By request, here is a little information on the First Amendment, in brief (or, ConLaw for Writers). The First Amendment prohibits the government of the United States from abridging the freedom of speech or infringing on the freedom of the press. (It does some other stuff with regard to religion, but I’m not going into that here as it is not relevant.)

The short version: To figure out if the First Amendment is relevant, ask yourself who is doing the censoring or punishing. If it’s the government, there might be a First Amendment issue. If it’s private citizens doing the censoring, it’s not a First Amendment issue.

The long version (with examples): Our speech is protected from government censorship (with exceptions — they’re not relevant here, but you can look them up if you want). Unless an exception applies, the government can’t stop a person from saying something, or punish them after they said it.

Imagine Lamanda wrote something that offended literally everyone on the planet. The gov’t cannot stop Lamanda from writing or publishing her piece. If the gov’t were to arrest Lamanda for her offensive screed, then she could use the First Amendment in her defense. A court would tell the government to let her go; generally, the gov’t can’t arrest a writer for writing offensive things, or prevent them from writing them or putting them out there.

Now, the First Amendment does nothing to protect Lamanda from the other public consequences of her actions. Remember, she wrote something that offended everyone in the country. So if, let’s say, all her neighbors decided to tell her she was a horrible writer, and all the book clubs and “hot wife” organizations she had once been a member of decided to ban her from attending their meetings, kick her out, or just be mean to her, Lamanda has no First Amendment protections. Those are simply the social consequences of writing offensive things. You can’t go to jail (yay First Amendment!) but you can lose all your friends.

With regard to freedom of press, it is basically the same. A website called EffOffBane was the press/publisher was of Lamanda’s work. If the US Government were to take the site down, or arrest its editors or founders because of the offensive writing, then EffOffBane would be in the same position as Lamanda; they could raise the First Amendment in their defense. The gov’t also can’t prevent EffOffBane from publishing the piece. But if all of EffOffBane’s readers just decide to no longer support the site? That is not a violation of the First Amendment. If people decide not to associate themselves with people who work there, and are mean to them? Again, that is the social consequence of publishing offensive things.

What it boils down to is who is doing the censoring or punishing. If it’s the government, there might be a First Amendment issue. If it’s private citizens, there is not.