Back-to-back letters by Steve Cupani and David Sheridan, published in the New Jersey Star-Ledger in January 2023, took aim at the first two amendments to the U.S. Constitution from opposite perspectives, each claiming that one or the other “creates” violence.
I’ll take each in turn.
Under the heading 2nd Amendment is a blessing, not a ‘curse’ [1/8/22], Steve Cupani responded to a Star Ledger Editorial Board (SLEB) titled “The 2nd Amendment is a curse:
Some people find that the Second Amendment is actually a blessing. Some would say the First Amendment is inherently just as dangerous as the Second Amendment, maybe even more so.
The content of propaganda and hate-related rhetoric allowed by the First Amendment’s right of free speech has inspired violence against others, and has led to people losing their lives over the course of history.
The Second Amendment’s gun ownership rights simply guarantee every citizen the right to defend themselves from any First Amendment-created violence toward them in this country.
I’m glad to see that Cupani understands that the fundamental argument for gun ownership rights is personal self defense, which derives directly from the individual’s inalienable right to life.
But as right as he is on the Second Amendment, he is much more wrong—dangerously wrong—on the First Amendment. The First Amendment guarantees intellectual freedom, including freedom of speech. Speech doesn’t create violence. Violence derives from individuals choosing to commit violence. People have free will. No matter how much “propaganda and hate-related rhetoric” he encounters, it is the violent offender, not the speaker, who is guilty of the violence. The idea that speech is violence is Woke nonsense.
And what of “propaganda and hate-related rhetoric?” Propaganda is defined by Cambridge Dictionary as follows: “information, ideas, opinions, or images, often only giving one part of an argument, that are broadcast, published, or in some other way spread with the intention of influencing people's opinions.” That’s the broadest definition, the most relevant, and the most useful. The concept “propaganda” is so broad as to basically make the advocacy of any controversial opinion capable of “creating violence.”
Likewise, how does one define “hate-related rhetoric?” Almost anything can be “related” to hate, sometimes even rational hatred. I hate Communism, Nazism, Theocracy, egalitarianism, and collectivism, which includes racism, a form of collectivism, of all kinds. How does that “create” violence? Should I be held responsible for whomever acts violently after hearing my opinion? If I criticize communism, am I responsible for some offended communist who commits violence after hearing my “propaganda?” Where is the justice in that? Cupani would probably protest, “But I didn’t mean that.” But then who gets to define “hate-related rhetoric?” Cupani? Champions of Communism, Nazism, Theocracy, egalitarianism, and collectivism, who exist in significant numbers.
My opposition to these ideologies, which I express regularly and strongly, is certainly hate-related. Should one of these advocates of ideologies I hate commit violence, is it me who “created” their violence? How, precisely, did I create it? Those are evil ideologies, you say? Only they should be (presumably) banned from speaking (which would happen without the First Amendment protections.) By what right does anyone have to silence them? If so, what limiting principle would prevent the silencing of proponents of “better” ideologies, such as me?
Cupani might say, But that’s political discourse. I’m talking about bigotry, like racism or homophobia. But again, bigotry can be subtle. So-called “anti-racists” claim racism is “implicit,” and comes camouflaged in ordinary language. What limiting principle can sort it out? What authority gets to decide? More to the point, On what basis is someone spouting explicit racial slurs responsible for someone else choosing to commit violence after hearing the slurs? How does one even prove it? The First Amendment protects all speech, including the right to fight back against disagreeable ideas or expressions through counter-speech.
In rebuttal to Cupani, David Sheridan, under the heading 1st Amendment isn’t the curse [1/16/22], wrote:
In his letter, Cupani argues that free speech incites violence, whereas the Second Amendment allows us to protect ourselves from that free speech-inspired violence.
I guess it has not occurred to Cupani that the violence, whatever its cause, too often manifests itself by the firing of guns made so plentiful by the modern over-interpretation of his beloved Second Amendment.
Perhaps if this hadn’t resulted in America being so dangerously over-armed, his need to defend himself wouldn’t be so urgent.
Certainly, some violence “manifests itself by the firing of guns.” But also by other means. There is a legitimate debate about the government’s role in regulating and limiting gun ownership, including what kinds of guns are permissible. Undoubtedly, too many people who shouldn’t own guns do, such as mentally unstable people or people with a prior history of violent behavior. But again, just as the violent offender, not some prior speaker, is the guilty party, the culprit in crimes involving guns is not the gun, but the criminal. The right to own a gun is an inalienable self-defense right. The peaceful, law abiding gun owner is not responsible for some other who commits a crime with a gun.
Both are wrong. But Cupani is the most egregiously wrong. I could sum up my basic counter-arguments; to Sheridan, I would say “Guns don’t kill people, people kill people,” and to Cupani, “Free speech doesn’t kill people, people kill people.” Regulating gun ownership in a rational, rights-respecting way could conceivably reduce some wrongful uses of guns used in violence. But restricting in any way freedom of speech, or more broadly First Amendment rights, could only lead to violence. Cupani’s implicit call for censorship or even repeal of the First Amendment is dangerous totalitarian nonsense.
Humans are rational beings. There are only two ways for people to deal with one another, reason or violence. Suppose, to apply one example, the government institutes policies that violate my rights—some Communistic, Fascist, or collectivist policy. Protected by the First Amendment, I can fight back through speech, advocating for politicians who would change those policies. Take my speech away, and what’s left? Ultimately, only some kind of physical resistance—i.e. violence. You can’t have a free, civil society—or counter the threats to thereof—without the freedom of expression and the broad protections for intellectual freedom embodied in the First Amendment.
The First and Second Amendments are not in conflict. The right to self-defense and the right to free expression are philosophical blood brothers. Sheridan complains of too many guns. Without the First Amendment, we’ll need many more guns, since our means of defending our rights, freedom of speech, would be banned. Cupani decrees violence. Much more violence would be the ultimate result of taking away the rights to express our “propaganda and hate-related rhetoric.” But most crucially, the First and Second Amendments—the rights of self-defense and the rights of self-expression—are integral to the rights to life, liberty, and property. Therefore, any restriction on these rights are not only impractical. They are immoral to the core.
Related Reading:
Under the Guise of ‘Gun Control,’ a Call to Trash the First Amendment
The First Amendment Restricts Government, Not Private Citizens
Protecting Rights vs. Sanctioning Action
To 'Stop Gun Violence,' Stop Free Speech, Leftist Says
Want to Stop Gun Violence? End the War on Drugs—FEE
Former Supreme Court Justice John Paul Stevens’ Scary Attack on the Right of ‘Personal Self-Defense'
Human Volition, not Guns, is the Source of Gun Aggression
HATE: Why We Should Resist it With Free Speech, Not Censorship (Inalienable Rights)--Nadine Strossen
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