isen.blog

Polite, conventional speech isn't speech that needs Constitutional protection.
As I blogged here, Voices in Conflict, a play about the Iraq war developed by a Wilton CT drama class has been censored by the school principal. A friend reported that it was available here, but the actual script, both an early version and "the current version" are replaced by a message that says,

We've been advised to take down the script for now. Sorry for the inconvenience.

Fortunately, another friend saved these scripts, and I've posted them. Here's the Early Version, [.pdf] and here is the most current, March 25 Version [.pdf].

I don't see any copyright claims (or any other attribution, for that matter) on them, and I am posting them for non-commercial, educational purposes, i.e., so people can see what the Wilton High School censorship case is all about. I believe that my posting of these texts is covered by Fair Use.

Even in the current version, which was the result of a lot of negotiation among the pro- and anti-war students and faculty, the truths of war are evident. For example:

I am not going to dishonor the effort in saving my life by saying “woe as me I got no legs.” Well I got one knee. There are guys who have none, guys who are blind. I have my arms, my face, my brain. This is a pretty good life I have compared to what it could be. Plus they make prosthetic high heels. I checked into it. Not three-inch stilettos, but at least an inch or two of heel. I’ll be good to go.

and

I see this woman walking out in all black, shes got a bag in her arm, shes wearing a berka. Uh and shes walking out towards the armoured vehicle . . . and i went, “ok one or two things are gonna happen: this woman is gonna put up her hands and surrender and start talking to the marines or she’s gonna walk up to these guys and explode. And if she blows up, she’s gonna kill a bunch of those guys or wound a bunch of them. I’ve got a clear shot with nothing behind her. And this was all, i mean (snaps fingers continually, while nodding head) the was spilt second ya know? It happens all that fast. Pulled up my rifle, took two shots at her. (takes deep breath) I know i probably missed the first shot, the second shot, I’m pretty sure i hit her. And as soon as that second shot went off, the guys on the other vehicle opened up and they cut her down. She fell to the dirt, and as she fell, she had a a white flag in her hand. At that moment there, I lost it, I threw my weapon down on the deck of the vehicle and I was crying . . .

and

in certain areas, uh, everything was considered hostile. Taking fire from that general direction there are fifty frigging people there, it's one guy shooting at us, y'know we can't find that one guy… Frigging kill everything y'know, hah, lay fire down there- suppression fire- area target uhm, y'know… You don't think, 'Oh, okay, there's a lady in a pink dress, let's take her out. There's a kid, y'know, let's take him out. No, we're taking fire from over there, blanket the frigging area… (long pause) It works. It's effective, y'know, you don't take fire from over there anymore.Hah, y'know, threat's eliminated and, uh, you keep, you keep going. We all become casualties of war- who we are when we leave is not who we are when and if we're lucky to physically return, because psychologically, you, you, you're completely changed by it.

I can see that this upsets some people. It SHOULD upset us all. But that's no reason to suppress it. Polite, conventional speech isn't speech that needs our protection. Speech like this does.

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