Relatable with Allie Beth Stuckey - Ep 12 ｜ Free Speech & Our Fast Track to Tyranny

00:00:00.000 What's up, guys? Welcome to Relatable with me, Allie Stuckey. This is a podcast by CRTV.

00:00:06.680 Sorry that this episode is a little bit late today. I've been having technical difficulties.

00:00:11.100 Hopefully, I won't run into any as I am recording this one. So my apologies for that. I really feel

00:00:18.380 like I haven't talked to you guys in like 10 years, even though it's only been a week. But

00:00:22.660 it's been a long few days. I've been traveling. I was in LA, then I was in Georgia, visiting my

00:00:28.220 husband's family, which was really fun. But now I am back with you, my friends. And I really do feel

00:00:34.000 like you guys are my friends. I hope that's OK. I really hope that you feel that way, too. Even

00:00:38.500 those of you who hate me, I feel like if we hung out and we didn't talk about politics, that you

00:00:44.460 might like me and we might be friends. I don't know. Maybe you'd still hate me. And that would

00:00:48.480 be totally fine. Thanks for listening anyway. OK, we have a lot to cover today. Let's go ahead and

00:00:53.980 get started. We are going to discuss the issue of free speech, how it is being dangerously

00:00:59.260 threatened right now and why that matters. We are also going to talk about what free speech

00:01:04.640 actually is and what it is not. And don't worry, for those of you who are wondering and who have

00:01:10.100 been asking, I will touch on Ireland's decision to legalize abortion. And better yet, I will 0.64

00:01:15.280 find a way to tie it into the issue of free speech. This is going to be fun. We are going

00:01:20.480 to cover a lot of ground and you will be smarter and more knowledgeable because of it, which is

00:01:25.020 always my goal. So first things first, why are we talking about free speech today? Well, there are

00:01:32.500 a few reasons. There is a right wing guy in Britain named Tommy Robinson who is being jailed

00:01:38.800 currently basically for his political views. There's a little bit more background on that that

00:01:43.440 I'll give you. And people in Britain, journalists in Britain were being told by the government not to

00:01:47.980 even report on his arrest at all. There is also the issue of the NFL and kneeling. Then there is

00:01:53.780 also Roseanne, whose show was just canceled by ABC because of her tweeting something racist about

00:01:58.820 Valerie Jarrett, who used to work in Obama's administration. There is also Starbucks, who

00:02:03.620 just had anti-implicit bias training this week for all of their deeply racist employees. Now, first,

00:02:10.420 I want to note, not all of these things have to do with free speech, but they are all being lumped

00:02:16.320 together in the conversation about free speech, the First Amendment, political correctness,

00:02:21.340 suppression, mind control, stuff like that. So first we need to distinguish what does the concept

00:02:26.400 of free speech mean and what does it not mean? Free speech in the United States of America means

00:02:33.180 freedom from government suppression or censorship of your speech. Free speech is guaranteed by the First

00:02:39.800 Amendment to the Constitution, which says Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion

00:02:46.000 or prohibiting the free exercise thereof or abridging the freedom of speech or of the press

00:02:51.520 or the right of the people to peaceably assemble and to petition the government for a redress of

00:02:58.400 grievances. So Congress can't make any law that hinders the freedom of speech. Now, there have been

00:03:03.580 many a Supreme Court case about what that actually means. A major one is Texas v. Johnson, for example,

00:03:09.420 where the court ruled that burning the American flag is protected under the Constitution.

00:03:13.000 So that's a pretty inclusive interpretation of the First Amendment. There have also been

00:03:17.480 exclusive rulings on the First Amendment that usually have to do with something called the

00:03:22.080 clear and present danger test, which was used in Schenck v. United States, Abrams v. United States,

00:03:27.600 and Whitney v. California, for example. The court used that test until 1969 when they started using

00:03:35.080 something called the imminent lawless action test. So under the clear and present danger test,

00:03:39.660 if you said something that was meant to cause illegal or dangerous action, your words were no

00:03:43.960 longer protected by the First Amendment. But the imminent lawless action test, the test that

00:03:48.600 they still use now, says that you that what you say has to cause both likely and imminent illegal

00:03:55.160 action for you to be protected, not to be protected by the First Amendment. This is where you get the

00:04:00.680 whole you can't yell fire in a theater thing. There are also limits to the First Amendment that

00:04:05.700 include defamation like slander and libel and obscenity. But an obscenity is different than

00:04:12.420 than defamation, just to make that clear. But proving a case for defamation or obscenity is really

00:04:18.180 hard to do because the standards of those things are subjective. And so they're constantly being

00:04:22.180 challenged. So not all speech is protected by the First Amendment, but most speech is. Hate speech is

00:04:28.260 protected by the First Amendment. There is actually it can be argued no such thing as hate speech because

00:04:33.980 the definition of hate is constantly getting more and more broad or maybe it's broader and broader

00:04:38.940 today to the left. It seems like hate means disagreeing with you. It means saying something that is true

00:04:46.360 that they don't like holding a religious view that they don't like most on the left. It seems like now

00:04:52.800 would love nothing more than to ban what they deem hate speech, anything they qualify as racist or sexist

00:04:59.460 or Islamophobic. But actually, it is that kind of speech that the First Amendment was set up to

00:05:05.700 protect. Controversial speech. We don't need the First Amendment to protect ideas that everyone agrees

00:05:11.600 on. We don't need the First Amendment to protect boring mainstream ideas. We need it to protect the

00:05:17.560 offensive ideas, the ideas that are constantly being pushed to the outskirts because no one wants to

00:05:22.600 hear them. The ideas that are in danger of being silenced. That is what the First Amendment is for.

00:05:27.540 The First Amendment is supposed to protect this so-called hate speech. That is its whole point.

00:05:33.640 The First Amendment wasn't established to actually condone speech. It was just established to protect

00:05:38.860 it. I think that all people, no matter how much I loathe what they believe, no matter how much hate

00:05:45.860 they have in their heart, no matter how much I disagree with them, I think that they should be able to

00:05:51.240 be free to speak their mind without fear of punishment from the government. 0.99

00:05:55.440 Uh, Louis Farrakhan, a racist, crazy anti-Semite who spews hate on a daily basis. I want him to 1.00

00:06:02.240 have free speech. Neo-Nazis who believe all kinds of terrible things, including that women should

00:06:07.220 basically be in the kitchen and who shouldn't have a right to vote. Um, they should have free

00:06:11.340 speech. These are the ideas that the First Amendment was set up to protect.

00:06:15.000 Why? That's a good question. Why would the Founding Fathers create an amendment to protect ideas that

00:06:21.460 are offensive and hateful? Because they knew that the definition of what is offensive and hateful

00:06:27.220 changes with whoever is in power. So say that America didn't have a First Amendment. Say in America, 0.98

00:06:33.400 Congress, uh, that they were free to make a law that restricted certain kinds of speech. 0.59

00:06:39.480 Say in 1950, every single one of the congressmen were Christians and they said, okay, no one gets 0.92

00:06:47.140 to talk about evolution. You are not allowed to say there is no God. You are not allowed to say that

00:06:51.940 Jesus was not the son of God. So Jews, you're out of luck. And also if you get angry, you can only say 1.00

00:06:58.140 gee willikers and dag nabbit. Everything else is considered hate speech and hate speech is offensive

00:07:03.380 and illegal. Would most people be okay with that? No, everyone who is not a Christian would not be okay 1.00

00:07:08.900 with that because a group of men who don't necessarily, who doesn't necessarily represent

00:07:14.020 all of America passed a law based on their own arbitrary subjective definition of what is okay

00:07:19.380 to say and what is hateful to say. Fast forward 80 years to 2030. I think that I got that math right.

00:07:25.620 Say we have an all transgender Congress and they say, you are not allowed to say he, she,

00:07:31.140 we hereby decree that everyone can only say zoo and loo. That is what you call people based on their

00:07:38.000 name tags on which they write their preferred title zoo or loo right after comrade. Of course,

00:07:42.900 anything else is hate speech and that is illegal. Would we be fine with that? No, of course not.

00:07:48.220 Because again, a group of people who, who doesn't necessarily represent America is legislating 0.72

00:07:53.680 censorship based on their own subjective standard of what is hateful and what is not.

00:07:57.840 So in more realistic terms, without the first amendment, what would be stopping a left leaning

00:08:03.820 Congress from telling us that we can't talk about Jesus anymore? That sharing our faith at work or

00:08:08.560 with our neighbors is hateful, offensive and wrong. What would be stopping a progressive government

00:08:13.420 from censoring books on capitalism? More imminently, what would be stopping them from telling us that

00:08:18.660 we can no longer talk about the dangers of illegal immigration? When would we be prevented 0.93

00:08:23.400 from publishing material that shows the gruesome reality of abortion? Being anti-illegal immigration

00:08:28.860 and pro-life are radical far right stances these days. You think a democratic Congress wouldn't

00:08:34.740 censor those ideas if they could? Their entire business on the left is thought control through

00:08:39.940 clever messaging. Of course they would. That is why we need the first amendment to protect ideas that 0.91

00:08:45.460 the majority considers dangerous. Those are our ideas, conservative ideas now that are considered

00:08:51.300 dangerous, but tomorrow the scandalous idea could be progressive. That's why this is an issue for both

00:08:56.140 the right and the left to defend. The first amendment protects all of us. So that's what the first

00:09:02.040 amendment is. That's what free speech as it pertains to the first amendment is. Um, here's what it is

00:09:06.860 not. It is not freedom from consequences. It does not protect you from being fired or punished. If you say

00:09:13.500 something stupid, you could lose your job. You could lose credibility. You could lose an award, lose your 1.00

00:09:18.440 scholarship, lose your relationship. You could get banned from Twitter. You could get censored on YouTube

00:09:23.520 or Facebook. And I hate social media censorship. I think it's morally wrong and bad company policy.

00:09:31.060 Um, but them censoring me is not actually a violation of free speech. When we were young,

00:09:38.220 for example, in elementary school, if we talked what we weren't supposed to or said something we

00:09:42.960 weren't allowed to say, we got in trouble. That wasn't a violation of our first amendment rights.

00:09:47.220 That was just, they were school rules. And as students of the school, we had to obey them.

00:09:53.400 The first amendment only prevents the government from creating a law that hinders free speech.

00:09:59.140 So if a company say, I don't know, the NFL says, Hey, you're, if you're out on the field and the

00:10:07.360 anthem is playing, you have to stand, uh, their new policy, by the way, if you didn't know that if you

00:10:12.340 are on the field, um, you stand for the anthem when it's being played, if you don't want to stand,

00:10:17.040 you have to stay in the locker room, but no kneeling is allowed. That is not a violation

00:10:20.940 of free speech. Now you can still disagree with that policy. You can say it's immoral. You can say

00:10:25.360 it's wrong. That's fine, but it doesn't have to do with, uh, the constitutional protection of free

00:10:31.600 speech. The NFL players are free to protest on their own time, but when they are on the field,

00:10:39.960 they are on their boss's time. They are in uniform and they are there to play the game and entertain

00:10:45.980 the ticket holders. They are not there to make political statements. Now I will defend to the

00:10:52.880 death, the NFL players right to protest. Do I agree with their protest completely? No police brutality

00:10:59.320 is not evidence of systemic racism in the police force. Any instance of police brutality is wrong,

00:11:05.280 of course, but it doesn't point to institutional racism against black people. The stats just don't

00:11:09.360 back that up. Even so the players have a right to protest on their own time, not on the NFL's time.

00:11:17.000 The NFL is a private company who is free to make their own policy. Players as employees of the NFL

00:11:22.040 are obligated to obey that policy or risk getting punished just like any other job. The punishment

00:11:27.360 in this case with this new policy, um, is that the team gets fined if any player kneels. So there's a

00:11:33.300 lot of hubbub about that. And I understand the concerns on both sides. Conservatives want to force the

00:11:39.100 players to stand and be on the field. And sure the NFL could do that. They have the right to do

00:11:43.820 whatever they want, but I'm not so sure that some major cultural win for conservatives that really

00:11:50.860 just puts a bandaid on the cancer that's festering beneath the surface, which is political and racial

00:11:55.420 division. That's fostered a real resentment among many on the left toward our country. I'm not sure

00:12:01.220 forcing the players to stand for the anthem really does much for anyone, except we get to put a point

00:12:09.500 on the board. Uh, liberals on the other hand, want people to be free to kneel, but I totally get why

00:12:16.320 the NFL doesn't want that. Uh, they don't want their games to be about politics. This isn't a time for

00:12:22.280 politics. People watch football to get away from politics, but honestly, the NFL's new policy isn't

00:12:27.540 going to make things less political. People are going to know who stayed in the, in the locker

00:12:32.780 room. So it's going to be essentially the same thing as kneeling. It'll be the new kneeling. The

00:12:36.520 conversation will be the exact same. It's just a new form of protest. Uh, the only thing they could

00:12:42.900 have done was to scrap the national anthem altogether, which to me would be really symbolic

00:12:48.380 and kind of sad about of where we are. Um, we can't get along. So let's tear down the one thing

00:12:54.640 that holds us all together. The one thing that unites us, no matter what our skin color is,

00:12:58.380 the fact that we're Americans, but also it wouldn't be that big of a deal because the NFL

00:13:04.560 didn't have players standing on the field for the anthem until 2009. So really recently, um,

00:13:09.880 they could still play the anthem, but everyone just stays in the locker room while the players

00:13:13.380 stay in the locker room. But you know, you know what in 2018, I think what happened, I bet that you

00:13:20.180 would have players that would run out on the field and stand for the anthem anyway, to,

00:13:24.380 you know, try to prove a patriotic point. But then the question would be, okay, would the team

00:13:29.360 get fined for that? And then if so, I'm sure conservatives would be mad that people are

00:13:34.440 getting punished for being patriotic and around and around we would go forever and ever. Um,

00:13:39.500 at this point there, there might be no good answer. In my opinion, it was never a good idea

00:13:45.420 for Kaepernick to use his company's time to protest a political issue, protest it all you want. Like I've

00:13:50.940 said again and again, but not on your employer's time. And again, that has nothing to do with free

00:13:56.000 speech or the first amendment and everything to do with company policy. Uh, you will hear people

00:14:00.540 incessantly call this a free speech issue. And in terms of the constitution, it's, it's just,

00:14:05.620 it's not, um, a second issue that has nothing to do with the first amendment, but people want to

00:14:11.840 make you think it is, is Roseanne. Um, okay. So in case you guys didn't hear the, the Roseanne show

00:14:18.180 got canceled after Roseanne Barr tweeted something racist about Valerie Jarrett, who used to work in 0.98

00:14:23.260 the Obama administration. Uh, Valerie Jarrett is black and Roseanne said she looks like a cross 0.95

00:14:28.000 between the Muslim brotherhood and planet of the apes. Yikes, yikes. Um, of course this is racist. 0.99

00:14:35.160 It sounds racist anyway. Now, this is not defending Roseanne at all. I just think she could be this kind 0.89

00:14:42.160 of crazy and loopy. I honestly wouldn't be surprised if she didn't mean it as racist. She might have 0.98

00:14:50.280 really just thought that she was commenting on her appearance and didn't consider race. I mean,

00:14:55.460 Roseanne is a liberal. I don't think that she is actually a racist, but even if that wasn't her 0.99

00:15:01.560 intention, no matter what, I mean, it was stupid and it was wrong. And this was actually just one 0.99

00:15:08.420 tweet, uh, among a lot of other apparently controversial tweets, according to ABC. Um,

00:15:13.920 so this is not the first time that ABC got complaints about this, um, regarding Roseanne.

00:15:19.700 Now, if you don't know, uh, the reboot of Roseanne showed Roseanne as a Trump supporter, which was a

00:15:25.060 really big deal because Trump supporters are never seen on sitcoms. So conservatives embraced her. 0.98

00:15:30.160 Some did not all, uh, including me. I didn't embrace Roseanne because I've never really probably seen a

00:15:37.180 full episode of Roseanne. I remember it being on TV, maybe like for a little bit when I was younger,

00:15:42.940 I never liked it. I just think it's, it was kind of nasty. It's not, it's not my humor. It didn't

00:15:48.100 reflect my family's values. Um, now did I appreciate during the reboot when it was rebooting the slight

00:15:55.080 ideological diversity that we were seeing in the mainstream? Yes. Did I find it interesting that

00:16:00.500 the show did so well and had so much support despite Hollywood acting like Trump supporters

00:16:05.420 don't exist or that we don't watch TV? Yes. But Roseanne, the character and the person they're,

00:16:11.200 they're liberal. Like I said, um, I just think that the show was degrading that, uh, that it wasn't

00:16:16.600 funny, that it was inappropriate. Um, I, I didn't watch any of the new episodes either,

00:16:22.240 but of course, because Roseanne was a Trump supporter, a lot of people who probably felt

00:16:27.340 like I do actually about the show, uh, they embrace her anyway. Sean Hannity was about her.

00:16:31.980 Now he has since said that her comments were wrong. Uh, Trump called her to congratulate her.

00:16:37.140 Trump also tweeted this morning, uh, Wednesday morning that there's a double standard at ABC.

00:16:43.060 Um, and it did kind of seem for a while, like she was joining the right. She was tweeting in support

00:16:48.540 of Kanye West. She followed me on Twitter, LOL. She actually started liking some of my tweets a

00:16:53.920 while ago, which I remember thinking was funny at the time. Um, but listen, homegirl be crazy. 0.99

00:16:59.320 She crazy. Uh, David French had a good short summary of this in national review where he 0.94

00:17:04.060 summarized all of Roseanne's insanity over the years. And there's really no denying the fact that

00:17:08.800 she is a conspiracy theory loving Looney Tune. She might, she might, I don't know her be an otherwise 1.00

00:17:15.380 good person. I think probably a lot of people love her, but she's a little bit of a Looney Tune

00:17:19.620 guys. Um, she believes Bush, for example, is responsible for nine 11. She thinks the ruling

00:17:25.680 class in America is running to pedophile sex cult. She said she hopes people who eat Chick-fil-A 0.99

00:17:30.700 get cancer. She thinks Zionism was created by the third Reich. She's not what you would call 0.87

00:17:37.320 a role model. Okay. She's not, it never has been a good face for conservatism. I wouldn't even say

00:17:44.740 she's any, I don't even think any bit of her as a conservative. She's a social liberal who is off 1.00

00:17:51.300 her rocker, who also happens to have voted for Donald Trump. That's it. I totally get though,

00:17:56.700 that conservatives desperately wanted someone in mainstream pop culture that was fighting for

00:18:01.560 them, which is why people jumped so quickly on the Kanye train, but she never represented

00:18:06.900 conservative values. We can't be that desperate. You guys, if we never have true conservatives in

00:18:13.100 Hollywood, who really cares? We don't need that. And we've actually prided ourselves many, many times

00:18:18.320 on not needing that. But anyway, once again, the conversation on what Roseanne said has centered

00:18:24.500 on free speech. Well, this doesn't have anything to do with free speech. Sure. Roseanne is free to say

00:18:31.460 what she wants to say, but ABC is also free to fire her. Like I said, according to CNN, this apparently

00:18:38.280 wasn't the first time ABC had had an issue with her tweets. So it was time to cut ties. Roseanne's

00:18:44.160 first amendment rights are not being violated here. Now, could you argue it's not fair? Sure. You could

00:18:51.240 look at Bill Maher, Keith Olbermann. You could look at Michelle Wolf, Jimmy Kimmel. Keith Olbermann

00:18:57.920 specifically has said some really nasty stuff about Donald Trump calling him a Nazi. And yet he has an

00:19:06.000 expanded role at ESPN right now. And you could look at all that and say, OK, there's clearly a double

00:19:11.800 standard, which is true. Even though Kathy Griffin was fired from CNN after she posed with Donald Trump's

00:19:17.480 severed head, it's still obvious on social media and in the mainstream that there is and probably has

00:19:24.520 been for a while a bias that is increasingly tilted towards the left and that conservatives are held to

00:19:31.120 much higher in a much more virtuous and a restrained standard than those on the left. So sure, that could

00:19:39.300 be your point and you would be correct. But that doesn't mean that Roseanne's show should still be

00:19:45.100 on air. Not everything in life is about conservatives versus liberals. Some things are just right and wrong.

00:19:52.640 Roseanne was wrong. And you know what? I think everyone should be held to that standard. That's the standard

00:19:58.480 we have. That's the standard that we should keep no matter what your political affiliation is.

00:20:04.240 I think it should go both ways. I'm fine with the outrage. I do believe that the outrage should be

00:20:09.040 equal on both sides. But again, this is not a free speech issue. Here's what is a free speech issue.

00:20:15.220 The arrest of Tommy Robinson in England. Tommy Robinson is a right wing and I don't usually use that term,

00:20:22.180 but he's not a conservative. He's just a right wing anti-Islam guy whose goal is to preserve the West,

00:20:28.780 Western culture against the infiltration of Muslims and other immigrants. He said some pretty off the

00:20:35.800 wall stuff, not just about Muslims, but about Jews and others as well. He's not a guy that I would

00:20:40.720 associate myself with. He's certainly what I would consider alt right. But none of that really matters.

00:20:45.940 I don't really care what he believes because whether he is far right or far left, we should care about

00:20:52.280 the fact that he just got arrested for what appears to be no reason. So here's what happened.

00:20:58.140 In England, there actually has been an infiltration of millions of Muslims and some of those Muslims 0.99

00:21:05.500 have formed what are called grooming gangs where they groom, exploit, and rape young girls as young 0.99

00:21:10.400 as the age of 11. Great. In the vast majority of the grooming gang cases, Muslims have been the 1.00

00:21:16.500 perpetrators. People have been complaining about these grooming gangs for years, but they've been

00:21:20.920 ignored by social workers, by teachers, by the police force. Why? Because England is more afraid

00:21:26.300 of Islamophobia than they are afraid of rapists and criminals. But finally, these gang members have 0.96

00:21:32.340 been brought to trial and at one of the trials, Tommy Robinson was outside and he was taking pictures of

00:21:38.060 the guys that were going in. And because of that, because he was taking pictures, he was swarmed by

00:21:43.660 police and taken to jail. I am not joking. I am not exaggerating. That is really what happened. I am

00:21:48.640 serious. He took pictures of the guys going into court. I think he was trying to even like interview

00:21:53.100 them as they were going in and he got arrested. Of course, when people heard about this, there were

00:21:57.800 protesters. There's been an uproar here in America. But guess what? Journalists in Britain weren't even

00:22:03.400 allowed to cover the arrest and the trial of Tommy Robinson. The sentencing, the sentencing judge on

00:22:09.060 his case issued a gag order against the media, meaning they couldn't write or talk at all about

00:22:14.940 his trial, supposedly because it would, quote, interfere with the trial. That has been overturned

00:22:21.080 now, thankfully. So British journalists can write about it, but it wouldn't actually matter whether it

00:22:25.380 was overturned or not because journalists around the world have been covering this and probably have

00:22:29.620 been covering it more than if the gag order hadn't been issued. That is an issue of free speech.

00:22:35.740 The government, a judge in this case, telling you you cannot report on something because it might

00:22:41.360 interfere with the trial. I mean, are you kidding? Then you would never be able to report on any trial

00:22:46.840 ever. No, this is Britain's attempt to censor not only Tommy Robinson because he's known to them as an

00:22:53.540 Islamophobe and a problem causer, but more specifically, the press. England has been hiding these 0.81

00:22:59.480 grooming gangs for decades, silencing victims, refusing to allow journalists to report on these

00:23:04.320 cases. And now when someone wants to talk about it, he gets arrested and people aren't allowed to

00:23:08.800 report on that. There hasn't been too much concern from the American left either. If any, I haven't seen

00:23:16.520 and I could be wrong at this point. I checked earlier. I hadn't seen the New York Times report on

00:23:21.400 this. Maybe they have at this point. Here's the Washington Post headline about it. Conservative outrage

00:23:27.240 after anti-Muslim campaigner Tommy Robinson secretly jailed in Britain. So the most important thing 1.00

00:23:33.560 there in the headline is obviously that there's is that there's something wrong with us, that

00:23:39.300 conservatives are mad about it, not about the arrest itself. Here is Times headline why Tommy Robinson was

00:23:46.400 jailed and why U.S. right wingers care. So again, it's our anger. That's the story here, not what

00:23:52.160 actually happened. Why? Because the left in America want this to happen. They agree with it. Maybe not

00:23:58.820 everyone, but a large majority. I haven't seen anyone on the left speak out about this or be

00:24:03.660 angered about this because they want ideas that they deem bad or dangerous or hateful to go away.

00:24:09.140 They think they deserve to be silenced. That's why they came up with this idea of hate speech.

00:24:14.580 I went to Cornell to speak a few months ago and the administration was preparing to pass a speech

00:24:19.360 code that would punish speech they deemed racist. They like when YouTube or Facebook or Twitter

00:24:25.700 shuts down a conservative but uplifts a liberal. And like I've said, private companies, campuses,

00:24:31.280 they can use any type of speech code, I guess, or censorship standards that they want to. That's

00:24:36.960 not necessarily a constitutional First Amendment issue, but it's still dangerous and wrong in principle,

00:24:42.780 the stifling of ideas that you don't agree with. But this is what the left wants. They want it not

00:24:48.120 just on social media, but I guarantee you almost everyone on the left would sign a bill outlawing

00:24:52.960 racist language. I guarantee it. You don't have to like Tommy Robinson. You don't have to like how

00:24:58.280 he does things. Apparently he hangs outside of courthouses and chases down defendants and films

00:25:03.640 them. You don't have to agree with him, but this should trouble you no matter what side of the political

00:25:08.060 aisle you're on. The slow death of free speech, the death of the free exchange of ideas is very real.

00:25:14.100 Meanwhile, Britain's neighbor, Ireland, who is not part of Britain, just making sure everyone 0.91

00:25:19.840 knows that, voted to repeal the Eighth Amendment last week. The Eighth Amendment said that an unborn

00:25:25.000 child had the same right to life as the mother. Very common sense amendment. They voted to overturn

00:25:30.700 the Eighth Amendment so abortion could be legalized. They called this, of course, a victory for women's 0.99

00:25:35.660 rights, for bodily autonomy, you know, all the euphemistic traps they use over here. They have taken a

00:25:41.940 progressive step politically, but obviously, as we know, a very regressive step morally as now they

00:25:46.940 are denying the scientific fact that a human being inside the womb is a human being and as a human

00:25:51.960 being should logically have the same rights that you or I have. Of course, you can get abortion pretty 0.99

00:25:57.980 much up until birth in America for any reason whatsoever. Sixty six percent of unborn babies with

00:26:05.360 Down syndrome in America are aborted. Ninety nine percent in Iceland, by the way. America is right on par 0.85

00:26:10.640 with China and North Korea and that we allow abortion after 20 weeks. So that's great. No doubt 1.00

00:26:16.240 this is the universal direction in which we're going. So let's tie it all together for a second.

00:26:21.820 Let's let's stop and think about where we are. Let's look in the entire world, not just America.

00:26:27.800 The entire world is moving toward greater access to abortion. The entire world is moving away from

00:26:33.400 freedom of speech and freedom of the press. Ireland was one of the most pro-life, if not the most pro-life

00:26:38.640 countries in the world. America is still the freest place in the world for speech and press. But for

00:26:42.600 how long, it's hard to tell. What does this say about the direction the world is moving in? Does

00:26:46.840 it correlate at all? To me, it shows that we're moving away from individualism and toward collectivism.

00:26:52.720 We are clearly shunning the idea of human dignity and the inherent individual rights that human dignity

00:26:57.840 demands and are instead embracing a dystopia where humans are regarded no higher than animals. There is no

00:27:04.400 such thing as an inherent right. The only rights you have are given to you by the government. There

00:27:10.420 is no real right and wrong besides what the government tells you. There's no truth besides

00:27:14.460 what the government tells you. This is exactly what happens when you forego the idea of sanctity of

00:27:19.860 life and human dignity. When you deny that humans are sacred, that we're above animals, that we are

00:27:26.420 uniquely made in the image of God, it then becomes easy to deny that humans have certain rights that

00:27:31.420 should be recognized and protected by the government rather than squelched and taken away.

00:27:35.780 So the pro-choice movement and the anti-free speech movement actually, in my opinion, go hand in hand

00:27:40.780 because they both deny the inherent right of human beings to be free, free from tyranny. They both deny

00:27:46.100 human dignity. They both deny the individual in exchange for some warped view of the greater good.

00:27:52.760 And I just wonder, when we actually get there in America, when we get to the point where the press is no

00:27:58.280 longer free, where we can get in trouble for saying something someone doesn't like, when we follow

00:28:02.940 the natural progression where abortion takes us, which is infanticide, glorified suicide, and eugenics, 0.97

00:28:07.840 will the left look around and say, oh, wow, okay, this is not what I wanted. This is not what I meant.

00:28:16.640 Will they even recognize that it is, that was their ideas that brought us here? Or will they be okay with it?

00:28:25.100 None of this stuff is really very important to most people on the left, though, that they either don't see

00:28:32.200 it's happening or they don't care. They want it to happen. They want us to go in this Orwellian

00:28:36.180 direction. What is important to them is anti-implicit bias training, which Starbucks engaged in this

00:28:42.520 week, shutting down their doors to make sure that their employees aren't racist. You probably remember

00:28:47.960 the incident in Philadelphia last month when an employee called the cops on these black guys who 0.53

00:28:53.500 refused to buy anything in the store but continued to sit there. This employee, by the way, who told

00:28:59.140 these guys to leave or called the cops is a flaming liberal, probably as SJW as they come. Since then,

00:29:05.260 there have been protests outside Starbucks for how racist they are. So, of course, they closed down

00:29:10.440 their stores Tuesday to do anti-implicit bias training. What is this training? I don't really know.

00:29:16.240 I think they show you pictures of people of different races and ask you how you feel about it.

00:29:20.140 And if you're not in love with every single one of them, then you're probably racist.

00:29:24.520 The truth is, this isn't going to drive out racism from the human heart or from any one of these people.

00:29:31.080 There's no study to show that this actually works. This is an expensive PR stunt. It's virtue signaling.

00:29:36.900 It's political correctness, which in its worst form, it's not always bad, but in its worst form is an

00:29:42.060 enemy of free thought and freedom of speech. We've really got our priorities backwards, guys.

00:29:48.400 But that's what we can expect from here on out, I think. And I don't just say that to be negative.

00:29:53.900 I think that that's just true. There's no evidence that the world is going to get better before Jesus

00:29:58.180 comes back. In fact, it's going to become worse. People are going to keep demeaning human dignity.

00:30:02.780 They'll continue to deny that truth exists. They'll continue to deny any kind of morality or

00:30:07.980 goodness. They'll continue to shun God, which is really the center of all of this. And this is not to

00:30:12.680 say that all liberals are evil and all conservatives are good. Not at all. But it is to say that most of the

00:30:18.140 progressive agenda is one that drives us further from virtue and godly values into moral relativism

00:30:23.600 and godlessness without a doubt. One final point on this topic. Memorial Day was this weekend. I hope

00:30:30.900 you guys enjoyed it. I did. I tweeted over the weekend that we went to church on Sunday morning

00:30:37.560 and that I was thankful for the rare privilege of getting to worship Jesus without the fear of

00:30:42.720 punishment or persecution, all because of the sacrifices that men and women have made for our

00:30:48.460 freedom. And it was just funny. Some of the comments that I got saying, this is not a rare privilege and

00:30:53.380 you're being dramatic. I'm acting like a victim. Clearly, these people don't know anything about the

00:31:00.360 rest of the world. I am not a victim, but there are people throughout the world who are. Freedom of

00:31:05.860 religion, also protected by the First Amendment, is not sewn into the fabric of most countries.

00:31:10.480 I'm not just talking about freedom for Christians to worship, but for people of all faiths. People

00:31:15.060 don't realize how uncommon that is and how good we have it. In fact, religious freedom has been in

00:31:21.540 the news this week because Secretary of State Mike Pompeo released the 2017 Religious Freedom Report.

00:31:27.600 He said in the report documents across or yeah, he said that is sorry. He said that in the report

00:31:33.760 documents across 200 countries and territories report violations and abuses committed by

00:31:40.160 governments, terrorist groups and individuals. For example, I'm going to give you a string of

00:31:44.380 examples here. For example, in Russia, the missionary activities of Jehovah's Witnesses have been

00:31:48.980 criminalized and labeled as an extremist organization. Now, Jehovah's Witnesses teach a false gospel, but they're

00:31:54.440 not extremists. They're the opposite of extreme. They don't even celebrate Christmas. A few years ago, Russia

00:31:59.420 imprisoned an academic who specialized in religious studies for 32 months. That's Russia, not the 0.90

00:32:05.280 Middle East, not China, Russia. In Iran, the law allows the death sentence for, quote, proselytizing and attempts by

00:32:14.160 non-Muslims to convert Muslims, as well as for enmity against God and insulting the prophet. Men in 2017 were

00:32:23.500 executed for waging what they called a war on God. People executed are mostly Christians, as well as other

00:32:31.780 religious minorities. In Afghanistan, conversion from Islam to another religion is considered apostasy and

00:32:37.620 punishable by death, imprisonment, or confiscation of property. Neighboring Pakistan continued to enforce 0.83

00:32:45.400 blasphemy laws whose punishment ranges from life in prison to death sentence for a range of charges,

00:32:51.380 including defiling the prophet Muhammad. The report says that at least 50 individuals were imprisoned on

00:32:56.740 blasphemy charges, at least 17 of whom had received death sentences. Regarding China, the report says

00:33:03.500 during 2016, as China's President Xi Jinping further consolidated power, conditions for freedom of

00:33:12.180 religion or belief and related human rights continue to decline. Authorities target anyone considered a

00:33:18.920 threat to the state, including religious believers, human rights lawyers, and other members of civil society. 0.97

00:33:24.600 In 2016, the Chinese government regularly emphasized the cynicization of religion and circulated revised

00:33:35.100 regulations governing religion, including new penalties for activities considered illegal and

00:33:40.600 additional crackdowns on Christian house churches. In Mexico, Mexican authorities in several states pressured

00:33:46.500 followers of minority religions to convert to and or practice the majority religion of the particular

00:33:52.260 area and participate in affiliated ceremonies and activities. Religious minorities who refuse or

00:33:57.980 forcibly displaced arbitrarily detained and have their properties destroyed and or had the utilities cut

00:34:03.920 off. Mexican state and federal authorities frequently fail to intervene in these cases, creating a climate of

00:34:10.140 impunity. So those are just a few instances. You can go to uscirf.gov and read this report for

00:34:17.860 yourself. The point is the First Amendment is rare and extremely unique. It is a right that millions

00:34:24.900 in the in the world do not get to enjoy. People are not free to say what they want, print what they

00:34:30.820 want, worship how they want. We in America are freer than any country in the world, especially in this

00:34:35.960 regard. And it is because of the men and women who have fought and died to protect our freedom to live

00:34:41.140 and speak as we please, which is exactly what Memorial Day is about. So let's summarize all of

00:34:46.560 this. First, Ireland shows that the pro abortion movement around the world is moving farther than 10

00:34:51.940 years ago we ever would have thought. Second, free speech is either dead or dying in every part of the

00:34:57.060 world, as the Tommy Robinson case shows. Third, freedom of religion is either dead or dying in many parts of

00:35:04.280 the world, as the Secretary of State's report shows. We used to think that these kinds of human rights

00:35:09.720 atrocities were exclusive to the Middle East and China, but that's just not the case anymore.

00:35:14.160 Like I said before, America is right up there with China and North Korea when it comes to abortion 0.86

00:35:18.240 rights. England routinely restricts the freedom of the press. Russia, who is not a part of the West,

00:35:23.760 but is certainly not a developing country, is included for the first time on the United States

00:35:28.700 list of countries who routinely persecute people for their religion. What this tells me is that the

00:35:34.320 value of the individual is decreasing rapidly around the world. In some places, it's always been very low,

00:35:39.560 but in other places, it's dropping. And when that happens, individual rights are seen as obsolete

00:35:44.600 and are taken away. And when individual rights are seen as obsolete because of a denial of human

00:35:49.500 dignity, the government has room to take over and become tyrannical. The government is allowed to grow

00:35:54.920 and flourish where the sanctity of the individual is diminished, which is exactly what is happening

00:35:59.640 around the world. We would be silly to think that it wouldn't come to America. Many people in America

00:36:05.540 certainly don't care about the intrinsic value of the individual. And as a consequence, his or her

00:36:12.340 inherent rights as outlined in the Constitution. You could argue that free speech here is already

00:36:18.500 starting to die in America if our college campuses are any indication of how the upcoming generation 0.94

00:36:23.500 views the free exchange of ideas. Clearly, censorship is something a lot of young people would advocate

00:36:27.960 for. There are certainly people in America who want to censor Christian and conservative ideas

00:36:32.540 and who would advocate for the government to do so. They don't see it as tyranny, though. They see it

00:36:38.660 as tolerance. That is the Orwellian dystopia the world is headed in. Like 1984 says, war is peace,

00:36:45.880 freedom is slavery, ignorance is strength. Add to that, tyranny is tolerance. And with that absolute

00:36:52.620 nightmare headed for our country, they want to take away our guns? No. All of this, everything that we've

00:37:00.220 just described regarding the First Amendment is inextricably intertwined with the Second Amendment.

00:37:05.040 The military fights for our freedom, yes, but at the end of the day, they are under command of the

00:37:10.660 government. Our freedom of speech, our freedom of religion, the freedom of the individual and human

00:37:14.960 dignity is protected by our right to defend ourselves as we see fit. You don't have the First Amendment

00:37:20.180 without the second. It is our only last defense against tyranny. You take away people's guns, you take away

00:37:25.740 people's freedom entirely. You don't have to be a gun owner to recognize that. Okay, that is where we

00:37:33.700 will end all of that. I have time for one question. And that question that I received on Instagram is

00:37:40.280 how did I meet my husband? I met my husband working out at a gym. It was a CrossFit type gym. I know it

00:37:47.900 sounds super lame. Want to know something even funnier. The first time I saw him, he was actually with his

00:37:53.320 girlfriend. I didn't talk to him or anything. But I distinctly remember them being together at the gym.

00:37:58.560 Don't worry, there was no overlap there. I didn't even meet him until a couple months after that until

00:38:03.860 later, I guess his relationship had ended. And we just hit it off immediately. We would talk in the gym parking

00:38:10.640 lot outside my car for hours at a time. One time we literally talked for four hours in the parking lot before

00:38:16.380 we ever even went on a date or he got my number. I texted one of my friends after that and said,

00:38:23.000 and I know this is crazy, but I think I've met my husband. And I was right. You always hear when you

00:38:30.480 know, you know. And I used to have no idea what that meant and how that could be possible. But when I

00:38:35.960 met him, I just I knew it. I understood what people had been saying. Fun fact, we only dated for five

00:38:43.140 months before we got engaged and we were only engaged for four months. I hadn't even I don't

00:38:47.880 think I had even known him for a full year when we got married. I know that's insane when I say it

00:38:52.500 out loud. But I've always been a very instinctive person. And I just knew without a shadow of a doubt

00:38:57.100 that I was supposed to be with him. And he felt the same way, thankfully. So for us, there was no reason

00:39:02.660 to waste any time. It was great. And now we've been married for about two and a half years. Side note,

00:39:08.440 I highly recommend short engagements. We planned an awesome wedding in four months and you really

00:39:13.960 don't need more than that. And I was working full time and everything. I wouldn't have it any other

00:39:18.400 way. OK, that is all for today. I hope you guys are enjoying the first bits of summer here in Texas.

00:39:23.820 We are already melting and dying, even though I know I said that I like the heat, but I'm like I'm

00:39:30.420 really dying. But that's OK. I'm not complaining. OK, that's it. I love y'all. Follow me on social

00:39:36.300 media. Leave a nice review. Share this with your friends. Bye.

Relatable with Allie Beth Stuckey - May 30, 2018

Ep 12 ｜ Free Speech & Our Fast Track to Tyranny

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