By Diane Roberts
Determined to keep the Free State of Florida the most incredibly free in the Land of the Free where freedom rings 24/7, Gov. Ron DeSantis is going to stop loud, tacky, possibly gay people from waltzing into his Capitol to “protest.”
This is serious, people.
You can’t let any old bunch of weirdo wokesters into the hallowed beige halls of government, especially during the legislative session. What if they’re rude to a senator? What if they decide to invite themselves into a committee meeting or hang around the House chamber as if they have a right to be there?
What if they talk loud? What if demonstrations disturb the many people who go inside the Capitol to meditate next to the State Seal?
If it’s too noisy, legislators might not be able to hear lobbyists, and then how would they know what to put in their bills?
As everyone knows, our state lawmakers are models of quiet dignity, decorum, and probity and everything that happens in the Capitol is sanctioned by God his own self.
The main worry is that innocent children might see these “protests.”
‘Gratuitous violence, gore’
A proposed new rule initially said: “Because the Capitol Complex is often a destination for children learning about their state government, visual displays, sounds, and other actions that are indecent, including gratuitous violence, gore, and material that arouses prurient interests, are not permitted in any portion of the Capitol Complex that is not a traditional public forum.”
Later, the Florida Department of Management Services clarified that paragraph, saying:
“Because the Capitol Complex is often a destination for children learning about their State government, visual displays, sounds, and other actions that are harmful to minors…, or which include gratuitous violence or gore are not permitted in any portion of the Capitol Complex that is not a traditional public forum.”
DMS would decide which “protests” are indecent, smutty, upsetting, nasty, or just plain rude.
The department used to handle janitorial jobs, keeping state buildings painted, and ordering pencils and paper clips. Expertise in procuring office supplies translates seamlessly into skills at ascertaining which groups should be barred from the Capitol on “suspicion of disruption.”
DMS’ crack team of stapler-loaders and wranglers of copy paper will have no trouble dealing with misfits and pointing out malcontents infiltrating the corridors of power with scary pictures of people who got shot or pregnant 12 year-olds.
Anyone who’s spent time in Florida’s 22-story Temple of Conservatism has witnessed unwashed dissenters barge onto the Fourth Floor shouting about reproductive rights. Talking about reproduction makes kids think about babies, which leads them to think about sex, thus compromising their morals.
That’s bad. We don’t want the young folk stirred up.
We’ve seen what happens when they get stirred up. Back in the spring when the sap was rising, a bunch of high schoolers showed up at the Capitol hollering “We say gay!” and suggesting that someone have unsanctioned sex with our governor, deploying a shocking word that starts with an “f” and ends with a “k.”
(They learn that kind of language in government schools.)
Practical considerations
Profanity is, of course, one of the many social ills visited upon us by liberals and perverts, but there are also practical considerations in dealing with disruptive behavior. We can’t have our public servants and their masters at Florida Power and Light, Associated Industries, U.S. Sugar, Florida Crystals, the Florida Homebuilders Association, Big Resort, Big Phosphate, Big Paving, and Big Cow feeling threatened by unkempt 16 year-olds whose parents are probably communists.
See, by “protect the children,” we mean the cute little ones carrying stuffed bunnies. Not these punks. Adults need to ease children into certain uncomfortable topics, such as that stuff in our founding documents that implies people have a right “peaceably to assemble, and to petition the government for a redress of grievances.”
I’m sure you’ll agree that’s a bit strong for our younger future Republican voters!
The free-speech-free-assembly thing is over-rated anyway. If you don’t dress nicely and keep your voice to a whisper in the presence of your government, then that part of the Constitution should not apply to you.
But some people just can’t take a hint. At the Capitol the other day, a gaggle of miscreants showed up to voice their displeasure at the new restrictions on “protests.”
One, an FSU student named Emma Moses, recounted a tale of how she was detained by the Capitol Police and banned from the Capitol during the last legislative session. What did she expect? She was hanging around with a bunch of obviously promiscuous young women with hair dyed green and pink, chanting “My body, my choice!”
This Emma-person was also wearing a clearly obscene t-shirt with “ARTICLE I SECTION 2″ in big letters, a brazen reference to the so-called “privacy clause” in the Florida Constitution.
As if a baby-incubating body isn’t everybody’s business.
With this kind of behavior, she’ll never get into a decent sorority.
Next thing you know, it’ll be the trans types marching down to the Capitol. What if children see a clutch of drag queens? They could march into the rotunda any time, armed with Marxist-atheist fairy tales in which the princess refuses to marry the prince, preferring to open a vegan bakery, which they’ll proceed to read out loud to Mrs. Garcia’s fourth grade class from Condo Pines Elementary.
If our government doesn’t stand in the statehouse door, that is.
Men in false eyelashes
Gov. DeSantis and those courageous DMS Maintenance Support Technicians II and Administrative Assistants I are the only thing holding back the tide of threats to our way of life such as Black Lives Matter or Planned Parenthood or the Manatee Club.
Only they can protect our kids from the shocking sight of men in false eyelashes, wigs, and cocktail dresses promoting childhood literacy.
Our governor and his loyal legislators simply want what’s best for you and your children. Remember that when the lying liberal media tells you that some of our lawmakers might have done some illegal things.
Take Rep. Joe Harding, R-Leviticus. He sponsored the landmark “Don’t Say Gay” bill to shield the kids from knowledge of homosexuality, lesbianism, cross-dressing, and that sort of wickedness.
But the Deep State, the very people who see nothing wrong with a two-mommy family, have worked their evil on this righteous man, driving him to resign from the Legislature.
Just because a federal grand jury has indicted him on six counts of wire fraud, money laundering, and lying about it.
It wasn’t even that much money — a mere 150 grand of COVID loan cash.
You know the powerful gay cabal is behind this. Also, Antifa. Feminists. Environmentalists. And the Pro-Choice Industrial Complex. All hell-bent on corrupting the children.
Don’t let your darlings near the news. Don’t let them read the Constitution. Don’t let them register to vote. And keep them away from the Capitol.
This democracy thing is dangerous.
Diane Roberts is an 8th-generation Floridian, born and bred in Tallahassee. Educated at Florida State University and Oxford University in England, she has been writing for newspapers since 1983, when she began producing columns on the legislature for the Florida Flambeau. Her work has appeared in the New York Times, the Times of London, the Guardian, the Washington Post, the Oxford American, and Flamingo. She has been a member of the Editorial Board of the St. Petersburg Times–back when that was the Tampa Bay Times’s name–and a long-time columnist for the paper in both its iterations. She was a commentator on NPR for 22 years and continues to contribute radio essays and opinion pieces to the BBC. Roberts is also the author of four books.
Kyndra L Mulder says
My first suggestion to the writer is that you study civics. We are a representative republic NOT a democracy. the content of your article and its subject matter have nothing to do with whether we are a democracy or a republic.
Secondly, I suggest you pay more attention to detail when reading; “… are not permitted in any portion of the Capitol Complex that is not a traditional public forum.” The foregoing refers to ALL and all behavior. Secondly, they are permitted in areas where the general public are permitted. Sometimes a permit is required; this applies to everybody.
Finally, to the reader; this writer states a lot of opinion. I suggest you ask yourself; Am I reading fact or her opinion. Look for the facts.= and read the facts.
Eileen Gernet says
You should study civics. United States is a democratic republic. Some of our laws can not be changed without consulting the citizens via direct vote.
If you cannot see how dangerous this situation is then I feel sad. Our governor wants a state of wasps, however we are a country of many people’s of every kind. I feel like Huey Long and George Wallace have been resurrected. God help us all
Ray W. says
Thank you, Eileen Gernet.
I prefer to think of our founding fathers’ plan as an effort to create a liberal democratic Constitutional republic.
Kyndra L. Mulder presents as a commenter who has caved to a popular political talking point that leaves much to be desired in terms of accuracy. While she is not wrong, being barely right when one can choose to be more completely right should be her aspirational goal. Once again, a FlaglerLive commenter could benefit from the exercise of a little intellectual rigor before hitting the keyboard.
RonIs says
Is this at all surprising? He is ok with Nazi protestors and his pedo friends but not okay with anyone else apparently. I’d say I’m shocked but consider his preferred company. One of his friends killed himself while under investigation for sexual impropriety (a groomer), two of his other friends are sex traffickers (one convicted and one will be eventually), and as a teacher he liked to party with the 18-year-old students of his. Yet the LGBTQ people make him uncomfortable. Sure Ron, sure. Keep hanging with pedos (you know, actual groomers) and Nazi fascists. Makes you look SO respectable. 🙄
Dennis C Rathsam says
What ever happened to ….All the news thats fit to print????? Get over it snowflakes De Santis won by a landslide!
Michael Cocchiola says
Conservatives voted for fascist oppression and they’ve been rewarded. Yet they stand firmly behind their 1st amendment “freedoms”. Curious.
Maybe the rules are waived if you wear your MAGA hat.
Wow says
Ah Florida.
*Frozen embryos – precious beings we must protect at all cost
*Slaughtered school children – cost of doing business
*Jan 6 insurrection – patriotic act
*Peaceful protest at Florida capital – insurrection.
Bill Mat says
Our government offices are not the place for disruptive demonstrations. Their gender, sexual preference, religion, race, or how they identify themselves has nothing to do with this.
Ray W. says
If I read the editorial column correctly, the issue centers on a potential rule proposed by the Florida Department of Management Services. This infers, at the very least, either that an already existing rule pertaining to protests inside governmental buildings needs to be modified or that no rule pertaining to protests inside governmental buildings existed before DMS published its proposed rule.
Since government buildings have been the site of protests since before the founding of our country, I have to think that administrative rules have long existed to address protests. The author of the editorial column does not deal with this issue, but it likely isn’t all that important anyway.
Maybe I am wrong, but is it possible to infer that the act of proposing a rule change is a political ploy designed to stir up a little hatred and discontent? And that you, Bill Mat, took the bait hook, line and sinker? The giveaway is your use of the modifying term, “disruptive.” Just how would anyone ever come to a coherent definition of the verb, “to disrupt”? A partisan might define it as anything said or done that he opposes. If so, then anyone who ever protests anything inside a government building would potentially be subject to an arbitrary and capricious civil infraction or criminal prosecution, depending on which political party is in power at the time. Is it possible that your approach resembles the approach taken by so many authoritarian regimes around the world? Just announce that a protester is disrupting something, anything at all, and shut off the right of assembly guaranteed to all?
During the Bush/Gore recount in South Florida, partisans associated with one political party stormed as a mob a governmental building in an effort to stop the recount. Does that action meet your definition of a disruptive demonstration? Does a citizen wearing a Black Live Matter t-shirt meet your definition if that person enters the capital building to watch the legislative process from an observation area? What if the t-shirt depicts the LBGTQ rainbow theme? Where is the line? Where is your personal line? Is it etched in stone? Scratched in sand?