The Brady Campaign is always quick to remind us that while an overwhelming number of Americans support the second amendment, there are still a lot of people that support some vague thing called “gun control.” Rachel Lucas points to some interesting polling on the first amendment, in regards to “hate speech”.
88% “guard†free speech but only 53% have any sort of a clue as to what that means. Since it would be silly to imagine that as time goes on, more people will get the clue, I’m guessing that in another few decades, we’ll have laws just like France and Canada. Awesome.
The poll basically shows that while 88% believe in the first amendment, only 53% oppose laws regulating “hate speech”, with 28% favoring it, and 19% undecided. I don’t share Rachel’s pessimism about things going downhill from here, however. We’ve shown that public support for the second amendment can be enhanced when people start understanding the issue. I don’t see why the first amendment has to be exempt from that.
Banning hate speech is stupid. How will you know where the bigots are if you don’t let them talk?
after reading the poll questions, they failed to define ‘hate speech’ leaving that interpretation up to the person being polled… in my view, hate speech includes speech that promotes and advocates violence, and last time i checked inciting violence was illegal…
also keep in mind that free speech ideals were enacted into the first amendment at a time in history where it was still considered socially acceptable for someone to punch you in the mouth for insulting themselves, their family or their honor…
Punching? I think i was socially acceptable to challenge them to a duel :)