In all corners of the world, free speech is under attack, seen as something to be tamed and regulated either by corporate overlords or government bureaucrats.
Who is going to defend the rights of the people to speak freely, even if the right to speak freely means the right to speak cruelly or incorrectly?
Don't look to elected officials, business leaders, or the many "think tanks" that infest major cities the world over; that's for certain. You may find a handful of free speech champions, but only after a considerable amount of searching.
This reality, that free speech is considered now something of a social ill, if not an outright public hazard, appears to have moved well beyond the walls of academia and niche political circles. Anti-free speech sentiment, as they say, has gone mainstream. If you consider yourself a free speech absolutist, you are not wrong to think of yourself as being in the minority. Between the press, Big Tech, and world governments, your belief that speech should remain open and unregulated is an increasingly unpopular one.
"Audible reckoning," reads the eye-catching headline to a report published this week by the Brookings Institution, a liberal think tank, "How top political podcasters spread unsubstantiated and false claims."
Since the advent of podcasts, writes senior data analyst Valerie Wirtschafter, they "have generally offered a space where, in the words of [podcaster Michael Knowles], 'you can say whatever you want.'"
She adds, "Once...
The Dangote Group has denied claims that its President, Aliko Dangote, is at odds with Tony Elumelu, describing the report as false, malicious and baseless. In a statement signed by its Group Chie...