Wills Column This Week
In this week's Smoking Section we look at the death of free speech, hypocritical liberals, and Linda Ronstadt.
If that's not your cup of tea, read about how one county has the courage to make inmates pay for their stay in jail. And of course, the joy-kill ACLU is disgusted.
And for those of you that got hungry reading about the Monster Thickburger, here's a little relief.
Happy Chinese New Year folks. (And yes I mean Chinese, not Asian or Lunar)
posted by Will @ 1:22 PM
6 comments
6 Comments:
While you know that I agree with you on the larger point that all speech should be protected and given its due course in public discourse, no matter how offensive or cheap it may be to some people, I think that using the 1st amendment as the foundation for your argument:
"The beauty of the First Amendment is that it does not just protect politically correct speech, but speech that some may not want to hear."
is shaky in this case, because the 1st amendment isn't involved; this will be the major point of attack against your column.
I think an almost as important point is that the left's greatest crime (in my opinion) is the specter of political correctness, the bemoaning of which has become a rallying point for the right. Of course, they simply want to impose their own framework for what is proper discourse, but the political damage is done.
The reaction to HOT97 is certainly an overreaction - I think there are more worthwhile causes to devote energy to, and there will be enough of a stigma around them following this little debacle that their punishment has probably been and will continued to be carried out in full, without any need for excessive public force. Moreover, those offended can simply stop listening to the station entirely, and advertiser dollars will go down, punishment encated. Though I should add, as much of an advocate as I am of wanton violence and profanity on public airwaves, even I find the "just turn it off" argument to be unsatisfactory, and in a word, bullshit. But what can I do?
The greater issue then isn't necessarily free speech in the 1st amendment sense, but what role does and should the public have in deciding what is fit to be said? And what sections of the public? Who gains the right to determine what the line is between what can and cannot be said, to use a frequent criticism of the FCC? And how many does it take to be able to aptly define what isn't allowed? A small minority? A bare majority? An overwhelming majority?
And how does this shift depending on who is offended? (The left, the right; gay marriage advocates, gay marriage opponents; white people, nonwhite people; male, female; and so on.) What should determine what truly is too offensive and who is too sacred to be offended? I realize these are simply just more (of many that could be asked) questions to add to an already large pile of them. The problem with heading in this direction, however, is that then the solution seems to be anything and everything, and while in a way it's what I would like, I think overall, it doesn't work. Compromise seems in order, but the issue again is compromise on what to what point?
I have the vaguest idea than in a free-for-all, a screening mechanism would eventually set itself up, with worthy X remaining viable in discourse, and what the public deems as unworthy simply fading away. The major problem with this is private ownership of airwaves, and whether or not "what the public wants" is what is fed back to them, is debatable, as is the rest of the issue. But I'm still just working this out.
The First Amendment right to freedom of speech bars the U.S. government from acting to limit such speech. It does not bar private employers from terminating employees because they find such speech offensive.
Furthermore, while everyone has a right to speak freely, everyone does not have a right to access limited mediums to spread that speech. That is, I have the right to stand on a streetcorner and say whatever I want, but it is not part of my First Amendment right that my speech is broadcast on the radio or on televison.
That said, I do agree that the climate of censorship is, in general, going to far. But it's not a First Amendment issue. And in this case, protestors took the reasonable step of calling the business to terminate the offending employees. They didn't ask any governmental body or law enforcement agency to step in. They used their clout as media consumers to demand that a for-profit company meet their needs. Sounds like functioning capitalism to me, not a dying Constitution.
I also think that it's a mistake to lump all demands for media standards into the same category. Asking that a radio station not broadcast deeply offensive racial slurs and celebration of mass tragedy is perfectly reasonable -- much moreso than requiring TV stations to blur out a cartoon character's rear end. Reasonable people draw lines all the time. We can surely determine that things which are stunningly hateful and bigotted -- like the Tsunami Song -- are different from things which can only be qualified as softly sexual in the sense that they show part of the human body -- like the Family Guy baby's rump.
Bill Maher on Hannity & Colmes tonight laid out the free speech issues and such that we're talking about perfectly in my opinion. If you can get a hold of a clip, check it out, because the position he lays out is very close to what I've attempted to express, though he does so more succinctly, at least in the part of the segment I caught; I think I missed the very beginning. I disagree with him, however, on his belief that the Dems should move further left.
To respond to Jill, I'm not sure if you were responding to me or to Will, but just in case, I never said access to radio or TV was a 1st amendment right - in fact, I said that was the major fault with Will's argument. This may be stretching it a bit, but what really is the difference between blurring out Stewie's ass and censoring the Tsunami song? Each could be offensive to different people; why is one okay and not the other? Or moreover, how much does it really matter if offensive is considered "bigoted"? If it's offensive, it's offensive, and why is one type allowable and another not? You say that reasonable people draw lines all the time, but it's not about drawing lines on a personal level, we're talking about drawing lines that affect the entire public body. Who should have the power to draw those lines and why those particular people? That's somewhere near where the real issues lie, I think.
Matt, I was responding to Will's column, not to anyone's comments. Sorry, should have clarified that.
As for determining what's offensive... the argument that all offensive things are equal is simply not accurate. As a society, we establish social guidelines all the time with regard to what the vast majority of us consider to be unacceptable. Racism falls within these guidelines, as does explicit sex. Things like cartoon nudity aren't as clear-cut. I agree that we don't have lines drawn in every circumstance. But when it comes to some things, we do.
In a strict legal sense, perhaps this is not a First Amendment issue. Yet, in a spirit of the Constitution sense, this is.
One of the Founding Father's major intentions that, not only should the government not limit speech, but the public itself should not seek to limit speech.
To me, it may even be more disgusting when the people, not the government, makes moves to punish someone for saying something "offensive."
Sure, mobilize the public to pressure HOT97 to ban Lynn and Jones for saying something some people didn't want to hear. How many steps is that removed from the public mobilizing to pressure media outlets not to allow anti-Bush sentiments on their airwaves? In my humble opinion, not that many steps at all.
Yes, media outlets have the right to censor their employees. But should the public be pushing them to exercise that right? No. Put it into a liberal light. Imagine media outlets around the country banned all employees from anti-Bush sentiments. That's their right to do so.
Cut from my column in an editorial move I highly disagree with (to say the least) was the Voltaire quote, "I may not agree with what you say, but I will defend to the death your right to say it."
Once we start making strong moves to censor people for "offensive" comments, we have lost what Voltaire, the Founding Fathers, and so many other Enlightenment thinkers valued so much.
We cut the Voltaire quote because it wasn't Voltaire who said it. It was a guy who wrote a book about Voltaire, and that's not even exactly what he said. The editors and fact-checkers figured it was better to paraphrase the sentiments of the quote you wanted to use.
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