Deadly Speech

In Orwell's world, it was not wealth that made for hierarchy, it was poverty.


                                 Deadly Speech

Newspaper editors are forced to quit because of pieces they’ve run. Academics are removed from positions for daring to dissent from the dominant orthodoxy. Corporate executives have been fired for opinions written three decades ago that now fall outside the lines of acceptable public discourse. This is modern America.

The speech stakes have been raised. Your opponent is no longer angering you, no longer building monuments to stupidity and error, no longer misleading the foolish. When New York Times reporters mobilized to get an editor fired, they claimed the offending op-ed he published put their lives “in danger.” This was no mere difference of opinion. The offending speech was supposedly a direct physical threat to those offended. Speech has become a physically injurious weapon. And such weapons, like other weapons, need controlled.

So speech, and opinions, have significant consequences. And meaning. Favoring cutting back the size of government is a physical attack on the elderly, or the poor. Opposing birth control is a physical attack on young women that threatens their health and lives. Should such risks be tolerated? Must the elderly or young women endure this? Should these very thoughts be countenanced?

This is not hyperbole. People are being fired because of their thoughts and words. This is modern America.

(in part from a Baker article)