[Tomte]

Free speech, the correct way. In my opinion, of course.

(The following is not so much directed at you; I don't know you, after all. It's just that I need to rant, as always when Americans lecture us on free speech. "You" is not the personal you, but "you Americans on web forums")

Don't mistake your version of free speech for a canonical implementation.

Keep your hate speech and school shootings, be proud of it, and bury your dead.

We just happen to live in peace and don't need or want your constant superiority complex in our face.

Just remember, after WWII you had a wonderful opportunity to force your free speech on us. You deliberately chose to force something else on us. And had it written in our constitution. Because Nazis. Now don't you dare blame us for having it. You wanted us to not extend free speech to Nazis. You wanted us to defend our new constitution.

You don't get to come back after seventy-five years and ask us to please be nicer to Nazis. And Scientology. And whatnot.

Have you noticed how wherever you engage in nation building, you never implement your political system? How come? Isn't your system perfect? Maybe it's only for the enlightened American people and other peoples are too backwards and savage for that?

Okay, maybe Puerto Rico, which is almost an American state. They have your system, as well. Except... all their political organs serve at the US congress' pleasure. Very colonial.

It's great that you identify with your system. Really. But please enjoy it. Feel free to tell us how much you enjoy it. But stop disparaging others who disagree.

[eropple]

Thank you for writing this (and I say that as an American). We as a country are are gargantuan hypocrites about this whole thing; the idea of free speech in our Constitution--to say nothing of plenty of other privileges that we pretend are rights--is one of many things we don't pass on to the people we claim hegemony over.

We are tremendously bad at owning our shit. I wish we were better.

[cgriswald]

As a human...

The GP was just as condescending as the GGP. His rush to stereotype Americans was largely comical. He makes it quite clear at the beginning that his buttons were simply (and easily) pushed; and this his rant was justified in his eyes. He simply emoted all over this thread to the benefit of no one but himself.

It is not my status as an American that I defend or his status as a German(?) that I attack when I point out the hypocrisy or limits in his version of free speech. Nor does my acknoledgement of those limits imply I am not familiar with the history and hypocrisy of the United States and its voracious appetite for hegemony, empire building, and oppression of peoples (including the restriction or punishment of ostensibly free speech) both within and without its borders.

This entire thread reads like a bunch of petulant children pointing fingers. Neither side defends the merits of their version of free speech nor makes salient points about the others' version of free speech; leading to no greater understanding and apparently prompting people to take sides in a conflict that doesn't even have to exist.

[escherize]

So, how does this generation of Americans inherit their now dead politicians from years ago?

    You don't get to come back after seventy-five years 
    and ask us to please be nicer to Nazis. And Scientology.
    And whatnot.

Contention: If one can't inherit my father's debt, then why are people who were mostly born into a particular place responsible (or the same people as?) those who had power 60 years prior?

[ohsnap]

Wouldn't it be better to explain why you think that it is the correct form of free speech rather than disparage others? You say you hate being 'lectured by Americans' but you don't seem much better...

[jqm]

He actually seems a lot worse. I think there should be a rule he doesn't get to talk anymore unless he says only nice things:)

[trav4225]

This made me chuckle. Sarcasm, guys! No need to downvote him! :-)

[trav4225]

Thanks for your opinion! I sympathize with much of it.

I hope everyone here understands that I was not intending to be condescending, nor do I look down upon others for their opinions on this eternally divisive issue.

The main purpose for my comment "Free speech, European style" was simply to try to encapsulate what I was seeing in a short, "cute" phrase, with a subtle hint that free speech with restrictions is not really free speech. I do not wish to make value judgments about the various policies in this area, I just wanted to highlight the oxymoronic nature of the notion of "free speech with restrictions". Incidentally, even the United States contains restrictions on free speech, albeit to a lesser degree than perhaps any other nation.

With respect,

trav4225

[Grue3]

>We just happen to live in peace and don't need or want your constant superiority complex in our face.

Yeah, well, the only reason you live in peace is because of Americans with their free speech and school schootings, and the Soviets with their communism. We all saw what happens when Europe is left to its own devices.