“Congress shall make no law…abridging the freedom of speech…”
– First Amendment, Bill of Rights
We the people have the right to speak up, to speak out, to be voices of encouragement, and to be voices of dissent. The First Amendment guarantees my freedom to write this blog. It guarantees my freedom to speak out against my own government.
The founding fathers believed that we the people have a right to disagree with one another and we have a right to disagree with our government. And, when we do disagree, we should not be censored, threatened, punished, or otherwise coerced or made to stop.
The world our founding fathers lived in is not so very different from the world we live in today. Sadly, people are being bullied into silence through threats and intimidation by our very government. Around the world, there are countries where, if you dare to criticize the government, you can be hunted down, imprisoned or outright killed. How long before that starts to happen here? Some might say never, but we’re not so sure anymore.
The founding fathers wrote the First Amendment because they knew that we the people need the freedom to criticize our own government. We need the freedom to hold our elected officials accountable for what they do.
The founding fathers knew that “power tends to corrupt, and absolute power corrupts absolutely” and abuses of power need to be called out into the open. Corruption thrives in silence and secrecy.
The First Amendment gives us the freedom to speak up and to voice our opinions on any subject, including politics, religion and whatever else we want to. In that regard, the “me” generation was correct. The First Amendment is all about me and my right to speak.
But, too many people have twisted and corrupted the First Amendment. Too many people today think that the First Amendment affords them some kind of protection from other people speaking out or practicing their religion and so on.
They believe that if they disagree with something I say then I should be silenced. If my praying in public offends them, then I can’t do it. If the issue that I and like-minded individuals are gathering about offends them then we can’t assemble. Too many people today think the First Amendment guarantees them protection from everyone else. Well, wouldn’t it be nice if we could each live in our own little personal utopia, free from anything that offended our tender sensibilities? The fact of the matter is: we don’t.
The First Amendment does not give you the right to stop me merely because you don’t like what I’m saying. If you don’t like what I’m saying then you can choose to ignore me. Allowing me to speak, doesn’t mean you agree with me or condone what I’m saying. It means that you are respecting my First Amendment right.