In some ways, free speech is like a newborn baby.  It’s a beautiful thing, but must be loved, nurtured and showered with unwavering attention and care for it to survive.  As parents, we sometimes say, “Man, can’t I just have a break?” And just as with an infant, the answer when it comes to free speech is, “No.”

So it is that attacks on free speech, whether by law or by action, must be met with enduring resistance. So when the home of Rabbi Michael Lerner was recently vandalized for the third time in a year, we must stand up and be counted among those who find this physical invasion abhorrent and unconscionable.

Lerner is the Editor of the leftist Jewish magazine Tikkun.  He has often been the scourge of those further to the right on the spectrum, particularly when it comes to Israel.  But his most recent controversy probably angered more than usual.

Last week, Lerner presented the magazine’s Tikkun Award for ethics to Justice Richard Goldstone.  You no doubt remember Goldstone as the principal, named author of the United Nations report that charged Israel with acts tantamount to war crimes in its Operation Cast Lead offensive into Gaza in early 2009. Goldstone was anathema not only to most Israelis but also to American Jews who believed his mission was skewed from the start against Israel’s right of security and toward the perceived plight of Gazans.

The response against Lerner’s property included vandals leaving flyers with Lerner dressed in Nazi garb carrying away an “innocent” Israel. This episode follwed two others, one of which occurred shortly after Tikkun had announced Goldstone as an honoree. In response to these attacks, Lerner told Julia Bosman of the New York Times, “As much as I’ve been used to having all kinds of hate stuff put out about me, this is the first time they’ve actually come to my home …I want people to know that when you’re taking this kind of a stance in the Jewish world, that it can be very scary. We’re up against some real, live hate.”

And while people are (sadly) free to hate, they are not free to act on it.  No matter how we feel or respond to Lerner and Tikkun showering praise on Goldstone, it is patently unacceptable and immoral to visit exercises of physical vandalism upon his home.  

Responding to words with words is acceptable, of course; but quite honestly, the vandals are (wrongly) helping Goldstone and Lerner out by showing their inability to respond with civility and decorum. Doing so just sends the message, “Oh, those Israel supporters, they’re just a bunch of intolerant thugs.” Which, of course, 99 percent of us are not.

Since we substantively disagree strongly with recognizing Goldstone as an ethical icon, it is painful to have to write this. But such is the moral obligation of free speech.  Fatigued as we might be from staying up all night to listen to the bawling, we must rock the baby gently, lest he be irretrievably hurt.