"People demand freedom of speech as a compensation for the freedom of thought which they seldom use."
— Søren Kierkegaard

"All these people talk so eloquently about getting back to good old-fashioned values. Well, as an old poop I can remember back to when we had those old-fashioned values, and I say let's get back to the good old-fashioned First Amendment of the good old-fashioned Constitution of the United States -- and to hell with the censors! Give me knowledge or give me death!"
— Kurt Vonnegut

"To have a right to do a thing is not at all the same as to be right in doing it."
— G.K. Chesterton

"You can't talk about fucking in America, people say your dirty. But if you talk about killing somebody, that's cool."
— Richard Pryor

""Free speech means the right to shout 'theatre' in a crowded fire.""
— Abbie Hoffman

"We live in a world in which people are censured, demoted, imprisoned, beheaded, simply because they have opened their mouths, flapped their lips, and vibrated some air. Yes, those vibrations can make us feel sad or stupid or alienated. Tough shit. That's the price of admission to the marketplace of ideas. Hateful, blasphemous, prejudiced, vulgar, rude, or ignorant remarks are the music of a free society, and the relentless patter of idiots is how we know we're in one. When all the words in our public conversation are fair, good, and true, it's time to make a run for the fence."
— Daniel Gilbert

"The true test of liberty is the right to test it, the right to question it, the right to speak to my neighbors, to grab them by the shoulders and look into their eyes and ask, “Are we free?” I have thought that if we are free, the answer cannot hurt us. And if we are not free, must we not hear the answer?"
— Gerry Spence (Give Me Liberty: Freeing Ourselves in the Twenty-First Century)