Outpost of Freedom blog

Freedom of Speech

Gary Hunt
Outpost of Freedom
February 23, 2012

A while back, I wrote an article, The Three Boxes, about the loss of both ballot and jury boxes, tools intended by the Framers, which allowed the people a degree of protection and redress against usurpation of un-granted (unconstitutional) powers by the government.  A comment I received regarding that article was the proclamation, “We still have Freedom of Speech”.  Well, that struck me as not quite so, which has led to this article.

To properly evaluate whether we still do have, intact, Freedom of Speech, we must go to the beginning or we find ourselves simply jumping to a conclusion based upon what we have been told.  So, if we are to start at the beginning, it behooves us to think about Speech, and exactly what it is.

Now, the first reaction to this question often elicits the response, “the words that I say, I can say anything I want”.  Well, there is no doubt that Speech is the utterance of words.  However, we must consider that words uttered, absent conscious thought, are more aptly described as gibberish.

It appears, then, that we can likely agree that Speech, that protection afforded in the First Amendment, must surely be intended to also protect the Freedom of Thought.  Otherwise, it would be best described as “Freedom of Gibberish”.

So, now that we have expanded the concept of Freedom of Speech to the point that thought has to be the conscious source for the words to be uttered, we can proceed.

Well, we know that we can go stand on the street corner and speak, all that we want.  At first glance, that would seem to imply that we do have Freedom of Speech.  However, what if we said something that was, well, not really an advocacy of a crime, a threat, or some other expression that would, under the Constitution, be unlawful?  Of course, yelling “fire” in a theatre, which might result in injury as people flee a perceived peril, is prevented by virtue of reason and common sense.  Also, slander and libel, directed at a specific individual, are, likewise, subject to judicial scrutiny as civil matters.  However, at what point must we “restrict” what we say?  And, what if we do find that we have, by law, or other means, been prohibited from expressing our thoughts, whatever they may be?  I think that we can, rightfully, construe Freedom of Speech, as suggested earlier, to be, in actuality, the Freedom of Expression of Thought — so long as that expression does not result in an unlawful act.

To fully investigate the theory as to what Freedom of Speech really entails, perhaps it would serve us to pick a topic and evaluate whether, as a consequence of other factors, we are, in fact, denied Freedom of Speech.  Since most states, at some point in time, had moral laws regarding the subject, it is probably safe to look at homosexuality to begin to delve into the consequences of the social engineering, and if, in fact, it has had the effect of suppressing Freedom of Speech.

Let’s go back about fifty years.  The commonly used term for a homosexual, accepted even in academic circles, was “queer” or “homo”, or, the more offensive “faggot” or “fag”.

Queer (all definitions from Webster’s 1828 dictionary): “At variance with what is usual or normal; differing in some odd way from what is ordinary; odd; singular; strange; whimsical; as, a queer story or act”.  Well, there can be little doubt that homosexuality is “at variance with what is usual or normal”.

Fagot: “A bundle of sticks, twigs or small branches of trees…”  The term was applied to the wood bundles used to kindle the fires with which witches and queers were burned, during the Inquisition, and “fag”, the abbreviated form.

Back then, there was nothing wrong with calling a homosexual a queer.  Even if you called him a fag, there were no social consequences, unless, of course, you were in a queer bar.  That was the accepted — the norm — at the time.  After all, Freedom of Speech (and the inherent ability to express thoughts that led to the Speech) was still intact, as they had been since the ratification of the Constitution and long before.

Social engineering, however, provides us a different twist.  Social Engineering is the art of manipulating people with the purpose of having greater effect on the social structure of society.  The very act of manipulating is contrary to the Constitution; however, the much more subtle social engineering is nothing less than offensive to a free people.  However, we must understand that once exposed, the ability to manipulate is negated by virtue of knowing that an effort is being made to cause one to think differently than he would, without such manipulation.

So, to continue our understanding of Freedom of Speech, we need to understand that Freedom of Thought is based upon our free will, or, as the Framers would have described it, natural law and natural rights.

When a concerted effort is made, regardless of who is making the effort, to intrude upon those fundamental rights, we have social engineering with the intention to sway common opinion into acceptance of what might, otherwise, be unacceptable.

So, suppose we take a word that has a very positive definition and substitute that word for the word that was, before, commonly acceptable.  Of course, we would pick a word that could otherwise also be associated with the word being replaced, so, let’s choose “gay” as the word to be used for the purpose of social engineering.

Gay: “Merry; airy; jovial; sportive; frolicksome.  It denotes more life and animation than cheerful”

The connotation of gay, even four decades ago, was quite different from what many would expect.  If you were going to a party, it could be a poker party, a bridge party, birthday party, or, perhaps, a gay party.  The last being a party where, most often, drinks were served and jokes and humorous stories told — everybody had a gay time.  Surely, a positive word, even in a morally sensitive world.

That morality, however, whether Biblical, or simply a moral judgment that sex was for procreation, left homosexuality on the fringes — “at variance with what is usual or normal”.

So, a concerted effort was made by the homosexual community to replace the traditionally, morally judgmental, phrases then used with the now stolen word, “gay”.  Wait just a minute, did I say stolen?  Well, if I have something, or the use of something, and someone takes it away from me so that I can no longer use it for the intended purpose, is it not “stolen”?  At the same time, they have taken a word that had an acceptable connotation and applied it to a practice that was not deemed acceptable.  The effect is to add an air of legitimacy to what was once outlawed.

So, what affect does this have on us, especially with regard to Freedom of Speech?  Well, let’s just think (Freedom of Thought) about it.  We know that it is politically correct to use the current attribute to the sexual activity, so our minds tells us, “You can’t say queer, anymore.  You have to refer to them as “gay” (or the even more recent “same sex”).  Subtle, but, heck, through these past few decades, we have slowly begun to accept this subtle inference — and, in the process, have rejected that which was common in favor of the socially engineered word.  We have, essentially, conditioned our mind to reject that which was and replace it with that that is — even to the point of correcting someone who uses the now archaic term, queer and wondering why they would use such a vulgar term to describe an acceptable activity or condition.  Now, instead of rejecting what was once immoral activity, we tend to reject those who have not succumbed to the engineering, as if they were worse than the gay people, who have every right not to have any aspersions cast upon them.  The good have become the bad, and, the bad have become the good — the world, truly, turned upside down.

So, in a mere fifty years, we have seen that Freedom of Speech has not only been suppressed, rather, it has also developed into suppression of thought — by such subtle and manipulative means.

We must question our willingness to be socially engineered, however subtle and long term that effort might be, or we will find that we have, by Orwellian means, allowed ourselves to remove our once assured rights.