The Matt Walsh Show - June 01, 2018


Ep. 41 - Free Speech Does Not Mean That Your Speech Is Free From Consequence

Topics
cultural Free Speech decency Free Speech and decency killing babies
Hosted by
Matt Walsh
Mentioned
Roseanne Samantha Bee Valerie Jarrett Godspeed
Ep. 40 - Two People Fired For Not Serving A Black Customer After Closing Ep. 42 - Planned Parenthood Is A Rapist's Best Friend

Episode Stats


Length

19 minutes

Words per minute

168.49

Word count

3,261

Sentence count

279

Harmful content

Misogyny

8

sentences flagged

Toxicity

48

sentences flagged

Hate speech

5

sentences flagged


Summary

Summaries generated with gmurro/bart-large-finetuned-filtered-spotify-podcast-summ .

Free speech is one of the most overused, misused, misunderstood phrases and concepts in American society today. Everyone claims to be in favor of free speech, but when it comes down to it, most of the time it's not about free speech at all.

Transcript

Transcript generated with Whisper (turbo).
Misogyny classifications generated with MilaNLProc/bert-base-uncased-ear-misogyny .
Toxicity classifications generated with s-nlp/roberta_toxicity_classifier .
Hate speech classifications generated with facebook/roberta-hate-speech-dynabench-r4-target .
Topics generated with Qwen2.5-3B-Instruct.
Hosts, guests, and mentioned names generated with spaCy (en_core_web_sm), reconciled against Wikidata.
00:00:00.140 Before we get going, I wanted to mention the Western Conservative Summit is June 8th next week.
00:00:06.440 The Colorado Convention Center in Denver, I'm going to be speaking on June 8th.
00:00:10.600 And so I hope to see you there.
00:00:12.740 The Western Conservative Summit is the largest gathering of conservatives that happens every year outside of D.C.,
00:00:19.260 which is a big bonus because as someone who goes to D.C. on a regular basis,
00:00:22.920 I can tell you that if you could spend your whole life and never enter that cursed city,
00:00:27.040 you will be doing something right.
00:00:28.600 So it should be a good time and hope to see you there.
00:00:32.660 Let's talk about free speech.
00:00:34.100 Free speech is one of the most overused, misused, misunderstood phrases and concepts in American society today.
00:00:40.620 Everybody claims to be in favor of free speech.
00:00:42.600 Everyone tends to make everything into a free speech issue.
00:00:45.680 Everyone is always saying that their own free speech rights are being infringed upon.
00:00:50.120 And while we are constantly talking about free speech,
00:00:53.660 I think in the vast majority of cases and with the vast majority of controversies that we argue about,
00:00:58.600 they really have nothing at all to do with free speech.
00:01:01.680 I think 95% of the time, probably, that's a conservative estimate.
00:01:05.960 When somebody says, this is about free speech, it actually is not about free speech at all.
00:01:13.280 That's most of the time.
00:01:15.160 I think this is particularly relevant to discuss today.
00:01:18.740 The reason it's on my mind today is because this has been a week which has featured a blizzard of phony free speech claims.
00:01:27.460 Let's start with, of course, Roseanne.
00:01:30.540 We don't have to go through that whole thing again, but she said what she said about Valerie Jarrett.
00:01:34.280 She was fired, of course. 0.99
00:01:35.500 And Roseanne's supporters and people who like the show, many of them said,
00:01:39.080 this is a free speech issue.
00:01:40.800 She needs to be, no, she should still have her show in the interests of free speech. 1.00
00:01:45.880 But free speech had nothing to do with it.
00:01:48.620 Then we had Samantha Bee on the other end of the spectrum. 0.95
00:01:50.800 She called Ivanka Trump a feckless C word. 1.00
00:01:54.060 And she said some other revolting things about Ivanka as well.
00:01:57.160 This is just another long line of unfunny, vile things that this person has said on a nightly basis.
00:02:04.760 And I was among those who called for her to be fired.
00:02:07.520 And I was told that I didn't value free speech and I was infringing on the First Amendment for taking that position.
00:02:13.480 This is the way it goes generally.
00:02:15.020 If you believe that a person ought to suffer consequences for saying gross and reprehensible things,
00:02:21.860 or if you believe that gross and reprehensible things ought not be said in the first place,
00:02:26.880 even if you think that they should be allowed to be said, you don't think that they should be said in any case,
00:02:31.700 then you're going to be accused of infringing on the First Amendment.
00:02:35.660 There's a lot of confusion here, clearly.
00:02:38.400 And I think if we're going to talk about free speech, we should probably begin by trying to determine what exactly free speech is.
00:02:47.460 You know, what is free speech?
00:02:50.340 I think there's kind of two ways of looking at it.
00:02:54.140 There's the right way and the wrong way.
00:02:55.500 So, when you say free speech, you could be referring to that free speech which is enshrined in the First Amendment,
00:03:03.020 the legal free speech.
00:03:05.020 And the First Amendment gives you the right to express your views and beliefs,
00:03:10.360 especially your political views and your religious beliefs,
00:03:12.840 without being punished by the government or without being censored by the government.
00:03:17.200 It prohibits the government from passing laws that would require you to hold a certain view
00:03:23.580 or prohibit you from holding certain views.
00:03:25.940 That's what the First Amendment's all about.
00:03:27.480 It's all about the government.
00:03:28.620 It's got nothing to do with how the culture reacts to speech.
00:03:31.300 It's all about what the government does and doesn't do.
00:03:33.980 And it's not absolute, of course.
00:03:35.740 There are restrictions.
00:03:37.020 It's not enough to say or it's not accurate to say that free speech means you can say whatever you want
00:03:41.960 and the government can't stop you.
00:03:43.060 No, you can't say whatever you want.
00:03:44.600 You can't slander.
00:03:45.400 You can't lie under oath.
00:03:46.780 You can't intentionally incite violence against another person.
00:03:50.000 You can't shout fire in a crowded theater.
00:03:51.840 You can't do those kinds of things.
00:03:53.000 So there are restrictions on free speech.
00:03:54.400 And I think most people agree that there ought to be those restrictions.
00:03:56.900 So it's not absolute.
00:03:58.080 But that's basically what free speech is.
00:04:00.160 Great.
00:04:00.800 Then there's the second.
00:04:02.040 There's the incorrect, I think, usage of this term free speech.
00:04:08.240 And it's a little bit unclear to me exactly what it means because it's obvious that when most people
00:04:15.960 say free speech, they're not referring to the legal free speech.
00:04:19.620 Because, like I said, when they use the phrase, they're using it in a context that has nothing to do with legal free speech at all.
00:04:27.120 So obviously they mean something else.
00:04:30.080 They're talking about a different kind of free speech.
00:04:33.200 And it seems, and this is just me, this is just me kind of based on context, it seems like most of the time when this term free speech is used, what the person is referring to is a kind of cultural free speech.
00:04:48.580 And what they're saying is that the culture ought to be welcoming of all speech.
00:04:58.240 And what they're saying is that a person like Roseanne or Samantha Bee shouldn't be fired for saying reprehensible things because we should be a society that welcomes and tolerates all speech, even reprehensible speech.
00:05:13.260 And we should never attempt to correct or suppress or otherwise punish any speech at all.
00:05:19.200 They believe that legal free speech is not enough, so we have to have this cultural free speech as well, where we're welcoming and tolerant of all speech.
00:05:25.520 Now, I don't believe in that kind of free speech.
00:05:30.140 I don't think that anyone really believes in it, to be honest with you.
00:05:33.100 I think a lot of people claim to believe in it, but in reality, even if you say, yeah, people should be able to say whatever they want.
00:05:39.540 We shouldn't try to punish them for it.
00:05:42.680 You may say that, but I don't think you really mean it because I think you draw a line somewhere too.
00:05:48.360 Maybe for you, Samantha Bee didn't cross that line.
00:05:50.840 Maybe Roseanne didn't cross that line. 1.00
00:05:52.380 But there is a line.
00:05:55.160 Almost definitely there is a line.
00:05:57.160 There is something that a person can say, especially in a public position, that would make you go, they need to be fired for that.
00:06:05.860 So I think everyone has a line, but we claim not to because we all want to be so open-minded.
00:06:10.360 And so we say, oh, we're so open-minded.
00:06:11.880 I don't claim to be open-minded.
00:06:14.460 I'm not open-minded.
00:06:15.540 I'm all about figuring out what the truth is.
00:06:20.360 And once I know the truth, I'm sticking with that.
00:06:22.860 I'm not, you know, I'm not even going to consider a falsehood.
00:06:26.260 I'm just going to stick with what the truth is.
00:06:28.820 And I also believe that we all should operate with some human decency.
00:06:33.160 And I'm pretty narrow-minded about that.
00:06:35.020 I don't think that, no, I think decency is the way to go.
00:06:38.180 So I'm not going to consider indecency.
00:06:40.320 I think, no, decency, that's the way.
00:06:42.780 I don't believe that we, as a society, are obliged to be welcoming and tolerant of all speech.
00:06:50.260 I don't believe that a person should be able to say the most vile and disgusting and reprehensible things and suffer no penalty whatsoever for saying them.
00:06:57.260 I don't believe that.
00:06:58.180 Our founders didn't believe that.
00:06:59.360 That's not what our founders were talking about when they talked about free speech. 0.88
00:07:02.120 This is a concept of free speech that is rather new and rather, frankly, ridiculous.
00:07:05.940 Because what we're doing is we're drawing a line now between speech and decency.
00:07:11.880 And what we're saying is that you have to choose between being a society with free speech or a society with decency.
00:07:18.120 I don't agree with that.
00:07:18.880 I think we can be both. 0.99
00:07:20.840 But it seems like a lot of people think that any attempt by individuals and the marketplace to contain and control the filth and stupidity that is spewed, 0.99
00:07:29.280 or any attempt to free ourselves from having to be exposed to the filth and stupidity every second of every day, 0.99
00:07:36.500 is a violation of free speech by this way of thinking. 0.98
00:07:39.880 I strongly disagree with that way of thinking.
00:07:42.960 Here's how I think about it. 1.00
00:07:44.920 I think you have the legal right to be a profane, babbling idiot. 1.00
00:07:49.120 You have the legal right. 1.00
00:07:52.880 I have the right to treat your profane, babbling idiocy as profane, babbling idiocy. 1.00
00:07:59.660 I not only have the right to do so, I am right in doing so. 1.00
00:08:02.760 That's how I should treat it.
00:08:04.460 That's how society should treat it. 0.98
00:08:07.220 I think we should strive to be a society where we are all legally free to say what we want within reason,
00:08:13.040 but we still would make the effort to speak and behave with some decorum because we know that we will face shame and stigma from society if we don't.
00:08:23.680 That's the kind of society we should be.
00:08:25.620 That's the kind of society we used to be.
00:08:27.280 In the 1950s, a woman wasn't going to get up there in public and call somebody else a feckless C-word because she would have been shamed for that. 0.97
00:08:36.040 There would have been too much shame and stigma.
00:08:38.020 Nobody would have applauded.
00:08:39.000 Nobody would have laughed. 0.85
00:08:40.080 Everybody would have said, that's disgusting. 0.99
00:08:41.600 You should be ashamed of yourself. 0.99
00:08:43.880 You should be ashamed.
00:08:45.800 What's wrong with you?
00:08:48.720 That's how it would have been treated.
00:08:50.980 That's how it should be treated.
00:08:54.060 We should all be completely intolerant of that kind of language. 0.99
00:08:59.020 And we should be completely intolerant of certain opinions.
00:09:03.860 And I know that opinions have become this sacred, holy thing where we say, oh, it's somebody's opinions.
00:09:13.040 That we have to respect it.
00:09:14.060 I don't care if it's your opinion. 0.99
00:09:15.260 If it's wrong and stupid, then I'm going to treat it that way. 0.98
00:09:19.060 I don't have to respect it just because it's your opinion. 0.99
00:09:21.520 People like to say, well, everyone is entitled to his own opinion.
00:09:26.040 Yeah, that's true.
00:09:28.220 A guy is entitled to his own opinion.
00:09:30.060 Fine.
00:09:30.360 I mean, in the sense that he can, he's allowed to form opinions and nobody can stop him.
00:09:35.000 But he's not entitled to have those opinions taken seriously.
00:09:42.560 He's not entitled for those opinions to be welcomed or accepted.
00:09:45.840 And he's not necessarily free or he ought not be free necessarily from the consequences of expressing those opinions.
00:09:55.060 A white supremacist or a black supremacist or any kind of racial supremacist, because they come in all colors, by the way. 1.00
00:10:00.700 But a racial supremacist should experience social consequences for those views because they are deranged and evil and idiotic. 1.00
00:10:10.300 And they're also dangerous if enough people adopt them. 1.00
00:10:12.820 We've seen what happens when a majority of a population become racial supremacist.
00:10:17.640 It has led to some of the worst bloodshed and persecution in the history of mankind.
00:10:21.400 So, yeah, we should, as a society, militate against those opinions because they're so awful and there's nothing redeeming about them at all.
00:10:31.820 They don't deserve to be taken seriously. 1.00
00:10:35.480 Should the government prevent racial supremacists from gathering together and saying their stupid opinions? 1.00
00:10:41.580 No. 1.00
00:10:42.820 But should society shun that speech and mock it and treat it with contempt?
00:10:49.080 Yes.
00:10:50.260 Absolutely.
00:10:51.940 Again, just because you say something doesn't automatically make it legitimate. 0.99
00:10:56.580 Just because it's your belief or your opinion doesn't mean it's not repugnant and foolish and thus deserving of ridicule. 0.92
00:11:07.300 So, we've developed this really childish idea that, like I said, that all opinions are valuable. 0.97
00:11:16.980 All opinions are valuable.
00:11:18.060 We should listen to all opinions.
00:11:19.540 No, we shouldn't.
00:11:21.260 There are a lot of really opinions that are utterly worthless.
00:11:25.640 Should be treated that way.
00:11:26.980 Well, that's my opinion.
00:11:30.600 So?
00:11:31.600 What does that mean?
00:11:32.940 That's like if you took a big steaming pile of dung, right?
00:11:39.260 And you took it and you put it on a plate and you served it to somebody and you said, here, it's food.
00:11:45.880 And then the person said, I don't want to eat that.
00:11:49.080 And then you said, but it's food.
00:11:50.200 It's my food that I'm giving you.
00:11:52.720 Yeah, but it's still a steaming pile of dung, isn't it?
00:11:56.460 The fact that it's food and that it's you who's serving it to me, that doesn't mean anything.
00:12:00.900 In fact, it just makes me think less of you, that you're giving me this.
00:12:05.800 That's all it does. 0.99
00:12:07.400 It doesn't make the steaming pile of dung less disgusting.
00:12:14.200 This is why I think there is, and I'm trying to think of the, make sure I'm putting this the right way, because I know it's,
00:12:19.940 we tend to think of free speech in America as the most holy and sacred thing.
00:12:26.260 But it's not really.
00:12:27.580 The most holy and sacred and precious thing is the truth.
00:12:33.020 That's what really matters.
00:12:35.000 Truth.
00:12:36.500 And so I think we should be a little bit less focused on free speech.
00:12:43.280 And we should be a little bit more focused on what is right.
00:12:48.920 On the truth.
00:12:51.320 So we should spend less time clamoring about what our rights are.
00:12:55.740 And more time talking about what is right.
00:13:01.500 Society should give legal rights to everyone, but it should only embrace and accept that which is right and decent.
00:13:10.520 So, you know, this is a point that I've made about the situation on college campuses.
00:13:18.820 I think that the conservative critique of the environment on college campuses is a bit misdirected, and it kind of misses the point.
00:13:31.420 Because if you were to ask the average conservative, what's the biggest problem on modern college campuses, on most college campuses, liberal college campuses especially, which is most of them, I think the average conservative, what are they going to say?
00:13:43.180 They're going to say that the big problem is that these campuses are so intolerant of and hostile to opposing ideas.
00:13:53.540 No, that's not the problem, actually.
00:13:56.560 The problem is that colleges today are so hostile to and intolerant of the right ideas.
00:14:05.080 That's, that's the problem.
00:14:07.980 It's that they're hostile to the truth.
00:14:11.120 My point is, there's nothing wrong with being hostile to an idea, because some ideas deserve hostility. 1.00
00:14:18.940 The idea that it's okay to kill babies in the womb is a stupid, insane, evil, irrational, idiotic view that is, that deserves to be treated with contempt and hatred. 1.00
00:14:35.500 The view itself should be treated with contempt and hatred and ridicule. 1.00
00:14:40.980 That's how awful and dumb it is. 0.99
00:14:44.380 Just because it's an opposing idea from my own doesn't mean I respect it. 1.00
00:14:48.940 No, you think it's okay to kill babies.
00:14:50.340 I don't respect that. 0.99
00:14:51.940 What's wrong with you? 1.00
00:14:53.120 Are you crazy? 1.00
00:14:54.420 No, it's not okay to kill babies. 1.00
00:14:56.780 It's just the same thing if you came up to me and you said, you know what, I really think maybe it's okay to enslave black people. 0.98
00:15:02.060 I'm not going to sit here and say, okay, well, let's sit down and have a conversation. 0.98
00:15:05.280 I'm going to say, that's insane. 0.86
00:15:06.960 What's wrong with you?
00:15:08.180 Of course it's not okay.
00:15:09.640 Get out of here.
00:15:10.180 I'm not even going to listen to that.
00:15:11.200 You'll say, but no, hear me out.
00:15:12.640 No, I'm not going to listen.
00:15:13.900 I'm not going to hear you out. 0.98
00:15:15.800 Because I'm not an idiot, and I know that that's wrong. 0.98
00:15:18.400 Of course it's wrong. 0.60
00:15:20.260 There's nothing interesting or redeeming you can say in favor of it.
00:15:24.980 So, no, it is okay sometimes to treat ideas with hostility.
00:15:29.800 That's a sign of societal health.
00:15:32.860 If we're treating, if we are directing that hostility and that contempt in the right direction, the problem is our society misdirects it.
00:15:43.580 And we often treat the truth and the right ideas with contempt.
00:15:48.800 That's the problem.
00:15:50.160 So, conservatives, they need to stop whining and saying, well, no, listen to my ideas because they're the opposing ideas and they deserve to be respected.
00:15:59.260 Stop that.
00:16:00.500 Stop being weak.
00:16:01.440 No, stand up and say, listen to my ideas because my ideas are right.
00:16:07.100 That's why they deserve to be listened to.
00:16:08.980 Because they're true and they're right and you're wrong.
00:16:12.080 That's why you should listen to me.
00:16:13.920 It's not just because it's the opposing idea.
00:16:16.840 I'm not going to put my ideas in a big basket called ideas and lump it in with all other ideas.
00:16:22.940 No, this is the right idea.
00:16:24.540 The idea that you shouldn't kill babies is right.
00:16:27.380 And that's why you should listen to it. 0.99
00:16:30.040 That's why my idea deserves more respect than yours because you think we should kill babies. 1.00
00:16:34.400 And that's wrong and stupid and insane. 1.00
00:16:37.820 There are a few. 1.00
00:16:40.440 It's rare that you encounter it, but there are some college campuses out there.
00:16:44.640 There are mostly small conservative Christian schools where if you went there and tried to argue for killing babies, you would just be laughed out of the room.
00:16:57.460 Because everybody, you know why?
00:16:59.280 Because the people on campus are morally and intellectually formed. 1.00
00:17:03.440 And so they have no interest in that idiocy. 0.99
00:17:07.240 You see? 1.00
00:17:08.420 And that's good.
00:17:09.880 Because what's the real goal of education?
00:17:14.640 It's not to make open-minded people who listen to opposing ideas.
00:17:20.340 No.
00:17:21.180 It's to make people who understand and are grounded in the truth.
00:17:26.880 That is the only thing that matters in life.
00:17:30.700 It's the whole point of existence is truth.
00:17:33.340 It's the only thing that matters.
00:17:36.200 That's what education is for.
00:17:37.820 And the problem with education is that we are creating people who are hostile to truth.
00:17:44.380 If we were to take that hostility or if they were to take it and direct it to falsehood and evil and depravity, then that would be good.
00:17:53.280 That's an improvement.
00:17:54.460 That's growth.
00:17:55.200 That's what we want.
00:17:56.020 All right.
00:17:57.740 You get my point.
00:17:58.840 Hopefully.
00:18:00.040 This is just...
00:18:01.080 It's become a special pet peeve of mine.
00:18:05.480 All these people who...
00:18:07.080 People who have the truth on their side, yet they demand to be listened to on the basis of free speech and open dialogue.
00:18:16.400 Like, what is wrong with you?
00:18:18.080 You have the truth.
00:18:19.140 Why not bring...
00:18:19.720 That's the point.
00:18:20.540 So, in conclusion, legal free speech is great, and we should absolutely fight for it.
00:18:30.140 And in the cases where it is threatened, let's take the case that's going to be...
00:18:35.700 The verdict will be declared by the Supreme Court in the next week or two, Masterpiece Cake Shop and their fight against the LGBT mob. 0.82
00:18:43.700 Now, that is a real, honest-to-God free speech issue.
00:18:47.180 And if Masterpiece Cake Shop loses, then that's essentially the end of the First Amendment.
00:18:52.680 So, that's a big deal.
00:18:54.700 And so, we've got to pay attention to that.
00:18:55.960 So, where legal free speech is actually threatened, we need to defend it.
00:19:00.940 But outside of that, you're under no obligation to tolerate or take seriously falsehood, indecency, vulgarity, profanity, etc.
00:19:12.040 And you shouldn't.
00:19:14.480 And society shouldn't.
00:19:16.120 And that's the society that we should build.
00:19:18.680 Thanks for listening, everybody.
00:19:19.640 I'll talk to you next week.
00:19:20.880 Godspeed.