Is there total freedom of expression? (Including political ideologies/views)

  • Unknown's avatar
    treesschepens · Member ·

    I am not really intending to blog about political subjects that often. Of course, sometimes politics crawl in. For example, if you write a travel article on a country, or discuss a film in which politics play a role, … then a political point of view can crawl into one’s post.

    I know Automattic always used to defend total freedom of expression, including political points of view, points of view on subjects such as LGBTQ+ rights, immigration, …
    I can even recall the founder of Automattic saying that wordpress.com was censored temporarily in some countries because of critical posts, but that wordpress.com was fine with that rather than restricting the right to express opinions.

    Now, of course things have changed in the US in the last 1.5 year, and as far as I know the servers are in the US.
    Is that freedom of expression still protected on sites and blogs hosted by wordpress.com? Can any point of view or opinion be expressed without having to worry about a site/blog being taken down?

    For me, being in Europe, it is not exactly clear. We hear a lot of stuff in the news, but I’m sure a lot of things we hear are rumours. Normally the US constitution grants freedom of expression.

  • Unknown's avatar
    staartmees · Member ·

    WordPress.com strongly believes in freedom of speech and is designed to let users freely express ideas and opinions without censorship or endorsement.

    That said, there are some content categories that aren’t permitted — things like illegal content, spam, malware, impersonation, and direct threats of violence. You can read the full User Guidelines for details.

  • Unknown's avatar
    treesschepens · Member ·

    Thanks @staartmees for your response (PS: your pseudo sounds Dutch?).

    I think it is normal that you cannot threat violence to anyone, spread illegal content, spam etc.

    When it comes to impersonation, where is the line drawn? Comedians for example often imitate someone, but usually with the intent of comedy and not with the intend of ridiculising someone. But anyways, I am not a comedian or imitator anyway.

    WordPress.org claims your site is never taken down, unless you violate the law. But doesn’t the same apply to wordpress.com?

    WPBeginner.com states: “Content control: you need to follow the Terms of Service of wordpress.com on your website, your site could be removed in case of violations.”
    But if I understand you correctly, you are free to express any opinion unless you directly threat someone with violence, spread illegal content or spam, etc?

    Does this mean that any political opinion or opinion on hot topics in society is allowed?

    Note that I am not intending to create a political blog. Political posts would be very occasional. I’m just curious to know. Also, I won’t express any opinions here on this forum ; here it doesn’t matter what opinions I have.

  • adusman33 · Staff ·

    Hello @treesschepens,

    Yes, WordPress.com generally allows users to express opinions on political and social topics, including occasional political commentary in travel, film, or other blog posts.

    The main limitations are content that violates our policies, such as threats of violence, illegal content, spam, harassment, hate speech, or malicious impersonation intended to deceive others.

    Since WordPress.com is a hosted platform, sites must follow our Terms of Service and User Guidelines. I’d recommend reviewing them here:

    Based on what you described, occasional political opinions or commentary would generally not be an issue as long as the content follows those guidelines.

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