If the UK can do it....why the hell can't we?

[Orrex]

141. No need to modify or repeal it

No amendment is an absolute guarantee of rights, and the 1st is already subject to all kinds of limitations--as are all the other amendments.

A developed nation should be able to find a way to limit corporate speech by, for instance, abandoning the bullshit notion that corporations are people or are entitled to the same rights as people. One could thereafter require, for instance, that corporate speech is protected only to the extent that it can be proven true. A corporation cannot have opinions, nor should corporate falsehoods be protected. And matters of "good faith" falsehood should, once the falsehood is demonstrated, be subject to restriction.

Many restrictions along these lines already exist. A mutual fund cannot publish a prospectus full of falsehoods, nor can a food manufacturer lie about the contents of its product. I see no reason why similar strictures can't be applied to corporate speech in general.

Agents speaking on behalf of corporations, whether they be posing as journalists or serving as attorneys, should be held to the same standard.

Before someone howls "wHaT aBoUt SoCiAl MeDiA?" I assert that such open platforms are fundamentally distinct from media outlets in which seven-figure employees broadcast from scripts provided by the corporation that employs them.

And before someone else howls "WhAt AbOuT fIcTiOnAl Tv ShOwS oR mOvIeS?" I further assert that these are self-evidently fictional and do not try to pass themselves off as fact.


The only real obstacle here is, again, the bullshit fantasy that corporations are people. Although I don't pretend that it would be simple to get rid of that nonsense, the rest would be pretty simple after that, and doing so wouldn't curtail the 1st Amendment in any way.