[Cvillemedia] Free? Speech

[David Swanson]

*Free Speech Has Its Limits in Charlottesville*

The *bolded portion* of the letter below was censored by the Daily 
Progress:

Letter to the Editor:

As an organizer of the protest of former President Bush at Monticello 
last July, I was sorry to miss Sunday's panel on free speech and 
rudeness at PVCC but appreciated your Monday report.  I also appreciated 
the panelists' comments you reported to the effect that TV pundits and 
producers encourage rudeness.  If many people's views were not shut out 
of major communications outlets, they'd probably be less likely to force 
them in by shouting.
I was sorry to see, at least in your report of Sunday's panel, no 
indication that the panelists distinguished any types or shades of 
rudeness, as opposed to lumping it all together.  Here are three types 
worth thinking about:
1) Inciting hatred and violence.  This could include demonization, 
encouraging assaults, staging mock executions, racism or other bigotry, 
or promoting wars on the basis of lies.
2) Enforced democratic representation.  When doctors supporting 
non-profit single-payer healthcare, as have a majority of Americans in 
polls, were shut out of congressional hearings, they stood up and spoke 
briefly in a Senate hearing this year and went to jail  facing serious 
charges.
3) Incomplete citizen's arrest.  When an elected official openly spies 
without warrants, imprisons without charge, tortures, wages wars of 
aggression, or commits other serious crimes, his right to a public 
podium arguably disappears along with his right to liberty.  And a 
citizen's duty to make an arrest, rendered impossible by police 
protection, arguably includes the duty to loudly demand an arrest even 
if impolitely.

Are all of these types of speech, when disrupting the speech of others, 
essentially identical and equally impermissible?

And if so, is the right to speak without interruption available to all, 
or only to those in power?

*On July 21, 2007, the Daily Progress was good enough to publish a 
frontpage story on a peace rally I helped organize.  But when a 
relatively small group of war promoters with powerful megaphones 
disrupted the event, you did not raise the question of rudeness.  You 
reported on dueling rallies as though everyone had the right to shout as 
loudly as they were able. *

David Swanson

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