The First Amendment...

to the Constitution of the United States is something about which people display a dismaying level of ignorance. And what might be seen as ignorance on the part of the educated, I can only take to be deceit. For instance, the issue often arises: "Will we display these controversial artistic endeavours in an art gallery?" If the answer should ever come back "No," then we will certainly hear the artist and the ACLU and the New York Times and everyone else of that ilk cry out "You're violating my/his/her freedom of speech!" The implication is that after the artist has created his art, the private or taxpayer-funded art gallery has an obligation to house the art using the space they pay money to obtain and maintain, pay money to promote the display, defend the art and artist from all opposition, potentially at the cost of the gallery's reputation. And all this is the least we can do to protect the artist's free speech rights, we are told.

I threw a bag of trash in the dumpster at my apartment the other day. That represents to me the way we are being treated by the government. This is performance art, I am an artist, and it is my free speech right to be given money for this. Hand over the cash, suckah.

Okay, that was just a brief fantasy tangent. In reality, free speech rights protect an artist from being told he can't create a particular piece of art. It doesn't guarantee that someone will pay for it or use their resources to house or display it. If no one else in the world (or even everyone else in the world except those who fund art galleries) wants it in an art gallery, it shouldn't be put in an art gallery.

One way to make this simlper would be to eliminate all government funding for everything related to the arts. Imagine how much simpler it would be to interpret the First Amendment! Speech could someday mean speech again!

On the other hand, Campaign Finance Reform laws restrict what people can say, when and how they can say it, and only right wing extremists sit up and take notice. This is a direct assault on the First Amendment and everything it was established to protect. To the ACLU's credit, they did speak out against the worst CFR proposals. But they seem more interested in protecting murderers and making sure that the inmates at Guantanamo Bay aren't served cold rice pilaf than they are in protecting political speech. And the rest of the crucifix-in-urine crowd supports CFR.

So the First Amendment mandates funding for a crucifix in urine, yet doesn't guarantee the right to use one's own money to buy an ad on a consenting TV network to tell the truth about the actions of a politician? Come on.

SRS