Anthony Holden Quotes

Without censorship, things can get terribly confused in the public mind.

The presentation of an issue can no longer be controlled.

In many ways, I think that, while we've been remarkably violent in our media, there's been a real schizophrenia. In private, on the Internet, and on public-affairs shows or talk radio, we're way more explicit than we've ever been.

If somebody wants to book Alec Baldwin on one of our shows, and he wants to come on and talk to our people and say what he wants, I don't care. We would question him on his choice of words.

It is precisely the purpose of the public opinion generated by the press to make the public incapable of judging, to insinuate into it the attitude of someone irresponsible, uninformed.

People who write letters to the editor are idiots.

I think there's a difference between calling people out and understanding the role that the press plays in a free society.

I never really expected "Hurricane" to be censored and banned around the world, but I think the good thing that came from it was that it created a dialogue, a conversation, a debate and a discussion. And that's a great thing. It brought all of us together in a unique way. And it made us look a little deeper in ourselves. I think it's a good thing.

We need a free media, not just freedom of speech.

Even with censorship, the Internet is a force for change.

I don't like being forced to reduce my thoughts to sound bites.

I don't think any media has to feel obliged to show the cover of 'Charlie Hebdo.'

Let me make the newspapers, and I care not what is preached in the pulpit or what is enacted in Congress.

As far as the media is concerned, I wouldn't shoot anything down.

Every diminution of the liberty of the press is followed by a diminution of civilization. Wherever we see the freedom of the press interfered with, there we see the nutrition of the human family interrupted.

I think the best thing in cases of censorship or things like this is to get as much media as possible.

For the sake of public discourse, for the demands of the free market, and for the value we place in citizen advocacy, Rush Limbaugh must go.

I'm not an absolutist about free speech. Intellectually, I believe that most of the time it's better to let things get said, argue them, and put lies and stupidities to rest. Practically, I know that newspapers rarely issue corrections with the same prominence they give to denouncements - and Twitter, by its nature, never does.

It is the absolute right of the State to supervise the formation of public opinion.

The Washington Times wrote a story questioning the authenticity of some of the suggestions made about me in Silent Coup. But as a believer in the First Amendment, I believe they have more than a right to air their views.

The Press, which is mostly controlled by vested interests, has an excessive influence on public opinion.

Don’t let religious authorities decide what can or can't be published, …. free speech is vital for democracy, for social change, for the possibility of challenging what has been laid down by established authorities…. freedom only for those who do not offend, annoy, and irritate entrenched authorities - is no freedom at all.

How can that popular will express itself except by meetings, by speeches, by publications, by petitions, and by addresses to the representatives of the people? Any man who seeks to set a limit upon those rights, whether in war or peace, aims a blow at the most vital part of our government.... And before this great fundamental right [freedom of speech] every other must, if necessary, give way, for in no other manner can representative government be preserved.

In the absence of debate unrestricted utterance leads to the degradation of opinion .... The more rational is overcome by the less rational, and the opinions that will prevail will be those that are held most ardently by those with the most passionate will. For that reason the freedom to speak can never be maintained merely by objecting to interference with the liberty of the press, of printing, of broadcasting, of the screen. It can be maintained only by promoting debate.

Democracy becomes a government of bullies tempered by editors