Free Speech to Express What?
There is nothing new about the age-old debates around Free Speech and Free will.
Here is another example in the news recently:
Tobacco companies are challenging the federal government’s power (via the FDA) to regulate tobacco product advertising.
The tobacco companies claim this violates their right to free speech, that the government doesn’t have the right to force them to display imagery which persuades the public not to purchase their product, which they point out is a lawful product.
The Court’s reply was that the tobacco industry’s imagery “seeks to distract potential users from the fact that tobacco products are lethal and addictive.”
Free speech and self expression are important vehicles to have. They can be used for good or for bad, and for a wide range of things in between.
Self expression, too, of which free speech is just one aspect, can be used:
- To attract attention or to detract attention.
- To support or to oppose something.
- To express individuality or to express rebellious contempt.
- To get something done, or to stop something from being done.
- To unite, or to polarize.
- To be heard, or to drown out the voices of others.
Why waste free speech to defend tobacco product packaging? Aren’t there more important things to dedicate our lives to achieving?
That gets me thinking; how will I use my right/privilege/ability to express myself? How will you use yours? And, for what purpose? So many questions and so many options; but you’d probably agree that it’s better to have many options than to have none.
Let’s defend our right to Free Speech, but use it for something worthwhile. What worthwhile purpose would you use your right to Free Speech to express?
