Halloween and our First Amendment Rights.

I don’t know about you but I have a deep distaste for Halloween.

Not only because it’s a literal celebration of death, but because I am not a fan, repeat-

I AM NOT A FAN

of the creepy crawly, spider web ridden, spine chilling, hair raising, absolutely nightmarish decorations that the stores are full of and the streets are laden with this time of year.

To me, the menacing witches, ghosts, zombies and skeletons are symbols of death and evil.
This year however, for the first time, I saw the sinister characters in a new light.

I realized that they aren’t just symbols of death and evil.

They’re also symbols
of our first amendment rights.

Now before you spit out your pumpkin spice latte or report my blog and call me a lunatic,
hear me out…

My sister just wrote an Op-Ed on the First Amendment (which I HIGHLY SUGGEST you check out here). This week as I was reading it (and gushing with pride since she is only FOURTEEN and got published on a regional news website), I was reminded that the first amendment not only protects our right to assembly, our right to free speech and our right to religion, but it also protects our right to free expression.

I don’t like Halloween decorations.
But according to our Constitution, these displays are protected, no matter how ghastly.

In her Op-Ed, Elsie says the following:

“Our Founding Fathers wrote the Bill of Rights to maintain individual liberty. The Bill of Rights is a systematic document giving us what they thought was a top to bottom list of individual liberties. The First Amendment is the first because it is the most important. It states, “Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances.” The Framers made it clear that Congress SHALL not abridge the Freedom of speech.”

As you know, I typically don’t get political in my writing. But the first amendment and freedom of speech is essential to this platform and without it, I may not even have a blog.

We are living in the age of the “cancel culture”, a time of unwarranted censorship and misrepresentation of information.
Now more than ever,

we need to defend our rights.

For some of us that’s writing blogs, for others it’s speaking up at a county meeting, getting up on a stage to preach the word of God, talking on a podcast or literally writing about freedom of speech like my sister.

But for others- taking advantage of their first amendment rights simply means decorating their house, whether that’s with ghosts and gargoyles during Halloween or a nativity scene during Christmas.

Our first amendment not only allows us to voice our opinions and express what we believe, it also allows the person we don’t agree with to voice and express their own.

The freedom for a diversity of opinions is what makes our country unique.

So if you’re like me and you literally take a different route on your way to work or school to avoid the gravestones and grim reapers, just be thankful we live in a country where we still have a right to free speech and expression.

Let’s defend it while it lasts.

The Op-Ed mentioned in this post was an assignment for my sisters civics class and is currently part of a competition they are having based off the amount of views and comments each Op-Ed gets. Please consider encouraging young writers and activists by reading her full article and leaving a comment here!