CALIBRATING FREE SPEECH

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.

First Amendment

Bill of Rights

    It is the "First Freedom" and on it I am an absolutist. It is as close to sacred as a secular statement or law can be.

     It means we must tolerate hearing even those things we find offensive. Reasonable people understand the implication of beginning to limit expression of a particular group or idea-where does it end?

    There is an however to this and the Charlottesville march and incident and its aftermath illuminates the however.

     The right to free speech does not extend to nazis or white supremacists. Here is how this free speech advocate gets to that point.

     I begin by quoting an unlikely source, Richard Spencer the American white supremacist. Spencer said "nazis are out of the bounds of humanity."  In this case, I agree with him.

     Like many of his generation, my father was a combat veteran of WWII where the issue of the legitimacy of the nazi idea was prosecuted. Later the Nuremberg trials further established the outlaw, vile and inhuman nature of that belief and the participation in it. 

      The nazi government of Germany undertook behavior that is the most evil in human history. I find succor then between the bounds of a white supremacist and the defining history of WWII to say clearly there is nothing legitimate or protected in a nazi belief, statement or attitude. The nazi history of barbarity disqualifies them from any human right or endeavor.

      White supremacy is a specious idea at best. More, it is fundamentally wrong and it is just stupid. With the exception of a isolated tribe or clan that has never had contact with others, there is no place on this planet where "blood lines are pure." Beyond that, the United States fought a brutal war fueled in great part by the foundational attitude and attendant arguments of white supremacy. 

     Those ideas allowed slavery to exist in our national experience and contributed to the inhuman and barbaric treatment of human beings. We didn't need a war to establish the foul nature of that belief, but the side that pressed racial supremacy was defeated none-the-less, ending any claim to it being a legitimate idea.

      The sheer lunacy of white supremacy, combined with the  tragic and bloody U.S. history of that issue places that view outside the bounds of protected speech.

      We would not permit those who believe in child sacrifice, cannibalism, public beheading, public rape, or the likes of ISIS, Taliban, Boko Haram,etc., to march or express their views. White supremacists and nazis are no better and no different. In fact as a civil society we are better off when those attitudes and behavior are criminalized.

      I think I'm safe in saying we have history on our side, to say nothing of the greater moral arguments. There is nothing good or right about white supremacy or nazim. They have no legitimacy or credibility. They are more than offensive, they are off the human scale. Humanity would be better if we never again had to cross them.

      Waring elephant seals just up the coast from here have more right to free speech than nazis or white supremacists.

         It is my assumption they also have more intellectual

power than the human slugs who are so out of touch with humanity.

the night i saw the nigger

    First, my apology to anyone who might be offended, but that is exactly how Dick Gregory identified himself the first time I saw him.

     It was at Ball State University in the mid 60's. Gregory performed his social comedy and was pushing his 1964 book Nigger. Throughout the concert he kept urging us to buy his book and send a copy to the President because he said he "wanted to see a Nigger in the White House!"

     Over the ensuing years I would cover or interview Gregory as he advanced his social activism. On one occasion when I was scheduled to interview him I had a sore throat and a cough. Before the interview began Gregory asked the hotel staff to bring him hot water, tea, lemon and honey to make me an elixir.

     Gregory was a ground breaker. He found a way to combat racism and segregation with a great and skilled sense of humor. He was also was a sincere and dedicated advocate of human dignity and liberty. 

     See you down the trail.

Rebirthing

    Green man has been around for a while. He's thought to be a representative of a vegetative god, but he's shown up in many cultures over the centuries. He's come to represent re-birth, spring and renewal. Everybody can use a little renewal or spring tonic.
     A not so kind bug sidelined this writer for a few days but a benefit was attacking a stack of reading that had been building up. I'm referring to the kind of reading done in a comfortable chair. I read plenty each day, here on the screen but even the longer magazine pieces never seem to sink in like the reading done with magazine or book in hand. 

rumbles

conservative?

     One particularly long piece traced the mutation of the American conservative movement from Bill Buckley 's founding of the National Review in 1955 to the election of Donald Trump. Trump is the very kind charlatan Buckley devoted years to excising from the modern conservative movement. This president is the epitome of anti intellectualism. One wonders if Trump is really the new conservative.

religious?  

    As a backdrop to the executive order loosening restrictions on churches ability to partisan politic, there is the confounding support of Trump by white evangelical Christians, reported to be as high as 81%. Jim Wallis, author, theologian and president of Sojourners considers himself one of the 19% of white evangelicals who oppose trump. He wrote recently:
     "To many outside the white evangelical world, it seemed- and still seems-inconceivable that a thrice-married serial adulterer, ultimate materialist, casino owner, habitual liar, and unprincipled deal-maker could ever become the standard bearer for a group that professes to base their vote on "family values."
       Wallis attacks what he calls the racism of key evangelical 
Christian leaders including Jerry Falwell. He accuses them of being political operatives who have been "played" by right wing Republicans.
        It is that strain of self identified "Christian" who consider LGBTQ people unqualified for the ministry, who deny them communion or even consider them "sinful." Still, how that judgmental subset could endorse a sexual predator is beyond rationality. But it is that ilk that welcomes the ability to turn the Bible into a political weapon. Others argue that would be a dangerous and perverted use of the Judaic-Christian holy book, not unlike the fundamentalist terrorist's application of the Quran.

republican?

      One also wonders if Trump is the new Republican. Another long tome explored the political shenanigans of Trump loyalty and emerging Republicanism. 
      Most serious analysts hold out little hope for the House passed health care reform of getting anywhere. Senate Republican have their own ideas and they are better grounded in reality. As several have said the Trump-Ryan plan means people will die because money and politics trumps healing and well being. 
      What survived the house politicking is essentially a tax break for the wealthiest while everyone else divides up the pain--higher premiums, lost coverage, being out of luck. Rex Huppke of the Chicago Tribune wrote the plan is, "a big middle finger to anyone who needs help." Take that Trump voters. You believed him but you got Trumped. Will traditional Republicans let that stand? Or will the Ryan opportunists or the liberty caucus fanatics define Republican?

academic fascism

      With the first amendment and journalism under attack we also are watching the growing strain of fascism on college campuses. Intellectual freedom and freedom of speech are woven as a gospel of a free society. There is nothing that should be off limits in academia, but self righteous and narrow minded interests have attacked a researcher who proposed to study "transracialism."  It has all the hall marks of a totalitarian mentality. You can read about it here.

                                     back to nap time 

        All of this and the current manic drama draws me to note again we are in a spasm when celebrity is more important than intelligence, when thoughtfulness is eclipsed by emotion, when superficiality counts for more than history. It's almost enough to make you want crawl back under the covers.

 when size does not matter

    The perpetual mystery of the sleeping habits of Hemingway and Joy. Sometimes they share the box. On this night it doesn't matter that little Joy has room to spare, big Hemingway either chose or was banished to the little basket. Well, he curls well

      See you down the trail.

CROSS CURRENTS OF POLITICAL CORRECTNESS

     Sometimes it's all about how you see it.  

about the labels

     A preposterous misunderstanding is roiling through the American body politic, weaponizing words and good intentions. 

     The phrase is political correctness. If you are interested there is a study of the origins and how it has become a cudgel in cultural debate.

      The short course is this; at its origin it was used in the 1940's in debates about "proper" political dogma in communist discussions about Stalin. The point was to divine the "correct" party line. Stalin slaughtered "incorrect" opponents in massive purges. The phrase was a marginal concept known only to those who  studied communism or socialism. 

      Scholars say the phrase gained some usage in the early 1970's when Tony Cade Bambara wrote in The Black Woman:An Anthology "...a man cannot be politically correct and a male chauvinist too..." 

      In the early '70's progressives and feminists began to use the idea of political correctness as a way to avoid offensive speech, phrases and ideas. It was a kind of code to raise sensitivities about things that once had been acceptable but were no longer. It was an age of combating segregation, sexism, and speaking of people as "retarded," "cripples," "spics" "beaners" "Wops" "Jewing down the price" "chicks" and you can supply your own list. Old traditions and ways of speaking, seen in modern light, were as offensive as "colored" drinking fountains, red lining in banking, sexual harassment of women in the work place, sitting in the back of the bus or discrimination of any sort. Offensive and illegal traditions and old ways were considered politically incorrect.

       The phrase went from there to being almost a satire of itself. Sensitive and even insensitive people began to use it as a lighthearted lampoon about all manner of thing. It became a kind of sarcasm and joke, especially among those pushing for change. Still it was not widely used and certainly not part of the daily lexicon. 

       At the same time colleges and universities began to adjust curricula adding courses in feminism and the changing racial, ethnic and cultural diversity. Traditionalists, who did not like the way culture was changing, were unhappy. One of those was Allan Bloom who wrote The Closing of the American Mind in 1987. He railed against liberal philosophy and the changing of American education. In tying together the evolution of education and the change in the face of America he used the phrase political correctness as a pejorative. The phrase began to get more mileage, mostly from conservative or right wing ideologues who were opposed to the changing standards, culture and times.

       In the early 90's the word became weaponized. It became a code word for liberal, or liberal politics, progressives, changes in curriculum, education, or those who pushed against sexism, racism, and discrimination. What had been a word used mostly among academics became a red meat word and a political hammer used by conservatives. It was as if they had a flame thrower to scorch all ideas they opposed. Right wing think tanks dumped a lot of ink and time in using the word as a discrediting tool. Liberal ideas could be destroyed if they were labeled as "political correctness."

       It is only fair to mention there is also a conservative correctness. The most virulent form is book banning, or seeking to censor film, television, video games and other creative enterprise. As a small example, cafeterias in the US House of Representatives changed French Fries and French Toast to Freedom Fries and Freedom Toast when France opposed the US invasion of Iraq. Members of the Freedom Caucus in the House remain some of the most adamant attackers of ideas they oppose by means of condemnation using "politically correct." Trump has taken up the tool twisting it to "fake news" and "enemy of the people."

true words

    By most accepted definitions CONSERVATIVES are those committed to traditional values and ways of doing things and are opposed to change. Conservatives favor free enterprise, private ownership and socially conservative ideas. Conservatives favor as little government as possible, especially at the federal level. Conservatives are somewhat averse to change. They believe government should protect private property. Conservatives believe there are too many regulations and too much government interference in business. They oppose government changing culture.
          
       LIBERALS are open to new ideas, opinions and intellectual liberty. They favor progress and believe in the essential goodness of people. They favor protection of civil liberties and believe government is responsible for correcting social inequities in race, gender and class. Liberals believe government should protect individual liberty. They favor free trade. Liberals believe government regulations should protect individuals from the abuses of industry and corporations. 

       Now, I'm sure almost everyone, regardless of where you align, will find something you think I got wrong. I'm simplifying. And over the years the manifestations of liberal and conservative philosophy and politics have morphed.  

       free speech

       As an absolutist on the first amendment I understand that right wingers can zing liberals and if they choose liberals can zing back. That is part of the rough and tumble of our system. But as a journalist, I'm a stickler for getting it right and using the right words.  

       Even Bill Maher, a liberal snarkster, got it wrong. Like right wing ideologues he points to recent campus disturbances where a speaker has been barred, cancelled or denied a right to speak because, he said, of "liberals" in academia pushing political correctness.  Bull shit, to use a word understood on both sides of the spectrum. 
       Liberals don't deny free speech, fascists do. Anyone who advocates denial of a right to free speech, no matter how offensive or politically weighted, is not a liberal or an intellectual conservative. 

       Someone at a university who may fancy themselves a progressive or a liberal and who would agitate against the appearance of a speaker, film, production or whatever just lost the right to call themselves a liberal. The function of their behavior is fascism or totalitarianism. They would deny an individual civil liberty. They can gripe and protest, but not deny-that disqualifies them.

      A conservative who would seek to deny the right of someone to speak certainly betrays an adherence to traditional values. What can be a more traditional value than the bill of rights? Conservatives can gripe and protest as well, but not deny.
      The bottom line is simple. Those who seek to deny full access to the rights of the first amendment should be called what they are, fascists. Sorry if this pulls the steam out of a favorite conservative charge. Sorry if this unnerves some professor who fancies herself or himself a "progressive" or liberal. It's time for the media to get it right and to be precise. 
       This is the age of information. Accuracy matters. And besides that, there should be nothing considered off limits in the realm of academia or the church. If you can't consider or study something, controversial, challenging to your ideas, or even an evil, in the halls of academy or a place of faith, then what's the point? What's the value? You might as well turn off the lights, go home and devolve into superstitious, uninformed, science rejecting, close minded barbarians burning those books or dissertations in bonfires.

celebrating mother

    Pulling in an evening blanket...of fog.

     This years crop of fava beans. Frequent readers know of our fondness for this labor intensive crop. You can read Romancing the Fava here. With this fullness of growth it is for the first harvest. 

  Green Space Cambria celebrating mother earth in a beautiful green space. 

                         

O really?pt 2

     Bully mouth Bill O'Reilly may show up someplace else, but his banishment from Fox News was good to see. You have to wonder though when Fox News founder Roger Ailes and his superstar are dumped because of sexual harassment, how much can you trust what comes out of that sort of culture, especially on matters of women's rights, health, income equality and even sexual harassment in the work place? Fair and balanced?
      Then consider right wing radio and web screamer Alex Jones who has launched some of the most absurd theories and "facts" who now says it's only performance art. You wonder if those on the right who feed on Fox, O'Reilly, Jones and Limbaugh are feeling less secure in their "rightness" since their pantheon are dirty old men with feet of clay? 
And we include in that audience the predator in chief. Dirty Donny feeds on Fox and was a frequent guest on Alex Jones. That's no fake news. Just a fake president.

       See you down the trail.

SPLASH OF RED AND KEEPING SPEECH FREE

splash of red

Stolo Winery, Cambria CA

left overs

 "Griffin Park" Park Cambria

Free Speech?

      Speech is getting less free, a threat to our way of life.

      A federation of damnable causes conspire against free speech but stopping the repressive advance will be a challenge.

      First we must eliminate philosophical reference points. This is not a conservative vs liberal issue. Anyone who values the core of our democratic republic supports our Bill of Rights, including the First Amendment and its implications.

     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 of the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances. 

     If it is Constitutionally guaranteed then we must protect against attacks including those that come culturally. The threat exists in an attitude and a growing fascism, even if disguised.  

pc

     An example is PC, political correctness. Years ago it may have been born of a desire to be sensitive, to even recognize past discrimination, repression and accrued wrongs. But that was then. I heard a conservative friend observe recently "liberals and so called intellectuals especially college professors" were the greatest practitioners of political correctness to stifle free speech. He was partially right and largely wrong.

      No true liberal or no real academic would sign on to the silly practices underway in some of academia. Those who would impede speech are fascists, even if they shun that label.  

      In academia and in the church, nothing should be off the table, everything, regardless of its nature should be open for investigation, study and discussion. In a democratic republic we tolerate even the stupid and reprehensible. Wisdom and good judgment will be the antidote to that which is deplorable. We do not set up "guardians" of thought or study. That is what fascists do.

      In some places in America are those who demand a right not to be offended. Who do they think they are? 
      No one wants to be offended but in the rough and tumble of political debate, intellectual study or theology there are no restraints. Nothing is off limits. If these bright minds who whimper about "not being offended" would give it even a moment of thought they might see that under those rules almost nothing could be discussed or studied because about anything could offend someone. A right not to be offended means someone will control someone else's speech. That is fascism. 

     Schools, parents or academics who permit this mollycoddling are dong their children no good. The idea of "trigger alerts" or micro aggressions" are an intellectual dishonesty and a head in the sand self absorption, the practice of a weak and self indulgent society. Those who advocate such tripe need to speak with academics, clerics and journalists who try to leverage truth and reality in most nations on this planet, where it is not so free. 

religio fascism

     There is also the fascism that comes in a religious garb.

Perhaps the deadliest example are those practitioners of a virulent form of fundamentalist Islam. Writers, filmmakers, journalists and political activists have been targeted and killed because they dare "offend" Islam. Examples are the Charlie Hebdo killings, or the murder of Theo Van Gogh.        

     No one of faith wants to see their object of reverence or belief demeaned. While it may be repulsive, a standard of free speech demands the rights of speaking freely even if the intent is to offend. A democratic republic that values the freedoms that set us apart is strong enough to allow the profane and offensive, even if directed at our most sacred.    
     We don't condone merely because we tolerate. But the Islamist who stabbed to death the Dutch filmmaker who made a program about the abuse of Muslim women was quoted as saying he "could not live in any country where free speech is allowed."
     This is not an abstract problem. Satirists and more serious commentators are afraid to lampoon Islam. They are afraid of the violence that may befall them and they are afraid of being   labeled intolerant. For either reason there is a chilling effect on speech. No other religion practises such intimidation or intolerance to their critics-serious, comedic or even pathetic.

chilling or muting

    Controversial or dissenting theories or works are frequently held back in fear for one's career. To challenge a revisionist theory of history, or the self aggrandizing of someone in say a feminist or minority studies program for example could lead to scorn and crowd sourced derision. Look what happens when a Caucasian accuses an African American of being a racist. Preposterous perhaps, or not, but a serious discussion in a vein of free speech cannot ensue.
     Consider the damage done to the reputation of Duke athletes wrongly accused and maliciously prosecuted. Certain Duke professors jumped on and ganged up with a moral viciousness though they were dead wrong. The attempt to counter that rush to judgement got others in trouble with the fascist crowd. 
     This threat to free speech comes across several strands of American culture-politics, media, corporations and of course academia. The problem is not confined to the U.S.
The Economist says it is a British problem as well. Here's a quote from the Economist
       "Academics who think education requires the free flow of ideas are appalled. 'A university is not a "safe space,"' tweeted Richard Dawkins, a biologist at Oxford. 'If you need a safe space, leave, go home, hug your teddy and suck your thumb until ready for university.'"
     If a nation says it is free, then it must assure freedom and the liberty to speak one's mind, regardless of view. To quote a classical Greek idiom that has been around and oft quoted we need to "...call a spade a spade." Any attempt to control honest expression is dead wrong.

    See you down the trail.

HOW ARE YOU BEING MONITORED?

WHO KNOWS YOU ARE READING THIS?

    I was pleased to see a growing reaction to the reports about Google's accountability.  The info giant has reported

how government's around the world lean on them for information about users and push them for censorship.

   Since beginning this blog I have written about the

"INFORMATION WARS."  This reprises one of the more chilling accounts.

WHO CONTROLS YOUR SEARCH?

Maybe it is a leap, but perhaps it is closer to a chilling reality than we would
like to admit.  I acknowledge there is a bit of a stretch here, but it is one we should well consider.
In George Orwell's 1984, aside the from the image of Big Brother watching,
there was indeed the presence of the thought police.


"Who controls the past controls the future: who controls the present controls the past."

"Thoughtcrime does not entail death, thoughtcrime IS death"

George Orwell
1984

Now to the relevance of this to you and your life here in cyberspace.

Did you know someone is already "interpreting" your thoughts.

Take a few minutes to watch this and consider the consequence.

The tailoring of a search, to your specific parameters, may seem a benefit.  But think of the underpinning dynamic.  Your information is analyzed and choices are made, ostensibly to assist you, but they are choices that eliminate, prioritize and assume certain values about you, without the benefit of your input.
That appears to be the beginning of a slippery slope.
THE HAUNTING IMAGE
In case you've forgotten, here is a trailer of the movie
that followed Orwell's visionary novel.

Some of you may recall the "free speech movement" and the more recent court cases orbiting around the First Amendment. We have a history of a vigorous defense of liberty and freedom of thought and speech, absolutely.  
The age of convenient communication and information brings a world to your keyboard, smart phone or pad.  But the glow that comes in the marvelous flow of information and the wondrous world of apps, could occlude a more sinister presence.
Data mining, surveillance of your private chats, and control of the information we voraciously consume could begin to turn against us.  We simply need to be mindful, aware, vigilant, and never cede an inch of freedom nor control of what we put into our minds. And we must be diligent about the sources of our information.


"He wondered, as he had many times wondered before, whether he himself was a lunatic. Perhaps a lunatic was simply a minority of one"


"Nothing was your own except the few cubic centimetres inside your skull."
George Orwell 
1984


Give it some thought.
See you down the trail.