To paint “free speech” as “lawless speech” is a strawman fallacy, as well as the false dichotomy fallacy, because they are 1) equating freedom with lawlessness, which is a misrepresentation of free speech, and 2) because they are giving a false spectrum of options between the range of censored speech and lawless speech. As Paul from the New Testament once pointed out, the law of nature/reason is written upon the tablets of our hearts, and those who tune into it do not need external laws and legalities to remind them of what is good, moral, and true in the eyes of God.
The whole “you’re either with us self-censoring and censoring (based upon the cause of the day), or you’re literally the Devil incarnate” is a black and white mess of thinking that reduces everything down to the most simplistic and the monologic of either/or thinking. This is a good time to point out that egocentrism is considered “me vs you” thinking, while sociocentrism is considered “us vs them” thinking. Meaning, that the whole “you’re either with us or you’re the Devil” mindset is the peak of egocentric and sociocentric thinking, and the direct opposite of what we’re trying to accomplish as psychologically and spiritually whole beings who share a strong connection to the divine.
With all freedoms, a right, also known as a liberty, does not give one the license to aggressively harm another person directly or indirectly (although the defensive use of force is legitimate and natural) which is considered in law as a “trespass” against another’s personal or private property. This includes a prohibition from harming their bodies and/or reputation, as rights/liberties protect people from harm in a defensive manner from aggression/trespasses. Free speech then is our right to say what we think about various topics within the confines of lawfulness, including dangerous ideas, in an attempt to live a life of meaning and purpose, and critical thinking helps us to filter out ideas that are either false, or out of alignment with our purpose. If our ideas are good ones, they’ll stand up to healthy critique, but if they are bad ones, then they’ll crumble under the objective lens of truth.
If speech is geared towards acting in an aggressive manner as a means of attacking another person’s natural rights, then it is not protected as a right and liberty, but can be considered a criminal offense against nature, just like theft or murder, especially because both libel and slander can steal a person’s reputation, or even murder it. False speech can be protected by free speech, but it also may be reckless, or even criminal in nature, when it is geared towards harming another person’s body, personal property, private property, livelihood, and/or reputation. An example of borderline criminal speech is the “punch a Nazi” slogan used by Leftists, where they advocate violence against anyone their narrow understanding labels as a Nazi; such a mindset and speech encourages violence against those with opposing ideas and opinions by considering all viewpoints foreign to their narrow and dogmatic worldview as aggression.
Yes, free speech is a natural right of people, and it helps people to nurture a healthy intellectual and psychological immune system, while lawless speech is already unlawful, and not free. Legal speech on the other hand is just a construct of government, and one should not worry about the legalities of their speech when it is well within the reasonable limits of nature’s principles, because civil laws are merely agreements that must receive consent, and one is not bound by such agreements if they do not consent to them, nor if they violate their own natural rights.
THE UNITY PROCESS: I’ve created an integrative methodology called the Unity Process, which combines the philosophy of Natural Law, the Trivium Method, Socratic Questioning, Jungian shadow work, and Meridian Tapping—into an easy to use system that allows people to process their emotional upsets, work through trauma, correct poor thinking, discover meaning, set healthy boundaries, refine their viewpoints, and to achieve a positive focus. You can give it a try by contacting me for a private session.
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