Knot Helpful

The New York State Senate last week approved a bill banning the image of a noose, the infamous symbol of lynchings. If the State Assembly and Governor Eliot Spitzer sign off on the bill, any etching, drawing, or painting of the symbol will constitute a felony.

Though New York legislators believe this measure is a necessary response to recent incidents across the state, we find the measure an inherently bad idea. To be sure, the recent rash of harassing noose imagery in New York is troubling—from the letter sent to a black high school teacher in Brooklyn, to the hanging of a noose on a black professor’s door at Teachers College at Columbia University, to its display outside a lower Manhattan post office, and throughout Long Island.

Nevertheless, banning an image—however reprehensible—is a violation of free speech. If we accept the premise that all people should be free to express themselves, then we cannot deprive certain citizens of that right, even if they promulgate unsavory views in unsavory ways. To do so would be the pinnacle of self-contradiction.

According to State Sen. Dean G. Skelos of Long Island, the “rash of incidents clearly demonstrates the need for tough new penalties.” We appreciate the legislators’ wish to stamp out racism wherever it exists, but unfortunately, this bill won’t do that. Skelos has compared the image of the noose to that of a swastika or a burning cross. But his examples prove our point: banning an image doesn’t extinguish the hatred behind it. Germany banned the swastika in 1945, yet neo-Nazis still fester in the far-right National Democratic Party. And we highly doubt that banning burning crosses would kill the Ku Klux Klan. Rather, these hate groups would find another symbol to abuse, or ignore the law altogether.

It is unfortunate that racist incidents involved noose imagery have spiked in New York lately, but we cannot support banning an image. Indeed, such a move ignores the real problem: the hatred that motivates a person to use such an image. Outlawing the noose may allow New Yorker legislators to feel as if they have dealt a mortal blow to racism, but in reality they have merely put it on the back burner. Our country cannot overcome racism by passing meaningless laws, only by encouraging dialog and cooperation across racial lines.

Still, the most frightening consequence of this bill is the idea that the government can dictate to us which of our views are appropriate. In this case, New Yorkers haven’t lost much, but if politicians can ban the socially intolerable, then they can eventually ban the politically controversial. Such a move would lead to an even greater suppression of free speech, and is one against which we caution. We commend the New York legislature for its zeal in fighting racism, but as for this bill, we hope it collects dust on a shelf in Albany.