The Idiocy Of "Sure People Have A Right To Speech But....."

There are a lot of examples of the genre in the wake of the Garland, TX terrorist attack but Ken White at Popehat finds a particularly stupid one to gnaw on for awhile. As you might expect, hilarity and carnage ensue.

I can't come close to Ken's take down on the law but there's one sub-genre I'd like to address. It's the, "sure xxxx is a terrible, horrible, no good, piece of human excrement but even someone that loathsome is entitled to speak" club. Spare me the throat clearing. The quality of the person speaking and the content of their speech isn't at issue. In fact they are entirely irrelevant to the discussion at hand. It's the right to speak and our willingness as a society to stand for the principle that matters.

The reality is I'm not standing for or with Pam Geller, the KKK or anyone else I may disagree with. I'm standing for myself. Someday each of us may find ourselves on the "wrong" side of "all right thinking people" and unless we draw a firm and bright line all the time, we should not expect it to protect us when we most need it.

posted by DrewM. at 11:18 AM

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