The definition essay was a by far the most challenging assignment I had to do. I was initially confused because I did not know how to approach this. I believe since the assignment was so open ended, the writer could have taken any approach. I don’t think I ever had this much freedom, so it was difficult to find an interesting word that would be worth writing an extensive paper. I chose to explore the word “hate speech.” I came across the notion of free speech while I was watching the legendary political commentator Ben Shapiro, who destroys people with logic and facts. I hear this word thrown around a lot in the media, so I decided it would be something that I could enjoy learning about.

It was foolish of me to not catch the grammar mistakes in the essay. For example, in one sentence I said, “When we look at SCOTUS, which is comprised of both loose and strict constitutionalists, their rulings that relate to free speech, even something controversial as “hate speech,” is unanimous.” The word “rulings” should have been followed by “have been” because I am taking about more than one ruling, but I wrote “is” instead, which doesn’t match with “rulings.” I had a few of these mistakes throughout the essay, but I fixed them.

I also elaborated on two aspects of the essay that needed some more clarification. I did not spend a lot of time on the Overton Window because I knew that my audience was Professor Ward and he was the one who told me about it. In the revised essay, I talked more about how the Overton Window is a term coined by Joseph P. Overton which describes the range of ideas that are politically correct to talk about in discourse. I followed this statement by saying that because of the media and, probably the Trump administration, Americans seem to disagree more often. As a result, there are now certain topics that shouldn’t be discussed in public, unless you want a full out argument with your colleagues. I guess there was a reason why we had a silent majority of Trump supporters during the 2016 presidential election.

Along with the Overton Window, I addressed the notion that even if hate speech does not incite immediate harm, it can lead to some sort of psychological harm. Everyone is a social creature and it turns out that we can take the words of some people to heart. However, I further explained that this shouldn’t lead to the barring of hateful speech because I think it is imperative that people are exposed to different viewpoints. Regardless of how absurd or liberal the thought may be, people need to learn how to get along with others and communicate effectively like adults.