Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances.
No State shall make or enforce any law which shall abridge the privileges or immunities of citizens of the United States; nor shall any State deprive any person of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law; nor deny to any person within its jurisdiction the equal protection of the laws.
18 U.S.C. § 242: Makes it a crime to willfully deprive someone of a right or privilege protected by the Constitution or laws of the United States
Ok, that is a ton of reading. However, the point of this is to actually define what freedom of speech actually is.
You are free to tell your employer to fuck off and pound sand, but you will get fired. That is a consequence of words. The government won’t step in if you weren’t threatening anyone. You and your employer have specific rights in that regard.
In the US, you can go on the news and call anyone in the government stupid and they can’t do their jobs or that one party is incompetent. You might lose or gain friends from that, which is still a consequence.
Also in the US, if you directly threaten a person with physical harm and if intent of action can be shown, you are going to be arrested. Your words have now become an infringement on the rights of someone else.
I am just clarifying things, s’all.
Having a mouth and being able to speak words is a thing. You are “free to say words” and nobody can legally sew your mouth shut and make you incapable of talking.
When those words become a threat, someone else must now have their rights protected. This is mostly where the limitations on “Freedom of Speech” come from.
I am pulling this conversation back a hair to define what we are talking about as it’s easy to mix terms on social media.
Just curious, was there a recent event that happened that affects more than just you? Just curious, s’all.
So. I have had a decent amount of time to think about this kind of thing and I have just become very aware about what I consider private information. If something is super private, I take the appropriate steps to ensure absolute and super paranoid levels of security.
However, there isn’t much that I could be blackmailed for because if there wasn’t an absolute expectation of privacy from the start, I just expect most information to be public anyway.
Most “general human things” I still wouldn’t care about. Someone has naked pictures of me they want to share? “Uh. Why?” would be my first question. I am not much different and any of the other billions of humans out there, so if you want to see those, knock yourself out. (I just won’t go out of my way to make or distribute that stuff.)
You caught me going to a porn site on my free time where I had the expectation of privacy? Sorry, but many people do that and again, I’m just being human, so fuck off.
I think at the end of the day, I have seen (and done) so much stupid shit that it takes a lot to bother me. While my experience probably doesn’t help you at this moment, it’s fairly important to be aware of your own feelings in cases like this.
In the most kind way possible: If all else fails and you cannot rationalize the current situation, remember that very few people know or even care about you specifically. Sure, you have friends and family! If they are “real” friends, nothing can get in the way of that friendship. Family is family. The rest of the world? Bah. Fuck 'em.
Financial loss is another beast and a pain to deal with. Work with your bank and credit cards companies to resolve what you can, if that is the case.
Regardless, time fixes all so hang in there!