Heard a librarian in Portland say memes are protected under free speech

I was at the Multnomah County library last Tuesday and overheard a librarian telling a teen that memes count as political speech in most countries. She said that's why some governments ban them so quickly. It made me realize my own country isn't as open as I thought, since we still see memes taken down from platforms all the time. Has anyone else heard a similar take from an unexpected source?

3 comments

3 Comments

the_miles1mo ago

Yeah I talked to a librarian in Austin last fall who said pretty much the same thing. She pulled up a court case from Brazil where a meme got someone arrested and used it to explain how different countries view the line between humor and political speech. It stuck with me because she pointed out that platforms like Facebook and Instagram quietly remove memes all the time in the US without admitting it's censorship. They just say it violates community guidelines, but the timing always matches up with protests or election cycles. Have you noticed whether the meme removal in Portland comes right after local news events too?

ryan7192mo ago

Spent way too long trying to explain this to my dad once. He asked why I was laughing at a picture of a cat with bad grammar and I couldn't even get halfway through "it's a commentary on modern isolation" before he walked away. Makes sense though, memes are basically the new protest signs for people who can't afford poster board and markers. I've definitely noticed my own feeds getting quieter in the last year or two, especially when big events happen. Kinda funny how something so stupid looking can be considered dangerous enough to take down.

tylerr392mo ago

Used to think memes were just dumb jokes, but you changed my mind on that. The quiet feeds thing is real and it shows how much people actually pay attention to what they share now. Never really saw them as protest tools until I noticed which ones kept getting removed.