Speech that Offends: The Treatment of Transgressive Expression and Hate Speech in the United States

Chris Hanson

In the United States, war has been frequently justified on the basis of ensuring freedom for American citizens and to secure the American way of life. Memorial Day and Veterans Day are set aside as holidays meant to honor the sacrifice of soldiers who fought for these principles. The concept of freedom is used frequently and loosely to justify conflicts, many of which seem largely unrelated to this concept. However, it has remained a powerful ideal around which to rally support for military conflict and an effective argument against those who do not support such a conflict. The ideal of freedom is such an apparently universal desire that those who question the use of force to ensure it for America are often thought of as “un-American.” That is not to say that popular support has never wavered for conflicts that are intended to ensure freedom, but it seems to be commonly believed that the primary method for securing freedom is through the usage of military might. Certainly with nearly half of all U.S. government spending going to defense, one would have to assume that we must be literally swamped in freedom. Perhaps this is why the U.S. is currently so busy exporting this glorious freedom to countries like Iraq. Sarcasm aside, the current international climate does seem to suggest that freedom may not be best spread through force and that is better secured through different methods. So, what would these methods be exactly?

Freedom of expression, in particular, is one of the most fundamental and cherished rights in the United States, established in the First Amendment. Significantly, it has rarely been secured through war or violence. The reality of freedom of expression is more difficult to glorify than the idea of going to war to “defend freedom.” It is unlikely that any stirring Hollywood films will be produced about the American Civil Liberties Union suing to allow neo-Nazis to have a rally for their cause, but this is often the nature of modern conflicts over the freedom of expression. The basic ideals of the First Amendment are widely supported enough that conflicts over free expression tend to occur on the fringes of free expression, in cases involving pornography, alleged hate speech, and very strong obscenity. However, this circumstance does not mean that those who stand up on the side of free expression should be any less honored than the nation’s war heroes, although they rarely are. Additionally, just because freedom of expression is often secured in somewhat extreme cases, it does not make a victory for this freedom any less significant. In fact, it is these extreme cases that truly test whether the United States stands by its ideals of free speech. Free speech is only guaranteed when there are people willing to test its limits: like many of the other rights ensured to people, it has to be strongly fought for and defended through the continued free expression of ideas.

Defining Transgression

It may first be useful to define the idea of transgressive expression to firmly establish a framework for discussion. Transgressive expression, while intended to be offensive to a set of sensibilities, should not be confused with what is commonly considered “hate speech.” While there are certainly some who would argue that certain examples of transgressive expression are considered extremely personally hurtful and dangerous to society, this does not necessarily make them hate speech. Conversely, shouting a racial epithet at someone on the street does not count as transgressive expression. Certainly it would be offensive, but without any intended meaning beyond threatening someone, it could hardly be considered transgressive in any meaningful way. In his book, Transgressions: The Offenses of Art, Anthony Julius discusses the definition and roots of transgressive art. He notes that the idea of transgression is of “outrages that can liberate” (Julius 2002, 17). This definition provides a useful distinction between hate speech and transgressive expression because, although there will inevitably be disagreement about the exact distinction, they have opposite purposes and little in common beyond being offensive. One seeks to liberate the audience while the other seeks to control and cause fear. I will be returning to the idea of hate speech later in my essay, because it is fraught with its own issues related to freedom of expression, after further discussing the idea of transgressive expression.

Having separated the ideas of hate speech and transgressive expression, one might wonder whether anything offensive can be considered transgressive. The answer is very clearly “no.” Just because something is offensive, does not mean that it is necessarily transgressive. No, it needs to be extremely and widely offensive to be transgressive. Julius calls transgression “a sin, a super-crime, an offence against God” (Julius 2002, 16). Indeed, the idea of transgression is fraught with evocations of religious sin, owing to the word’s origin in Christian scripture. Although it has since become associated with general rule-breaking as well, the religious weight of the term remains because of its usage in relation to the breaking of a society’s most strict taboos. As such, transgressive expression is not accidental. The extreme degree of the offense separates it from that which is incidentally offensive. One certainly does not take a picture of a crucifix submerged in urine and title it “Piss Christ,” as Andres Serrano did in 1987, by accident. It should go without saying that transgressive expression is not known as an avenue for subtlety.

Additionally, transgressive expression, to varying degrees, displays a certain degree of knowledge about a subject and an intention to spur discussion on it. There is always an intention to confront a certain aspect of society and one must be educated about this subject to effectively offer criticism. Largely, this purpose is what allows one to differentiate between that which is transgressive and that which is merely offensive. Offense is certainly part of it, but transgressive expression couples offense with an invitation to the audience to reconsider the subject of the work. Having challenged the audience with an uncommon or offensive viewpoint, the transgressive artist seeks to spur further discussion in the wake of their ideas. The power of transgressive expression lies in its ability to both demonstrate an understanding of the subject but to frame the dialogue in a way that is rarely allowed in everyday culture. The creator’s transgression is intended to force the audience to reconsider the subject matter in light of the creator’s rejection of the traditional portrayal of the subject.

Why Transgression is Important

Now with an idea of what constitutes transgressive expression sketched out, it is worth elaborating on just why exactly it is such an invaluable form of speech that has served a significant role in securing free speech rights. As was touched upon in the introduction, transgressive expression in the United States actually tests the laws of free speech, which theoretically give the right to unfettered expression. While it is commonly accepted that one can say anything ones wants in the U.S., provided it is not a direct threat to anyone, this is certainly not always true. The language of the First Amendment would appear quite clear, sweepingly declaring that “Congress shall make no law […] abridging the freedom of speech” but its practical application has led to innumerable disputes over the exact meaning, not to mention the true intention, of its inclusion in the Bill of Rights. Even the most adamant free speech supporters accept that this right does require the exception of certain cases to ensure free expression for all people. Thus, it is clear that the actual application of the right to free expression is much more complex than the wording would imply because the practical interpretation differs from written law. As the various interpretations of the First Amendment illustrate, the law means nothing until it is applied, and it is through this application that the degree of freedom allowed by the law becomes evident.

The practical application of the First Amendment reveals the true nature of freedom in this democratic and multicultural society. It is not sufficient to simply say that freedom of expression is important or integral to society. This point is obvious. What is important to realize is that it is the very basis for societal advancement. Freedom of expression is not an ideal that merely requires pledged support. It requires constant action to secure. There is a reason that the dictionary of George Orwell’s 1984 is constantly pared down every year, removing words that are deemed unnecessary. To take away the means for free expression is to take away freedom itself. Future freedom is ensured only through the practice of free expression in the present. Orwell demonstrated how intangible limitations on expression can become manifested in very real ways, as the removal of words causes the citizens of Oceania to be unable to even express their thoughts and emotions. Thus, a limitation on free expression should never be viewed as an isolated incident; it has an effect on all forms of expression.

Without the ability to question aspects of society and voice unpopular opinions, change could rarely occur. It goes without saying that many of the most important and influential ideas in history were often first seen as foolish, offensive, and sometimes downright heretical. However, it is those who have dared to say that which no one else would who have gone down in history as some of our greatest writers, artists, and thinkers. It is not war heroes who have strengthened the right to free expression, it is the offenders and transgressors. This is not a group of people who are easily romanticized and it is typically only in hindsight that their contributions are truly recognized for the impact they have had on society. America, perhaps owing to the Puritan influence of the country’s founding, can be particularly loath to celebrate the transgressive speech that ensures free expression for others.

One might think that free expression has never been more guaranteed, with new media forms such as the internet, which allow widespread global communication and a seemingly more tolerant atmosphere than in any recent decades. Yet, the ways in which free expression are limited also change with the times. Overt forms of censorship are often replaced with more subtle, but still dangerous, forms. In the last two decades, debate over the concepts of political correctness and hate speech has come to the forefront in the discussion over freedom of expression because of an increased cognizance of the multicultural nature of our society. The establishment of laws against hate speech and the promotion of politically correct terminology have both been well-intentioned attempts to ensure that minority groups in society are able to fully utilize their own right to freedom of expression, but they remain controversial. There is a potential for these laws to be used to silence transgressive expression. Additionally, it seems there is movement toward treating offensive epithets as a form of action, rather than speech, that has potentially disturbing consequences for free speech in general, not just of the transgressive variety. The potential for limiting free expression is important to consider because modern disputes over free speech often occur around issues of political correctness.

The Real Problem that Political Correctness Poses

During the 1990s and until today, “political correctness” has come under attack by many conservatives for its perceived limiting of free speech. It has been often mocked for offering wordy substitutes for what were previously thought to be simple, appropriate terms. As a writer who vehemently supports the actions of artists and writers who break social taboos, one might assume that I would strongly oppose political correctness on the basis that it is a very limiting force on these people. However, I think the issue of political correctness and its relation to transgressive speech is more complicated. Certainly there are cases in which ideas and terminology supported in the name of political correctness have caused more confusion than good, but it seems that those who feel the most scandalized by the widespread adoption of more culturally sensitive terms are actually just reacting to their bigotry being pointed out more than anything. Unfortunately, it is largely conservatives who have controlled the popular perception of political correctness and given it such a bad name. They feel that they have to unfairly tiptoe around sensitive issues and that previously clear terminology is being replaced by obfuscating bureaucratic jargon. Certainly there are legitimate concerns to be raised on the issue, but they frequently seem raised more out of anger and exasperation toward the idea of one needing to alter their word choice than out of a legitimate concern for freedom of expression. Many conservatives assert that political correctness is the liberal threat to free speech, when the reality is that discussions on the issue have tended to create more heat than light. The real problem with political correctness is the atmosphere it has created in discussions related to minority issues, in which debates about language choices often eclipse the actual issues that are being discussed. The perception is often that these issues are so sensitive that it is better to avoid them rather than running the risk of offending someone.

In her essay “Teaching the N-word,” Emily Bernard encounters an example of the way in which political correctness, or more accurately college students’ perception of political correctness, can have a chilling effect on expression in the classroom. Bernard, a black professor, describes a discussion in her classroom, which is composed of all white students, over the use of the term “nigger.” Specifically, she notes the way her students “say ‘the n-word’” or, if they do actually say it, use it within the phrase “the word ‘nigger’” (Bernard 2006, 31). She jokes about her students’ inability to say the word but most of them refuse to budge, one even asking “What exactly is lost [by not saying ‘nigger’]?” She says she does not know, but the answer is clear. The experience of saying and hearing the word is at the heart of the discussion and cannot be removed without losing a critical aspect of the dialogue. The word becomes the proverbial elephant in the room when students refuse say it out loud, even in a strictly academic setting. Bernard is particularly cognizant of her race as the discussion turns to the question of whether the students would be able to say “nigger” if she were not in the room. The students seem to believe that certain words are completely taboo, which has a harmful, chilling effect on open discussion of subjects, such as the etymology of offensive terms and their usage in society. How, exactly, is one supposed to hold an effective discussion about a word, when most people try to skirt around having to actually say it? Is there not a time when and place where even the most feared words can be said in an academic setting without the risk of being accused of being a bigot? While some might view the reticence of the students to say “nigger” as a positive sign of increased sensitivity toward racist language, one has to wonder how many potentially illuminating discussions have been hindered by the idea that such words can absolutely never be uttered. The fear of using prejudicial language in any setting is so high that students are more likely to simply avoid these discussions than try to work their way around them without saying the words that are actually being discussed.

Words as Violence?

This treatment of certain words as taboo is indicative of a trend in modern thinking that equates physical violence with specific kinds of language, creating a rather dangerous precedent. As a justification for censoring these words, it is argued that since they are not actually speech, but violent acts, it would not be a violation of the First Amendment to control their usage. While this certainly provides a convenient justification for exempting this words from typical, free speech protection, it is an argument that makes little sense for its relative prevalence. Catherine MacKinnon, a conservative feminist scholar subscribes to this notion and is largely responsible for the idea’s dissemination in the feminist world. As she writes in her book Only Words, a collection of lectures:

There is a relation, for example, between the use of the epithet “nigger” and the fact that a disproportionate number of children who go to bed hungry every night in this country are African-American; or the use of the word “cunt” and the fact that most prostitutes are women (MacKinnon 1993, 74).

This strict view of word usage, suggesting that words can cause inequality has become popular among more conservative scholars of social injustice and has led to some of the most ridiculed developments in politically correct speech (the use of “womyn” instead of women, based on questionable etymological justification, etc.). Jonathan Rauch, a writer and defender of free speech, gives numerous examples of this mentality, from Toni Morrison arguing that “Oppressive language does more than represent violence; it is violence,” to a University of Michigan law professor who calls racial epithets “bullets” (Rauch and Rushdie 1997, 32). It almost sounds as if those making these arguments had just recently discovered the power of language in affecting human emotions. Yes, language is powerful and can be used to invoke strong emotions in individuals. This does not, however, mean that words or expressions that offend somehow transcend the bounds of speech. Unless they function as direct threats of violence against someone (a type of speech which is, understandably, not protected by the First Amendment), these offensive terms are simply the mechanism by which someone conveys a message, whether it be bigoted or not. The title of MacKinnon’s book, Only Words, mocks this argument, because she feels it minimizes the impact that words can have. However, to say that offensive terminology is only words is not to say that words cannot cause shock, pain, anguish, or any other emotion. It is to say that the words themselves are not weapons, but are vehicles of meaning that has been given to them in that specific context. Furthermore, the definition of what is even considered “assaultive,” and to whom, becomes a thoroughly confusing affair because of the context of how the words are used.. Of course, the idea of “speech as violence” attempts to ignore this pesky aspect of language by asserting that the words themselves are oppressive, whenever they are used. This approach is foolish.

The “speech as violence” argument is based entirely on the assumption that words are always fixed in their meaning and cannot evolve. The reclamation of epithets as a form of empowerment is an important example of the way in which the meaning of previously offensive words has been completely altered. The idea that society is at the mercy of violent, offensive words that must be eliminated looks ridiculous when one takes the example of “queer,” which has been reclaimed as a word of empowerment. In fact, it has become so widely accepted in this role that an entire field of study now falls under the mantle of “queer theory” and is represented on college campuses across the world. This example is not merely a unique case of a word overcoming its negative connotations. By turning what was once an insult into a mark of pride, reclamation returns power to the group against which the epithet was used and changes the connotation of the word. This is a much better method of controlling the use of a word than informal attempts to the ban use of epithets.

Rauch argues that the “purist” argument, which says that “society cannot be just until the last traces of invidious prejudice have been scrubbed away,” leads to futile fights over prejudice (Rauch and Rushdie 1997, 29). In the realm of language, this approach is represented in the efforts to “ban” certain words, such as bigoted epithets. In the last year, there have been increased efforts to expunge bigoted terms from the modern lexicon, as a result of numerous incidents in which offensive epithets were used, such as Michael Richards’ infamous tirade at the Laugh Factory. In particular, this incident became a rallying point for movements that sought to eliminate the usage of the word “nigger” in modern society. Civil rights leaders such as Al Sharpton and Jesse Jackson decried the incident and later sponsored a symbolic funeral for “the n-word,” and pushed to have the word removed from use in the entertainment world (Blanchard 2007). The Laugh Factory, the club at which Richards was performing on the night, banned the use of the word from its club, fining comedians a whopping twenty dollars for each use of the word (Salkin 2006). While the intent behind these responses was largely a symbolic gesture, intended to display a climate of resistance to the use of racial epithets, they are a short-sighted and ultimately misguided. Not only does this approach continue to give the banned word power, but it fights against racism in a completely superficial manner. Rather than focusing the discussion of racism around the ways it is institutionally supported in society, it becomes focused solely around the issue of specific words while the larger issue is completely obscured. Instead of talking about racism, discussions revolve only around the issue of who can say the word and who cannot. A potential dialogue on race in the United States, thus, turns into an inane discussion of who’s “allowed” to say what. Like Catherine MacKinnon’s quixotic crusade to ban pornography, which has eclipsed her fight against rape and sexual discrimination, the effort to ban “nigger” is bound to fail because it is focused on a reflection of a social ill, not the problem itself. The question that should be asked is why racial epithets, such as “nigger,” continue to carry such potency, because this would lead to an analysis of the ways in which Black Americans still suffer from injustice (MacKinnon 1993).

The Problem with Controlling Speech

Among supporters of banning offensive epithets, there seems to be no consideration given for the ways in which the word could be used in a clearly non-racist capacity, especially in an ironic manner in which its usage actually mocks racism. With zero-tolerance policies on offensive epithets, it is often the members of a minority group who are punished for breaking these rules, which ends up defeating the original point of the policies in the first place. In the aftermath of the Laugh Factory incident, the first person to be fined under the new policy against using the word “nigger” was Damon Wayans, a black comedian (Salkin 2006). As Rauch notes of policies that punish the use of offensive epithets:

Recall the Michigan student who was prosecuted for saying homosexuality is a treatable disease, and notice that he was black. Under that Michigan speech code, more than twenty blacks were charged with racist speech, while no instance of racist speech by whites was punished. In Florida, the hatespeech law was invoked against a black man who called a policeman a “white cracker”; not so surprisingly, in the first hate-crimes case to reach the Supreme Court, the victim was white and the defendant black (Rauch and Rushdie 1997, 32).

actually the minorities who are more discriminatory than members of majority groups but this would be a foolish assumption. Today, offensive epithets are likely to be used by the very minority groups the terms were intended to harm, rather than always being used as a form of intimidation. Blatantly obvious forms of racism have generally disappeared from everyday society in favor of more subtle incarnations, meaning a ban on these obvious forms accomplishes very little. Perhaps if this symbolic ban had been made in the first half of the 20th century, it would have had some impact, since this was a time in which the term “nigger” was still widely used by whites. The reason the incident at the Laugh Factory garnered such a large amount of press coverage was the fact that Richard’s racist comments were so incredibly blatant at a time in which that level of vociferous racism is rare to see.

What the enforcement of these policies shows is that limiting the freedom of all people, without actually addressing the underlying disempowerment of minority groups in society, will cause this restriction to be disproportionately used against minorities. Since there is no consideration for context in these sorts of policies, it may continue to be minority groups that feel the brunt of their application. Additionally, by codifying offensive epithets as all being equally evil, it supports the notion that all groups in society have an equal claim to discrimination. Rather than addressing the inequalities between groups in society, such policies suggest that no one group has any right to complain about discrimination any more than another because there are epithets for all manner of groups in society. These policies really only guarantee that majority groups are further protected from any perceived sort of discrimination and that minority groups can continue to be put under scrutiny for any perceived prejudices.

The focus on language and word choice ultimately obscures the real issues of civil rights behind a largely irrelevant issue that, while it is reflective of inequality in society, is certainly not the cause of inequality. While some race theorists such as Richard Delgado would argue that epithets are always degrading, regardless of their context, this approach ignores the possibilities for reclamation as a method for minority groups to reassert power, as well as the relationship between the power of an epithet and the social status of the group to which it refers (Delgado and Stefancic 1997, 9). A litany of other legitimate offenses, such as murders, rapes, and other crimes, are being associated with epithets and then the terms are being blamed for these offenses. This method was pioneered by Catherine MacKinnon, who in describing accounts of rape and sexual assault, decided that it is not so much those incidents that are the problem but pornography, which nebulously spreads values that supports these actions. Her arguments are very extreme, but they have attracted enough attention to wield a certain amount of influence over the sociological and feminist theory. How the argument that the problem with rape is not so much rape, but pornography, has gained any sort of legitimacy is certainly beyond me. This sort of argument runs entirely counter to the ideals of the First Amendment, which has never allowed for censorship based on the demands of any group that disagrees with a certain form of speech.

Coming back to the idea of transgressive expression, it is important to realize the difference between speech that is legitimately dangerous, the example of falsely yelling “fire” in a crowded theater comes to mind, and speech that is merely offensive. Arguments that some forms of speech, such as pornography or racist expressions, create an environment of disrespect toward some groups in society are simply insufficient as evidence of their need for restriction. The point of the First Amendment is that it is not making judgments on the value or goals of different kinds of speech, it simply protects free expression. Nowhere is there a guarantee that one should never be offended while living in a democratic society. We do not have to agree with a given type of speech to realize that it is still worth protecting. The title of a book by Richard Delgado and Jean Stefancic exasperatedly asks Must We Defend Nazis? as if defending someone’s right to free expression is an endorsement of their views. It seems the best argument of those who wish to censor free expression is to conflate the ideas of respect for ideas and support for them. Respect does not mean agreement, support, or any other judgment of value beyond what should be afforded to all forms of expression. Respect is, as Salman Rushdie puts it, “a mixture of good-hearted consideration and serious attention” (Rauch and Rushdie 1997, 26). Certainly we should all have respect for others’ right to free expression, but we do not have to agree with the ideas they express. Rushdie notes the change in thinking that has occurred in regard to the issue of respect:

Religious extremists demand respect for their attitudes with growing stridency. Very few people would object to the idea that people’s rights to religious belief must be respected—after all, the 1st Amendment defends those rights as unequivocally as it defends free speech—but now we are asked to agree that to dissent from those beliefs—to hold that they are suspect or antiquated or wrong—that, in fact, they are arguable—is incompatible with the idea of respect. When criticism is placed off limits as “disrespectful” and therefore offensive, something strange is happening to the concept of respect (Rauch and Rushdie 1997, 26).

Indeed, when the idea of “respect” becomes “endorsement,” it is easy to see why there are some who would wish to silence views they find offensive, but this mistaken conflation needs to be corrected. Few would know better the effects of this new treatment of the concept of respect than Rushdie, who had a death sentence put upon his head by the Iranian government for his book The Satanic Verses, which supposedly “exhibit[ed] flagrant prejudice against Muslims and outrageously slander[ed] their beliefs” (33).

Ideas Are Not Dangerous

What much of the debate over freedom of expression seems to boil down to is whether ideas should, in some cases, be treated as dangerous and, thus, worth censoring for the safety of society. While actions based on certain ideas would, in many cases, be reasonably made illegal, what of simply the ideas themselves? Those who wish for stronger censorship of what they consider to be offensive forms of speech seem to believe that since ideas lead to action, limiting some ideas would lead to a safer society. For those who subscribe to the idea of certain terms, such as offensive epithets, being themselves a form of action, this logic appears to be even stronger. However, this is a mistaken notion. “Bad ideas” do not automatically lead to “bad action” as Thomas Storck insists in his article “Censorship Can Be Beneficial,” and such simplistic logic should not be considered justification to censor certain ideas (Storck 1997, 21). The fact that ideas are not normally considered illegal in the United States is one of the things that distinguishes this country from Oceania, of 1984, where thought-crime is a crime unto itself. The mentality of those who support this notion suggests that there are some ideas that are so overpoweringly convincing that they completely short-circuit one’s normal logical processes. Reading a copy of the Anarchist Cookbook does not make someone throw Molotov cocktails at passersby any more than watching “Birth of a Nation” makes one a racist. They present ideas and information. They do not force action. Unless censors know something that the rest of the world does not, there is not something inherently more convincing about prejudicial or discriminatory ideas over those that are not. Censorship would suggest this is the case, implying that banned speech is somehow more powerful than speech that opposes it. If a normal person is not allowed access to a certain idea, does it not seem that the reason must be that it is too convincing to be allowed to spread? The best way to show that an idea makes no sense is to let people decide for themselves that it makes no sense, in a society that supports open discussion.

In fact, fear of an idea tends to lead to exactly the opposite of the intended effect when the idea is censored. This phenomenon has been shown over and over, from the increased sales of 2 Live Crew’s As Nasty as They Wanna Be after it was deemed obscene to the canonization of controversial authors such as Henry Miller and William S. Burroughs. Censorship empowers that which it is attempting to squelch because it assumes an idea is too powerful to be fought against through reasoned debate and discussion.

Conclusion

Freedom of expression should not be thought of as merely a goal or an ideal in the United States but as the means of ensuring a free society. The more uninhibited the exchange of ideas in this country, the more free its people are. Only through a constant process of testing the limits of free expression can First Amendment rights continue to be secured. Obviously, this is not a process that always occurs within the view of polite society, but that does not mean we should have any less respect for those who have fought for the right to offend in America. As Salman Rushdie says of the necessity of ensuring this right, “Without the freedom to offend, [freedom of expression] ceases to exist” (Rauch and Rushdie 1997, 33). As such, the battle over free expression in America hedges largely over this issue of what types of offense can be allowed. Increased sensitivity toward offending minority groups in society is certainly a good thing, in the sense that there is cognizance of societal power structures that disempower members of these groups. However, tampering with the right to free expression is not the correct avenue of action to ensure these groups’ First Amendment rights are respected.

Released in 1934 in Europe, Tropic of Cancer became one of the most notoriously banned books in the United States, deemed too obscene for publication for nearly thirty years. Its eventual publication in the U.S. led to an obscenity case in which its classification as obscene was overturned. In the book, Henry Miller states that “side by side with the human race there runs another race of beings, […] the race of artists who, goaded by unknown impulses, take the lifeless mass of humanity and by the fever and ferment with which they imbue it turn this soggy dough into bread and the bread into wine and the wine into song” (Miller 1961, 254). It is a tragedy that Miller’s words were censored in the United States for nearly thirty years, but it points out an important aspect of how the “race of artists” he speaks of are often subject to censorship, even in societies that claim to uphold the ideal of free speech (Rembar 1968).

As a country that prides itself on its principles of freedom, it should not be forgotten that those who have secured the right to free speech are, to the say the least, an interesting grouping of people from whom society can learn much. Transgressive expression is certainly not celebrated throughout society, but it has yielded a brave crop of experimenters who have dared to say that which no one else would. In modern society, even with the ever-increasing speed at which ideas can now be shared, there are still those who wish to silence views with which they do not agree. This is not to say that their reasons may not be sympathetic, such as with the issue of prejudicial language, but it is important to keep separate the ideas of offense and hate speech. Undoubtedly there are cases in which speech that directly threatens a group or an individual must be limited, but ideas and beliefs should never be considered to be immune from criticism. Living in a multicultural and democratic society often means having to grapple with ideas and expressions that can be shocking, offensive, and generally unpleasant but that does not necessarily make them wrong. Salman Rushdie aptly describes a free society, saying, “You must have free play of ideas. There must be argument, and it must be impassioned and untrammeled. A free society is not a calm and eventless place—that is the kind of static, dead society dictators try to create (Rauch and Rushdie 1997, 27). Rushdie’s experience of having a death sentence declared against him serves as a strong reminder that this idea is still not shared around the world. The “race of artists” that Henry Miller speaks of in Tropic of Cancer is an integral part of American society that helps to ensure freedom of expression for the rest of us and they should never be afraid that their right to express controversial ideas will not be protected. Limitations on free expression create a chilling effect on the practice of transgressive expression and bankrupt society’s artistic, intellectual, and literary development. The tragedy is that there is no way to measure the cultural loss suffered by constraining the range of expression available to citizens of the United States, but it is simply a risk that is not worth taking.

References

Bernard, Emily. 2006. Teaching the N-Word. In The Best American Essays 2006, edited by Lauren Slater and Robert Atwan. New York: Houghton Mifflin.
Delgado, Richard and Jean Stefancic. 1997. Must We Defend Nazis? New York: New York City Press.
Julius, Anthony. 2002. Transgressions: The Offenses of Art. Chicago: University of Chicago Press.
MacKinnon, Catherine. 1993. Only Words. Cambridge: Harvard University Press.
Miller, Henry. 1961. Tropic of Cancer. New York: Grove Press.
Rauch, Jonathan and Salman Rushdie. 1997. Censorship is harmful. In Censorship: Opposing Viewpoints, edited by David Bender, Bruno Leone, and Byron Stay. San Diego: Greenhaven Press.
Rembar, Charles. 1968. The End of Obscenity: The Trials of Lady Chatterley, Tropic of Cancer, and Fanny Hill. New York: Random House.
Storck, Thomas. 1997. Censorship can be beneficial. In Censorship: Opposing Viewpoints, edited by David Bender, Bruno Leone, and Byron Stay. San Diego: Greenhaven Press.