Some 25 years ago when I made the move from the political left to the political right, I took with me three liberal ideals: I remained an extremist on the issues of free speech and the rights of the accused, and have held on to my loathing for Big Business. A quick glance at today’s headlines proves that those ideals no longer belong to the left.
From President Trump to George Zimmerman to Antifa, the Democrat Party and its media have surrendered all claims of the moral high ground on the issue of due process and have even embraced (as long as it is against the correct people, meaning everyone from neo-Nazis to Trump supporters) violent vigilantism. Then — like something out of Robocop or Demolition Man — there is the issue of how those who call themselves progressive and liberals cheer on corporations that have seized control of how Americans communicate and how those corporations have used that control to censor us.
Case in point, a headline I never thought I would read at the left-wing Guardian:
The far right is losing its ability to speak freely online. Should the left defend it?
Keep in mind that this is the same Guardian whose editorial board just last week cheered the decision to “censor the Internet.”
The issue, in this specific case, involves Stormfront and the Daily Stormer, two white supremacist websites booted off the internet by their web hosts. Now that no one will host these racist sites, the Daily Stormer has been forced to retreat to what’s known as the Dark Net, which makes it inaccessible to most everyone.
But as the Guardian points out, this corporate censorship is not just taking place against neo-Nazis. Twitter and Facebook have become the 21st-century versions of Ma Bell, or the telephone (in other words, the primary means by which Americans communicate with one another) and both sites have become notorious censors and scolds. Under the guise of “hate speech” and the demonic media’s ever-expanding definition of the “alt-right,” today’s Ma Bells are always monitoring your phone calls and warning you not to say “this” or “that” under the threat of cutting your telephone wires altogether.
The lazy conservative argument is that “a corporation has every right to run itself as it pleases.” In a perfect world, yes. But conservatives should also oppose monopolies when a corporation becomes so large, overwhelming and necessary that you have no place else to go. How many websites would be lost without the ability to promote its posts on Facebook or Twitter?
And then there is the matter of the Daily Stormer.
If corporations band together and choose to ban you from the Internet, you lose your ability to exist.
Moreover, there actually is a conspiracy afoot…
The Silicon Valley robber barons and the media are scheming to continue to expand the definitions of hate speech and the alt-right to include opinions and people they do not like. For example, the Southern Poverty Law Center (SPLC) is the tip of this spear, an organization the establishment media takes seriously for only one cynical reason — because it gives them the cover they so desire to label those of us who do not hold the “correct” views on immigration, gay marriage, affirmative action and the welfare state, as part of the neo-Nazi brotherhood. And by extension, this makes the traditional conservatives and Christians part of the neo-Nazi brotherhood.
See where this is going? And it is happening in ways big and small.
The media and left not only cheer on campaigns that target a right-leaning site’s advertisers, which in turn gives corporations another form of veto power over speech, they express no outrage when corporations fire individuals over their personal political views.
How can a freeborn American enjoy the spirit of the First Amendment when mega-corporations are given the power to destroy and disappear us? We can’t. But do we really want to give neo-Nazis a platform?
Yes — yes, we do.
Hey, I’m a Roman Catholic married to a Mexican. You think I have any love for white supremacists like the KKK? Or Marxist supremacists like Antifa? Or the black supremacists in Black Lives Matter? Or the Hispanic supremacists in La Raza? Or the Islamic supremacists in CAIR? Or the cultural supremacists at CNN? They are all sides of a single coin. But they all should enjoy the right to spew their toxic beliefs.
The left used to understand that the only way to secure all of our speech was to defend the vilest of speech. Once you start adding asterisks, the toothpaste is out of the tube.
The line you draw when it comes to speech is a very simple one: Violence. Endorsing, promoting or encouraging violence is illegal and should be (which does beg the question of how CNN stays on the air). Anything else… bring it on.
Follow John Nolte on Twitter @NolteNC. Follow his Facebook Page here.