“Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances.”
First Amendment to the United States Constitution
WARNING: This piece contains no specific reference whatsoever to Donald J. Trump (although you are perfectly free to imply one). Given Rule No. 5, perhaps it should.
I have been thinking about the subject of this piece for many weeks, considering both the logic of my beliefs and the implications of their application. You will find out more about these as you read, and I am especially interested in any thoughtful feedback you may have. You will find that there is a reason for my emphasis on the word thoughtful – but only if you finish the piece.
Free speech was deemed so important to our Founders that when it came time to write the Bill of Rights they decided it ought to share primacy of place in the First Amendment along with the freedom and non-establishment of religion, the freedom of the press, the freedom to assemble, and the right to petition government for the redress of grievances. But there are other rights contained in the First Amendment as well. While they are not specifically stated, they are the rights which are correlative to those specifically granted.
For example, while we enjoy the freedom to assemble, no one other than a despot would argue that we are required to attend any particular gathering or, for that matter, any gathering at all. Similarly, we are not obligated to petition government whenever we have a grievance; we are allowed to whine instead. We have the right to adhere to no religion whatsoever and abstain form attending any church. That we are not required to read a newspaper or other source of legitimate journalism is all too evident in these days of the Internet and its plethora of wacky conspiracy websites; in fact, their popularity implies yet another right – that of self-imposed stupidity.
The correlative right to freedom of speech is the right to listen or not to listen to someone else’s speech. I wish to focus upon the latter. There is nothing in the Constitution that requires us to listen to the ravings of another, or, indeed, to his or her reasoned logic. In fact, freedom of speech allows us to disagree with either the ravings or logic of another and to speak out in opposition to either as often and as loudly as we wish. And there is nothing that requires us to have actually listened to or read whatever the other person said or wrote as a precondition to doing so.
In my opinion, the freedom not to listen is the most dangerous of the correlative rights inferred from the First Amendment, even though it is basic to our understanding of free speech itself. Choosing not to listen can have incredibly poor consequences to ourselves and to our society. A grade school student who chooses not to listen to his teachers will likely suffer a lifetime of poor jobs and low pay; a legislator who chooses never to listen to the opposition’s point of view has a profound misunderstanding of the concept of politics and will serve our country poorly. The current gridlock in Congress is ample proof of the latter proposition, but while the congressional deadlock is roundly criticized by almost all American citizens, many of the critics blame those holding opinions differing from theirs as its sole source – thereby evidencing that they, themselves, are guilty of not listening any better than their elected representatives. When everything is the other guy’s fault, legislative listening is not only dismissed as an obligation our representatives ought to possess, it is also roundly decried as a socially unworthy skill which requires dismissal from office whenever manifested.
Nevertheless, the freedom not to listen is an important right. None of us has an obligation to listen to the ravings of a maniac or the inanities of a dunderhead. If anyone were to attempt to make us do so on a regular basis, the frequently promised revolution would likely occur much sooner than one resulting from our community denying us the right to speak out about unpopular topics. The noise and noisomeness of being made to listen to someone we deem to be just this side of idiocy would drive us quickly to anger and retaliation. By comparison, we tolerate our neighbors’ smack downs of our beliefs much more easily; after all, they have a fundamental right to disagree with us.
Note that I refer to maniacs and dunderheads. This reference is important for two reasons: First, the definition of who is a maniac or a dunderhead is personal to the listener. While a definition of the terms themselves can be found in any decent dictionary, the right of application of the terms to others belongs solely to the listener. In other words, I have the right to decide who is and who isn’t a maniac or a dunderhead when it comes to my own listening habits, just as do you when it comes to yours. Whenever we make this decision we rely upon our education, experience, preferences, sense of cultural norms and decency, and – yes – our listening habits.
The second reason for the importance of the terms lies in the fact of the first reason: if we shut out all discourse with anyone of a different opinion from ours, we impair our ability to learn, we deny the importance of empathy in a civilized society, and we guarantee the deadlock Congress presently displays. It is clear that choosing not to listen is a right that needs to be exercised with the greatest of caution; in fact, it is clear to me that the right not to listen should be exercised as sparingly as humanly possible if one’s goals include any combination of learning, education, and personal success – to say nothing of being a good citizen.
Nevertheless, when someone’s discourse becomes too shrill and evidences no reasoned intelligence or the merest iota of common sense, not listening is my preferred method of maintaining my sanity. In most instances of shrillness in the context of the 2016 presidential election, I have endeavored mightily to listen carefully to the first utterance of some seeming inanity in order to determine what it is I find objectionable about it; I feel obligated to assess my reaction intellectually, and come to a reasoned conclusion about what makes the assertion objectionable. But once I have made that determination, I feel no obligation to listen to further rants about the same nonsense. In fact, I carry my determination to the extreme of not reading and not watching – but with the caveat that I should read or listen to any reasoned exposition of the objectionable opinion if it is being offered anew by someone other than the original spewer, someone who has taken the time and pains to consider the logic of the opinion, or its sources, objectively and carefully.
While I am comfortable with each of my specific decisions not to listen, I always find myself uncomfortable whenever I undergo the decisional processes that lead to one. I worry that I might decide not to listen too often, or, indeed, to develop the skill of not listening into my de facto reaction to anything which I disagree with on its face. As I grow older, I am conscious that my parents got less flexible in their listening habits as they aged. Because of that fact and my own advanced age, I have decided to observe a set of rules which must be met before turning off my hearing aids.
Rule No. 1: Presumption Of An Obligation To Listen. The right not to listen should be exercised sparingly, if at all. Consequently, a strong presumption exists in favor of the validity of a speaker’s opinions and of the underlying reasons which caused him or her to utter them. This presumption is different from their right to utter their opinions in the first instance, as guaranteed by the First Amendment.
Rule No. 2: We must Listen Before Choosing Not To Listen. We must always listen carefully to an opinion which we find objectionable, employing great care and empathy in an attempt to understand the nature and logic of, and reasons for the speaker having reached, the opinion. Each refusal to listen should be based upon intelligent and thoughtful analysis of the opinion itself, of our reasons for finding it objectionable, and of the reasons the speaker saw fit to utter it.
Rule No. 3: We Must First Try To Seek Common Ground Before Shutting Anyone Out. This is a corollary to Rule No. 2. If the speaker is known to us and has a legitimate basis for having said something we find objectionable based upon our own ethical system, our first task is to discuss our disagreement with the speaker in an attempt to find common ground or an alternative solution to the problem which the speaker addressed that would satisfy both of us even if it might contain a perceived flaw from our point of view. Having made that effort, if an objectionable opinion continues to be uttered by a relative, friend, or colleague, we should first attempt to counsel him or her to speak and behave otherwise for the sake of whatever relationship we enjoy. We should only proceed to dismiss a friend, relative, or colleague from our lives if we have first exercised the personal courage to confront them with reasoned argument against that which we deem objectionable.*
Rule No. 4: Avoid All Classifications Unless Manifestly Earned. Not everyone who has an opinion we refuse to listen to is a bigot, a terrorist, a lout, or some other beyond-the-pale classification. We must acknowledge that there are otherwise good people who hold specific opinions which we find anathema. We are entitled to refuse to listen to the specific opinion which we find objectionable, but shunning someone entirely for a single opinion is a step beyond reasonableness. Shunning someone requires lot more than a single instance of disagreement.**
Rule No. 5: Applications of Well and Truly Earned Bad Classifications are Imperative. As a corollary to Rule No. 4, we should never abide authoritarianism, bigotry, or the sort of knee-jerk communal hatred and filth that is spread around with a paint roller by complete assholes. Whenever the bigotry of any speaker becomes too loud, too forceful, or too dangerous, public recognition by us of him or her as a bigot becomes a civic obligation. Only this kind of public naming and shaming can prevent the rise of despots and preserve our shared cultural norms. Such persons are worthy of our attention, but only in the sense that we should shout them down loudly and collectively. Very occasionally – even more sparingly than exercising our right not to listen to them – a person such as Timothy McVey should be punished when he translates his opinions into harmful behavior extending well beyond his own inherent right to freedom of speech. While it is appropriate to call some opinions bigotry and to protest them publicly and even confrontationally, it is not appropriate to refuse the right to speak to those doing nothing more than uttering that which we deem blasphemy.***
These are my rules, all of them. I can only hope they cover the applicable waterfront. Others may well disagree with some or all of my thoughts and logic, or think the rules themselves inadequate in some manner. Some may even do so thoughtfully.
I can well imagine that many will quickly come to the conclusion that my premise that we have the right not to listen is faulty in its inception. Even I must admit there is a certain educational heresy to the notion. But I know one thing for certain: there isn’t a shred of doubt that each of us closes our minds to others’ thoughts and ideas on occasion, and many do so all too frequently. Therefore, I am much happier having made the attempt to discover a reasoned way of doing so in future.
Feel free to have at me and/or my ideas, logic, or perceived lack thereof. My very own rules (at least I think they are mine, because I didn’t bother to read anyone else’s ideas on the subject before writing this piece) require me to listen to you or to anyone who cares to comment one way or another – for at least a little while, anyway.
*This is also called the “Who Made Me God?” rule.
**This is also known as the “Frequently Wrong But Never In Doubt” rule after the following concluding chorus to Cheryl Wheeler’s eponymous song:
And I guess I’ve forgotten since I was a kid
I don’t know why we loved him I just know we did
And he was easily riled, likely to shout
Frequently wrong but never in doubt
***This is also called the “Westboro Baptist Church” rule for reasons which ought to be obvious to anyone who possesses even an ounce of sanity and decency.
