X CEO Linda Yaccarino Says “Free Speech” Ends at “Hate Speech”

If you’re tired of censorship and dystopian threats against civil liberties, subscribe to Reclaim The Net. X continues to sit on two chairs and send mixed signals regarding the company’s stance on free speech. A new blog post penned this week by X Corp CEO Linda Yaccarino goes into this, at once claiming that society must “empower people to express its thoughts” – but also, that the line must be drawn at “hate” and “hate speech.” Considering the platform’s long and difficult history with suppressing free speech, well documented in the Twitter Files, and the fact terms like “hate speech” not to mention “misinformation” are so often used simply to cover up straight-up censorship, Yaccarino’s intent here can be seen as confusing. All the more so since the blog post is entitled, “Safeguarding Information Independence and Combating Hate Speech” only to be followed by the subtitle, “Building an Indispensable Global Town Square.” This is particularly interesting since it’s an admission of sorts that X is indeed a (digital) town square. The argument that this is the case with all major social sites has been used for a long time to prove that speech there should be protected under the US Constitution’s First Amendment, regardless of the companies being privately-owned. The term “modern public square” as it pertains to social networks is found in the 2017 US Supreme Court opinion in Packingham v. North Carolina. Related: How the term “hate speech” has become a mainline internet censorship tool And, another thing…X CEO Linda Yaccarino Says “Free Speech” Ends at “Hate Speech”