Harsh, over the top rhetoric is all too often a hallmark of our grand experiment in representative democracy. As the past couple of years have shown, free speech can be, and often is, offensive and nonsensical. When you allow people to speak their minds, very often you discover that what people have in their minds is…well, not very much at all, really. Better to be thought a fool than to open your mouth and remove all doubt, eh? Or not.
Still, there’s a pronounced difference between the legitimate expression of one’s opinion- however seemingly odious or ridiculous- and advocating violence against those you happen to disagree with. This is even more true when a Congressman essentially condones advocating violence with his silence. Earlier this week, at a town hall meeting, Rep. Paul Broun (R-GA) was asked a very simple question:
Who is going to shoot Obama?
The questions drew hearty laughs from the audience, and Broun belatedly issued a statement claiming that he “was stunned by the question and chose not to dignify it with a response.” Witnesses, though, reported that Broun laughed along with the rest of the audience after the question was asked.
It’s no secret that Paul Broun is no fan of Barack Obama. He answered “I don’t know” when he was asked if he believed that Obama was an American citizen and a Christian. His enmity and disrespect for the President is so thorough and complete that he even tweeted
The problem is that when political leaders who should know better embrace exhortations to violence, “secession,” guns at town halls, “Second Amendment remedies,” or bizarre tactical falsehoods like those of 9/11 truthers or birther conspiracists, they not only connect with their base, they green light extremists who see our elected officials and the institutions they inhabit as legitimate targets for contempt or even aggression. To be sure we must protect free speech, as the Supreme Court held in Terminiello v. Chicago, 373 U.S. 1 (1949), “a function of free speech under our system is to invite dispute. It may indeed best serve its high purpose when it induces a condition of unrest, creates dissatisfaction with conditions as they are, or even stirs people to anger.” Even at a time of great national division, when almost one in five folks say that both President Bush and Obama are, or could be the anti-Christ, elected officials should still responsibly stir constituents to action — even anger as part of an effort to make positive change. However, a Congressman who seemingly tolerates with a chuckle the assassination of our sitting head of state, does something else and should be condemned for it across the political spectrum.
Criticism and disagreement are real, legitimate, and should be welcomed and celebrated in a healthy, functional democracy. The problems begin when those who criticize and disagree are so convinced of the superiority of their beliefs and ideology that they’re willing to demonize, dehumanize, and perhaps even kill those who happen to view the world in a different light. When differences of opinion become viewed as evil and dangerous, it’s a small step from there to viewing those you disagree with as subhuman and, as such, worthy only of destruction and extermination.
Rep. Broun’s cowardice and lack of simple human decency in not immediately denouncing the person who posed the question about shooting the President is beyond reprehensible. At least Sen. John McCain (R-AZ) had the decency to contradict the elderly woman who called Obama a Muslim at an event during the 2008 Presidential campaign. Those we’ve elected to office need to be able to understand and recognize that words have meaning, and that some sentiments needed to be faced down immediately and forcefully. Asking who is going to shoot the President is no laughing matter…unless, I suppose, you’re convinced that the President is less than human and therefore worthy only of being killed.
We need to be able to recognize the difference between legitimate dissent and language that demonizes, dehumanizes, and rationalizes the destruction of those who think and believe differently. That’s not to say that asking who’s going to shoot the President rises to the level of criminality, but Rep. Broun erred egregiously in not immediately and forcefully condemning the questioner. There’s nothing funny in asking who’s going to shoot the President. That a Congressman chose to see humor in such a question is reprehensible. Then again, Rep. Broun is not someone I’d ever accuse of possessing an excess of simple human decency.
My fear is that eventually someone will ask the same question, and not much later it will be answered when someone actually does attempt to assassinate the President. Sadly, there will be those who will see such an event as cause for celebration, when in fact it would represent a new low in our collective tolerance for dissent.
When good men do or say nothing, it becomes possible for evil to triumph. Sadly, Rep. Broun seems to be OK with that.
WE DESERVE BETTER.
