Occasionally, while lazing around Bloody Nib Manor watching the lovely French maids wearing short black dresses and petticoats reaching up to dust the upper shelves of the library or tramping through the extensive grounds looking for signs of fox for the next foxhunt, you're faithful correspondent occasionally considers the matter of free speech. To be short, this writer is for it. In fact, the freer the better.
We have come into an age when one's speech or expression of an opinion that is opposed to that of another (especially a young college student, a minority of some sort, a thin-skinned politician or entertainer) is considered "hate speech." And all one has said is something like, "You're an idiot", or "You're wrong and I'm right." Considering a person an idiot does not mean that one hates them, let alone considering that person wrong. It just means that one thinks that the person being addressed or discussed is mistaken, mislead, wrong, uninformed or just plain dumb. And the fact of the matter is that all of us, even this writer, fall into one of these catagories once in a while. But yours, as are you, gentle reader, is rarely grossly wrong. But there are people who have ideas and position that seem to be based on the ideas of an pimpled adolescent angry at the fact that he isn't dating the "hot" cheerleader or the high school quarterback.
But to get back to the point (this writer apologizes for the straying), even if a person is so uneducated, so racist, so bigoted as to really engage in real "hate" speech such as "Jews are the spawn of the Devil" or the Asian version of the same, "Chinese are the Jews of Asia" or White-Europeans are oppressors and wreckers of the world" or "Mexicans are lazy gang-bangers" or "Blacks dance good while picking your pocket through welfare", that doesn't mean that that form of speech, while as prejudiced as it may be, has no right to be expressed. Freedom of speech is guaranteed by the Constitution. The Bill of Rights is sacrosanct. It is the foundation of the Republic. And once the government and politicians, never mind the media, which is run by a bunch of lily-livered Ivy Leaguers who have no more sense of the Constitution than a foxhound does of calculus, starts regulating speech on the premise of a subjective idea of "hate" we're all in trouble. One finds one's self wondering if Animal Farm were to be published today if PETA would have protested the book because it finds the portrayal of pigs and hogs offensive.
And we come to the question about the value of "hate." Today hate is considered bad because liberals and atheists take a wishy-washy reading of the Bible. They forget that God, in the Old Testament hated i.e., " Jacob have I loved and Esau have I hated" or that Our Lord Jesus Christ said that we should hate evil (which brings up the whole modern idea that there is no such thing as "evil", just differences of opinion). We should not, as a matter of course, hate people or a particular person outside of special circumstances such as hating Hitler, the Nazis, Stalin or Mao or Pol Pot. Hillary Clinton and Donald Trump are not worth hating. They are worth disdain). But it right, in fact, for a mature thinking person, to hate bad ideas or bad behaviours. Such ideas would be, according to your faithful correspondent, such ideas like Nazism (an old favorite), Communism, Fascism, Racism (whether black or white), serial polygomy (the behaviour and not the person), homosexuality (the behaviour and not the person), and Islam (the religion and not the individual), among many other things that may raise one's ire. Hate is something that one holds within one's self. And whether changable or not (and it seems that it is), the expression of that hate is, at least for now in the United States and by law allowed. One has the right to make one's point in print, on screen, or by voice. And once that right is taken away by law in some way or another the next step will be legally mandated love.
Not only will the citizen be required not to hate, or even tolerate, but will be required to express in some form love for those who stand for everything against one stands. In other words one will be required to give a big and enthusiastic "God bless you. brother!" to the guy who is taking money from your wallet whether he is doing it by legal means i.e., taxes and fees, or if the guy is thug on the street pointing a gun at one. And one will be expected to love the person who hates one. And the result will be the destruction of one's self.
Now, there is a bit of debate about "radical" Islam and the rights of Americans to criticize the religion and the products of the religion, as well as the willing ignorance of some people in positions of leadership to ignore the products of Islam.
Recently David Petraus, the man who was the Army general in Iraq for a few years, has said that Islam should not be criticized because it will anger the Mohammedans. But at the same time his former service has no problem criticizing conservative Christians and limiting their speech. General Petraus has no problem pitching a bitch against a Holy Roller, but when it comes to the local Imam it's all hands off. The question is why? The reason is simply that the Holy Roller may hired a lawyer to file a losing lawsuit, but the Imam may send or encourage a young man with more hormones than sense to blow up somebody. In other words, Gen. Petraus wants us to limit our speech to prevent being physically attacked by the benighted. And he states, in effect, that the United States is not able to protect its citizens practicing a fundamental right as written in the Constitution. It is almost like people who do not have cancer and who are afraid of getting cancer not using the word "cancer." It's like referring to cancer as the "C" word If one doesn't talk about it it will go away instead of facing the threat and fighting it. It's childish thinking. But childish thinking has become all too often the norm.
Pope Francis (note that this writer is not a Roman Catholic; he's the Protestant of Protestant, Baptist of Baptists) has been playing the same game with the Mohammedans. He's met with several Mohammedan religious leaders while singing Kumbaya. In other words, he's basically said that all religions are true religions, which asks the question, why doesn't he just resign and get a job as a shoe-maker? Pope Francis is as reluctant to piss of the Mohammdans as this writer is to stick his hand into a pit of vipers. The difference is that the behaviour of Mohammedans such as Boko Haram, ISIS, Al-Queda and the Taliban (all groups who make it a habit to kill or persecute Christians) are groups that the Pope has not condemned or publicly hated. He apparently sees those groups as victims of Western oppression while the faithful of the church he leads are slaughtered. He's too busy hating capitalism. And should probably be prosecuted for hate speech.
Hate is not the best of emotions. In fact, it's pretty rotten. But it's not useless. It has its places. Love is good. But love is not all. Any young man or young woman will be able to tell the reader that love, occasionally like the old J. Geils song, stinks. And love, misplaced love, is as destructive, perhaps even more destructive, than is a good healthy hate. And once that expression of hate is legally restricted that hate will manifest itself in ways that the society will rue.
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