{"id":283,"date":"2017-02-28T19:33:04","date_gmt":"2017-03-01T00:33:04","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/rationalnationusa.com\/blog\/?p=283"},"modified":"2017-02-28T19:33:04","modified_gmt":"2017-03-01T00:33:04","slug":"food-for-continued-thought","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/rationalnationusa.com\/blog\/archives\/283","title":{"rendered":"Food For Continued Thought…"},"content":{"rendered":"

Given what we are seeing from the\u00a0Trump administration the following article by Yousef Munayyer\u00a0<\/a>, written in 2015 and published in The New\u00a0York Times<\/strong><\/em><\/a>\u00a0seems especially\u00a0pertinent today. But maybe it’s just me?<\/p>\n

Freedom of speech does not mean freedom from its consequences. The ideal of freedom of speech is one well worth defending but it can only be guaranteed in a perfect world and sadly, as we have seen throughout 2014 and in the early days of 2015, our world is far from perfect.<\/p>\n

The heinous attacks and murders in Paris are the responsibility of the killers alone. Freedom of speech, however, is upheld by certain rules and laws in our society and governments and there is always going to be a minority who refuse to play by the rules. This reality means that merely having a public profile and expressing views on contentious issues can put one at risk.<\/p>\n

Should writers and artists be able to express themselves in any way they choose even if it is provocative and offensive? Sure, but they should also expect that provocative expressions will provoke and what exactly it provokes is impossible to know.<\/p>\n

Each writer, artist and publisher must decide for themselves which risks they are willing to take. Those who died in Paris knowingly took a risk and died. Did they expect that? I don\u2019t know. Did they deserve that? Certainly not! Could they have avoided such provocations? Yes. But should they have?<\/p>\n

My writing often focuses on Palestinian rights and you might be able to imagine the hate mail I get. Every unfamiliar letter, package or knock at the door I receive raises a troubling question in my mind; what if this is one I shouldn’t open? I live with that question as do countless people every day who write publicly on emotional issues. The hope is that the contentious convictions you espouse are ones that are truly worth taking on risks for.<\/p>\n

For me, freedom and equality for Palestinians is worth taking on risks to espouse. Gratuitous insults at venerated religious figures and others employing sometimes racist and disparaging images is not, simply because it adds nothing of any value to the public discourse. I am well aware that the staff of Charlie Hebdo believed otherwise, and paid the ultimate price for it.<\/p>\n

It must also be noted that there is a hypocritical tension around free expression in France, where Islamophobic speech is protected and yet Muslims cannot dress freely in certain public spaces.<\/p>\n

I respect the right of Charlie Hebdo to express what they want while simultaneously having no respect for most of the distasteful content they produced. If only more people could see that these two views are not mutually exclusive we would be in a better place. Unfortunately, we are not there yet.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Given what we are seeing from the\u00a0Trump administration the following article by Yousef Munayyer\u00a0, written in 2015 and published in The New\u00a0York Times\u00a0seems especially\u00a0pertinent today. But maybe it’s just me? Freedom of speech does not mean freedom from its consequences. The ideal of freedom of speech is one well worth defending but it can only … Continue reading Food For Continued Thought…<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"nf_dc_page":"","jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[23,18],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-283","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-hate-crimes","category-terrorism"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p8ovtF-4z","jetpack-related-posts":[{"id":399,"url":"https:\/\/rationalnationusa.com\/blog\/archives\/399","url_meta":{"origin":283,"position":0},"title":"On Freedom…","author":"Les","date":"March 10, 2017","format":false,"excerpt":"He laughs; \u00a0\u00a0 when he does, his face opens \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 his eyes beam like moon and stars In the silence of his voice \u00a0\u00a0 no words exist \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 but the soft hum of an almost \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 forgotten song In the enclosed world \u00a0\u00a0 of his room \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 he opens up\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Literature\/Poetry"","block_context":{"text":"Literature\/Poetry","link":"https:\/\/rationalnationusa.com\/blog\/archives\/category\/literaturepoetry"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":569,"url":"https:\/\/rationalnationusa.com\/blog\/archives\/569","url_meta":{"origin":283,"position":1},"title":"Freedom XIV","author":"Les","date":"March 31, 2017","format":false,"excerpt":"Have a great weekend. We certainty will as\u00a0we chuck the political BS for a few\u00a0days. We leave you with the following... And an orator said, \"Speak to us of Freedom.\" And he answered: At the city gate and by your fireside I have seen you prostrate yourself and worship your\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Literature\/Poetry"","block_context":{"text":"Literature\/Poetry","link":"https:\/\/rationalnationusa.com\/blog\/archives\/category\/literaturepoetry"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":458,"url":"https:\/\/rationalnationusa.com\/blog\/archives\/458","url_meta":{"origin":283,"position":2},"title":"Are We Really Who We Profess To Be?…","author":"Les","date":"March 19, 2017","format":false,"excerpt":"Here we are, precisely at the same place we were yesterday, last week, last month, and last year. Trying to determine just exactly how in the hell this nation of immigrants with the best governmental system known to humankind got so goddamned screwed up. A bunch of educated and liberal\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Crime\/Law Enforcement"","block_context":{"text":"Crime\/Law Enforcement","link":"https:\/\/rationalnationusa.com\/blog\/archives\/category\/crimelaw-enforcement"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":574,"url":"https:\/\/rationalnationusa.com\/blog\/archives\/574","url_meta":{"origin":283,"position":3},"title":"Trump May Be In The Mood To Compromise With Dems To Get A Healthcare Deal…","author":"Les","date":"April 2, 2017","format":false,"excerpt":"\u201cIf we don\u2019t get what we want, we will make a deal with the Democrats and we will have \u2014 in my opinion \u2014 not as good a form of healthcare, but we are going to have a very good form of healthcare and it will be a bipartisan form\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Government"","block_context":{"text":"Government","link":"https:\/\/rationalnationusa.com\/blog\/archives\/category\/government"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":579,"url":"https:\/\/rationalnationusa.com\/blog\/archives\/579","url_meta":{"origin":283,"position":4},"title":"Koch Influence In The Trump Administration…","author":"Les","date":"April 4, 2017","format":false,"excerpt":"The long reach of the Koch bothers into American conservative\/libertarian politics now reaches to the Trump administration. \u00a0They have been actively involved in exerting influence on politicians for years. Their primary goals are to strip regulation on business and reduce tax responsibilities on the wealthiest of Americans. They must certainly\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Ethics"","block_context":{"text":"Ethics","link":"https:\/\/rationalnationusa.com\/blog\/archives\/category\/ethics"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":212,"url":"https:\/\/rationalnationusa.com\/blog\/archives\/212","url_meta":{"origin":283,"position":5},"title":"The Importance Of Freedom Of Ideas And The Expression Of Them On American Universities…","author":"Les","date":"February 22, 2017","format":false,"excerpt":"Following is an excerpt from a speech\u00a0John Etchemendy made before the Stanford Board of Trustees. Etchemendy is the former Provost. His views ought to be listened to because academic political correctness, which is what he is talking about, does the student, our society and our democratic republic no good. Institutions\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Education"","block_context":{"text":"Education","link":"https:\/\/rationalnationusa.com\/blog\/archives\/category\/education"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]}],"jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/rationalnationusa.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/283","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/rationalnationusa.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/rationalnationusa.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rationalnationusa.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rationalnationusa.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=283"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/rationalnationusa.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/283\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":284,"href":"https:\/\/rationalnationusa.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/283\/revisions\/284"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/rationalnationusa.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=283"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rationalnationusa.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=283"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rationalnationusa.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=283"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}