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Notes -
Kanye West is banned from Twitter. So obviously any definition of free speech absolutism doesn't include him.
Snark aside - and the anti Elon crowd is quite snarky - the whole free speech for people in meltdown or not quite mentally stable is interesting question. My approach to human rights have often been - approve of them as long as I get to define who the humans are. So it turns out that my approach to free speech is that while I will go to extremes to protect the free, I don't consider the incoherent ramblings of a drunken hobo as speech.
On the other hand while it is easy to say "Cut his access to the social networks until he has cool down, so he stop hurting himself" and probably it is the best thing to do - I can see how a policy of for your own good can be used to cull all the edgy content.
Ye's post that Musk identified as an "incitement to violence" was a swastika embedded in a Star of David, to signify how both sides should love each other. I don't understand why he'd identify that as an incitement to violence, and I think it'd have been better for Musk to just admit he's doing this because Ye is off his rocker.
It's ironic to see free speech warriors pulling the same move the wokes do: yes, we're for free speech however some things just can't be tolerated but are still being defended as speech so we're going to use the "incitement to violence/harassment is not protected speech" exception.
Let's wait and see if it takes on the utterly stretched, mutilated character "danger" has in woke discourse as the need for exceptions grows.
This assumes that Musk is, or ever was, a "free speech warrior." Actual free speech warriors are in fact extremely skeptical of claims of incitement to violence, and insist that that exception be extremely narrow, and certainly not nearly narrow enough to encompass that post. Most obviously, see the relevant Supreme Court precedent
Sounds like No True Scotsman
Nope. This is an issue that actual free speech advocates have dealt with forever. In addition to my previous link see eg here and here
Yeah, there's a long history here. I'm squishy enough on the matter that I'm not entirely happy with Brandenburg v. Ohio's test, but I don't think there are any really plausible reads that make the publicly-known posts clear violations.
I expect Musk is more directly under pressure from German/EU environments where this does violate standing law -- German law in particular has a ton of rules related to fascist symbols -- which has been Musk's publicly repeated standard, but it also shows the problems with that standard.
((And, tbf, I'm 50/50 on whether Ye's having a genuine mental breakdown and/or doing some Springtime With Hitler-level punking, but the odds of the former are high enough that I could see the argument for intervening as a friend, albeit perhaps a better argument for intervening with the help of some men with white coats bearing extra-long sleeves.))
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