Free speech doesn't require good manners

I hate anonymous Internet postings but I hate this stupid idea more.

As noted on Pat Crowley’s N.Ky. Politics blog, Kentucky Rep. Tim Couch, R-Hyden, has filed a bill that would require anybody posting to a Web site to first register using their legal name, address and valid e-mail address.

Couch knows this won’t go anywhere – he said as much in a Louisville Courier Journal story – but he wants to pound his chest and waste time about it down in Frankfort all the same.

Generally speaking, I think people who put up anonymous postings and comments on the Internet are cowardly blowhards. But they have an absolute First Amendment right to be cowardly blowhards if that’s how they prefer to communicate with the rest of the world and Couch’s proposal would clearly be an unconstitutional infringement of free speech.

His objection to anonymous postings is that they often are nasty. He said some parents in his Eastern Kentucky district had complained to him about mean-spirited anonymous comments aimed at their kids. Like I said, cowardly blowhards, or perhaps in this case, name-calling children. But Couch also said he’s been the subject of anonymous online nastiness himself. That’s rude, but it’s no reason to rewrite the First Amendment.

People who disagree with public officials have an absolute right to say so – politely or not. You should be willing to put your name to your opinion, but that’s a free speech choice.

I, David Wells, think Tim Couch’s proposal is a boneheaded idea designed to placate a few constituents without really accomplishing anything.

See, it’s easy. But you should feel free to respond to this opinion, by name or not.