Originally Posted by
chadknowslaw
Once you draw the line of what is ethical and what is not you cannot help but have problems. Making a LAW, so that breaking that LAW puts you in jail is exactly what laws about morals and ethics do. So, should we let the majority decide what is moral, then criminally charge those people that act immorally? Two adult men having consensual vanilla sex was one of those prohibitions and otherwise law abiding men went to jail for having sex in the privacy of their own homes. After the Lawrence v. Texas decision in 2003, our Supreme Court finally ruled that private, consensual sex by adults was not something that could be subject to criminal law. Deciding what speech is moral is very similar--once that line is drawn in the sand, the speech on the other side that we don't like becomes a criminal act. In a free society, tolerating unpopular speech is a necessity. If today we criminalize unpopular speech, then tomorrow what you say could become unpopular and subject you to jail for speaking your mind. Once a line is drawn for speech that is moral and speech that is immoral, a whole bunch of people will want it re-drawn to their tastes, so a line cannot be drawn around the content of the message no matter how repulsive.
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