Recently a few of my Steem Buddies have been receiving some flags and some grief for writing about unpopular topics. This has been frustrating to watch since an obvious market for Steem is to attract those who can not express their views on other platforms.
However, it seems a few other special snowflakes cannot bear to let others discuss topics that they disagree with. Topics commonly discussed even on Facebook and Twitter like the validity of Global Warming or the Effectiveness of Vaccinations. Some Steem users by their best logic, try to flag and bully those who are discussing these topics into being silent. **Notice I did not use the word censorship. **
Since I talk about flagging a lot I cringe through these moments because while I believe strongly in our flagging system, I am not a fan of attempting to silence people from talking about these or ANY topics. Mostly because I think mature adults can discover how valid their position on topics are by discussing them with people who disagree. I nearly always find debate and discussion interesting and useful.
Lately, I have been giving this a lot of thought and working through my own feelings of frustration that large accounts are driving topics, people and their stake away from this platform.
My conclusion is simply that the price of Freedom is that you have to accept other people have that freedom aslo. On Steem we have two types of Freedom. Freedom of Speech, which can be hidden, but not deleted and Freedom of Stake.
Freedom of Stake means simply that if you own stake you can use it to influence the site how you want to. If you want to be an asshole or an idiot... Really there is not much we can do about it. Even if those decisions are unpopular.
In the case of flagging other large stakeholders could come to the conclusion that their investment is being hurt and take countermeasures, but I find it unlikely any of them will stand up to each other on these topics. So, those of you with unpopular opinions.. the price of that Freedom is that your holding those viewpoint pisses some other people off and they retaliate with their flags, in some cases with a lot of SteemPower behind it. You have to suck it up or coordinate efforts where too many of you are talking about it at once.
Those of you with a lot of SteemPower and who are too delicate to discuss unpopular views will have to accept that others think differently and that you are hurting the value of your (and mine) investment. Because you have more stake than I do... That is your right.
DPOS - Dumb People Own Steem, but also Delegated Proof of Stake
While some are quite mad about their side of this conflict it occurs to me that Freedom should not be expected to be free or without conflict.
Suck it up.. You can say and do what you like, but for every action, there is a reaction.
The price you pay for Freedom is that others are also Free.
You are now free to move about the blockchain
