The principle of free speech is a foundation of Western democracy; I have the freedom to state any belief, however odious, so long as it doesn\u2019t threaten anyone\u2019s safety or impinge on anyone else\u2019s freedom. Civil society arrived at this principle after several thousand years because it makes a whole lot more sense than killing each other whenever we disagree.<\/p>\n
But free speech gets more complicated in private spaces \u2013\u00a0that is, spaces not owned by the government. In most countries, private businesses have every right, legally, to refuse service to individuals who don\u2019t adhere to their stated policies. No shoes, no shirt, spewing vile hatred? No service.<\/p>\n
So what does that mean for free speech online? The entire internet is basically a patchwork of private spaces owned by different companies. When you build a website, create a blog post, make a comment, or update your social accounts, that content is touched by multiple companies \u2013 from hosts to registrars to service providers and browsers \u2013 on its way to the world\u2019s eyeballs.<\/p>\n
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Which gives those companies license to pull content whenever they see fit. White supremacist outlet The Daily Stormer got kicked offline after the protests in Charlottesville and subsequent death of Heather Heyer \u2013\u00a0several of its service providers, including Google, GoDaddy, and Cloudflare, decided that their terms of service had been violated by The Daily Stormer\u2019s hate speech. And just like that, the outlet was relegated to the depths of the Dark Web<\/a>.<\/p>\n The Daily Stormer is just one among many websites the white supremacist protesters used to recruit, organize, and in many ways, incite violence in Charlottesville. And it\u2019s just one example of the kind of hate speech and violence that seems to be popping up in more places, with increasing frequency. All of this got the IRL<\/a> team thinking: how do the limits and liberties of free speech on the web impact what we do and say in real life? If you haven\u2019t already, take a listen<\/a> to the thoughts of Jillian York of EFF, Brandi Collins of Color of Change, and tech entrepreneur Anil Dash as they delve into thorny questions like: Whose job is it to regulate speech online? Should it be regulated at all?<\/strong><\/p>\n