Wednesday, June 2, 2010

The First Amendment: A Review

I'm not sure why people have so much trouble understanding the free speech portion of the First Amendment. It's not long or complicated. In fact, the entire amendment is short and quite simply stated.

Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances.

Do you see anything in there that protects anyone from the consequences of their speech? No, you don't. You are more than welcome to say any horrible, shocking, racist, sexist, otherwise bigoted crap you want to say, but you are in no way protected from my reaction to what you said. I am more than welcome to tell my boss exactly what I think of him- and he is equally welcome to fire me for doing so.

Or, as my mother used to say, you have the ability and the right to shove a potato chip up your nose, that doesn't make it a good idea. (I didn't realize until much later in life that my mother made up a lot of her "old sayings" on the spot.) Sure, John Stossel, you can announce to the world that you think people should be allowed to engage in institutionalized racism, and I have to right to call you a bigoted spleenweasel because of it.

At the time, racism was so pervasive that such an intrusive law may have been a good thing. But, as a libertarian, I say: Individuals should be surrounded by a sphere of privacy where government does not intrude. Part of the Civil Rights Act violates freedom of association. That's why I told Fox's Megyn Kelly, "It's time now to repeal that part of the law."

You can't say that in America?

Sure you can, asshat. Were you arrested for saying that? Were you thrown in prison? Were you executed? Clearly not. Clearly, you still have a platform from which to spew your stupidity. So, can you say that in America? Yes. Is it a good idea? Probably not. Those are two entirely separate issues, however.

The First Amendment allows you to say what you wish, but you're on your own when it comes to deciding whether or not you should.

14 comments:

  1. What he means is that you can't express that sort of libertarian principle without being smeared as a racist. You are basically making his point for him.

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  2. I forgot to mention that I don't even agree with Stossel on this issue. I think libertarians are unrealistic on many issues, and that the use of government power to establish equal rights regarding race is a legitimate and necessary. But his disagreement on the use of goverment in this case doesn't in any way make him a racist or a bigot. That's just a smear attempt to silence him, which is what he was reacting to.

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  3. Private clubs can discriminate all they want. If I want to start a club for left-handed bald men name John, I may do so, and you can't join my club.

    But if I incorporate, and get liabilty protection from the government, my club is no longer private.

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  4. Well, let me put it this way: whether or not Stossel really is a bigot is irrelevant. Perhaps he simply is a naif who thinks that the market (I always hear that as said by Andrew Ryan) will correct racism, and people really aren't that racist anymore. It's possible.

    However, that's irrelevent. When speaking in public, one has to be careful what one says. A reasonable person could foresee that saying what Stossel said could easily be interpreted as racist, and would rephrase or maybe just not say it.

    It's one thing to protest that one's words were misinterpreted and entirely another to say How dare you infringe upon my right to say things by reacting to what I said?

    It's also Stossel's responsibility to understand why everyone exploded the way they did. He needs to consider that perhaps his ideology is, to put it lightly, absurd and that his phrasing was . . . open to interpretation.

    Shorter me: maybe the white guy needs to take a listen to the black/hispanic/disabled/etc before deciding that bigotry is dead.

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  5. "Well, let me put it this way: whether or not Stossel really is a bigot is irrelevant"

    Somehow I doubt he thinks so. He's being called a bigot because of his politcal philosophy of extremely small government and personal liberty. That's something even someone as used to being attacked as Stossel is going to have to respond to.

    "When speaking in public, one has to be careful what one says.""

    That's not a good thing. The attacks on him are not an attempt to disagree with him, or point out where he is wrong, they are smears to try to remove him from the airways and silence him. That's why he's invoking the first amendment.

    "It's also Stossel's responsibility to understand why everyone exploded the way they did."

    Oh I'm sure he understands smears very well. That sort of thing is nothing new. He is taking a position that is a minority position, but it is based on principle and a particular interpretation of the role of government in society -- one that happens to be shared by many libertarians.

    I'll give you a personal example of what I am saying. I am strongly pro-choice to the point that I think a woman should be able to control her own body, even if it means the death of another human life in a late-term pregnancy. But at the same time I am strongly against Roe v. Wade. I think it was a terrible decision that created an imaginary right not in the constitution, from another imaginary right (privacy). So while I support the ultimate outcome and intent -- a woman's right to choose, I disagree with the legal process by which it was established. But being against Roe v. Wade doesn't make me anti-abortion.

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  6. I think it was a terrible decision that created an imaginary right not in the constitution, from another imaginary right (privacy). So while I support the ultimate outcome and intent -- a woman's right to choose, I disagree with the legal process by which it was established.

    False. The Constitution does confer upon anyone, be they legislative or judicial, the ability to, as you say, create "imaginary rights."

    The Constitution recognizes rights, mostly within the Bill of Rights and the various other Amendments. But what the Constitution also has is the power to create entitlements. Therefore, within the purview of the capabilities granted to the government by the Constitution, the decision of Roe v. Wade is just fine. Even if privacy is not a right, the government is within its scope to entitle the American people to their own privacy. That entitlement can then be revoked, but that, too, is also within the government's purview.

    Besides, how, exactly, is privacy not a right? Is the government legally allowed to wiretap my phones and read all of my emails just in case I'm attempting to foment revolt? Is it allowed to place listening devices in my home on the off chance I'm gearing up to assassinate a government official? Is it then allowed to overhear a discussion I have in the privacy of my own home about a health problem and report it to my insurance company?

    Quite frankly, I regard privacy as a right. I'd like to believe that a libertarian would agree with me about such things. And if the right to privacy only extends to certain, special cases that an individual agrees to and all others can fuck off, it's neither a right nor an entitlement. It then becomes a privilege. And privilege is a much more elastic chip with which the powerful can wheel and deal at the expense of the weak...

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  7. To be fair, as has been pointed out, you sorta missed the point of what Strossel was saying. Admittedly, he could’ve phrased it quite a bit better, but his point was not in support of bigotry (or, as you falsely put it, “institutionalized racism”). It, as with many other libertarians’ on the issue of the Civil Rights act, was that the government should not be allowed to interfere in private businesses and dictate whether their owners can discriminate or not. This is simply not the same as encouraging people to discriminate, or condoning bigotry, or anything of the sort. It’s basically saying, “Sure, be an asshole all you want, we won’t stop you. But people will just realize you’re an asshole and will stop coming and your business will die.”

    It actually makes sense in that way, though I feel that it’s too optimistic to feel that bigoted private businesses will all die out if people realize they’re discriminatory. Assholery has a remarkable tenacity that way. Personally, I honestly don’t know where to stand on the matter, having heard both sides’ arguments. On the one hand, keeping regulations to an absolute minimum is a strong ideal of mine for private businesses, yet on the other, it’s rather apparent that legislating equality does tend to work. Consider me cognitively dissonant, I guess.

    Just my 1.5¢.

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  8. On the one hand, keeping regulations to an absolute minimum is a strong ideal of mine for private businesses, yet on the other, it’s rather apparent that legislating equality does tend to work. Consider me cognitively dissonant, I guess.

    That's not actually cognitive dissonance. It's that lovely space between ideals and reality.

    The big problem one both ends: the hard-core libertarians v. the hard-core Communists is that the system can work, just not in any way that's connected to reality.

    If people were angels we'd need no government to convince them to do the right thing. We'd need no government to tell people to share and help the less fortunate and to be responsible with the use of their resources. But if people were angels their shit wouldn't stink and their farts would give off the pleasant aroma of fresh-baked cinnamon rolls, too.

    This is, in my opinion, the biggest problem with libertarians in the public sphere. I don't think Rand Paul is a racist. I don't think John Stossel is, either. I think they're just hopelessly misguided about the actual state of the world that they're attempting to govern and comment upon, respectively.

    It's fine to say that the government shouldn't have to regulate because the market will. It's a different thing to believe that in the face of the overwhelming evidence to the contrary. And that, for the record, is why I wouldn't vote for a libertarian candidate, or a Communist, for that matter. Anyone who wishes to govern by ideals that aren't even remotely borne out in reality is a danger.

    Even if I happen to agree with bits of libertarian philosophy on one side and Communist philosophy on the other, I don't want anything to do with either side making the rules.

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  9. "But if people were angels their shit wouldn't stink and their farts would give off the pleasant aroma of fresh-baked cinnamon rolls, too."

    Lies and balderdash! I don't like cinnamon. No, it is the sweet scent of freshly baked chocolate chip cookies that would emanate from our flatulent asses.

    So let it be written. So let it be done.
    So say we all.

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  10. Geds,

    "The Constitution does confer upon anyone, be they legislative or judicial, the ability to, as you say, create "imaginary rights.""

    I agree. That's why I disagree with Roe v. Wade. The court created a new right not found in the Constitution. Your argument about entitlements is irrelevant. Privacy and the right to an abortion are rights under U.S. law, not entitlements. I agree that the U.S. government has the power to create or remove various entitlements. It does not and should not have the power to remove rights without amending the Constitution. If rights can be created by judicial interpretation -- and they have been -- there is no reason in theory that other rights can't be removed by judicial interpretation.

    "Besides, how, exactly, is privacy not a right? "

    Do you have to report every bit of your income to the government, even illegal earnings? Are there all sorts of other requirements to provide information to the government that many people would consider private? Are there all sorts of databases throughout the country that maintain records containing detailed personal information that is supposedly private? What we have are a few areas where privacy is respected, and many areas where it is not. In my opinion calling it a "right" is a major overstatement.

    "Quite frankly, I regard privacy as a right. I'd like to believe that a libertarian would agree with me about such things. "

    A libertarian would. But then I'm not a libertarian :). There are things that many people think should be rights. But that doesn't mean there is a constitutional basis for them.

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  11. "There are things that many people think should be rights. But that doesn't mean there is a constitutional basis for them."

    Your perspective seems to be broken, let me help you out.

    "There are many things that people acknowledge as fundamental human rights. But that doesn't mean the U.S. Constitution acknowledges them."

    There, I fixed it for you.

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  12. you FIGHT PAPER MONSTERS...

    the blood and bodies of the atheist movement...


    you mofos killed MICKEY MOUSE!!!!


    this has more TRUTH than what Dawkins, Randi, Harris, Myers, and Shermer combined have said in their entire lives...


    http://www.youtube.com/watch#!v=5R2wE8Sduhs&playnext_from=TL&videos=hht1U_19anc&feature=rec-LGOUT-exp_fresh%2Bdiv-1r-3-HM



    they tried to BULLDOZE the entire METAPHYSICAL DIMENSION...

    they LOST THE WAR......

    you have FORFEIT YOUR SOUL, shermer... you have become an object in the material world, as you WISHED...

    http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eUB4j0n2UDU

    http://farm1.static.flickr.com/7/11792994_ffaaee87fa.jpg

    we're gonna smash that TV...

    They had become ENEMIES OF THE PEOPLE AND OF GOD...
    you pushed too much and *CROSSED THE LINE*

    degenerates (PZ) or children (HEMANT) - ATHEISTS!

    http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bRRg2tWGDSY

    do you have anything to say, you STUPID LITTLE F*CKER?

    how about I tell you, Mr. Shermer, EVERYTHING YOU THINK ABOUT THE WORLD is

    *WRONG*

    THE BOOBQUAKE - 911!

    http://dissidentphilosophy.lifediscussion.net/philosophy-f1/the-boobquake-911-t1310.htm

    http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sx7XNb3Q9Ek

    RUN, ATHEISTS, RUN!!!

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  13. "There, I fixed it for you. "

    No, you gave a somewhat different opinion. There was nothing to fix. My comment stands as written.

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  14. hi dear, are u ok ? how is every thing? long time no hear from you. i think you are busy. have a good time.

    ReplyDelete

Comments are for you guys, not for me. Say what you will. Don't feel compelled to stay on topic, I enjoy it when comments enter Tangentville or veer off into Non Sequitur Town. Just keep it polite, okay?

I am attempting to use blogger's new comment spam feature. If you don't immediately see your comment, it is being held in spam, I will get it out next time I check the filter. Unless you are Dennis Markuze, in which case you're never seeing your comment.

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