A Global Crackdown on Free Speech

[Celerity]

We explore how the U.S. has joined all the other countries where leaders have tried to silence speech.

https://www.nytimes.com/2025/09/29/world/free-speech-crackdown-israel-gaza-trump-proposal.html

https://archive.ph/uPeN0


Mark Abramson for The New York Times

Humor is dangerous for autocrats. Seven months before the outbreak of World War II, Hitler’s propaganda minister ended the careers of five comedians, calling them “brazen, impertinent, arrogant and tactless” and their fans “parasitic scum.” Their firing made the front page of The New York Times on Feb. 4, 1939. The article explains what got them into trouble. The comedians “deftly, but unmistakably, caricatured the gestures, poses and physical characteristics of National Socialist leaders.” This month, the American late night talk show host Jimmy Kimmel was suspended and then reinstated. I spoke to my colleague Damien Cave, who has written extensively about the growing restrictions on speech around the world, to see if he could put what is happening in the U.S. into a larger context. (I really recommend reading his full story.)

Damien, what does the Jimmy Kimmel saga look like to you?

It reminds me of all the other countries where leaders have tried to silence speech, whether it’s taking over newspapers or shutting down TV stations or going after comedians. For the past decade, the trend line has been moving away from freedom of expression, whether it’s in hard-core authoritarian countries like Russia or China, or backsliding democracies like Turkey and Hungary. The degree of crackdown differs, but the number of countries cracking down is rising. What’s shocking is that the U.S. — specifically its government — is now among them.

Why is humor so dangerous to autocrats?

Authoritarians tend to have thin skins, and insist on being seen as great. Some scholars argue that the perception of competence is what keeps dictatorships in place — and that unlike anger or protest, which seek to compete with power, laughter and mockery are entirely dismissive, essentially insisting, “This guy is a joke.” In that sense, humor is the ultimate weapon.

Is there a pattern in how authoritarian leaders try to crack down on speech?

It often starts with broad media criticism. Next come suggestions that individual people and publications are somehow an enemy of the people. After that, it moves to takeovers of media companies. The goal is always to create an echo chamber. Today, it’s not just about controlling newspapers and broadcast networks, it’s social media outlets and future technologies like A.I. But the logic is the same: It’s to control the information space and use that to impose a new idea of what’s normal or “common sense.” It’s all part of trying to achieve cultural and political dominance.

Who is the master of this kind of control today?..........................

snip

[Johnny2X2X]

1. It's going to get much much worse

I believe the next thing they're going to do is target Democrats for benefits removal based on their social media posts. AI can easily search these databases and find out who is a liberal, those people will be deemed anti-American and have their Social Security, Medicare, and Medicaid benefits targeted. Republicans will call it the Save Social Security and Medicare Act.

It's all about revenge for Trump and this cabal, and they haven't forgotten about just regular people who vote Blue. You can expect the IRS to target people based on political leanings too.