Opinion: When The Founders Wrote The First Amendment, They Never Imagined It Would Apply To The 'Sonic The Hedgehog' Movie

There is an encroaching plague on our country. All who have seen the trailer for the Sonic the Hedgehog movie know it is coming. More so even than Jim Carrey hamming it up as Doctor Robotnik, we are assaulted with the sight of the CGI Sonic, a monstrosity stuck between the cartoonish Sonic from the games and a realistic depiction of a blue hedgehog. And the people cry out, “Can’t the government save us from this? Can’t they destroy this thing?”

But the free speech absolutists point to the First Amendment and say no.

They are wrong.

Think back to the time when the First Amendment was written. The kinds of speech it was made to protect at the time were just talking out loud and newspapers. Could the people who wrote that amendment imagine the things we call speech today, such as movies? Actually, I think if moving pictures were described to them, they would agree those are speech as well. But what they would not understand, no matter how hard you tried to describe it, would be the weird blue hedgehog with human teeth. Were the Founders to see even one frame of that trailer, they would say, “No. We never meant such a horror as this. We would rather surrender to the British than have our words used to protect this awful thing. Destroy it by any means necessary; shoot it with a musket or your more rapid-firing weapons that are surely ubiquitous in your future.”

So it is time to ignore the crazies and pass legislation outlawing the Sonic the Hedgehog movie. Maybe Paramount Pictures will challenge this before the Supreme Court, but I'll bet we will get a 9-0 decision stating that the protected speech in the First Amendment was never meant to include a $90 million assault on the childhood of ‘90s kids.

Get Free Access To Our Brand New Site: Not the Bee After creating The Babylon Bee in six literal days, Adam Ford rested. But he rests no longer. Introducing Not the Bee — a brand new humor-based news site run by Adam himself. It's loaded with funny content and all the best features of a social network. And the best part? Everyone with a subscription to The Bee gets full access at no extra cost. Get FREE Access *with premium subscription to The Babylon Bee