But if you want to respond to comments without reading them, that’s your prerogative.

The problem arises because law is passed by the majority, and too frequently the majority do not think. My fear is that someday a thoughtless, spineless majority will pass a “we should all be nice to each other” law, because the morality behind it has become so diluted with political correctness that thats all we have left.

When I talk about free speech, I mean my right as a human being, as a conscious entity, my moral right. Not my right as an EU citizen, or an Irish person, or whatever. When I talk about the response people have to what I say, I mean their moral take on it. But that morality, and the mentality that holds it today, shapes the law tomorrow. If people really truly believed that everything we say about each other should be nice, that I shouldn’t be honest if my opnions reflect badly on others, then someday we really will have a law that prevents me from having them.

I will not be allowed to dislike people, I will not be able to make a judgement based on value, or worth, lest it be negative. Or I make these judgements, and then lie about them. Pretend that I like people I do not, pretend to laud acheivements that are not real. Yes this is an extreme example, but as far as I can tell thats how moral arguments work.

An enforcing of morals is all that the law has ever been. So I want to be damn sure those morals are corrupted as little as possible by public relations bullshit.

If you’re discussing the legal right to free speech, don’t confuse it with the effects etiquette and ethics play on legal free speech. You might mention that they are there, but using the law to enforce manners is almost always a bad idea. And usually using the law to enforce morals is a bad idea.

Murder is wrong because people have a right to live. Rape is wrong because people have control of their person. Stealing is wrong because people have a right to their property.

Yes, there are moral (and ethical) issues with the above crimes, but there are also legal issues. Just because the law, morals and ethics frequently overlap, that does not mean they are related.

Cian:
*Sigh*, where to even start. Most of what you say is totally besides the point, perhaps because you appear to have entirely missed it. Firstly, I refer you back to the paragraph where I differentiate between wrong and inaproppriate. Commenting on drunk driving at a drunk drivers funeral is inappropriate, but no, you won’t convince me that it is wrong.

Do I believe its the same to complain about the government as it would be to tell a teenager leaving an abortion clinic that I think she did the wrong thing? Yes. Yes I do. It _is_ the same thing, there is no magical line somewhere that defines what opinions should be taboo. And if there is, I disagree with it, and will not use it. The fact that I choose not to stand outside abortion clinics and tell people I think they have made a mistake is my own business. You may not have noticed that I say “I think”, because I am expressing opinions, not stating facts.

No amount of intelligence or decency will tell you what another person is going to feel. Should we then disregard people’s offended reactions to things? Yes. That was the entire point of the rant. You seem to think that by choosing to describe the most extreme uses of free speech for expressions of opinion, that you will make me reconsider or retract my view. This is not the case. If the principle involved is the same, then the level of extremity is totally irrelevant. I have zero intention of pandering to squeamishness. Either something is right, or it is wrong.

I will not change my language or my opinions because other people are wrong.

(BTW, you here is general - not pointed at the author :-)

Just because you have the right to do something doesn’t mean you should, at every point possible, excersice your right to do so.

In fact, you could easily argue that being offensive (in a blatant manner) and/or expressing whatever opinion you have whenever you feel like it to whatever group of people happen to be there is an abuse of free speech. Much like there is a very good reason for diplomatic immunity but parking wherever you want despite what problems you may cause is abuse.

The other problem is that when people abuse the law or their rights as written, more laws have to be applied to limit or clarify the point. For instance, you have a right of free speech - but do you have (or should you have) the right of free speech outside my window at 4 in the morning when I have to get up in 2 hours?

As you well know, I am about as blunt as can be at times and am regularily afflicted by foot-in-mouth disease. However, there are some lines even *I* won’t cross. For instance, drink driving is evil and should be condemned. But the funeral of a fella who drove into a wall after 10 pints is not the place to do it - despite the fact you have the right to do so.

So to suggest that your right to criticise the government or say what you actually think about religion is the same as preaching to a teenager leaving an abortion clinic about the evils of what she’s done is abuse and is to be condemned by intelligent, decent people.

Much as all as you might disagree, everyone does have feelings - some just hide or surpress them more than others. We should apply the intelligence and decency given to us by $deity to decide when we invoke our right to free speech. To suggest that someone who doesn’t want to hear some illogical, offensive opinion you have to say should leave or walk around with their fingers in their ears is selfish at best and disgraceful.

Like dynamite, free speech was designed for a good purpose but is reguarily used for evil. Same with e-mail and spam, knives and stabbing etc etc etc. To be decent human being, we need to apply decency and intelligence to everything and not just do it because we can. It’s the difference between ideals and reality. People *shouldn’t* be offended by things we say but realistically, they will we. Should we disregard them? If everyone said everything they wanted, the world would decend into hate very fast and WWIII wouldn’t be far behind.

Free speech for fought and died for - let’s use it right.