[tayo42]

reasonable was probabaly a bad word choice on my part then, sure we can have unreasonable view points in a a discussion, but even if your not talking from an extreme point of view it gets shut down, people believe free speech is all or nothing, where "all" is ambiguous. There is plenty of middle ground of expression.

I don't know why you think im talking about the first 5 words. Look at the relevant part

> Congress shall make no law ... or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; ...

That is all it says, its open to interpretation. Free speech for who, and how is speech defined. What did the they have in mind when they wrote it, it likely wasn't 21st century communication. It is ambiguous. Did they even have businesses in mind? We already not all forms of expression are covered.

Yes all those points you bring up suck about advertising. Why should it be allowed? Why is the news able to be misleading. Why are are we being emotionally manipulated by corporations to buy? Because we can't have a discussion about free speech in America and it nuances. People are so die hard about their right (that doesn't even exist the way they think it does) and fall for slippery slope fallacies. We absolutely should real in advertising, both corporate and political, we should real in manipulative news reporting. None of these freedoms are helping the world, and if anything chipping away at others.

100% Free speech is a detriment to society, it is too idealistic. We can start with these ideals, but the need to figure out how they apply in a world with moral-less actors. We should figure out what we want in regards to forms of expression and content, be clear about it and protect society from entities that want to abuse their rights to take advantage of others.

[atypicaluser]

As this thread has died, I'll leave off with a couple of parting comments--as I previously mentioned, the idea of 'reasonable' will change depending on who you ask. When you say 'We should figure out...,' rather than leave reasonableness to an individual 'I,' now it's given to a multitudinous 'we.' That is, the idea is given a democratic flavor, wherein if a majority (even by just one person) thinks this or that speech act is unreasonable, it can enforce its prohibition.

Given your reasonable fear of manipulation/propaganda by those in power, can you see where this might go wrong?

Thus, as Americans, we've done more or less what you've asked--we laid out the ideal, 'Congress shall make no law...,' then we set our local, state and federal bodies of government on the problem of how to work within this ideal. Which, if the solutions are reasonable, will remain law. Which, if an individual (e.g. a flag burner) or a multitude (e.g. a religious sect) thinks are unreasonable, will be challenged through later legislation or through the courts. Potentially landing at the doorstop of a nine-member group called SCOTUS who, using their collective wisdom, will tell us whether we've (or our bodies of government have) gone too far. (And if we as a nation disagree with their decisions, we as a nation have remedies for that as well.) All in a world of moral-less actors.

Is this not reasonable?