Tuesday, March 14, 2023 | 2 a.m.
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The writer of the March 10 letter “Downfall of Dilbert unfair” unfortunately misconstrues the First Amendment.
The amendment reads, in part, “Congress shall make no law … abridging the freedom of speech …”
This is generally interpreted to mean that the government cannot ban or seek to control speech by law nor impose punishments based on an individual’s speech.
In Scott Adams’ case, the government did not prohibit him from saying what he did, nor did the government punish him for it. Therefore, his First Amendment rights were fully upheld.
However, nongovernmental entities, such as newspapers and media, are not included in the restrictions of the First Amendment. In fact, the amendment also bans “abridging the freedom of … the press …” They are free to decide what content they will or will not publish. After all, Fox News, the epitome of presenting carefully selected speech, could not be forced to broadcast Rachel Maddow’s show based on a First Amendment argument.
Furthermore, I don’t believe that there is an organized “crusade” against Adams. Each newspaper’s editorial board makes its own independent decisions for what appears in their pages.
Like the letter writer, I enjoyed “Dilbert” for many years. But given Adams’ statements, I doubt I would ever again read his strip, even if the Sun continued to publish it.
