It’s the Economics, [REDACTED]
SOMEWHERE IN AFGHANISTAN—Two months ago long-time White House correspondent Helen Thomas got fired by her employer, the Hearst newspaper conglomerate, in response to her off-the-cuff slam at Israel. I criticized the firing on free speech grounds.
“Free speech must be defended no matter what—even that of cranky anti-Semitic columnists (if that’s what Thomas is/was),” I wrote. “Unless we are truly free to say what we think—without fear of reprisal—free speech is not a right. It is merely a permission.”
I received many letters in response. Most people disagreed with me.
A letter from Joseph Just was typical, but better written than most (which is why I quote it here):
“Ms. Thomas has been denied not one of her constitutional rights. She faces no fine, legal censure or criminal charges for saying what she said. Her immunity from the threat of such sanction (rather than immunity from being, shall we say, ‘asked to resign’) is what the First Amendment protects. The only reprisal Ms. Thomas has materially suffered (in addition to the public opprobrium directed at her) is the loss of her job at Hearst. She held her job at the pleasure of her employers, and if they decide that due her comments they no longer want her around, they are not obligated to retain her. She is not—indeed, none of us is—entitled to a forum…particularly a paid one.”
Legally, Just is right. The First Amendment does not protect us from economic reprisals. I was arguing that employers ought to choose not to fire people for speaking their minds.
Unfortunately, employers seem to be whacking people for what they say outside of work more than ever. Countless workers have gotten canned for statements they made on non-work-related blogs and social networking sites. Even more worrisome, many citizens don’t have a problem with that. Even self-described leftists have embraced the libertarian extremist view that you have the right to say whatever you want—but don’t expect to be able to feed yourself or your family if you do.
Posters at Democratic Underground, a left-of-center discussion site frequented by that rarest and most appreciated of creature, balls-out Democrats, has long been a community I’ve been able to count upon. On the Thomas issue, however, they sound like Sean Hannity. “Private organizations aren’t and shouldn’t be required to put up with speech they don’t agree with,” said one poster.” “Free speech is not guaranteed to be speech without consequences,” wrote another.
“Freedom of speech doesn’t mean freedom from criticism,” argued a third. “It means that you can say what you want without the threat of being thrown in jail.”
Funny, these same libertarians would have freaked out if the artists who created the Danish Mohammed cartoons had all gotten fired by their newspaper.
True, the First Amendment doesn’t protect your right to keep your gig as a community banker even though you wear a swastika T-shirt and whistle the Horst Wessel song on your lunch break.
But it ought to.
If the First Amendment is to truly protect freedom of speech, it must allow Americans to say and think whatever the hell they want, no matter how outrageous. So the First Amendment should be expanded to prohibit economic reprisals.
As things stand, the First Amendment is pure sophistry, a bad joke. A right to free speech, ostensibly protected in order to encourage the vigorous exchange and discussion of ideas that make a society truly free, is meaningless if a person risks getting fired each time he opens his mouth. While it is true that some people will decide that the risk of professional opprobrium and unemployment is worth it, most people won’t. And don’t.
Consider the other basic right guaranteed under the First Amendment: freedom of worship. Title VII of the 1964 Civil Rights Act makes it illegal for an employer to fire you because of your religion (or lack thereof). (There’s an exception for employers that are religious groups.) The U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission has filed numerous federal lawsuits against companies it accused of reprisals against employers due to their religious preference.
Why is religious expression granted greater protection than, say, political speech? It’s not because religion is inherently less offensive. To many people, religion is itself offensive.
The distinction is arbitrary and, ironically, wholly political: in the secular American republic, you have the right to say that your God is better than anyone else’s God without fear of losing your job. If Helen Thomas had thrown down a Muslim prayer carpet on the White House lawn and prayed toward Mecca, it would have been offensive to many people—she’d still be working.
Another way to examine my proposed expansion of free speech protections is to look at it from the standpoint of an employer. What would a boss stand to lose if the First Amendment were strengthened?
Certainly, employers would lose a measure of control over their workers. They would risk embarrassment. But they would also gain a big measure of CYA: when one of their staff did or said something outrageous (but constitutionally protected), they could point to the First Amendment and shrug their shoulders. In the Helen Thomas example, Hearst execs could say: “What can we do? She has the right to say whatever the hell she wants.”
Which of course she should.
(Ted Rall is in Afghanistan to cover the war and research a book. He is the author of “The Anti-American Manifesto,” which will be published in September by Seven Stories Press. His website is tedrall.com.)
COPYRIGHT 2010 TED RALL
26 Comments.
I was going to make a pithy comment, but I fear the my boss might find out and can me.
I am not supposed to pith on company time.
Official Libertarian Response:
Without meddling in the situation, we can actually expect the marketplace of ideas to function toward the most correct outcome. It could be any of the following.
1) Companies that fire people for saying things they don’t like will lose the patronage of those who believe the same thing as the person who was fired.
2) Employees will find jobs at places that value their beliefs.
3) Employees will learn to change their beliefs to those of their employer, thus, arriving at their true beliefs.
Meddling will only pervert the marketplace of ideas.
Seems to me there is no “free” “speech” in need of “protecting”.
You could never run a business in an effective manner if employees could say whatever the hell they want. One of my subordinates could calmly say “It is my opinion that you’re an asshole fuck-face piece-of-shit”, and I’d be powerless to fire them. Why? It’s their opinion. Freedom of speech. Whereas now I can fire them for insubordination.
Ted doesn’t run a business so he doesn’t really have a clue how little there is already to keep these friggin’ animals in line. You think service is bad now, wait until employees can say whatever they want with no fear of dismissal.
Quoth Ted:
Even self-described leftists have embraced the libertarian extremist view that you have the right to say whatever you want—but don’t expect to be able to feed yourself or your family if you do.
Are you using “extremist” in the same sense as the MSM, i.e., “something with which I don’t agree”? Or is the “extremist” part of it, holding that there is no security for loudmouths? If it’s the former, you got me confused as to where you stand.
I was arguing that employers ought to choose not to fire people for speaking their minds.
I think you have a problem with terminology (it might be me since English is not my first language): you hold that employers ought not choose to fire or must not fire people for speaking their minds? If it’s the former, I’m with you mostly: employers would be totally justified to fire an employee who told a customer to their faces that they think they’re idiots. Anyway, the rest of your article would then belie that belief, so you contradict yourself. If it’s the latter, which is more inline with your authoritarian worldview, this is of course absurd and immoral, forcing people to keep on paying folks, no matter how outrageous their utterances. Until I see your pithy article about speech code in academia, I think you’re just being your inconsistent self.
Funny, these same libertarians would have freaked out if the artists who created the Danish Mohammed cartoons had all gotten fired by their newspaper.
Aren’t you confusing criticizing them for doing so with acknowledging that they’re perfectly within their rights to do so? I’ve never read the fictitious libertarian who would get those confused. For the record, I don’t think Thomas should have been fired.
If the First Amendment is to truly protect freedom of speech, it must allow Americans to say and think whatever the hell they want, no matter how outrageous. So the First Amendment should be expanded to prohibit economic reprisals.
That’s a perverted way to transform an Amendment that protects a negative right (by preventing the State to jailing/fining folks it disagrees with) into one that guarantees a positive right (by forcing folks to keep giving money to folks they disagree with).
Why is religious expression granted greater protection than, say, political speech? It’s not because religion is inherently less offensive. To many people, religion is itself offensive.
That’s the one good point in your article, and the obvious answer is that the problem lies with the Civil Rights Act and not with the First Amendment.
Olegna78, I have just one question: is it Angelo ’78 or Angelo ’87? Somehow, I get the feeling it’s the last date…
How about a minimal compromise… your employer can’t fire you for speech outside of work that is not about the organization you work for.
I’m not sure whether that would have covered Helen… was she working at the time?
nom, you really shouldn’t pith on company time. They pay, you work, that’s the deal.
Olegna, at #3 I assume you are being sarcastic… at least, I hope so.
ex-whatever, I sure wouldn’t want to work for you. Which would be your loss, as I’m extremely good at what I do. If you regard your employees as “friggin’ animals” you’re not going to keep good talent. Of course, maybe you’re in one of those businesses where you can just pay minimum wage and let them cycle on through… but in that case why would you expect any better from them?
Sorry if I made you angry. I have a knack for caricaturing libertarians because I spent the first few years of my life as one.
No anger at all, it’s just frustration. Sometimes you write stuff that makes sense, but your attempts at satire are not good.
And I’m all for satire, be it of points of view I disagree with, or points of view I concur with.
I had stopped referring to the libertarian ideology as “libertarian” along time ago. So called libertarians are really just conservatives who don’t want to be called conservative. The only freedoms these so-called libertarians support are the freedoms of the ultra-wealthy, the giant corporations, and that asshole who wants to blow smoke in your face. It is a facade. The true libertarians are the people on the left.
The true libertarians are the people on the left.
That’s hysterical. It’s also stupid and wrong.
Ironic that you use Democrat Underground as an example. They do not allow freedom of speech.
We are talking as if self-reliance had not been made impossible.
Applying Buckley vs. Vallejo to the constitution we get:
Congress shall make no law abridging the freedom to make monetary contributions toward influencing an election.
All we have to ask is “has congress passed any laws which abridge my freedom to make monetary contributions?”
The answer is that they have. Here is one example:
The Federal Land Policy and Management Act
it did away with the homesteading act, which was really just protected the status quo (ie. people had the ability to stake out a piece of land and subsist and/or sell some of it.)
Quoth Albert:
The only freedoms these so-called libertarians support are the freedoms of the ultra-wealthy, the giant corporations, and that asshole who wants to blow smoke in your face.
Albert, you’re arguing about a caricature and one sadly lacking in humor, unlike Angelo’s. I, for one, support the same freedoms for the “ultra-wealthy” as for the dirt poor, for mom-and-pops as well as “giant corporations”, and I think it’s nobody’s business if his neighbor wants to smoke, snort, inject or swallow whatever he damn pleases. I know of no “so-called libertarian” (an American term, BTW. I consider myself a classical liberal and somewhat anarchist) who argues for different rights to people according to their wealth. Try not to use emotional banter in place of intellectual argument.
It is you leftists who argue for different “freedoms”. Susan Stark, for instance, claims not to have anything against mom-and-pop shops, but anything bigger than that should be taken over by the state. That is very unlibertarian.
The ultra wealthy and large corporations by definition have more power and wealth than everybody else, so I don’t feel sorry for calling for certain “restrictions” on their influence. Because when you try to give people and corporations who already have a lot of power more power, it becomes a dictatorship. That’s what it all boils down to, the right-wing so-called libertarianism is just authoritarianism by another name.
“and I think it’s nobody’s business if his neighbor wants to smoke, snort, inject or swallow whatever he damn pleases.”
I agree, but just do it away from me. I see lots of so-called libertarians argue against public smoking bans and they are wrong. If anything, public smoking bans are libertarian because they give freedoms to the non-smoker majority who don’t want their lungs ruined.
Albert,
Just curious: Are you aware that a corporation cannot arrest you, tax you or otherwise take any of your liberties without your per,mission? Government can, and does.
No, but with the help of the government they can. That’s what we call “fascism” when the government does what the corporations tell them to do. That’s why our government needs to be packed with as many pro-regulation liberal politicians as possible to diminish this threat. With the new campaign finance rules thanks to the Supreme Court, it will be easier for corporations to buy elections and get more corporation-friendly politicians elected, so that will be tough on liberals.
I’m sorry Albert, but you’re being extremely naïve if you think regulation affects big companies more than it affects small ones. Big corporations can afford the overhead and extra more easily and that’s why they line up the pockets of politicians, “liberal” or not, as campaign contributions or in other forms. The fictitious libertarian who only defends big money exists only in your emotionally charged tirades.
And, in any case, fascism is precisely the opposite of what you claim it to be. It’s industry, commerce, the whole of society doing the state’s bidding, for the state’s sake: nothing outside the State, nothing above the State, remember?
PS: I put “liberal” in scare quotes, because neither the modern Democratic Party and its leadership, nor the fringe leftist groups who cling to it for relevance, have anything to do with Liberalism in the classical sense.
Albert,
The reason corporations lobby (bribe) congress is because they are so heavily regulated and taxed.
nothing outside the State, nothing above the State
My memory is not good enough for me to know for sure whether that is an Il Duce quotation. In any event, I don’t find it particularly useful in arriving at an understanding of the systems for which we reserve the term. I was forced to read Mussolini in college. It was instructive to see what he thought he was implementing, and the words he chose to describe it. I imagine there is something of use to be gleaned from any motto. For example, the captains of industry don’t appear to have experienced much personal sacrifice as a result of Fascism in any country.
…so the motto, in this case, reveals itself as irrelevant in a larger discussion about economic freedom, political freedom, economic equality…or any discussion outside of some PR firm discussion concerning branding.
The reason corporations lobby (bribe) congress is because they are so heavily regulated and taxed.
Route is exactly correct here. The deeper the pockets, the easier a company can afford governmental red-tape and regulation. That’s the reason “captains of industry” didn’t experience much personal sacrifice (compared to the little guy), but that doesn’t mean they didn’t have to kowtow to the Duce.
Albert, I don’t have much of a problem with smoking bans in so-called public places: public parks, government buildings etc. It might add to the delusion that these places are “property of the public”, but so what?
A ban on smoking enforced against private businesses is a different beast, though. There’s no such thing as “freedom to not inhale someone else’s smoke”.
“The reason corporations lobby (bribe) congress is because they are so heavily regulated and taxed.”
That is the most retarded thing I’ve heard in days. They have more money to bribe BECAUSE they aren’t regulated and taxed enough. And let’s not forget that a ban on bribery is itself a regulation, so if they bribe, they aren’t regulated enough, duh.
“I’m sorry Albert, but you’re being extremely naïve if you think regulation affects big companies more than it affects small ones.”
If that is true, the solution is to rewrite the law so only the big corporation is “screwed.”
“The fictitious libertarian who only defends big money exists only in your emotionally charged tirades.”
True I guess, that’s why I don’t consider these people true libertarians, they only call themselves that so that they can gain access to the mainstream. They are authoritarians who only support the freedoms of the corporatations, wealthy, and the smoke-blowing asshole. Liberals are the true libertarians.
“And, in any case, fascism is precisely the opposite of what you claim it to be.”
No it’s not, it’s what I said it was. Fascism is also called “corporatism”, the corporate takeover of government, period.
“A ban on smoking enforced against private businesses is a different beast, though. There’s no such thing as “freedom to not inhale someone else’s smoke”.”
One could make the argument that business owners have the right to kick out black people, but I don’t want to open up a can now.
Albert, even though this thread is dead, I’ll leave my last comments in here, in case you bother to read:
1. You got to read up on history and the genesis of fascism. The quote from the Duce should say it all, really;
2. Rewriting the law so that only the “big corporation” (I supposed the definition of “big” is going to be in the law too, right?) gets “screwed” hurts the principle of isonomy, which should be at the base of the rule of law in a just society;
3. Again, this fictitious libertarian who only defends the fat cats exists only in your imagination. So-called “liberals”, as in, supporters and elected officials of the Democratic party won’t be seen defending the rights of pot smokers and prostitutes (even though many in their midst patronize ’em) any day soon now;
4. If you ask me, the black business owner should have right to kick out Asian customers if he wants to. Having the right to do so, doesn’t mean it’s the right thing to do, but I trust you can fathom the difference;