First Amendment is not ‘bonkers’ – Mount Olive Tribune

Bart Adams

Now that weve once again celebrated our nations independence, lets look at one of our most fundamental rights: Freedom of speech.

Its tempting to take this right for granted, but it is under attack in a big way.

Specifically, there is growing acceptance of the idea that if speech hurts someones feelings then it must be suppressed.

Right now in Finland, for example, a Christian member of Parliament faces six years in prison for hate speech because she shared her views on homosexuality.

I dont think Ive been guilty of threatening, slandering [or] disparaging any population group, she responded. These [statements] are all about what the Bible teaches about marriage and sexuality.

In Canada, a 2017 law (Bill C-16) could send someone to jail for refusing to use the pronoun preferred by a transsexual.

It could happen, lawyer Jared Brown told the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation when asked about the possibility of jail time for violating the law. Is it likely to happen? I dont think so. But, my opinion on whether or not thats likely has a lot to do with the particular case that youre looking at.

Even if the possibility were slight, its abhorrent to imagine someone going to jail for declining to engage in compelled speech.

Sadly, a 2017 poll by the libertarian Cato Institute found that 51 percent of Democrats favor such a law here.

Fortunately, we have the First Amendment, which gives Americans more confidence in our right to speak freely, though much of the world doesnt understand it.

Look what Prince Harry, one of our newer residents, had to say back in May: Ive got so much I want to say about the First Amendment; I still dont understand it, but it is bonkers.

Thats fine; he doesnt have to understand our liberty. After all, when our Continental soldiers fought and died for that liberty, they did so to free us from the unjust rule of Prince Harrys relative, George III.

But another George Orwell , whose work offers great insight on the dangers of unchecked government power, said this: If liberty means anything at all, it means the right to tell people what they do not want to hear.

Another George Washington said, If freedom of speech is taken away, then dumb and silent we may be led, like sheep to the slaughter.

In the Internet age, protecting free speech is more complicated because its not just governments doing the censoring, its also big-tech giants like Google, Facebook and Twitter.

As a Wall Street Journal op-ed stated earlier this year, Conventional wisdom holds that technology companies are free to regulate content because they are private, and the First Amendment protects only against government censorship. That view is wrong: Google, Facebook and Twitter should be treated as state actors under existing legal doctrines. Using a combination of statutory inducements and regulatory threats, Congress has co-opted Silicon Valley to do through the back door what government cannot directly accomplish under the Constitution.

And while conservatives justifiably complain about big-tech censorship, all are threatened.

As that same article (published while Donald Trump was still in office) pointed out, Liberals should worry too. If big tech can shut down the president, what stops them from doing the same to Joe Biden if he backs antitrust suits against social-media companies?

In short, lets remember what the late Supreme Court Justice William O. Douglas warned: Restriction of free thought and free speech is the most dangerous of all subversions. It is the one un-American act that could most easily defeat us.

Contact Bart Adams at badams@mydailyrecord.com.

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First Amendment is not 'bonkers' - Mount Olive Tribune