The slap seen ’round the world from Sunday night’s Oscars ceremony holds an important lesson on free speech.
That was no doubt the farthest thing from Will Smith’s mind when he charged the stage at the Academy Awards to pop Chris Rock after the comedian joked about Smith’s wife, actor Jada Pinkett Smith, and her nearly bald head. But he vividly demonstrated why we must resist the idea that “speech is violence.”
For those who want to vigorously police microaggressions, shut down ideas they disagree with and demand that tech companies and government help them do it, some words cause so much trauma that they equal violence. And to some extent, they have a point about how much certain comments can hurt, especially young people.
