Commentary: If you think this Aubrey Huff mess is about the First Amendment, youre as dumb as he is – Monmouth Daily Review Atlas
Twitter is a toilet bowl and so is Facebook.
The latest proof is the raging story of Aubrey Huff, the sadly misguided former San Francisco Giants player who got himself dumped from the invitation list of the team's commemoration of its 2010 World Series title. That party will be at Oracle Park in August.
Before he was a Twitter troll, Huff was the 2010 Giants first baseman who was not the biggest star on the team, but definitely a home run producer who got some big hits in the postseason and rode the wave of an unlikely title run that took everyone by surprise _ including the Giants themselves.
Sadly, Huff's life after baseball has devolved into a tweet storm of vulgarity and despicable musings that target people of color and especially women. He recently tweeted a picture of himself with a gun and this statement: "Getting my boys trained up on how to use a gun in the unlikely event @BernieSanders beats @realDonaldTrump in 2020."
Cool, huh?
Listen, I'm not going to promote his vile tweets. There are many others about women that are vile and indicate someone who probably needs help. You can find Huff's handiwork with ease, but the larger point is this: Huff and his fellow backward supporters like former pitcher Curt Schilling are making his exclusion from a 2010 celebration a First Amendment thing.
It's not and if you think it is, you are either ignorant on purpose or by accident about how free speech works. Neither type of ignorance is good.
One could make an argument that our country and democracy are in trouble because of a shocking lack of knowledge about civics, but let's stay on point. The First Amendment is protecting Huff right now. The government hasn't arrested him, detained him or questioned him about his stupid tweets. His right to be stupid, abusive, disgusting, unkind and bereft of humanity is not only preserved, its protected status is unquestioned.
Huff still routinely makes nasty comments about women, including Alyssa Nakken _ the former star athlete from Sacramento State and Woodland High School recently hired by the Giants to be a coach. She'll be the first woman on a big league coaching staff _ ever.
It was a great story that Huff was only too happy to trash on his Twitter feed. Again, he had the constitutional right to do that and nobody stood in the way.
But Huff doesn't have a constitutional right to attend what is essentially a private party thrown by a private business, just as the Giants get to invite whoever they want. They don't have to include someone they find objectionable.
The Giants said: "Aubrey has made multiple comments on social media that are unacceptable and run counter to the values of our organization. While we appreciate the many contributions that Aubrey made to the 2010 championship season, we stand by our decision."
Huff wants to make it about politics, but it's clear from the Giants statement that its not about politics, but common decency.
For whatever reason, Huff seems to lack common decency for people he views with contempt. But perhaps his most outlandish statement yet was this one in his interview with The Athletic: "If it wasn't for me, (the Giants) wouldn't be having a reunion."
OK, Huff had a really good year in 2010 with the Giants. He hit 26 home runs and drove in 86 runs. He hit a home run and drove in four runs in the 2010 World Series. Was he the MVP? No. Was he a solid contributor? Yes. Did the Giants win the World Series because of Huff? Come on, now. That's when we veer back into social media crazy land.
And that's where Huff lives now. He preens about his physique and what he expects in a woman. "She has to be hot," he tweets.
He pens stick figure drawings extolling President Donald Trump and brags when he sells them for $265. He says the Giants wouldn't have won the World Series without him.
OK, dude. You be you. But come August, this little tempest will have blown over. It will be forgotten and Huff won't be sharing the joy of the 2010 Giants title run because Huff doesn't know how to act like a human being around others.
His rights will be intact on that August day, but what a sad and self-defeating way to ruin your blessings and isolate yourself from the joy of brotherhood because you can't help but be a hateful ass.
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