Our society achieves order by giving our elected government the authority to protect us by prohibiting acts we agree to be harmful, such as theft, rape or murder. But we achieve freedom by allowing the widest variety of beliefs to flourish. Unique to our democracy is the supreme respect we hold for the opinion of the minority, even a minority of one. The Bill of Rights protects every individual from the potential tyrannies of the government.

It is hard to balance order and freedom in a democracy. The challenge is to guard this high principle, freedom of expression, while living with masses of "low" speech hateful language, disturbing art, ideologies preaching destruction. The number and variety of media products makes this challenge even greater.

In the 21st century, the media are the air we breathe; we can hardly imagine politics, art or even religion without the media. In such an environment, it is as crucial to debate the meanings and consequences of the stories we show, sing and send through cyberspace as it is to grapple with the threat of violent aggression in a country where weapons are plentiful.

These debates should rage in our schools and neighborhoods, in our families and where entertainment and news are created. But the decisions about what to see, hear, say or think are far too personal and important to be made by a chip or a bureaucrat. The way to fight offensive speech is not to yield to fear and silence it, but to meet it with more and different speech, informed speech, critical speech. Only in a robust intellectual and political exchange will we find answers to the violence that threatens our nation and the world.