The solution to free speech is free speech

As with high prices being the solution to high prices, the solution to free speech is that very free speech:

Covid conspiracy theories should not be removed from social media sites as it only serves to drive the conversations into dark, unregulated corners of the web, experts have said.

A landmark report from the Royal Society stated that governments and online platforms should instead focus on investing in fact-checking and improving digital literacy.

Frank Kelly, emeritus professor of the mathematics of systems at the University of Cambridge, and one of the co-authors of the report, said: “Our report does not recommend removing misinformation.

“We found little evidence that forcing major platforms to remove offending content will limit scientific misinformation’s harms, and could even drive it into harder-to-address corners of the internet and exacerbate feelings of distrust in the authorities.”

The report looked specifically at harmful but legal misinformation, which can dupe people into believing falsehoods, but are not inherently dangerous in the same way as hate speech, threats or terrorist content.

We would go rather further too. Subject to only two restrictions you may say what you wish - libel, and probably a rather tighter definition than English law provides, plus incitement to immediate violence. After those two you have the right to say what you wish and the consequent duty to suffer the consequences of having said it. Societal reaction rather than legal is the solution, free speech being that answer to free speech.

After all, history does show us that an alarmingly large number of humanity’s most ghastly mistakes have been immediately preceded by the awarding to some clerisy of a monopoly over answering that “What is Truth?” question.

We agree that this puts us somewhat out of kilter with much of fashionable society, this fundamentalism on this basic civil liberty, but then there are times when we look around and wonder whether we’re the only actual liberals remaining.