As an attorney of 16 years (who did alright in law school and on the bar exam), let me extend an invitation. Let me invite you to law school. (One or two of you have asked, so... here we go.)

Category: First Amendment. Subcategory: Freedom of Speech.

(A thread)

First, think of the Bill of Rights this way: It is a list of limitations on the GOVERNMENT, a sort of redline the government cannot cross. So, according to the Constitution, “Congress (i.e., the Government) shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion...

or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press....”

The Constitution does not preclude any private corporation from setting parameters around speech (or religion for that matter). Because we live in a free market, capitalist...

society, any publisher, platform creator, or tech company can choose who it allows to use the platform. And because we love the free market, we’re all down with this. Right? I mean... we don’t want the government requiring companies to allow speech they disagree with...

(and which would hurt their brand). This would be a different sort of government overreach.

Consider this hypothetical: Your local coffee shop is hosting a poetry reading. Before the event, a group of Neo-nazis calls and asks if they can read the collected poems...

of Adolf Hitler. Shouldn’t the coffee shop have the right to say “YOU ARE NOT WELCOME!” And if said group does show up, does the coffee shop have to let them use the mic? No way.

Now, the analogy: Twitter, Google, and Facebook have created a sort of digital coffee shop. They...

spent billions creating these platforms, marketing them, and drawing patrons. As a result (and because WE LOVE THE FREE MARKET (right?)), they get to choose who uses their platforms to spread speech. They are not the Government...

, so there is nothing in the Constitution that would keep them from elevating some forms of speech and excluding other forms of speech.

Now, a pop quiz:
(1) What entity (or entities) does the Constitution govern/limit?
(2) Who does the Speech Clause of the First Amendment protect and against whom?
(3) Are Twitter, Facebook, Apple, or Google governmental entities?