Speaking Past Each Other
Will Baude has a response to my defense of PG and Ampersand, but I still think that he and I (and thus the Clerk and PG/Ampersand) are talking past each other.
First, he reiterates a point that no one disagrees with:
As The Clerk further points out, not only have the VFW not violated anybody's rights, but anybody who tried to make them do otherwise would be violating theirs.
We understand this. That's why no one is arguing that they should be forced to change their message. That's why WE are exercising our First Amendment rights in criticizing their actions. Because that is the proper way to attempt to change the VFW's views on the issues, by showing them that their actions engender disgust or disagreement.
Then Will tries to engage them on their real point, but I think fails pretty badly:
Both Ampersand and PG miss the VFW's point. The VFW thinks that opposing the war on Veteran's Day isn't "honorable" to veterans. This isn't a denial of their mission, it's just that Ampersand and PG don't like the VFW's interpretation of its own mission.
That's right Will, they don't like the VFW interpretation. They don't like it so much that they think it is actually contradictory or undermining of the stated mission. You and the Clerk might well disagree, but this is not a question of First Amendment rights at all. Will seems to be understanding that (which is why he makes two policy defenses of the VFW position), but then he suddenly tries to tie it back to the Constitution, and in so doing loses me completely:
You can and should feel free to disagree with the VFW's opinion on the merits, but you shouldn't disagree with the way they've chosen to express that opinion.
That seems nonsensical to me. I can disagree with the KKK but not call cross-burning "despicable"? What about if they just walk up and down the streets whispering racial slurs to minority chidlren? Not "despicable" enough? What if the VFW had excluded black veterans because "we don't honor you today"? Might that have been despicable, though constitutional? What about when the Nazis marched through Skokie? Constitutional, yes, but some might say it was "despicable" as well. I certainly don't think the VFW has so clearly crossed the imaginary line between respectable and despicable behavior, but these quick examples suggest this opinion/action demarcation that Will wants to make doesn't hold up.
I can criticize someone for having the relevant opinions (racist, anti-gay, anti-peace protesters, etc.) AND I can criticize them when they express those opinions in a way I consider particularly offensive or egregious. Not because I don't think they have a right to express them or because I'm trying to just keep them quiet, but because I'd rather they changed their opinion. One way of doing that is by suggesting that their opinion has led them to actions which I consider immoral, hypocritical, or otherwise wrong.
Under Will's line, I can't criticize the Nazis' march because that's "the way they've chosen to express that opinion." Well I'm sorry Will, but that's nonsense. The various ways of expressing opinions have different meanings unto themselves, they are value-added (or subtracted as it were) and I can and must criticize particular methods when I think they are inappropriate or immoral. After all, as Will admits at the beginning (but seems to forget):
[T]here are lots of despicable things one can do by exercising one's First Amendment rights.
But how are we to know this if no one is allowed to call it despicable?
That is the importance of the First Amendment in this discussion (since no one is questioning the VFW's right to exclude), and I'm not sure why the Clerk and Will Baude can't see it. The VFW exercises its First Amendment rights to exclude certain veterans, and PG and Ampersand exercise their First Amendment rights to say that the VFW's message is wrong and their exclusion of the anti-war veterans shows it. Will and the Clerk can think that PG/Ampersand are wildly off-base, that their criticisms are unfounded, etc., but none of that means that PG/Ampersand were in any way threatening the VFW's constitutional rights or the spirit of those rights. They were engaging in a normal, common method of criticism.
What's interesting is that the First Amendment is actually most threatened not by PG or Ampersand, but by Will's new formulation, where we "shouldn't disagree with the way they've chosen to express that opinion." That's an arbitrary and nonsensical restriction, and would greatly hamper debate.
UPDATE: I'm not sure if Will is trying to make me mad, but if so he's done it. While his new explanation for the comment I criticized is perfectly reasonable and allays much of my concern, this line at the end is not:
Personally, I think VFW's decision might be correct or incorrect, but it probably isn't despicable. If others disagree then let's move the debate to the merits, and get away from the red herrings.
Dammit Will, that's what I've been saying. That's where the debate was in the first place. It's the Clerk who threw the red herring of the First Amendment into the mix. PG and Ampersand WERE discussing the merits. As Will says:
Thus, in this case what should be at issue is whether or not the message of the parade (and the VFW's decision about who supported that message) was correct, incorrect, or despicable.
Well, Will, take another look at PG and Ampersand's original statements:
It suggests that the parade was organized in bad faith; it's not about honoring veterans, as it claims to be. It's about honoring veterans with "patriotically correct" opinions.
Looks to me like Ampersand was pretty clearly discussing the message of the parade, and what kicking out the anti-war veterans tells us about that message. And PG too:
It is not honoring veterans to tell them that they cease to be "true" veterans once they start opposing a war. It is not honoring veterans to tell them that their opposition to war is offensive and renders them ineligible to march in a parade.
So from my view, Will has ended up exactly where I was in the first place. The discussion began as a very reasonable and common critique of a group's message, as evidenced by their actions, and degenerated into a silly First Amendment discussion with the Clerk's red herring attacks.
