Animal Cruelty/Freedom of Speech: The Supreme Court Got It Wrong!

Let me excercise my Freedom of Speech this morning. Seems the Supreme Court is all about this. Since my dogs are not able to take pen to paper, I feel it is my duty to take a moment to help educate others in what I think is one of the greatest steps backward we've ever witnessed. We are "devolving". And as I write this, Missouri has a vote pending in the senate called the Horse Slaughter Bill. If passed, Missouri would become the first state, and only state to pass a law making it "okay" to slaughter horses. (My senator has already received my letter of concern on this matter--and I've received a nice "note" back stating his consideration of my letter.) We live in a very precarious time.

I was incensed this morning as I read with disbelief an article in the St. Louis Post-Dispatch (tucked nicely away on page A8, one column width, far right corner) which outlined the Supreme Court's 8-1 (thank you for your compassion Justice Samuel Alito) decision yesterday to overturn a law signed by former President Bill Clinton. The court has now, in their infinite wisdom, decided that the depiction of animal cruelty is something we need not protect ourselves from--that it, in and of itself, should be granted "freedom of speech" protection. Really?


I believe the Supreme Court's next order of business is to go home and explain their decisions they made yesterday to a group of say, third and fourth graders (and take some video footage along with them--you know, of the "protected speech" and share this), then explain this to their own children or grandchildren and then bring themselves to come sit on a panel in front of the Humane Society, ASPCA, and various other animal rights/animal defender folks and explain their actions there as well. In other words, come down from the Ivory Tower a moment and speak one-on-one to "us" about how important it was to protect this kind of "free speech." On second thought, maybe a re-examination of what "freedom of speech" really entails should begin.

For as it was written by our forefathers, the "freedoms" of which we speak had more to do with our neighbors within walking distance or those gathered on horseback in the town square. Just as the Right to Bear Arms probably never envisioned street gangs toting enough fire power to destroy much of a city block. No horseback meetings take place today. Instead, there is a much more far-reaching channel of communication in our current world that relegates the masses to having absorption of certain "freedoms" at a volume much higher and more influential than those first drafts of "inalienable rights" could have ever imagined. As of yesterday's decision, it is now "okay"--per our freedom of speech experts, i.e., our illustrious Supreme Court-- for online sites run by inhumane, low IQ, subhuman, bottom feeding, ignorant, self-absorbed types (there's my Freedom of Speech) to post videos and have websites of animals being tortured, animals fighting and animals killing other animals (specifically, dog fighting).

This once again illustrates to me how far we've not come in our understanding of what it means to be human in the twenty-first century. Or what it means to improve and evolve, what it means to have compassion over some illogical argument whose premise was witnessed by wig-wearing, slave-owning men. (Who, by the way, kept the wives at home while all the pen-to-paper constitution stuff was happening.)

I hope my message is read by a broad audience today, by those who not only are of like-minded passion as it relates to protecting those who cannot protect themselves (animals) but also reaches those miscreants who take pleasure or profit from the pain and torture inflicted on helpless, vulnerable, innocent lives.

I am sure some wise guy could argue, "Well, your Freedom of Speech certainly was put to use today". Yes, I would reply, but who, might I ask, was killed in the process?