The Patriot Post® · Sticks and Stones: 'Words Can Be Weapons'?

By Thomas Gallatin ·
https://patriotpost.us/articles/93176-sticks-and-stones-words-can-be-weapons-2022-11-30

While many Americans may take it for granted, our First Amendment right to freedom of speech is a uniquely recognized and protected right when compared to history and the rest of the world. For much of the world, the right of any individual citizen to express ideas and opinions without fear of government retaliation is nonexistent. Of course, the inability to freely express one’s opinions and ideas necessarily restricts and limits the ability of the development of thought, both for individuals and for entire communities and nations.

Authoritarians hate free speech because it exposes them to not only criticism, but also challenges or reduces their authority. Throughout the COVID pandemic, this reality of the authoritarian mindset was on full display, as those in power sought to shut down the space for the airing of contrary opinions regarding their draconian decisions, such as lockdowns and masking mandates. They defended this abuse of power as all self-labeled “do-gooders” do, arguing that all they were doing was looking out for the people’s best interests.

Increasingly, as the radical Left has gained ground in governments throughout the West, the right to freedom of speech has become a problem they wish to remove. Hence the campaign not only to stop “hate speech” but also, even more dubiously, the Left’s latest aim to stop “misinformation.”

In this vein, the United Nations, an organization that, ironically, exists to protect and further human rights, recently jumped aboard the Left’s anti-free speech train. The UN posted a social media message ridiculously declaring that “words can be weapons.” The post advertises a new campaign against “hate speech,” further asserting, “Hate speech online can lead to cruelty & violence in real life.”

There are two degrees of separation, if not more, between words and actions. Furthermore, the legal standard for inciting violence is a clear and direct call to action, not merely the expression of “controversial” or even genuinely offensive opinions. Voicing objections to an individual’s chosen lifestyle, such as homosexuality, does not necessarily equate to hate. Refusing to celebrate such deviancy is also not an expression of “hate speech,” no matter how much the Left asserts otherwise.

Even indefensible speech, such as the racism spewed by many on the radical Left these days, is not necessarily violence. Neither was the racism of the Democrat Party of 50 years ago.

What the UN should be concerned about is the rising authoritarianism among liberal democracies in the West. Attacks on the individual right to free speech is a massive red flag that should have the UN crying foul from the top of its ivory tower. Unfortunately, the UN has repeatedly demonstrated that it is a feckless organization that caters to the whims of the self-assigned intellectual elites. Nowadays, the best that can be said of the UN is that it does little other than offer vacuous virtue signals to appease the self-righteous woke.

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