  Since Americans have freedom of expression, there is nothing to be done. That is what some have said. So that’s why we sometimes end up with the odd situation that when someone makes ugly racial, anti-gay and lesbian, anti-some-group statements, people act as if there is nothing to be done. We Americans have the right to freedom of expression. We seem to think that that freedom means that we have to shut up in the face of someone else’s ugly use of freedom of expression. No we don’t because we don’t have a right to free expression, we have a right to freedom-of-speech. All of us have that right.
   I am happy to report that Americans are beginning to realize that.Â
  There’s a group of Americans who turn out to yell and scream at the funerals of soldiers. Members of the Westboro Baptist Church say that the death of a soldier is god’s punishment for the sins of America. So they come out to a funeral to make that point in front of a family burying a loved one who served our country. And they have the freedom-of-speech right to do so. Indeed the Supreme Court ruled that they cannot be stopped from doing so, based on freedom-of-speech. That was the right reading of our Constitution. But that does not mean other Americans cannot use their freedom-of-speech to shout down this mean spirited behavior at the funeral of soldiers.Â
   That’s what happened when the Westboro Baptist Church members showed up at the funeral of Elizabeth Edwards (former wife of presidential candidate John Edwards). Since Ms. Edwards had been in support of marriage rights for gays and lesbians, members of the church came to her funeral to shout out that she was damned. But members of that church found themselves peacefully blocked by a “…line of love.”
At the funeral of Ms. Edwards, when that church group assembled where permitted, other Americans were there to block their position. This has started to happen at the funerals of soldiers; people line up early early to stand in front of the assigned position of the Westboro Baptist Church, to block their signs from the sight of those attending the funeral.
   That is also legitimate freedom-of-speech.Â
   So too was what people did in New York city on the first day that gays and lesbians could be legally married in that state. Knowing anti-gay and lesbian protestors would be there, people, some strangers to each other, some straight, showed up with colorful umbrellas. With those umbrellas open they took positions that blocked the view of the protesters from those couples who, in love, had showed up and lined up to get married.
   That was also legitimate freedom-of-speech.
   One person’s freedom-of-speech does not negate other Americans’ freedom-of-speech. Let’s not forget that because when we do, we allow ugly speech to rule the day.
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