Fwd: Reflections on freedom of speech, thought and inquiry (questioning)

Friends of Brookfield

Below are snippets of quotes you might want to reflect and store as the days and weeks ahead unfold. Remember them when reading the paper, emails, and conversations. Pay attention to what's being said and more importantly what isn't...and of course...form your own opinion! Remember, inquiry and questioning are good things.

A long habit of not thinking a thing wrong gives it a superficial appearance of being right. - Thomas Paine

If the freedom of speech is taken away then dumb and silent we may be led, like sheep to the slaughter. - George Washington

The peculiar evil of silencing the expression of an opinion is, that it is robbing the human race; posterity as well as the existing generation; those who dissent from the opinion, still more than those who hold it. If the opinion is right, they are deprived of the opportunity of exchanging error for truth: if wrong, they lose, what is almost as great a benefit, the clearer perception and livelier impression of truth, produced by its collision with error. -John Stuart Mill, On Liberty, 1859

We are willing enough to praise freedom when she is safely tucked away in the past and cannot be a nuisance. In the present, amidst dangers whose outcome we cannot foresee, we get nervous about her, and admit censorship. - Edward M. Forster

Did you ever hear anyone say, "That work had better be banned because I might read it and it might be very damaging to me?" - Joseph Henry Jackson

If you don't have this freedom of speech, then all these little fellows are weaseling around and doing their monkey business and they never get caught. - Harold R. Medina

If all mankind minus one were of one opinion, mankind would be no more justified in silencing that one person than he, if he had the power, would be justified in silencing mankind. - John Stuart Mill

"Free speech is intended to protect the controversial and even outrageous word; and not just comforting platitudes too mundane to need protection." - Colin Powell

"Restriction of free thought and free speech is the most dangerous of all subversions. It is the one un-American act that could most easily defeat us." - William Orville Douglas

We are not afraid to entrust the American people with unpleasant facts, foreign ideas, alien philosophies, and competitive values. For a nation that is afraid to let its people judge the truth and falsehood in an open market is a nation that is afraid of its people. - John F. Kennedy

"The Framers [of the Constitution] knew that free speech is the friend of change and revolution. But they also knew that it is always the deadliest enemy of tyranny." - Hugo Black

The populist authoritarianism that is the downside of political correctness means that anyone, sometimes it seems like everyone, can proclaim their grief and have it acknowledged. The victim culture ensures that anyone who feels offended can call for moderation, for dilution, and in the end, as is all too often the case, for censorship. And censorship, that by-product of fear - stemming as it does not from some positive agenda, but from the desire to escape our own terrors and superstitions by imposing them on others - must surely be resisted. - Jonathon Green

When one makes a Revolution, one cannot mark time; one must always go forward -- or go back. He who now talks about the ''freedom of the press'' goes backward, and halts our headlong course towards Socialism. - Vladimir Ilyich Lenin

I disapprove of what you say, but I will defend to the death your right to say it. - Voltaire

The beginning of thought is in DISAGREEMENT -- not only with others but also with ourselves. - Eric Hoffer

He that would make his own liberty secure, must guard even his enemy from opposition; for if he violates this duty he establishes a precedent that will reach himself. - Thomas Paine

I love the man that can smile in trouble, that can gather strength from distress, and grow brave by reflection. 'Tis the business of little minds to shrink, but he whose heart is firm, and whose conscience approves his conduct, will pursue his principles unto death. - Thomas Paine

It is an affront to treat falsehood with complaisance. - Thomas Paine

It is error only, and not truth, that shrinks from inquiry. - Thomas Paine

This election, start the re-birth of Brookfield with an open and transparent political process that embraces open and honest dialogue on the state of Brookfield finances after years of Republican and Democratic voting control. This November the unaffiliated voters in Brookfield, it's largest block and the town's silent majority, should chart a new course free from politics and shouldn't have to select "NONE OF THE ABOVE" by sitting on their hands and not voting.

Psssst...pass it on. Get Cranky.

Continue to send this email to all your friends, neighbors and relatives as you have and help re-invent a town that wants accountability for the tax and grant dollars it gets and gives.

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Please continue to write back with your tips, observations and rumors of what is going on in Brookfield's public schools and government.

Let us know what you think is both right and wrong with the public's business of education and governance in Brookfield. We won't prejudge you nor reveal you as a source.

Happy with the direction of the results shown in test scores? Wonder where the school activity receipts went over the last few years? Have a safety issue that concerns you? Fearful of retribution from Board of Education members? Drop us a line. Many do and thank you for doing so. See an injustice? Let us know so we can let all your neighbors know and get a consensus of opinion in the community...

There are many people in the community, hundreds, that want to help. Thank you for participating in our democracy! We'll focus the discussion on issues that you see. Thanks for all your support and sharing your issues.

As always these represent opinions and thoughts and any conclusions you draw are yours to do.