More than half of Americans believe the First Amendment may go too far in terms of the rights it guarantees, according to a new survey from the Foundation for Individual Rights and Expression (FIRE), a nonprofit organization focused on the First Amendment.
The survey, released Thursday, asked 1,000 U.S. adults a series of questions about the First Amendment, free speech and the protection of those rights. Fifty-three percent of respondents agreed at least somewhat with the statement that the First Amendment goes too far in terms of the rights it protects, including 28% who said the statement went “mostly” or “completely.” ” describes their thoughts.
Americans’ partisan divide deepens. More than 60% of Democrats think the First Amendment may go too far, compared with 52% of Republicans.
“It’s clear that one in two Americans wishes they had fewer civil liberties,” Sean Stevens, FIRE’s chief research adviser, said Thursday. “Many of them deny the rights to assemble, to press freely, and to petition the government. This is a dictator’s fantasy.”
Additionally, one in five respondents said they were “somewhat” or “very” worried about losing their job if someone complained about something they said. 83% reported self-censorship in the past month, with 23% doing so “fairly” or “very” often.
Only 22% of respondents said they believed the right to free speech was “very” or “completely” safe. But despite these concerns, more than a third said they “somewhat,” “a lot,” or “completely” trust the government to regulate what speech is considered “intimidation,” “threats,” “harassment” ” and “indecent” to make fair decisions, ” and other tags.
All told, almost 7 in 10 respondents believe the United States is heading in the wrong direction when it comes to free speech — though it’s unclear whether respondents think our culture and government have become too receptive to controversial speech Tolerant or not tolerant enough.
This latest survey shows that many Americans are concerned about the safety of their free speech rights but are also eager to censor speech they personally find objectionable.
“Americans have little tolerance for some forms of protected speech and a lot of tolerance for unprotected conduct, and the opposite is true,” Stevens said. “This poll shows that the U.S. The state of free speech is terrible.”
