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I can remember a time when kids were getting their heads bashed in because they stood up for “free speech.” Today, people are getting roasted and banned on the internet for the same thing, except this time, the ideological soulmates of the kids who got clubbed are doing the roasting.

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It’s another one of life’s little ironies that the children and grandchildren of those who supported freedom of speech now enthusiastically stifle it. They think that some speech they disagree with can be classified as “hate speech” because of the subject matter or people being targeted.

This brings to the fore the revolutionary concept that “free speech” can be dirty, hateful, hurtful, wrong-headed, obscene, insulting, even racist, homophobic, Islamophobic, and Catholicphobic. 

To sum up, free speech is, well, FREE FRICKING SPEECH. It’s not pretty. It’s not polite. It might hurt your feelings. It might cause your blood to boil. But that’s what freedom is, and the morons on the left who insist that the First Amendment to the U.S. Constitution doesn’t really mean what it says need to check their ignorance at the door. 

Why this concept is difficult to grasp on the left escapes me. Leftists taught me everything I believe about free speech. I saw them — long-haired, disheveled, needing a bath — standing up to 1960s-era cops (who were nothing like cops today) so that you and I could grow up in a country that tolerated different points of view and could laugh at each other’s shortcomings and foibles. 

The reaction to Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg’s announcement that there would be no more “fact checkers” on his platforms nor would there be much “content moderation” to speak of is incredible.

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“Here are some of the horrible things that you can now say on Instagram and Facebook,” sniffed the tech site The Verge.

“Without these necessary hate speech and other policies, Meta is giving the green light for people to target LGBTQ people, women, immigrants, and other marginalized groups with violence, vitriol, and dehumanizing narratives. With these changes, Meta is continuing to normalize anti-LGBTQ hatred for profit,” said GLAAD President and CEO Sarah Kate Ellis.

Well, that sounds serious. “Hatred for profit” or not, Ms. Ellis misses the point. Whether it’s just not penetrating her pointy head or she’s unable to grasp the concept of “freedom,” it is immaterial. 

Ellis is concerned because now, ignoramuses can refer to homosexuality as a “mental disease.” Pass the smelling salts! If someone wants to make an untrue claim and people want to read that untrue claim, so what? That’s the price we pay for Ms. Ellis and her cohorts to be able to call anyone they wish “homophobic” for any reason — including to smear someone who harbors political beliefs different from hers deliberately.

Jim VandeHei and Michael Allen, co-founders of Axios and long-time political commentators in D.C., said that Zuckerberg’s change in policy “opens up most of social media as a Wild West of expression, where high-quality, trustworthy information will commingle with garbage and misinformation.”

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And that’s a bad thing? Sheesh. I guess the rest of us will have to apply our critical thinking skills to determine what’s true and what’s not.

And as far as “high-quality, trustworthy information” is concerned, who are they trying to snow? There’s “garbage and misinformation” coming from mainstream sources as well. Who do we “trust” to give us the facts? 

The bottom line is that we, as citizens, have been empowered by the First Amendment to make those decisions ourselves. We don’t need a commissar instructing us in the “correct” interpretation of the facts. We don’t need a Red Guard to enforce one way of thinking.

What the hell is self-governance anyway if you can’t trust the people to figure out this democracy thing themselves?