Cyberbullying ACLU

gonna cyberbully you so hard

My friend Jacob was kind enough (!) to share on Facebook my newsletter about the ACLU’s “cyberbullying” comment, and to share with me one person’s emotional response.¹ First, he asserted that ACLU is in the Supreme Court fighting for free speech (arguing that Tinker should not be expanded to allow schools to punish out-of-school speech) and therefore cannot be criticized for taking an anti-free-speech position (that schools “need to deal with cyberbullying”) that it had in the past explicitly rejected.

Bpenn005 at English Wikibooks, Public domain, via Wikimedia Commons

But it’s possible for someone to argue in favor of free speech in a particular case using an argument that is generally anti free speech.

For example, if you are challenging a revenge-porn statute you might argue that nonconsensual pornography may be restricted, but that this particular statute is not narrow enough: you’re arguing for free speech in a way that surrenders the real fight.

Or for another example, here’s my ol…