WELP it’s been a bit – almost a year in fact – I was answering a facebook post and started delving down the rabbit hole, accidently making a blog post in the progress! (P.S. This blog post was refined with Echo IE ChatGPT)
I think many of us have forgotten what free speech truly means. It’s not meant to only protect speech we like or agree with. True free speech protects all voices — even the ones we find uncomfortable, offensive, or downright wrong.
The problem comes when someone’s words cross the line into actively harming others. That’s where the waters get muddy, where terms like “hate speech” come into play. And here’s the conundrum:
- If we say we value free speech, then we must accept that everyone has a right to express their opinion — even when it grates against our beliefs.
- But if that same speech is wielded as a weapon to hurt or dehumanize, suddenly it’s no longer just “free expression.”
We live in a free country, which means people are also free to seek out communities where their values align. If you don’t like how someone lives or thinks, you don’t have to join their club, church, subreddit, or dinner table. The issue isn’t that we disagree — it’s that somewhere along the way, we stopped respecting that disagreement.
I was once told:
“Religion is like a dick. A percentage of the population has one, but I only want it shoved down my throat if I ask for it.”
Crass? Maybe. Accurate? Absolutely.
The same could be said of politics, ideology, or personal beliefs. Share your truth, sure. But don’t force-feed it to everyone around you.
The Tom & Jerry Analogy
Imagine Tom and Jerry in one of their classic chases.
In their chaos, they stumble across a massive vat of milk.
While chasing each other, they both sneak sips from this vat — the same milk, the same shared desire.
Suddenly, a lightbulb moment: “Hey, maybe we’re not so different after all.”
But then Jerry starts fantasizing about all the cheeses he loves.
Tom, meanwhile, is daydreaming about pistachio ice cream, fish, and meat.
When they realize the other’s tastes are so “revolting” to them, they recoil in disgust. For a moment, they almost forget that what brought them together was just enjoying the same milk.
As the thought bubbles pop, reality comes back into focus:
they’re both still standing at that same vat. Neither one has to love what the other likes — but they can respect each other’s right to enjoy it.
The cartoon fades out with them resuming their chase,
but both dipping their hands into the milk every so often, sharing that common ground even while bickering.
Why This Matters
This is where we are as a society right now:
- The far left and far right are like Tom and Jerry mid-fight, too consumed by disgust at the other side’s “diet” to notice the milk between them.
- Those of us in the middle? We’re the audience watching, exhausted, shouting, “Just share the milk and stop wrecking the house!”
Most of us don’t care about every label, every culture war battle, every ideological purity test. We just want to live our lives, raise our families, protect our freedoms, and be left alone by “powers that be” who benefit from keeping us divided.
Free speech isn’t about agreeing — it’s about protecting the right to disagree without destroying each other in the process. If we can bring back that respect, maybe we can meet somewhere in the middle again.
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