MODELING THE STRUCTURE OF “THE FREEDOM OF SPEECH”

Watching the news recently about the struggles many are having with ‘freedom of speech’ in the U.K, and in France got me thinking, “What is the structure of this subjective experience called ‘the freedom of speech?’ For those of us here in American, the idea of freedom of speech began in 1776 with the founding of the country. It has long been our way of being, and our cultural frame of reference. The fathers of our constitution made it our First Amendment— the right and freedom of religion, gathering, and freedom of speech.

What’s not obvious is in the idea is what it implies, namely, the right to speak is founded on another right—the right to think for yourself. After all, you speak as you think. Further, as you speak, your thinking is either well informed or it is not. If you think—truly think, you “work an idea over in your mind” as you bring your best thinking to it. If you do it well, you bring your critical and creative thinking so you produce clear, precise, testable, and actionable thinking. Your right to think enables and grants you the right and the freedom to speak.

As we here model the structure of ‘the freedom of speech’ two abstract words immediately need to be clarified. Freedom and speech are nominalizations that hide the underlying verbs.

• Freedom: free to act, to do, to be not restrained, to deal with blocks and interferences, to think for oneself, and to express one’s thoughts. To be ‘free to’ do something implies an ability—to ‘think’ rather than passively or automatically repeat what others have thought and to disagree.
• Speech: To say what you think, say it specifically, precisely, clearly, and thoroughly. And because it is not automatic, it requires lots of learning, training, and practice.

As we model what something is, that very process allows us to identify what that experience is not. For ‘freedom of speech’—it is not freedom to misuse speech. Against all of the ways we can misuse speech, we have laws which penalize the misuse. Why? Because they are dishonest and manipulative, there are legal restraints to constrain people to not engage in such ways of mis-using speech. We are not free to speak in order —

• To lie, deceive, trick, set up a scam.
• To hurt, destroy, steal, embezzle.
• To shout ‘fire’ in a crowded theater, or ‘bomb’ in a stadium.
• To create misinformation, disinformation.
• To plagerize, claim what is not yours, arrogant qualities you do not have (mis-represent self on your CV).
• To threaten to do bodily harm or kill.
• To steal an identity, to calm a false identity.

Now that’s a lot of things ‘the freedom of speech’ does not allow. Sure you can do those things, but you are not free to do them without constraints arising. In fact, most people avoid misusing their freedom in these ways because of the constraints. Is there a pattern in the things we should not say? Is there a pattern for managing our ‘freedom of speech,’ and holding back on misusing speech?

Yes. All of the misuses are falsehoods, errors, and distractions. And they arise from false thinking —thinking you can take advantage of others for personal gain. As such, they are not honest attempts to find and speak the truth. They are manipulative means used to gain unfair advantage over others. And worse of all— they are not presented in a way that invites testing, checking, or questioning. They are presented absolutely and rigidly to cut off discussion. And that’s a key sign that the person is using ‘freedom of speech’ as a ploy, a short-term tactic—its lack of openness to feedback, to questioning, and to discussion.

What Can We Conclude?

‘Freedom of speech’ is your right to think for yourself and to express your honest thinking. But you do not have to be right to do that. You only have to assume responsibility to be honest with yourself and others. Developing that—first learn to think critically, creatively, and executively. When you do, you can do some real thinking rather than the childish thinking of the Cognitive Distortions or the corrupt thinking of the Cognitive Fallacies. Those arose thousands of years ago in the context of debating between the different philosophical schools of thought. They developed them to win arguments, prove themselves ‘right,’ and prove others wrong. Talk about mental poison! Engaged in agenda thinking, they used them to defeat others, not to honestly seek truth.

Modeling ‘the freedom of speech’ in this way now gives us some tests to run:

• Are you free inside yourself to search for the truth, and follow it no matter where it takes you, or how it shakes up your current thinking?
• How free are you to say, “I don’t know?” Or to admit, “I was wrong about that idea.”
• Are you free to think and express your ideas in the presence of others, an authority figure?
• Do you know the critical thinking skills and how to use them?

Recognizing ‘the freedom of speech’ as a basic human right, Abraham Maslow noted that it requires responsibility. It requires learning how to use this power of thinking so you can speak truthfully and compassionately. For him, ‘the freedom of speech’ is one of the being values along with justice, beauty, meaning, excellence, making a difference, etc. This freedom makes us truly human.

Can ‘the freedom of speech’ be misused? Yes, of course it can! Yet the solution is not to constrain speech or forbid it—the solution is to do what journalists are supposed to do—

• Question what we say; check the facts, challenge the evidence, and require the speaker expose his or her thinking for more inquiry.
• The solution is critical thinking that invites an open and respectful conversation. In fact, a dialogue where people actually listen to each other and attempt to understand each other on the other’s terms.

The solution is never to shut down honest speech as many in America, the UK, and France are currently attempting. Banning open discussion is exactly the wrong direction. That leads to Mind Police, and an Orwellian 1984 scenario of inquisitions, and to punishing someone for searching for the truth. We may not like what we hear and we may strongly disagree with it, yet if there is still open discussion, a willingness to consider the other’s point of view— banning speech is never the solution. Keeping speech open is the solution. Now for some critical questions:

• Can we discern when someone is openly and honestly searching for the truth while we think that person is wrong about some ideas?
• Can we discern when someone is using speech to manipulate, humiliate, shame, and gain unfair advantage?
• Can we tell when someone is open to feedback, willing to keep talking, and willing to change one’s mind given evidence?
• Can we tell when someone can hold a respectful dialogue with patience and kindness?

“Freedom of speech” is the foundation for democracy. It is a powerful, useful, and precious human right. Yes, it has to be managed well! That’s where our responsibility comes in. Now given the 250 years of managing it fairly well here in America, it can be done. And we can do better! And to do that, we need a well educated population who can discern healthy and unhealthy speech. For that— people need to be trained in critical and creative thinking for humans.