Freedom of tweet?

Freedom of Speech is one of the most important rights we have as Americans and is something that differentiates our society from others around the world. Speech can have positive and negative effects; hateful speech is just as protected as uplifting speech. However, we should consider how hateful speech could be before it should be stopped, or if it should be stopped at all.

Map of racist post-election tweets 

While we can all agree that there was no shortage of smearing campaign ads during the 2012 election, the most hateful speech may have come from social media sites. After Barack Obama was re-elected, there were many hateful tweets about the president. Many of them included racial slurs and referred to him as a monkey.

Some of these tweets were composed by teenagers whose profiles were not on private, so reporters were able to track down their schools. They contacted their schools about their student’s racial messages in hopes that “they could let them know that while the First Amendment protects their freedom of speech, it doesn't protect them from the consequences that might result from expressing their opinions”. These tweets and responses were compiled into an article that is eye-opening to how some abuse twitter and how far people will go to cover up their mistakes- many teens claimed their accounts were “hacked” and that they were offended people would write such things under their name.

This article (that I strongly encourage you to actually follow the hyperlink- some of the things being tweeted are shocking and appalling) made me think of our class discussion of John Stuart Mill. Mill believes that no opinion should be silenced because to silence an opinion is, to put in the words of Professor LM during lecture, robbing the human race. For if the silenced opinion is right, society has been robbed of its potential knowledge. If the silenced opinion is wrong, we lose the clearer perspective on the truth. Mill believes that harmful ideas should not be suppressed because if all ideas can compete freely, we will benefit as a society. However this freedom of speech gives each citizen a duty to evaluate and try to improve their own beliefs while interacting with others.

Mill is not impressed with these tweets

Mill does state that in the instance of hateful speech the expression should be stopped because when directed at another person, it can intimidate them into silencing their own opinion, and thus would be opposed to these Students tweets.

In the heat of political debate, it is clearly easy for some to lose track of the intentions of a presidential election: to find the next leader of the free world. This is a time to express our opinions pro or con in the way the Mill suggests. It makes for better political discourse and ultimately will help shape people’s political opinions that will help make their decision in the polling booth. These hateful tweets did not have any benefit or positive impact on the election and were simply filled with ignorance and hate. Thus, there is no place for them on the Internet. Even though legally these students were allowed to write whatever they wanted, they should reevaluate their decisions to say hateful things in the future. Hopefully while experiencing the consequences of their actions, these racist teens have learned their lesson. 

Sources-

Mill Photo-http://www.utilitarian.net/jsmill.jpg

Jezebel photo- http://blogs-images.forbes.com/kashmirhill/files/2012/11/Jezebel-Racist-Tweets.jpg

Racist Map photo-http://www.guardian.co.uk/news/datablog/2012/nov/09/mapping-racist-tweets-president-obama-reelection

http://jezebel.com/5958993/racist-teens-forced-to-answer-for-tweets-about-the-nigger-president

http://www.bartleby.com/130/2.html