Umm… that doesn’t strike me as quite the same.
Jews do go around calling each other [themselves] “kike”. Not even in edgy music.
Sort of like what the right wing did with the Dixie Chicks back in 2003?
Not only doesn’t it, but when it comes to the “Court of Public Opinion”, you are not even covered by the notion that it’s a defense to be speaking truth.
She now finds herself in the distinguished company of not just Don Imus (“nappy-headed Ho’s”), who represents the merely ignorant faction in the Culture War, but also of such luminaries of the Left faction thereof as the Dixie Chicks (“ashamed George W Bush is from Texas”), Bill Maher (“is it cowardly to fly a plane into a building instead of firing a missile from 100 miles away”), John Lennon (“more popular than Jesus Christ these days”) and others. Sauce for the goose, sauce for the gander; **joebuck20 **called it.
Doctor Laura says she’ll stick to print and online - venues where she can absolutely control what words of her go out onto the public sphere. Good call, in view of this. But oh boy are these last months going to be a whinefest…
Nitpick : it’s “brouhaha”. It’s French. Je vous en prie.
Agreed.
I think it was more her radio persona speaking that makes her show interesting to some. That said, I’m still not convinced that Laura is racist.
The funny thing here is that…
I have not seen any of the civil rights which give anyone the right to an offince free life, or any recourse for being offended. You have the right to be offended, as often as you like and be get upset about anything/everything if you want too.
Your offence to what is said is illrelevent to my (her) first amendment rights to say whats on her mind.
The only time or place that peoples senseabilites seem to matter is: When the person speaking is somehow dependent upon popularity, such as an entertainer or elected government official.
Dr. Laura is an entertainer, or sorts, when she hosts a radio broadcast. If she decideds to pull back from that and act as a voice… something more like a journalist, reporter, commentator… then she would be more at liberty to express an opinion without reprocussions from the offended. If they want to change her mind, they’d have to deal with her in a more direct, open, honest forum and debate her.
I think that is her point.
I think if that were her point, she might have actually said something like it at some point.
And seriously - the first amendment has nothing to do with this, the government has nothing to do with this. This is her saying something that caused people to complain to her sponsors - and then, rather than waiting to see if she got fired, she quit in protest of other people exercising their rights to free speech.
In Dr. Laura land, you don’t have the right to complain about her.
Good grief, she never debated anyone on her show. If things weren’t going her way, as with that caller, she just cut them off and trashed them when they couldn’t respond.
So you think Dr. Laura’s First Amendment rights have been violated?
Well, mounting an organized campaign using lies and misrepresentations to remove someone’s ability to be heard would be considered usurping the rights. Just because that is not the government, it does not mean that well organized group is not abusing its place in a democracy - in other words, today they are removing someone you do not like but tomorrow it might be someone you agree with… how would you feel then?
Government itself is nothing but a super organized group.
It may be too strong of an analogy but people seem to be focused on technicalities. So, if you are put in jail you are still free to say whatever you want. It’s just that your audience is reduced.
You know … you’re absolutely right. When do we raid Fox News?
Care to debate? You think it’s okay if a group has enough power to silence people you disagree with?
To bring this back to the case under discussion, which group are you talking about? The people who were paying Schlessinger to speak, or her listeners whom the aforementioned fellows are obligated to please to retain advertising revenue?
I don’t debate matters of certitude—such as the fact Dr. Laura is not the victim of a vast left-wing conspiracy to deprive her of her rights.
So, no.
What power to silence does the vast left wing conspiracy have over Dr. Laura?
At this point I don’t have any specific group in mind. Please debate the question of principle as posited above.
^This. Piss off your sponsors, or piss off your sponsors’ potential customers, and it costs you? That is life, not an organized violation of your rights. Had she taken my advice, said “I’m not playing this, caller: if you don’t see my point there’s nothing I can do for you, and if you are insisting just to see if you can goad me into saying it myself, you’re a troll. Good bye”, she’d still be going on her normal business.
But, wait, you say, there are groups who organize together to influence others and that gives them power! Well, whoopee. Humans attain and exercise power through organizing into groups. The “Tea Party” is a collection of (more or less) organized groups; the Southern Baptist Church is a group; the Rainbow Coalition is a group; so’s the AARP; so’s NAACP; the American Legion, Republican Party, NRA, NORML, NOW - groups. Otherwise you just have a bunch of random individuals who can be independently ignored or picked off by other, more powerful individuals.
Utter fail in the analogy, man. Precisely because, the crux of the position that no rights were violated (just as no rights were violated to the Dixie Chicks or Imus) is that she is NOT being put in JAIL over it.
The First Amendment does not guarantee you that if you publish a newsletter and call your neighbors kikes, they can’t campaign for people to stop reading and advertising in your newsletter. It does not guarantee that if you call your daughter-in-law a slut and a whore in front of the children, those grandkids will not one day get together with their cousins to just cut you off from their lives and let you die alone in a cheap nursing home. It does not guarantee that the rest of the parishioners at First Congregational Church (whose Pastor, we hope, has a good command of grammar and spelling) HAVE to keep acting like nothing’s up if you insist on showing up “sky clad” for services and asking to get married to three other people of both genders in one same ceremony there.
Now, if the parishioners vandalize your car over that, then they have committed a crime against you. But merely shunning you and asking others to do likewise? That’s an exercise of THEIR freedom of expression.
The first amendment prohibits official censorship. It does not, can not, do anything about social censure. What it does guarantee you is that if you are willing to endure social censure for something you believe in, and are not endangering public peace and safety while you do it, the State will not interfere with your quest. All that Dr. Laura received for her expressions was social censure. That in the end it led her to an economic decision and now she wants to spin into some sort of persecution is just opportunism.
Define “silence”. Radio is a commercial enterprise. Neither Dr. Laura nor anyone else has an absolute right to be on the radio. Dr. Laura is free to sell her product – advice – wherever she likes, and hope that people will buy it, just as with any other product. She can absolutely give it away for free, by starting her own email newsletter, or standing on a street corner sharing her opinions. What she has no right to do is to force people to buy her product – or listen to her.
People have an absolute right not to listen to a radio show they disagree with, or not to purchase from the advertisers supporting that show. The alternative is to force people to listen, and then you’re in Kim Jung Il territory.
Doctor Laura is not having, and did not have, her first amendment rights violated. She’s making shit up. (not the first time, i would bet).
That’s right. No one can be forced to listen, and no one can be forced to be a sponsor either.
She wants to spin this episode so she will (somehow) appear to be the blameless victim.
What is the alternative? Should government step in and force people to listen to her show? I would hope the government has better things to do. Force sponsors to continue financing a radio show they may be embarrassed to support now? Why? Nobody forcibly and officially removed her and tossed her in radio prison. She used the N Word, quite a bit, and it pissed people off. Now she has a problem with the idea that other people have a problem with her and are pissed off. So what? She was damn stupid and people reacted. What a huge surprise!
In the final analysis, who really cares. Government did not trample her right to free speech. Her first amendment rights are safe.
She just discovered the flip side of the coin, which is,
You can say what you want, but you can not force anyone to listen.
Personally, I never thought she had one single thing worth saying or listening to. So why listen? If I did run a company, why should I sponsor someone I could consider an embarrassment or a liability?
I have a doctorate in psychology. Post doctoral certificates are real- it consists of training above and beyond a doctorate degree. I doubt however, Dr. Laura has one in Marriage and family therapy. It is well documented that she has a doctorate in physiology. Apparently she also has two masters degrees. One may very well be in Marriage and family therapy. However for her to make the claim, as she does, that she has a post doctoral certificate in Marriage and Family therapy, would require her to have a doctorate in Marriage and Family therapy first. I have never heard of her making this claim