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Originally Posted by Gilda
Well, I would say that it's well within our first amendment rights to express disagreement with another's actions. That's what freedom of speech is about. And while it's certainly not illegal for the parents to do what they did, they are interfereing with the boy's being able to make his own moral decisions regarding his sexuality. Again, morality separate from legality.
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Absolutely!
The crux of the other issue is that the parents are the guardian of the child. The parents speak and act for the child. The law does not recognize the child's rights as an equal citizen until the child is no longer a minor which in this country is 18.
If the child is ready to be challenged as to being an equal in the eyes of the law in order to express his own morality and freedom of speech, then the child will need to go through emancipation to force the state to see him and treat him as an equal.
Morality obviously evovles before one has is legally responsible for actions, minors get a clean slate once they turn 18 for those infractions of law. But exploring the fact that morality exists even without law, is a good topic for discussion. From my HS morality class I recalled us studying things like Maslow's Heirarchy of needs to help frame and undersand motivation of people's actions.
william, kicking that person's ass isn't an expression of "free speech" that is a violation of someone's physical being. You are free to picket, stand on a box and shout at him, but you are not allowed to touch or assault the offending individual.
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