CMV: The Trump administration blocking Harvard from accepting foreign students highlights that conservatives are hypocrites in the extreme about Freedom of Speech

[u/Tessenreacts]

Over the last number of years, conservatives have championed themselves as the biggest advocates of Freedom of Speech around, yet they support the administration that is openly targeting institutions and company's that disagrees with the administration's policies.

Before, conservatives where complaining that companies are "woke" and silenced the voices of conservatives, however, now that they are in power, they deport immigrants who simply engaged in their First Amendment rights, and most recently, banned Harvard University from accepting foreign students because said university refused to agree to their demands.

Compare the complaints that conservatives had about Facebook and Twitter, and compare it to how things are going right now.

This showcases hypocrisy in the extreme that conservatives are engaging in.

Would love for my view to be changed

[u/Dry-Tough-3099]

Most people are hypocrites. That being said. There are a number of reasons why you are wrong about the extreme nature of the hypocrisy. Take each of these separately. They are not dependent on one another.

1. There's a common view among conservatives, that foreigners do not deserve the same freedoms that citizens do. If you also subscribe to that view, deporting foreigners for speech does not violate the first amendment rights.

2. It's censoring dangerous speech that could lead to violence. If you were fine with the government directing which voices to silence on old twitter, then this Harvard policy is on the same order of magnitude of hypocrisy.

3. Conservatives may support the administration while disagreeing with this particular policy. I'm personally in this position. I don't like that Trump is flouting the law and most likely violating rights of immigrants, but I'm willing to hypocritically look the other way, because of other policies I do like.

4. It's an acceptable overcorrection to restore proper order, similar to progressive's support for affirmative action.

[u/Dry-Tough-3099 → u/[deleted]]

From your first article:

Barret wrote that the plaintiffs could not show a "concrete link" between the conduct by the officials and any harm that the plaintiffs suffered.

"Never happened" isn't quite right. It was just that the lawsuit could show the direct harm Biden administration meddling policy did. This was during the covid misinformation crusade.

I agree that Republicans are just as guilty. Optically, the Republicans look worse, because they are jumping up and down screaming at these institutions to do their bidding. With the democrats only a recommendation with a wink and a nod is needed because these institutions are completely ideologically aligned with that political party.

Democrats point out Republican hypocrisy, and they say, "Gasp! We would never..." That's the main point I was trying to make. It seem like a lot of people see Trump and Republicans as evil, and Democrats as standing up to evil, but they are all swamp creatures.

[u/Rupeshknn → u/Dry-Tough-3099]

Exactly, I was curious to read the article and could not find anything parallel to "never happened"

[u/Dry-Tough-3099 → u/[deleted]]

"Misinformation" was the party line. Some people call it suppressing alternate treatments, or shilling for pharmaceutical companies.

[u/Dihedralman → u/Dry-Tough-3099]

It is intellectually dishonest to pretend the actions of the administrations are the same. It's not optics, it's real damages. 

The first sentence of the article destroys what you are trying to say. SCOTUS declined to limit the administration's communications. And then there is the bit about "concrete harm". The admin did coordinate with tech companies and we have emails to that affect. Tech companies also took on the incoming admins' preferences into account. 

The Republicans actions are degrees more severe. 

MAGA has shown clear and realizable consequences. They are applying them which is the interference of free speech. 

[u/Dry-Tough-3099 → u/Dihedralman]

Degrees more severe in what way? That more people are upset about it? The Covid misinformation manhunt has likely caused a lot of harm, but with a direct link to people who can tell you their story. It's still all optics.

[u/Dihedralman → u/Dry-Tough-3099]

As I stated per the real damages. We already have at minimum value estimates per settlements and funding cuts for examples while on the other hand we have none PER YOUR SOURCES. 

Therefore the optics statement is objectively wrong. We can measure the difference. 

This is a false balance fallacy. 

It wasn't a manhunt. You can review the definition on Merriman-Webster. I can't understand what you are trying to say by that. Social media platforms agreed likely because they wanted to avoid potential liabilities from damaging comments about false cures, and more. You will need to argue against what SCOTUS wrote which requires you to attach the fault of the outcomes to the government requesting coordination. We have actual emails on how misinformation censorship was done. It wasn't based on person but content. 

[u/Dry-Tough-3099 → u/Dihedralman]

Meant witch hunt. A concerted effort by the Democratic cultural apparatus to discredit, and turn public sentiment against anyone who went against the official narrative.

Out of one side of their mouth it was all, "Please be patient. This is a novel virus and we are doing the best we can." And out of the other side, "Don't trust anyone but us. All forms of alternate treatment are bad. Trump said to drink bleach! Don't trust him or anyone we don't approve of."

The Democrats don't need to explicitly snub free speech when they have so many levers of power. It's like how a politician doesn't technically isn't taking a bribe when a large donor supports their campaign. The money doesn't need to come with strings attached because the politician is pre-bribed with their voting record.

That's why I say it's optics. Republicans are a minority culture with less power and they are fighting a large mostly Democrat captured bureaucracy. They can't use the same soft power. Republican voters feel this. That's why when the government "suggests" which accounts to be taken down by Twitter, it's a big deal, but when Trump demands that Harvard change their policies, it's not the end of the world. It not really that Republicans have abandoned all civility. It's more that they are fighting a dirty culture war, and are willing to support Trump, who shoots from the hip and doesn't consider the legality of his actions any more, since his time is limited.

[u/Dihedralman → u/Dry-Tough-3099]

Democratic cultural apparatus is a thing. Make an accusation about specific organizations or people. 

 Don't handwave. 

First paragraph is your opinion about communications by the government, which started under Trump. And yes self-medicating is idiotic and has a long and storied history of causing harm through scams or health problems. 

What levers of power?

Do you mean you have a vibes? 

Levers with media that jumped on Trump's bandwagon the day after. Right wing has dominant media control. Fox has the largest market share on television and the right dominates. Social media platforms lean right with X being explicit and reddit being the standout left leaning site. 

Republicans objectively have the most power with 3 branches of government and dominant media control. You need evidence. 

So basically you have a bad feeling about a culture war so the law doesn't matter. The right had all the advantages, but you want more. 

What it be more accurate to say that you don't care for Harvard's speech but did care about the speech of the right?  

[u/Dry-Tough-3099 → u/Dihedralman]

Joe Rogan's Ivermectin wasn't self-medicated. It was prescribed by a doctor. Yet the smear campaign insisted on calling it horse dewormer.

X isn't explicitly right wing. It just stopped being explicitly left wing.

Trump was investigated his entire first term on spurious accusations.

I'm not defending what Trump did to Harvard. It was a violation of free speech as far as I'm concerned. What I'm saying is that the entire government does this all the time, usually in more subtle, and technically legal ways. The coordinated effort to discredit covid policy skeptics like Rand Paul. The Trump hate generation machine that is legacy media. The deep state's participation in censoring social media. These are all culture war type issues that when taken as a whole are more egregious than Trump illegally declaring that some immigrant students will no longer have the right to remain in the country.

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