No Aid for Censors: The Case for Quitting Twitter
Last night I suspended Twitter indefinitely. This had been building for some time for two primary reasons. First, Twitter, like Facebook (which I had given […]
Free Speech
How to Think about Property Rights and Social Networks
Is it true that Twitter, Facebook, and Google are private companies, which can cancel, delete, or ban anyone they want at any time? Short answer: […]
Conservatives, Don’t Quit Twitter
If you are someone on the political Right who might quit Twitter because it just banned Jesse Kelly, here’s my plea: Don’t. After the shocking […]
Maybe We Could Use a Civic Hippocratic Oath
A mob of protesters associated with the radical left-wing group Antifa swarmed the private residence of Fox News host Tucker Carlson on the night of […]
Blacklisting Patrick Henry and American History
My days as an American historian may be numbered. For the better part of 40 years, my extended family has featured American “living history” on […]
Don’t Give In to the Left’s Moral Blackmail
A statement posted on social media by Pittsburgh Tree of Life synagogue shooter shows what he shares in common with 99 percent of the members […]
In Europe, ‘Hate Speech’ is the New Blasphemy
In Europe, calling the prophet Muhammad a “pedophile” is not protected speech, at least according to the European Court of Human Rights, the continent’s highest […]
What Is Racist?
The English language has its peculiarities. Two English words that appear to be opposites to one another can instead be synonyms. If someone is telling […]
How Big Tech Will Swing the Midterms, Then Take Over the World
Facebook is a menace to grassroots political organizing—and to free and fair elections generally. The social media giant this week announced it would ban “misinformation” […]
The Phantom Pain of the Left
As the president of the Senate called for a sufficient second to move to a vote on Judge Brett Kavanaugh, a . . . noise […]
Explaining the Left, Part IV: Contempt for Middle-Class Values
When I was in graduate school, I learned a lot about the Left. One lesson was that while most liberals and conservatives abide by society’s […]
Resisting #TheResistance
If the recent generic ballots tell us anything, it is that the Republican establishment should stop trying to run generic Republicans as candidates. The GOP […]
Are We on the Verge of Civil War?
Americans keep dividing into two hostile camps. It seems the country is back to 1860 on the eve of the Civil War, rather than in […]
Fahrenheit 111000011
The digital world, like the modern world generally, is ephemeral. Entire universes appear and disappear in the space of days or weeks. In the mid-2000s, […]
The Battle for America’s Mind
Heralding the rise of the daily newspaper in 1831, French poet and politician Alphonse de Lamartine declared journalism would emerge as “the whole of human […]
Save the Culture from the Modern Vandals
By now, it’s become a parlor game: which movies, even from the recent past, could and would not be made today? “Blazing Saddles,” for sure, […]
How Social Media Collusion Censors Speech
Whether it is Twitter’s “shadowban,” Facebook’s news-sifting algorithm, or YouTube’s concern for user “safety,” social media gatekeeping is now deployed shamelessly in the service of […]
Millennials Are Breaking Free from the Thought Police
Millennials have already changed our country. This generation was raised in groups starting in daycare. They are linked constantly via social media. They never experienced […]
Clarity About Clearances
Last week, a dozen former directors and deputy directors of CIA in Democratic administrations (Robert Gates made the list bipartisan) chastised President Trump for removing […]
The Spanish Inquisition: Back by Popular Demand
Nobody expects the Spanish Inquisition,” said Monty Python, the great British comedy troupe that the BBC now dismisses as unwanted “Oxbridge white blokes.” In his […]