Free Speech

News flash for Robert Ehrlich: The undeserved pot shot at the ACLU in your recent op-ed speculating on life if Mitt Romney had won the presidency is, indeed, based on fantasy and delusion ("What might have been: Life under President Romney" Jan. 27). As a Ravens fan, I must set the record straight. Far from wishing to keep Ravens linebacker Ray Lewis from invoking God during post-game interviews, the ACLU would defend his right to pray any time during the game he wants. The First Amendment protects his right to pray.

In 1994, I worked closely with residents all over Howard County to gather the 10,000 signatures needed to put a charter amendment on the ballot that allowed county residents to take to referendum changes to the general plan, the zoning map and zoning regulations. In what was described at the time as the nastiest race in county history, and over the vehement objection of county officials and the development community, 67 percent of voters wisely approved the amendment in the 1994 election.

Columnist Marta Mossburg's column on the Maryland Council on American-Islamic Relations' protest against Pamela Geller as a speaker at the recent Maryland Conservative Action Network conference in Annapolis is factually incorrect ("A controversial speaker's right to be heard," Jan. 16). As a moderator at the conference, Ms. Mossburg was understandably biased in favor of Ms. Geller's hateful and hurtful views, but she failed to disclose this potential conflict of interest to her readers.

Organizers of the Maryland Conservative Action Network conference (Turning the Tides 2013) were profoundly disappointed that The Sun ran an attack on our conference and our speakers on the very morning of our conference ("The tide of Islamophobia," Jan. 12). You did a huge disservice to your readers by posting this polemic in a complete vacuum and without an opportunity for response from those, especially Pamela Geller, whose characters were impugned by a writer with an obvious ax to grind.

The "Unhappy Halloween, Hon" (Nov. 3) commentary by Michael Cross-Barnet was a scream. Like a Holy Roman emperor or a demented totalitarian dictator, it dictated what was appropriate free speech for all times and all places. It also chastised the owner of Cafe Hon for apologizing for a Halloween depiction of a white person with a black face only twice and not at least three times. Moreover, the writer actually spelled out in several sentences what it deemed as the only appropriate wording of a theoretical third apology by the Cafe Hon . And what was the Hon's verbal trespass?

I find it so amazing that the proponents of Question 6 say that passing this will help to promote a climate of tolerance. All the while they are attacking anyone, any organization or church that opposes it. The recent comments of those opposing the Rev. Robert Anderson and other pastors who oppose the redefining of marriage have been anything but tolerant ("Same-sex unions: What would Jesus do?" Oct. 25). I understand that there have been threats made to him. Perhaps, this is just of glimpse of what to expect if this Question 6 becomes Maryland law. I guess we will have free speech, as guaranteed by the United States Constitution, as long as we agree with supporters of this ballot question.

Gallaudet University President T. Alan Hurwitz's decision to suspend the university's chief diversity officer for signing a democratic initiative to put same-sex marriage on Maryland's ballot violates her right to free speech and diversity itself ("Gallaudet official suspended for signing anti-gay marriage petition," Oct. 11). In the first place, Angela McCaskill acted privately, and not as a representative of the university. Second, her apparent view of legalized homosexual unions is obviously in the minority among the leadership of the university, making it not only subject to majority oppression but a spot of intellectual diversity.

Your editorial on Katie Moody's tasteless tweet was either written by two different people in two different worlds or is a prime example of the lunacy that is all too common in our culture today ("Offensive tweet, outrageous response," Sept. 27). In the same editorial, Ms. Moody's right to free speech, however moronic, was defended, while the rights of her equally moronic respondents were dismissed out of hand. No doubt most of those respondents hid behind some cowardly pseudonym, which is detestable.

It is always reprehensible to mock anyone's religious beliefs, and it is even worse when the mockery is expected to result in violence, injury or death ("Obama defends free speech," Sept. 27). The freedom of speech exercised in the notorious anti-Islamic video "The Innocence of Muslims" is a case in point. It is tantamount to falsely yelling "Fire!" in a crowded theater, which is impossible to defend as free speech. Yet in some of the Muslim countries where the outcry against the video has been loudest, the notorious anti-Semitic libel known as "The Protocols of the Elders of Zion" is freely sold and published.

The article, "Free speech clash grips U.N. " (Sept. 25) could also apply to the recent lecture at the Baltimore Council for Foreign Affairs (BCFA), where its president, Frank Burd, caved into pressure from pro-Israel groups and would not allow questions concerning the Middle East during a lecture by University of Chicago Professor John Mearsheimer. Even though the topic was China, Mr. Burd was evidently afraid that the professor's comments critical of Israel and U.S. policy favoring Israel would offend some of his audience so he limited discussion solely to China, something that he had never done before.