2008 Woodie Awards
Death of a Right
Joshua Benesh
Issue date: 10/2/06 Section: Opinions
- Page 1 of 2 next >
Freedom, it seems, is truly under attack. While the ever-present terrorist threat continues to keep us on guard and vigilant in the protection of our homeland another freedom is slowly slipping away. It is a freedom as fundamental as they come, of exceptional importance to the functionality of democracy and imperative to the progression of society that comes with the free exchange of ideas.
Freedom of speech, the ability to express a position, belief, view, opinion, or one of countless other synonyms under the protection of the law is a key aspect of what makes us American. With each challenge, it has prevailed. With each generation, its value reaffirmed.
The age-old debate over the extent of speech protection has again come to the forefront as a result of the release of "Death of a President," a British docudrama which fabricates the assassination of President Bush as the starting point for a discussion of the War on Terror in computer generated reality.
As news of video depicting the fabricated death of the President reached the states a chorus of outrage rang out. Amidst the cries of potentially helping terrorists and simple disgust for the images came a far more dangerous cry.
The argument has been posed about the extent to which freedom of speech protects these activities. Numerous political personalities and citizens alike have gone on the record to directly state that the right to freedom of speech stops at a certain point, not a point of hate speech nor a matter of shouting fire in a crowded theater. Instead, it is a limitation based on speech being un-American and unpatriotic, leaving it unwanted and unprotected in this era marred by uncertainty.
What an appalling construct we have happened across. When did something as fundamental and foundational as one of the very freedoms that exist in the Bill of Rights, one of the freedoms that our countrymen have fought and died for become open to interpretation and subject to the prevailing winds of popular opinion?
Freedom of speech, the ability to express a position, belief, view, opinion, or one of countless other synonyms under the protection of the law is a key aspect of what makes us American. With each challenge, it has prevailed. With each generation, its value reaffirmed.
The age-old debate over the extent of speech protection has again come to the forefront as a result of the release of "Death of a President," a British docudrama which fabricates the assassination of President Bush as the starting point for a discussion of the War on Terror in computer generated reality.
As news of video depicting the fabricated death of the President reached the states a chorus of outrage rang out. Amidst the cries of potentially helping terrorists and simple disgust for the images came a far more dangerous cry.
The argument has been posed about the extent to which freedom of speech protects these activities. Numerous political personalities and citizens alike have gone on the record to directly state that the right to freedom of speech stops at a certain point, not a point of hate speech nor a matter of shouting fire in a crowded theater. Instead, it is a limitation based on speech being un-American and unpatriotic, leaving it unwanted and unprotected in this era marred by uncertainty.
What an appalling construct we have happened across. When did something as fundamental and foundational as one of the very freedoms that exist in the Bill of Rights, one of the freedoms that our countrymen have fought and died for become open to interpretation and subject to the prevailing winds of popular opinion?
Be the first to comment on this story