EPOCH TIMES/ Scott S. Powell-
As Americans we have had it good for so long that we often take important things for granted until they are about to be taken away. As recently as five or six years ago, who would have thought that America’s dominant social media platforms, such as Facebook, Google-You Tube, or Twitter would assault its host country’s First Amendment rights by engaging in the silencing of a huge number of its users through censorship, cancellation, and deplatforming?
Of all the impediments to America’s progress on every front, censorship and the cancel culture probably rank right at the top. Many of the younger generation accept cancel culture as being part of depersonalized relationships that social media has fostered. It seems many have gotten used to cyberbullying and the flippant cancellation of people, ideas and relationships—all facilitated with just a few clicks.
The older generations appreciate that protection of free speech, free association, and a presumption of innocence have always been a core principles in America not only because of the Constitution’s First, Fifth, Sixth and Fourteenth Amendments, but also because of the importance of civility and the wide recognition that tolerance is a necessary virtue in a pluralistic society and that no one has a monopoly on the best ideas. From the beginning of the American constitutional republic, it’s been axiomatic that progress in every field and endeavor is contingent on competition of ideas, policies, and products. Continue reading…
