First Amendment

[Guest]

Literotica exists, and the US writers here are free to write as they wish because of the US First Amendement.

Now, high school students believe the First Amendment goes "too far" in protecting speech.

Indeed, "Only half of the students said newspapers should be allowed to publish freely without government approval of stories."

The story is on the CNN website.

 

[brightlyiburn]

I saw that.

All I can say is

 

[SeaCat]

Now this truly is scary, but it is not surprising. Most schools now focus on, and force the teachers to focus on the students passing tests like the FCAT.

What is scary about this is these are the future leaders and voters in our country. If they believe the First Amendment rights go too far, then it will be within their power to reduce those rights, as it will be in their power to reduce other rights. Scary when you think about it. We can only hope they do learn about their rights, and understand why they are important before they allow themselves and others to lose them.

Cat

 

[rgraham666]

I can't say I'm surprised.

Ignorance is far more useful than censorship in controlling thought.

Undoubtedly, the pollsters asked the wrong questions. The important one is "How would you feel if the government restricted your freedom of speech?"

The people in favour of restricting free speech always assume it will, and should be someone else who will be restricted. For some reason, they never seem to think it will happen to them. And that protections are for all of us.

"First they came for the Jews…" etc.

 

[Op_Cit]

What do you expect from a public education system that teaches that the Civil War was over slavery? (to be correct, it wasn't even a "civil" war but a failed war for independence.)

Or that fails to teach that the Second Amendment was among other things about the peoples' right and capability to over throw their own government?
(Liberals inclined to love the First Amendment swiftly move to toss this one out the window.)

Or that allows the television myth of the fishing expedition: that you don't have to explicitly identify each item that you're looking for in a search warrant.

Or that completely ignores the Ninth Amendment? (this is the one the gay marriage advocates should be resurrecting.)

But that's all superfluous. Because what do you expect a constitutionally invalid institution (federally funded/regulated education) to be doing if not trying to justify its own existence?

 

[cantdog]

That sort of thing is why we've never dared to hold a Constitutional Convention again, to fix things like, for example, the electoral college. Every time the idea has come up, and it has, believe me, there are always too many yahoos who value other things above freedom. The Bill of Rights would never survive a referendum. Not at any time in the twentieth century, and not in the present one, even more.

 

[R. Richard]

I think that the scariest thing about the students willingness to restrict free speech is that what the young students are voicing is a reflection of the education they are being given. That is, the views are basically a reflection of the views of their teachers.

If you do not like the views of the students, you must start any change with the teachers of the young. Changing the teaching should be easy, We, you and I, pay the teachers. If you are not getting what you want, you should raise your voice, I have. It is your money and your kids.

JMHO.

 

[Couture]

When you are in school, you don't have the right to free speech. Twelve years to stamp out what little independent thought the little 'uns have left. Is it a wonder they don't give a shit about the first amendment?

 

[cantdog]

Couture makes a point. Kids have about as many rights at law as a chair, except they can't be sold or intentionally put at risk. The last part only applies after they've already been harmed or put at risk, so it's not very good preventatively.

They have no free speech, no freedom of the press, no freedom of assembly, no freedom from search and seizures, anybody up to and including soldiers can be quartered on them, any money they make belongs legally to their parents or guardians. They're a special variety of chattel.

But the emphasis in the schools is not to prepare citizens of a republic, but obedient members of the subclass in a totalitarian state. They do not learn to question authority, they are not encouraged to be independent, they are even trained to wolf down their food in less and less time as they pass from grade to grade in the schools, so that they will take quick lunch breaks in the workplace and get the fuck back on the job.

Civics isn't taught any more, and obedience and order is paramount. They drug you up if you don't fit in.

 

[Joe Wordsworth]

Originally posted by cantdog
Couture makes a point. Kids have about as many rights at law as a chair, except they can't be sold or intentionally put at risk. The last part only applies after they've already been harmed or put at risk, so it's not very good preventatively.

They have no free speech, no freedom of the press, no freedom of assembly, no freedom from search and seizures, anybody up to and including soldiers can be quartered on them, any money they make belongs legally to their parents or guardians. They're a special variety of chattel.

But the emphasis in the schools is not to prepare citizens of a republic, but obedient members of the subclass in a totalitarian state. They do not learn to question authority, they are not encouraged to be independent, they are even trained to wolf down their food in less and less time as they pass from grade to grade in the schools, so that they will take quick lunch breaks in the workplace and get the fuck back on the job.

Civics isn't taught any more, and obedience and order is paramount. They drug you up if you don't fit in.

That describes absolutely no part of my public education.

 

[minsue]

The Bill of Rights would never survive a referendum.

*SHUDDER*

Agreed, but still shuddering.

 

[cantdog]

Mine, about fifty-fifty. I started school in 1958-59 school year, when Eisenhower was president. I graduated in 1970 from a school with mandatory junior ROTC for all male students. They were, of course, drafting for southeast Asia at the time. My Dad had been in Korea, and my grandfather stateside training during WWII. Lunch "hour" had shrunk to about ten minutes by then, and my first few jobs allowed twenty if things weren't too busy.

We had Civics, but my daughter had only state history in junior high (one quarter out of a school year with four) and US History, which had little emphasis on the responsibility of citizens to be informed participants in their own governance. Almost none at all.

I am gratified to learn that you had leisure for long lunches and a thorough grounding in civics. You have been, as always, very fortunate to have had a superior educational experience.

cantdog

 

[Joe Wordsworth]

I had civics, I had a forty-five minute lunch break (or hour, can't remember), I had economics, I was required a language, we covered state history, US history, and the like. I was not trained to be subserviant, I was not taught that lacking creativity or critical thinking was some kind of virtue or destiny or purpose.

If I had a "fortunate" educational experience, relatively speaking, then every high school graduate in the state of Mississippi must be so fortunate... and if we're saying Mississippi is somehow an educational icon, we're obviously not looking at the statistics properly at all.

 

[Op_Cit]

I had civics, I had a forty-five minute lunch break (or hour, can't remember), I had economics, I was required a language, we covered state history, US history, and the like. I was not trained to be subserviant, I was not taught that lacking creativity or critical thinking was some kind of virtue or destiny or purpose.

If I had a "fortunate" educational experience, relatively speaking, then every high school graduate in the state of Mississippi must be so fortunate... and if we're saying Mississippi is somehow an educational icon, we're obviously not looking at the statistics properly at all.

So you're education included details such as the plight of the "Bonus Army", the factors which lead to the institution of income tax, Lincoln's abrogation of the Constitution?

Did they teach you that minor detail about the Emancipation Proclomation, that it didn't free any slave? Maybe they explained why in 1776 a declaration of independence was a natural right, yet not so in the 1860's?

Perhaps they explained to you how a hundred years ago they needed a constitutional amendment to make alcohol illegal, yet somewhere along the way, they no longer needed an amendment to make any other drug illegal?

Maybe you can point out where in the Constitution it says felons, who have served their terms, are not included as "people" when it comes to the Bill of Rights?

Can you show me where the verbage is in the Constitution that says paper money is official?

It took me many years to unlearn the things that I was fed.