In
today’s America, everything offends somebody. The government is faced with the tough
task of protecting the peace while at the same time upholding the First Amendment
as written by our founding fathers. But the public had started to cling to the
idea that the individual has a right to not be offended, and if they are
offended, the accused “offender” is clearly in the wrong. Thus the idea of
censorship was born. However, we must make sure not to go to either extreme on
the polarized First Amendment debate; we cannot and should not censor
everything and we cannot and should not protect every form of free speech. In
terms of what we should not protect under the First Amendment, I agree with
Lawrence in “On Racist Speech.” Racist speech and other direct verbal attacks should
be regulated because they pose an imminent threat to the peace. Simply because
the history of racial tension in America, it should not be protected under the
First Amendment as harmful speech. We can accurately distinguish between harmful and offensive by looking at the effects of the speech. Harmful words carry a danger of imminently
disturbing the peace. Offensive
speech merely contradicts someone’s personal beliefs. Like “fighting words” or
words that indicate “clear and present danger,” racist speech has a history of
inciting violence, and is therefore harmful
rather than just offensive. As
Lawrence says, “Everyone concerned with these issues must find ways to engage
actively in actions that resist and counter the racist ideas that we would have
the First Amendment protect” (Lawrence 65). But offensive speech is another matter entirely. As previously
mentioned, modern society operates to some extent under the delusion that some
speech should not be tolerated because it offends people. The proponents of
this argument miss part of the point of free speech; we have the right to
disagree with others. Humans are always going to disagree with one another.
That is why I disagree with the ideas of “Why the Pledge of Allegiance Should
Be Revised.” We shouldn’t take the time, trouble, and extensive effort and
uproar merely to satisfy the offended. For these reasons, and because of the
mere definition of offensive, I do
not believe we should censor speech deemed offensive.
I found the position of Bok in “Protecting the Freedom of Speech on the Campus”
to be very persuasive: “it is extremely difficult to decide whether a
particular communication is offensive enough to warrant prohibition” (Bok 67).
So while harmful speech should not be protected by freedom of expression, the
censorship of offensive speech would violate the basic principles of the First
Amendment and would be extremely difficult to distinguish.
