Free Speech

Free speech is a fundamental value of liberal politics, an expression of John Stuart Mill's promise that we can do and say anything , so long as we do no harm.

It's a false promise. Absolute free speech was always a ruse.

Speech has never been entirely free. It can't be. Every polity worships one god or another. And so every polity has blasphemy laws of one sort or another.

As liberalism dissolves, the delusion of absolute free speech naturally dissolves too. We're watching that dissolution in real time, as the kids say.

But what takes the place of absolute free speech? The political questions are always, "By what standard?" and "Who decides?"

We're in a chaotic phase, where the standard of what counts as legitimate speech is little more than the power to enforce.

It's likely to be chaotic for some time before we settle into a new speech regime. I suspect there's no going back to the halcyon days when we thought we could say anything.

But we can't govern speech by mere whim and power forever. Speech standards must be grounded in something fundamental, in reality.

We can't resolve the debate about free speech within the frame of liberalism, because liberalism pretends it doesn't believe in anything fundamental.

Christians should take the opportunity to press for biblical standards of speech and expression.

While the iron is hot, redouble efforts to outlaw porn and push for standards that penalize actual blasphemy against the true, living God.