~a column by Colleen O’Brien
Freedom of speech has suffered its bumps in the road in this country. For close to 50 years during the last century, a group, on their own authority and judgment, banned certain films whether imported or originating in Hollywood.
During that particular period of dark ages (1933 to 1978), the Legion of Decency within the Catholic Church (I was a member of the church at one time), compiled an annual list of “Condemned” movies. Once the big ‘C’ was plastered on a film, good Catholics were not supposed to watch it. Most adult Catholics in fact took the pledge to the Legion of Decency to forgo the movie theater when a morally offensive flick was showing.
In the 1930s, members of the Catholic Church were considered a threat to the majority Protestant population of America, the misplaced belief being that Catholics owed their loyalty to the Pope in Rome rather than to the President in Washington, DC.
Keeping this in mind, it seems odd that the Legion of Decency could actually cow Hollywood producers and directors, but that’s what happened. The indecency squad’s power had something to do with Catholics constituting about a quarter of the population of the country. If by the basic fact that a quarter of the movie-going public could possibly be Catholic, offending them might hurt the bottom line.
There’s a movement afoot currently to bend to some people’s “morals” our era’s favorite communication, known as “social media.” The forms of social media include Facebook, Twitter, discussion networks, selling networks, private networks – on and on. A minority religious institution in the 1920s, ‘30s, ‘40s and ‘50s decided what movies were morally offensive and therefore worthy of boycotting; a few members of the current Congress are demanding that owners of social media platforms ban lies and morally offensive political talk, especially if it comes from the “other side.” Both parties in the political scene say this. They have not succeeded in banning much so far.
Our “morally offensive political talk” is apparent and rabid. It’s out there just as the accused “immoral” movies of nearly a century ago continued to be shown. Banning and condemning certain words, books, movies, political dialogue is in fact a difficult piece of business in a nation of free speech.
The particulars of what is condemned or restricted change over the decades and centuries, although the particulars historically have had to do with religion, politics and science.
Not only are we in an iffy possibility of disallowing free speech in our private social media, but half the U.S. population is still denouncing science.
Human societies have done the pendulum thing forever, swinging from outrageousness to laxness. One begets the other – too much licentiousness brings on restrictive laws; too strict a society brings out the freedom–in–everything folks. Over the approximately 5,500 years since the invention of writing, no society has settled for long on a defensible middle ground for what we can/should and cannot/should not say to maintain equilibrium and goodwill within our societies. We’re dealing with our most extraordinary human ability: our vast number of ways to communicate.
Our ability to imagine, talk, write, paint, sculpt, build, decide, make plans, remember the past – the best of what humans are because of our big brains derives from this remarkable and varied ability to depict what we’re thinking – the best and the worst of our persuasive tendencies.
Because we are rational beings who can pursue knowledge for its own sake, because we can figure out symbols to write our thoughts, because we can form art by reason and imagination for art’s sake or for interpreting life – we constantly display our curiosity and our understanding of ourselves and each other.
Any millennium now, we’re going to hit our stride and incorporate this empathy and instinct for cooperation and vision into wisdom that will no longer be a perpetual argument but a whole-earth catalogue of cooperation.
We might be able to call it what we’ve been praying for – (do other species pray?) – peace on earth.
