Main problem I have with (modern/common) arguments pitched in "defence of free speech" is that they all turn on invalidating other people's speech.

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Which makes perfect sense - because all rights are a push-me-pull-you affair which impinge on someone else's right - *all* defences of free speech are, by definition, telling *someone else* to pipe down.

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But somehow this modern iteration of free speech argument frames this basic tension - i.e. the substance of all dialogues about rights - as if it didn't exist and presents any tension as pathological.

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E.g. a prominent author wishes to expand their (already significant) platform for some controversial ideas so they respond to a request to give a talk.

Some university students disagree and try to get a platform for their ideas by pitching for the invitation to be pulled.

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Or a magazine decides to decline to invite you to do a competition.

These are all forms of free speech. I.e. none of them are individually impressive but they all reflect limited contextual agency to speak publicly.

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(I'm pre-emptively dismissing all arguments that reduce to "free speech is what I do with the platforms I have, which are totally, theoretically, notionally, open to all - not exclusive and limited, like, say the membership of a student university society")

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There's good reason to think about how the right of groups to decide who to invited to speak/hold competitions based on who they choose impacts on other people's rights.

But not on the basis that it's de facto intolerable.

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And if you genuinely are worried about the impacts of those speech freedoms on other people, thinking about the economic dimension and the incredible range of remuneration - is the biggest impact on well-to-do authors?

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