In Reply: Viewpoints, Discrimination, Free Speech, and the First Amendment

In reply to the following comment at this Lawyers, Guns, and Money post, discussing the 8-1 ruling in favor of the first amendment rights of Westboro Baptist and their ugly, homophobic protests: Court Properly Upholds First Amendment Rights of Hateful Speakers--(an opinion I agree with, on principle. As I said the other day, in regards to a different situation, "That's whole point of free speech though, isn't it? No one complains about speech that they approve of, or 'like.' One doesn't need to stand on principle to defend popular speech, because no one opposes popular speech. The whole idea of free speech is to defend the right to speak words and sentiments that 'no one likes.'"):

Manju says:
Yeah, I know. I’m saying Althouse is right. He’s moderate.

I don’t agree with him, but being pragmatic and unprincipled is generally associated with moderation.

I mean we got a bunch of absolute assholes imposing themselves on war veteran’s funerals with signs saying “god hates fags”. Its like some comic combination of the kkk and communists, the worst of the left and right.

Surely we can carve out an exception to the first without putting the foundation of our republic at risk. Again, I don’t want to do a carve out, i prefer philosophical consistency whenever possible, but a carve-out does indeed strike me as moderate.

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In reply:

Surely we can carve out an exception to the first without putting the foundation of our republic at risk.

First amendment rights... unless you're really, REALLY, REALLY offensive. (And, offensive by whose standards? And how quickly could that become an argument about potential viewpoint discrimination, for reals and true*, in this case.)

*as real and true as a hypothetical for potential harm can be, anyway...
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Posted March 3, 2011 at 1:12 am
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Also mentioned: Althouse: Is it viewpoint discrimination under the First Amendment for Wisconsin to permit the protesters to use the Capitol building as it has over the past 10 days?