Poll: Almost a Third of Americans Say the First Amendment Goes 'Too Far'

The survey also found that two-thirds of respondents believe that America is on the "wrong track" when it comes to free speech.

According to a new poll from the Foundation for Individual Rights and Expression (FIRE), a First Amendment organization, nearly a third of Americans, including similar numbers of Republicans and Democrats, say that the First Amendment goes "too far" in the rights it guarantees. More than half agreed that their local community should not allow a public speech that espouses a belief they find particularly offensive.

"Those results were disappointing, but not exactly surprising," said FIRE Chief Research Adviser Sean Stevens in a Tuesday press release. "Here at FIRE, we've long observed that many people who say they're concerned about free speech waver when it comes to beliefs they personally find offensive. But the best way to protect your speech in the future is to defend the right to controversial and offensive speech today."

The survey, which was conducted in partnership with the Polarization Research Lab (PRL) at Dartmouth College, asked 1,000 Americans about their opinions on free speech and expression. The survey found that "when it comes to whether people are able to freely express their views," over two-thirds of respondents said they believed America was headed in the wrong direction. Further, only 25 percent of respondents agreed that the right to free speech was "very" or "completely" secure.

The survey also asked respondents to read a dozen controversial statements and pick the one they found most offensive. The most disliked beliefs were that "all whites are racist oppressors," followed by statements like "America got what it deserved on 9/11" and "January 6th was a peaceful protest." The survey then asked respondents whether they'd agree with allowing this opinion to be expressed in different circumstances.

Half of the respondents said that their community "definitely" or "probably" should not permit a public speech expressing the opinion they found most offensive. A whopping 69 percent said a local college should "definitely" or "probably" not allow a professor who holds such an opinion to teach there. Over a quarter of respondents said that someone who previously said the offensive opinion should be fired from their job.

These results indicate that though the average American is concerned about protecting free speech rights, a significant portion of the population seem poised to welcome increasing censorship.

"The average American already thinks that free speech in America is in dire straits. Most worryingly, they think it will get worse," said Stevens. "These findings should be a wake-up call for the nation to recommit to a vibrant free speech culture before it's too late."

Comments

[Idaho-Bob]

Almost a Third of Americans Say the First Amendment Goes 'Too Far'

Considering Millennials and Zoomers makeup ~40% of the population, I'm not surprised.

[DesigNate]

I’d like to say fuck you for the dig at millennials, seeing as some of us are in our 40’s, but I’ve read too many posts on the Millenial subreddit to argue with you.

[Spiritus Mundi]

The oldest millenials didn't really have functional internet until they were off to college. The youngest have never known life without it. It is a bifurcated generation with a wide variation from the start to the end.

[Dillinger]

I'd comment about how this seems correct but I'm genX so barely care.

[JesseAz]

Meh.

[Dillinger]

exactly.

[InsaneTrollLogic]

Whatever.

[MrMxyzptlk]

Yeah, fuck it.

[Truthteller1]

Complete bullshit. The internet was functional in the mid 90's, earlier really.

[MrMxyzptlk]

Yup. Al Gore invented it.

[B G]

It took a bit of skill to get around the internet prior to 1994 since everything was command line based, and downloading porn generally involved doing a uudecode, then waiting 45 minutes to download a 300x400 pixel (about 1/4 of a screen) static image in 16-bit color. One of the best siglines I remember seeing back then was "I read a.b.p.e for the articles" (either you know what that means or it'd just take too long to explain all of the context...)

There were some interesting threads that popped up on usenet during the 1992 campaign when Bill Clinton called for the creation of an "information superhighway" that could connect all of the nation's computers together. Brilliant political strategy in a way, to call for the creation of something that's actually existed for decades already; best way to appear to be successful unless people figure it out.

[MrMxyzptlk]

In the mid 1990s I was living in Denver Colorado and was using some Israeli developed computer program to text communicate in real time with people across the world. I met my wife online when it still cost a lot to make long distance calls. We also chatted in real time through a web based chat room. I recall making a web site around that time using HTML.

I'm not sure of exact dates here. I know we got married in 2000 and we had chatted for quite some time before we got engaged. I can't remember if it was dialup or not, I know we accessed over the phone lines. Don't recall the speed.

[B G]

I'm pretty sure the first versions of the original HTML browser program were rolled out to the public in 1994, and rudimentary web sites started popping up pretty soon after that; initially for universities and agencies like NASA and maybe a few corporations. I don't remember when the initial hosting servers for personal web sites started to pop up ( I want to say that an early one was called "tripod"?)

Some of the "online services" which people initially dialed into started to allow outside internet access at some point around then; a lot of the experienced users got really agitated when AOL rolled theirs out becuase a lot of their users didn't know the difference between what was inside the AOL environment and what wasn't. Those services (AOL, Prodigy, etc) might have also provided some hosting for a certain amount of data for users to post personal "home pages" accessible via www.

[MrMxyzptlk]

Yeah, short of a timeline of developments and such its hard to remember the bad old days when we only had three channels and no TV remotes.

[Johnathan Galt]

This is how ALL politicians operate. Make a great hew and cry about something you know is going to happen anyway; with great ballyhoo tell everyone you are going to do something, and that something will cause the thing you already know will happen, to happen. Then claim credit when it happens.

All roosters. All crowing. All claiming they made the sun rise.

[Spiritus Mundi]

Dial up internet was not functional.

[WCPlace]

Of course it was, just not for surfing porn like you do 18 hours per day!

[MrMxyzptlk]

When I got internet access in Denver Colorado I was lucky to be on an area where we had good speeds for the time. My boss came over and tested the relative speed by going to a porn site and seeing how fast the picture downloaded. He was impressed and I learned far too much about his kinks....

[Nazi-Chipping Warlock]

Sure, some of us have been on the internet for basically forever. But it's not like now where almost everyone is on the internet, effortlessly.

I would guess the vast majority of millenials have never configured a SLIP or PPP connection.

[MrMxyzptlk]

SPEAK NOT THE NAME OF THOSE DREADED PROTOCALLS ER YOUR CONNECTION BE PLAGUED WITH SLOW SPEEDS!!!

[Minadin]

I didn't have broadband until I went to college in 1997 / 1998, and the first professional office I worked at circa 2005 still had dial-up, where only one person could be on the internet at a time, and it blocked both the fax line (which was a real thing) and the secondary phone.

[Granite]

Tell me you worked in the third world without telling me. Bruh t3 lines were already going out of style in favor of broadband cable in 2005. We had extremely fast internet in 2005. Hell we had extremely fast internet as early as 2000. We were downloading entire albums from Napster and Kazaa in less than a minute. You either are getting the dates wrong or you were working for Sno Shack.

[Minadin]

Dates are legit. Maybe your experience isn't universal or your memory is faulty.

Not everyone adopted the latest tech as early as you might have - and if you weren't at a university or a large coastal metropolitan area, the infrastructure actually lagged behind. Unless you think that KC is the '3rd world', 'bruh'. The first office that I worked at most definitely had dial-up when I arrived in June of 2005, and I was a big part of the push to upgrade them to broadband.

As far as other countries -

Argentina circa 1997, the places I lived, absolutely did not have internet. Not at the homes, not at the high school. They probably had it in the cities. No one had cell phones, either. I communicated with people back home by hand writing notes on paper and sending them through the postal service, because international long-distance calling was so expensive. And I'm not even sure I would call them a 3rd world country, either.

Denmark, in 2000, definitely not a 3rd world country in anyone's imagination, and they definitely had internet, but most broadband access I saw was either at the university I attended or at internet cafes. My host parents had broadband internet at the business they owned, and were looking into replacing their home dial-up service. Digital cameras were a brand new thing - some models used both film and a digital sensor, and they had one, which was cool. International calling was a lot less expensive, so no more letter-writing. Some people had mobile phones, but they weren't worth using internationally with the roaming charges.

[DesigNate]

I prefer the term Oregon Trail Millenial.

All the Gen X responses are fucking perfect btw. Chefs kiss.

[mad.casual]

I wonder how much of the third is people genuinely caught up in the weeds between Free Speech, libel, demonstrable harm, and tards like FIRE saying “best way to protect your speech in the future is to defend the right to controversial and offensive speech today” and then defending a social activist defaming a university while using the university's own intellectual property to do it.

Because I’m only like 30% in favor of any given bullshit that FIRE (‘E’ as in ‘E’xpression, not ‘E’ducation) identifies as free speech.

[Rob Misek]

If one third of Americans think that being coerced and unable to speak makes them free it must be the one third that coerces the other two thirds.

[B G]

Says the liar who yearns to impose a system like what they've got in Iran, China, North Korea, Syria, and Cuba.

[Rob Misek]

You obviously have no intention to attempt to prove that lie.

[B G]

The countries I named all have laws on the books allowing their governments to criminalize speech which they've decided is false, dishonest, or likely to "coerce" people to behave in undesirable ways. This is exactly what you've repeatedly called for to be established in this country (along with some bizarro interpretation under which merely being factually inaccurate or not fully informed could be turned into criminal offenses).

The only difference between those regimes and the one you imagine in your fever dreams is that you think there's a version in which those who enforce the laws can actually be held accountable by the same laws. I guess nobody should be surprised that names like Robespierre and Torquemada were ever mentioned in whatever version of history was taught within the North Idaho Aryan Nations cult in which you grew up (odd that you've never disputed that any time I've suggested it...). Maybe a bit surprising they didn't lean into the Spanish Inquisition, considering how heavily it targeted Jews and other non-Catholics.

Do I really have any need to "prove" that you've advocated for enacting laws which would criminalize whatever you happen to view as "dishonesty"? Or that you've repeatedly insisted that in such a prosecution you'd want the burden of proof to be on the accused, in direct violation of the long established meaning of "due process" under the Constitution in which that burden is always put on the prosecution, and the accused is supposed to be "presumed innocent until proven guilty")?

[Rob Misek]

“The countries I named all have laws on the books allowing their governments to criminalize speech which they’ve decided is false, dishonest, or likely to “coerce” people to behave in undesirable ways.”

Like perjury and fraud are criminalized fuckwit?

[B G]

More like how political dissent, or even being suspected of some kind of disloyalty is criminalized.

Somehow I expect what you're really after is some way to make it illegal for undercover law enforcement to infiltrate groups like the cult in which you grew up with the intention of dismantling their leadership. How many of your friends/family ended up facing prison time when the FBI crushed most of the Aryan Nations groups in North Idaho? Are you one of the ones who ended up going over to Whitefish, MT and following Richard Spencer around? Maybe worried the same might happen to that group?

I've addressed why criminalizing fraud and perjury are fundamentally different from your insane dream of making any incorrect, or disputable statement a criminal offense. I've even stated flatly that I don't support the criminalization of holocaust denial as it's been enacted in Europe; ironically it would be something which would almost immediately get you imprisoned in this country if your preferred system were actually enacted since every credible historian at every significant University in the USA would explain to the court that all of your alleged "proof" is either irrelevant, is being misinterpreted, or extrapolated beyond its significance (besides which, you'd have to empanel 10000 juries to get one with a single member who'd be at all receptive to your rantings).

[mad.casual]

I take a gray box from Misek as a backhanded affirmation of what I said and would expect similar to be obvious to anyone familiar with Misek.

TL, DR-
FIRE (Education): Thomas Sowell
FIRE (Expression): Claudine Gay

FIRE (Expression) is no friend of anyone else's free speech or liberty. They literally only advocate it in defense of overtly socialist policies like activists professors are owed jobs outside their contract and activist students are owed special treatment outside policy and even if that policy violates other, more longstanding and fundamental policy like Title IX.

[Rob Misek]

Get your “affirmation” how you can loser.

The bigotry button was made for pathetic fuckwits like you.

[MrMxyzptlk]

I'd argue their religious upbringing has more to do with it than their ages. Religion is all about intolerance of the other. This isn't to forgive the left since their religion of Marxism is just as intolerant and stupid as any other superstition based religion.

[JesseAz]

Religion is all about intolerance of the other.

This is largely false.

[MrMxyzptlk]

Islam proves my point all by itself. Fastest growing religion in the world.

[retiredfire]

Islam is an ideology, masquerading as a religion.
And a murderous one at that.

[Liberty_Belle]

Same with Christianity, but so few people ever call it out for such.

[Johnathan Galt]

False.

Some SECTS of Christianity were subverted into cults - like the Roman Catholic Church at the time of the Inquisitions.

But, Christ never advocated any of that.

Modern Progressive ideology is more toxic than even the Inquisition (although perhaps a tad less overtly violent, but not by much). It has become the Cult of Marx. I like the term "Demunists" for brevity.

[MrMxyzptlk]

Ah yes, the infamous picking and choosing of history and sub cults to assemble your ideology.

Is that any different than Marxists claiming that the ideas of Marx and Engels were never correctly implemented? "No, Stalin wasn't a REAL Marxist! His pogroms had nothing to do with true socialism."

Christ never wrote a book of the Bible, that we know of, you know only about him from the writings of four of the twelve disciples. Even those four can't manage a consistent story. They don't all agree where he was born much less if he ever claimed to have divine heritage.

Just because one cult chose different quotes than your cult doesn't mean you get to dismiss them out of hand any more than you let Athiests dismiss communist leaders who discarded their childhood faiths in favor of creating religions that put them in the throne of gawd.

[Johnathan Galt]

Cult, not religion. Religions are founded on seeking enlightenment. Cults like Islam are founded on creating armies to conquer, subjugate, and enslave.

[MrMxyzptlk]

So you don't believe Judeaism is a religion? It was founded on attacking other cultures and murdering the males and any women who had known a man while keeping those who had not known a man as slaves.

According to their own holy book they did this across the middle east. Their angry, petulant and greedy god sent them on mass killing sprees everywhere.

What of the babies of Egypt who were murdered by their god? What about the times Moses was told by their god to murder fellow tribesmen who had turned to idolatry while Moses was carving his ten commandments?

If Judeaism isn't a religion what does that say about Christianity that is a derivation of Judeaism. Your savior himself was a Jew. His followers were Jews. So were they men of god to begin with? How can the derivative of a cult of death not be another cult.of death.

[Truthfulness]

Your antisemitism is noted and reported.

[Granite]

Actually bro, the primary most fundamental tenet of any religion in the western world, is to exclude. That is what separates the right from the apostate.

Religion is a fucking cancer bc beliefs are by definition not part of this reality, and thus cause for contention.

[mad.casual]

Oh Good. Another sarcasmic that believes he's so radically divergent and so morally and socially enlightened that he hovers above the rest of humanity for the last couple thousand years.

[Yawn]

You deride the left of their religion of Marxism and then ascribe religion not as a belief system but as a synonym with intolerance or excommunication in distinct Marxist/Orwellian fashion and in plain refutation of the obvious fact that people are intolerant and exclusive without religion *and* that some of the most tolerant and accepting people on Earth are among the most religious.

Congrats on finally attaining the level of useful idiot.

[MrMxyzptlk]

So insults instead of a defense. That seems typical.

You know Stalin was raised to be a priest in the Russian Orthodox Church. He clearly learned the mind numbing effect of religion considering the methods he used were very similar to how churches brainwash and control their flocks so they are more easily fleeced. The Soviet Nation Anthem is clearly influenced by the formula of the hymn. Dirge like and filled with glorification of their god the state.

Hitler has a confusing number of quotes out there where he often claims to be Christian. The Catholic Church clearly supported Hitler's Regime up to and including aiding Nazis in getting to South America. They were quite happy with Hitler killing Jews and took over 40 years to find one priest in Germany to canonize because he wasn't totally with the Nazi ideology.

The Catholic Church also supported their own home grown Italian dictator. Not having any problems as long as they still got their peice of the pie.

Intolerance and bigotry are part of the whole package. Insistance that your sect has the only path to heaven and all others will burn in hell. Monotheism is all about feeling superior to others and until after the Nazi Death Camps were found and publicized Christians of many stripes called Jews "Christ Killers". Some branches still do, but not as loud as before.

Silencing dissent is what religions do. To deny that is to deny reality. Oh wait, that's another thing religions do.

[freedomwriter]

You must real dumb to think this is generation specific. This is a human problem. I want MY freedom, not YOUR freedom if it contradicts my beliefs. That is how it has always been.

[Bill Falcon]

woke is the problem..cultural marxists have been pushing this crap since they started to take over all insitutions from the media to academia to govt and the NGO grifter set. doesn't help when you have the same cast of folks who took over big tech pushing the attack on the bill of rights. With those folks it is all about Trotsky....isn't it?

[MrMxyzptlk]

Sure, the religious on the right side of the aisle have been trying to silence those they disagree with as much as those on the left worshiping the syphalitic ramblings of Marx. The right just sucks at it and they dont have the power they had in the 80s and 90s and it shows. I've been banned from as many right leaning sites as left leaning sites. Moderators abusing their power to silence dissent isn't a feature reserved for the left.

[Ajsloss]

Feel free to gtfo.

[Earth-based Human Skeptic]

Exactly. My fantasy is some sort of declaration people must agree to honor that would somehow redirect the statists to exit the nation. I know, not very libertarian, but I don't know how else to protect a free society from those eager to "improve" it.

[MrMxyzptlk]

Improve it in what way? Make it more gay or make it more Christian?

Those of us who are strait and atheist would like to know.

[mad.casual]

Those of us who are strait and atheist would like to know.

Wow, after declaring religion to be about intolerance, declaring all the various Christian, Marxist, and other religious peoples by any definition he may dream up to be beneath him, he deigns speak on behalf of all straight atheists (in order to not give any answers or enlightenment)! How transcendental of him!

[MrMxyzptlk]

So. No answer then. Expected.

[Senor Science]

Getting an improvement to the Constitution as it exists would be near impossible. I am grateful for Amendments 1 & 2.

[Granite]

That’s dumb. If everyone is convinced free speech is bad, well they just have to wait for you to age out and then they’ll have it their way. I suspect the brainwashing will be so effective that people will embrace their totalitarian overlords and actually be happy for once. That’s they only way this plan of theirs will be successful.

[Dillinger]

>>nearly a third of Americans, including similar numbers of Republicans and Democrats, say that the First Amendment goes "too far"

this is the one time of year I agree with Kirkland, but probably for different reasons.

[Naime Bond]

Getting closer and closer to people using the 2nd, not the 1st, to express their opinion.

[B G]

We're also getting closer to the only states where the 1st is still respected are the places that aren't trying to repeal the 2nd.

[MrMxyzptlk]

Been hearing that for over 30 years. Hasn't happened yet. Doubt it will happen now.

[Mickey Rat]

So the first most disliked belief is a blatantly racist progressive sentiment. The second one is a jibe at progressive hypocrisy at how riots are treated depending on whether they originate from the political Left or Right.

[The Ignorant One]

...and 45 million Americans are functionally illiterate and read below a 5th grade level. The best part is they can vote!

[Spiritus Mundi]

Government schools need moar funding. Teachers work for slave wages, and have to deal with all those icky kids who refuse to wear a face mask or change their gender.

[MrMxyzptlk]

To be fair most southerners at the time of the War of Northern Aggression were pretty much illiterate. But they could vote. Heck, northerners weren't much better and they could vote too. Since slaves were forbidden to learn reading and math before the War of Northern Agression they were likely illiterate when they were given the vote. We gave women the right to vote before we mandated school attendance so many of those women were probably illiterate too.

Hell, illiterate voting has been a tradition in this nation. Why stop now?

[Senor Science]

Sometimes it is the under "educated" that has wisdom. Devoting your life to the study of narrow and tiny part of the universe usually means neglect of other parts. Hence the utter stupidity of so many PHD's in broader realities of life, politics, and political economy.

[mad.casual]

And, true to libertarian principles, now and of the time, if your ideas benefited the wider market or humanity in general, it didn't matter if you were a an unofficially-educated, University-employed, "instructor of elocution and music", or a couple of unofficially-educated brothers running a bicycle shop.

[MrMxyzptlk]

Experience is learning from your own mistakes.

Education is learning from the mistakes of others.

[Granite]

Even worse, half have an iq of less than 100. To be fair, the whole world is like that too, but still…

[A Cynical Asshole]

FTFY:

Poll: Almost a Third of Americans Say the First Amendment Goes 'Too Far' Are Shitheads

[Spiritus Mundi]

44 million Americans are immigrants plus another 10-30 million illegals. Them plus their children almost make a third.

[Sandra (formerly OBL)]

Reminder: Reason.com used to publish an extreme leftwing authoritarian nutcase named Noah Berlatsky who later produced this jaw-dropper.

Is the First Amendment too broad? The case for regulating hate speech in America.

[Dillinger]

mirrors are such terrible weapons.

[Shlomo's Shiksa]

Before Berlatsky became a spokesman for homosexual pedophiles.

[JesseAz]

From The FIRE:

“Polarization not only divides Americans on policy, but it fractures our assessments of the stability of the bedrock features of our democracy,” said PRL Director Sean Westwood. “Nearly half of Democrats think free speech rights are headed in the right direction, compared to only 26 percent of Republicans. And more than a third of Republicans think the right to free speech is not secure, compared to only 17 percent of Democrats.”

So... the cancel culture/censorship we've seen the last 7 years seem to be more supported by the left as the right direction.

[Sevo]

Those proportions are not what the article claims.

[JesseAz]

The article only posted the parts Emma could use for both sides argumentation.

https://www.thefire.org/news/poll-69-americans-believe-country-wrong-track-free-speech

[mad.casual]

"Jan. 6th was a peaceful protest." being more 'too far' than "Abortion should be completely illegal." is blowing my mind (but not really).

"I know this procedure that I've said is lifesaving and without which I've said the patriarchy enslaves you as a woman is important but we've got to deal with these people walking through the Capitol with a buffalo hat on first."

They really have between zero and some negative amount of principles (like they'll only adopt your principles in order to stab you in the back with them) and are confused why *everyone* doesn't want to obliterate Trump or anyone associated with him from history as much as they do.

It's like some sort of insane movie plot where Trump tried to cast a love spell and it backfired and caused like 10% of the population to go insane and want to murder him except he didn't cast a spell and 10% of the population just went insane and wants to murder him for no particular reason at all. [cue clip of The Cazies, The Happening, etc.]

[A Thinking Mind]

Reading this, I do have to wonder how thin some of the respondents were trying to slice things. There’s things I think people are wrong to say, but that doesn’t mean I think they’re not allowed to say it. There are people who hold certain views that I would prefer not be taught, but whether their teaching is connecting to their views can be a bit sticky.

People who believe all white people are racist oppressors, for instance, probably shouldn’t be teaching white students because they’re unfairly biased against those students. That is not me saying they should be silenced, that’s me advocating for the rights of others not to be discriminated against.

EDIT: And this can be a problem with polling. Polling really wants quantifiable data it can plug into an output, but if someone has a nuanced answer like, "Don't silence them but keep them from having authority over the people they're racially biased against," that's not going to show up in polling data.

[A Cynical Asshole]

Eh...

These results indicate that though the average American is concerned about protecting free speech rights, a significant portion of the population seem poised to welcome increasing censorship.

I think the way I'd parse these results is that most people want free speech rights for themselves, but not "those people" that they don't like.

[JesseAz]

If you read the article on thefire.org, this was a pretty badly applied poll. Unclear definitions of free speech mixed with polling about statements someone feels distasteful. They seem to mix the two different ideas into the same poll without very clearly descriptive questions.

[A Cynical Asshole]

I'm not surprised. Usually when you get weird poll results it's because the poll itself was poorly designed/ odd or confusing questions, etc.

[JesseAz]

Here is another example of them doing it.

Americans’ tolerance for offensive speakers
The bipartisan “agreement” on whether the First Amendment goes too far is also evident in Americans’ tolerance of people who express ideas they consider offensive. Democrats and Republicans do not differ much, if at all, in their willingness to censor or otherwise sanction speakers they find offensive. What does differ is who they find offensive.
.
When asked to identify the most offensive idea from a list, Democrats most frequently identify “January 6th was a peaceful protest” (21%), “Abortion should be completely illegal” (16%), and “America got what it deserved on 9/11” (15%), as the most offensive.
Republicans, on the other hand, most frequently identify “All whites are racist oppressors” (25%) and “Black Lives Matter is a hate group” (11%) as the most offensive.
Democrats and Republicans also both identify “America got what it deserved on 9/11” as one of the more offensive statements (15% and 22%, respectively).
Overall, about 1 in 5 Americans (19%) picked “All whites are racist oppressors,” followed by “America got what it deserved on 9/11” (18%) and “January 6th was a peaceful protest” (12%), as the most offensive idea.
After identifying the most offensive idea, respondents were then asked about their tolerance for someone who expressed that view.

So basically they are setting up people to have ire against a speech, asked their tolerance, then infer free speech attitudes from that leading poll setup.

https://www.thefire.org/news/first-national-speech-index-shows-mixed-bag-free-speech

[JesseAz]

And this is the followup.

More than two-thirds of Americans (69%) either “somewhat” or “strongly” oppose allowing a person who has said something they consider offensive to teach at the local college, and about half (52%) say they “somewhat” or “strongly” oppose allowing this person to give a public speech in their local community.
Around two-fifths (41%) say that they “somewhat” or “strongly” support removing this person’s book from the public library, and almost a third (29%) say that they “somewhat” or “strongly” support this person getting fired from their job.

So basically they point not to criminalization for speech, but of consequences involving taxpayer funds or jobs.

[mad.casual]

So basically they point not to criminalization for speech, but of consequences involving taxpayer funds or jobs.

I wish I could say I as psychic but it's like the whole "We didn't know the Biden Administration was going to do this!" situation. FIRE has, for quite some time, been advocating on behalf of activist (low-level) professors to effectively guarantee that they're unable to be fired and/or owed jobs... and this is in a University system that's already has tenure and is collapsing under it's own weight. They aren't a free speech organization, but that doesn't stop Reason from using them as the reference metric or gold standard and "being confused" or sewing confusion in others as a result.

[mad.casual]

You mean almost like FIRE themselves has trouble with traditional distinctions between free speech, personal opinion, other rights, and legally actionable/defensible acts? Like their just a Tastes Great/Less Filling (We do a shitty job defending all Civil Rights! vs. We ignore other civil rights just do a shitty job defending free speech!), BOAF SIDEZ alternative to the ACLU?

Huh. You don't say.

[Yuno Hoo]

most people want free speech rights for themselves, but not “those people” that they don’t like.

"You know. 'Those people.' The ones that can't be trusted with firearms or drugs, either."

[MrMxyzptlk]

Most of those people don't think others should have access to plastic silverware for fear they'd stab someone.

[Sevo]

Or throw it in the oceans!!!!!

[MrMxyzptlk]

Ah, you've watched the Aquaman movies too I see.

[freedomwriter]

You are spot on and it is the always the way humans have operated.

[mad.casual]

I think the way I’d parse these results is that most people want free speech rights for themselves, but not “those people” that they don’t like.

Of course, the fact that half the political discourse involves a group of people using their free speech to overtly try to convince people that “bitter clingers” and the people they trust to own guns to give up their guns so that they can put a bullet in all their skulls kinda justifies the distrust.

Again, just like the tranny issue isn’t about what people do inside their own bathroom stalls or the gay issue isn’t about what people do inside their own bedrooms and hasn’t been for decades, if ever: One side is broadly OK with your speech, your ownership of guns, or your (non-)reproductive habits, as long as it’s relatively clear that no one gets hurt and the other side openly says “Eat bugs, sleep in pods, own nothing, be happy.” and when someone says, “Is that an observation or a mandate?” answers “We’re just an international conglomeration of governments, world leaders, and sympathetic useful idiots just making observations here.”

[SMP0328]

The First Amendment, along with the rest of the Bill of Rights, is meant to be antimajority. We're talking about individual rights that are not supposed to be subject to democracy.

Also, I'm sure this third of Americans can't come close to agreeing on what limitations to place on free speech. How many want to exclude hate speech? How about corporations? What of flag desecration? In the end, I take comfort in that two-thirds of the respondents to this poll fully support free speech.

[Use the Schwartz]

This is a failure of our education system, our politicians, and our media.

Race to the bottom, and you will reach it.

But! It’s okay, someone needs to clean the toilets. And 1/3 of respondents seems like a manageable number of ignorami.

[Earth-based Human Skeptic]

From their perspective this is another win. Remember how progressives told us they would march through academia, media, and the political establishment? And that they would then seize power and remake the nation?

[freedomwriter]

I do not. Post the evidence please. I would like to read it.

[MrMxyzptlk]

Which batch are you talking about? The idiots that think you shouldn't be able to talk about January 6th being non violent or the morons who think you shouldn't be able to talk about the US getting what it deserved on 9-11?

[Use the Schwartz]

Dirty toilets don’t care about politics – they just need cleaning.

[Yuno Hoo]

"[The] best way to protect your speech in the future is to defend the right to controversial and offensive speech today."

How did *that* utterance rank in the list of controversial/offensive statements?

[Earth-based Human Skeptic]

In other shocking news, more than a third of Americans wished they lived in a country that had more socialism, less freedom, stronger authoritarian government, higher taxes (mostly on others), single party rule, and just plain ideological conformity, but are too lazy to move to any existing utopian country that better fits their dreams.

[MrMxyzptlk]

Another third want to live in a Christian Theocracy where the law of their Bible is the law of the land.

The other third just wish those other fuckers would leave them alone.

[freedomwriter]

lol good one

[mad.casual]

Another third want to live in a Christian Theocracy where the law of their Bible is the law of the land.

MOAR TESTING! LESS COMSTOCK! MOAR #IFLS! LESS RETHUGLIKAN KKKRISTCHUNZ!

Your schtick was tired even before the rise of the "moral majority".

[MrMxyzptlk]

If it's tired that's only because Christians in America never tire of trying to impose their ideology on the rest of us.

[Truthfulness]

That simply isn't true. Plenty of universities, corporations and celebrities mocked these Christians into marginalization. The actual number of "Christian Theocrats" is far smaller than you think.

The same cannot be said of secular wokesters--the elite establishment left lends them full support towards their cause.

[MrMxyzptlk]

Marginalized? How many elected representatives at the Federal level aren't Christians? I'm not saying you don't think they are Christians because you don't like them but on their websites say they are Atheists, much less Buhdists or some other non Abrahamic religion?

How many CEOs of fortune 500 companies are public Atheists? How many state governors? How many heads of major universities?

You have people in public life terrified to say they don't believe in your god and you claim marginalization?

[freedomwriter]

You are under the impression anyone can just move to any country they want tinkle brain?

[MrMxyzptlk]

I'm shocked the numbers were so low. Most people are not in favor of those they disagree with having plastic silverware much less a right to speak their blasphemous ideas in public.

People tend to think rights are all fine and dandy for themselves but favor draconian limits on others. Those of us willing to accept that the religious right has the right indoctrinate their children into a bronze age religion and that the far left Alphabet Mafia has the right to indoctrinate their children into their more modern but just as idiotic wokism are few and far between, as these forums frequently show.

Popular speach does not need protection as the majority already agrees with those ideas and will allow them to propagate. It is unpopular speach, meaning the speach you don't like, that needs protection from the majority.

[Truthfulness]

You're deeply mistaken with your characterization of the "religious right"--most of them simply want religious freedom, which many people like you do not believe in.

Maybe you ought to credit that "bronze age religion" for doing much to shape the lives of billions of individuals. The same cannot be said of the "far left Alphabet Mafia".

[MrMxyzptlk]

Yeah, because their obsession with abortion is based on pure logic and reason.

[Minadin]

Polls can say all sorts of BS. For instance, over at al-Reuters:

https://www.reuters.com/world/us/extremism-is-us-voters-greatest-worry-reutersipsos-poll-finds-2024-02-27/

"Worries about political extremism or threats to democracy have emerged as a top concern for U.S. voters and an issue where President Joe Biden has a slight advantage over Donald Trump ahead of the November election, a new Reuters/Ipsos poll showed."

Meanwhile at Gallup:

"Immigration Surges to Top of Most Important Problem List.
A majority of Americans (86%) say illegal immigration is a critical or important threat to the United States."

https://news.gallup.com/poll/611135/immigration-surges-top-important-problem-list.aspx

[NOYB2]

Poll: Almost a Third of Americans Say the First Amendment Goes 'Too Far'

I say it goes entirely not too far enough!

[mad.casual]

Richard Nixon's Head on a giant war robot/SMOD '24!

[Jerry B.]

“Almost a Third of Americans Say the First Amendment Goes 'Too Far'”

Almost a third of Americans should probably meet Mr. Woodchipper.

[Oafish]

Meh. Another day another BS survey to rile up the sheep. In other news, 95% of respondents don’t think their opinions stink as much as a homeless persons’ a hole.

[Sevo]

Another day, another pile of bullshit from the arrogant Oafish asshole.
Doncha love it that twits like this infer that 'all humanity is stupid', while exempting themselves? Just landed from somewhere near Alpha Centauri, did you?

[tlapp]

We have a 2nd Amendment to protect us from that 1/3

[Davulek]

And they can say that BECAUSE of the 1st Amendment.
How stupid are Americans?

[Johnathan Galt]

Almost a third of Americans also believe that full-on totalitarianism would be a better government, too. Hard to take such surveys seriously...

[NOYB2]

A third of Americans are socialists or fascists; that's still significantly lower than in Europe.

[voluntaryist]

“…a wake up call for the nation…before it’s too late.”
It’s never too late or too early to demand our rights be respected.

Fascists are socialists that try to pass as capitalists, e.g., protecting property rights. It's a lie. They protect their interests and profit by conspiring with socialist businesspersons at everyone's expense.

[DocAvi]

Guarantee it’s the same demographic of retards who are boosted and addicted to cable news. A third of this country is irredeemable.

[JesseAz]

Double meh.

[Mother's Lament]

Dare you to make that bet with Sarcasmic.

[Sevo]

Hey lynn, please make your family proud, your dog happy and the world a far better place:
Fuck off and die a long, painful death, slimy pile of lefty dishonest shit.

[Johnathan Galt]

I had eggs for breakfast!