Posted on 08/14/2017 8:53:16 PM PDT by 2ndDivisionVet
"No Free Speech for Fascists!" It's a motto you see on pre-printed signs at protests, including at yesterday's rallies in reaction to the violence and death in Charlottesville, Virginia, this weekend. Paired with a flood of invective against the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) for the group's support of Unite the Right's right to stage a rally at the city's statue of Robert E. Lee in the first place, they make for a troubling trend.
Support for the ACLU has been on the uptick from the left of late, thanks to Executive Director Anthony Romero's decisive legal maneuvering and online sass in response to President Donald Trump's misguided attempts to restrict immigration from several Muslim-dominated countries. But perhaps these new supporters didn't fully understood what they were buying into? Sure, they might have heard about the group's commitment to stick up for intersectional Muslim activists. But were they fully aware of the ACLU's long history of litigating in favor of KKK marches and other exercises in speech and assembly by unpopular minorities? (Or that time they defended NAMBLA, even!) Along came the defense of Milo Yiannopoulos (along with several others, including PETA and a women's health clinic) in a suit against Washington's transit system, and some of the Trump-era donors started getting nervous. Then, Charlottesville happened.
When people live in low-trust societies—that is, when citizens broadly believe that corruption is rampant and the powerful cannot be relied upon to follow the rules—they paradoxically tend to call for more regulation and other types of government action. That impulse was on full display in the anti-speech reaction to the cold-blooded murder of Heather Heyer. Many observers looked at what happened in Charlottesville and decided that not only were the neo-Nazis, white supremacists, and alt-righters who gathered in Virginia culpable for egging on those who physically lashed out, the legal and political institutions that defended their speech rights were as well. These are not just angry or grieving laymen; Waldo Jaquith, a member of the board of the ACLU of Virginia, resigned after the protest turned violent, characterizing the group's support for the right to gather as "a fig leaf for the Nazis."
But if fascists are to lose their free speech rights, someone must take them. And if you believe, as many of the counter-protesters do, that the white nationalists and their brethren were emboldened by the presence of a man in the White House who sees them as part of his coalition, then why on God's good green earth would you want to turn around and hand that very man the right to censor anyone whom he labels fascists? Because I can tell you right now, the list of folks that Trump and the restive-but-still-Republican Congress would like to silence sure won't look like the list those sign-wavers have in mind.
The people wielding "No Free Speech for Fascists" placards might as well be holding up signs saying "No Free Speech for Muslims." And in fact, many on the right have been making just that argument against the ACLU for years now, arguing that exceptions to our free speech principles should be made to curtail extreme speech by Muslim religious figures or activists in the name of security, or even (in the stupidest variant of the idea) that the ACLU is part of a radical Islamic conspiracy. But if the justification for restrictions on the speech of one man is violence committed by another, there can be no end to list of people who may be silenced in the name of order.
I have my beefs with ACLU too. I wish they'd see the importance of defending free speech even in situations where money is changing hands—to my way of thinking, the group has lately been on the wrong side of a few debates over freedom of conscience and association in the commercial realm. But the ACLU's work on speech in the public sphere is unbeatable. They did the right thing to let Unite the Right gather in Charlottesville. Sticking up for free speech for fascists doesn't mean you love fascists, it means you love free speech.
For more, check out Glenn Greenwald's humongous defense of the ACLU's habit of defending unpopular speech at The Intercept.
‘No Free Speech for Fascists’
Only a Fascist would say that.
well yes, because their definition of fascist is anyone not towing the far left socialist/globalist line.
Being a private property owner is fascist to these people.
Who is worse in this scenario? I pick the left.
Any disagreement with the left, no matter how large or small, is no longer accaptable, and will be punished with violence. That is how totalitarianism works and they are totalitarians.
No Free Speech for Liberal fascists!
Good read!
Barrack Obama: The Quintessential Fascist
http://www.americanthinker.com/articles/2009/05/barack_obama_the_quintessentia_1.html
Apparently much of the nation including our supposedly brightest politicians and journalists have forgotten the Supreme Court Skokie decision from back in the 60’s - the Nazi Party of America petitioned to demonstrate and march in Skokie Illinois - then too the ACLU, before they became a wholly-owned subsidiary of the ‘rat party, supported the rights of the Nazis - although Skokie’s population was about fifty percent Jewish, the US Supreme Court said that nothing the Nazis would be doing, including wearing their uniforms and displaying their flag, would constitute a threat to the public and approved their march (it never took place in Skokie - it was eventually moved to Chicago, where the Nazis had wanted it to be originally) - those outraged that the demonstration was allowed to be held in Charlottesville seem to forget that the whole idea of the First Amendment protection of speech is that it guarantees speech that might be offensive to even them....
You left out the part where someone in group 1 ran over and killed someone in group 2.
Tax speech to pay for health care!
Once upon a time, an American would disagree with what you say, but defend to the death your right to say it.
Cart before the horse.
If you want get rid of 1A, you are going to have to get rid of 2A first.
Question number one. Do you know the Motive, if there was motive, for the Driver of the Challenger doing what he did?
I have read that he was attacked by the Commies and reacted in fear (badly), that he is Mentally Ill and of course the Leftist MSM pushing the Narrative that he was fulfilling what his Mentor in Terrorism President Trump wanted him to do, mind control at its finest...
Now, question number two. IF the incident with the Challenger didn’t occur, would we be hearing the FACT that the Commies assaulted the Right Wingers who were just exercising their God Given RIGHT to Free Speech and were forced to defend themselves?
We all know the answer. The Challenger accident was just the Cherry on top of the Liberal Wet Dream we see unfolding before our eyes.
“No free speech for fasicts” = No free speech for anyone who disagrees with me.
And then the only people who get to speak are those who are willing to fight, not legally but physically, in the streets, for their right to do so. Willing and able to fight, which leaves out old geezers like me. Sorry Antifa, I am not buying that argument.
That's why gunpowder was invented.
Too soon?
right and I left out how James Hodgkinson shot Steve Scalise and not one democrat condemned it . So what is your ploint? that the right is worse. I don't think so. Antifa and BLM have been rioting for months. The far right has only joined the fray late in the game.
This is a truly horrible, evil plan. Given the way the left constantly redefines language anybody or any group will be called fascist for any reason at every opportunity and the 1st Amendment will be dead.
“That’s why gunpowder was invented.”
Alas, the same infirmities of age which diminish my abilities and skills to defend myself in unarmed confrontations or with legal melee weapons (for example a cane), also degrade my capacities with firearms. I’d need a shotgun to hit anything smaller than the broad side of the barn, and unfortunately it Would hit the whole broad side of the barn. I would want to defend myself, not sweep the street!
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.