Comments | Eastern NC Now

Agreed on all counts John.

When it comes to AI versus human art, which AI is not art because it is not human, I agree with it being highly regulated, and even classes to help humans know what is real and human, and what is not.

Also, I agree: At some point in your life, "pick up an instrument and learn to play," even if you never become a professional, learn to play.

Often, my wife, of 47.5 years, will ask me to play my guitar and sing for her, which I do almost every time she requests it.

I play what she likes to hear, and she loves it like I was one of here favorite musicians, and from that point on for the rest of that evening, I am so thankful that I 'picked up an instrument and learned to play.' One more thing, if one possesses any ear for music at all, playing an instrument will help to tune one's vocals.

Commented: Sunday, December 21st, 2025 @ 5:49 pm By: Stan Deatherage

I mentioned this issue to our board a while back. I've been monitoring this phenomenon both internationally and nationally for years. Now, as expected, it has fallen in our laps locally.
I'm an old soldier. My oath to protect and defend the Constitution did not expire. In fact, all U.S. citizens should recognize how important these dearly bought constitutionally protected rights are.

Commented: Sunday, December 21st, 2025 @ 12:51 pm By: Charles Hickman

There is a quote: "One person's junk is another person's treasure."
That seems 2b the way Hate Speech/symbols is understood.
People r easily misled. Humans who r naturally compassionate, cannot resist hugging a tree n need. AND so That is why we must always revert back to the rule of law, THE Constitution.
One must always b aware of the philosophy of their elected ppl. Either they r law & order ppl or they r let's "work the system" types.
When we choose to live inside a city, we r actually accepting the city's ordinances & zoning laws. These laws exist so that humans can live closely together & not b combatting each other. If the city govt is "working the system" then they r creating needless stress on
citizens,& actually violating civil rights IMO.
Abt 3yrs ago I heard a councilman say "I think pple should b able to do what they want on their own land. So w that attitude we now hav govt workin th system to benefit a landowner, to th detriment of neighbors.
IS THIS NEW GOVT DIFF?

Commented: Sunday, December 21st, 2025 @ 9:57 am By: Washingtonian

Van Zant: I very thankful two more Republicans - Davis and Shreve - are added to that list in respecting the First Amendment.

For the life of me, and my life is very dear, I will never understand how other so-called "Republicans" don't understand that they must be circumspect of words used by Leftists, of which the word "HATE," and all it represents to the Democratic Socialists, is chief among them.

Commented: Sunday, December 21st, 2025 @ 9:30 am By: Stan Deatherage

It looks to me that when Carolyn Walker switched her registration from Democrat, she still kept a lot of her old Democrat thinking. One would hope she would listen to President Trump and Vice President Vance and start thinking like a Republican, which she is supposed to be.

Commented: Sunday, December 21st, 2025 @ 8:52 am By: Rino Hunter

Earlier this year in Davidson County, NC, a student was suspended for using the correct legal term for foreign citizens who are illegally in the country, "illegal alien" in the classroom. The teacher had asked them to use the word "alien" in a sentence, and the student asked if he should use it in the sense of a space alien or an illegal alien. "Illegal alien" is straight out of federal law. How in the world could a school system punish a student for using a correct legal term exactly as federal law defines it? I hope the morons on that school board who went along with that have primaries this year. They badly need to be replaced. Also, the school system did get sued over that travesty, as well.

Commented: Saturday, December 20th, 2025 @ 9:01 pm By: borderhawk

Van Zant, the proposal to add the term "hate symbol" to our school policies did not originate locally. It came down from Raleigh, a place more inclined to liberal ideas than eastern North Carolina. Using undefined terms "hate speech" or "hate symbols" have clear problems for freedom of speech.

My first thought on encountering this proposed addition to our school policies was the well publicized incident some time back in Colorado where a student was suspended from school for wearing an item of clothing displaying the Gadsden flag. The Gadsden flag is a historic flag carried by American soldiers in the Revolutionary War, but to a school official in Colorado, it was a "hate symbol".

A similar situation for another flag of that era involved the Betsey Ross 13 star American flag, which was the first official flag of the newly independent United States. Leftwing activists called that flag a "hate symbol" and pressured Nike to remove it from sneakers they were selling. Nike caved in and removed the flag even though they kept selling sneakers displaying the Communist Chinese flag.

This issue of adding the undefined term "hate symbol" to our school policies has come up recently in two meetings at two different places in the policies. If memory serves, in addition to the board members listed by Van Zant, member Donald Shreve also voted for free speech.

My first proposal was that we just not add the term at all. Nothing seems to have happened in our school system to show it was even needed. Getting pushback on that, I then suggested that we simply make a list of the symbols that we thought not appropriate for display by students in our schools. I suggested that swastikas and any emblem of the KKK, for example, should not be allowed. I got strong pushback from member Carolyn Walker who wanted to leave it open ended.

During the discussion, board chairman T.W. Allen mentioned a definition he had just found online that was fairly tight and he seemed to be okay with such a definition. Of course there are various different definitions that could be found online, so we would need to adopt one specifically as part of our own policy. Toward that end, I have drafted a proposed specific definition of this term to add to our policies, which I asked to be put on the agenda for our January board meeting. A tight enough specific definition should resolve freedom of speech issues.

It is shocking but not surprising to look at some of the lists of "hate symbols" compiled by various organizations and published online. They included a number of Christian symbols and symbols of Christian organizations. They include the logo of the Conservative Political Action Conference, an annual gathering of American Reagan-style conservatives. They include party symbols of the governing parties of Italy and Hungary, the main opposition party of Portugal, the largest party in the Swiss parliament, and the parties leading in the polls in France, Germany, Austria, and the UK, as well as other major European political parties. They even include the symbol that has been used for years by the main opposition party in the Bahamas, the Progressive Liberal Party. Obviously, those who want to designate things as "hate symbols" are just way out of control.

When one gets to undefined "hate speech" it gets even worse. People who have been prosecuted criminally under that banner recently include a French feminist leader charged for posting online that biological women needed their own private spaces, a Finnish member of parliament prosecuted for posting a Bible verse online, and a German pensioner prosecuted for posting online that his country's very unsuccessful Economics Minister was "an idiot". Unfortunately there are many.many more similar cases in Europe.

We do not need to go down this slippery slope. We have gotten by fine without having this term in our policies at all, and if we are going to have it, it needs to be defined so it is harder to abuse. That Colorado incident shows what can happen. The definition I have drafted should accomplish that objective.

Commented: Saturday, December 20th, 2025 @ 6:26 pm By: Steven P. Rader

I understand that Beaufort County School Board has been wrestling with the same free speech issue. From what I am told, the more liberal members voted to include an Orwellian term "hate symbol" which is like this "hate speech" scam. From what I hear it was a split vote but I don't know which side prevailed.

President Trump and Vice President Vance have both been very vocal and taken action against the attempts to suppress free speech with this "hate speech" nonsense. I wish all the Republicans on our school board at the very least stood as strongly on free speech. One expects Democrats to oppose free speech like Biden did, but not Republicans.

Commented: Saturday, December 20th, 2025 @ 12:47 pm By: Conservative Voter

Lock her up! And throw away the key!

Commented: Saturday, December 20th, 2025 @ 9:01 am By: Bubba

Those that issued the CDL's to the illegal invaders that cause harm need to be charged as an accessory to murder or attempted murder.

Commented: Saturday, December 20th, 2025 @ 7:16 am By: Countrygirl1411

Tyre is a slug who is just trying to protect the sleazy Sadler machine and cover up their sleaze. If he wants to be on a city council, he should run in Greenville, where the condo he owns and lives in is located, not from a fake downtown address in Washington.

Commented: Thursday, December 18th, 2025 @ 2:05 pm By: Rino Hunter

Tyre made his motion to the OLD council, which should NOT have had ANY jurisdiction over the agenda of the NEW council. Any objection he had should have been addressed to the new council. That power play stunk. And Tyre himself is a total phony, not really a resident of Washington.

The losers have been trying to stymie the winners of the last election, and this is just their latest ploy. They have slow walked the city audit documents (what are they hiding????) and left the city with no functioning city manager. There are a lot of highly questionable things that need to be looked into, and this bunch is trying to gum up the works to keep those things from being looked into as long as they can.

Commented: Thursday, December 18th, 2025 @ 12:39 pm By: John Steed