this thing" incitement? She didn't even say that someone SHOULD do it. Had she said that in the US, it would 100% have been protected speech, no matter how regrettable.
As for the climate activists, as you yourself said, they weren't punished for their speech. They were punished for their actions, actions which were wholly separate from their speech. It's called civil disobedience for a reason. If you weren't violating the law, it wouldn't be disobedience!
Lastly, just to be clear that I'm not ignoring it, I have nothing to say about supposed non-punishment of leftist or Muslim speech as I'm not in the UK and don't use social media, so I have no idea if that's true or false.
“I went on TV to discuss Pakistani grooming gangs in my Labour-run hometown of Telford.
The next day, officers came banging on my door. They ignored victims for decades, but tried to intimidate me for blasting their failings
Labour doesn’t care.
They didn’t then, they don’t now.”
- This is testimony from a young British woman. Do you really want your fellow citizens treated like this? Even if you are a leftist and have much more sympathy for minorities than white women concerned about diversity?
Explain this - “Axel Rudakabana murdered 3 children and has access to kitchen facilities in prison.
Tommy Robinson made a documentary and is in permanent solitary confinement.”
Why is this? Why do the UK police and justice system think this is just?
“Racist” is not a word that applies anymore. Wanting to shut borders means you care about the stability and well being of your countrymen and women. It does not mean you hate anyone else. Left wingers cannot even think clearly anymore. It is like their brains short circuit and arrive at “racism” and “fascism” whenever a disagreement arises
I strongly believe that if even someone like you writes an article like this, it clearly shows how deeply dystopian influences are shaping the American debate. But aren't you the ones turning tourists away at the border just because of the subjective judgment of an officer, or because they have ironic memes about the president on their phone, or have sharply criticized him? Even just referring to Europe as a unified entity makes any logical reasoning collapse. What are we even talking about? Here, everyone criticizes everyone and everything. No one is turned away at the border out of personal dislike, and no one is massively relocated to another country without any kind of legal process. It seems to me you're living with a beam stabbing through your gut, your head, and your heart—while you worry about a few straws falling on the complex issues we're dealing with here at home. Unless, of course, you're talking about Hungary… now that is a real mess when it comes to democracy.
Nothing in this reply addressed any idea or example that Yascha included. It didn't even come close. If you believe that these laws (against nonviolent expression online) are good, perhaps you could explain why. If you believe they're bad then we agree. "No one is turned away at the border out of personal dislike." It appears that no one is turned away, for any reason... but what border? What are you talking about? I thought Europe was not a unified entity. Surely having "a border" would at least partially contradict that...
And doesn't Hungary consistently have one of the most popular governments in Europe? If your definition of democracy is supporting institutions and agendas that are increasingly unpopular (like the liberal immigration policies and generous migrant support in Germany) in the face of widespread public criticism, and using the police and the media to deride and dismiss that criticism, then not only is your definition of 'democracy' different from mine: it's the opposite.
British voters have wanted to halt and reverse non-European migration for over 20 years (it's more than 5 years for Germany) and no government has even begun to execute these wishes. That's not democracy. That's rule by a technocratic class which is increasingly hated by the regular people of EVERY country. Reversing that trend will require 'the elect' (the people who believe that their education and social status give them the right to coordinate society and manage the affairs of others, and the people who have advocated for increased international migration to bolster their economic and political position) to honestly deal with the growing chorus of hostility and complaint. When you're in power you don't have to pay too much attention to the commoners. They won't be in power forever, though-perhaps not even for much longer.
Francesco, I think it shows a poor judgement of Yascha to believe that any calls for the nations of Europe to improve means he thinks the USA is perfect! Both of these wide, large, and diverse locations are quite far from it.
You do not give the slightest evidence that the author is incorrect. You are just trying to change the subject, because you know that he is correct.
🎯- pure whataboutism
Alright, that’s fine. Look, I’m not someone who usually comments, so the fact that I wrote the previous comment is already exceptional for me — and with this, I’m done. The world is beautiful because it’s diverse.
The point isn’t to say that everything is perfect in Europe — who cares, I’m not here to defend anyone. The point is to tell you that you’re focusing on tiny events that are insignificant in the lives of Europeans. None of the dangers you mention actually exist. Not because we don’t see them, but because they’re episodes that end just a little beyond where they began.
What I’m saying is that the democratic crisis we’re all witnessing with the degeneration of the American system is so devastating, enormous, gigantic, that it feels like we’re watching a chicken thief in the henhouse while a nuclear bomb explodes in the farmer’s house.
The situations are so vastly incomparable that I don’t believe there’s any way to convince you otherwise — everything is so obviously clear that only political or cultural affiliation could prevent someone from seeing it.
Have fun!
“None of the dangers actually exists” except that people are, in fact going to prison in Europe.
Bemoaning the legitimate election of American president as a “degeneration of the American system” is odd as he was elected. Like I get you don’t like him, but sometimes democracies elect people you don’t like
Considering the political crisis in France, the rise of the Vox, reform party and AFD in Spain, the UK and Germany, the clustefuck of Romanian elections, the justice party winning in Poland, Hungary and Slovakia, or the collapse of the government in the Netherlands, the idea that Europe isn’t facing severe democratic challenges is so naive it’s laughable. It’s quite plausible (maybe even likely) that in the next 5 years the Vox, the AFD, Reform, and the National rally will be in charge
Excellent piece Yascha. I think we need to criminalize speech that undermines US foreign policy. Criticizing Israel? Prison - you're undermining our foreign policy. Advocating for transgender rights? Send them to prison, they are insulting biological women. Advocating for immigrants? Prison, of course - you're insulting law abiding citizens, and supporting terrorists to boot. Criticizing Trump? Then you go to the prison in El Salvador, sucker. Uggh. I'm aghast and demoralized by the fact that people criticizing your point of view seem oblivious to the concept that what's good for the goose is good for the gander. Keep up the excellent work Yascha, and for all you Europeans supporting these insane speech laws, please open your eyes to the fact that all of this could be turned around on you, and you too could be censored by a right-wing government.
Perhaps the worst is things like effectively banning Marine Le Pen, and that guy in Romania whose name I can never remember. And who doubts that now that AfD is the biggest party in Germany, the powers-that-be will find a way to ban them next time there is an election.
A very interesting and enlightening read for a European like me. The examples given are alarming: they make it flagrantly obvious that this kind of censorship is not sustainable and toxic for democracy. So thank you for waking me up to this.
But I’m surprised not to see a single mention made on algorithms. Social media is impossible to avoid even for those who aren’t connected at all, as it shapes the overall discourse, which is then reflected in traditional media.
While social communication should sustain the social fabric, it is on the contrary controlled by private corporations using opaque, profit-driven algorithms. This leads to increased polarization, as it triggers our animalistic attention based largely on fear and combativeness.
The cocktail of free speech and these algorithms is toxic as hell too, isn’t that quite obvious? Can speech really be qualified as free in such conditions?
Alas, it’s a well-known human weakness to take the easy path and pick on the weakest culprit, as Europe does in your examples. Censoring individuals is hitting the wrong target. Perhaps, in Europe as elsewhere, sleeves should be rolled up and action taken on a whole other scale. Communication between citizens should be a public good. Can we imagine an agora where the range of its members’ voices is amplified or muffled by dark algorithms?
The sad part is the people who think they're making sure they stop the next Hitler before he gains a following. Just remember that Hitler banned free speech just as soon as he had the power to do it.
No tyrant cementing power around himself claims to be doing it for himself. He proclaims that he is doing it for the people. The ability of the 'authorities' to silence any and all opposition is the essential component of totalitarianism.
Thanks for writing this. This story has festered in the background while everyone left of center including the DNC has continued to gaslight. Really appreciate your integrity in pushing out so many of these uncomfortable issues that absolutely need to be dealt with. The democrats have been denying this reality and making lame excuses while they simultaneously liken Trump to Hitler and Stalin. It's not the heat....it's the hypocrisy. Trump is no more (and admittedly no less) than a populist. Stalin and Mao were not charismatic and they were not populists--not by any reasonable definition. A populist is a charismatic politician (left or right) that rises to said popularity on a backlash sparked by elite overreach. That's us, folks, that's what we are and that's what did. A democracy is by definition a political framework in which populist backlashes can, and apparently do, occur when elites hog all the resources, hog all the power, and then hog all the culture. Anybody truly interested in beating Trump better start by admitting our own culpability in the overreach that led to this backlash. Then the next step is to publicly denounce the culture and cancellation war that has been waged against regular folks. Then, and only then, can you recover the centrists who cast a negative vote against whoever it is that was running things. An honest look at this story is 100% essential and has been far too long in the waiting. @Yascha if my poly-sci 101 is oversimplified don't pull any punches please.
Not really sure how the Dems should be so focused on European lack of freedoms of speech. Sure, I would like to see it, but it’s not their first priority surely ?
And first amendment sadly doesn’t protect against cancellation, online mobs, etc. Only constrains government. This is a deep cultural issue we’ll have to solve from non-political angles. Politics is downstream of culture after all.
The story goes beyond Europe. It's a western issue and we should be watching this very closely. So far the dems mainline response to speech issues has been to deny and gaslight even in the face of the reporting by Taibbi Shallenberger et al. My point is that this behavior played a decisive role in this backlash. When so many liberals ask "why are you making such a big deal [of the cultural issues] that would be why.
Dear Yascha, We have the European Convention on Human Rights, separate from the EU, and this has been incorporated into British law and entrenched as much as anything else in our system. You should have picked this up when you did your obviously too shallow research for this piece. Hopefully, you will review your piece and withdraw it meantime. Yours Simon
Yascha gave many specific examples. What does the Convention, or any laws, have to do with the actual people who were arrested and punished (and the many thousands of others who received the intended message)?
Lots of countries have laws about human rights and equality and democracy on the books, and they're completely ignored. If national governments are arresting pensioners and children for nonviolent comments, then I think that's a problem. There must be SOME reason why tens of thousands of Brits have been arrested, and thousands of Germans? The laws are irrelevant. These are consistent, long-standing, oppressive policies which are designed to protect the powerful. Do you think these kinds of policies are good, or bad?
Tens of thousands of Brits arrested for this! No, and you must be living in cloud cuckoo land if you believe that.
Yascha, that you have to write this today shows how little we (even in the West) understand how democracies work. For years I have been trying to raise awareness of the importance of building citizen competencies including critical thinking and dialogic capabilities- both of which (at a bare minimum) require freedom of thought and speech. For my sins I was told I was unreasonable, clueless and even insensitive to minority sentiments, while those who ignored my warnings about an inept citizenry created profitable careers for themselves and spoke eloquently about the imminent collapse of democracies. After all it is far safer and profitable to talk about the dangers of authoritarianism and the Right-Wing than to suggest that the foundational problem of all democracies was that 'We, the People' didn't even have the cognitive capabilities needed to separate fact from fiction, let alone preserve their complex democratic political systems.
As you painstakingly explain, Hate Speech laws are the gateway to censorship and illiberalism. It shouldn't require a PhD to understand this.