There are many levels to this, blogging only being a small part of it. Blogging is like a home or private club to me, and then there is the issue of my gay relatives who have been beaten bloody in the 70’s.
I don’t think Free Speech was created for “I can hurt you, and be a harassing douchebag in the name of something meant to protect people’s right to object to Governmental or The Elite’s abuse of them”…
Hence; I wrote this last month for my blog. I ban NO subjects, only abusiveness.
Most of you reading this already get me.
But I have heard the rumors, that I am an anti-free speech hypocrite.
So I want to talk a little about what I think Free Speech is, and gather your thoughts on Free Speech as well.
I also want to address on how people abuse speech in the name of what it was never intended to be.
You know, the Spree Feechers.
The fine print on the poster has a couple nifty quotes.
Wendell Phillips said:
The manna of Liberty must be gathered each day, or it is rotten.
Only by intermittent agitation can a people be kept sufficiently awake to principle not to let liberty be smothered in material prosperity.
Republics exist only on the tenure of being agitated.
Quite a mouthful, isn’t it?
There, my friends is the heart and soul of Free Speech: The ability to agitate an otherwise rotting system, in order to continually create the Republic’s liberty.
This sets me strongly against the so-called “Free Speech” zones that exist behind barbed wire fences, the blocking of the Press from unbiased reporting and the naming of dissenters as treasonous.
I would no sooner have them shut down the reprehensible “God Hates Fags” website, than my own liberal one that denounces them.
They have a right to spew it, I have a right NOT to listen.
However, I would NEVER frequent their site.
Ben Franklin said:
Where Liberty Dwells, there is my country.
I get that. I get aspiring to create a space in which Speech happens unrestricted, in the name of this Liberty.
I get why they let the Klan march, too.
However, I also get why they don’t let the Klan line up wearing hoods and writing names or taking pictures outside polling places in black southern neighborhoods.
Where is the Liberty of those Blacks who in trying to vote, were bullied and intimidated into turning around, knowing full well that they were outnumbered and outgunned?
Free Speech has some restrictions when it infringes on another humans well being.
Then there is my next thought.
Should I be forced to listen to, to invite into my home people like the people on the “God Hates Fags” website; people I detest? Should I, in the name of Free Speech allow them to shout me down en masse? Should I let them derail any progress made in my home in a meeting held by like-minded concerned people to overcome that kind of prejudice?
You can argue that is covered under “Hate Speech” but hate speech is as elusive as free speech in practical terms.
Even in a circumstance where a person used the word Nigger in my home, with no Black people present, they would be invited to leave. Ok, I am being kind, I would probably (actually have) tell them to “Get the fuck out of my house, NOW!”
What about people who just like to fight, argue, and spread untrue gossip? I wouldn’t sit by them in a bar, I wouldn’t meet them at a function and continue to stand by them. So, if they followed me around said bar or function, do I not have the right to ask to be left alone? Does that mean you have to subject yourself to ugliness daily, like some martyr to being shouted down by people you detest? Subject yourself to the hunting and stalking of every conversation you may try to have with a friend?
See, I think the Free Speech clause was created to ensure a country in which we could speak out against any wrongdoing by our representatives or people in power.
I don’t think these brilliant men meant us to have to break bread with bullies and psychos.
It was about standing up for the weak, not preying on them. It is about not letting a vocal minority overrun and overrule the rest of us.
It was never meant for petty individuals with vendettas and grievances to stalk people; it was about governmental abuses of individual rights.
Now, there is nothing like a reasoned debate to clarify and hone a position down to brass tacks. It focuses.
But in my process of trying to fight tyranny, I wish not to be constantly sidetracked by a small and petty mob in the name of “I can be an asshole, ‘cuz I gots me some Spree Feech!”
See, Thomas Paine said this, the last line in the image:
Where Liberty dwells NOT, there is mine.
In my heart of hearts, this line is the essence of what I believe. Where there are downtrodden, where there are human abuses, there go I… to speak for them, to witness, to speak Truth to Power.
That is the Point of all we do, isn’t it?
Reasoned debate, no problem. Being subjected to abuse, not so much. Being locked in a room with brawlers? Nevah!
I think the pursuit of happiness may let me off the hook on that one…..
Peace.
Diane.
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yesterday. all without the word nigger being hurled at anyone.
nobody had hoods on in Nov 1999 in Florida. but it happened, didn’t it? Black voters had their right to vote stolen. Out in the light of fucking day. Still nobody has been charged or faced a trial over this.
Diane, I’m glad for your essay. I understand what all of you would like to accomplish. And it would be lovely if people felt no need for such horrible words.
But if i let you ban the word nigger, then i’m thinking i will have to give the same consideration to the fear and concern of those who ban books, like Catcher in the Rye. Or who insist that creationism must be taught in science classes because really, evolution is heresy. does it infringe on religious freedom then?
just who gets to draw the lines? and when they come after the word “fuck” then what do i do? because, from what i can see about human nature, give em an inch, they go for a mile.
it isn’t about controlling people. it is leading them to a better place. imo.
that forbidding language unhooked from it’s context or useage is absurd. I watched a whole bunch of George Carlin last night and he twists the worst of language and our euphemisms right around so your confronted with unpleasant truths about humanities nature, and your own. See no evil does not help, speak no evil how can you address the concept that reflect our inhumanity and hubris and hypocrisy. Hear no evil and you get PC speak which leads us all happily down garden paths, where we feel good and the nastiness is just called something else. No one on this site including P8, is a bigot or full of hate, a rose by any other name?