Lynching has always been a crime and that’s why nobody was lynched ever. The mob already has protection because their numbers. It is everyone but the mob that needs the protection.
You know, there is a rule about presuming good faith. Accusing me of "giv[ing] them up to the lynch mob" is not that. Knock it off.
Here's the issue, either you're advocating for something useless, or for the suppression of speech.
On one hand, you have the idea of criminalizing violent responses to unpopular speech. This is completely superfluous; we already criminalize violence, what will adding another law do, really? The theory might be that it'll dissuade action, but someone furious enough to literally lynch their neighbor over speech isn't rationally balancing the pros and cons. "I strongly disapprove of this and therefore I want whoever does it to be locked up forever" might feel viscerally good, but we know it's a bad way to run a country.
On the other hand, attempting to protect people from non-violent responses involves the suppression of speech based on popularity. You might have the right to say whatever you want, but I also have the right to tell you exactly how I feel about that. You can't abridge my legal right to say that because I happen to be in the majority any more than you can suppress my speech if I was in the minority. And if my push-back to your original speech is noxious in its own right, then maybe I'll suffer social consequences for my own speech, as is completely fair.
Oh, and remember that any tool you give the government might be abused. We're already seeing local cities trying to pass "hate speech" laws against anti-cop sentiment, which is probably not what the original authors had in mind. The path between "we need to suppress the mob" and "my political opponents are a mob and must be suppressed" is very straight and very short.
I don't think your straw man of my argument is particularly in good faith.
>Here's the issue, either you're advocating for something useless, or for the suppression of speech.
Incorrect. I'm pointing out your flawed argument where you somehow believe that "free speech" exists if there are social consequences for speaking. I provide a counter example where severe social consequences, effectively suppress speech.
As pointed out by another commenter on your post, freedom of speech is much more than the letter of the law. It is a much wider concept for exchanging ideas. Your claim that "not free from consequences" by the letter of the law while legally correct, is ironically, the polar opposite of what freedom of speech actually is.
> I provide a counter example where severe social consequences, effectively suppress speech.
You listed a crime that might happen, and then asserted that therefore we need more laws to protect speech. I find the argument unpersuasive, for reasons I have already provided.
As an aside, I find the hyperbole tiresome. "What if someone gets lynched?" is half a step away from "think of the children" in its triteness, and it's a really quick way to make these conversations go off the rail.
> Your claim that "not free from consequences" by the letter of the law while legally correct, is ironically, the polar opposite of what freedom of speech actually is.
And what, pray tell, do you recommend when the "social consequences" of free speech are also speech? Would you suppress the speech of "the mob" for the sake of the original speaker? Would you force people to associate with those they find noxious against their wills? If so, I don't think you're nearly as pro free speech as you think you are. If not, then I'm not really sure what you're actually advocating for, aside from generally being angry at Twitter.
You think that people aren’t already hiding their views because of social consequences? And this is progress? You’d rather that people hid what they really think?
Your entire view handicapped by your inability to see past what is and what is not allowed by law. You seem to think that only legal methods, instead of social or cultural changes are the only way to encourage a culture that values the freedom of speech. You are too shortsighted to see that freedom of speech is both a cultural and legal concept. More importantly, by arguing legal semantics, you don’t seem to understand why freedom of speech is necessary at all. Freedom of speech is merely an implementation detail. Has it never occurred to you to ask “what problem is it trying to solve?”
