Freedom gives haters the room to reap contempt of society
Andrew P. Napolitano
Opinion
The Washington Times
4/30/2014
…What to do with them because of their speech? Nothing. I mean nothing. Racially hateful speech is protected from government interference by the First Amendment, which largely was written to protect hateful speech. Neither Mr. Bundy nor Mr. Sterling has been accused in these instances of racially motivated conduct — just speech animated by hatred.
In the Bundy case, the feds did suppress speech by keeping it three miles away from them. Free speech, free assembly and the right to petition the government would become empty and meaningless if the governmental targets of the speech and assembly could not hear it. The First Amendment will condone outlawing the use of a bullhorn by protesters in front of a hospital at 3 o’clock in the morning, but it will not condone free-speech zones for the sake of government convenience. The entire United States of America is a free-speech zone.
In the Sterling case, is it fair to punish someone for speech uttered in the privacy of his home? It would be exquisitely unfair for the government to do so, but the NBA is not the government. When Mr. Sterling bought his basketball team, he agreed to accept punishment for conduct unbecoming a team owner or conduct detrimental to the sport. Is speech conduct? For constitutional purposes, it is not; the Constitution does not restrain the NBA. It is free to pull the trigger of punishment to which Mr. Sterling consented.
But it needn’t do so.
Hateful and hurtful words have natural and probable consequences where the people are free to counter them. The government has no business cleansing the public marketplace of hateful ideas. The most effective equalizer for hatred is the free market…
The Judge’s entire op-ed is at The Washington Times.
Related: Andrew Klavan: Sterling Shouldn’t Be Punished At All
…His words were spoken privately and taped. Let me ask leftists and decent folks alike: whose reputation could survive if all his private words were made public? Not yours, believe me. Not even mine and I’m an absolutely great guy! More importantly, who wants to live in a world where that is the ultimate test of our morality?
Leftists are always calling for a “national conversation on race.” But you can’t have a conversation in which people aren’t allowed to speak their minds. …
Read the whole thing.
…“In our zeal to appear righteous or courageous or free of bigotry, a ratings-pleasing mob hell-bent on revenge turned Donald T. Sterling — a victim of privacy invasion and white supremacy — from villain to martyr.”
Whitlock further calls Silver “a rookie commissioner” who penalized Sterling, whom Whitlock characterizes as “a flawed man whose rights were violated.”…
WSJ Editor: NAACP Backed Sterling When He ‘Lined Their Own Pockets’
…“The NAACP knows about this history, and yet gave him a lifetime achievement award and was about to give him a second one,” the WSJ editor continued.
“This is another example of how the civil rights movement has become an industry,” Riley added. “You have groups like the NAACP, Al Sharpton, Jesse Jackson, others who basically go around the country shaking down corporations and individuals for money.”
“This guy gave them money,” Reilly said of Sterling, “and that’s what’s most important to them.”…
Gavin McInnes: ‘Fuck Donald Sterling, But Where’s The Outrage Over The Loss Of Privacy?’
…Do you want to live in a world where you can’t even say terrible things privately on the phone? Can you imagine the kind of homophobic shit these players say to their girlfriends on the phone? Remember when Kobe Bryant called a ref a “fucking fag”? Me, neither. It barely made the news.
Update: MSNBC And The Conversation No One Will Have (video) If only someone would bring it up!
In recent weeks the topic of racism has been discussed on news networks almost constantly, as a result of the comments made by Cliven Bundy and Donald Sterling. But what was MSNBC talking about BEFORE that happened?
A new video released today shows just how frequently the topic comes up on MSNBC, both after and before Bundy and Sterling.
Bill Maher On Sterling: “Creepy To Me We Can’t Even Speak In Our Own House Anymore” (video)
