Eight Values of Free Expression

 

    After reading the Eight Values of Free Expression, the one I felt like stood out to me the most was Stable Change. To live in a world where a person in society cannot voice their opinion about a situation that makes them feel upset or angry, is a world of violence and destruction. The Stable Change value helps support the need for citizens to voice their opinions, it helps support the need for society to “vent” in order to keep a stable country. Allowing people to express themselves and voice what they feel helps society come together and also helps the government understand issues that need to be looked at. The Stable Change allows us to realize that the reason behind venting is in the government’s self-interest so they can keep the people safe by monitoring dangerous groups. The government uses the protest and free speech as a way to understand the frustration more, they want to hear from society.

    A new story that relates to the concept of Stable Change is an article from October 18, 2025, “As ‘No Kings’ protest decry Trump, surveillance worries emerge.” The article discusses the nationwide “No Kings” protest, where people came together to publicly express their disagreement with the Trump administration. It was stated that it was expected to have around 2,600 rallies across all 50 states. The article discusses concerns about government surveillance, which includes the possible use of facial recognition, drones, phone monitoring and social media monitoring.

    The protests provided citizens with an opportunity to openly express their anger and political dissatisfaction. The idea of Stable Change is allowing people to “vent” their frustrations can help maintain stability because citizens have a legal and public outlet for their concerns. This protest also demonstrated how governments can observe public dissatisfaction and learn what issues are causing frustration.

In this case, government agencies were reportedly monitoring some protest activity, this illustrates how public expressions can provide information about groups and issues that authorities may consider important. Although, the article does also raise the concerns that too much government surveillance could discourage people from exercising their right to peacefully protest. This article helps demonstrate both sides of Stable Change: allowing people to express dissatisfaction can make their opinions visible, while excessive monitoring of that expression may make people less willing to speak openly.

Stable Change seemed to be the most important to me because I believe that everyone deserves to be able to speak freely about what they believe. But I also understand that part of being afraid of the power the government could have and what could potentially affect you. To be able to voice your opinion without the fear of the government watching you is a world we will never be able to live in. The government does need to monitor certain things society is putting out on the internet. If someone puts on the internet that they are going to potentially hurt a group of people with extreme violence I think that is when it is necessary for the government to step in.