October 19, 2004
Speak Now, Or Forever ...
Enough is enough. The Left's violence against the Right's freedom of speech is beyond unacceptable. It is one thing to cause a little frat boy mischief, quite another to shoot the windows out of campaign headquarters, burn swastikas on lawns, break the bones of campaign workers. If you don't know about these incidents, please read Stanley Kurtz, Michelle Malkin, the Kerry Spot, or Professor Bainbridge, to get up to speed on the thuggery taking place in America.
There are millions of Americans right now who are being intimidated into not exercising their right to speak for fear of retaliation. No Bush placards in the window, no Bush bumper stickers on the car, no political conversation with even the closest of friends and colleagues. I stand up and count myself amongst this group. What a shame. Yes, we should all be ashamed that the threat of a broken window or a keyed car is keeping us from supporting Bush and getting involved in the most important presidential election since perhaps Lincoln/McClellan.
You know what? I think that Bush will win, and will carry a mandate back to the White House. Does this justify our silence? No, for three reasons.
One, the Democrats need to be crushed. Crushed in a Bush mandate, crushed in Congress, crushed in the Governor's races, crushed at all levels (I say this as a staunch small-l libertarian, and as no great friend of the Republicans). Why? Stephen Green wrote THE ESSAY on why. He, too, is not a Republican, just a very concerned citizen.
Two, behold bravery:
Do you think she worried about having her car keyed? How about being shot. Or beaten by her male relatives. Or stoned to death. We silent types don't know the meaning of bravery.
Three, the most important reason of all. We're all friends of Kim du Toit (aren't we?). He recently reposted an email he received in July 2003 which is a solar plexus punch on why we must now stand up and speak. Please read it before you continue. I'll wait.
Here's what I carry away from that post (you did read it, right?):
Your offhand comments about speech supporters who do not, themselves, speak up hit a nerve.
I've seen the light, and I'm here to testify.
To those of you who grew up in outspoken families, I expect that what I'm about to say will seem painfully obvious. But I came to class late, and what I learned there is still fresh and vibrant.
I thought, all my life, that I couldn't speak safely, that no one could, really. Free speech was dangerous and icky. Even after I realized that the First Amendment was not quite the shriveled, antiquated appendix I'd been taught by my public school teachers, for a couple of years or so I still wobbled around with the training-wheel comfort of believing that while not all free speakers were necessarily smarmy, laminated-hair, talking-head TV pundits, I myself ought not to speak freely. I was too clumsy and careless, and free speech was still dangerous and icky.
Just before 9/11 I woke up to how quickly my liberty was eroding, and in a fit of anger and defiance started speaking my mind by blogging. (Thanks to Glenn Reynolds at Instapundit) When I actually spoke out (to the horror and confusion of my friends and family), speaking around the house, speaking in my car, talking about it, showing it off, and of course blogging about it, taught me what I could not learn from books, magazines, classes, or even Usenet:
It taught me that freedom takes practice.
I thought I'd practiced. I'm as full of opinions as the next guy, but I thought that having the strong opinion was the freedom. I read banned books and underground comics. I've watched the picket lines and hung out with undesirables. A teacher's kid, I pointedly made no effort in school. I've thought stuff that Wasn't Allowed.
But when I spoke my first opinion, I discovered it had all been safe, padded, wading-pool-with-floaties dabbling. After near on to fifty years, I finally started to grow up. If my Grands are any clue, I've still got twenty or thirty years to work on it, and get to be something like mature by the time I go senile.
It's not just that rights are useless if they are not exercised, not even that rights must be used or be lost. It's that exercising your rights, constantly, is what instructs you in how to be worthy of them.
Speaking out goes far beyond simple self-protection against morons or even moonbats -- it's an unequivocal and unmatched lesson that you are politically and morally sovereign; that you, and not the state, are responsible for your life and your fate. This absolute personal sovereignty is the founding stone of the Republic. "A free-speaking citizenry" (where citizenry is "the whole people") isn't just "necessary to the security of a free state" because it provides a backup to (and defense against) the Democratic Party and the Mainstream Media. More importantly, speaking freely trains sovereign citizens in the art of freedom, and accustoms us to our authority and duty.
As Eric S. Raymond wrote [remember, this is a reinterpretation of the post you just read; you did just read that post, right?]:
"To believe one is incompetent to speak out is, therefore, to live in corroding and almost always needless fear of the self -- in fact, to affirm oneself a moral coward. A state further from 'the dignity of a free man' would be rather hard to imagine. It is as a way of exorcising this demon, of reclaiming for ourselves the dignity and courage and ethical self-confidence of free (wo)men that the speaking out of one's mind, is, ultimately, most important."
Unless you have some specific impediment (and most impediments can be overcome), speak. Find out who you really are. (Yes, there are many paths to self-knowledge. But this tests something you cannot access any other way. No one path goes everywhere.) You'll probably discover you're not all that bad. And if not, well...
Think of it as evolution in action.
I cannot think of a better reason to speak than to affirm my political and moral sovereignty. Tomorrow morning I am heading down to the New Orleans Republican Party headquarters on Lee Circle and get placards and bumper stickers. Why don't a million or so of y'all do the same. Not to rile the Democrats (though that is a fun game), not to help Bush (though that is a good reason), but to instruct yourself in how to be worthy of the right of freedom of speech.
UPDATE 3 pm 10/20: People, it works. No sooner had I pulled my signs out of the car and set them up in my flowerbeds, than my neighbor came up and asked if I had one more. I did (I was going to put it in my window). I gave it to him and he put it up on his fence. Guess when the last time he displayed a political sign? Eisenhower!!!
People are starving all around you who want the validation of knowing they are not alone in supporting Bush. Let the sun shine in!
UPDATE 3 pm 10/23: One of my two signs was stolen sometime between late last night and now. My neighbor (the one from above) found it this morning in the garbage, put it back, and it is now stolen and not found back as of now. Car is not yet keyed. One sign still standing out front. Sheesh.
Posted by nopundit at October 19, 2004 10:21 PM