Speech is considerably regulated to varying extents in the majority of countries globally. Please try to step out of the US when making arguments about "much of the world." China and India alone contain almost half of the world's population.
Didn't I literally say "much of the world" ?
As I have said many times, I understand that free speech is not absolute. The limits vary from country to country, I understand that.
You are back to the habit of rephrasing others' positions instead of responding to what we actually say. I have no interest in having to correct misrepresentations every other post, so focus on what I'm actually saying or tell me if you don't want to so that I spare my time and know not to engage you.
As we all know, sometimes posters post loaded questions, or if not loaded, questions that might better be cast from a different perspective. I can assure you that I'm not trying to dodge any of your questions, I'm trying to demonstrate that there are different - perhaps better - perspectives.
I reject the very notion that anti-harassmsnt laws that cover trans people "erode free speech" in the first place. The majority of the world's most posperous countries that top freedom indices have hate speech laws and significant medical and legal support for trans people's rights. They're doing fine, and they have more freedom per multiple metrics than the US does. That includes Canada, the home of Bill C-16.
I understand your position. I suspect we'll have to agree to disagree on this point. I think a lot of new-ish "hate speech" laws have been implemented due to short term political pressure, not to long preservation of free societies. To be clear, I'm not supporting hate speech, I just think that we can fight hate speech with tools less dangerous to society than censorship laws.
Do you realize that Europe's most developed and free countries all have hate speech laws? The same goes for Australia.
I will iterate what I said above: try to think of the wider global scope and the evidence from developed countries outside the US instead of focusing only on the US and the alarmist mantras of its ideologues.
I believe I've answered this earlier in this post, but let me add: The whole world has been corrupted by unchecked capitalism. Much of the world has become some form of Oligarchy / Kleptocracy. We are all awash in a sea of propaganda, marketing, and other forms of coercion. In that context, I think we have to step back, and try to evaluate issues using evidence, logic, and common sense, not the identity politics based solutions provided by activists.
Several decades ago the Muslim world erupted over cartoons. Almost the entire world of journalism capitulated. We have to be able to think for ourselves. It seems to me we have overwhelming historical evidence that the beginning of tyranny is also the seemingly well intended introduction of censorship laws.
Censorship should be our last line of defense. Should we fight against bigotry and harassment? Of course!!!! But we have tools other than censorship to fight with.