The curious state of freedom in our time

In his wonderful movie “Annie Hall,” Woody Allen boils down California’s distinction to the ability to make a right turn on a red light.

America has a particular distinction too, one that has set us apart from nearly every country that has come or gone since the founding fathers first established this republic.

The distinction is freedom.

Around the world, we are envied for our devotion to this one element of our society. And though our freedom requires constant vigilance so it is neither reduced nor abused, it is still a marvelous concept.

In America, freedom of speech takes many forms, and often those forms are at odds with each other. Consider for example, that though the limits of free speech prevent us from yelling “Fire!” in a crowded theater, it does allow one video game company to produce a game in which the player chooses to play as law enforcement officer or as a criminal.

If you play as the bad guy, you can shoot cops.

Welcome to America.

The Costa Mesa Police Department apparently is circulating an e-mail throughout the department, encouraging people to petition against the videogame.

By the way, you are not going to see in this column the name of this game or the company that manufactures it, as there is a track record of having sales increase due to the attention focused on the product, however revolting that product may be.

That includes movies, too. There is a history of otherwise bad films receiving more than their share of ticket sales due to the fact that one group has chosen to raise public awareness of some negative element it contains.

But this is America, and there seems to be nothing preventing a grossly irresponsible videogame company from producing such an awful product.

And as was recently predicted here, Costa Mesa has attracted the attention of the American Civil Liberties Union, which has filed a lawsuit against the city for the alleged mistreatment of a speaker at a city council meeting last month.

The ACLU is alleging that someone who was exercising his right to speak freely was denied the full three minutes to do so. After being asked repeatedly by Mayor Allan Mansoor to stop talking because his three minutes were up, the man was forcibly removed by police.

In the Daily Pilot story, Belinda Escobosa Helzer, an ACLU staff attorney, was quoted as saying, “It’s clear from looking at the videotapes [of the meeting] that he was targeted because of the content of his speech.”

Sorry, but I highly doubt that, and I believe that once the facts are sorted out, it will show that Mansoor will have been within his right to silence the speaker because he was abusing his free speech privilege by not sitting down in a timely manner.

Free speech also allows one recent letter writer to accuse me of carpetbagging within the city in which I live.

I have every right to mention the writer’s name but usually hesitate to do so because I possess an unfair advantage.

In the letter, I was positioned as unqualified to comment on the effects of closing Costa Mesa’s Job Center because my contact was limited to once-a-week drive-bys.

The truth is that until three years ago, I lived on Costa Mesa’s Westside, and for 17 years I made frequent trips past the Job Center.

In America, you can have your facts wrong and get published.

In America, members of the board of trustees of the Newport-Mesa Unified School District can deny themselves the right to speak freely, as they have done conspicuously for years.

Until trustee Tom Egan rose to defend the board against a recent Daily Pilot editorial blasting the state of many schools, I could not recall the last time a trustee had anything published in the paper.

That’s not because their letter or column was suppressed, it’s just that they chose not to respond, even when they had to ask us for another few hundred million dollars last year because they ran out of the first hundred million without completing all their objectives.

Free speech also allows Egan to voice a sketchy opinion.

In his letter, Egan writes of a school near his home in which 79% of the students are English-learners and a “majority of the students qualify for free or reduced-price lunch program, indicating that they come from low-income families.”

Egan also states that many parents in the neighborhood send their kids to private schools, schools in other districts or home school their kids rather than send them to this neighborhood school.

Why? According to Egan, “It’s the demographics.”

I have another reason: The school is not performing well and parents would rather pay out of their pockets, drive many miles or stay home to teach their kids because of this underperforming school.

But that’s the beauty of free speech. Egan can look at a situation and claim one position, I can look at it and claim another.

And possibly, just possibly, the ACLU will step in to try to help us sort it all out.