speech and respect - College of Social Sciences and International ...

The Excesses of State Regulation
in the Bill of Rights will always be ours to enjoy. We must keep a
watchful eye, a sharp mind, and most of all, a willingness to
ensure that everyone is afforded the same freedom. 84
The producers of blasphemy, pornography, and hate speech are no
less inventive. Salman Rushdie's parody was sufficiently subtle to
escape most early reviewers; had he not named the protagonists after
historical characters his critique of Islam might have passed
unnoticed and certainly would have gained less notoriety. Pomographers
portray sex as mutual and call it erotica. Novel technologies
offer new means of dissemination. When the French government
launched its electronic conferencing system on Minitel, more than
20 per cent of the messages were sexually charged. America Online
invites computer users to meet electronically in a series of public
rooms—"Naughty Girls," "Romance Connection," "Gay Room"—
and then adjourn to private rooms for confidential conversations;
participants can use faxes to transmit sexually explicit photographs.
Sierra On-Line offers an interactive version of the best-selling aduit
software program, Leisure Suit Larry, in which participants can
configure the appearance of their characters and engage in sexual
adventures with each other. 85 Madonna clothed (or rather exposed)
her brand of striptease in the mantle of patriotism and civic duty by
giving rap performances urging young people to register and vote.
Wearing red panties, bra and combat boots and literally wrapping
herself in the flag, she incanted:
Dr. King, Malcolm X
Freedom of speech is as good as sex.
We need beauty, we need art
We need government with a heart.
Don't give up your freedom of speech.
Power to the people is in our reach.
Backed by two flag-waving male dancers in tight shorts and army
boots, who were paddling her, she warned: "If you don't vote,
you're going to get a spankie." Although a VFW spokesman
denounced this as "bordering] on desecration," Madonna's publicist
boasted that more than 10,000 college students had registered as
a result. 86
Racists translate hate into pseudo-science, substituting regression
analyses for vulgarities. The Nation of Islam has published The
100