Free Market Free Speech

courtesy of my blog: http://cjferrara.blogspot.com/

                 So, Juan Williams, a reporter for NPR, was recently fired. See, earlier, he was a guest on the O'Reilly Factor, and in a discussion about terrorism, and mosques, and such; he said, "I mean, look, I'm not a bigot. You know the kind of books I've written about the civil rights movement in this country. But when I get on a plane, I got to tell you, if I see people who are in Muslim garb and I think, you know, they're identifying themselves first and foremost as Muslims, I get worried. I get nervous."

Fox immediately jumped on it declaring this a free-speech issue. Fox News has a tendency to do this often. Sean Hannity and Glenn Beck often talk about how they lose sponsors because of their opinions expressed on the air, and how that's a violation of free speech. Remember Dr. Laura and Sarah Palin saying that Dr. Laura resigned because she is not free to express her views? It wasn't because virtually everyone got pissed when she said the N-word 23 times, was it?

I think the mistake here is a lack of true understanding of the first amendment. The above people and others seem to believe that free speech means that you can say anything you want without consequence. And that isn't true. The first amendment says that Congress shall make no LAW infringing the freedom of speech. In other words, the government cannot punish you for what you say. If Juan Williams or Dr. Laura had been arrested for what they said, then THAT would be a violation of their freedom of speech.

Freedom of speech works best when it works like the free market. For example, Don Imus has the right to call the Rutgers Women's Basketball team a bunch of "nappy-headed hoes." Imus' sponsors have the right to be offended by this and pull their advertising from the show. Al Sharpton has a right to complain about this to the people Imus works for, and promise that he and his organization will not be listening to the network or supporting the sponsors who advertise on the station. He also has the right to say that to the sponsors, who also, in an attempt to continue having a business, have the right to pull advertising from the show. CBS, who used to employ Imus, has a right to try and get these sponsors back by suspending Imus for a period of a few months. I have the right to not like CBS for caving to politics in this way, and Imus has the right to feel unfairly judged.

Nazis have a right to march and spread their hatespeech through my neighborhood, and I, in turn, have a right to call them assholes as they pass. As soon as someone throws a punch, THEN someone has violated the law, and they're wrong.

When everyone excercises their own freedom of speech, the real idiots start to emerge, and we can all make an informed choice about who we chose to listen to, follow, believe and support.

The holiday season is coming soon, so I'm sure we'll hear about the guy who was fired from Wal-mart for greeting customers with "Merry Christmas" instead of "Happy Holidays." Wal-mart has the right to set its own standards of behavior of its staff. If it's store policy that you help customers find the bathroom, and you instead send them to women's wear, well, then they can fire you. If it's store policy that you greet customers with the all-inclusive "Happy Holidays" and you defiantly insist on "Merry Christmas," well, then you're defying store policy, and they have the right to fire you. Is this rule just? Probably not. But they have the right to do it, and if you don't like it you have the right to say so, and boycott the store.

In every scenario, the things we say have consequences. When you have freedom of speech, you run the risk of offending someone with your speech. If you are not prepared for the consequences of such an offence, then watch what you say. We often hear this rule as "Don't yell 'fire' in a crowded theatre." Because if you do, you may start a riot which will hurt people. By the way, if there IS a fire in a crowded theatre, then, please, yell "Fire!" Then you can justify your words and live with the consequences.

NPR has the right to fire Juan Williams for whatever reason they want. Maybe his words were evidence that he's not that bright, and being NPR, they want to uphold the standard of intelligence in their staff, and that's why he was fired. Fox has a right to hire Williams and tout him around to every news show on the network praising his bravery and heroism. And I have the right to think that's stupid, and to continue NOT watching Fox News. What a wonderful country!