Back when I wanted to be a journalist more than anything, I used to take these classes on reporting, writing, journalism history and the idea of a free press.
My classmates and I would conduct after-class bull sessions at a local college watering hole talking about the importance of a free press in a free society. Basically, we decided it is essential. Take it away, and the whole thing will collapse.
That’s why they made it the First Amendment, my one friend would say, noting that no one can really remember the Fourth Amendment or Sixth Amendment or Eighth Amendment.
So it went for the young and radical of my generation. Our rallying cry was free speech – total and unfettered.
When Tipper Gore, wife of then Sen. Al Gore, wanted to put warning labels on record albums, the alarms were set off. That’s an infringement on free speech. No labels.
I may not agree with what you say but I will defend to the death your right to say it. That was our mantra. But who believes in such an idea today?
The college campus was one place where free speech abounded. Ideas were debated. Speakers and newsmakers were invited to speak out. Protesters protested. Free speech was cherished.
But today, colleges create free speech zones, outside of which speech is restricted. How ironic when the entire United States should be free speech zone.
Colleges used to invite speakers of all stripes. Today, students riot to keep speakers, mostly those with conservative views, off their campus.
And just last week an administrator at New York University argued in an essay in the New York Times that speech that fails to advance society and humanity should be restricted. He adds that universities have no need to invite speakers with opposing views of the current progressives that run the universities because of the plethora of views that can be found on the Internet.
These are frightening ideas when you carry them to their logical conclusion.
Here’s what I mean:
Thanks to the Internet, all learning is available to anyone. Why have universities, then?
If only speech that advances humanity is allowed, then how is that advance measured and who does the measuring? How best to advance humanity is essentially a political question, and political questions are settled by those in power.
The founding fathers meant for ideals like freedom of speech, the press and religion to be above and beyond petty political decisions.
Out in public discourse, the mantra of my generation – that although I don’t agree with what you say I will defend your right to say it – has been supplanted by an idea familiar to anyone that has read George Orwell’s “Animal Farm” or “1984.”
Sure, you’re free to say what you want, just remember, the new generation says, speech has consequences.
This rationale dares people to say what they will, but warns they will be punished if what they say doesn’t toe the party line. It is, as Hilary Clinton rightly described it, public shaming.
That’s not free speech. That’s tyranny.
Such proponents acknowledge that free speech exists, but frame it only as a right granted by government. Free speech has no right to exist in public discourse.
Of course this is completely backward and opposite of what has been the historic understanding of free speech.
Free speech is a basic human right that exists naturally. We form government to protect our right to free speech, not to grant it.
But that idea is going by the wayside.
Will anyone march for free speech?
Randy Blaser is a freelance columnist for Pioneer Press.
