Free speech has consequences, but should firing be one?

What meaningful difference is there between an authoritarian state, where saying the wrong thing can get you arrested, and a regime of economic censorship, in which the consequence of unpopular expression results in unemployment, potentially followed by eviction and destitution?

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As a left-leaning editorial cartoonist and writer, I have been fired, dropped and canceled over thoughts I conveyed through pictures and prose. Once I was fired by a magazine for whom I drew cartoons about romantic relationships because the publisher was angry about one of my political cartoons, which ran elsewhere. Getting the ax that way felt unfair. But at least there was a tangential connection, since both features were cartoons.

It is disturbing to see widespread acceptance of censorship of speech and conduct that takes place outside the workplace in an unrelated context and venue. Victims have included Democrats as well as Republicans, though the right seems to be targeted more these days. Self-appointed online sleuths identified attendees of the 2017 Unite the Right rally in Charlottesville, Va., and contacted their employers, requesting that they be fired. The digital vigilantes successfully de-employed a cook at a hot-dog stand in Berkeley, Calif., and an employee of a tile contractor in Pittsburgh.

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