Florida State Senator Josh Brodeur recently introduced a new bill regarding information dissemination that would require “bloggers” who write opinion articles about elected officials in the Sunshine State and are compensated for their “blogs” to register with a state ethics board within five days of their first post. They (we?) must inform the state of each blog post and the compensation for each to the nearest $10. Those who don’t will be fined $25 a day up to a maximum of $2,500.
Having presumably read far enough into the Bill of Rights to get to the freedom of the press section (lucky for us the founding fathers put that one right up front), Brodeur’s legislation explicitly excludes newspapers or websites published by newspapers. Still, he has suggested that bloggers are really just lobbyists disguised as writers and that as such they should be registered with the state.
I’m not a lawyer, but I’m pretty sure that Brodeur’s proposal is still unconstitutional. A free press is vital to a democracy. One can argue that in the era of the Substack and Medium, we can all choose to be members of said free press with the right to write our opinions—even if that opinion suggests DeSantis is a founding member of the Secret Society of GOP Republican Governors.
Freedom of speech, however, has never been limited to the press. Even those who don’t choose to write, say, a weekly newsletter should be able to say what they want about Governor Don’t Say Gay.
It's not clear if Brodeur’s blogger registry has any support, even among Republicans in Florida. DeSantis has not commented as of this writing, though in a tweet former House Speaker Newt Gingrich did call it embarrassing that a Republican would suggest such a thing. It’s more than embarrassing, the GOP’s embrace of authoritarianism in which they get to dictate what people read, write, and wear—not to mention what medications they take or whether they stay pregnant—is downright scary, especially when they’ve proven themselves willing to ignore election results.
Most of the laws being introduced right now are scarier than a blogger registry. Last week Governor Bill Lee of Tennessee signed a bill banning drag shows, calling them harmful to minors (they’re not) while at the same time becoming yet another douchey GOP governor to sign a bill banning gender affirming therapy (which will actually be very harmful to trans minors). But attempts to control free access to information—like the proposed Texas law that would make it unlawful to “create, edit, upload, publish, host, maintain, or register a domain name for an internet website, platform, or other interactive computer service that assists or facilitates a person’s effort in obtaining an abortion-inducing drug”—are the building blocks of totalitarian regimes.
I’m still trying to figure out if I qualify as a blogger under the very circular definition in Brodeur’s bill (a blogger writes for a blog, and a blog publishes the work of bloggers). Even if I do, I have no intention of registering with Florida nor will I stop calling DeSantis douchey. I might, however, offer to write content for a Texas website that assists in a person’s effort to obtain abortion-inducing drugs.
I know, I’m a rebel.
Unfortunately, this week, I’m a rebel with a cold. I wanted to dig in on a new study that says the “No Fap” movement is bad for members’ mental health (which seems both obvious and intriguing), but it’s all going to have wait until next week when I can breathe through my nose.