Title: Freedom of Talk is dead
Tags: freedom, speech, writing
Blog Entry: I write passionately, because I am not allowed to speak passionately. Freedom to say what you like is now completely erased from our short list of liberties in this country. The freedom to write what you like, as long as its not something you would like published, is still alive. But the act of talking directly to another person about any topic or in any fashion you like is dead and gone. The sad part of this fact, is that it is not even a direct government law that prohibits the act. It is the self righteous and thin-skinned masses that take offense to adult words and risque topics that has made participating in a real, honest, common sense conversation more dangerous than skydiving these days. One off colored joke, one criticism, or a single phrase that makes anyone within earshot even slightly uncomfortable can have you ostracized from your community, served with a lawsuit for slander or libel, or land you in jail. This may seem outlandish or paranoid, but I have first hand experience with the backlash of my spoken words that proves this nightmare to be truth. Political correctness, which I predicted from its inception as an evil thing, has finally twisted and permeated society to the point where people with a different opinion, non-traditional outlook on life, or who use "adult words", are afraid to go out in public and carry on their "normal" conversations. I am one of these people. No longer will I approach a stranger in a bar in the hopes of learning something about them and maybe make a new friend. By the third word out of my mouth, its very possible that the stranger will take offense at my words and have me removed from the bar. And heaven forbid that one is talking to a trusted friend in the mall and a child wanders by. More than once I have had children that strayed too close to my words whisked away by an overprotective parent with a condemning glare and a later visit by the mall cop. I was not talking to the child, nor even aware of the no-necked monster's presence. And yet it is somehow my responsibility to monitor what I say to a close friend, just in case some lazy parent loses track of their offspring. So I write. For the time being it is my last safe haven for spreading the truth. I write passionately, because I am not allowed to speak passionately.
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