Do you think the First Amendment goes too far?

This poll was suggested by Spider, with the difference being it is totally independent with any other poll or survey conducted on the internet ...

For those clueless individuals who don't know what the First Amendment of the Bill of Rights to the United States Constitution is, it states:

"Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the government for a redress of grievances."

In a nutshell, free press, free speech, free spirit, all that creamy goodness...

Altho it's too much to hope that this thread will not become a battleground for the politicially adrenalized denizens of this forum, please take the time to read OTS's stance on the First Amendment as they relate to these forums before you post anything (read number 6)...

And on that note, poll away, you repressed individuals...

I chose 'other', which in this case represents the incredulity that anyone would answer anything but a resounding '**** no'. The first amendment represents relatively everything that is encompassed by 'liberty'. Remove any of those, and you no longer have the right to life, liberty, and happiness.

ooooo, good point nova

*applauds nova*

The poll isn't a question of whether the first amendment is needed or justified ... the point of the poll is whether you think the first amendment goes too far or not ... whether you believe in absolute freedom of speech, with no repercussions or limitations ... whether a TV news crew has a right to report the local sheriff office's plans to apprehend a suspect on national TV without the sheriff's permission, for instance...

i vote sometimes it does, most people take the quote literally and that gets annoying. Its nice to have some things but you can get criticzied about somethings. Like you could say a racist remark and then you might be in court for a hate crime, even though we supposedly have this right of freedom of speach. So that right actually sounds better then it is.

sigh, ok laggy well try to stay on topic

yes, the media has the right to report that, should they somehow (and i really couldnt imagine how) become aware of it. whether its proper and ethical that they do it is another matter.

barring the exceptions that the supreme court has laid out (causing a panic, libel, slander, etc), then i believe that the first amendment is proper as it is written. id certainly rather have it go too far than not far enough.

but of course, there is no absolute, as there are and have always been limits set on the first amentment. for the most part, those limits were based on fact. as in telling the truth wasnt limited, but lying had legal repercussions. the other exception i can think of is national security, in a tighter sense than we mean now. printing up pamphlets of classified war plans and handing them out doesnt fall under free speech, it falls under treason.

but your right to express an opinion, whether in speech or writing, should be absolute, no matter how repugnant that opinion may be. its not possible to go too far there. and that is what the first amendment is really about, the right to express your opinion. in the case of religion, its your opinion about deity(s) or lack thereof. for speech and the press its your opinion about anything under the sun.

Saying the first amendmend goes to far is like saying you don't want to be free.

quite.

The argument could be made that in a truly civilized society, it does not go far enough.

That is because you would not get the idiots yelling FIRE in a crowed theater when there is no fire(the classic example).

I am not so sure I want the government interpreting what is political free speech (the intent of the amendment) and criminal free speech (lible, slander, fire). THe problem is most people would not take the appropriate action (whatever that would be) against the violaters of criminal speech, just believe the (supposedly wrong) information. I guess it is a case where I need to trust the government to protect me from libel,slander and idiots.

Well, naturally you can't commit acts that are prohibitted by other laws and claim 'freedom of speech' as your defense. That's like shooting someone in cold blood and citing the 'right to bear arms' as your defense. Use your head, man.

The real issue here is the slippery slope we face by letting the censorship djinni out. Allowing one act of expression to be censored or prohibitted by our government in a wholly subjective manner robs us of the right to discuss a whole battery of important issues. Dissidence in regard to our own government and its actions or intents would have to be chief among these. Current issues with foreign affairs are a perfect example (and would be perfect to discuss in another thread, not this one).

Another problem is the people who support the idea of censorship don't seem to realize that the same power could be used to oppress them. For instance, lets's say that right out of some righteous nightmare, some radical religious group goes on a holy campaign to make swearing in public illegal, they get public support, the laws are passed, challenged and then the Supreme Court justices are all on mescaline that day and it holds up in the Supreme Court. Well, that sets a precedent that our government can dictate what is acceptable or unacceptable to talk about. They could subsequently decide that the radical religious group that had the law instituted in the first place was practicing a religion that was not decent to talk about. This would make it legal to practice that religion but you couldn't discuss it in public.

No, the First Amendment doesn't doesn't go too far, aiyemm aicho. It keeps our government from driving a truck up our ass. . . . .and believe me, given the fact that our current Cheif Executive was quoted on both December 18, 2000 and July 27, 2001 as advocating a dictatorship as long as he was the dictator, he's got the keys in his hand.

The right to bear arms doesn't give you the right to use them, I agree.

You better be defending yourself or getting dinner. (I am not too fond of sport hunting. Food hunting is a little different but a different topic.)

An issue that floats around this topic is, unfortunately, not the government's limitations to free speech (campaign reform bill's aside), but the Press's control of free speech by determining, apparently as a conspiracy or coordinated operation (again another topic), what is Politically Correct.


Jesus of Nazareth was politically incorrect. So was Patrick Henry. How would ?BC/CBS/Fox/CNN have treated them?

Jesus wasnt politically incorrect, he was a proponent of a religion that the government of the time had banned.
its not being labeled politically incorrect we need to be afraid of. in fact, some people take great pride in that label for some reason. we are talking about the government limiting of free speach, among other things.
as in arresting 3 mideastern medical students because some idiotic woman misheard or just plain made up a story that even if true, shouldnt have gotten them arrested.

Just to be clear, they weren't arrested, they were detained and questioned for about 17 hours. No charges were filed, therefore they weren't arrested.
The justice system worked exactly as it should -- quickly, publicly, and fairly. The woman reported a possible terrorist attack, the men were stopped and questioned, and sent on their way with a public statement of innocence from the government.

What SHOULDN'T be happening, as far as free speech is concerned, is that since this incident: The hospital the men were travelling to (they had medical internships there) has received death threats and racially-motivated threats. The hospital has now told the men they can't do their internship there because of the threats.

i know no charges were filed, but i thought they were arrested and released. not that i find a significant difference in this case. even if you take her at her word, they said nothing threatening. they were talking about mourning the dead. people need to calm down and think rationally now.
do you really think theyd have been detained if the same conversation had taken place 13 months ago? i dont. but that hospital is pure evil. their ethics board needs to look at the administration there instead of its doctors
im very glad right now that im white and female. less likely im going to have to deal with that crap. although with my luck, you never know