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Comment by throwawayapples | Hacker News Reader

Of course, if you incriminate yourself while spouting off (or while engaged in any other activity, like writing in your diary), then you are producing evidence of a different crime, but spouting off is not a crime in itself.

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literally what I wrote, no? "you do not have a constitutional right to spouting off in the public square without consequence. What you say publicly can & will be used against you in the court of law."

like I can say what I want, but if I say "I DID CRIMES" then guess what.. that could be used as evidence that I DID CRIMES

Not sure if you all read the article, but the controversy IS NOT about people confessing to crimes on Facebook. It is people who might have friends (who they dont have befriended on Facebook) and thus might be guilty by association and suddenly all the mights turn into a Dossier of a potential criminal. Some magic black box decides if you did crimes or not.

"Spouting off" is an idiom that means, essentially, "angrily complaining". It does not mean publicly confessing to a crime.

> In NYC for example, there's been a large uptick in teen shootings, many adjacent to schools, and a lot of it involves the idiots posting on social media before & after. (emphasis mine)

“Spouting off” is an idiom that can also mean “speaking without a filter” and that’s what OP meant in this case.

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