I would posit that our legal protection of Free speech is primarily needed because we don’t have an overwhelming societal majority of shared values. If such a state existed there would likely be little disagreement and legal challenge to non existent dissent. I have been deeply dismayed at the consistent hypocrisy displayed by the tail distributions of the Left and Right when they feel the others “free speech” has crossed a line, despite it not actually being an incitement of violence or literal threat. I don’t condone vile and disgusting celebration of death, of any person, especially when they were targeted simply for exercising their rights to speak freely. However, targeting people with retribution for exercising their free speech related to their opinions of Charlie Kirks death is just as hypocritical as the lefts cancel culture in the wake of Floyd’s death or weaponization of twitter to cancel people prior to Musk.