Funny how phrases are often understood one way when they may have multiple meanings. I was thinking about this following the assasssination attempt in Arizona and calls for toning down the bombastic rhetoric used in political and social discourse on talk radio.
It's true, free speech and civility are not synonymous. One of the quickest ways to garner attention is to engage in hyperbolic bombast using rhetorical art to demean and diminish opponents. Of course, there's no guarantee that the attention you earn will be positive. And there's also the matter of culpability for what you say. I acknowledge folks have the right, the inalienable right, to their opinions and expression of the same no matter how deluded, criminal, or moronic I might believe them to be.
But I also hold to the idea that words are things - words have power and are not morally or ethically neutral. They are quite capable of inciting action: ask any advertiser, psychologist, or politician. And inasmuch as folks who hold bully pulpits like to take credit when folks behave in positive ways that confirm the speakers' arguments, they must also be held accountable for negative results and tragedies that arise when they pollute the airways in uncivil ways. Fair is, after all, fair - true?
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