From the mind of critic: “If we believe flag burning should be illegal because it’s a symbol of America, and burning a flag is like burning America itself, do we care more about the symbol than the country? Do we care about the aura of rights, dignity and liberty of all people more than the actual practice when it’s put to the test? Or do we believe rights, dignity and liberty can only exist if it exists for all of us, especially the downtrodden and those we disagree with? Flag burning has been a controversial issue for a long time, and will continue to be for the forseeable future. We must ask ourselves if a symbol is more important than the meaning behind it. Do we care more about the illusion of freedom, then the practice of it? Do we want to feel safer, or do we actually want to be safer? There is a reason that free speech is not only in the bill of rights as the first ammendment, but also the first of five parts of that first ammendment. Without free speech, our democracy, our democratic republic, our great American experiement or whatever else we want to call it, would cease to exist. There is a reason dictators, despots, strongmen, warlords, facists and oligarchs all want to give their people a symbol, the illusion of freedom. That they can stand up and speak out for what they believe in, and get a token response from the government that they’re acting in support, all the while preventing big changes from happening. Further entrenching their power and influence through bread and circuses. When free speech starts getting trampled, the slippery slope toward facist dictatorship is not far behind. Do we believe in America enough to know that without dissent and protest, we would probably still be part of England? We might not believe that flag burning is an acceptable form of protest, but I’ll believe dollars to doughnuts that we believe in dictatorships even less. Free speech never has and never will mean only things we agree with” 🙂