Exactly Right: 'You're Not Entitled To A Platform, Boomer.'
from the bingo dept
The Washington Examiner is popular among conservatives, so it's good to see them publish a wonderful article by Hannah Cox completely dismantling the various arguments made by so many Republicans these days, that the government should force websites to carry all speech. In particular, she targets Donald Trump's pathetic lawsuits against Facebook, Twitter, and YouTube with the brilliant title: "You're not entitled to a platform, boomer." Of course, if only it were true that it were just clueless boomers making this argument, but the point stands.
What I like most about the article, though is that it hits on just how incredibly entitled and hypocritical these arguments have been -- completely tossing in the garbage what had been seen as bedrock conservative viewpoints about private property and not playing the victim all the time.
To hear my elders tell it, millennials are entitled.
For as long as I can remember, we’ve been called the participation trophy generation. It’s been said that we’re lazy, we don’t work as hard, and we believe we deserve the best just for showing up. All of that has been debunked pretty thoroughly, by the way, but the narrative persists.
So, pardon my somewhat snide reaction to the latest Trump lawsuit, which is chock-full of the entitlement millennials have been accused of for so long — and from a boomer, no less.
But, then also there's this:
Private companies have a right to censorship; anything less would be a violation of the business owners’ First Amendment rights. The government cannot compel you to say or not say what you wish not to. If Trump were to have his way, this is exactly what the government would be doing. Not only that, it would be telling private business owners they have to host speech by a former (and potentially future) political candidate. There have been many egregious violations of free speech in our history, but none that surpass that in recent memory.
Honestly, the only thing that's missing is highlighting the hysterics that many Republican politicians -- who are now supporting this nonsense -- went into over net neutrality (a much, much, much different situation, that would not, in fact, demand compelled speech, but was simply non-discrimination of traffic flowing over a network). In that case, we heard all about how it would be "the government takeover of the internet" (it was not). And yet, when it comes to these cases (and the various state laws, and Congressional Republican proposals), which would actually be the government forcing websites to host speech they don't want to support, those same voices insist it is necessary (and still whine about the evils of net neutrality).
It's almost as if they never had any real principles at all beyond "what helps me right now."
Filed Under: boomers, content moderation, entitlement, personal responsibility, responsibility