I take your point about the issue but not about the example. There are many issues that people will cite strong ethical reasons for and against. No problem, let them argue their reasoning and debate the issues on social media, in the press, in books, by writing to MPs, debating in parliament, holding protests, or erecting a billboard in the town centre on a Saturday afternoon and handing out leaflets. These things are freedom of speech.

However there are a minority of activists that are not content to just do that. They insist that they want to harass, intimidate, threaten etc ordinary people that happen to use or work in the relevant area. We know this. It is the tiniest step away from terrorism and can boil over into actual terrorism. These activists are very cunning in seeking ways around 'the letter of the law'. For example, Animal rights activists attacking the cars of people working in abatoirs, or following them home. Extinction rebellion shutting down city centres and stopping ambulances by blocking the roads. There is if you like a spectrum - free speech - protest - activism - terrorism.

I think J D Vance is talking too much off the top of his head in ignorance of the details of some of the specific examples he is citing. He has read a press headline or a one line tweet, but hasn't understood the full context. If you are going to make the valid points about free speech you need to make sure your valid message cannot be undermined by exposing the details of the examples you have chosen.

Vance, Musk, and Trump although very right in their general thrust re freedom of speech, can miss the detail which we ourselves know about what is happening in our countries.

This might be so, but the time for endless debate and indecisive muddling through is over, they are going to change the world.

I thought they were already 'woke.' :)

So you want to rim the bible bashing, walkin' dude, Gilead Commander with the guy liner?

Am I aloud to say that? That's free speech right?

Have you read his back story of opportunistic conflicting opinions? He once intimated that Biden was responsible for poisoning MAGA voters and their kids with Fentanyl and perhaps astutely likened Trump to Hitler.

I thought Stephen King's The Stand was fiction…now I'm not so sure.

I don't know why I'm on Robin's list of 'offenders'. I'm always willing to listen to opinions on both sides. I thought Vance made a decent speech and agreed with a lot of it, but I've also raised questions about Trump's agenda, so presumably I'm now beyond the pale on all sides, having previously been dismissed by one or more of the more left-leaning commentators, and called a primate by another. Now something I've said has raised hackles on the Right. Apparently it isn't OK to ask questions or express opinions (how ironic), or not to fit the profile - whatever that is. Anyway, it has become clear that this is no place for nuanced debate (with honourable exceptions), as many of you have probably already realised. So much for the free speech that we're all supposedly in favour of. So that's it for me. I'll be restricting my comments to investment-related matters from now on.