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TechnographRuling plays into conservative hands
When the Right is right about politically correct censorship
By Brian Pierce
Posted: 4/26/07 Section: Opinion Columns
- < prev Page 2 of 2
He's right. You can't. And while I would ordinarily scoff at this type of argument so often employed by conservatives, I can't in this case. When certain conservatives got up in arms about "political correctness run amok" after Don Imus got fired or Ann Coulter was universally condemned for her use of the epithet "faggot," I could comfortably dismiss them as confusing disagreement and accountability with censorship.
Here, however, we just have clear-cut censorship. A school, an agent of the state, is not allowing the free expression of ideas. And when that happens and liberals celebrate the progressiveness of this restriction, we play right into the hands of those conservatives who wish to portray us as the "thought police."
The best way to respond to the students wearing T-shirts is to respond to their "Truth" with the actual truth: That homosexuality is a fact of nature and that any religious doctrine that condemns it as sinful deserves to be relegated to the tier of outdated religious beliefs occupied by slavery and the subjugation of women. Or, even better, make a punch line out of them.
The students who want to wear these shirts are ignorant, hurtful and wrong. But suppressing their ideas won't eliminate them; it will embolden them. If liberals want to effectively counter the Day of Truth, they will remain quietly confident that a truly free dissemination of ideas will only serve to prove them right.
Here, however, we just have clear-cut censorship. A school, an agent of the state, is not allowing the free expression of ideas. And when that happens and liberals celebrate the progressiveness of this restriction, we play right into the hands of those conservatives who wish to portray us as the "thought police."
The best way to respond to the students wearing T-shirts is to respond to their "Truth" with the actual truth: That homosexuality is a fact of nature and that any religious doctrine that condemns it as sinful deserves to be relegated to the tier of outdated religious beliefs occupied by slavery and the subjugation of women. Or, even better, make a punch line out of them.
The students who want to wear these shirts are ignorant, hurtful and wrong. But suppressing their ideas won't eliminate them; it will embolden them. If liberals want to effectively counter the Day of Truth, they will remain quietly confident that a truly free dissemination of ideas will only serve to prove them right.
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Viewing Comments 1 - 8 of 9
Elizabeth
posted 4/26/07 @ 2:28 AM CST
Great article. I completely agree with everything in it. The people in this country seriously depress me sometimes. I'm guessing that if today's students protesting homosexuality had lived a hundred years ago, they would have been against women's suffrage and interracial marriage - they just blindly listen to whatever oppressive norms they're told. (Continued…)
lyn
posted 4/26/07 @ 9:51 AM CST
"The best way to respond to the students wearing T-shirts is to respond to their "Truth" with the actual truth: That homosexuality is a fact of nature and that any religious doctrine that condemns it as sinful deserves to be relegated to the tier of outdated religious beliefs occupied by slavery and the subjugation of women. (Continued…)
Lyn
posted 4/26/07 @ 10:05 AM CST
Oh, before someone jumps all over the fact that I equated the current PC behavior with McCarthyism and Hitler, I am not equating the ideas of these men with current PC crowd(current PC is liberal and they were conservative)but of the atmosphere of censorship that surrounded them from the beginning and aided in their rise to power
B Wright
posted 4/26/07 @ 12:10 PM CST
"..the best way to protect freedom for future generations is to exercise those freedoms responsibly, which in my view would not include preaching intolerance or creating a hostile environment for their gay classmates and then hiding behind the First Amendment. (Continued…)
Narc
posted 4/26/07 @ 12:45 PM CST
I can only think that, when a response to a column is twice as long as the column itself, maybe it's time to get a blog or something.
Dan
posted 4/26/07 @ 1:42 PM CST
Why, Narc? The comment, long or short, was in response to the column, and this is the best way for people who read this column to see it. If you don't like reading long comments, just scroll down. (Continued…)
Linda
posted 4/27/07 @ 12:11 AM CST
Brian, you know I have chastised you before for your over-the-top articles. That's not the case now. You have supported your own case well, with arguments, with a sense of nuance, with sobriety. (Continued…)
Jeanette
posted 4/27/07 @ 1:01 AM CST
Come on now, let's not be silly. Bashing gay people is not about "freedom of opinion". Neither is it some unassailable moral judgment, such as "murder is wrong," or "torturing little kittens is indefensible". (Continued…)
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