Showing posts with label free speech. Show all posts
Showing posts with label free speech. Show all posts

Friday, July 31, 2026

Religious Liberty Essential to Preserving Life




(Zimmytws/Dreamstime.com



Monday, 27 July 2026 09:53 AM EDT

Religious liberty is more than the freedom to hold private beliefs — it is the freedom to live according to one's faith in public life. The recommendations recently presented by the Religious Liberty Commission to President Trump reinforce the principle that Americans should never have to choose between following their faith and following the law.

This has particular impact on Americans who fight every day to protect children in the womb from the violence of abortion. Concerns for such Americans came up in one way or another in every one of the hearings that the Religious Liberty Commission held.

The anti-abortion movement is rooted in the very American conviction that every human life deserves equal protection under the law, despite its age.

That conviction, coupled with the American belief in peaceful protest, motivates those who are anti-abortion to stand for hours outside abortion facilities, enduring the hostile stares and words - and occasional vicious beatings - from abortion advocates in the hope of changing the mind of one mother, of saving one baby.

These same Americans believe that mothers and fathers need day to day support, and the pregnancy help movement provides such support across the country.

So often maligned for being "fake clinics" because they do not perform abortion, these vitally important centers are almost exclusively started and staffed with people of faith who are trying not to impose their faith on others but to use it to lead mothers and fathers to a much better choice than abortion.

Yet these centers are constantly harassed in abortion-friendly states and all too often find themselves embroiled in lawsuits or fighting unjust laws.

The First Amendment wins every time, with these suits settled in favor of pregnancy centers. Religious liberty helps protect the ability to advocate for life without compromising sincerely held beliefs.

One of the commission's key recommendations is to clarify the proper understanding of the Establishment Clause and the separation of church and state.

Saturday, April 04, 2026

Trump Admin Signals Clarity on Church Speech



By Charlie McCarthy | Friday, 03 April 2026 12:23 PM EDT


The Trump administration announced Friday that it will "provide additional clarity and guidance" to religious organizations after a federal judge's decision this week to dismiss a case seeking to overturn the 70-year-old ban on political activity by houses of worship.

The Treasury Department and Internal Revenue Service issued a statement saying the move is aimed at reinforcing First Amendment protections while helping churches better understand how existing law applies to their communications.

"Religious liberty is foundational to our Constitution," Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent said, adding that the administration is committed to ensuring Americans can "practice one's faith openly and in community" while laws are applied fairly.

The new guidance will focus on clarifying how the Johnson Amendment, the 1954 law that restricts tax-exempt organizations from endorsing political candidates, applies in real-world settings, particularly within religious services.

According to Treasury, internal communications between houses of worship and their congregations, when delivered through customary religious channels and tied to matters of faith, may not constitute prohibited political activity under current interpretations of the law.

Tuesday, October 28, 2025

God Complex: The Rise Of America's Censorship Machine

 

God Complex: The Rise Of America's Censorship Machine

Streamed live on Oct 16, 2025

BECOME ONE OF OUR FOUNDING MEMBERS: https://sitebp.la/vd_yt_big_picture_g... 

For generations, Americans have believed the First Amendment was untouchable — the cornerstone of our Republic. 

But today, that freedom is under attack. Behind closed doors, government agencies, Big Tech, universities, and NGOs built a powerful system to control what citizens can say, hear, and believe. 

This is not speculation. It is a documented reality — and it strikes at the heart of our liberty. 

God Complex: The Rise of America’s Censorship Machine is a Big Picture Originals documentary that reveals how this system came to be, how it operates, and why every American who values freedom must pay attention. 

Because when free speech is silenced, the truth disappears — and with it, every other right we hold dear. 

God Complex premieres on October 16. 
Share this link with your friends and help us to spread this message.

Tuesday, September 16, 2025

Trump will 'go easy' on teetering Starmer over free speech during State Visit with PM 'on the ropes' - as Sadiq Khan stokes feud...

Trump will 'go easy' on teetering Starmer over free speech during State Visit with PM 'on the ropes' - as Sadiq Khan stokes feud claiming Americans fleeing to London for its 'liberal values'

By DAVID WILCOCK, DEPUTY POLITICAL EDITOR

Published: 04:25 EDT, 16 September 2025 | Updated: 08:00 EDT, 16 September 2025

Donald Trump could go easy on Sir Keir Starmer during his state visit to Britain with the Prime Minister 'on the ropes' after a series of domestic hits to his leadership, allies of the president have claimed.

Labour had feared that the president could use the visit, which starts tonight, to lambast the PM over freedom of speech in the UK, amid claims from conservatives that the Online Safety Bill impinges on the rights of Americans.

But sources today told The Telegraph that the president could go easy on Sir Keir due to the significant domestic pressure he is under.

One said: 'This trip will be about the splendour of Windsor Castle, inspecting the troops, the big banquet. This is a big deal for him. And the plan is to keep it about that.'

The American leader is being feted with a stay in Windsor Castle where he will be hosted by the King and treated to a ceremonial welcome on Wednesday and a lavish state banquet.

Security will be paramount, with Mr Trump confined to the private Windsor estate on the first full day, before heading to the Prime Minister's country residence Chequers on Thursday.

They arrive in the midst of a furious row over freedom of speech fuelled by the president and his allies which could cause a flashpoint adding to the pressure on Prime Minister

Just hours ahead of the president's arrival, Sir Sadiq Khan has reignited his feud with the Republican, claiming record numbers of Americans are moving to London to escape him.  

Tuesday, July 08, 2025

Atlantic Union Seeks to Ban Conrad Vine, Oversteps Authority


July 4, 2025 Fulcrum7 Staff



Back in November, the Atlantic Union executive committee voted to ban Conrad Vine from every pulpit in their union.

The Northern New England Conference believes that the AU acted outside their authority as outlined in the Church Manual. This ban would give higher entities in our organization the authority to circumvent local church business meetings and to impact the standing of members even outside of their Union. They chose to not be a party to this decision, as it undermines the sound, Bible-based practices and procedures outlined in the Church Manual and erodes proper church order.

Thursday, April 11, 2024

Overton Window


From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

This article is about the political concept. For the 2010 novel, see The Overton Window.


An illustration of the Overton window, along with Treviño's degrees of acceptance

The Overton window is the range of policies politically acceptable to the mainstream population at a given time.[1] It is also known as the window of discourse.

The term is named after the American policy analyst Joseph Overton, who proposed that an idea's political viability depends mainly on whether it falls within this range, rather than on politicians' individual preferences.[2][3] According to Overton, the window frames the range of policies that a politician can recommend without appearing too extreme to gain or keep public office given the climate of public opinion at that time.
Summary[edit]

Overton described a spectrum from "more free" to "less free" with regard to government intervention, oriented vertically on an axis, to avoid comparison with the left/right political spectrum.[4] As the spectrum moves or expands, an idea at a given location may become more or less politically acceptable. After Overton's death, his Mackinac Center for Public Policy colleague Joseph Lehman further developed the idea and named it after Overton.[5]

The political commentator Joshua Treviño has postulated that the six degrees of acceptance of public ideas are roughly:[6]

Unthinkable
Radical
Acceptable
Sensible
Popular
Policy

The Overton window is an approach to identifying the ideas that define the spectrum of acceptability of governmental policies. It says politicians can act only within the acceptable range. Shifting the Overton window involves proponents of policies outside the window persuading the public to expand the window. Proponents of current policies, or similar ones within the window, seek to convince people that policies outside it should be deemed unacceptable. According to Lehman, who coined the term:

The most common misconception is that lawmakers themselves are in the business of shifting the Overton window. That is absolutely false. Lawmakers are actually in the business of detecting where the window is, and then moving to be in accordance with it.[5]

According to Lehman, the concept is just a description of how ideas work, not advocacy of extreme policy proposals. In an interview with The New York Times, he said:

It just explains how ideas come in and out of fashion, the same way that gravity explains why something falls to the earth. I can use gravity to drop an anvil on your head, but that would be wrong. I could also use gravity to throw you a life preserver; that would be good.[7]

Criticism

Laura Marsh of The New Republic argued that:

Viewing politics through the Overton Window reinforces liberal notions about the moderate center, even as that center ground erodes. ... Overton did little more than repackage the basic negotiating principle that if you ask for a lot, you will likely get more than if you ask for a little.[8]



Glenn Grothman Blasts NPR After Article From Employee Claiming Radio Gia...

Monday, October 09, 2023

The UN Calls for Prosecuting Online Religious Hate Speech and for Training Initiatives for Faith-based Communities to Help Stop It


Press release

The UN Calls for Prosecuting Online Religious Hate Speech and for Training Initiatives for Faith-based Communities to Help Stop It


10-07-2023 12:14 AM CET | 

Press release from: Advent Messenger




Truth is under attack. People are facing more and more restrictions on their right to free speech, both across the world and here in America. Powerful elite groups and politicians are calling for a crackdown on truth to criminalize certain speech that contradicts the prevailing popular narrative. At the same time, these very same people are pushing godless, anti-Christian propaganda upon the world, and to them, that's fine. New proposals are being written to impose censorship, and this will result in the erosion of the rights of all people.


On October 5, 2023, the United Nations Human Rights Council called upon UN member states and governments to do more to stop religious hate speech online and on social media platforms. Some of the hate speech that was addressed had to do specifically with sexual orientation and gender identity. The UN reported the following:

• "Religious hate speech, a phenomenon that was far from new, was now unfolding unchecked. Online, social media algorithms were amplifying hateful messages and nourishing the echo chambers of ignorance." [1]

• "The human rights impacts of religious hatred and discrimination were clear. They undermined human dignity, and could lead to incitement of violence - or to violence itself." [1]

• "Gaps in national policy, and in legal and law enforcement frameworks were letting hate and discrimination slip through the cracks. Member States could and must do more." [1]

• "Training initiatives for law enforcement officers and the judiciary, faith-based actors, teachers and media professionals in combating religious hatred needed to be part of a comprehensive approach which integrated faith literacy, better understanding and sensitivity, and clear measures to address discrimination." [1]

• "A number of speakers also expressed concern about persistent discrimination against people due to their sexual orientation or gender identity. The recognition of diversity was essential to preserve human dignity." [1]

It is deeply troubling when churches are enlisted to assist the government in stopping religious hate speech. These globalists want to turn the churches against each other to spy out, track down, expose and arrest those who spread so-called religious hate. Any criticism of the radial sexualization of our children by LGBT+ activists could soon be prosecuted with the help of our fellow church members. The UN wants to criminalize any online speech that opposes abortion, the transgender agenda, the Pope's climate message, the common good, Sunday rest by law, the 2030 agenda, or any other policies it supports. Any dissenting voices will be labeled as "hate speech."

Let us be clear: when these globalists say "hate" speech, they actually mean conservative biblical views. It's not about equality, it's about steamrolling and silencing the voice of God's people. Free speech is coming to an end because the United Nations wants to define what constitutes hate speech. Unelected officials at the UN want to decide which speech will be accepted and which will be forbidden in society.

Our world is in trouble. We are becoming more and more intolerant of speech that deviates from what the elitists deem acceptable or true. And don't think for a second that this cannot happen here in America. These kinds of Marxist laws would be enthusiastically supported by half the population. There are plenty of activist politicians and judges who care little about our Constitution and would support anti-freedom and anti-Christian legislation. It can very easily happen here.
But regardless of what the New World Order eventually does, God still tells us to use our divinely appointed right of free speech to expose the dangers that are threatening the spiritual lives of the people:

"Cry aloud, spare not, lift up thy voice like a trumpet, and shew my people their transgression, and the house of Jacob their sins." Isaiah 58:1.

"Son of man, I have made thee a watchman unto the house of Israel: therefore hear the word at my mouth, and give them warning from me." Ezekiel 3:17.

We have to denounce the popular and national sins that are corrupting society. This is part of the work of the gospel. We must also expose the rampant apostasy that is prevailing in the religious world and in the churches.

"Those ministers who are men pleasers, who cry, Peace, peace, when God has not spoken peace, might well humble their hearts before God, asking pardon for their insincerity and their lack of moral courage. It is not from love for their neighbor that they smooth down the message entrusted to them, but because they are self-indulgent and ease-loving. True love seeks first the honor of God and the salvation of souls. Those who have this love will not evade the truth to save themselves from the unpleasant results of plain speaking. When souls are in peril, God's ministers will not consider self, but will speak the word given them to speak, refusing to excuse or palliate evil" (Prophets and Kings, 141).

The Bible says that when God's truth is suppressed, there will be a famine in the land. Truth will be scarce because evil men are conspiring to censor the preaching of the word that will set men free. This famine represents an organized effort to restrict and suspend the preaching of truth.

"Behold, the days are coming, says the Lord God, That I will send a famine on the land, Not a famine of bread, Nor a thirst for water, But of hearing the words of the Lord. They shall wander from sea to sea, And from north to east; They shall run to and fro, seeking the word of the Lord, But shall not find it." Amos 8:11-12.

In this fearful hour, God's people will understand their responsibility, and they will lift up their voices, encourage the faithful, and warn the disobedient. They will use their right to free speech to "reprove, rebuke, exhort with all long-suffering" (2 Timothy 4:2). The time to do this work has fully come.

Sources

[1] https://www.ungeneva.org/en/news-media/meeting-summary/2023/10/le-conseil-des-droits-de-lhomme-se-penche-sur-les-moteurs-de-la

Contact: Andy Roman, Publisher
Address: Advent Messenger, PO Box 96, Dover, OK 73734
Phone: (888) 299-2119
Website: www.adventmessenger.org
Email: adventmessengers@gmail.com

About: Advent Messenger provides news and commentary on current events, top stories, social trends and political and religious events. For more news visit www.adventmessenger.org

This release was published on openPR.



Sunday, December 04, 2022

All of Us Are in Danger: When Anti-Government Speech Becomes Sedition


By John Whitehead, 06 October, 2022


Anti-government speech has become a four-letter word.

In more and more cases, the government is declaring war on what should be protected political speech whenever it challenges the government’s power, reveals the government’s corruption, exposes the government’s lies, and encourages the citizenry to push back against the government’s many injustices.

Indeed, there is a long and growing list of the kinds of speech that the government considers dangerous enough to red flag and subject to censorship, surveillance, investigation and prosecution: hate speech, conspiratorial speech, treasonous speech, threatening speech, inflammatory speech, radical speech, anti-government speech, extremist speech, etc.

Things are about to get even dicier for those who believe in fully exercising their right to political expression.

Indeed, the government’s seditious conspiracy charges against Stewart Rhodes, the founder of Oath Keepers, and several of his associates for their alleged involvement in the January 6 Capitol riots puts the entire concept of anti-government political expression on trial.

Enacted during the Civil War to prosecute secessionists, seditious conspiracy makes it a crime for two or more individuals to conspire to “‘overthrow, put down, or to destroy by force’ the U.S. government, or to levy war against it, or to oppose by force and try to prevent the execution of any law.”

It’s a hard charge to prove, and the government’s track record hasn’t been the greatest.

It’s been almost a decade since the government tried to make a seditious conspiracy charge stick—against a small Christian militia accused of plotting to kill a police officer and attack attendees at his funeral in order to start a civil war—and it lost the case.

Although the government was able to show that the Hutaree had strong anti-government views, the judge ruled in U.S. v. Stone that “[O]ffensive speech and a conspiracy to do something other than forcibly resist a positive show of authority by the Federal Government is not enough to sustain a charge of seditious conspiracy.”

Whether or not prosecutors are able to prove their case that Rhodes and his followers intended to actually overthrow the government, the blowback will be felt far and wide by anyone whose political views can be labeled “anti-government.”

Monday, April 11, 2022

Students who oppose free speech and contracts should lose professional prospects


by Washington Examiner
| April 11, 2022 12:00 AM



São Paulo, Brazil, January, 12, 2016: Woman with a megaphone shouting slogans during act by reducing public transport fares organized by social organizations of the city
(iStock)


Law students who oppose the twin constitutional pillars of free speech and the sanctity of contracts should never work as lawyers. Journalism students who oppose free speech should also never work in a professional newsroom.

Colleges that encourage their students to embrace illiberal positions against two of the things that make America great are depriving the nation of a new generation of competent professionals. They are doing the nation a grave disservice, to say nothing of the students they are misleading. And they should not be permitted to get away with it.





Recent developments at Yale Law, Georgetown Law School, the University of Virginia, and elsewhere point to a frightening trend that could render these and other institutions unfit to teach or proffer degrees that employers will want to honor.

This fall, Georgetown Law School will require all first-year students to take a contracts course that is really an anti-contracts course. It does not teach basic principles of contract law so that students can become competent lawyers — rather, it propagates an ideology that all American property law is rooted in “the history of dispossession and appropriation” and that “intellectual property has a cultural appropriation problem.” Georgetown students will also be forced to waste time that should be used to learn the law taking an elective course “certified” to “focus on the importance of questioning the law's neutrality.”

This is a truly noxious trend that undermines this nation's greatest treasure — the rule of law. Indeed, it is the law of contracts that hinders powerful people from dispossessing the weak. Property rights, as Peruvian scholar Hernando de Soto has shown through a career of research, are the surest safeguard against a situation like that in Russia today, where only those who latch on to the powerful can be safe in their possessions and everyone else can be dispossessed. The superwealthy and the oligarchs always have special privileges, but only contracts and strong property rights can protect ordinary people.

Georgetown's anti-contract nonsense might not seem unusual coming from a law school that already beclowned itself by suspending incoming legal scholar Ilya Shapiro for an innocuous tweet. This school provided student protesters catered food and a “space to cry” about their hurt feelings. It's not just that Georgetown is obviously not preparing people to serve competently in the hard-nosed legal profession. It is also that Georgetown’s dean lacks the spine to protect free speech and free thought, the entire purpose of his institution.

Shapiro, who has patiently endured thuggish mobs that shut down debate, is just one of many being subjected to a “heckler’s veto” by little, narcissistic tyrants who despise the First Amendment. On March 10, attorney Kristen Waggoner was similarly shouted down and threatened at Yale Law. In reply, some 1,400 Yale alumni, activists, elected officials, and distinguished lawyers wrote an April 7 letter blasting the Yale administration’s mealy-mouthed response to the incident. They rightly demanded disciplinary actions against the students who took it upon themselves not to make counterarguments but to trample free speech.

The alumni letter is on target. “Our nation desperately needs the next generation of attorneys, legislators, judges, and Supreme Court justices to be marked by the character and values that undergird the American legal profession and a free society,” the alumni wrote. “These include, at the very least, respect for the right to freedom of speech.”

Students who join mobs to shut down free speech show themselves as proto-totalitarians. Such people are unfit to practice in courts of law. That’s why veteran judge Laurence Silberman of the D.C. Circuit Court of Appeals was fully justified in suggesting such students “be disqualified from potential clerkships” with “all federal judges.”

But that's not really enough — further repercussions are warranted, especially in the area of law, which has its own code of ethics. Law firms should think twice about hiring anyone who, as a law student, violates the free speech rights of others, and particularly grievous offenders should risk banishment from the bar itself. Their denial of others' rights should be viewed as an ethical breach, disqualifying them from even taking the bar exam.

Likewise, if Georgetown Law School continues down its anti-contract path, it will be preparing graduates to fail their clients. Law firms should think twice before hiring law school graduates so poorly trained, whose view of contracts is deformed by woke silliness.

Of course, the journalistic profession is in even worse shape already. But to see how much worse it could get, consider the truly worrisome development at the University of Virginia. An official editorial of the Cavalier Daily argued against allowing former Vice President Mike Pence to speak on campus about "taking a stand for America's founding." That would-be journalists would thus advocate a denial of First Amendment rights is a real shock to the conscience and a worrying sign about the professionalism of the next generation of journalists.

No would-be journalist who rejects the founding First Amendment principles — the rights to free speech, free religious exercise, and, of course, a free press — should ever be rewarded with a job in the media of a free society. And in general, society will be better off when those seeking to exercise tyranny and corrupt the integrity of the legal and journalistic professions graduate only to find that many doors are closed to them.