Free speech and business decor

[Volokh, Eugene]

        Any thoughts on the following?

> -----Original Message-----
> From: CathyYoung1 at cs.com [SMTP:CathyYoung1 at cs.com]
> Sent: Tuesday, March 07, 2000 10:35 AM
> To:   undisclosed-recipients
> Subject:      More PC insanity
> 
> Time to talk to Tom English 
> By Brian McGrory, Globe Staff, 3/7/2000 
> 
> 
> His name is Tom English, and as he sat in his lawyer's office yesterday 
> morning reflecting on a life that has been torn asunder, he seemed nothing
> 
> like the racist monster he has been portrayed to be.
> 
> 
> His salt and pepper hair is tousled in some spots, matted against his
> scalp 
> in others. His face is broad, pink, and ruddy. He speaks through an 
> esophageal tube because his voice box was removed during cancer surgery a 
> year ago.
> 
> 
> ''It's a strange feeling,'' he says of the last two weeks. ''Everyone's 
> talking about me, but no one's talking to me. It's like I'm in a dream. I 
> have no say, and it hurts.''
> 
> 
> English, 62, awoke on Feb. 25 to the news in the Boston Herald that he was
> 
> the worst kind of bigot - a South Boston bar owner who placed stuffed
> monkeys 
> and spear-toting figurines around his tavern in a blatant mockery of Black
> 
> History Month.
> 
> 
> Put the words ''South Boston'' together with ''blacks'' and ''racism,''
> and 
> the outcome is preordained. The Boston Licensing Board now threatens to 
> revoke his license. City Councilor Charles C. Yancey, who is black, said
> he 
> was ''outraged by this display.'' One young woman called it an
> ''atrocity.''
> 
> 
> Charles E. Walker Jr., chairman of the Massachusetts Commission Against 
> Discrimination, launched an ''expedited'' investigation, saying, ''This
> kind 
> of conduct is deeply offensive to all decent Americans, as well as being 
> illegal.'' . . .
> 
> And the facts are these: Yes, there were monkeys at the bar, white,
> purple, 
> and brown, as well as a dozen parrots, several hippopotamuses, a giraffe,
> a 
> lion face, and an alligator - all part of English's jungle display
> intended 
> to add a touch of the tropics to his bar in the throes of a Boston
> February.
> 
> 
> You don't believe him? Sitting in his lawyer's office, he pulled out a
> 4-inch 
> stack of time-coded color snapshots of his bar in different months of the 
> year. In April, he decorates with frogs because of all the rain. In July
> and 
> August, he hangs dozens of fish and netting. In September, he has a pirate
> 
> motif. October is Halloween, December Christmas. Around elections:
> elephants 
> and donkeys. . . .
> 
> 
> Brian McGrory's e-mail address is mcgrory at globe.com.
> 
> 
> This story ran on page B01 of the Boston Globe on 3/7/2000. 
> © Copyright 2000 Globe Newspaper Company. 
> 
>  
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