Trying To Explain: Freedom of Speech Is Not Freedom of Preach

AMONG THE BEST VENUES available in America for the absorption of jaw droppingly inexplicably bizarre words and deeds is ye olde small town senior center, especially deep in the conservative Christian south. Smilingly I recall the extreme right wing extremely devout evangelical Christian MAGA-man saying: "a true Christian must vote for Trump". This same person, an eighty year old from Minnesota, who should therefore know better, expressed his opinion that the Democratic party is so anti-Semitic that it is "pushing for", as he put it, a new holocaust. (yes, I really heard him say that.) This is a man who proudly boasts of having traveled to eastern Europe for the purpose of trying to turn Eastern Europeans into Christians, "witnessing", as they like to say. That most eastern Europeans are already Christians, and probably don't need any American role model witnesses doubtless has never occurred to the old goat. The most reprehensible aspect of America's conservative evangelical community, other than its devotion to the decidedly un-Christian Trump, is their delusional belief that they are mandated by God to change other people's religions, and that the only correct religion is the one to which the evangelical is devoted. These right wing evangelicals are not spreading the word of God; they are presuming themselves to be God. Sometimes, they step over the line among their devout brethren and sistern. One can over preach to the point of bullying. So it was with our octogenarian zealot. At long last his membership in the senior center was suspended, temporarily, for doing more Christian bullying than witnessing. When he threatened people with eternity in hell for not accepting Christ, he was out, if only refreshingly briefly. He didn't go easily. he went with a bang, proclaiming all the way to the door his right of free speech, and his intent to exercise it fully and completely upon his return. he was dead wrong, of course. I wanted to, and may yet try to explain to the self sainted Bible spouting bully that, no, in the senior center he has no "free speech". He, and millions of other Americans, do not understand the first amendment. it says that congress shall pass no law abridging free speech. It says nothing else. The sacred document says nothing about parents, teacher, employers, and senior center directors. One can arguable extend the word "congress" to mean "government", but that's about as far as it goes. Any parent can tell any offspring to shut the hell up. any teacher can tell any student to be silent. Any employer can tell any employee...but you get the point, assuming you are not a right wing Christian Trump loving maniac. When I was teaching high school I got into it with the principle, which I often did, and tried to argue that since the school received federal funding, my freedom of speech inside the building was intact. I think I was was wrong. Good try though. It is important, particularly so for extreme right wing Trumper christian fanatics to understand that free speech is not absolute, and that it protects us only from Congress, and from nobody else. if the old bastard ever comes knocking at my front door, he'll learn that vital lesson in one hell of a hurry. At eh senior, center, I'll play the part of prudence, and let the director explain it, assuming she understands it.