Writing with chalk on a public sidewalk is "graffiti and vandalism"? I see quite a few businesses write messages on the public sidewalks leading to and in front of their storefronts. They're never brought up on charges of graffiti and vandalism.
This was not a case of graffiti and vandalism of public property, but of a private corporation not appreciating the chalker's sharing of constitutionally protected speech.
Perhaps we can at least agree on the principle, if not the terms, that this was gross abuse of, not by, the justice system.
Everyone deserves First Amendment rights. Whether one understands the limits of those rights is a separate matter entirely.
I find much less to find fault with in the chalker than, say, a hate group protesting funerals. But even they deserve First Amendment rights.
Nobody deserves First Amendment rights if they undermine those very rights by making invalid and nonsensical arguments about them and thereby undermining the public's understanding of them.
Nor do religious bigots who are, in fact, profoundly anti-rights.
We give them rights because we don't want the government to have to judge who deserves what, which would swiftly lead to me not having rights.
> chalker's sharing of constitutionally protected speech
You only have a right to free speech if you don't infringe on other people's rights. Thus, you can't use other people's property, including public property.
Under your logic, you could put a sign up on my house and it would be "constitutionally protected speech."
Your characterization of my logic, as you put it, is grossly flawed.
Your house is not public property. I've said nothing in any way to suggest putting a sign on your private residence is at all protectable free speech or in any way homologous to chalking a sidewalk.
You are fabricating an argument I did not make. In so doing, you appear to either fundamentally misunderstand the First Amendment, or willingly narrow your interpretation of it (which, thankfully, the courts do not stand with you). And you apparently do not understand either what I said, or what you are suggesting.
I think you're making a bit much of my last sentence.
All you had to say was, "My logic actually doesn't reduce to that, because I think everybody has a right to dispose of public property as they wish, but not private property." (Or something like that. Is that what you think?)
I mean, when I said "Under your logic...," I'm just extending your argument in the obvious way, and expecting you to tell me how you extend it differently. I am not presuming to actually know exactly what and how you think, that would be ridiculous.
As for misinterpreting or narrowly interpreting the First Amendment, I don't see how you get that.
> I mean, when I said "Under your logic...," I'm just extending your argument in the obvious way...
Extending my comments to the point that I am allegedly suggesting disregarding private property laws egregiously to erect a sign at your private, personal residence and then call that constitutionally protected free speech is the obvious way?!
We have very different notions of obvious, friend. Your last sentence read as having very little to do with extending my argument in a way that would be obvious to other sensible citizens and, instead, extending it in a way that distorted its meaning entirely to shoe-horn it back into your preferred view of seeing protecting free speech in the public sphere as something that ought to be beholden to a others' definition of whether or not they approve of the message, allowing for legal punishment and incarceration for sharing one's views in a public way.
Can someone put a sign up on your house and it be constitutionally protected free speech? Nope. Can persons stand peaceably outside your house with a sign airing their grievances? Yep, absolutely. Can they write on the sidewalk or street in chalk to get your attention? I'm willing to bet they can, so long as they are not inciting violence or threatening you. You don't own the street or sidewalk. It is public space. And if you are going to abuse the justice system to apprehend and punish them, well, at least you're sticking to your principles. But I hope also that you call the authorities on any children in the neighborhood who might also be writing in chalk on the street. Or any businesses that might so abuse the public space as to write on sidewalks with chalk to grab the attention of consumers.
You called for jail time and a fine for writing in chalk on a sidewalk. You called it graffiti and vandalism. There was no destruction of public property. There was no private property damage, to my knowledge.
You further suggested that there ought to be some kind of litmus test for who deserves First Amendment protections. Thankfully, the founders were wiser than you and did not make our right to speak freely dependent upon passing a test that evaluates our entitlement to constitutional rights beyond that of being a citizen.
> extending it in a way that distorted its meaning entirely to shoe-horn it back into your preferred view
That's just nonsense. It's normal, in an intellectual debate, to say, "Doesn't your position equate to X?" and get a response. That's what I was doing. People can distinguish between that, and actually intentionally misrepresenting someone else's position to make them look bad or "win" the argument.
I restated the issue in simple terms, and I don't see why you didn't just respond to that directly. Again: I think the public has a right to determine how public property is disposed of. I guess you don't? Because writing messages badmouthing a business day after day on the local sidewalk is a public disturbance of public property (the sidewalk). I don't think this has anything whatsoever to do with free speech. It's a property issue.
> You further suggested that there ought to be some kind of litmus test for who deserves First Amendment protections.
I explicitly said the opposite of that in my very first comment on the issue.
This was not a case of graffiti and vandalism of public property, but of a private corporation not appreciating the chalker's sharing of constitutionally protected speech.
Perhaps we can at least agree on the principle, if not the terms, that this was gross abuse of, not by, the justice system.
Everyone deserves First Amendment rights. Whether one understands the limits of those rights is a separate matter entirely.
I find much less to find fault with in the chalker than, say, a hate group protesting funerals. But even they deserve First Amendment rights.