Social media plays a larger role in our daily life. The question of how free we are when we express ourselves online also becomes an issue and the fact of the First Amendment of the US law is freedom of speech. One of the cases covered two problems is Elonis v. the United States.
The case named Anthony Douglas Elonis; Petitioner v. the United States was argued on December 1, 2014. Anthony Elonis is a rap artist so that the content of music lyrics should be censored, and some artists’ music has profanity and some do not. According to the United States Courts, Anthony Elonis was arrested on December 8, 2010, and charged with five counts of violating a federal anti-threat statute, 18 U.S.C § 875(c). Despite the fact that his ex-wife, an FBI agent, and others viewing his comments might have perceived his statements as threats, he argued that he could not be convinced of making a threat. At the first time, the Supreme Court has heard a case considering true threats and the limits of speech on social media.
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For instance, he posted “There’s one way to love you but a thousand ways to kill you. I’m not going to rest until your body is a mess, soaked in blood and dying from all the little cuts.” His state could let his wife to be threatened although his statement was indirect in order to point at his ex-wife. However, everyone or even his ex-wife read his posts could have different thinking about