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Free Speech
- A History from Socrates to Social Media
- Narrated by: Fajer Al-Kaisi
- Length: 13 hrs and 24 mins
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Publisher's summary
A global history of free speech, from the ancient world to today
Hailed as the “first freedom”, free speech is the bedrock of democracy. But it is a challenging principle, subject to erosion in times of upheaval. Today, in democracies and authoritarian states around the world, it is on the retreat.
In Free Speech, Jacob Mchangama traces the riveting legal, political, and cultural history of this idea. Through captivating stories of free speech’s many defenders - from the ancient Athenian orator Demosthenes and the ninth-century freethinker al-Rāzī, to the anti-lynching crusader Ida B. Wells and modern-day digital activists - Mchangama reveals how the free exchange of ideas underlies all intellectual achievement and has enabled the advancement of both freedom and equality worldwide. Yet the desire to restrict speech, too, is a constant, and he explores how even its champions can be led down this path when the rise of new and contrarian voices challenge power and privilege of all stripes.
Meticulously researched and deeply humane, Free Speech demonstrates how much we have gained from this principle - and how much we stand to lose without it.
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Critic reviews
“The best history of free speech ever written and the best defense of free speech ever made. Jacob Mchangama never loses sight of the trouble freedom causes but always keeps in mind that lack of freedom creates horrors.” (P.J. O’Rourke)
“Freedom of speech has emerged as a major issue of this decade, but most of the discussion consists of outrages over speech or the repression of speech. Missing is the intellectual background: What does free speech really mean? What is its history? How has it played out in world events? Why should we defend it? Jacob Mchangama lays out this context with deep erudition, strong writing, and a light touch.” (Steven Pinker, Johnstone professor of psychology, Harvard University, and the author of Enlightenment Now and Rationality)
“Jacob Mchangama’s history of the world's strangest, best idea is the definitive account we have been waiting for. It teems with valuable insights, lively characters, and the author's passion for the cause he has done so much to advance. Mchangama brings to life the ancient struggles which established free speech and also the modern dangers which embattle it. Free Speech is that rare book which will impress scholars as much as it entertains readers, all while telling the world's most improbable success story.” (Jonathan Rauch, author of The Constitution of Knowledge)
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In this seminal work that has spent more than 30 years in print, Dennis Prager and Joseph Telushkin explain the reasons behind anti-Semitism, the world's preoccupation with the Jews and Israel, and why now more than ever the world needs to confront anti-Jewish sentiment. Prager and Telushkin examine in detail how anti-Semitism is a unique hatred - no other prejudice has been as universal, deep, or permanent - and how the concept of the "chosen people" spawned that hatred.
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It answers the question!
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More than any other people on earth, Americans are free to say and write what they think. The reason for this extraordinary freedom is not a superior culture of tolerance, but just 14 words in our most fundamental legal document: the free expression clauses of the First Amendment to the Constitution.
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In this timely, highly original, and controversial narrative, New York Times best-selling author Mark Kurlansky discusses nonviolence as a distinct entity, a course of action, rather than a mere state of mind. Nonviolence can and should be a technique for overcoming social injustice and ending wars, he asserts, which is why it is the preferred method of those who speak truth to power.
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A brief, necessary account of the history of nonviolence
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Interesting but lacks objectivity
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A little more than a century ago, as the Japanese navy annihilated the giant Russian one at the Battle of Tsushima, original thinkers across Asia, working independently, sought to frame a distinctly Asian intellectual tradition that would inform and inspire the continent's anticipated rise to dominance.
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Nazism triumphed in Germany during the high era of Jim Crow laws in the United States. Did the American regime of racial oppression in any way inspire the Nazis? The unsettling answer is yes. James Whitman presents a detailed investigation of the American impact on the notorious Nuremberg Laws, the centerpiece anti-Jewish legislation of the Nazi regime.
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Did not we suspect this?
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Great book for getting a clearer idea of fascism
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The life story of the most controversial, volatile, misunderstood provision of the Bill of Rights. At a time of increasing gun violence in America, Waldman's book provoked a wide range of discussion. This book looks at history to provide some surprising, illuminating answers. The Amendment was written to calm public fear that the new national government would crush the state militias made up of all (white) adult men - who were required to own a gun to serve. Waldman recounts the raucous public debate that has surrounded the amendment from its inception to the present.
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were not paying attention, just passed it
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On a hot summer afternoon in 1928, the leaders of the world assembled in Paris to outlaw war. Within the year, the treaty signed that day, known as the Peace Pact, had been ratified by nearly every state in the world. War, for the first time in history, had become illegal the world over. But the promise of that summer day was fleeting. Within a decade of its signing, each state that had gathered in Paris to renounce war was at war. And in the century that followed, the Peace Pact was dismissed as an act of folly and an unmistakable failure.
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cart before horse
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What listeners say about Free Speech
Average customer ratingsReviews - Please select the tabs below to change the source of reviews.
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- Tiago Flora
- 02-15-22
A reaffirmation of a key fundamental right
The author does a fantastic job at documenting the conception and application of a right to free speech from Athenian democracy to the 21st century.
The first two thirds of the book are an informative history of the philosophical, legal, and practical contexts for speech in Ancient Greece, Rome, medieval and modern Europe and the Middle East, and the American colonies/United States. It brings detail to the evolution of free speech and the press in the West in particular.
If you follow international news on democratic backsliding, most of the last few chapters of the book won't give you that much new information. Those are nonetheless a vivid and chilling reminder of the threats free speech faces today in the developed and developing world alike, and why we should not let barriers to speech be raised.
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3 people found this helpful
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- Sadanand Evans
- 02-28-22
very informative
This was a good review of free speech. I enjoyed listening to the history of free speech. it wasn't as dry as one might think
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1 person found this helpful
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- John Wayne Mortimer II
- 03-12-22
Great book - boring narration
Loved the book, but I really wish Jacob had narrated it for us. The narrator is clear and understandable. My only issue was that his narration as a bit monotone and slow. I listened at 1.4x just to stay awake.
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- John Mayo
- 05-08-23
Great historical perspective.
It is amazing to understand the ebb and flow of free speech from the Athenians to today. THE fundamental principle of freedom is explained historically.
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- baroquenspirit
- 09-16-22
Timely and Vital
This book is a well researched and fairly comprehensive account of the history and value of free-speech. It warns us that this right can and often is eroded in the name of both authoritarianism and tolerance. If you are thin skinned in your ideology on either the left or right, this book will tweak you. I highly recommend it.
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- Anonymous User
- 02-22-22
Great review of free speech and history
Enjoyed the overall look at free speech, free press, and how these freedoms were viewed over time in different cultures. I felt it was a little left leaning, and the details were difficult to remember for an audiobook. I had to rewind and re-listen a few times. Maybe that’s just me.
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3 people found this helpful
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- N. Martin
- 07-15-23
Sensational book, problematic reading
Mchangama’s book is everything I had hoped for and more. It lays out the history of free speech elegantly and in fascinating detail. The narrator, while having a fine voice, serves up some excruciating mispronunciations. I run into this problem too often, and the blame lies with the publishers. They seem to have little concern for the excellence of their products. Don’t let that discourage you from buying this fine book.
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- Louis Macareo
- 03-06-22
Reminds you why free speech is the core freedom
The details in this book are many, but the core point that repeatedly hit me was how oftrn people suffer from Milton's Curse, that is, how often people rise to prominence and power via free speech and then very often, almost instinctually, begin to limit free spech in their wake. It is remarkable and never a good thing, as are all efforts to limit speech, even when there is a downside to allowing it, it is the greatest and most important vehicle that exists. Am excellent work chroniclally several thousand years of thought on the subject. Well worth the read.
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- Sarah
- 10-26-22
An overwhelming amount of information
This is a scholarly tome containing a great deal of detail on freedom of speech down through the ages. But given such an overwhelming amount of detail, the book loses track of the big picture. I didn't feel his conclusion pulled it all together well and was not convinced by the book's basic thesis that Every effort to limit the freedom of speech backfires. Today, freedom of speech includes pervasive LIES that are destroying civil society. If we cannot restrict politicians from spewing nothing but lies, and if we have television stations and internet sites echoing the same, we will end up in a totalitarian state. Once the thugs take over, the same people who tout their right to say ANYTHING today will be throwing people in jail for speaking the truth.
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