Free Press has long claimed that Net Neutrality is crucial in protecting free speech, but now they have signed a petition asking the FCC to start monitoring “hate speech” over the Internet.  The hypocrisy isn’t very surprising given that Free Press’ definition of free speech is far from what the definition in the Constitutional since they believe that free speech  must be “free as in free beer”, but not free from government control.  Marvin Ammorri wrote:

“Net Neutrality is the principle that ensures users’ access to the speech, content or software of their choice online, without interference from Internet service providers. It keeps the Internet open to everyone’s speech, from the largest corporation to the newest blog, and the FCC is seeking comment on its proposed rules to strengthen Net Neutrality.” … “turning the Internet into a pay-for-play media that destroys its egalitarian spirit of competition and free speech.”

Free Press wants the FCC to regulate the Internet’s infrastructure to force an equal outcome where any individual should have the same capability as the largest corporations to distribute information on the Internet despite the fact that the free market has already made text, image, and even HD video distribution free for anyone.  If those regulatory proposals weren’t bad enough, Free Press is so concerned with “hate speech” and the anonymity of the Internet that they also want the FCC to regulate speech.

Technically speaking, the anti hate speech petitioners don’t want the FCC to directly censor or regulate content.  They favor shaming the hate speech offenders publicly by raising awareness in the hopes of getting advertisers and citizens to boycott them or whatever platform that made that speech possible in the first place.  They cite the ousting of Lou Dobbs at CNN which was the result of non-governmental action, yet they clearly don’t believe this to be sufficient.  What they seem to be asking for is an official seal of shame from the FCC which is impractical because these aren’t just radio and television stations with a single neck to choke.  Not only that, giving the FCC or any group of individuals the power to decide what constitutes “hate” is alarming.

The current FCC leadership insists that they don’t want to regulate the Internet, at least not the content part of it, but that doesn’t seem to be stopping Commissioner Copps from wanting a national discussion about having a decency standard over the Internet.  But once we’ve decided to give the FCC this power to monitor and arbitrate speech, anonymity would have to be eliminated.  The petitioners highlighted the problem of anonymity by saying:

“on the Internet, speakers can hide in the cloak of anonymity, emboldened to say things that they may not say in the public eye.”

So if the FCC decides that this is a problem, what’s next?  Do we start mandating blogger and commenter registration?  Do we mandate more detailed and longer logging from website and network operators?  Once we start going down this path, there’s no speech will truly no longer be free on the Internet.

The first amendment doesn’t grant the government the power to arbitrate private disputes over speech because that gives the government the power to control speech, nor does the first amendment mean that the government should compel individuals or groups to distribute the speech of others.  It’s easy for anyone to defend free speech when they are in favor of what’s being said, it’s the speech that we don’t like that needs the protection of the first amendment.