{"id":3157,"date":"2009-07-22T07:53:41","date_gmt":"2009-07-22T12:53:41","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/politickles.com\/blog\/?p=3157"},"modified":"2009-07-22T07:53:41","modified_gmt":"2009-07-22T12:53:41","slug":"the-right-to-speak-anonymously","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/politickles.com\/blog\/the-right-to-speak-anonymously\/","title":{"rendered":"The Right to Speak Anonymously"},"content":{"rendered":"

The right to speak anonymously was of fundamental importance to the establishment of our Constitution. Throughout the revolutionary and early federal period in American history, anonymous speech and the use of pseudonyms were powerful tools of political debate. The Federalist Papers (authored by Madison, Hamilton, and Jay) were written anonymously under the name “Publius.” The anti-federalists responded with anonymous articles of their own, authored by “Cato” and “Brutus,” among others. See generally McIntyre, 514 U.S. at 341-42. Anonymous speech is a great tradition that is woven into the fabric of this nation’s history.<\/p>\n

The right to speak anonymously extends to speech via the Internet. Internet anonymity facilitates the rich, diverse, and far ranging exchange of ideas. The “ability to speak one’s mind” on the Internet “without the burden of the other party knowing all the facts about one’s identity can foster open communication and robust debate.” Columbia Ins. Co. v. Seescandy.com<\/em>, 185 F.R.D. 573, 578 (N.D. Cal. 1999). People who have committed no wrongdoing should be free to participate in online forums without fear that their identity will be exposed under the authority of the court. Id. — Doe v. 2TheMart.com Inc.<\/em> (cited in State of Tennessee v. Cobbins<\/strong><\/a><\/em>)<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

I made a similar argument when challenged about my anonymous posting on the nefarious unethical and criminal activities at my former place of employment, the national office of the Society of St. Vincent de Paul. Nothing I said was untrue, but I had reason to fear reprisal — I’d already been fired for raising some of these questions — and I wanted my expos\u00e9 to be considered on its own merits, not dismissed as the plaint of a disgruntled ex-employee.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The right to speak anonymously was of fundamental importance to the establishment of our Constitution. Throughout the revolutionary and early federal period in American history, anonymous speech and the use of pseudonyms were powerful tools of political debate. The Federalist Papers (authored by Madison, Hamilton, and Jay) were written anonymously …<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"slim_seo":{"title":"The Right to Speak Anonymously - Politickles","description":"The right to speak anonymously was of fundamental importance to the establishment of our Constitution. Throughout the revolutionary and early federal period in"},"_slim_seo_primary_term_category":0,"_slim_seo_primary_term_post_tag":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[453,1700,1699,755],"class_list":["post-3157","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized","tag-anonymity","tag-federalist-papers","tag-pseudonyms","tag-society-of-st-vincent-de-paul"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/politickles.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3157","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/politickles.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/politickles.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/politickles.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/politickles.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=3157"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"http:\/\/politickles.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3157\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/politickles.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=3157"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/politickles.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=3157"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/politickles.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=3157"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}