View from the Valley

Picture this: you are walking through Kroger when you hear someone dropping the “f bomb.” They are walking in a small group, laughing among friends and are not near any children. Do you ask them to stop? Do you get the manager to tell them to stop?
Or how about this: you are walking past the memorial fountain when you see someone preaching atheist beliefs. Do you stop them? Do you report them to the administration? Do you become violent?
Last one: you are sitting in class, when you see a person wearing a T-shirt that reads “Obama can suck it.” What do you do? Do you yell at them? Do you inform your professor that the student is wearing something offensive?
All of the above actions are allowed by the first amendment of the United States Constitution. The amendment states, “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.”
Despite the clear language of the first amendment, many people around the U.S. seem to think that speech and expression should be limited. I am not talking about mass produced items such as pornography or sex toys — I am talking about personal expression, like talking about your atheist ideas in public or wearing a shirt that challenges the government.
The freedom of expression is one of the most important elements of the Constitution, closely following the freedom of the press, my number one ranked constitutional right. Without the freedom of expression, we would limit art, music, what you can say and how you could act.
A government limit on freedom of expression would require you to be careful about everything you did. Think about the movie “V for Vendetta.” Deitrich (played by Stephen Fry) is arrested for making fun of the chancellor in a comedy sketch, and then executed because he has a Quran in his house. Although this is an extreme form, extremities are the result of many small rights progressively taken away.
Take Marshall University for example. A poster on the second floor of Smith Hall advertising an event for the Marshall University Libertarians was taken down after a professor complained to the administration about its use of the f-word.
There is no law prohibiting the use of profanities. The closest anyone has come to prohibiting profanity was in the case FCC vs. Pacifica (1978), also called the “Seven Dirty Words” case, in which justices found that repetitive and frequent use of the words at time or place where a minor could hear could be punishable.
So the question remains: does the administration have the right to ban profanity from fliers posted around campus? Furthermore, if you saw someone’s first amendment rights being trampled on, would you care?
Unfortunately, my bet is that most Marshall students neither care about the first amendment nor would protect someone else’s rights.
November 10 marked the 71st anniversary of Kristallnacht, the Night of Broken Glass. That night, Jewish shops and synagogues around Germany were destroyed. Scholars have said the night was a test to see if anyone would stand up for the rights of the Jewish population. Six million lives later, we saw the outcome of being silent.
Don’t get me wrong— I do not think the United States is turning into the Third Reich. However, I read about those types of events and find a renewed appreciation of my rights of expression and my right to criticize the government.
I just hope you stand up and protest anytime you see someone’s right’s being trampled. Just think — if you don’t stand up for anyone, who will stand up for you?

1 comments

Mario

Fri Nov 13 2009 08:39

I wouldn't complain to the professor about the guy in the tshirt. I would ask him where I could get one though.

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