Issues With Moderating Free Speech

By Leo Gura - May 8, 2022

I enjoyed this discussion on Rebel Wisdom about the current online free speech debate. It was a good, nuanced discussion that introduced some unique distinctions that I feel the free speech debate is lacking.

Still, the discussion was not sufficiently deep or comprehensive, so I made a comment under the video adding a few crucial points. Here’s my comment:

Good conversation.

What I don’t see anyone mentioning in free speech discussions is how this problem of free speech is just a microcosm of the larger problem of freedom and anarchy. Humanity has already solved this problem when we invented government. The function of government is to limit absolute freedom in order to maximize survival and higher orders of effective freedom. We did this because absolute freedom is intolerable, even to so-call freedom absolutists. If someone is raping your daughter, you will stop caring about freedom, because freedom means nothing if your survival is sufficiently threatened. You can only complain about lack of freedom if you are alive and comfortable. We solved this problem by creating laws, democracy, monopoly on force, a court system, an appeals process, judges, etc. This is what Twitter needs. Twitter is just like a virtual society, and it will require the complex sort of governance and regulation that a healthy society requires. Anarchy is not going to work because humans are not conscious enough to behave themselves. If the majority of online citizens were well-behave, honest, and conscious — we wouldn’t need any moderation. But we also wouldn’t need government, courts, judges, laws, police, and military. If you think humanity can work without these instruments in our lifetime you are kidding yourself. These instruments were invented and evolved over 10,000+ years for very good reason. Libertarians and anarchists do not understand this, and the mind-virus of libertarianism has unfortunately infected the minds of many billionaires, because it serves their survival agenda.

These free speech debates always feel like we are reinventing the wheel. Humanity has a long and rich history of dealing successfully with anarchy. Twitter is just the next front line in that struggle.

People deeply do not understand that freedom is not what you want. Absolute freedom = death. You would shit your pants if you got a taste of absolute freedom. You only want freedom that serves your ego’s survival. Admit this much to yourself and we can start to make some progress. But if you keep lying to yourself that you can handle and even enjoy absolute freedom, we cannot make progress. Anarchy is all fun and games until your daughter gets raped in the name of someone’s freedom. And if you believe that there are not a million people on this planet who would feel it is their legitimate freedom and right to rape your daughter, you do not understand the human mind.

The problem of where to draw the line when making laws will always exist and never be resolved to everyone’s satisfaction because in truth all such lines are human inventions. Reality is infinite and has no lines. But even so, if we want a healthy society we have no choice but to draw subjective lines. These lines are drawn and then enforced by physical force precisely because not everyone will agree, and those who disagree sufficiently enough must simply be killed or removed from the community. The final arbiter of where the lines get drawn is death. Society is a human invention, a game, with the highest possible consequences. So welcome to civilization. Play nice. Or don’t and suffer the karma

I plan to do a video on free speech in the future which addresses the issue in a deep, nuanced, and comprehensive way. This was a preview of my thoughts on the free speech debate.

Click Here to see ALL of Leo's juicy insights.