Balancing speech

There have been times when I've read news articles in mainstream media that are full of praise about someone who is adamantly anti-gay and have written to the author complaining about balance. I was confronted with the error of my ways in a guest editorial in yesterday's Detroit Free Press by Darnell Gardner who is all of 17 years old. Wisdom isn't always tied to age. Gardner was actually talking about the FCC's Fairness Doctrine, which some people are talking about reviving, but I'm good at generalizing concepts and sometimes even recognizing when they apply to me. The Fairness Doctrine was a requirement that broadcasters present a balanced range of opinion to their listeners and viewers. Gardner says there are two big reasons why the Fairness Doctrine should be allowed to rest in peace. The first is that we would not be able to agree on whose standard of fairness to follow. This is the same reason why we should not incorporate religious doctrine into secular laws -- we couldn't agree on which set of religious doctrine. The second and bigger reason is that enforcing balance violates freedom of speech. We take the annoying speech along with the good. And listening to those annoying opinions without a rebuttal means that citizens have to think for themselves rather than having the government think for them. That's always good. The solution to balance isn't to demand the author supply it, but to engage in some free speech of my own.