At the root of most political crimes are bad ideas. And at the root of the #TwitterGate was the notion, widely spread by the political class and the media, that “disinformation,” essentially propaganda, posed a critical threat to our society and had to be urgently restricted.
The ‘inciting incident’ for this argument was Trump’s victory in 2016. The more the media blew him into a threat to mankind, the stronger the argument became for urgently regulating speech. With the combination of Russiagate and garden variety demonization, the goal of making speech into a threat was achieved.
Everything that followed was corruptly inevitable.
The idea that unregulated speech was “disinformation” or “misinformation” and that no society could survive free speech was widely dispersed among the educated classes. It was eventually taken on faith.
I have frequently said in the past that the ability to define the problem is also the ability to define the solution. It’s one of those things that the Left does really well. It invents a crisis, homelessness, global warming, racism, speech, gives it a political name and then hammers home the idea that this is a problem that only they can urgently solve. And it pulls off the same trick over and over again.
The invention of disinformation was a particularly daring trick because it reclassified a universally agreed on right and virtue, speech, as a threat by changing its name.
TwitterGate just shows how this particular meme played out within the confines of one organization in its interactions with government officials and activists. But that’s a microcosm of what was taking place across the tech industry and much of the corporate world, governments and institutions.
The invention of disinformation meant that everyone was now expected to grapple with a new crisis. They did so by imposing restrictions on speech where they were able to, conducting political propaganda in offices and funding leftist groups.
TwitterGate exposes some of these abuses, but much of the audience that needs to hear it is guilty of the same thing.
gravenimage says
The idea that speech is ‘disinformation’ and that no society can survive free speech has been widely accepted
……………………………………..
Important stuff from Daniel Greenfield.
All too true. Whatever happened to the idea that the tonic for false or negative speech is, well, more speech?
And “disinformation” need not even be false–it can be nothing more than a difference of opinion from the Left.
And the sign in that picture above is also absurd–“Hate Speech = Murder”. I am no fan of genuine hate speech (although this is often also just anything the Left does not like), but even at its worst, hate speech, ugly as it is, is *not* murder.
You cannot have a free society where most people are muzzled from expressing their opinions–which for many, I think, is the whole point.
mg says
Who was it, Justice Brandeis who said, “If there be time to expose through discussion, the falsehoods and fallacies, to avert the evil by the processes of education, the remedy to be applied is more speech, not enforced silence.”
gravenimage says
Yes–a great quote. Thank you, mg.
milo minderbinder says
gravenimage,
+1
“Once a government is committed to the principle of silencing the voice of opposition, it has only one way to go, and that is down the path of increasingly repressive measures, until it becomes a source of terror to all its citizens and creates a country where everyone lives in fear.”
[Special Message to the Congress on the Internal Security of the United States, August 8, 1950]”
― Harry S. Truman (1884-1972)
gravenimage says
Another great quote, Milo. Thank you.
bill carr says
I would like to ask that silly girl with hippy headband, which she would prefer. That I say something that offends her or that I murder her? I am sure she would be sensible enough to say the former and not the latter.
gravenimage says
Yep.
Jim J Fox says
invents a crisis, homelessness, global warming, racism, speech, gives it a political name and then hammers home the idea that this is a problem that only they can urgently solve.
I’m little confused. RU saying homelessness, global warming, racism, speech are invented? Obviously, they’re not.
gravenimage says
“Global warming” actually was invented–that’s why the name was changed to the much vaguer “climate change”. (And before it was known as global warming it was characterized as global cooling or a new ice age).
Then, free speech is not actually a problem–it is a value to be defended, not a difficulty to be solved.
Scotsman48 says
I am always wary of those who think my opinion is worth less than theirs and as they wish to shut me down rather than debate what I say and so then I call them fascists, which is a term they call everybody even though they can never seem to define what it means expect as they scream racist fascist etc at me.
Wee soy boys and their butt ugly ”girl” friends running around covered in black clothes from head to toe calling everybody a fascist is a really bad joke as they all look and sound exactly like the fascist brigade of Italy in the 1930s. Whereas these silly youth of today stand there with a Peace headband on her head suggesting that hate speech, which she cannot define, causes murder… HOW does that work?.
Everybody is against gun violence as well as domestic violence and islamic violence.
Maybe she can change her headband soon as she wakes up from her woke sleep.