zappepcs's Journal: Why Free Speech Is Important

Sometimes you see an opinion piece and it just seems to right to let it settle alone on a blog site. Below is such an opinion, and it is taken from http://frontpagemagazine.com/Articles/Read.aspx?GUID=B93243EA-B390-4B86-BA89-DCAA36A66277

It is important to understand that only individuals should be afforded rights. Ideas, thoughts and religions should not be protected from criticism. There is no such thing as defamation of religion. To the degree that it is concocted, the rights of ideas and religions will stand in direct opposition to the rights and freedoms of humans. The right of free speech is, in part, designed to offend others. The Founding Fathers of the United States Constitution erected the First Amendment for the purpose of fostering cantankerous political speech. They believed that the way to counter offensive speech and bad ideas is to engage in more speech, espousing good ideas. In this case, however, it is the OIC that clearly has the bad ideas, and not the alleged defamers. Perhaps the reason the OIC seeks to prohibit free speech rather than to rebut it, is because it too knows that free speech works.

While the US Constitution does not apply to all people on this planet, this does a nice job of stating why the right of free speech SHOULD apply to all peoples.