Woke ACLU Wakes Up On Free Speech?

Huh? Did we read the headline right? “ACLU slams govt working with Big Tech to decide ‘what is true or false’”? If the return to its core value of legal honesty is itself true, welcome back Dear ACLU to your 1st Amendment roots …

Based on its recent history, one can be forgiven for adding how “it’s hoped this new sign of growth is sustained.” Yet, as Fox News reported, “The American Civil Liberties Union went back to its roots Monday, condemning the government for working with Big Tech to censor certain topics and calling it a betrayal of constitutional rights.” In the ACLU’s own words via a Tweet: “The First Amendment bars the government from deciding for us what is true or false, online or anywhere. Our government can’t use private pressure to get around our constitutional rights.”

Noted Fox: “Former ACLU head Ira Glasser condemned the state of the organization [during] a January episode of ‘Real Time’ with Bill Maher. Glasser lamented, ‘There is a requirement now f[rom] the national ACLU employers, that before they [staff] can take a case defending someone’s free speech they have to make sure that the speech doesn’t offend or threaten other civil liberties values.’ He explained that by contrast, in the [ACLU’s] nobler days, ‘most of the speech we defended didn’t [actually] reflect our values [e.g., the highly controversial defense of the so-called Nazi marches in Sweet Home Chicago’s Marquette Park].’” Concluded Glasser, “‘That’s the point.’”

Davd Soul