Why Moderates are Necessary for Free Speech

People are free to not be moderates, but moderates are the key to maintaining freedom

Photo by Markus Winkler on Unsplash

In the past decade, free speech has been attacked and eroded by forces from both the left and the right, to an extent not seen since at least World War II. I think an important question we need to ask is, why is it happening now? Why did free speech norms that have stood the test of time suddenly begin to crumble at this moment? What is it about our current political moment that has allowed this to happen?

I think the answer lies in extremism, and the tribalism, self-righteousness, lack of genuine openness, and lack of commitment to the objective truth that comes with embracing an extreme politics. It is an objective fact that both the left and the right have gotten more extreme in the past decade. Ideas previously considered taboo have been increasingly mainstreamed from both directions: divisive oppressor vs. oppressed identity politics, pseudo-Freudian and existentialist philosophical theories, and the critical anarchist deconstructionist worldview from the left; ‘replacement theory’ inspired ultra-nationalism, new pro-authoritarian political ideologies (like Neoreaction and NatCon), and literally regressive culture war posturing from the right. What all these ideologies have in common is that they have no use for studying the objective truth as it is, or learning from the viewpoints of other people. They are already certain of their own correctness and righteousness, and the only thing left to do is to impose their vision on the rest of society, by force or other illiberal means if necessary. Such ideologies have no use for free speech. While there are indeed individual cases of extremists who nevertheless respect free speech, it is only logical that extreme political movements, as a whole, don’t respect free speech very much.

On the other hand, moderates have a consistent interest in defending free speech. This is because moderates don’t have a pre-established commitment to an extreme ideology. This makes it more possible to be truly open to the different viewpoints that exist out there. After all, it is only natural that, when coming to a topic without preconceived commitments, one would want to gather as much evidence as possible, in order to arrive at a more accurate understanding of the objective truth. Moreover, given the lack of commitment to an overarching view of how things must be, moderates don’t always agree with the ideas of any one tribe. I mean, moderates don’t even always agree with each other on every topic! The fact that moderates don’t ever feel comfortable to join a tribe, and that disagreements are a normal part of life for moderates, also mean that they would have more incentive to embrace free speech. This is because free speech is both a mechanism for resolving our differences, and also a way to agree to disagree peacefully when we must.

Herein lies an important paradox: free speech allows people to reject moderation. Indeed, it allows people to be extremists, and to promote their extremist ideas. A moderatism that censors ideas it considers to be extreme would no longer be upholding free speech, by definition. (It would probably also not be truly moderate anymore.) On the other hand, the rise of extremism is harmful for free speech, and could eventually kill it off altogether. Putting it another way, free speech must allow people to not be moderates, but if too few committed and outspoken moderates remain, free speech itself might cease to exist. In this way, some doomers might even say it is inevitable that free speech eventually digs its own grave.

Is there a way we can resolve this paradox, so that free speech doesn’t end up digging its own grave? I guess we can both uphold free speech, and also promote the virtues of political moderation within the bounds of respect for free speech. There is no contradiction in these things, as long as we are using the free market of ideas to promote moderation, rather than using censorship to force people to be moderate. Indeed, I believe one of the biggest mistakes of the 2010s free speech movement was a lack of discussion about the virtues of the kind of political moderation which would naturally support a culture of free speech. In the 2010s, free speech activists often talked about things like respecting the ‘marketplace of ideas’ when we opposed de-platforming and cancel culture, but we didn’t talk enough about why we should respect the marketplace of ideas. This, in turn, allowed bad faith actors to pretend to be one of us, in order to defend the speech of people they agreed with, only to later turn around to support anti-free speech actions from their own tribe, thus discrediting the whole movement, and setting the cause of free speech back even further.

There are many reasons why I support free speech. But an important reason is because I am a moderate, and I believe it is very important to emphasize this. Free speech goes with a moderate politics like a horse and a cart. It allows us to reject tribalism and embrace independent thinking, listen to different perspectives, arrive at a more accurate understanding of the objective truth, try to find common ground and agree where we can, and peacefully disagree where we must. These are all attractive features for the political moderate. This is why I believe defending free speech is the natural position of the moderate, and promoting moderate politics is key to ensuring the continued survival of free speech.

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TaraElla is a singer-songwriter and author, who is the author of the Progressive Conservative Manifesto, the Moral Libertarian Manifesto and the Moral Libertarian book series. She is also the author of her autobiography The TaraElla Story.