by Dr. Larry Burris

“First They Came” is a poem written by German Lutheran pastor Martin Niemöller in regards to the cowardice of German intellectuals following the Nazis’ rise to power and subsequent purging of their chosen targets, group after group:

FIRST THEY CAME
By Martin Niemöller

First they came for the Communists
And I did not speak out
Because I was not a Communist
Then they came for the Socialists
And I did not speak out
Because I was not a Socialist
Then they came for the trade unionists
And I did not speak out
Because I was not a trade unionist
Then they came for the Jews
And I did not speak out
Because I was not a Jew
Then they came for me
And there was no one left
To speak out for me.

___

So here’s a question for those of you who seem to favor banning speech: What are you going to do when big tech decides to cancel your account because someone doesn’t like what you have to say?

What are you going to do when there is no one left to protect your right to speak out?

Here’s a quotation from Supreme Court Justice Oliver Wendell Holmes: “If there is any principle of the Constitution that more imperatively calls for attachment than any other it is the principle of free thought—not free thought for those who agree with us but freedom for the thought that we hate.”

How willing are you to listen to ideas you don’t like? Or, put another way, how opposed are you to big tech deciding what you can, or cannot, listen to? Even for ideas you hate?

Try this quote from Winston Churchill: “Everyone is in favor of free speech. Hardly a day passes without its being extolled. But some people’s idea of it is that they are free to say what they like, but if anyone else says anything back, that is an outrage.”

People need to realize there is not a speech, or kind of speech, on the planet that someone else does not consider outrageous. It may come as a surprise, but I bet there is someone who considers your speech to be outrageous, and would like to censor it.

Once censorship starts, it is almost impossible to stop it—that is, unless everyone supports the idea, and the practice, of free speech for everyone.

__

Dr. Larry Burris is a professor at MTSU.