There Goes Freedom of Expression

Yesterday at approximately 11:30AM, I stepped out of my american government class ecstatic that I finally finished my midterm. 10 chapters about government, its history and its contemporary application are now lodged into my head.

I head over to the food court, buy myself a sandwich and start watching MtvU and Sean Paul's song, "We Be Burning" is on. If you did not already know, this song is about partying particularly with cannabis, the epitomizing line being, "Legalize it, time to recognize it" at the end of the chorus. So at this point, I'm surprised that they made a video for this song although I did hear it on the radio a few months earlier. The chorus approaches and I'm getting a bit anxious about the words "Legalize It" about to play through out the food court. The chorus arrives and instead of "Legalize it, time to recognzie it", they replaced it with "Recognize it, pimping as we ridin."

I was about to punch a wall-- I thought to myself, okay, maybe because this video is on during the day, they didn't want impressionable kids to hear that but that couldn't of possibly been their concern because the line prior to "Legalize it" is "Sipping Hennesy and We Be Bubblin" so clearly, safety with drugs isn't of their concern, it's just a blatant violation of freedom of expression.

It's so frustrating, especially now that I understand government much more, to see this sort of thing happening. The only legal limit on Freedom of Expression is if it incites violence and lawlessness or if it infringes on the rights of others-- which this song doesn't do.

The more I see things like this the more I want to pull my hair out, because in reality, there's little I can do about it.

<End Rant>

It has long been the desire of royalty to limit the information the peasants have access to. Slaves weren't taught to read for fear the skill would enable them to overpower their masters. It's just a tactic to suppress the advancement of a culture while keeping our leaders in the lifestyle they are accustomed. Historically this approach has always failed.