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Gauge -> RE: Free speech? (3/12/2006 12:02:34 AM)
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I found myself having to post this statement as part of a post on another thread “Trying to use the right of free speech to defend a bigoted viewpoint is the last and only defence of a moron, if someone is so weak minded they are incapable of constructing any real justification for their views or actions other than resorting to saying they have the right to say them then they really should reconsider their viewpoint”. What are your thoughts?.
I am going to go out on a limb here and say that you assumed on the thread in question that the viewpoint was bigoted. It was not, but you have the right to your opinion.
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At what point does the right to free speech become the right to be defended when expressing an offensive viewpoint?
Define offensive please. You see? This is where there is a serious flaw in your argument... who decides what is offensive and what isn't? Where do we draw the lines? Who draws the lines? You? Me? The Government?
I do not want the government legislating what I can and cannot say. When that happens, we are in serious trouble. In another thread (it is in this section and I started it if you care to see what I have already said) I have pointed out that the government is already censoring and controling what is in print. Public documents taken out of circulation and censored under the guise of a "threat to national security." This scares the hell out of me.
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Do you think the right to free speech should apply to everyone and everything no matter how offensive it is to the section of society their hatred is directed?.
In a word, yes. If it applies to one it should apply to all. Silence one persons opinion, just one... legislate what they can say and Orwell's 1984 is not far behind. Again... who defines what is offensive?
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Do you think free speech should be tempered by other legislation such as in Austria where it is illegal to deny the holocaust or in Britain where inciting racial hatred can land people in the courts?.
Tempered how? Other legislation? Our lives are slowly being legislated to hell in a handbasket. Look at the clusterfuck of the Terri Schavio case. The government had no responsibility being involved in that case... yet there they were.
Where do we say enough is enough?
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So you would put someone’s right to offend other people above the right of other people to be protected from being offended.
Since when am I supposed to protect someone from getting offended? In this day and age (note the very reason you started this thread in the first place) if I look at someone the wrong way they get offended. The "Race Card" is a great catch-all whenever someone feels like they have been offended. Look, if I wanted to offend you, you would have no question in your mind that it was my intent to offend you (you being a gereral term). Under the guise of many buzzwords we (general term again) have made it so easy to claim offense. I suffer from depression. That is a mental illness. People tell jokes about the mentally ill. Does that offend me? Nope. Not one bit. If they so choose to poke fun at my illness, blood has been shed for their right to do so. Who the hell am I to tell them to stop because they have insulted me? I have the option to walk away, to not read their articles or their messages on a message board.
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Do you not think that allowing people to say whatever they want and then attacking anyone who disagrees with them stifles discourse?.
Isn't this what started this thread in the first place? I mean no disrespect here, but it was you who expressed your displeasure. You went on the attack.
I am reminded of the Monty Python sketch of "The Argument Clinic." An argument is a well thought out position intended to establish a contrary point of view, it is not discouraging discourse.
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I don’t agree that free speech makes people accountable for what they say, in many ways people use it as a defence and argument against being accountable for any of their viewpoints.
People are accountable for what they say. We (general term again) hold them accountable by our opinions of what they say. If we rise up to challenge them to defend their perspective do they not have to defend their point of view or be discredited for what they have said? Hiding under the First Amendment does not provide an exemption for accountability for what you (gereral term) say. If you don't believe that, try saying that you want to harm the President of the United States and see where that lands you. The First Amendment allows me the freedom to call him an idiot and state other opinions of him, but when violence is implied then you have crossed a line where there are laws.
OK... I am sure that I have bored the masses to tears but let me end with this:
We must be able to express ourselves, everyone, within the laws that govern us. The Constitution provides liberty of expression as long as it does not infringe on the rights of any other person. Being offended or not being offended is not a right that can be defined with any amount of clarity in order to establish what you want... and quite honestly, I want it to stay that way.
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