Eight Values of Free Expression

Freedom of speech is the most important thing in the United States because it gives people the right to say whatever they want without feeling pressure to always say the right thing. There are many different positives that come with having freedom of speech, but today we are starting to see freedom of speech be ripped away from people. 

Lately, there have been many instances of a popular figure who says something controversial and in return are having their lives ruined because of something they said possibly years prior. Very often those that are affected by this are streamers (people that live stream). Many of these individuals have been "cancelled" because of something they have said in the heat of the moment and so, lose out on sponsorships and more money opportunities. 

By cancelling anybody that says something that you might disagree with or take offense to, means that it is becoming increasingly difficult for people to set themselves apart from others because they can no longer be as creative as they want. 

What is freedom of speech without the ability to speak your mind or to express ideas with others? The answer is pretty simple actually, it isn't freedom of speech at all and we are beginning to come closer to a society where you have to watch everything you say.

Even if there is not intent to hurt anyone with what you say or believe there are many people out there that will be offended by whatever comes out of your mouth. It is unfortunate that is the society we could be going towards, because a lot of these countries in the world that Americans make fun of for not having freedom of speech would be in the same boat as us. 

In countries that do not have freedom of speech they are, for the most part, underdeveloped (North Korea) and have poor economies. This is mostly because people are not allowed to share ideas with one another because of fear that they will be prosecuted. 

Individual self-fulfillment is the most important thing to Americans in the United States I believe, because it gives people the right to express who they are and what they believe in without facing consequences from the government. 

Think about it, how would any of the biggest inventions, not just in the U.S. but throughout the world have been created without those people having the right to discuss ideas with one another to create something that would change the world. 

The last point is, if citizens did not have the right to freedom of speech, which in return is what separates people from each other everybody would seem the same. It would get boring meeting new people all of the time just to have the behave and talk the same way everybody else does. There would be no creativity in the world if that were the case and people would most likely be less happy if they had to contain everything about them.

There are many other versions of freedom of speech that have very good arguments for why every person has the right to say what they want, the one that connected with me the most was individual self-fulfillment and being able to share any ideas that one may want to.