There should be some kind of measuring tool for free speech in America.
I understand that free speech, especially in a democratic society, is important as an impetus for change; speech is the only peaceful mechanism we have that is effective in bringing about political and social movements, or at least, bringing awareness to a possibility for such movements (i.e. Occupy).
Violations of freedom of speech however serve to stamp out the spreading of those ideas. Such examples would be when the government arrests its citizens for speaking either in favor or against certain political leaders or philosophical ideas, or if people, in advocating their ideas, are regularly threatened or even murdered, yet the government does nothing to protect them.
It is a sad, sad truth however that in our society, those who are able to employ free speech most effectively and most often seem to be only those of a certain demographic, a certain "white male" demographic. And this, I think, is most unfortunate because this particular, single demographic is allowed to represent all of us--women, the LBGT community, POF, those of "other" religions--to the rest of the world. And frankly, the only people that can best represent "Us" is, well, us. And, even more unfortunate, not every white male seems to have nice things to say about those who are unable to defend themselves in the public sphere. Thus, white men can say whatever they want on, for example, Fox News--Muslims are terrorists, women shouldn't have control over their own bodies, fetuses are people but gays are not--and anyone outside the white male sphere has trouble grabbing the microphone and denying such accusations.
Let's stop pretending that there is no such thing as a white privilege, particularly, a white male privilege. And unfortunately, because many in that particular sphere have realized that they alone have the power of free speech, they can stretch the limit from what is free speech, or, open speech to express their opinions to bring about change, and just blatant sexist, racist, hate speech for the pure sake of seeing the world burn.
And that is why I don't like Ryking. This is my employing of free speech to bring about change, and as a citizen of this society, it is my right and DUTY to bring about change when I see something going wrong: in this case, Tumblr's/Ryking's blanket statement of "free speech" to hide the fact that he is spreading blatant emotional harm to others. People like this are WAY off the "free speech" scale--and perhaps no such thing exists, perhaps there is no way to calculate what actually constitutes as free speech and "not free speech," but as a society, we still agree upon make these invisible lines, a social contract of sorts. It is clear that line has been crossed. Ryking's "free speech" isn't benefiting anyone. That it why a petition against him was created: not to remove his right to free speech, but rather, to remove the power he thinks he has that he thinks allows him to get away with hateful comments.
If you want to hate on women, fine--those are your "daddy issues" to sort out. But don't you dare abuse your power and tell women that they deserve to be raped, especially, dare I say, to women who have already been through it.
Not that I'm a big supporter of traditional gender roles, but I'd like to think real men PROTECT AND RESPECT their fellow women. Don't call women whores, and don't be surprised when they react. Just a thought.