Williamson, as is his prerogative, had declined to answer a question that a New York writer—the "hostile columnist"—posed to him about his views. New York, as is its prerogative, declined his counteroffer, which was that it publish his blog about criminalizing abortion. This exchange bears a startling resemblance to an editor rejecting a bad pitch, which is something that has been known to happen from time to time in the world of journalism. To Williamson, however, it is proof that he is a victim of discrimination and censorship.

And there you have it.

New York magazine, in the words of its own editor, prefers a truncated, incomplete account, which is of course easier to distort and to misrepresent. Whatever that is, it isn’t journalism.

Notably absent from this published account of Williamson's offer of a free essay explaining his views on abortion is his free essay explaining his views on abortion. Instead of using the pages of the Weekly Standard (or any other outlet willing to publish him) to begin the substantive, rigorous debate he claims to crave, Williamson complains only about process. His is the same problem encountered by every conservative op-ed columnist who shrinks from public criticism of their work: while they can convincingly (and correctly) argue that they are entitled to hold their opinions, they are never able to show why they are also entitled to see those opinions printed in the publication of their choice.

In his most recent bit of writing about his stint at the The Atlantic, which was published in The Wall Street Journal—Williamson's determination to parlay a 13-day trial run into some semblance of lingering relevance is almost Scaramucci-like—he railed against the evils of the "Twitter mob," asserting that social media outrage acts to suppress good-faith public discourse. This argument elides the possibility that in this context, social media enables the free marketplace of ideas to operate more efficiently than ever. The Atlantic, a for-profit company, hired someone who harbors views that the public finds repugnant, and social media enabled the public to make clear that it was uninterested in hearing more about them. Instead of dedicating space to someone who does not have the audience they imagined him to have when they hired him, The Atlantic simply let him go.

This is not censorship. It is rejection, and the swiftness with which it occurred here makes you wonder if this kind of thing would have happened more often in days past if people had been equipped with the tools to make their opinions similarly clear. If Kevin Williamson wants to see his pitches accepted in the future, he should craft some better pitches, or otherwise content himself with writing the stuff he really wants to write in a Medium post, just like anyone else.