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> the establishment wants to shut Alex down for speaking the truth. What truth did Jones speak?
The full quote is > This will only send the signal to millions of people, that the establishment wants to shut Alex down for speaking the truth. I don't think OP is arguing Alex Jones spoke any truths per say, he's arguing that's how it'll be interpreted by his supporters.
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> Say the wrong words and get financially destroyed I would argue that a failed society is one that protects an individual at the cost of the group. You only see one individual held accountable for his words and actions, but you don't make any attempt to recognize the families and how their lives have been affected by Alex Jones' negligent and irresponsible words.
Where are we going with this line of thought Protecting minorities within a larger group of people is the ideal state according to thought leaders. In your world kicking out a black man of his home because property values are lowering for everyone else is acceptable. Sometimes the needs of the one outweigh the many
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First amendment isn’t under attack. Alex Jones isn’t being punished by the govt. Ge attacked people, they responded back. Defamation law has always existed and people can always sue you for libel and slander.
> Defamation law has always existed and people can always sue you for libel and slander. But a $965 million dollar judgment for libel or slander would have to be justified by comparable damages. That isn't the case here.
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Cigarettes kill 7x as many as opiates in the USA every hour, day, week, month, and year. Those companies aren't even fined or put behind a prescription-wall.
Adding some numbers: [1] gives ~480k cigarette deaths, [2] gives 107k drug deaths with ~80k of those from opiods which is an approx 6:1 ratio (close enough!) [1] https://www.cdc.gov/tobacco/data_statistics/fact_sheets/heal... [2] https://www.cdc.gov/nchs/pressroom/nchs_press_releases/2022/...
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This is a fair judgement against Jones. A fair judgement against the people who lied about WMD's and killed millions via the war in Iraq would be life in prison, for a start. Just because the criminals at the top get away with war crimes doesn't mean the criminals lower on the totem pole shouldn't be punished. It's a false equivalence to claim otherwise.
That is definitively not the definition of a false equivalence as I did not claim he should go scott free. However I doubt that there is anything fair regarding a 900 millon dollar punishment on a person that has a net worth that is orders of magnitude smaller.
[1] https://www.insider.com/alex-jones-free-speech-systems-infow...
One surprising thing (at least for me) that I don't see anyone talking about in the comments is: I had no idea Alex Jones had that much money. That's 1 billion dollars in damages.
This is a good verdict - defamation in the media is a very serious problem. It's unfortunate that it took a person like Alex Jones to convince people of it. If anything he should not be taken seriously. Those who are taken seriously have gotten away with much worse by merely apologizing or correcting themselves (as he did as well). As for the amount - the highest fine paid by Wall Street firms for the 2008 crisis was…
[1] https://news.yahoo.com/alex-jones-railed-against-sandy-19364...
This is great news, but we should temper our expectations: It's likely that Jones will appeal and keep this tied up for years before he has to pay anything. Even if he is eventually obligated to pay some amount, it is unlikely to be what the jury just decided. And even if it is what the jury just decided, Jones' company is already "bankrupt" (yet still on the air) and he will almost certainly avoid liability through…
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I normally would agree with you - I'm very pro free speech - but what Alex Jones did was not just "the wrong words", it was blatant slander that permanently ruined the lives of these people. I understand why you're concerned, but we've had slander laws forever, and this is exactly what it's used for.
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