There is one big difference between sharing the best avaiable information (taking circumstances into account) and conspiracy theories and disinformation. The WHO falls in the first category, Alex Jones and Co. in the latter.
It was definitely not the best information at the time. Everyone knew that masks worked, but many organizations and governments lied to the public because they didn't have enough masks. And how could anyone think that encouraging people to go to crowded public events during a pandemic is the best available information? It was clearly harmful at the time and it's one of the reasons why over 18,000 New Yorkers are now dead from coronavirus.
It's easy to find far more harmful information than a stupid conspiracy theory that almost nobody believes. Here's a fun one: Should we ban all pro-life messages? After all, they reliably lead to some crazies attacking abortion doctors. Should we ban all pro-communist sentiment? Communism led to mass death and starvation in the USSR, China, and North Korea. If there's a more harmful ideology, I have yet to hear it.
Getting back to cell phones: Should we ban anyone who says that cell phones cause cancer? The exact same argument applies: It can cause people to damage cell phone towers and threaten maintenance workers.
There is no coherent framework for censorship that allows these things while also banning 5g conspiracy theories. The double-standard could not be more obvious.
Well, that's disingenuous at best. There's still fierce debate as to whether it's worth the general public wearing masks.
Pro life? Communism? You're really digging now. How about capitalism? Lots of people die because of capitalism. Shall we ban any debate about capitalism as well?
Freedom of speech is one of those issues that will never be resolved because there are no clear boundaries. We all agree that there are some things that people should not say. That's why we have things like libel/slander laws. I'm sure you wouldn't like it if someone was going around trying to convince people that your father likes to give blow jobs to dobermans. You would, rightfully, want that person stopped. Is that suppression of freedom of speech?
The question is: where does the boundary lie? This is where we have the debates.
> Should we ban anyone who says that cell phones cause cancer?
Possibly. The difference is we have not (to my knowledge) heard any stories of engineers being attacked because of this whereas there have been a number of stories in the news recently of engineers being afraid to go to work because of idiots attacking them because of these ludicrous coronavirus 5G stories.
