After the former president was banned from Twitter for attempting to incite insurrection at the U.S. Capitol on Jan. 6, by claiming that his reelection was “stolen” from him by just about everyone in the world, there were others who were banned from the social media sites, which prompted a lively debate on censorship and freedom of speech.

The debate will go on for a long time, but there is one thing that is very important in this debate, but which is not likely to get much attention and that is the anonymity of the speakers who demand, and get, their right to free speech under the First Amendment of the U.S. Constitution. There are several factors at work here and there is much confusion about rights and privileges.

First, there is the question of First Amendment rights, which holds that governments may not impede the expression of ideas and opinions, no matter how wrong, ridiculous, or dangerous they may be, if they are only expressions. Acting on those ideas and opinions is another matter. Under the U.S. system of jurisprudence, a person is innocent until proven guilty and committing a crime is what will get that person in trouble, not what that person has uttered on the street or on “social media.”

The First Amendment only curbs the government’s control of speech and it does not address the curbing of speech by private players, such as the owners of social media or owners of industries or businesses. For the record, when an at-will worker crosses the threshold of the business or industry to go to work each day, he or she gives up freedom of speech because...for the most part, the First Amendment doesn’t apply. This is a difference that many across the political spectrum don’t seem to understand. All you have to do is listen to the rioters who trashed the Capitol and threatened the lives of lawmakers, when they are banned from social media. “My free speech rights were violated,” they have said, adding that they are losing or will lose, “our freedoms” under this or that administration.

They have not truly lost their First Amendment rights, even though banned from their perches on social media. They, like the former president, can always take to a soapbox in any given park, in any given city, and express themselves until they are out of breath. They won’t do that because that does not reach enough people at one time to make a difference in the political scheme of things. The only alternative to that is to organize to have an impact and that takes work. Usually, they, like the just defeated president, are unwilling to do that. It takes work, perhaps a lifetime of work. And, it takes ideas and plans and programs and, after that, it takes debate among equals, to come to a path that might lead to something that would benefit humanity and the planet. They don’t want to do that, because it takes work. In other words, it takes participation in the sometimes dull routine of the democratic process and some, like the rioters in the U.S. Capitol, want to be gratified instantly, instead of doing the hard work of democracy. Obviously, they thought that a violent, short siege would be enough to disrupt that process and place their hero back in the White House. So far, it hasn’t worked.

Part of the debate about free speech in the light of the ejection of the former president and some of his cult followers from social media should be: What should be done about their cries of alarm of being “censored” by the private companies like Twitter, Facebook, Instagram, and others. The Internet age has thrown the U.S. body politic into confusion on the subject of free speech and freedom, in general. But, that doesn’t have to be. The country has been through this before. There were monopolies of great size in the past and there were efforts to deal with them. Wasn’t Theodore Roosevelt known as the great trust-buster? He had the idea, but whatever was done to accomplish that did not last.

TR’s efforts to break up great monopolies was a good idea, but the remainder of the 20th Century is evidence that his good idea did not take hold and was quickly forgotten, even by (maybe, especially by) so-called conservatives throughout the last century. By the end of the century, the nation still faced the enormous power of monopolies, even though these were monopolies that dealt in ideas and communication and opinions, not of iron and steel, glass, rubber, railroads and all of giant systems that were tangible. A few of the biggest tangibles, of course, are the corporations that make up the U.S. “defense” industry. They rule us and take up about half of the federal budget, where your tax dollars go. These are monopolies that are sacrosanct for most politicians and they will be curbed only by massive organizing, pressure, and voting by millions of citizens. Much of that money should go to relieve human suffering, of which there is plenty across the nation.

Then there are the American billionaires, owners of multi-billion-dollar corporations, like Jeff Bezos, CEO of Amazon, who raked in some $48 billion during the pandemic, according to a report in Business Insider last October. Not to pick on poor Bezos, but he was in the company of the rest of America’s billionaires. The publication reported that the nation’s billionaires “increased their total net worth $637 billion during the Covid-19 pandemic, so far.” Those monopolists don’t seem to be able to miss a beat in raking in profits, no matter what they do.

Tax experts and economists have been trying to come up with ways to break up monopolies for generations, but how to do it? Right now, the problem seems to be the power of social media, but there was a time when “social media,” local newspapers, magazines, and other forms of communication were spread generously across the landscape. The editors and writers knew their towns and villages and cities and wrote intelligently about them. When the editors received letters from readers, chances were they knew them or knew of them. At least, they knew the issues and the character of the people, and the writers of opinion did not write in anonymity. Their names and community were attached to the opinion, unlike social media of 2021, in which all manner of wild and often reckless and uninformed claims can and will be made, because the identity of the speaker can be hidden. When people have to reveal their identity, their opinions usually are much more measured, even rational.

Although many survive, the halcyon days of the local newspapers are gone and in their place are advertising circulars. In a consumer, consumptionist society, apparently that’s all that’s needed. The cohesiveness that was provided by local daily newspapers and radio stations is mostly gone. In their place are computerized programming and few human beings that write the copy and speak to them about life in their own towns and villages, their own milieu. Is it any wonder that working people feel alienated from what is going on in the far places of decision-making?

No way is the nation returning to the newspaper in every village and city, but there must be a way to break up the monopolies in information and ideas and a large part of it would be to bring the commenters and writers out of the shadows, to places where their family, friends, and neighbors would know who they are and what they are thinking. It was a way to start conversations on important issues and a way to curb the most unhinged thinking that is directly connected to anonymity and it still could be. Again, it might be a long way back to rationality, but it’s worth trying. What there is now is unworkable and dangerous. In a way, it’s like dealing with the inside of the former president’s mind, only it having metastasized to include a huge proportion of the U.S. electorate.

Fine minds must be set to work on a solution to the world-sized problem of monopolies in every sphere and the problem of irrationality that anonymity brings. Even in a predatory capitalist system, there must be those fine and sound minds willing to tackle the seemingly overwhelming problems. Let’s find them.

BlackCommentator.com Columnist, John Funiciello, is a former newspaper reporter and labor organizer, who lives in the Mohawk Valley of New York State. In addition to labor work, he is organizing family farmers as they struggle to stay on the land under enormous pressure from factory food producers and land developers. Contact Mr. Funiciello and BC.