There was a time in the U.S. where the concept of freedom of speech meant something. At one time we had something called the freedom of the press. It was considered to be the Fourth Estate. Which went along with the Executive, Judicial and Legislative branches of government. And generally considered to be the equal of the other three in importance. But it would seem that our new technology has put a stake through the heart of that idea. Because of technology we now have places for people to communicate electronically. For instance, in forums like this. But because they label themselves as "private entities," freedom of speech has no place. There is one forum out there where I can see why. Because the truth to some extent is allowed to be spoken there, the place is practically a ghost town. Maybe if all the forums were the same, instead of a place for the self deluded to hide in and speak to each other, that would be different.
Another blow against freedom of speech happen during the Reagan administration. There used to be a thing in the media called the fairness doctrine. Where two sides to any issue were given equal time. But Reagan killed that. I wonder how the incidents with george floyd or ahmaud arbery (for instance) would have been handled if the fairness doctrine was still in place. Is it time we were honest and took the image of George Washington off the dollar bill?
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The Fairness Doctrine did not increase freedom of speech, it restricted it, severely restricted it. Why you ask?
The Fairness Doctrine, in short, said that any media outlet--television, radio, whatever--the FCC had regulatory control over had to, by force of law, provide equal time for each side of an issue. This meant that if a radio station put a Republican on for 15 minutes, a Democrat had to be given the opportunity to have 15 minutes as well. Left, Right, Up, Down, whatever your political position was, the opposite one had to have equal time.
Now, that sounds all fair and wonderful doesn't it? Well, in reality it didn't work. Finding two opposing positions wasn't always possible. But it was possible that if a station put on some particular view then out of the woodwork would come someone claiming they needed equal time to present the opposite view--at the station's expense of course,
or else (eg., a lawsuit). All of this resulted in stations simply refusing to put anyone on that was foisting an opinion as that was the only way to avoid being sued for not giving equal time.
Thus, speech was severely restricted. The reason the Fairness Doctrine was established to begin with was back in the day there were only three TV networks (well, there was PBS too, but nobody watched it). The same went for radio. In most locales there were a limited number of mostly AM stations to choose from.
By Reagan's time in office this had changed. Cable TV was widespread with now dozens, and moving towards hundreds, of channels. Radio had expanded to FM and there were often twice as many, or more choices to be had. The internet was on the horizon, and this would expand choice of venue to literally hundreds of thousands. There was now a panoply of outlets everyone could choose from. The Fairness Doctrine was obsolete. Everybody's opinion could find an outlet and those most wanted would get more exposure.
Then along came talk radio. This was a lifesaver for AM radio. Most talk radio ended up being Conservative. A few Liberal / Leftist stations tried to compete but found little audience. The Left went elsewhere for their news and information.
But the Left couldn't stand that AM talk radio for the Right existed at all. Thus, the Left and Progressives demanded a return to the Fairness Doctrine to shut Right wing talk radio down. So far, that hasn't worked. If the Fairness Doctrine were in place, and the FCC could regulate the Internet, this very board wouldn't exist simply because somebody could complain that by word count, post count, whatever measure you want to use, some side of an argument wasn't getting equal time on the board.
The Fairness Doctrine in our current world is a pile of bullshit meant to restrict speech.