There’s nothing safer in politics than blaming social media for all of America’s problems, whether mental illness, racism, or even our collapsing republic’s virtue. Meanwhile, nearly every politician’s convenient response is to control speech and deny access to social media. Although the federal effort to ban TikTok is receiving the most attention, California — whose laws dominate the many global social media companies headquartered there — has just proposed new laws that could obliterate free speech worldwide.
The new laws would require all social media users to verify their age, thus potentially requiring an identification tie-in, and that users with more than 25,000 followers upload and confirm their personal identifying information. These requirements could terminate the ideals of free speech — and anonymity — that our republic was founded on. Allowing for speakers to anonymously express their views helps ensure truth, not dogma, to prevail in the public arena.
Given our nation’s history — its founding by patriots who, for their own safety, spread the truth and an alternative vision for our nation in anonymous pamphlets and essays against an increasingly oppressive state, such as Thomas Paine’s fiery “Common Sense” — an implicit ban on online anonymity in the name of children’s safety is ludicrous and out of touch with history. Those seeking to end anonymous speech, by extension, are either ignorant or willful tyrants hoping to suppress Americans’ most basic rights.
At the federal level, “national security” concerns created a Republican-led bipartisan coalition marching towards banning Chinese-owned TikTok. That proposed ban, which would allow the president to selectively ban social media companies he or she doesn’t like, hopefully won’t pass. Should the Patriot Act be any indication, however, it’s clear Democrats are not the only party willing to throw Americans’ rights to the wayside for short-term electoral gains.
At the state level, we see Republicans and Democrats passing social media access laws that require some kind of age verification — and thus tying accounts to government identification, implicitly ending anonymous speech online. The proposal, Senate Bill 976 by Sen. Nancy Skinner, D-Berkeley, to require social media companies to determine if users are minors would effectively require any social media company based in California to adopt its new rules tying some kind of effort at age identification to social media accounts.
If this proposal passes, anonymous, online free speech would essentially be terminated for every American, leaving behind even the kind of small whistleblower who uncovered Los Angeles Metro funding taxpayer-funded transportation contractor spending on public events for “compensated partnerships” with “community and faith-based organizations” in an apparent vote-buying scheme.
If that’s not bad enough, California is poised to go one step further, which is even more ominous because as the global headquarters of most social media companies, California has the ability to pass laws that have global impact.
An even more extreme California bill from Sen. Steve Padilla, D-Chula Vista, would require social media companies to verify users with more than 25,000 followers with their name, phone number, and email. Users with more than 100,000 followers would need to provide government-issued ID.
Companies that fail to end anonymous free speech for larger accounts would face state lawyers authorized to “seek injunctive or other equitable relief against a large online platform to compel compliance with the bill.” In other words, any company that refuses to out their influential anonymous users would be sued out of existence.
Admittedly, the use of AI deep fakes and other deceptive practices to sway elections — the supposed rationale for the anonymous outing bill — could be a major problem for low-information voters, but the solution to bad information is better information. On X, the Community Notes feature allows individuals to correct information in real time. This feature has targeted statements, AI generated and real, across the political spectrum, including presidents Trump and Biden, demonstrating that real-time correction of falsehoods can easily be rectified by citizens, not the government.
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To say that Americans can’t tell what information is real or not is to question the basis of our democracy; any leaders who don’t trust citizens to critically evaluate information are calling into question the judgment of the voting public that put them into office. Instead of curtailing free speech, leaders must trust voters to discern truth from falsehood, lest we undermine the very essence of American governance.
While concerns about online safety and misinformation are legitimate, the measures to end online anonymity risk stifling dissent, inhibiting whistleblowing, and setting a dangerous precedent for government intrusion into digital spaces. Instead of curtailing free speech, efforts should focus on improving citizens’ ability to make better judgements by expanding historical and financial literacy. Trust in the public’s ability to discern truth from falsehood is essential for a functioning democracy, and California’s proposed legislation that undermines this trust jeopardizes the foundation of American governance. To protect the right to anonymous, free speech online, citizens across the world must demand California legislators reject these tyrannical bills.
Kenneth Schrupp is a journalist covering California politics and policy. His commentary and analysis have been published by Newsweek, RealClearPolitics, and the Pacific Research Institute.